My Utmost for His Highest

I have copied this in here where it belongs, because it is a devotional form My Utmost For His Highest, and because it deserves the extra reading. We need to get back to our first love.

Remember What God Remembers

Jeremiah 2:
2 "Go and proclaim in the hearing of Jerusalem: "`I remember the devotion of your youth, how as a bride you loved me and followed me through the desert, through a land not sown.


Am I as spontaneously kind to God as I used to be, or am I only expecting God to be kind to me? There is no jowy in the soul that has forgotten what God prizes. It is a great thing to think that Jesus Christ has need of me. "Give Me to drink." how much kindness have I shown Him this past week? Have I been kind to His reputation in my life?

God is saying to His people--You are not in love with Me now, but I remember the time when you were. "I remember...the love of thine expousals." Am I as full of the extravagance of love to Jesus Christ as I was in the beginning, when I went out of my way to prove my devotion to Him? Does he find me recalling the time when I did not care for anything but Himself? Am I there now, or have I become wise over loving Him? Am I so in love with Him that I take no account of where I go? Or am I watching for the respect due to me; weighing how much service I ought to give?

If, as I recall what God remembers about me, I find He is not what He used to be to me, let it produce shame and humiliation, because that shame will bring the Godly sorrow that works repentance.

Vision and Darkness

Genesis 15:


12 As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him.


When ever God gives a vision to a saint, He puts him, as it were, in the shadow of His hand, and the saint's duty is to be still and listen. There is a darkness which comes from excess light, and then is the time to listen. Genesis 16 is an illustration of listening to good advice when it is dark instead of waiting for God to send the light. When God gives a vision and darkness follows, wait. God will make you in accordance with the vision He has given if you will wait His time. Never try and help God fulfill His word. Abraham went through thirteen years of silence, but in those years all self-sufficiency was destroyed; there was no possibility left of relying on common sense ways. Those years of silence were a time of discipline, not of displeasure. Never pump up joy and confidence, but
stay upon God.

Have I any confidence in the flesh? Or have I got beyand all confidence in myself and in men and women of God; in books and prayers and ecstasies; and is my confidence placed now in God Himself, not in His blessings?

"I am the Almighty God"--El-Shaddai, the Father-Mother God. The one thing for which we are all being disciplined is to know God is real. As soon as God becomes real, other people become shadows. Nothing that other saints do or say can ever perturb the one who is built on God.

Do You See Your Calling?



Romans 1

1 Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God,

Our calling is not primarily to be holy men and women, but to be proclaimers of the Gospel of God. The one thing that is all important is that the Gospel of God should be realized as the abiding Reality. Reality is not human goodness, nor holiness, not heaven nor hell ; but Redemption , and the seed to perceive this is the most vital need of the Christian worker today. As workers we have to get used to the revelation that Redemption is the only Reality . Personal holiness is an effect, not a cause, and if we place our faith in human goodness in the effect of Redemption, we shall go under when the test comes.

Paul did not say he seperated himself, but, "when it pleased God who seperated me...." Paul had not a hyper-sensitive interest in his own character. As long as our eyes are upon our own personal whiteness we shall never get near the reality of Redemption. Workers break down because their desire is for their own whiteness and not for God. "Don't ask me to come into contact with the rugged reality of Redemption on behalf of the filth of human life as it is what I want is anything God can do for me to make me more desirable in my own eyes." To talk in that way is a sign that the reality of the Gospel of God has not begun to touch me, there is no reckless abondon to God. God cannot deliver me while my interest is merely in my own character . Paul is unconscious of himself, his is recklessly abandoned, seperated by God for one purpose -- to proclaim the Gospel of God. (cf. Rom 9:3).

The Call of God

1 Corinthians 1

17 For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel : not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.

Paul states here that the call of God is to preach the gospel: but remember what Paul means by "the gospel," viz., the reality of Redemption in our Lord Jesus Christ. We are apt to make sanctification the end-all of our preaching. Paul alludes to personal experience by way of illustrations , never as the end of matter. We are nowhere commissioned to preach salvation or sanctification: we are commissioned to lift up Jesus Christ
(John 12:32). It is a travesty to say that Jesus Christ travailed in Redemption to make me a sasint. Jesus Christ travailed in Redemption to redeem the whole world, and place it unimpaired and rehabilitated before the throne of God.

The fact that Redemption can be experienced by us is an illustration of the power of the reality of Redemption, but that is not the end of Redemption. If God were human, how sick to the heart and weary He would be of the constant rquests we make for our salvation, for our sanctification. We tax His energies from morning till night for things for ourselves -- something for me to be delivered from. When we touch the bedrock of the reality of the Gospel of God, we shall never bother God any further with little personal plaints.

The one passion of Paul's life was to proclaim the Gospel of God. He welcomed heartbreaks, disillusionments, tribulation for one reason only, because these things kept him in unmoved devotion to the Gospel of God.

The Constraint of the Call

1 Corinthians 9

16 For if I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for I am under compulsion; for
woe is me if I do not preach the gospel .

Beware of stopping your ears to the call of God. Everyone who is saved is called to the fact but that is not the call to preach, it is merely an illustration in preaching. Paul is referring to the pangs produced in him by the constraint to prach the Gospel. Never apply what Paul says in this connectioon to souls coming in contact with God for salvation. There is nothing easier than getting saved because it is God's sovereign work -- Come unto me and I will save you. Our Lord never lays down the conditions of discipleship as the conditions of salvation. We are condemned to salvation through the Cross of Jesus Christ. Discipleship has an option with it -- "If any man..."

Paul's words have to do with being made a servant of Jesus Christ and our permission is never asked as to what we will do or where we will go. God makes us broken bread and poured-out wine to please Himself. To be "seperated unto the gospel" means to hear the call of God: and when a man begins to overhear that call, then begins agony that is worthy of the Name. Every ambition is nipped in the bud, every desire of life quenched, every outlook completely extinguished and blotted out, saving one thing only --
"seperated unto the gospel ." Woe be to the soul who tries to put his foot in any other direction when once that call has come to him. This College exists for you, and you -- to see whether God has a man or woman here who cares about proclaiming His Gospel; to see whether God grips you. And beware of competitors when God does grip you.

The Recognized Ban of Relationship

1 Corinthians 4

13 Being defamed, we intreat: we are made as the filth of the world, and are the offscouring of all things unto this day.

These words are not an exaggeration. The reason they are not true of us who call ourselves ministers of the gospel is not that Paul forgot the exact truth in using them, but that we have too many discreet affinities to allow ourselves to be made refuse. "Filling up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ"
is not an evidence of sanctification, but of being "seperated unto the gospel."

"Think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you," says Peter. If we do think it strange concerning the things we meet with, it is because we are cravenhearted. We have discreet affinities that keep us out of the mire -- I wont stoop. I wont bend. You do not need to, you can be saved by the skin of your teeth if you like, you can refuse to let God count you as one seperated unto the gospel. Or you may say -- "I do not care if I am treated as the offscouring of the earth as long as the Gospel is proclaimed." a servant of Jesus Christ is one who is willing to go to martyrdom for the reality of the gospel of God. When a merely normal man or woman comes in contact with baseness and immorality and treachery, the recoil is so desperately offensive to human goodness that the heart shuts up in despair. The marvel of the Redemptive Reality of God is that the vilest can never get to the bottom of His love . Paul did not say that God seperated him to show what a wonderful man He could make of him, but "to reveal His Son in me."

The Overmastering Majesty of Personal Power

2 Corinthians 5

14 For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died;

Paul says he is overruled, overmastered, held as in a vise by the love of Christ. Very few of us know what it means to be held in a grip by the love of God; we are held by the constraint of our experience only. The one thing that held Paul, until there was nothing else on his horizon, was the love of God. "The love of Christ controls us" -- when you hear that note in a man or woman, you can never mistake it. You know that the Spirit of God is getting unhindered way in that life.

When we are born again of the Spirit of God, the note of testimony is on what God has done for us, and rightly so. But the baptism of the Holy Ghost obliterates that forever, and we begin to realize what Jesus meant when He said -- "Ye shall be witnesses unto Me." Not witnesses to what Jesus can do -- that is an elementary witness -- but "witnesses unto me." We will take everything that happens as happening to Him, whether it be praise or blame, persecution or commendation. No one can stand like that for Jesus Christ who is not controlled by the majesty of His personal power. It is the only thing that matters, and the strange thing is that it is the last thing realized by the Christian worker. Paul says he is gripped by the love of God., that is why he acts as he does. Men may call him mad or sober, but he does not care; there is only one thing he is living for, and that is to persuade men of the judgment seat of God, and of the love of Christ. This abandon to the love of Christ is the one thing that bears fruit in the life, and it will always leave the impression of the holiness and of the power of God, never of our pesonal holiness.

Are You Ready to be Offered?

Philippians 2

17 Yes, and if I am being poured out as a drink offering on the sacrifice and service of your faith, I am
glad and rejoice with you all.

Are you willing to be offered for the work of the faithful -- to pour out your life blood as a libation on the sacrifice fo the faith of others? Or do you say -- "I am not going to be offered up just yet. I do not want God to choose my work. I want to choose the scenery of my own sacrifice. I want to have the right kind of people watching and saying, 'Well done."

It is one thing to go on the lonely way with dignified heroism, but quite another thing if the line mapped out for you by God means being a door-mat under other people's feet. Suppose God wants to teach you to say, "I know how to be abased" -- are you ready to be offered up like that? Are you ready to be not so much as a drop in the bucket -- to be so hopelessly insignificant that you are never thought of again in connection with the life you served? Are you willing to spend and be spent not seeking to be ministered unto, but to minister? Some saints cannot do menial work, and remain saints, because it is beneath their dignity.

(Continued) Are You Ready to be Offered?

2 Timothy 4

6 For I am already being poured out like a drink offering , and the time has come for my departure.

"I am ready to be offered." It is a transaction of will, not of sentiment. Tell God you are ready to be offered; then let the consequence be what they may, there is no stand of complaint now, no matter what God chooses. God puts you through the crisis in private, no one person can help another. Externally the life may be the same, the difference is in will. Go through the crisis in will, then when it comes externally, there will be no thought of the cost. If you do not transact in will with God along this line, you will end in awakening sympathy for yourself.

"Bind the sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the altar." The altar means fire -- burning and purification and insulation for one purpose only, the destruction of every affinity that God has not started and of every attachment that is not an attachment in God. You do not destroy it, God does; you bind the sacrifice to the horns of the altar, and see that you do not give way to self-pity when the fire begins. After this way of fire, there is nothing that oppresses or depresses. When the crisis arises you realize that things cannot touch you as they used to do . What is your way of fire?

Tell God you are ready to be offered and God will prove Himself to be all you ever dreamed He would be.

The Discipline of Dejection

Luke 24

21 but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place.

Every fact that the disciples stated was right, but the inferences they drew from those facts were wrong. Anything that savours of dejection spiritually is always wrong. If depression and opprssion visit me, I am to blame. God is not, nor is anyone else. Dejection springs from one of two sources -- I have either satisfied a lust or I have not. Lust means -- I must have it at once. Spiritual lust makes me demand an answer from God instead of seeking God, Who gives the answer. What have I been trusting God would do? And today -- the immediate present -- is the third day, and He has not done it; therefore I imagine I am justified to being dejected and in blaming God. Whenever the insistence is on the point that God answers prayer, we are off the track. The meaning of prayer is that we get hold of God, not of the answer. It is impossible to be well physically and to be dejected. Dejection is a sign of sickness, and the same thing is true spiritually. Dejection spiritually is wrong, and we are always to blame for it.

We look for visions from heaven, for earthquakes and thunders of God's power (the fact that we are dejected proves that we do), and we never dream that all the time God is in the commonplace things and people around us. If we will do the duty that lies nearest, we shall see him. One of the most amazing revelations of God comes when we learn that it is in the commonplace things that the Deity of Jesus Christ is realized.