In his old age, when he could no longer see to read, John
Newton heard someone recite this text, “By the grace of
God I am what I am.” He remained silent a short time and
then said: “I am not what I ought to be. Ah, how imperfect
and deficient! I am not what I wish to be. I abhor that which
is evil, and I would cleave to that which is good. I am not
what I hope to be. Soon, soon I shall put off mortality,
and with mortality all sin and imperfection.

Though I am not what I ought to be, what I wish to be,
and what I hope to be; yet I can truly say, I am not what
I once was–a slave to sin and Satan! I can heartily join
with the apostle and acknowledge–By the grace of God I
am what I am!”

“The prayer of the upright is His delight”   (Proverbs 15:8).

This is as good as a promise, for it declares a present fact, which will be the same throughout all ages. God takes great pleasure in the prayers of upright men; He even calls them His delight. Our first concern is to be upright. Neither bending this way nor that, continue upright; not crooked with policy, nor prostrate by yielding to evil, be you upright in strict integrity and straightforwardness. If we begin to shuffle and shift, we shall be left to shift for ourselves. If we try crooked ways, we shall find that we cannot pray, and if we pretend to do so, we shall find our prayers shut out of heaven.

Are we acting in a straight line and thus following out the LORD’s revealed will? Then let us pray much and pray in faith. If our prayer is God’s delight, let us not stint (limit) Him in that which gives Him pleasure. He does not consider the grammar of it, nor the metaphysics of it, nor the rhetoric of it; in all these men might despise it. He, as a Father, takes pleasure in the lispings of His own babes, the stammerings of His newborn sons and daughters. Should we not delight in prayer since the LORD delights in it? Let us make errands to the throne. The LORD finds us enough reasons for prayer, and we ought to thank Him that it is so. (From Faith’s Checkbook)

You haven’t done all you can do until you’ve prayed.

Lew Wallce was a famous general and literary genius of the nineteenth century who, along with his friend Robert Ingersoll, decided to write a book that would forever destroy what they called “the myth of Christianity.” For two years, Wallace studied in the libraries of Europe and America, and then he started writing his book. But while writing the second chapter, he found himself on his knees crying out to Jesus Christ in the words of Thomas, “My Lord and my God.” And the book he was writing became the great novel about the times of Christ, Ben Hur.   Bill Murray was a businessman who grew up in a home that had rejected God so completely that his mother once told him, “I don’t care if you become a drug addict or a bank robber or if you bring home a boyfriend instead of a girlfriend. There’s just one thing I don’t want you to do in life-become a Christian.” So Bill grew up sexually promiscuous, moving from one marriage to another, from one sexual partner to another. He began drinking and drugging, and wanting more and more possessions, he worked himself to the point of exhaustion. He collapsed inwardly and found himself praying to the God he had rejected, “Please, get me out of this mess!” Going to an all-night bookstore, he found a Bible buried under a stack of pornographic magazines, and he began reading about Jesus Christ. He was especially drawn to Luke’s Gospel, and as he read it he grew convinced that Jesus was unique in history, matchless in his magnetism, his teachings, his claims, his resurrection and his impact on history.   Bill received Christ as his Savior, and it changed his life. He gave up his drinking and drugging and promiscuous sex and rampant materialism, and he found the inner peace and joy he’d always been looking for. Bill Murray, you may be interested to know, is the oldest son of atheist Madalyn Murray O’Hare, who used him as the plaintiff in the Supreme Court case that outlawed prayer in the public classrooms of America.   C. S. Lewis, likewise, came to Christ almost against his will, being convinced by the evidence that Christianity was true. One of the factors was the simple process of deduction. He said that he realized that it was impossible to call Jesus a great mora! teacher but not God. Lewis explained, “A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic, or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”   There are only three logical options. Either he was a liar, a hoax, a deceiver, an imposter-in which case you have to explain how he could also have been the greatest spiritual leader and the most selfless, atoning sacrifice the world has ever known; or he was a lunatic-in which case you have to explain how he could have been the wisest teacher the world has ever seen; or he is the God-Man-which is just who he claimed to be.   Liar, Lunatic, or Lord. The answer, it seems, is obvious.  (From a sermon by Robert Morgan)

It all started so good—“very good” (Gen. 1:31). But Satan was determined to turn the garden into a graveyard. Man was created to live in fellowship with his Creator. God desired that man live in constant communion with Him. Doing so would bring perfect peace and abundant joy, such as could not be found in any other source. But sin changed all that, depriving man of what God intended.

 

Since sin entered the world life is a constant struggle-everything is now difficult. Nothing comes easy anymore. Even the food we eat must be earned by the sweat- of- our brow. We live in a wicked world and we are weak. Instead of subduing the earth we find ourselves being brought into submission to it. That is not what God intended. So now, in our natural state, we are forced to live a life that is “of few days and full of trouble”(Job 14:1). And our prospect for the future is even worse. As sinners we face an eternity of separation from God. That’s the bad news!

 

The good news is that Jesus came to change all that. He came to redeem man and restore him to fellowship with God. To do this He had to suffer and die in our place. O, how amazing it is that He, who is without sin, would be made sin for us, “that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.” (2 Cor. 5:21). That sounds too good to be true-but it is true! The proof that God is able and willing to do this is found in the resurrection of Christ. The fact that He lives sweeps away all doubt for those who trust him. They have a hope that goes beyond the grave!

 

The world, however, is always trying to pull us down and bury our hopes and dreams and joy beneath a deluge of difficulties. That’s exactly where some of you are at this very moment. Your joy is buried under an avalanche of adversities, and you feel you will never laugh again. But, it doesn’t have to be that way. Jesus came to raise our hopes and His resurrection proves He can. Because He was raised from the dead, He can raise you up out of the ash-heap of sin and restore you to fellowship with God. Why would anyone not trust a God like that?           ———HDS  4/12/09

And they crucified Him. –Mark 15:24

A medical doctor once gave a detailed description of what happens when someone is crucified:

“The cross is placed on the ground and the exhausted man is quickly thrown backwards with his shoulders again the wood. The legionnaire feels for the depression at the front of the wrist. He drives a heavy, square wrought-iron nail through the wrist and deep into the wood. Quickly he moves to the other side and repeats the action, being careful not to pull the arms too tightly, but to allow some flex and movement. The cross is then lifted into place.

“The left foot is pressed backward against the right foot, and with both feet extended, toes down, a nail is driven through the arch of each, leaving the knees flexed. The victim is now crucified. As he slowly sags down with more weight on the nails in the wrists, excruciating, fiery pain shoots along the fingers and up the arms to explode in the brain–the nails in the wrists are putting pressure on the median nerves. As he pushes himself upward to avoid the stretching torment, he places the full weight on the nail through his feet. Again he feels the searing agony of the nail tearing through the nerves between the bones of his feet.

“As the arms fatigue, cramps sweep through the muscles, knotting them in deep, relentless, throbbing pain. With these cramps comes the inability to push himself upward to breathe. Air can be drawn into the lungs but not exhaled. He fights to raise himself in order to get even one small breath. Finally carbon dioxide builds up in the lungs and in the blood stream. Spasmodically he is able to push himself upward to exhale and bring in life-giving oxygen.

“Hours of this…pain, cycles of twisting, joint-rending cramps, intermittent partial asphyxiation, searing pain as tissue is torn from his lacerated back as he moves up and down against the rough timber. Then another agony begins: a deep, crushing pain deep in the chest as the pericardium slowly fills with serum and begins to compress the heart.

It is now almost over–the loss of tissue fluids has reached a critical level–the compressed heart is struggling to pump heavy, thick, sluggish blood into the tissues–the tortured lungs are making a frantic effort to gasp in small gulps of air. He can feel the chill of death creeping through his tissues…finally he can allow his body to die.”

The Bible records this process of death by crucifixion in just a few simple words. How often we take for granted the pain and suffering Jesus endured when He died on the cross for you and me. Let us remember this Easter the sacrifice He made.  Thank Jesus for the price He paid for your sins through His painful death on the cross.. ( From Senior Living)