A RETURN TO BLOGGING
Thoughts
How peculiar that in the craziness of this world we are encouraged to slow down, even isolate to places of quietude. This is a national day of prayer for the crisis we find ourselves in, even if we are not personally affected. There is something worldwide we must all come to terms with: nothing is promised in this world but the love of God no matter come what may.
We are one breath away potentially from a miniscule germ that is spread across all of humanity, no matter what nationality, color of skin, gender, for richer or poorer, even age. If we are held in the hollow of God's hand, we have no need to fear. We need to recognize this life is not all there is. We are strangers, aliens, sojourners in this life heading for our true eternal home, heaven. We are God's "peculiar" people.
I, more than most, am able to enjoy solitude. I still have to go to my appointment with Social Security. I still have to prepare my taxes. I still have to cook, clean, wash my clothes, and order my food to be delivered to my door (I love this!). However, I am blest to have more time than most. Not only this, but I have inherited books from four generations of preachers. Yes, they are pretty on my bookshelves, but I am determined to read them as well. So, I will give excerpts from different ones.
Here is one given to my grandmother Ruby Robinson Wise from her mother Sally Harper Robinson in 1917. It is written by Colonel S. L. Brengle (founder of the Salvation Army) and titled, "The Way of Holiness." I have a framed black and white photo of him on a trip to the Holy Land with my great grandfather, Uncle Bud Robinson. So, I would like to think of it personally as a gift not only to my nineteen year old grandmother, but to me as well, from not only my great grandmother, but from Colonel Brengle.
"...a girl asked me, 'What is this sanctification, or holiness that people are talking about so much about?'"
"Have you a bad temper?"
"Oh, yes," said she, "I have a temper like a volcano."
"'Sanctification," I replied, "is to have that bad temper taken out...Sanctification is to have temper and all sin taken away, and the heart filled with love to God and man...for that is sanctification, that is holiness. It is, in our measure, to be made like God. It is to be made a 'partaker of the Divine nature.'" (II Peter 1:4)
"A spark from the fire is like the fire. The tiniest twig on the giant oak, or the smallest branch of the vine, has the nature of the oak or the vine, and is in that respect like the oak or the vine. A drop of water on the end of your finger from the ocean is like the ocean; not in its size, of course, for the big ships cannot float upon it, nor the big fishes swim in it; but it is like the ocean in its essence, in its character, in its nature."
"Just so, a holy person is like God. Not that he is infinite as God is; he does not know everything; he has not all power and wisdom as God has; but he is like God in his nature. He is good and pure, and loving and just, in the same way that God is."
"Holiness, then, is conformity to the divine nature of God. It is likeness to God, as He is revealed in Jesus."
"But someone will cry out, 'Impossible! We are poor sinful creatures. We cannot be like Jesus. He was Divine. Show me a man like Jesus."
"Well, now, let us be patient, and keep quiet, and go to the Bible, and see what that says about the matter before we further define holiness. What did Jesus Himself say? Listen!"
1. "In speaking of the separation of His disciples from the world, Jesus says, 'They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.' And again, 'As Thou hast sent Me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.' (John 17:16, 18.) We are then, to be like Jesus in separation from the world. Jesus was in the world, but He was not of the world. He took no pleasure in its wicked ways. He was not spoiled at all by its proud, sinful, selfish spirit. While He worked and associated with bad people to do them good, yet He was always separate from them in spirit."
"One of our dear, pure Rescue Officers went to a house full of bad women, to see a sick girl, and while she was there the health authorities declared the girl's sickness to be small pox, and they sealed up the place, and the Officer was shut in for weeks among those poor lost women. She was in an evil place, but she was not of it. Her pure spirit was utterly opposed to the spirit of sin that ruled there. So Jesus was in the world, but not of it; and in the same way, holy people are so changed, that while they are in the world, they are not of it. They belong to Heaven, and are but strangers and pilgrims, doing all the good they can while passing through this world to their Father's house, their heavenly home. They are separate from this world."
I will continue this selection on my next post, but this struck me as so appropriate for the unique time we are in. This world is not our home; we are just passing through. We may be shut in by the pandemic, but know that we are pilgrims, strangers, sojourners, even aliens in this world. We are in it, but not of it.
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