Morning “Exceeding great and precious promises.” / 2 Peter 1:4

 If you would know experimentally the preciousness of the promises, and enjoy

them in your own heart, meditate much upon them. There are promises which are

like grapes in the wine-press; if you will tread them the juice will flow.

Thinking over the hallowed words will often be the prelude to their

fulfilment. While you are musing upon them, the boon which you are seeking

will insensibly come to you. Many a Christian who has thirsted for the promise

has found the favour which it ensured gently distilling into his soul even

while he has been considering the divine record; and he has rejoiced that ever

he was led to lay the promise near his heart.

 But besides meditating upon the promises, seek in thy soul to receive them as

being the very words of God. Speak to thy soul thus, “If I were dealing with a

man’s promise, I should carefully consider the ability and the character of

the man who had covenanted with me. So with the promise of God; my eye must

not be so much fixed upon the greatness of the mercy–that may stagger me; as

upon the greatness of the promiser–that will cheer me. My soul, it is God,

even thy God, God that cannot lie, who speaks to thee. This word of his which

thou art now considering is as true as his own existence. He is a God

unchangeable. He has not altered the thing which has gone out of his mouth,

nor called back one single consolatory sentence. Nor doth he lack any power;

it is the God that made the heavens and the earth who has spoken thus. Nor can

he fail in wisdom as to the time when he will bestow the favours, for he

knoweth when it is best to give and when better to withhold. Therefore, seeing

that it is the word of a God so true, so immutable, so powerful, so wise, I

will and must believe the promise.” If we thus meditate upon the promises, and

consider the Promiser, we shall experience their sweetness, and obtain their

fulfilment.

 

Evening “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?” / Romans 8:33

 Most blessed challenge! How unanswerable it is! Every sin of the elect was

laid upon the great Champion of our salvation, and by the atonement carried

away. There is no sin in God’s book against his people: he seeth no sin in

Jacob, neither iniquity in Israel; they are justified in Christ forever. When

the guilt of sin was taken away, the punishment of sin was removed. For the

Christian there is no stroke from God’s angry hand–nay, not so much as a

single frown of punitive justice. The believer may be chastised by his Father,

but God the Judge has nothing to say to the Christian, except “I have absolved

thee: thou art acquitted.” For the Christian there is no penal death in this

world, much less any second death. He is completely freed from all the

punishment as well as the guilt of sin, and the power of sin is removed too.

It may stand in our way, and agitate us with perpetual warfare; but sin is a

conquered foe to every soul in union with Jesus. There is no sin which a

Christian cannot overcome if he will only rely upon his God to do it. They who

wear the white robe in heaven overcame through the blood of the Lamb, and we

may do the same. No lust is too mighty, no besetting sin too strongly

entrenched; we can overcome through the power of Christ. Do believe it,

Christian, that thy sin is a condemned thing. It may kick and struggle, but it

is doomed to die. God has written condemnation across its brow. Christ has

crucified it, “nailing it to his cross.” Go now and mortify it, and the Lord

help you to live to his praise, for sin with all its guilt, shame, and fear,

is gone.

 “Here’s pardon for transgressions past,

 It matters not how black their cast;

 And, O my soul, with wonder view,

 For sins to come here’s pardon too.”