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August 9
OUR ABSENT but RETURNING LORD: “looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13). “Blessed” here could be translated “happy,” and—knowing what we know about the promised return of our Champion—we ought to be a happy people! In fact, our hope is linked with joy, for…
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August 9 Petition Mission
“He cast himself down upon the earth, and put his face between his knees” (1 Ki 18:42 KJV). Elijah’s first prayer is not the kind of request we want to make. He called on God to stop blessing His people until they returned to Him. It took three-and-a-half years until they finally fell to their…
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August 9
“Having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever…Now this is the word which by the gospel was preached to you” (1 Pet 1:23, 25). Michael Boland, in his introduction to John Flavel’s The Mystery of Providence (p. 11), tells the story of Luke…
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August 8
JESUS “FAITHFUL and TRUE” (Rev 19:11). “Faithful” (pistos) refers to one who “can be relied on…in the transaction of business, the execution of commands, or the discharge of official duties”; while “true” (alethinos) speaks of “that which has not only the name and resemblance, but the real nature corresponding to the name, in every respect.”…
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August 8 Petition Mission
“Your gentleness has made me great” (2 Sam 22:36). In urging Robert Southey to write a biography of John Wesley, Sir Walter Scott recounts the following: “When I was twelve years old, I heard him [Wesley] preach more than once, standing on a chair, in Kelso churchyard. He was a most venerable figure…. He told…
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August 8
The primitive churches were not mere assemblies of men who agreed to meet together once or twice a week, and to subscribe for the support of an accomplished man who should on those occasions deliver lectures on religion. They were men gathered out of the world by the preaching of the cross, and formed into…