A remaining name

"My name from the palms of His hands
Eternity will not erase;
Impress'd on His heart it remains,
In marks of indelible grace."

"He shall present my soul,
Unblemish'd and complete,
Before the glory of His face,
With joys divinely great"

"I, among the blood-wash'd throng,
Shall wave the palm, and wear the crown,
And shout loud victory"

"Grace all the work shall crown
Through everlasting days;
It lays in Heaven the topmost stone,
And well deserves the praise"

- C. H. Spurgeon

C. H. Spurgeon, "The Prince of Preachers" (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Related articles

• "Glory to crown it all" by Charles Spurgeon
• "Loved unto the End" (Spurgeon's Faith's Checkbook)
• A Man Without Fear (Spurgeon's Faith's Checkbook)
• Voices from the Past: The Conversion of Charles Spurgeon
• "The Prince of Preachers"
• What Made Spurgeon a Great Preacher

Self-preservation is the highest law of nature

"Self-preservation is the highest law of nature;
self-sacrifice is the highest rule of grace ..."
- Unknown

"Greater love hath no man than this,
that a man lay down his life for his friends."
John 15:13

"And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us,
(and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,)
full of grace and truth."
John 1:14

I am grateful that Jesus sacrificed himself for us.
I ask you God that I will become like Christ
and that I always will sacrifice myself for others.

Nederlandse versie > Zelfbehoud is de hoogste wet van de natuur

Christ in Gethsemane (Christus in Gethsemane), oil painting by Heinrich Ferdinand Hofmann (Heinrich Hofmann). The original is at the Riverside Church (Riverside Church, New York City). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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2013 + 2016 update:

Related articles

• Part 1 Why Religion disobeys The Laws of Nature. How to Get Closer to God.
• Bet-Lechem: House of bread
• The Glory Of Christ
• "...Learn the Natural Law"
• Laws of Nature
• Can God Break a Law of Nature?
• What does it mean to observe the Torah of God?
• Calvin on Christ in All of Scripture
• 05/10/2016 Scripture
• Winning over doubt: how to be sure of your salvation

Ask Grace to go forward

"Be trustful, be steadfast, whatever betide thee,
Only one thing do thou ask of the Lord, -
Grace to go forward wherever He guide thee,
Simply believing the truth of His Word."
- Unknown

"And the Lord said unto Moses, wherefore criest thou unto me.
Speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward."
Exodus 14:15

"And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough,
and looking back, is fit for the Kingdom of God."
Luke 9:62

God, our Father, I ask you to accompany me
and to pave my road.
Give me your Grace.

Dutch version / Nederlandse versie > Vraag Genade om voorwaarts te gaan

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2013 update:

 

Related articles

• Walk before me and be perfect

The redemption of man by Christ Jesus

"The redemption of man by Christ Jesus has been tearfully contemplated, angrily debated, reduced to mathematical equations, abandoned as incomprehensible, and, sometimes, made a matter of scorn. Some have thought that the Lord Jesus succeeded in placating a fiercely angry Deity and caused Him to turn His face toward us when hitherto He had been wrathful and unforgiving. Others have regarded redemption like a system of weights, pulleys and strings by which the redemption of man was, as it were, mechanically contrived. Yet others have taken it as a spiritual business transaction whereby the inestimable value of Christ's blood was paid to a being known as the Devil in order to secure the release of sinners from his evil grasp. Some have found it helpful to look upon Christ's death as substitutionary: that is, that Christ went to the cross instead of us, paying in this way the price for our personal sins. And some have regarded his death as a tragedy, an accident of wicked circumstances, and in no way of itself redemptive.

What is the truth? How can one find a way through this maze of speculation? As in everything else, there is only one sure way, and that is to let the Bible do the teaching and guiding, and to submit humbly to the discipline of this instruction.

Let us start by dismissing the notion that Jesus was pleading on bended knee to a God whose anger had caused Him to turn His face away from us. The secret of the cross is love, the love of God and the love of His Son. Whatever else we may have to consider, let us lay down this foundation: The motivating force for redemption is love:

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:16)

"But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:8)

"The Son of God who loved me, and gave himself for me." (Galatians 2:20)

Love is the reason for redemption. Love flowed first from God, and therefore from the Son whom He sent into the world. Love cannot be and must not be reduced to law or considered in terms of rights and earnings. Love is above and beyond all considerations. Love owes nothing to any goodness or merit in us. Love comes from God who is "merciful and gracious"."
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Brother Harry Tennant
The Lord who Bought Me
The Christadelphians - What they Believe and Preach

Believing in God the rewarder

"Like a great bell tolling over all the land, the consistent voice of the
sovereign power of God reverberates throughout Old Testament and New.
He is omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient in this life and the next.
We cannot believe this and also think that our God is no match for the evil of the world."
- Catherine Marshall

"Do not I fill the heavens and the earth? saith the Lord."
Jeremiah 23:24

"Yes, we believe that God is. But that “He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him” is a truth that becomes clearer as we become more diligent. That the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth should give His Son for the salvation of each believer and should see fit to tell him about that grace through His word is quite overwhelming. The grace wherein we stand is the favour of God extended towards those who respond, who are God’s heirs."­
- Trevor Pritchard (Studies in the Statement of Faith, Page 63)

"For it is by free grace (God's unmerited favor) that you are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ's salvation) through [your] faith. And this [salvation] is not of yourselves [of your own doing, it came not through your own striving], but it is the gift of God; Not because of works [not the fulfillment of the Law's demands], lest any man should boast. [It is not the result of what anyone can possibly do, so no one can pride himself in it or take glory to himself.]" (The Amplified Bible).
Ephesians 2:8-9

End of the Bottom Line

The importance of the bottom line is one of the first lessons of business. Effective business and professional leaders are naturally performance-oriented. They understand the need for results. But that attitude can sometimes negatively affect our spiritual lives.
Ephesians 2:4-10 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions - it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.(Holman Bible)

In Business Terms ...

While hiking alone out of the country, I crushed my left leg in a bad fall. I had to drag myself nearly three hours to get to a road, where miraculously I was found and taken to a hospital. Eventually I was flown back to the United States for surgery. The most profound result of that accident was that I discovered God in my pain. There I was, stretched out in bed in excruciating pain, and praying didn't make the pain go away. So I began to ask God how to find him in the midst of the pain and not only as the alleviator of pain. He answered that prayer. Some of the times of deepest pain and anguish were periods of closest fellowship with him. For the first time in my life, I was taken off the fast track for a brief time. I discovered most of my security and identity was in what I accomplished for God - preaching sermons, writing books, leading a church, being part of a media ministry. All of this identified my worth. What can you do when there's nothing to do but wait for healing? During that difficult convalescence, I discovered in a new way that God loves me not for what I do but simply because I belong to him.  - Lloyd John Ogilvie

Something to Think About:

We can't save ourselves by pulling on our bootstraps, even when our bootstraps are made of the finest religious leather.  -  Eugene Peterson
 - 1 Minute Bible for Business Professionals - "End of the Bottom Line"