Morning"Oil for the light." Exodus 25:6
My soul, how much thou needest this, for thy lamp will not long continue to burn without it.Thy snuff will smoke and become an offence if light be gone, and gone it will be if oil be absent.Thou hast no oil well springing up in thy human nature, and therefore thou must go to them that sell and buy for thyself, or like the foolish virgins, thou wilt have to cry, "My lamp is gone out." Even the consecrated lamps could not give light without oil; though they shone in the tabernacle they needed to be fed, though no rough winds blew upon them they required to be trimmed, and thy need is equally as great.Under the most happy circumstances thou canst not give light for another hour unless fresh oil of grace be given thee.
It was not every oil that might be used in the Lord's service; neither the petroleum which exudes so plentifully from the earth, nor the produce of fishes, nor that extracted from nuts would be accepted; one oil only was selected, and that the best olive oil.Pretended grace from natural goodness, fancied grace from priestly hands, or imaginary grace from outward ceremonies will never serve the true saint of God; he knows that the Lord would not be pleased with rivers of such oil.He goes to the olive-press of Gethsemane, and draws his supplies from him who was crushed therein.The oil of gospel grace is pure and free from lees and dregs, and hence the light which is fed thereon is clear and bright.Our churches are the Saviour's golden candelabra, and if they are to be lights in this dark world, they must have much holy oil.Let us pray for ourselves, our ministers, and our churches, that they may never lack oil for the light.Truth, holiness, joy, knowledge, love, these are all beams of the sacred light, but we cannot give them forth unless in private we receive oil from God the Holy Ghost.Evening"Sing, O barren."
Isaiah 54:1
Though we have brought forth some fruit unto Christ, and have a joyful hope that we are "plants of his own right hand planting," yet there are times when we feel very barren.Prayer is lifeless, love is cold, faith is weak, each grace in the garden of our heart languishes and droops.We are like flowers in the hot sun, requiring the refreshing shower.In such a condition what are we to do?The text is addressed to us in just such a state."Sing, O barren, break forth and cry aloud." But what can I sing about?I cannot talk about the present, and even the past looks full of barrenness.Ah!I can sing of Jesus Christ.I can talk of visits which the Redeemer has aforetimes paid to me; or if not of these, I can magnify the great love wherewith he loved his people when he came from the heights of heaven for their redemption.I will go to the cross again.Come, my soul, heavy laden thou wast once, and thou didst lose thy burden there.Go to Calvary again.Perhaps that very cross which gave thee life may give thee fruitfulness.What is my barrenness?It is the platform for his fruit-creating power.What is my desolation?It is the black setting for the sapphire of his everlasting love.I will go in poverty, I will go in helplessness, I will go in all my shame and backsliding, I will tell him that I am still his child, and in confidence in his faithful heart, even I, the barren one, will sing and cry aloud.
Sing, believer, for it will cheer thine own heart, and the hearts of other desolate ones.Sing on, for now that thou art really ashamed of being barren, thou wilt be fruitful soon; now that God makes thee loath to be without fruit he will soon cover thee with clusters.The experience of our barrenness is painful, but the Lord's visitations are delightful.A sense of our own poverty drives us to Christ, and that is where we need to be, for in him is our fruit found.Today's reading: Psalm 123-125, 1 Corinthians 10:1-18 (NIV)Today's Old Testament reading: Psalm 123-125 A song of ascents.I lift up my eyes to you,
to you who sit enthroned in heaven.
2 As the eyes of slaves look to the hand of their master,
as the eyes of a female slave look to the hand of her mistress,
so our eyes look to the LORD our God,
till he shows us his mercy.
3 Have mercy on us, LORD, have mercy on us,
for we have endured no end of contempt.
4 We have endured no end
of ridicule from the arrogant, ...read the rest on Bible GatewayToday's New Testament reading: 1 Corinthians 10:1-18 Warnings From Israel's History For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all pa*sed through the sea.2 They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.3 They all ate the same spiritual food 4 and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.5 Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.
6 Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did.7 Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written: "The people sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry." 8We should not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did-and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died.9 We should not test Christ, as some of them did-and were killed by snakes.
