Your heavenly Father knoweth. Matt. 6:32.
The Master judges by the result, but our Father judges by the effort. Failure does not always mean fault. He knows how much things cost, and weighs them where others only measure. Your Father! Think how great store His love sets by the poor beginnings of the little ones, clumsy and unmeaning as they may be to others. All this lies in this blessed relationship, and infinitely more. Do not fear to take it all as your own.
—Mark Guy Pearse
Thoughts for the Quiet Hour.
Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. Col. 3:3.
It is neither talent, nor power, nor gifts that do the work of God, but it is that which lies within the power of the humblest; it is the simple, earnest life hid with Christ in God.
—F. W. Robertson,
Thoughts for the Quiet Hour.
The mother of Jesus saith unto Him, They have no wine. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? Mine hour is not yet come. His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it. John 2:3-5.
In asking for temporal blessings, true wisdom lies in putting the matter into the Lord's hand, and leaving it there. He knows our sorrows, and, if He sees it is good for us that the water should be turned into wine, He will do it. It is not for us to dictate: He sees what is best for us. When we ask for prosperity, perhaps the thing which we should have is trial. When we want to be relieved of a "thorn in the flesh," He knows what we should have is an apprehension of the fact that His grace is sufficient for us. So we are put into His school, and have to learn the lessons He has to teach us.
—W. Hay Aitken
Thoughts for the Quiet Hour.
Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. 1 Cor 10:12.
Angels fell in heaven, Adam in paradise, Peter in Christ's presence.
—Theophilus Polwheile
Thoughts for the Quiet Hour.
Continue in prayer. Col. 4:2.
The greatest and the best talent that God gives to any man or woman in this world is the talent of prayer. And the best usury that any man or woman brings back to God when He comes to reckon with them at the end of this world is a life of prayer. And those servants best put their Lord's money to the exchangers who rise early and sit late, as long as they are in this world, ever finding out, and ever following after better and better methods of prayer, and ever forming more secret, more steadfast, and more spiritually fruitful habits of prayer, till they literally pray without ceasing, and till they continually strike out into new enterprises in prayer, and new achievements, and new enrichments.
—Alex. Whyte
Thoughts for the Quiet Hour.
He entered into one of the ships... and... sat down. Luke 5:3.
When Jesus sits in the ship everything is in its right place. The cargo is in the hold, not in the heart. Cares and gains, fears and losses, yesterday's failure and today's success do not thrust themselves in between us and His presence. The heart cleaves to Him. "Goodness and mercy shall follow me," sang the psalmist.
Alas, when the goodness and mercy come before us, and our blessings shut Jesus from view! Here is the blessed order—the Lord ever first, I following Him, His goodness and mercy following me.
—Mark Guy Pearse
Thoughts for the Quiet Hour.
Now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light. Eph. 5:8.
We do not realize the importance of the unconscious part of our life ministry. It goes on continually. In every greeting we give to another on the street, in every moment's conversation, in every letter we write, in every contact with other lives, there is a subtle influence that goes from us that often reaches further, and leaves a deep impression than the things themselves that we are doing at the time. It is not so much what we do in this world as what we are, that tells in spiritual results and impressions
—J. R. Miller
Thoughts for the Quiet Hour.
