Prayer and Promises

The Bible is God’s voice speaking to us just as surely as though we could hear him with our ears. The word of the living God is not merely written, but spoken. Do we receive the Bible as the oracle of God? 

 

If we realized the importance of this word, with what awe would we open it, and with what earnestness would we search its precepts! The reading and contemplation of the Scriptures would be regarded as an audience with the Most High. 

 

“Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.” The world is rushing on madly, blindly, infatuated with amusements...without a thought of the final retribution that is coming. 

 

As sons and daughters of God, will you prove yourselves to be the light of the world, shining amid moral darkness? Will you keep the standard of truth uplifted, testifying to the pure light of truth by your words and your influence? 

 

Like faithful stewards of the grace of God, will you build up one another in the most holy faith? Will you strive to strengthen those who are weak in the faith? 

 

Will not those in this house of worship rise up in their God-given, moral independence, and say: “I will no longer give God a divided heart. I will serve him with undivided affections. I will no longer misrepresent his sacred truth. I will arise and shine. I will sanctify myself through the truth. I will obey the truth.” 

 

Will you not today pledge yourselves before God to seek him with all your heart, to cease from all evil-speaking, to put away every trait of character that has dwarfed and crippled your religious life? Will you not resolve to be fully on the Lord’s side? 

 

Notwithstanding your past ingratitude and unthankfulness, and your resistance of warnings and invitations, Jesus will receive you just as you are, if you will receive him... you will be able to say, “I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” 

 

Pardon and peace is yours today if you will reach forth your hand and take it as the free gift of God. 

 

— The Home Missionary, November 1, 1897