the Third Week after Easter
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Daily Devotionals
Spiritual Treasury For The Children of God
Go, tell his disciples and Peter, that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him.- Mark 16:7.
How different is the gospel from the law; one is the voice of condemnation, terror, and wrath; the other speaks nothing but grace, peace, and love. God’s children only murmured for water in the wilderness, and even the meek Moses is in wrath with them, and calls them REBELS. Here, though the poor disciples had acted most base and ungrateful to their loving Saviour; for they added sorrow to his distress, when they all forsook him and fled, and Peter above all the rest; for as though Jesus was the most abandoned wretch, Peter with oaths and curses denied that he even knew him. What could they expect, but that the first message from their Lord should be full of upbraiding? Was it, Go tell those apostate REBELS I am risen from the dead, they shall receive their just deserts; vengeance is mine, I will repay them? No: be astonished, O heavens! Hear, wonder, and love, O ye backsliding children: devils are not permitted to terrify, but angels commissioned to comfort them. Tell his disciples, amazing! Disciples still! How unworthy of the very name! Yet more, lest this message should prove a dagger to poor Peter’s heart, lest he should write bitter things against himself, "I am no disciple; though all the rest forsook and fled from Jesus yet not one of them sinned with so high a hand as me. I not only forsook him, fled from him, but denied him, denied him with oaths, cursed and swore most bitterly that I did not know him. Ah! woe is me: the Lord told me Satan had desired to have me, so it must be." No, no, Peter, "whom thy Lord loves, he loves to the end;" he hates putting away; his loving heart cannot bear it.
Not all that sin or hell can say can turn his heart, his love away. Peter is included in the commission of comfort, by name. Did Peter sin above the rest? Yet grace super-abounds; therefore behold, he is particularized above the rest by name. "He goeth before you to Galilee, there shall ye see him." O, but for this comfortable message, poor Peter would have dreaded to meet with and see Jesus. O soul, Jesus is gone before to glory, there shalt thou see him. But for the comfortable message our souls have had from him, of his love and salvation, we might dread the sight of Jesus. But who shall set bounds to the love of Jesus? Will any poor trembling disciple say, the Lord hath forsaken me, my Lord hath forgotten me? True thou mayest deserve it; but thy Lord deals with thee not after that manner; though thou art a sinner, a backsliding sinner, a hell-deserving sinner, the chief of sinners, yet still his name is Jesus the Saviour, his nature is love; and it is the joy of his heart and the work of his life "to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them."- Hebrews 7:25.
Giving all diligence: add to your faith, etc. 2 Peter 1:5.
Here is the Christian’s work. All diligence is required in it. O believer, be assured (the Lord impress it upon your heart and mine) there is no being a lively, comfortable disciple, without it. Beware you do not add to your faith licentious notions and Antinomian sloth, instead of Christian virtues, holy tempers, and heavenly affections, which adorn our profession, and glorify our Saviour. Ever remember, you are called to honour Christ by your life on earth, as well as to be saved by and enjoy him in heaven. By faith we receive Christ, rest upon him, and look to him alone for justification unto eternal life. But a lively faith will not leave us barren and unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. If there be not an habitual disposition of soul, to add to faith, virtue, knowledge, patience, godliness, etc., we should examine and see to it; lest, instead of Christ dwelling in our hearts by faith, we have only a notion which floats in our heads. If so, this will only make us idle talkers; but not diligent workers and holy walkers. That we are guilty sinners, justified and saved by Christ only, is a truth which is ever to be held fast in the conscience. We can add nothing to Christ’s work. To attempt to do any thing towards our own justification before God, is the basest act of unbelief. But faith is the queen of graces. She lives upon the King of saints. She will have a noble retinue to attend her. Let us never desire to get beyond this blessed rule of addition. Let us never subtract from it. Let us give all diligence to multiply more and more. Have we got into the rule of three? Do we know the love of the Three One God?-the everlasting love of God the Father; the redeeming love of God the Son; the sanctifying love of God the Holy Ghost? Still we must never leave the rule of addition: add to your faith; but go on to all diligence in practice. Christ hath taught it: faith enjoins it; love constrains to it: Christ’s honour and glory demand it. But beware of getting into fraction, as though any thing you do gives you a title to glory. But see, hence, the glory and spirituality of the gospel, and the reason why the belief of it is called, “our most holy faith.” (Judges 1:20.) We are called by the faith of Christ to glorify God, by adding an obedient life to our most holy faith. This is our way in Christ: walk in it, and ye shall find rest for your souls from Christ. Jeremiah 6:16.
Add to my faith!-the sluggard smiles:
“I want no more than Christ:”
But him you want, for sin beguiles-
His truth you do resist.
Dear Lord, stir up to diligence,
To walk in all thy ways:
O! arm my soul with vigilance,
Which thou hast sav’d by grace.
