DECEMBER 13

OUR PERSONAL PROMISES

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2 Corinthians 8:2 (Amplified)

“ for during an ordeal of severe distress, their abundant joy and their deep poverty [together] overflowed in the wealth of their lavish generosity.”

Psalm 22:24

“For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; Nor has He hidden His face from Him; But when He cried to Him, He heard.”

Psalm 34:19

“Many are the afflictions of the righteous, But the Lord delivers him out of them all.”

Psalm 119:92

“Unless Your law had been my delight, I would then have perished in my affliction.”

Psalm 41:3

“The Lord will sustain him upon his sickbed; In his illness, You restore him to health.”

Matthew 9:12

“But when Jesus heard this, He said, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick.”

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This month we will read choices from Charles Spurgeon’s (known affectionately as the “prince of preachers”)  devotional, “Beside Still Waters.”   It’s no secret that this world system is getting more evil by the day.  We have to stand strong in the Lord and look to Him more than ever to get through, and to be guided through, what is in the future……..known and allowed  by Him alone…..as well as whatever personal things we are experiencing in our lives.

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PASTOR SPURGEON:

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You cannot place too high a value on health. If you are healthy, you are infinitely more blessed, regardless of possessions  than one who is sick.  If I have health, if my bones are strong, if my muscles are well-toned, if I scarcely know an ache or pain, then let me not glory in my strength, which could fail in a moment. 

A few short weeks may reduce the strongest to a skeleton.  If today you are strong, do not glory in your strength. 

Psalm 147:10-11 says, “The Lord does not delight in the strength of the horse;  He takes no pleasure in the legs of a man.  The Lord takes pleasure in those who fear Him, in those who hope in His mercy.” 

If you are healthy, you should ask the Lord to give me a healthy soul, and healthy spiritual diseases.  Jehovah Rophi, come and purge the leprosy that nature has placed in my heart and make me healthy in the heavenly sense.  Bless my health, that I may properly use it in Your service and for Your glory.  Otherwise, though blessed with health, I may not be blessed at all.

Some of you are poor, and weary days and long nights are yours.  There is much about you to be pitied.  I pray that you will be blessed.  I can sympathize with a sister who said, “I had such nearness to God when I was sick, such full assurance and joy, that I regret I have now lost it.  I could almost wish to be ill again, if I might have a renewal of God’s fellowship.”

Often I gratefully look back to my sick bed.  I am certain that I grew greatly in grace on my bed of pain.  Frequently, pain is more healthy than joy.

Whenever we suffer weakness, pain, or anguish, may His divine presence be so real that “our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”  (2 Corinthians 4:17)

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