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May 17—Morning Devotion
"I am poor and needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me."—Psalm 40:17 Precious consideration, my soul! Under all thine exercises, the Lord, thy Lord, thy Jesus, thinketh upon thee. Wherefore should I faint, then, under any burden? Surely I may say, as Hagar did at the well, "Thou, God, seest me." Surely I may give my God, my Saviour, this name, as she did; for she said, "Have I also here looked after him that seeth me?" Yes, however unconscious my poor heart is of the blessed truth, yet a very blessed truth it is, while! am looking after Jesus, he is beforehand, thinking and looking upon me. Precious Lamb of God! I will remember my poverty no more: that is, I will remember it…
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1 Corinthians: Chapter 2, Verse 2
“For I determined not to know anything among you, etc.]” This was a resolution the apostle entered into before he came among them, that though he was well versed in human literature, and had a large compass of knowledge in the things of nature, yet would make known nothing else unto them, or make anything else the subject of his ministry, “save Christ, and him crucified:” He had a spiritual and experimental knowledge of Christ himself, and which he valued above all things else; and this qualified him to make him known to others; and which knowledge he was very willing and ready to communicate by preaching the Gospel, which is the means of making known Christ as God’s salvation to the souls of men;…
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1 Corinthians: Chapter 2, Verse 1
“And I, brethren, when I came to you, etc.]” This account the apostle gives of himself is occasioned, either by what he had said in the latter part of the preceding chapter, concerning the choice God has made of the foolish, weak, base, and despicable things of the world, and of his calling them by his grace both to fellowship with the saints in common, and therefore he accommodated his ministry unto them, and in particular to the ministry of the word, of which he himself was a like instance and an example; or else by what he had declared in (1 Corinthians 1:17) of the same chapter, that he was sent to preach the Gospel, “not with wisdom of words;” Which he here reassumes,…
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1 Corinthians: Chapter 2, Introduction
The apostle, in this chapter, pursues the same argument as before, that the Gospel needed not the wisdom and art of men: this he illustrates by his own example; and then he extols the Gospel above all the wisdom of men; and observes how it comes to be made known to men, even by the Spirit of God: hence it follows, that it is to be taught in his words, and not in the words of men; and that it can be only known and judged of by the spiritual, and not by the natural man. He instances in himself, and in his own ministry, when at Corinth, where he preached the Gospel in a plain and simple manner, without using the ornaments of speech,…
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May 8—Morning Devotion
"Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth, and believeth in me, shall never die. Believest thou this?"—John 11:25, 26 Pause my soul, over those divine, those glorious, those soul-quickening, soul-reviving words of thy Almighty Redeemer! What man, what prophet, what servant of the Lord, what angel but he that is the angel of the covenant, one with the Father, over all, God, blessed for ever, could assume such a language, and prove that assumption as Jesus did, both by his own resurrection and that of Lazarus? And mark, my soul, the many precious things contained in this sweet scripture. Observe the blessing itself, even resurrection…
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1 Corinthians: Chapter 1, Verse 31
“That, according as it is written, etc.]” (Jeremiah 9:23,24). “He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord;” Not in his own wisdom, riches, and strength; but in Christ, as his wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.
