Wholeheartedness
"Unite my heart to fear Thy name. I will praise Thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart." Psalms 86:11, 12
As the sunflower ever turning, To the mighty sun,
With the faithfulness of fealty, Following only one --
So make me, Lord, to Thee.
J. Tauler
(pp. 77-80, Footprints for Pilgrims)
Many own the grace of God, but how comparatively seldom do we see the surrender of prospects and position in order to follow Christ fully.
There is great need for David's mighty men in this day -- men devoted to David. The nation gains from their services, but they are thinking of David.
The more saints are for Him the more they will in every way gain for themselves.
I see many convered souls, but I do not see many witnesses ... I feel that one man standing fully for Christ, like Anna the prophetess, would be a greater testimony than many conversions.
I do not believe that any one advancing in this world and not surrendering it can be seeking the things above.
I fear that the saints are rather advancing in the world instead of retiring from it. Surely there never has been real advance but as there has been renunciation, and the "manifold more" is with reference to the surrender.
Those nearest and dearest to us naturally can do us the greatest mischief spiritually, because they consider too much for us and too little for the Lord.
It is a good sign on all sides when children prefer their home to any other place. How blessed if this were true of each of us with respect to our home in the Father's house. The reason of our not doing so is that we do not sufficiently know the joy of it.
I admire much her (Mary of Bethany) isolated path, because her affection for Him carried her outside and apart from every one here, and, as far as I can see it, it is in this connection she should be spoken of in the gospel. As the Lord says, "Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a memorial that our blessed Lord not only so loved a sinner, but could make a sinner love Him so much.
It is very markedly the way the heart is weaned from a place when the object of it has left it, but it is much more weaned when it truly follows Him to the place where He is. His absence detaches you from this place, while His presence in heaven attaches you to heaven because He is there.
Do not be satisfied with as much Christianity as will ease your conscience.
It is not to the one who works most, nor to the one who reads most, that the Lord confides His mind, but to the one who loves Him most (as Mary Magdalene). It is only near Himself that the human mind is so in abeyance that His mind is in the ascendant.
How many things try and annoy us all day which are not really for Christ's sake.
--- J.B.S.
