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POSSESS YOUR
POSSESSIONS
Obadiah 17
VOLUME 10
THE PERSONAL HOPE,
THE PERSONAL FAITH,
THE PERSONAL GOD
NOT REJUVENATION BUT REGENERATION
NOT KNOWING IT ALL, BUT KNOWING GOD
Rev. Dr. Robert E. Donaldson
Presented by World Wide Web Witness Inc.
PREFACE
When you know a friend, you do not need to know his habits when a two-year old, his ways with the bottle when a toddler, nor his genome. Exhaustive knowledge is for God, and our aspirations, hopes, prudence all would like to know all about whatever it is, for safety and understanding, clarity and competence. Yet it is neither necessary nor possible for us in this world.
It WOULD be eminently desirable were it not that we can KNOW the ONE who DOES have it all. His is able and competent to make us have a logical basis for trust, which surpasses all other grounds for all other knowledge, is sure and reliable; and as in all things, not only is this basis significant, the results of its identification are also. Thus 1od has shown Himself so zealous about His word, saying that He has magnified it above all His name (Psalm 138:2), that it becomes a crucial and substantial confirmation as seen in
Deity and Design..., and
LIGHT DWELLS WITH THE LORD'S CHRIST,
WHO ANSWERS RIDDLES,
AND WHERE HE IS, DARKNESS DEPARTS,
Bible or Blight, Christ or Confusion:
The Comprehensive Resolution of Man's Intractable Problems
is Found Only in the Bible, the Word of God
Thus there is a unique and logically impelling basis for belief, but it is not in itself compelling, despite its logical constraint, for one reason only: its acceptance per se has little to do with reason, but with will it has everything to do. There are none so blind as those who will not see, and whether it be pride, or fear, or apprehension of inner secrets being revealed to ANYONE, even to God (who knows them anyway), or other misguided, misconceived or mischievous drives, conscious or unconscious, there are thresholds to cross. God is able to conquer all these things, and in eternity before this world was, knew His characters better than anyone knows those in a novel; but HIS characters are NOT INVADED.
They are subjectible trials and tests, but their outcomes are known, not as deeds to come merely, but far beyond those variable lightnings of action, with His own infinite discernment. HE KNOWS whom He has called His own and would like it to be for all, but does not intrude. When we meet history and it hits us, God still knows His own, and infallibly finds them. Since we are in His image, it is a matter of restoration (Colossians 3:10), and since we are sinners, of redemption (Hebrews 9:12), and since spiritually we are without Him, helpless, of free salvation, and since sin blinds, it is by such application of the Spirit that we are convicted, convinced, constrained. Yet it is all true, as before sin arrived, and nothing remotely like manipulation, since it is according to truth. Often in conversion the reality of the heart is felt as God probes and acting, reveals, and revealing makes a place for His throne in the lives that are His; and this is not contrary to the reality, but its historical application.
Hence in becoming a Christian, you do not embark on a spiritual fitness course (though there is that element in it), for this is rather what is becoming for one, WHEN he is regenerated and THEREFORE a Christian at all. You are remade like a write-off, the cost far greater than that for bringing on a new car, never touched! That, it is love. Love is like that. God is its source (I John 4:7ff.), and when this love arises, then this is seen and valued, indeed, to be applied.
Then what was logically adequate to show who God is, and that the Bible is His only authorised written word to mankind, becomes empirically attested, and one finds in life, what is attested by reason; and then one can grow. When you know God, you know enough, and when you walk with Him, you have company enough. In the end, we who are His shall know as we are known; in the interim, now, the knowledge is secure and stable based on His word, attested in life; then, it will be instant and immediate, as when one sees a station approaching in rather a dim light, but as one comes nearer, the lights are turned on and it is immediately apparent and only more come and this, when it is the celestial station, with a joy divinely ennobled.
CONTENTS
CREATION, SALVATION, BECOMING MAN,
BECOMING DEAD AND
WHAT IS BECOMING TO THE SAINTS
To extend use hyperlink where marked
Revelation 1:17-18
THE AWFUL RUIN
WHEN A NATION WORSHIPS ITSELF,
OR ITS CHANGING DESIRE,
LIKE A MONUMENT TO VAINGLORY
with
A THEME FOR THANKSGIVING : JEREMIAH TO JESUS
REST IN THE REALITY OF THE REDEEMER
Matthew 2, Jeremiah 30-31
ISRAEL WILL NOT GO AWAY
BUT THOSE WHO PRESUME TO DICTATE TO
HER,
MAY NOT COVET - BUT WILL COLLECT - CUTTING:
NOT BY MAN, BUT BY GOD
Zechariah 12, Romans 1, Hebrews 4
UNTIL DECOMMISSIONED,
WHAT IS BORN OF THE FLESH WILL NOT GO AWAY:
IT IS FLESH;
WHAT IS BORN OF THE SPIRIT IS SPIRIT,
AND THIS WILL NEVER GO AWAY
WHAT IS BORN OF THE FLESH IS FLESH,
WHAT IS BORN OF THE SPIRIT IS SPIRIT,
The one strives against the other,
The victory is by faith, by the power of God
and what comes through the Spirit to Re-make Man,
That too will not go away!
John 3:5-6
John 1, 3, 8, 15, Colossians 1, I Corinthians 2-4
From remedies that misfire
to the irresistible fire of the word of God (Jeremiah 20:9)
A STRANGE ATTACK -
REJOICING IN THE ETERNAL TRUTH
AND GREAT MERCY OF GOD
Psalm 117
A DELIGHTFUL GIFT
Conscience and Man in his Calamity
Christ and Man in his Opportunity
Luke 19:42ff.
Being Empirical and Scriptural
Romans 2