Pilgrim Days

2 Corinthians 12:8–10 (NKJV) — Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong. 2 Corinthians 13:4 (NKJV) — For though He was crucified in weakness, yet He lives by the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, but we shall live with Him by the power of God toward you. This week as I read chapters thirteen and fourteen of The Bruised Reed , there were three themes that caught my attention. The first is the ongoing battle in the believer’s life. Sibbes reminds us that growth and sanctification is a slow process. He also reminds us there will be suffering along the way, but Christ has ordained all

Psalm 119:32–36, 45 (NKJV) — I will run the course of Your commandments, For You shall enlarge my heart . Teach me, O Lord, the way of Your statutes, And I shall keep it to the end. Give me understanding , and I shall keep Your law; Indeed, I shall observe it with my whole heart . Make me walk in the path of Your commandments, For I delight in it. Incline my heart to Your testimonies, And not to covetousness… And I will walk at liberty, For I seek Your precepts. There was a sweet providential topic running through my devotions this week - the empowering and transforming work of God's Spirit in the believer's heart. That was the major theme in chapters eleven and twelve of The Bruised Reed as well as my Scripture reading.  As believers, we are being conformed to the image of Christ. Our affections, our will, what we love, and what we hate are being transformed. Or, to use the language of the Psalmist, our hearts are being enlarged to understand, love, and delight in the thin

This week, in chapters nine and ten, Sibbes continues to encourage us to gaze at the tender mercies of Christ. As we see the best affections of mere men, be they father, husband, or brother, let us remember that these are but dim reflections of Christ’s benevolence toward us. We are the body of Christ, surely he will not mistreat His own. If the sweetness of all flowers were in one, how sweet must that flower be? In Christ all perfections of mercy and love meet. How great then must that mercy be that lodges in so gracious a heart? Whatever tenderness is scattered in husband, father, brother, head, all is but a beam from him; it is in him in the most eminent manner. We are weak, but we are his; we are deformed, but yet carry his image upon us. A father looks not so much at the blemishes of his child as at his own nature in him; so Christ finds matter of love from that which is his own in us. He sees his own nature in us: we are diseased, but yet his members. Who ever neglected his own m

Psalm 46:1 (ESV) — 1 God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Once again, I offer the following quote without comment. It is from chapter eight of The Bruised Reed . OVERCOMING DISCOURAGEMENTS Suffering brings discouragements, because of our impatience. `Alas!', we lament, `I shall never get through such a trial.' But if God brings us into the trial he will be with us in the trial, and at length bring us out, more refined. We shall lose nothing but dross (Zech. 13:9). From our own strength we cannot bear the least trouble, but by the Spirit's assistance we can bear the greatest. The Spirit will add his shoulders to help us to bear our infirmities. The Lord will give his hand to heave us up (Psa. 37:24). 'Ye have heard of the patience of job,' says James (James 5:11). We have heard of his impatience too, but it pleased God mercifully to overlook that. It yields us comfort also in desolate conditions, such as contagious sicknesses and the like,

Philippians 3:12–14 (NKJV) — Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Philippians 2:12b–13 (NKJV) — work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure. In chapter seven of The Bruised Reed Sibbes encourages us to persist in duty even though our works are mixed with “good” and “ill”. By that Sibbes is referring to the indwelling sin that taints even the good we do. He reminds us that Christ sees the good and will abolish the ill in due time, so carry on. He reminds us to pray even though our prayers are feeble, because the Spirit helps us in our infirmitie

Once again, offered without comment, a few of my favorate quotes from chapter six of The Bruised Reed : We must neither trust to false evidence, nor deny true; for so we should dishonor the work of God's Spirit in us, and lose the help of that evidence which would cherish our love to Christ, and arm us against Satan's discouragements. Some are as faulty in this way as if they had been hired by Satan, the `accuser of the brethren' (Rev. 12:10), to plead for him in accusing themselves.[1] We must remember that grace sometimes is so little as to be indiscernible to us. The Spirit sometimes has secret operations in us which we know not for the present, but Christ knows.[2] …fire, as much as it can, sets everything on fire. So grace labors to produce a gracious impression in others, and make as many good as it can. Grace also makes a gracious use even of natural and civil things, and spiritualizes them. What another man does only in a civil way a gracious man will do holily. Whe