Octavius Winslow nailed me hard October 12 in his Morning Thoughts. He does this often, but given that this was the day I was coming back from Haiti, it came with particular force. God has opened many doors and done many amazing things over the past six months. It is as if he is giving far more than we are asking, and this to our shame.
Insert Winslow, commenting on Psalm 36:9 . . .
What stinted views, unjust conceptions, and wrong interpretations have we cherished of Him, simply because we overlook His character as the Fountain of living waters! We “limit the Holy One of Israel.” We judge of Him by our poor, narrow conception of things. We think that He is such a one as we ourselves are. We forget, in our approaches, that we are coming to an Infinite Fountain. That the heavier the demand we make upon God, the more we shall receive, and that the oftener we come, the more are we welcome. That we cannot ask too much. That our sin and His dishonor are, that we ask so little. We forget that He is glorified in giving; and that the more grace He metes out to His people, the richer the revenue of praise which He receives in return. How worthy of such an infinite Fountain of love and grace is His “unspeakable gift.” It came from a large heart; and the heart that gave Jesus will withhold no good thing from those who walk uprightly.
Father, forgive me for dishonoring you because of my unbelief. Enlarge my heart to believe your promises and fetch from your omnipotent hand the good that you are so readily desirous to impart. Had I longed for your glory as I should, I would have asked for what only you can do. But I have beckoned so seldom and have asked so little, and this to my shame. Turn me into the kind of beggar who is familiar with riches flowing from your abundance, and never let me believe that you withhold any good thing because you have given me your Son.
Amen.
I began asking God for a Third Great Awakening in the Spring of 1973, when I was pastoring a chuch in the area where the Second Great Awakening had occurred. Since that time I have added the request for every soul on earth to be won to Christ beginning with this generation and continuing for a thousand generations , not manipulated or coerced, but won with a winsomeness wholesome and wonderful beyond words to convey. At times the pressure to think it impossible and even inconceivable is more than can be imagined. However, the word’s promises that are the basis for such plea, promises recorded and expounded by John Bunyan and Jonathan Edwards, are as good as the day they were written. Winslow hit the nail on the head. He drove the point home. God grant us grace to receive and implement it.
Mr Brister,
Please help me to understand this. I want to believe it. I was right there nodding my head along with Mr. Winslow, hope rising in my heart, then I came to his last line,
“and the heart that gave Jesus will withhold no good thing from those who walk uprightly.”
The trouble is with “those who walk uprightly.”
I’m afraid I don’t fit that qualification, unless it applies to one saved by grace who still stumbles and falls and hates her sin but sometimes won’t let go of it though detesting it. Do you know what kind of sinner I mean? This person saved by grace, robed in Christ’s righteousness, but not yet glorified, not “walking uprightly” in ALL things? Do these words of Mr Wislow’s apply to such a one as this?
Fearfully hoping,
Jacqueline