Meditate
with a daily devotion
Daily Light's Morning Reading
In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin: but he that refraineth his lips is wise.—PROV. 10:19.
My beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath.—He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty: and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.—If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able to bridle the whole body.—By thy words thou shalt be justified and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.—Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips.
Christ . . . suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.—Consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.
In their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God.
Jas. 1:19. -Prov. 16:32. -Jas. 3:2. -Matt. 12:37. -Psa. 141:3.I Pet. 2:21-23. -Heb. 12:3.Rev. 14:5.
Spurgeon's Morning Reading
“I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint.”
Psalm 22:14
Did earth or heaven ever behold a sadder spectacle of woe! In soul and body, our Lord felt himself to be weak as water poured upon the ground. The placing of the cross in its socket had shaken him with great violence, had strained all the ligaments, pained every nerve, and more or less dislocated all his bones. Burdened with his own weight, the august sufferer felt the strain increasing every moment of those six long hours. His sense of faintness and general weakness were overpowering; while to his own consciousness he became nothing but a mass of misery and swooning sickness. When Daniel saw the great vision, he thus describes his sensations, “There remained no strength in me, for my vigour was turned into corruption, and I retained no strength:” how much more faint must have been our greater Prophet when he saw the dread vision of the wrath of God, and felt it in his own soul! To us, sensations such as our Lord endured would have been insupportable, and kind unconsciousness would have come to our rescue; but in his case, he was wounded, and felt the sword; he drained the cup and tasted every drop.
|
“O King of Grief! (a title strange, yet true To thee of all kings only due) O King of Wounds! how shall I grieve for thee, Who in all grief preventest me!” |
As we kneel before our now ascended Saviour’s throne, let us remember well the way by which he prepared it as a throne of grace for us; let us in spirit drink of his cup, that we may be strengthened for our hour of heaviness whenever it may come. In his natural body every member suffered, and so must it be in the spiritual; but as out of all his griefs and woes his body came forth uninjured to glory and power, even so shall his mystical body come through the furnace with not so much as the smell of fire upon it.
Old Testament Chapter a Day - Esther 4
4. Mordecai Persuades Esther to Help
Esther Agrees to Help the Jews
4
When Mordecai learned all that had been done, Mordecai tore his clothes and put on sackcloth and ashes, and went through the city, wailing with a loud and bitter cry;2he went up to the entrance of the king’s gate, for no one might enter the king’s gate clothed with sackcloth.3In every province, wherever the king’s command and his decree came, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting and weeping and lamenting, and most of them lay in sackcloth and ashes.
4 When Esther’s maids and her eunuchs came and told her, the queen was deeply distressed; she sent garments to clothe Mordecai, so that he might take off his sackcloth; but he would not accept them.5Then Esther called for Hathach, one of the king’s eunuchs, who had been appointed to attend her, and ordered him to go to Mordecai to learn what was happening and why.6Hathach went out to Mordecai in the open square of the city in front of the king’s gate,7and Mordecai told him all that had happened to him, and the exact sum of money that Haman had promised to pay into the king’s treasuries for the destruction of the Jews.8Mordecai also gave him a copy of the written decree issued in Susa for their destruction, that he might show it to Esther, explain it to her, and charge her to go to the king to make supplication to him and entreat him for her people.
9 Hathach went and told Esther what Mordecai had said.10Then Esther spoke to Hathach and gave him a message for Mordecai, saying,11“All the king’s servants and the people of the king’s provinces know that if any man or woman goes to the king inside the inner court without being called, there is but one law—all alike are to be put to death. Only if the king holds out the golden scepter to someone, may that person live. I myself have not been called to come in to the king for thirty days.”12When they told Mordecai what Esther had said,13Mordecai told them to reply to Esther, “Do not think that in the king’s palace you will escape any more than all the other Jews.14For if you keep silence at such a time as this, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another quarter, but you and your father’s family will perish. Who knows? Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for just such a time as this.”15Then Esther said in reply to Mordecai,16“Go, gather all the Jews to be found in Susa, and hold a fast on my behalf, and neither eat nor drink for three days, night or day. I and my maids will also fast as you do. After that I will go to the king, though it is against the law; and if I perish, I perish.”17Mordecai then went away and did everything as Esther had ordered him.
New Testament in Four Years - James 1:22-25
1. Trials and Temptations
22 But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.23For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror;24for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like.25But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.
Psalm a Day - Psalm 75
75. Psalm 75
Psalm 75
Thanksgiving for God’s Wondrous Deeds
To the leader: Do Not Destroy. A Psalm of Asaph. A Song.
1
We give thanks to you, O God;
we give thanks; your name is near.
People tell of your wondrous deeds.
2
At the set time that I appoint
I will judge with equity.
3
When the earth totters, with all its inhabitants,
it is I who keep its pillars steady.Selah
4
I say to the boastful, “Do not boast,”
and to the wicked, “Do not lift up your horn;
5
do not lift up your horn on high,
or speak with insolent neck.”
6
For not from the east or from the west
and not from the wilderness comes lifting up;
7
but it is God who executes judgment,
putting down one and lifting up another.
8
For in the hand of the Lord there is a cup
with foaming wine, well mixed;
he will pour a draught from it,
and all the wicked of the earth
shall drain it down to the dregs.
9
But I will rejoice forever;
I will sing praises to the God of Jacob.
10
All the horns of the wicked I will cut off,
but the horns of the righteous shall be exalted.
