The Howling Wilderness has moved to http://vahskresenye.solideogloria.com.  Please update your links and bookmarks accordingly.

Where Grace Reigns

October 4, 2006

Rev. Matthew Winzer (armourbearer on the Puritanboard on this thread) made the following statement (emphasis mine)

…in reformed churches, where free grace is proclaimed loud and clear, blessings joined to obedience should never be called law-preaching. I tend to think it is only a soul stricken by the law that could construe it that way; where grace reigns every precept is a precious promise of God’s goodness to His people.

promiseportugal.jpg

…not that that ever happens to me, of course.

45_endymion.jpg

Thomas Decker, quoted in Dorothy Sayer’s “Gaudy Night”

Do but consider what an excellent thing sleep is: it is so inestimable a jewel that, if a tyrant would give his crown for an hour’s slumber, it cannot be bought: of so beautiful a shape is it, that though a man lie with an Empress, his heart cannot beat quiet till he leaves her embracements to be at rest with the other: yea, so greatly indebted are we to this kinsman of death, that we owe the better tributary, half of our life to him: and there is good cause why we should do so: for sleep is that golden chain that ties health and our bodies together. Who complains of want? of wounds? of cares? of great men’s oppressions? of captivity? while he sleepeth? Beggars in their beds take as much pleasure as kings: can we therefore surfeit on this delicate Ambrosia? Can we drink too much of that whereof to taste too little tumbles us into a churchyard, and to use it but indifferently throws us into Bedlam? No, no, look upon Endymion, the moon’s minion, who slept three score and fifteen years, and was not a hair the worse for it.

G. Campbell Morgan, The Crises of the Christ, Part Three — The Temptation, Conclusion

gcampbellmorgan.jpg

In the last temptation there is an intimation of the devil’s estimate of the worth of Jesus. After showing Him the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, he declared his conviction that to capture the soul of Christ would be a greater victory than all his conquests. He reckoned this perfect Man to be worth all over which he claimed to have gained authority. “All these,” said the enemy, and the offer included the result of the dreadful persistency of diabolical endeavour through long centuries, the evolution of evil through tedious processes. The spotless Son of God was, in the estimate of the devil, of more value than all. In effect the enemy said, I will give to Thee all that has cost so much, if I may but gain for one moment Thy homage. It is a stupendous and startling revelation, the devil’s estimate of the worth of Christ. There are persons who say that they cannot understand the expiatory work of Christ on the Cross, because of the difficulty of believing that the suffering and death of One could possible be sufficient for the redemption of the world. Those who speak of this difficulty evidently hold Christ at lower valuation than did the devil. He, comparing the world with the Master, tacitly acknowledged the greater worth of Jesus. Satan evidently reckoned that unless he could bring Christ into subjection, nothing he had, would he be able to hold. He evidently recognised the infinite value of this second man; and understood, moreover, the relation of that undepreciated value to the redemption of the world.