Morning By Morning #295

Christ’s love compels us.

2 Corinthians 5:14

From the pen of Charles Spurgeon:

How much do you owe the Lord? Has He ever done anything for you? Has He forgiven your sins? Has He “covered [you] with [a] robe of righteousness” (Isa. 61:10 KJV)? Has He “set [your] feet on a rock and [given you] a firm place to stand” (Ps. 40:2)? Has He prepared heaven for you and prepared you for heaven? Has He written your name in “the book of life” (Phil. 4:3)? Has He given you countless blessings? Has He “stored up for you in heaven” (Col. 1:5) wondrous mercies that “no eye has seen, no ear has heard” (1 Cor. 2:9)?

If so, then do something for Jesus worthy of His love, but don’t merely give the Redeemer who died for you an offering of empty words. How will you feel when your Master returns if you have to confess you did nothing for Him, that you kept your love inside like a stagnant pool instead of pouring it out on the poor or into the Lord’s work?

Away with love like that! Most people would prefer an open rebuke than that kind of secret love that never results in action. After all, who would accept a love so weak it never prompts a single act of devotion, self-denial, generosity, or heroism.

Think how Jesus has loved you and given Himself for you! Do you know the power of His love? Let it be “like the blowing of a violent wind” (Acts 2:2) to your soul, clearing away the clouds of your worldliness and the mists of your sin. “For Christ’s sake” (2 Cor. 12:10), may the power of one of the “tongues of fire” (Acts 2:3) rest upon you. “For Christ’s sake,” may His power bring you His divine passion and heavenly creativity that will lift you from earth. May His Spirit make you “as bold as a lion” (Prov. 28:1) and cause you to “soar on wings like eagles” (Isa. 40:31) in service to your Lord.

Love will give wings to our feet of service to the Lord and strength to our arms for His work. May we truly exhibit a determined love for Jesus that is fixed on Him with a faithfulness that will not be shaken, that is resolved to honor Him with a steadfastness that can never be swayed, and that presses ahead with a passion that will not grow weary.

May the divine Lodestone draw us heavenward toward Himself.

From the pen of Jim Reimann:

Spurgeon ends today’s devotion with a word seldom used today: lodestone. He refers to Jesus as the Lodestone, defined by Merriam-Webster as “magnetite possessing polarity” or “something that strongly attracts.”

Consider this in light of today’s text: “Christ’s love compels us.” What an amazing Savior we have! And what amazing love—a love that “strongly attracts” us to Him! “We love him, because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19 KJV). And although “he had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him” (Isa. 53:2), He nevertheless draws us to Himself. He has called His chosen to come to Him, attracting us to His light.

“You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9).