My Journey 8/1 - 8/3/2010

God's insight to me:

I love this devotional about being pruned. I will be the first to admit, "it hurts sometimes", but it is for our own good. I know if I look at my own yard I have some bushes that because of my lack of pruning, either because of time consuming or knowledge of doing it, the bush produces less and less flowers and grows aimlessly. Well praise God that He is the Master pruner in my life and all others who will let Him. Annie Johnson Flint wrote a good poem about this.

A. B. Simpson's devotional I titled "Some Day". For one day my friends, we do not know when, but Christ is coming back. The Gaither's had a song called "The King Is Coming" that I have performed during some of the God's Love Outreach Ministry. I mainly present it in the Seeds of Salvation program at Easter time. Every time I do I think of a friend of mine who said to me, "they just don't preach that enough from the pulpit". To listen to this song on YouTube click here. Here is a poem the Lord blessed me with over a year ago;

It’s Jesus!

It was just another day,
my thoughts were of family and friends.
I was thinking of what I was going to do,
not thinking today this life on earth would truly end

It was like so many other days
the sunshine filled the sky.
But all of sudden it was the brightest day ever,
I looked up and said, it’s Jesus, He said, “Yes, it is I!”

As I looked around I saw neighbors,
family, friends and even some people I did not know.
Jesus looked at each one
but to certain ones He said, “come its time to go home.”

I just stood there crying
then Jesus came to me.
He said, “as a young boy you asked Me into your heart,
what are you crying about, what can it be?”

I said my Lord, the tears are not for me
but for so many that would not let go.
Theirs lives were consumed by the many worldly lies,
even though you loved them so.

Jesus smiled and wiped my tears
and said, “come, life now truly begins!”
As it was written in My Word,
blessed are the believers, for they are the ones that win!

E. P. Shagott
6/5/09


The second devotional by A. B. Simpson speaks about the Holy Spirit. Mr. Simpson describes Him with these characteristics, gentleness, lowliness, quietness, meekness, and forbearance. As I was reading this devotional I saw most if not all these in myself. The more my walk with Christ strengthens is more of them. It is because I want to be "Christ-like!" How awesome it was as I was reading my devotionals the other devotional on the 8/2 by Mrs. Charles Cowman, "Victorious Living is Possible", I thought goes along perfectly with Mr. Simpson's. See, without the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life you will be fighting a losing battle!

In this last devotional it also goes along with the others. I have found in my own life to have a victorious life, it comes with patience. Where does that patience come from? It is one of the gifts of the Spirit. Mrs. Charles Cowman's devotional explains it very well, "He knows your need better than you do, and His purpose in waiting is to bring more glory out of it all. Patience takes away self-works." The glory goes to God, always!

From God's heart, to mine, to yours,
Ed Shagott

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8/1

A devotional from Streams in the Desert
by Mrs. Charles Cowman

Pruned to Yield Fruit

"And every branch that beareth fruit he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit" (John 15:2).

A child of God was dazed by the variety of afflictions which seemed to make her their target. Walking past a vineyard in the rich autumnal glow she noticed the untrimmed appearance and the luxuriant wealth of leaves on the vines, that the ground was given over to a tangle of weeds and grass, and that the whole place looked utterly uncared for; and as she pondered, the Heavenly Gardener whispered so precious a message that she would fain pass it on:

"My dear child, are you wondering at the sequence of trials in your life? Behold that vineyard and learn of it. The gardener ceases to prune, to trim, to harrow, or to pluck the ripe fruit only when he expects nothing more from the vine during that season. It is left to itself, because the season of fruit is past and further effort for the present would yield no profit. Comparative uselessness is the condition of freedom from suffering. Do you then wish me to cease pruning your life? Shall I leave you alone?" And the comforted heart cried, "No!"
--Homera Homer-Dixon

It is the branch that bears the fruit,
That feels the knife,
To prune it for a larger growth,
A fuller life.

Though every budding twig be lopped,
And every grace
Of swaying tendril, springing leaf,
Be lost a space.

O thou whose life of joy seems reft,
Of beauty shorn;
Whose aspirations lie in dust,
All bruised and torn,

Rejoice, tho' each desire, each dream,
Each hope of thine
Shall fall and fade; it is the hand
Of Love Divine

That holds the knife, that cuts and breaks
With tenderest touch,
That thou, whose life has borne some fruit
May'st now bear much.
--Annie Johnson Flint
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8/1

A devotional from Days of Heaven Upon Earth
by A. B. Simpson

"For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done" (II Cor. v. 10).

It will not always be the day of toil and trial. Some day, we shall hear our names announced before the universe, and the record read of things that we had long forgotten.

How our hearts will thrill, and our heads will bow, as we shall hear our own names called, and then the Master shall recount the triumph and the services which we had ourselves forgotten! And, perhaps, from the ranks of the saved He shall call forward the souls that we have won for Christ and the souls that they in turn had won, and as we see the issue of things that have, perhaps, seemed but trifling at the time, we shall fall before the throne, and say, "Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name give glory!"

Beloved, the pages are going up every day, for the record of our life. We are setting the type ourselves, by every moment's action. Hands unseen are stereotyping the plates, and soon the record will be registered, and read before the audience of the universe. and amid the issues of eternity.

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8/2

A devotional from Days of Heaven Upon Earth
by A. B. Simpson

"Thy gentleness hath made me great" (Ps. xviii. 35).

The blessed Comforter is gentle, tender, and full of patience and love. How gentle are God's dealings even with sinners! How patient His forbearance! How tender His discipline, with His own erring children! How He led Jacob, Joseph, Israel, David, Elijah, and all His ancient servants, until they could truly say, "Thy gentleness hath made me great."

The heart in which the Holy Spirit dwells will always be characterized by gentleness, lowliness, quietness, meekness, and forbearance. The rude, sarcastic spirit, the brusque manner, the sharp retort, the unkind cut--all these belong to the flesh, but they have nothing in common with the gentle teaching of the Comforter.

The Holy Dove shrinks from the noisy, tumultuous, excited, and vindictive spirit, and finds His home in the lowly breast of the peaceful soul. "The fruit of the Spirit is gentleness, meekness."

Lord, make me gentle. Hush my spirit. Refine my manner. Let me have Christ in my bearing and my very tones as well as in my heart.
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8/2

A devotional from Streams in the Desert
by Mrs. Charles Cowman

Victorious Living is Possible

"Nothing shall be impossible unto you" (Matt. 17:20).

It is possible, for those who really are willing to reckon on the power of the Lord for keeping and victory, to lead a life in which His promises are taken as they stand and are found to be true.

It is possible to cast all our care upon Him daily and to enjoy deep peace in doing it.

It is possible to have the thoughts and imaginations of our hearts purified, in the deepest meaning of the word.

It is possible to see the will of God in everything, and to receive it, not with sighing, but with singing.

It is possible by taking complete refuge in Divine power to become strong through and through; and, where previously our greatest weakness lay, to find that things which formerly upset all our resolves to be patient, or pure, or humble, furnish today an opportunity--through Him who loved us, and works in us an agreement with His will and a blessed sense of His presence and His power--to make sin powerless over us.

These things are DIVINE POSSIBILITIES, and because they are His work, the true experience of them will always cause us to bow lower at His feet and to learn to thirst and long for more.

We cannot possibly be satisfied with anything less--each day, each hour, each moment, in Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit--than to WALK WITH GOD. --H. C. G. Moule

We may have as much of God as we will. Christ puts the key of the treasure-chamber into our hand, and bids us take all that we want. If a man is admitted into the bullion vault of a bank, and told to help himself, and comes out with one cent, whose fault is it that he is poor? Whose fault is it that Christian people generally have such scanty portions of the free riches of God? --McLaren.
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8/3

A devotional from Streams in the Desert
by Mrs. Charles Cowman

Wait With Patience

"Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him" (Ps. 37:7).

Have you prayed and prayed and waited and waited, and still there is no manifestation?

Are you tired of seeing nothing move? Are you just at the point of giving it all up? Perhaps you have not waited in the right way? This would take you out of the right place the place where He can meet you.

"With patience wait" (Rom. 8:25). Patience takes away worry. He said He would come, and His promise is equal to His presence. Patience takes away your weeping. Why feel sad and despondent? He knows your need better than you do, and His purpose in waiting is to bring more glory out of it all. Patience takes away self-works. The work He desires is that you "believe" (John 6:29), and when you believe, you may then know that all is well. Patience takes away all want. Your desire for the thing you wish is perhaps stronger than your desire for the will of God to be fulfilled in its arrival.

Patience takes away all weakening. Instead of having the delaying time, a time of letting go, know that God is getting a larger supply ready and must get you ready too. Patience takes away all wobbling. "Make me stand upon my standing" (Daniel 8:18, margin). God's foundations are steady; and when His patience is within, we are steady while we wait. Patience gives worship. A praiseful patience sometimes "long-suffering with joyfulness" (Col. 1:11) is the best part of it all. "Let (all these phases of) patience have her perfect work" (James 1:4), while you wait, and you will find great enrichment. --C. H. P.

Hold steady when the fires burn,
When inner lessons come to learn,
And from this path there seems no turn
"Let patience have her perfect work."
--L.S.P.