When health is absent, wisdom cannot reveal itself, art cannot manifest, strength cannot fight, wealth become useless, and intelligence cannot be applied. Death end.
On this day, evening, we celebrate your birthday at Sukon Thai Restaurant, followed by one Bengawan Solo birthday-cake. HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!! Beloved friend, I pray that you may get along well in every way and may enjoy health, just as your soul is prospering.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
This Message is dedicated to you andeande
"And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me." - Jesus said.
THE very grammar of this towering prophecy surely strikes a significant balance which defines the drawing-power of Calvary. Our Lord does not say that either He alone or the Cross alone would constitute the attraction. There is a deliberate dual emphasis when He says, "And I, if I be lifted up."
The Cross itself apart from Jesus Christ has no saving power ; nor has even the Lord Jesus Himself apart from the Cross. Therefore, in the saving sense, neither Christ Jesus nor the Cross apart from each other has this drawing-power. But together they are the most wonderful magnet which ever drew the hearts of earth's sin-cursed millions. I was one of them, you are one of them, they too. And herein lie two vastly momentous truths which need strong reassertion today.
First : it is not Christ Jesus apart from the Cross on Calvary who draws and saves. Calvary was the place of crucifixion for criminals by the Roman Empire . Many modern divines have a way of eulogising Jesus without any reference to His death as a substitutionary sacrifice for sin. If they bring in the Cross at all, it is decked with the draperies of a sublimated sentimentalism which obscures its real nature, tragedy and glory. Yet the real power of the Gospel Of human souls' Salvation , to draw and to save lies in the very Cross with Christ which these aesthetic preachers deem to be its most unattractive feature. They fondly dream that if they preach His exemplary life without His ignominious death, men/women will be attracted to Him ; but they are wrong. Christ Jesus, presented only as supreme Teacher and Ideal, has never drawn the sin-conscious sons of Adam, humankind, who are far too fallen to be charmed into holiness by a mere exhibition of moral excellence, however perfect. What human race need is not just a beautiful portrait, but a cure for their sin- disease. It is the Christ Jesus of Calvary Cross, and He alone, who really saves and really draws.
Second ; it is not the Cross apart from Christ Jesus which draws and saves. For there were many other crosses beside His. Let the public evangelist guard against the easy danger of preaching the Cross as a mere doctrine, or as a sort of detached transaction which in itself can save. There is a cheap evangelistic jargon today which almost sounds like bargaining the Cross off to those who will only "believe" in it and lift up their hands in meetings, show of hands - as though the Cross by itself were a free entry-permit to heaven, apart from a persevering, life-long faith-union with Christ Himself which sanctifies character and conduct. We are making a true distinction when we say that it is not strictly the Cross itself which saves us, but Jesus Himself who saves us through the Cross. And, remember, it is not the mere creature-Christ of the so-called Christian Scientist, the Spiritualists, the Jehovah's Witnessess denominations, and other such unitarian cults, but the Christ Jesus who is the Son of God and God's only begotten and Delight.
It is the deity life behind the manhood which makes the Cross an atonement. It is the manhood within the divine deity incarnation which makes it an atonement for us, humankind, and such a magnet to us, lost souls. Wondeful Christ ! Wonderful Cross !
Still, still He draws ; true Man, incarnate God,
Who once the sad, brown earth as Jesus trod,
Until, with pinioned limbs and deep-torn side,
On yonder rough-hewn beam and bar He died.
Yes, still that Cross with Christ Jesus compels our gaze today ;
Sin nailed him there ; yet sin He bears away !
Yes, His death on the Cross enables us to celebrate our yearly birthdays without fearing for death right through eternity, He has given eternal life to us to love and share. Happy birthday again, !!!
On this day, evening, we celebrate your birthday at Sukon Thai Restaurant, followed by one Bengawan Solo birthday-cake. HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!! Beloved friend, I pray that you may get along well in every way and may enjoy health, just as your soul is prospering.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
This Message is dedicated to you andeande
"And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me." - Jesus said.
THE very grammar of this towering prophecy surely strikes a significant balance which defines the drawing-power of Calvary. Our Lord does not say that either He alone or the Cross alone would constitute the attraction. There is a deliberate dual emphasis when He says, "And I, if I be lifted up."
The Cross itself apart from Jesus Christ has no saving power ; nor has even the Lord Jesus Himself apart from the Cross. Therefore, in the saving sense, neither Christ Jesus nor the Cross apart from each other has this drawing-power. But together they are the most wonderful magnet which ever drew the hearts of earth's sin-cursed millions. I was one of them, you are one of them, they too. And herein lie two vastly momentous truths which need strong reassertion today.
First : it is not Christ Jesus apart from the Cross on Calvary who draws and saves. Calvary was the place of crucifixion for criminals by the Roman Empire . Many modern divines have a way of eulogising Jesus without any reference to His death as a substitutionary sacrifice for sin. If they bring in the Cross at all, it is decked with the draperies of a sublimated sentimentalism which obscures its real nature, tragedy and glory. Yet the real power of the Gospel Of human souls' Salvation , to draw and to save lies in the very Cross with Christ which these aesthetic preachers deem to be its most unattractive feature. They fondly dream that if they preach His exemplary life without His ignominious death, men/women will be attracted to Him ; but they are wrong. Christ Jesus, presented only as supreme Teacher and Ideal, has never drawn the sin-conscious sons of Adam, humankind, who are far too fallen to be charmed into holiness by a mere exhibition of moral excellence, however perfect. What human race need is not just a beautiful portrait, but a cure for their sin- disease. It is the Christ Jesus of Calvary Cross, and He alone, who really saves and really draws.
Second ; it is not the Cross apart from Christ Jesus which draws and saves. For there were many other crosses beside His. Let the public evangelist guard against the easy danger of preaching the Cross as a mere doctrine, or as a sort of detached transaction which in itself can save. There is a cheap evangelistic jargon today which almost sounds like bargaining the Cross off to those who will only "believe" in it and lift up their hands in meetings, show of hands - as though the Cross by itself were a free entry-permit to heaven, apart from a persevering, life-long faith-union with Christ Himself which sanctifies character and conduct. We are making a true distinction when we say that it is not strictly the Cross itself which saves us, but Jesus Himself who saves us through the Cross. And, remember, it is not the mere creature-Christ of the so-called Christian Scientist, the Spiritualists, the Jehovah's Witnessess denominations, and other such unitarian cults, but the Christ Jesus who is the Son of God and God's only begotten and Delight.
It is the deity life behind the manhood which makes the Cross an atonement. It is the manhood within the divine deity incarnation which makes it an atonement for us, humankind, and such a magnet to us, lost souls. Wondeful Christ ! Wonderful Cross !
Still, still He draws ; true Man, incarnate God,
Who once the sad, brown earth as Jesus trod,
Until, with pinioned limbs and deep-torn side,
On yonder rough-hewn beam and bar He died.
Yes, still that Cross with Christ Jesus compels our gaze today ;
Sin nailed him there ; yet sin He bears away !
Yes, His death on the Cross enables us to celebrate our yearly birthdays without fearing for death right through eternity, He has given eternal life to us to love and share. Happy birthday again, !!!
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