Quote of the Day

The whole creation is on tiptoe…” (Romans 8:18, Phillips) and groans awaiting the redemption of nature. Who can listen to the robin’s “all clear” in springtime, or the wood thrush at sundown singing his vespers, without sensing the longing of creation for a better time to come? Was Goethe thinking of this when he wrote, “Often have I had the sensation as if nature in waiting sadness entreated something of me so that not to understand what she longed for cut me to the heart”? Dr. A. T. Robertson wrote “This mystical sympathy of physical nature with the work of grace is beyond the comprehension of most of us. But who can disprove it?” John Keble put it this way:

It was not then a poet’s dream
An idle vaunt of song,
Such as beneath the moon’s soft beam
On vacant fancies throng,
Which bids me see in heaven or earth,
In all things fair around,
Strong yearnings for a blest new birth
With sinless glories crowned.

Devotion of the Day

We Gain As We Give

He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which giveth bountifully shall reap also bountifully.
II Corinthians 9:6

God “giveth liberally.” He is a generous God, and His children should never be misers. He loves a cheerful giver and “the liberal soul shall be made fat.”

Mary used expensive ointment when she anointed Jesus, not a cut-rate bargain. It was Judas, who pilfered the treasury, who grumbled about Mary’s generosity. God does not smile upon extravagance, but He does reward the bountiful sower. His servants are worthy of their hire, and Paul, though he sought nothing for himself, ever exhorted the saints to be liberal in their giving. When Christians turn into tightwads and try to do God’s work as cheaply as possible they get cheap results. God will not honor a stingy testimony. The church that puts on a bargain revival cheats itself. God’s work is in no danger of bankruptcy when His people are hilarious in their giving and hospitable to His servants.

God hates a false economy that is out to reduce a budget instead of to receive a blessing. We reap as we show here, just as anywhere else.