I RECALL recently I had been away for a week, and upon my returning home noticing two hanging plants on the patio in distress for lack of water. One has snapped back, the other did not. Alas, another Lesson from the Garden; that which doesn’t grow, dies.
I’M going to keep my opening comments short today, and get right to it. As we have been looking as the problem of self in recent None But the Hungry Heart readings, here is another instructive antidote from the problem within, “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Col. 1: 27.
In the inexorable riches of Christ,
Joe
Neh. 8:10; Isa 30:15; Job 2:10; Jas. 1:2; Prov. 21:30
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1-9. Powerless Recipients
“Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us” (Rom. 8:37)
The world, the flesh, and the devil say, Be powerful. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit say, Be powerless – “for My strength is made perfect in [your] weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9)
“There would be little harm in trying to imitate Christ if such an endeavor did not hide from us what our Lord really desires; and so keep us back from ‘life more abundant.’ Christ has come Himself into our hearts to dwell there, and what He wants is to live His life in us, as the Apostle Paul says, ‘For to me to live is Christ.’ Christ was the very source and mainspring of all he was and did. What a wonderful thing this is! We would be driven to despair if Christ had simply left us an example to follow or imitate, for we have no power within ourselves to do it. We must have a new source-a new spring of action, and Christ Himself wants to be just that for us.” -E.C.H.
“The man in Romans Seven is occupied with himself, and his disappointment and anguish spring from his inability to find in self the good which he loves. The man of Romans Eight has learned there is no good to be found in self. It is only in Christ; and his song of triumph results from the joy of having found out that he is ‘complete in Him.’” -H.A.I.
“I have strength for all things in Christ who empowers me-I am ready for anything and equal to anything through Him who infuses inner strength into me” (Phil. 4:13, Amp.).
