Summoned By Jesus

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8/13/2023 How do we know Him? 2 Tim 1:12

(This is a post taken from today’s devotional from AW Tozer. It is a true reflection of my heart also.)

I must ask this question in the context of today’s modern Christianity: “Is it not true that for most of us who call ourselves Christians there is no real experience?”

We have substituted theological ideas for an arresting encounter; we are full of religious notions, but our great weakness is that for our hearts there is no one there!

Whatever else it embraces, true Christian experience must always include a genuine encounter with God. Without this, religion is but a shadow, a reflection of reality, a cheap copy of an original once enjoyed by someone else of whom we have heard.

It cannot but be a major tragedy in the life of any man or woman to live in a church from childhood to old age and know nothing more real than something synthetic God compounded of theology and logic but have no eyes to see, no ears to hear – and no heart to love!

AW Tozer concludes with this prayer, which is also mine… Oh Lord, I pray for the people in churches who may think they are Christians because they are raised in a religious environment. What a tragedy it would be if these men and women are not truly saved. Lord, I pray for each one, that they will receive Christ into their hearts.

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wesknadle

4 responses to “8/13/2023 How do we know Him? 2 Tim 1:12”

  1. wesknadle Avatar
    wesknadle

    Sister, here is another author (Charles Spurgeon) with a similar devotional concern…

    Morning
    “Strangers are come into the sanctuaries of the Lord’s house.”
    Jeremiah 51:51

    In this account the faces of the Lord’s people were covered with shame, for it was a terrible thing that men should intrude into the Holy Place reserved for the priests alone. Everywhere about us we see like cause for sorrow. How many ungodly men are now educating with the view of entering into the ministry! What a crying sin is that solemn lie by which our whole population is nominally comprehended in a National Church! How fearful it is that ordinances should be pressed upon the unconverted, and that among the more enlightened churches of our land there should be such laxity of discipline. If the thousands who will read this portion shall all take this matter before the Lord Jesus this day, he will interfere and avert the evil which else will come upon his Church. To adulterate the Church is to pollute a well, to pour water upon fire, to sow a fertile field with stones. May we all have grace to maintain in our own proper way the purity of the Church, as being an assembly of believers, and not a nation, an unsaved community of unconverted men.
    Our zeal must, however, begin at home. Let us examine ourselves as to our right to eat at the Lord’s table. Let us see to it that we have on our wedding garment, lest we ourselves be intruders in the Lord’s sanctuaries. Many are called, but few are chosen; the way is narrow, and the gate is strait. O for grace to come to Jesus aright, with the faith of God’s elect. He who smote Uzzah for touching the ark is very jealous of his two ordinances; as a true believer I may approach them freely, as an alien I must not touch them lest I die. Heart searching is the duty of all who are baptized or come to the Lord’s table. “Search me, O God, and know my way, try me and know my heart.”

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  2. Linda Rodante Avatar
    Linda Rodante

    True for many, I think. And yet, so many more have met him but are drawn away by the lusts of the world. The parable of the sower is as real today as it was when Jesus gave it to his disciples. ” “Therefore hear the parable of the sower: 19 When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside. 20 But he who received the seed on stony places, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21 yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles. 22 Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful. 23 But he who received seed on the good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.”

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    1. wesknadle Avatar
      wesknadle

      Yes. My concern is that “the many” are misled or unfed in the very sanctuaries where they should be hearing “rightly divided” truth.

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    2. wesknadle Avatar
      wesknadle

      And this, from My Utmost for His Highest, 8/15/23… I believe dovetails with the AW Tozer post:
      My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers
      https://utmost.org/

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