Peace, love, and faith

"Peace be to the brethren, and love and faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."—Eph. 4:23.

Peace, love, faith; these are the three things which the apostle desired for the brethren; remembering, no doubt, what had come to himself,—"the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant, with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus" (1 Tim. 1:14) This threefold blessing comes directly from the Father and the Son, through the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.

"I need peace." Yes; and it is this that the Father gives. It is this that Jesus gives. Both Father and Son desire that you should have it. Allow them to give it.

"I need love." Yes ; and it is this which the Father and the Son bestow. They hold it out to you. They will not only teach you their own vast love, but also to love in return.

"I need faith." Yes, surely you do; and the whole Godhead presents it to you. "It is the gift of God." Lord, increase our faith! Lord, help our unbelief!

Go, then, trustingly to God; to the Father and the Son; that you may get at once the peace, the love, the faith which you need so much. Confide in the free love of the Godhead. You will find in this simple confidence the cure of all spiritual diseases, the channel of all health and blessing. Distrust will do nothing for you. It will only make you worse. Unreserved confidence will do everything for you. God asks this. Give Him his request.

Who is a rock, save our God?

"Who is a rock, save our God"—2 Sam. 22: 32.

Yes, who is a rock, except Him? Shelter, shadow, fortress, shield, hiding-place and refuge—all in Him! Jehovah, God of heaven and earth; the God who so loved the world as to give His only-begotten Son, He is our Rock!

What shall we then say? If God be for us, who can be against us? If He be our rock, who can harm us? What storm of the ocean can overthrow us when established on this Rock, or what sun of the desert can scorch us when seated under the shadow of the Great Rock in the weary land?

Let us trust and not be afraid. Let us be without carefulness. Let us not forecast evil, or trouble ourselves about the future. All is well. Who is a rock except our God? We may well be calm and peaceful. We have a good right to be steadfast and unmovable.

It is not we that have made the Rock, nor placed it where it is. It is Jehovah himself; and He has done it for us.

It is on this Rock that the Holy Spirit places us when He draws us out of the horrible pit. And He does so simply in enabling us to receive God's testimony concerning this wondrous Rock; concerning the free love of Him who is our rock and refuge.

"Trust ye in the Lord for ever; for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength;"—the Rock of Ages —(Isa. 26:4.)

The Lord is my refuge!

"And the Lord shut him in."—Gen. 6:18.

He who shut Noah in, did by that very act, shut out all evil . He shut out the flood, he shut out the storm, he shut out death. He gave a pledge to his faithful servant that all would be well.  Above, there was darkness; beneath, the tossing wave; around, the moaning wind; far off and near, the cries of dying multitudes; yet Noah was secure.  Jehovah had shut him in and Jehovah kept watch.

Then was he safe indeed.  No peril could reach him, no enemy could find access, no sudden mischance could surprise him.  He was as safe in the midst of the rolling waters as was Enoch in the presence of that Lord to whom he was caught up, that he might be taken away from the evil to come.

It is Jehovah who "shuts in" His Noahs, with their families, in the day of evil. He has His chambers provided for them; He leads them into these when danger threatens; He secures them against enemies; He himself stands sentinel at the gate.

In stormy times let us call to mind this security. The name of the Lord is our strong tower; let us run into it and be safe. He bids us enter; He shuts us in ; He keeps watch without. Though the whole world, like a mighty flood, rise against us, as if to overflow and overwhelm, He who shuts us in will keep us. We shall not be moved. Jesus is our ark, and He who shuts us in is the Father.

The Effects of Being filled with the Spirit

1. It is the secret of holiness. There is a measure of the Holy Spirit's life in every regenerate soul, but it is when every part of our being is filled with His love and possessed for His glory that we are wholly sanctified, and it is this divine fullness which excludes and keeps out the power of sin and self, even as it was the descending cloud upon the tabernacle which left no room for Moses within.

Would you have continual purity of heart and thought and feeling, and entire conformity to the will of God? "Be filled with the Spirit;" "Of his fullness have we received, even grace for grace." Let the heavenly water flow into every channel of irrigation and by every garden bed and plant, until all the graces of our Christian life shall be replenished by His grace, and bloom like the garden of the Lord. Only abide in Him and have His abiding, and you shall bring forth all the fruit of the Spirit.

2. It is the secret of happiness. A heart half full is only full enough to make it conscious of its lack. It is when the cattle are filled that they lie down in the green pastures. "These things have I spoken unto you that my joy might remain in you and that your joy might be full."

3. It is the secret of power.  Only full hearts accomplish effectual work for God. Only the overflow of our blessing blesses others.

How the Joy of the Lord is maintained.

The joy of the Lord is sustained by His word and nourished by His "exceeding great and precious promises." "I rejoice in Thy Word," exclaims the Psalmist, "as one that findeth great spoil." Oh, the rich delight of beholding in the light of the Holy Spirit, the heavenly landscape of truth open before the spiritual vision, like some land of promise shining in the glory of the sunlight, the whole Bible seeming like the vision Moses saw from Pisgah's top! We have found great spoil, and it is all our own. "We have received the Spirit that we may know the things that are freely given us of God," and we can truly say like the same Psalmist again, "Thy testimonies are the joy and rejoicing of my heart." How sweet the voice in which the Spirit speaks the promises to the sorrowing heart and makes this precious word a living voice from our Beloved!

It is the joy of prayer. Its element is the closet, and its source the Mercy-seat. No prayerless life can be a happy one. "They that wait upon the Lord shall mount up on wings as eagles." "Ask and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full."

It is the joy of meekness and love. "For the meek shall increase their joy in the Lord," and the loving spirit ever finds that "it is more blessed to give than to receive." Selfishness is misery, love is life and joy. The gentle, lowly, chastened spirit shall find all the flowers in bloom and the waters flowing in the valleys of humility. The unselfish heart shall never fail to prove the promise true, "If thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul, the Lord shall satisfy thy soul in drought, and thou shalt be like a watered garden and a spring of water whose waters fail not." 

It is the joy of service and especially of winning souls. All true work is a natural delight, but work for God in the true spirit and in the power of the Holy Ghost, is the very partnership of His joy, whose meat and drink it was to do the will of Him that sent Him and to finish His work.

The secret of the Joy of the Lord

It springs from the assurance of salvation. 

It is the joy of salvation. 

Its happy song is

 "Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine,

Oh, what a rapture of glory Divine 
Heir of salvation, purchased of God,
Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood.
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour all the day long."
If you would know it you must accept His promise with full assurance of faith, and rest upon His word without a wavering or a doubt.

It is the joy of the Holy Ghost. "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy." It is not indigenous to earthly soil; it is a plant of heavenly birth. It belongs to the kingdom of God, which is "righteousness, and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost." To know it we must receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit in full surrender and simple faith. It is the characteristic of all who receive this baptism that they know the joy of the Lord, and until we do receive this eternal fountain in our heart, all our attempts at joy are but surface wells ; they are waters often defiled and their bottom often dry. This is the great Artesian stream, the "well of water" Jesus gives "springing up unto everlasting life."

It is the joy of faith. "Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing." There is indeed a deep delight when God has answered prayer, and the joy of fulfillment and possession overflows with thankfulness, but there is a more thrilling joy when the heart first commits itself to His naked promise, and standing on His simple word in the face of natural improbability, or even seeming impossibility, declares, "though the fig-tree shall not blossom nor fruit be in the vines, yet will I rejoice in the Lord and joy in the God of my salvation." If you are doubting God you need not wonder that your joy is intermittent. The witness of the Spirit always follows the act of trust. "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee, because he trusteth in Thee," but it is just as true, "Surely, if ye will not believe, ye shall not be established."

The Joy of the Lord is our strength for the body.

"A merry heart doeth good like a medicine." This is the divine prescription for a weak body. And so on the other hand, despondency and depression of spirits are the cause of nervousness, head-ache, heart-break, and low physical vitality. A word of cheer and an impulse of hope and gladness will often break the power of disease. 

It is true there is a deeper cause and a diviner power than the mere natural influence of joy. Incurable disease can only yield to the actual touch of Divine omnipotence, but joy is the channel through which the healing waters flow, and the overflow of the life of Christ in both soul and body.  If you would live above your physical conditions, if you would renew your strength continually and "mount up on wings as eagles, and run and not be weary, and walk and not faint," if you would carry in your veins the exhilaration and zest of unwearied youth and freshness, if you would know, even here, in all its fullness, the foretaste of the resurrection life in your body, if you would be armed against the devil's shafts of infirmity and pain, and throw off his arrows upon your body as the heated iron repels the water which will not lie upon it, then, beloved, "Rejoice in the Lord always, and. again I say, Rejoice."

The Joy of the Lord is our strength for temptation.

"Count it all joy," James says, "when ye fall into divers temptations." One reason for this is because it is the best way to meet them. The devil always gets the best of a melancholy soul. Despondency will always bring surrender. Satan is so little used to joy in his own home that a happy face always scares him away. Amalek got hold of the hindmost of Israel's camp, the discouraged ones who were dragging behind and fretting about the hot weather and the hard road they had to travel. Such people always find the way harder before they get through. The fiery serpents, which were the devil's scouts, stung the murmuring multitudes, and it was an upward look to the brazen serpent that healed them. Jehoshaphat's armies marched to battle and victory with shouts of faith and songs of praise, and so still the joy of the Lord is the best equipment for the great conflict. But the apostle also means, no doubt, that temptation is no cause for despondency, but rather a great opportunity of spiritual progress. It is the proving of our armor and an evident token that the devil sees something in us worth trying to steal, and we may be very sure where the army of the enemy is encamped there the army of the Lord is also near. "The trying of our faith worketh patience, and let patience have her perfect work." Let us go through all the discipline and learn all that it has to teach us, and "when we are tried we shall receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to them that love Him."

Let us then go forth into the conflicts which await us without a fear or cloud, and when we cannot feel the joy, but "are in heaviness through manifold temptations," let us "count it all joy," and say, "I will rejoice in the Lord, and I will be joyful in my God."

The Joy of the Lord in trials

The joy of the Lord is our strength for the trials of life. There are two ways of bearing a trial; the one is the spirit of stoical endurance, and the other through the counteracting forces of a holy and victorious joy. It was thus that Christ endured the cross for the joy that was set before Him, and then He could despise the shame and not even allow the smell of fire to remain upon His garments. We read in the first chapter of Colossians the prayer of the apostle for a company of saints who had already reached such a measure of holiness that they were made partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light; but there was something higher and better for them, namely, that they should be ''strengthened according to His glorious power unto all patience and long suffering with joyfulness." "Patience" to endure the trials that come from the hand of God, and "long suffering" to endure those which come from men, and both to be endured with real joyfulness. In fact, there is nothing to endure when the heart is full of joy. It lifts us wholly above the trial, and we do not realize that we are being afflicted or wronged. The blessedness of true self-sacrifice is in being so filled with God that we will not have any sacrifice. What luxury of grace it is thus to be lifted above all that could even try the heart! The rocks are not taken from the bottom of the stream, but the blessed tides rise so high that the ships sail far above them in the current of God's great joy. And so the apostle explains his self-sacrifices for the Philippians, "Though I be offered on the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice with you all."

The joy of the Lord always counts on something better than we lose, and remembers that there is one above who is the great Recompenser and Restorer, and will give a thousand times more by-and-by for one victory of patience and love than all the world is worth to-day.  Yes, the joy of the Lord is our strength for life's trials, And lifts the crushed heart above sorrow and care,

Like the nightingale's song, it can sing in the darkness, And rejoice when the fig tree is withered and bare.

The Joy of the Lord

"The joy of the Lord is your strength." 8:10

There is no more pointed difference between Christianity and all other religions than the element of joyfulness. "God is Light and in Him is no darkness at all." The blessed God must be the source of blessedness. His Beloved Son, our Pattern and our Saviour, is the Prince of Peace, and the Royal Bridegroom, whom God "hath anointed with the oil of gladness above His fellows," and surely His salvation should be a glad salvation; His touch should bring joy and sunshine, and they who follow Him should be true to His own ideal of that happy company who "shall come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away." As we look over the earth we find that God has put beauty and gladness wherever He can. He has made us to be happy, and He has sent redemption to restore and consummate our joy, and so His great salvation is inseparably linked with a rejoicing spirit. True, it can stoop to sorrow; it will enter the saddest home and the darkest midnight, but it cannot dwell with gloom. It must banish sorrow as well as sin, and live in the light of joy.

Beloved, let us take the joy of the Lord into the dark places and the hard places and the low places, and the dusty, grimy streets and lanes of life! Let us plant the flowers around the little cottage as well as the great mansion! Let us have the song of the birds along the wayside, and even in the night, as well as in the gilded cage of the drawingroom and in the broad sunshine of the day! Let us rejoice in the light evermore and go through the pathways of common life so filled with the Spirit that like men intoxicated with the wine of heaven, we shall be heard "speaking to ourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in our hearts to the Lord," and then it shall be true, "Whatsoever we do in word or deed," we shall "do all in the name of the Lord Jesus givingthanks unto God by Him."