Some receive the knowledge of forgiveness without much conviction of sin, and usually their appreciation of Christ as Savior is proportionately feeble. He that is forgiven much, the same loveth much (Luk 7:47). There may be the sense of forgiveness, with little realization of needing it. The evening was not a dark one, and the morning is not a very bright one, although it may be a happy one.
If you have gone on in the world and its ways, wounding your conscience by sin and folly, before your conversion, the Savior, if you are really separated to Him through grace, is loved by you in proportion as you feel your escape from the penalty of your sins, and the judgment that impended over you (there is nothing impending over those whom God knows are going to choose salvation—for those who should be saved will be saved—NC). But then your love for Him is with reference to your former course. I think a great deal depends on the exercise of conscience (always knowing being accepted of Him—NC) and the nature of it which we pass through, before conversion or before we get peace with God.
Some having been raised under the law have tried to be good, and having failed in efforts, they delight in Christ not only as their Savior, but as their righteousness, the answer to everything which their souls need before God. I see again some who have gone against their conscience, and have done wicked things; when convicted, they for the most part are occupied with the grace which has delivered such wretched sinners. The one has not been able to satisfy his conscience though making every effort to do so; the other has openly and violently ran counter to his conscience.
Then there is a third class who, Isaac-like, have a quiet, easy life, and have little exercise of conscience (not appreciating it enough yet—NC), because walking according to the approved order of things in which they have been brought up. Grace presents a Savior and forgiveness of sins to them, and they have the sense of pardon unknown to them before, but they have not suffered much from the need of it.
This latter class are like the widow of Sarepta; they enjoy the quietude until some great link to the scene is broken, and then they learn their natural unfitness for God (1Kingd 17:18); then the sufficiency of Christ above and out of death is known to the soul, and it is as if it were a new conversion; and a devotedness follows unknown to the other classes, unless they have learned the evil of their natures as well as relief from its evils.
The one who learned the evil of his old nature (“old man”—NC) before God, will be far more devoted than the one who has only known pardon from the sins of the nature. The latter may be more enthusiastic in love to the Savior, but it is because of what He has done for him. The one who has found Him as his in the presence of the Father outside and apart from the old man, will rejoice in what He is to him, and Christ is his gain. The one who has found Him as his righteousness before God grows in the excellence of the knowledge of Christ.
The first evening may be the darkest. The widow of Sarepta’s was not; but the dark evening came, and the bright morning followed. We have many evenings and many mornings. To my mind the sense of Christ is greater when He is known in preserving from evil (2Th 3:3—NC), rather than in rescuing from it. I think some natures, as Peter’s, will not bow without an actual fall; others submit and humble themselves when they reach only the brink; and others are subdued when they see the precipice from which His strong arm saves them. I think every evening the foundation is enlarged and deepened (2Co 3:18); and hence as one gets on, the Cross and all that has been affected thereon gets a fuller and clearer place in the soul; but this must ever be with the realization of being united in glory to Him Who was here.
—J B Stoney
MJS daily devotional for February 5
“The defect in souls in general is the incompleteness of their conversion. It is pardon that is apprehended and not acceptance. Acceptance embraces God’s side—how He feels, and this should be chief, for we as sinners have offended Him. The offender has been removed from His eye by a Man—the Lord Jesus Christ, and He can receive us on the ground of the Man who glorified Him in bearing our judgment.
“We cannot enjoy acceptance but in the way in which it was acquired or effected for us, and if we are in the acceptance we know that no improvement of the flesh could commend us to God, and that we cannot be before Him but in Christ. But if we are in any degree dark as to the crucifixion of the old man, we are not in acceptance experientially, we are not in the daily benefit of it, and our liberty by the Spirit can never go beyond our conscious acceptance.”
—James Butler Stoney (1814-1897)
Note: The material from the online “None but the Hungry Heart” daily devotional is central to the entirety of the Plymouth Brethren writings (1700-1800’s). They are unsurpassed in the spiritual growth teachings of Paul’s 13 Epistles, from Romans to Philemon.
May the Father teach us to deeply bestow to Him all the love due Him!
If you have gone on in the world and its ways, wounding your conscience by sin and folly, before your conversion, the Savior, if you are really separated to Him through grace, is loved by you in proportion as you feel your escape from the penalty of your sins, and the judgment that impended over you (there is nothing impending over those whom God knows are going to choose salvation—for those who should be saved will be saved—NC). But then your love for Him is with reference to your former course. I think a great deal depends on the exercise of conscience (always knowing being accepted of Him—NC) and the nature of it which we pass through, before conversion or before we get peace with God.
Some having been raised under the law have tried to be good, and having failed in efforts, they delight in Christ not only as their Savior, but as their righteousness, the answer to everything which their souls need before God. I see again some who have gone against their conscience, and have done wicked things; when convicted, they for the most part are occupied with the grace which has delivered such wretched sinners. The one has not been able to satisfy his conscience though making every effort to do so; the other has openly and violently ran counter to his conscience.
Then there is a third class who, Isaac-like, have a quiet, easy life, and have little exercise of conscience (not appreciating it enough yet—NC), because walking according to the approved order of things in which they have been brought up. Grace presents a Savior and forgiveness of sins to them, and they have the sense of pardon unknown to them before, but they have not suffered much from the need of it.
This latter class are like the widow of Sarepta; they enjoy the quietude until some great link to the scene is broken, and then they learn their natural unfitness for God (1Kingd 17:18); then the sufficiency of Christ above and out of death is known to the soul, and it is as if it were a new conversion; and a devotedness follows unknown to the other classes, unless they have learned the evil of their natures as well as relief from its evils.
The one who learned the evil of his old nature (“old man”—NC) before God, will be far more devoted than the one who has only known pardon from the sins of the nature. The latter may be more enthusiastic in love to the Savior, but it is because of what He has done for him. The one who has found Him as his in the presence of the Father outside and apart from the old man, will rejoice in what He is to him, and Christ is his gain. The one who has found Him as his righteousness before God grows in the excellence of the knowledge of Christ.
The first evening may be the darkest. The widow of Sarepta’s was not; but the dark evening came, and the bright morning followed. We have many evenings and many mornings. To my mind the sense of Christ is greater when He is known in preserving from evil (2Th 3:3—NC), rather than in rescuing from it. I think some natures, as Peter’s, will not bow without an actual fall; others submit and humble themselves when they reach only the brink; and others are subdued when they see the precipice from which His strong arm saves them. I think every evening the foundation is enlarged and deepened (2Co 3:18); and hence as one gets on, the Cross and all that has been affected thereon gets a fuller and clearer place in the soul; but this must ever be with the realization of being united in glory to Him Who was here.
—J B Stoney
MJS daily devotional for February 5
“The defect in souls in general is the incompleteness of their conversion. It is pardon that is apprehended and not acceptance. Acceptance embraces God’s side—how He feels, and this should be chief, for we as sinners have offended Him. The offender has been removed from His eye by a Man—the Lord Jesus Christ, and He can receive us on the ground of the Man who glorified Him in bearing our judgment.
“We cannot enjoy acceptance but in the way in which it was acquired or effected for us, and if we are in the acceptance we know that no improvement of the flesh could commend us to God, and that we cannot be before Him but in Christ. But if we are in any degree dark as to the crucifixion of the old man, we are not in acceptance experientially, we are not in the daily benefit of it, and our liberty by the Spirit can never go beyond our conscious acceptance.”
—James Butler Stoney (1814-1897)
Note: The material from the online “None but the Hungry Heart” daily devotional is central to the entirety of the Plymouth Brethren writings (1700-1800’s). They are unsurpassed in the spiritual growth teachings of Paul’s 13 Epistles, from Romans to Philemon.
May the Father teach us to deeply bestow to Him all the love due Him!
