Edition 17 November 17th  2009

In this edition:

●Wise words of old. (Part one)

_________________________

Wise words of old for today

●This is a collection of some very powerful quotes relating to many things. They are from old-school preachers dating back from the 1700s to the early 1900s. None are from today's preachers and teachers. As you well, know I am no fan of modern preachers with few exceptions. Many of these quotes are shocking in today's terms, but this is because 'today' has moved so far away from yesterday. If these were appropriate hundreds of years ago, they are much more so today!

You can be part of the great apostasy or the great awakening. Both are gathering momentum today. To be part of the prophesied great apostasy (falling away from the faith) you need do nothing...just drift along with the flow. To be part of the great awakening, you need to set your heart and soul after our great Messiah with determined purpose and everything in you.

We are entering a time period where many things will be shaken. Ignorance will be the breading ground of great deceptions. The wrath of God, the wrath of the devil and the wrath of man will all hit the world together. To be ready and to be able to stand securely, you need a lot more than simply to know the truth. You need to have it forged and fired into the very core of your existence. To be safe and right with God you need a soft and broken heart before Him and to know deep spiritual truth backwards!

I've selected a very small handful of quotes from A.W Tozer, Watchman Nee and Charles Finney. They're in no particular order. These are from many books, perhaps a few hundred in all, which I've meticulously and lovingly digested over the last 30 years. I cut my spiritual teeth on the material from these guys and consider them my spiritual fathers. With the addition of Derek Prince. Paul the apostle said that it's good to have many instructors but few fathers.

I have so many of these quotes that from time to time I'll present you with more in some future editions. I'll space them out a fair bit because this is a departure from prophetic subjects, but nonetheless of great importance today.

Books and other publications by these three are available through the 'Resources' link at the top.

Jeremiah 6:16 "Ask for the old paths, where the good way is and walk in it; Then you will find rest for souls."

Tozer, Nee, Finney (below)

The words of life:

A.W Tozer (late 1800s) The Old Cross and the New and some other books: He was a prophet of his time, and a prolific author. His legacy reaches well beyond his grave and has impacted countless millions calling them to a deeper life in God.

"All unannounced and mostly undetected there has come in modern times a new cross into popular evangelical circles....From this new cross has sprung a new philosophy of the Christian life and a new type of meeting. The old cross would have no truck with the world. For Adam's proud flesh it meant the end of the journey. The new cross is not opposed to the human race, rather it's a friendly pal. It's the source of oceans of good clean fun and innocent enjoyment. It lets Adam live without interference. His life motivation is unchanged; he still lives for his own pleasure"

"God offers life, but not an improved old life. The life He offers is life out of death. It stands always on the far side of the cross. God salvages the individual by liquidating him and then raising him again to newness of life"

"Truth is the daughter of God. If you look for truth you may find comfort in the end. If you look for comfort, you'll get neither"

"Nothing less than the whole Bible can make us a whole Christian."

"Today we need those with a baptism of clear sight, who can see through the mists of confusion with prophetic vision"

"The neglected heart will soon be overrun with worldly thoughts, his life will soon become a moral chaos as the creeping wilderness takes over. Complacency is a deadly foe of spiritual growth"

"We are not diplomats but prophets, and our message is not a compromise but an ultimatum."

"Refuse to be average. Let your heart soar as high as it will. Many Christians today have wasted their lives"

"The idea that this world is a playground and not a battleground has now been accepted by the vast majority of Christians...they are no different to dressed up drunks"

"Whatever a person wants badly and persistently enough will determine that person's character"

Sound Bible exposition is an imperative MUST in the church. Without it no church can be a New Testament church. Christianity today is man-centred and not God-centred"

"The way to deeper knowledge of God is through the lonely valleys of soul poverty and abnegation of all things."

"The thoughtful soul to solitude retires. Modern civilization is so complex as to make the devotional life all but impossible. It wears us out with multiplying distractions and destroys our solitude"

"The idolatrous heart assumes that God is other than He is, and substitutes for the true God one made after its own likeness. This God will conform to the image who created it - a monstrous sin. People today have modified God and created Him in their own image."

"Many today have an imaginary Christ to keep them satisfied, but they also have an imaginary salvation"

"Among the plastic saints of our times Jesus has to do all the dying and all we want is to hear another sermon about His dying. No cross for us, no dethronement, no dying. We remain king within the kingdom of mansoul and wear our tinsel crown with all the pride of a Caesar; but we doom ourselves to the shallows and weakness of spiritual sterility."

"Before the church goes into eclipse, there must first be a corrupting of her simple basic theology. The masses of her adherents come to believe that God is different from what He actually is; and that is heresy of the most insidious and deadly kind"

"Christianity has become so entangled with the world that millions never guess how radically they have missed the New Testament pattern. Compromise is everywhere. The world is whitewashed just enough to pass inspection by blind men posing as believers."

"There is scarcely anything so dull and meaningless as Bible doctrine taught for its own sake. Truth divorced from life is not truth at all"

"People who refuse to worship the true God now worship themselves with tender devotion. Every person is as holy as he wants to be"

"Too many Christians want to enjoy the thrill of feeling right, but are not willing to endure the inconvenience of being right"

"We become what we love"

"The Lord will not fully bless a man until He has fully conquered him."

"In Christ I have died yet I'm more alive now than before."

"I live here but I'm not at home here."

"I lose my life to save it."

"I am wisest when my reason is defeated."

Watchman Nee 1903 - 1972: The Normal Christian Life. The Salvation of the Soul. He was thrown into prison in China for his beliefs where he spent most of his life. Of the 100s of Nee books only one was written by him. All the others were collections of his notes smuggled out of prison. Prison authorities tore his tongue from his mouth in an attempt to silence him. He was a man of incredible suffering.

"Whatever is produced by the mind lacks spiritual power"

"Our end is God's beginning. Too many have gone too far for the world to use them and not far enough for God to use them. The Christian life is not a changed life but an exchanged life."

"Separation to God and from the world is the first principle of the Christian life."

"We will lose interest in the world and see it's doom and it in will lose interest in us when the power of the cross is at work in us."

"With complete consecration comes perfect peace. I want nothing for myself and everything for my Lord"

"Are you living for the Lord or for yourself. Rest lies in looking to the Lord and not ourselves. It's a great thing when I discover I am no longer my own, but His"

"The soul renounced shall abound in the boundlessness of God's life."

"There is nothing more tragic than to come to the end of one's life and then know that we have been on the wrong course"

"Unless self love is abandoned the believer will forever shrink back when called to take up the cross for Christ"

"God's way of deliverance from sin is altogether different from man's way. Man's way is to try and suppress sin by seeking to overcome it. God's way is to crucify the sinner"

"He who is able to accept everything gladly from the Lord - including dryness and barrenness and completely disregard self, is he who lives for Him"

Charles Finney 1792 - 1875: Revival Lectures (No preacher since New Testament times has ever had as many converts remain faithful until death as those converted under Finney)

"Christians are more to blame for the lack of revival than sinners for not being converted"

"Revival pre-supposes that the church has sunk so low. Revival is then a return of the church from its backslidden state. Only then can sinners be converted. True revival breaks the power of the world and sin over Christians. The salvation of sinners follows revival in the church"

"When a worldly spirit is in the church it is seen in Christians conforming to the worlds ways in dress, talk, reading of novels and their music, it shows that they are far from God. Even their prayer is an abomination to God"

"Today's Christians are half-converted and their conversion is of their own minds.".

"The unsaved are affected by the conviction of truth seen in its believers."

"Christians are to testify to the guilt and danger of sinners, the reality of hell, the necessity of a holy life, denying self and the soon coming of the Lord"

"Christians today make the impression that Christ loves the sinner so much and with such compassion, that they have nothing to fear. The church has given many a false comfort and hope."

"All sinners are on the very verge of hell and in a danger far greater than they can imagine. The sinner must be made to feel distressed. The comfort full of death relieves this blame."

"God comes to the sinner with pardon in one hand and a sword in the other; repent and live or refuse and perish."

"If Christians accommodate a love for the world, they make the salvation of the world impossible"

"Most ministers today are rocking the cradle of a sleepy church, compromised with the world"

"Today's Christians make their vows to God and then go and bow down at the shrine of fashion and other worldly pursuits and then wonder why there is no revival. Christians declare by their conduct that there is no truth in the gospel"

"Millions of souls will meet you on their judgement day and if permitted to speak, would curse you for leading them to hell by your practical denial of the truth"

"The evils of gay balls must be condemned"

"Revival will cease when the doctrine shifts from truth, when there is disunity in the church, when the church no longer honours the Sabbath and when the church takes the neutral ground on morals."

"You can't obey God and error. The church needs more division. If they are not agreed on truth keep them out."

"True doctrine is indispensible to growth in grace. Rightly instructed and trained the Christian will take the right road, if not they will backslide."

"A want of entertainment and a lack of spiritual conversation is evidence of a backslidden heart."

"Where there is no revival it is all the fault of the church."

______________________________________________

In closing, I took this picture of this magnificent giant Baobab tree some 3000 years old and 40m in circumference. (There is another similar tree in the 'God's Garden section) To stand strong through time in the face of many storms, droughts, and upheavals we need to be deeply rooted in the things of our Messiah!

Kind regards and many blessings...Shalom and grow in grace!