Month: February 2012

“Happiness or Happen-ness?

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Vance Havner 90x115by Vance Havner

The things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the Gospel. Philippians 1:12

Rejoice in the Lord always and again I say, Rejoice. Philippians 4:4

“WHICH HAPPENED” is not in the original, but the idea is. This world’s happiness should be spelled “happenness,” because it depends on what happens. Paul’s joy was not over the things which had happened unto him, things the world would call calamities. Yet he was happy because he knew that all things work together for good to the Christian. What men mean for evil God turns to good, as He did with Joseph.

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The Inner Chamber of Humankind

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A.W. Tozer 90x115by A.W. Tozer

The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children." Romans 8:16

However we may explain this mysterious "ground" within us, we will not have been long in the Christian way until we begin to experience it. We will find that we have within us a secret garden where no one can enter except our self and God. Not only does no one else enter, no one else can enter. This secret inner chamber is the sacred trysting place for Christ and the believing soul; no one among all our dearest friends has the open sesame that will permit him to enter there. If God is shut out, then there can be only everlasting loneliness and numb despair. Where God is not known in the inner shrine, the individual must try to compensate for his sense of aloneness in whatever way he can. Most persons run away to the world to find companionship and surround themselves with every kind of diversionary activity. All devices for killing time, every shallow scheme for entertainment, are born out of this inner loneliness. It is a significant and revealing fact that such things have in these last days grown into billion dollar enterprises! So much will men pay to forget that they are a temple without a God, a garden where no voice is heard in the cool of the day.

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