Category: Jesus

Do It Now!

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Oswald Chambersby Oswald Chambers

Agree with your adversary quickly . . . —Matthew 5:25

In this verse, Jesus Christ laid down a very important principle by saying, “Do what you know you must do— now. Do it quickly. If you don’t, an inevitable process will begin to work ’till you have paid the last penny’ ( Matthew 5:26  ) in pain, agony, and distress.” God’s laws are unchangeable and there is no escape from them. The teachings of Jesus always penetrate right to the heart of our being.

Wanting to make sure that my adversary gives me all my rights is a natural thing. But Jesus says that it is a matter of inescapable and eternal importance to me that I pay my adversary what I owe him. From our Lord’s standpoint it doesn’t matter whether I am cheated or not, but what does matter is that I don’t cheat someone else. Am I insisting on having my own rights, or am I paying what I owe from Jesus Christ’s standpoint?

Do it quickly— bring yourself to judgment now. In moral and spiritual matters, you must act immediately. If you don’t, the inevitable, relentless process will begin to work. God is determined to have His child as pure, clean, and white as driven snow, and as long as there is disobedience in any point of His teaching, He will allow His Spirit to use whatever process it may take to bring us to obedience. The fact that we insist on proving that we are right is almost always a clear indication that we have some point of disobedience. No wonder the Spirit of God so strongly urges us to stay steadfastly in the light! (see John 3:19-21).

“Agree with your adversary quickly . . . .” Have you suddenly reached a certain place in your relationship with someone, only to find that you have anger in your heart? Confess it quickly— make it right before God. Be reconciled to that person— do it now!

by Oswald Chambers

“I am with you all the days”

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A.B. Simpsonby A.B. Simpson

Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world —Matthew 28:20

Literally, Jesus is saying, “I am with you all the days.” He comes to us each day with a new blessing. Every morning, day by day, He walks with us with a love that never tires and a blessing that never grows old. And He is with us “all the days;” it is a ceaseless abiding. There is no day so dark, so commonplace, so uninteresting that we do not find Him there.

Often, no doubt, He is unrecognized, as He was on the way to Emmaus, until we realize how our hearts have been warmed, our love stirred, our Bible so strangely vivified, with every promise seeming to speak to us with heavenly reality and power. It is the Lord!

God grant that His living presence may be made more real to us henceforth. Whether we have the consciousness and evidence-as they had a few glorious times in those 40 days-or whether we go forth into the coming days as they did most of their days to walk by simple faith and in simple duty, let us know this fact always, that He is with us, a Presence all unseen but real and ready when we need Him to manifest Himself for our relief.

by A.B. Simpson