For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.
— Colossians 2:9-10
In the New Testament, John tried to tell us about God. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (1:1). "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth" (1:14). John the Mystic tried to tell us how great God is. The Apostle Paul also gave us insight on who God is. . . . And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.
Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ" (Colossians 2:15-17). Why am I giving you all these passages of Scripture? Because I want to tell you who it is who says, "Present your bodies to me. Take your cross and follow me. Give yourself wholly to me. Surrender to me. Concentrate upon me and learn to be fascinated by me." He is the only One who can say it.
thought
We give ourselves to the One who has given Himself. We are given fullness in Christ. Are we experiencing that fullness?
prayer
Incomprehensible, Lord, that You would receive one like me. But You do! And to You I give myself.
It is possible for us to go through spiritual experiences that can rouse us, the spiritual equivalent of a springtime in the meadow.
I have seen it happen, and I would like to see it happen today. . . We can have the spiritual equivalent of springtime in the meadow, but we have to enter in.
The tree waits it out, and even the animals have to wait it out. But you and I, being made in the image of God and having wills of our own, can do something about it.
We can appeal directly to our hearts.
We do not need to lie like a field covered over with snow.
We can stir ourselves up.
We can run to meet the sun.
We can create our own crisis, because the job is not for meadow and grass, but for our own hearts.
These other things only illustrate spiritual springtime. We can stir ourselves up. We can bring out the sun, and we can bring on the springtime. How do we get this to happen?
First it must come to the individual.
I have no faith in anything that happens to a church that does not happen to the individual.
If it does not affect the individual, numbers of individuals, if it is only a sort of social overtone that affects everybody momentarily,
I have no faith in it at all.
verse
Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
— Psalm 51:10
thought
Wrote William Quayle: "Christ is come and has changed my winter into laughing spring." He can change your winter, too!
prayer
Father, like the lost son, I get up and come to You. I embrace the springtime.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
There is such a thing as a renaissance, a personal revival.
The best illustration is the coming of the springtime on the farm. The snow will lay all winter long, and in some places you don"t see the ground until springtime. How utterly dead everything looks, but you know that life is still there. The trees are stark, but there is life in them. The roots in the ground are all quiet, but there is life down there. Just below the frost line are the worms, the bugs, the mice, the moles and the chipmunks. They are all there, and there is life down there. They are all waiting for something, listening for Mother Nature to say, "Stir up the gift of God that is in thee." Then comes the spring; the snow goes, and the blotches and patches begin to appear. The bobwhites begin to whistle their happy but monotonous song on the sunny side of the hill. The cattle begin to kick up their heels and run about the fields. That is spring. Pretty soon all the snow is gone, calves are born and lambs are about, and we start all over.
Thank God, it is all new. There is such a thing in the Christian life as going under for a winter. In other words, something happens to you, little by little, until you get snowed under and frozen over.
There is life down there, covered up by the frost and ice. It may be hidden; it is there somewhere.
verse
I said, "Oh, that I had the wings of a dove! I would fly away and be at rest?"
— Psalm 55:6
thought
"Lord, to my heart bring back the springtime. Take away the cold and dark of sin," wrote Kurt Kaiser. The sunshine of His presence melts the snow and the ice. We feel we are growing again.
prayer
Lord, bring back the springtime into my life. Refresh, renew! For Jesus' sake.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
It is possible to be beaten until you are numb.
You can smile and praise the Lord and say, "Jesus, I my cross have taken," for a while. But then you are slowly beaten until you are numb, and you get into a sort of a rut where you cannot fight back.
Timothy had been with Paul a long time, and Paul had been in so much trouble so much of the time.
Timothy was taggging along behind in the same trouble, and Paul had noticed a little temptation to be ashamed of the cross.
Essentially, Paul was saying, "Don't be ashamed of the cross. Don't shrink from the affliction of the gospel. God has not given us the spirit of fear."
Then in Second Timothy 2:3, Paul said, "Endure hardship with us like a good soldier of Christ Jesus."
It is as though he might have detected in the young man a little temptation to recoil a bit from the hard life he was called into.
Paul knew that Timothy was basically a sound man.
He knew Timothy had been reared in a Christian home.
He mentioned Timothy's grandmother, Lois, and his mother, Eunice. The grandmother and mother were both Christians, and good ones.
Young Timothy had learned and become a Christian early in life.
Paul knew that he was basically sound.
But Paul was afraid that the pressure of things and the boredom of always being in the minority might put Timothy in danger of leveling off.
verse
Endure hardship with us like a good soldier of Christ Jesus.
— 2 Timothy 2:3
thought
Hardship hurts, especially if it appears to us that by going incognito as a believer we can avoid it. Are we good soldiers, poor ones or have we gone AWOL?
prayer
Lord, You know how I shrink from hardship. Yet, by enduring it, I can grow as in no other way.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
. . . The old soldier, Paul, was about to retire; that is, the Lord was about to take him home.
Before he went he wrote a letter to his young coworker, much younger than he, but a noble young man.
Timothy was full of faith, having been reared in a family where the faith of God was strong. He had proven himself a hundred ways in working with the great man Paul. But even Timothy, though very busy and even because he was so busy, was in danger of settling into a rut.
Otherwise Paul would not have said, "Fan the flame."
In the King James this is translated "stir up the gift of God."
In Scripture God never uses superfluous words.
He never says to a person who is wide awake, "Wake up!"
He never says to a person who is lying down, "Lie down!"
He never says to someone standing, "Get up!"
And He never says to a person who is already stirred up, "Stir up!"
God never wastes His words, and He never makes any little speeches like a person called upon at the laying of a cornerstone.
Nor was Paul wasting words or giving a little talk that would be good just about anywhere. "Stir up the gift of God that is in thee" (KJV). Timothy needed this, or it would not have been written.
The evidence is that Timothy, even though a hard-working and faithful man, was in danger of getting into rut.
Paul said, in effect, "Don't be ashamed of the cross."
verse
For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. . . . So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me his prisoner. But join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God. He has saved us and called us to a holy life.
— 2 Timothy 1:6,8-9a
thought
God gives spiritual gifts to all believers. We need to be aware of the gifts He has given. Your gift and mine sometimes must be rekindled or fanned into flame, otherwise it may just burn out through unuse or misuse.
prayer
Father, show me how to fan into flame that gift You have given me that by its use You may be glorified.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
Jesus gives the story of the man who was covetous and lost his soul.
So do not be covetous-be generous.
Do not be stingy, but be free with your money.
Do not be afraid thank the Lord, trust Him and put fear away.
These are examples of the constituted means of faith and obedience.
We sing this and do not know we are singing it: "Trust and obey, for there's no other way/ To be happy in Jesus, But to trust and obey."
We sing that, but we have sung it so long that we might as well sing Mother Goose rhymes, because we do not know what we are singing.
Some of us are down in a spiritual rut, the old routine. Nothing has any taste to it.
Some churches try to handle that by pandering to the situation, bringing in every kind of weird claptrap in order to get some of the poor half-dead people to get a little taste again.
We have God.
We have Christ.
We have truth.
We have a world needing help.
We have the saints, and we have the power of prayer.
We have the joy of obedience and we have the sweet wonder of His presence.
We have the joy of Christian song.
We have all this and we do not need garbage.
We have God.
All we have to do is trust in His Son Jesus Christ and obey the truth, and the Lord will manifest Himself, show Himself through the lattice.
verse
. . . I came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of (The Message).
— John 10:10
thought
Spiritual reality eludes us when we merely play Christian and dip our toes in the water from the shore. Let's jump into His fullness, holding nothing back. Then we will know Him and grow in Him.
prayer
O God, forgive me for living like a spiritual pauper when You want me to have life to the full. I'm going to follow You, in Christ's enablement.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
The Lord said to become children.
If we all became children, how beautiful that would be.
You could walk up to a man and shake his hand without wondering, "Do I know enough judo to handle him?" He would not hurt you.
Christians here are not going to hurt anybody, so just be perfectly candid. This is one passage you can practice no matter who you are or where you are. It touches you right now. "I tell you, whoever acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man will also acknowledge him before the angels of God." (Luke 12:8).
This passage tells us we are to testify and witness boldly about our Lord Jesus.
If some of you would begin to quietly witness where you work, you would find a change coming over you. "Whoever has my commands and obeys them. . . [I will] show myself to him" (John 14:21).
You will get out of the rut when the Lord begins to manifest Himself to you.
But you would rather go off somewhere and get down on your knees and pray. Now praying is right? I have taught and preached and practiced it since I was converted. But do not try to pray down something that the Lord is telling you to do.
Do what you are told, and the Lord will be right with you. . . .
verse
Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins.
— James 4:17
thought
We sometimes use "spiritual activity" to avoid doing what we know God wants us to do. Sometimes by prayer we try to change God's mind. And all the time we are missing His best for us!
prayer
Lord, I rise up to do what I have long known You want me to do. Trusting You, I am going to do it.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
Obedience to Christ proves we love Him, and in return He shows Himself to us.
You say, "There are so many commandments, how can I obey?
How can I remember them all, and can I be sure I am obeying?"
In faith and love, rest, wait and look.
Then as His teaching touches your life, conform to it. There are some teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ that you would never get into because they would not touch you.
They would not impinge on you in your present state. But as soon as they do touch you, then you automatically, sweetly and quietly obey.
A man was giving testimony about being shipwrecked and praying, and about how the Lord delivered him.
A dear old man of God went home, got on his knees and wept before the Lord. "God," he said, "You never saved me from shipwreck."
And the Lord said, "Son, have you ever been at sea?" The man answered, "No."
Of course you cannot save from shipwreck a man who has never been offshore.
There are things that do not touch you, but the moment they do, obey instantly.
For instance, the Bible says, "Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord" (Ephesians 5:22). If you do not have any husband, why worry about that one?
But if ever the words of our Lord Jesus Christ touch your life, instantly because you are totally committed gladly and quietly obey and do what you are told.
He said that is your part, and His part is to manifest Himself to you and get you out of the rut.
verse
I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me.
— John 10:14
thought
There is a simplicity in just following the Lord day by day. He shows His will in increasing areas of life and, as we follow, radical change occurs.
prayer
You lead, Great Shepherd. I can follow You in confidence. You lead. You feed. You enable. Thank You!
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/
Faith in Jesus is not commitment to your church or denomination.
I believe in the local church; I am not a tabernacle man.
I believe in the divine assembly.
We ought to realize that we are, as a group of Christians, a divine assembly, a cell in the body of Christ, alive with His life. But not for one second would I try to create in you a faith that would lead you to commit yourself irrevocably to a local church or to your church leaders.
You are not asked to follow your church leaders.
You are not asked like a little robin on the nest to open your innocent little mouth and just take anything I put in.
If what I put in is not biblical food, regurgitate and do not be afraid to do it. Call me or come see me or write me an anonymous letter. But do something about it.
Do not, by any means, swallow what your leaders give you.
Here is the book, the Bible; go to it.
Faith is faith in Jesus Christ, God's Son.
It is total faith in Christ and not in a denomination or church, though you may love the church and respect and love your leaders and your denomination.
But your commitment is to Christ.
verse
What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe?as the Lord has assigned to each his task.
— 1 Corinthians 3:5
thought
God uses human leaders in leading us. But they can stumble and fall. Our faith commitment must be in Him. It is to Christ that we are ultimately responsible.
prayer
It is You I want to follow, Lord, You. Help me to distinguish You and Your leading from the human leaders You use but who sometimes fall.
https://cmalliance.org/devotionals/tozer/