My Daily Meditation for the Circling YearJowett, John Henry
Religion
My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year
Jowett, John Henry
Calendars; Devotional exercises
And thus the gifts are manifold in order that every man may find his
completeness in his brother. One man is like an eye--he is a seer of
visions! Another man is like a hand--he has the genius of practicality! He
is "a handy man"! One is the architect, the other is the builder. And each
requires the other, if either is to be perfected. And so, by God's
gracious Spirit, the individual man is only a bit, a portion, and he is
intended to fit into the other bits, and so make the complete man of the
race.
MAY The Thirtieth
_FINDING THE DEEP THINGS_
"_The Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God._"
--1 CORINTHIANS ii. 7-12.
The deep things of God cannot be discovered by unaided reason. "_Eye hath
not seen:_" they are not to be apprehended by the artistic vision. "_Ear
hath not heard:_" they are not unveiled amid the discussion of the
philosophic schools. "_Neither hath entered into the heart of man:_" even
poetic insight cannot discern them. All the common lights fail in this
realm. We need another illumination, even that provided by the Holy
Spirit. And the Spirit is offered unto us "that we might know the things
that are freely given to us of God."
And here we have the reason why so many uncultured people are spiritually
wiser than many who are learned. They lack talent, but they have grace.
They lack accomplishments, but they have the Holy Ghost. They lack the
telescope, but they have the sunlight. They are not scholars, but they are
saints. They may not be theologians, but they have true religion. And so
they have "the open vision." They "walk with God," and "the deep things of
God" are made known to their souls.
We must put first things first. We may be busy polishing our lenses when
our primary and fundamental need is light. It is not a gift that we
require, but a Friend.
MAY The Thirty-first
_CONNECTION AND CONCORD_
"_By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body._"
--1 CORINTHIANS xii. 12-19.
It is only in the spirit that real union is born. Every other kind of
union is artificial, and mechanical, and dead. We can dovetail many pieces
of wood together and make the unity of an article of furniture, but we
cannot dovetail items together and make a tree. And it is the union of a
tree that we require, a union born of indwelling life. We may join many
people together in a fellowship by the bonds of a formal creed, but the
result is only a piece of social furniture, it is not a vital communion.
There is a vast difference between a connection and a concord.
Many members of a family may bear the same name, may share the same blood,
may sit and eat at the same table, and yet may have no more vital union
than a handful of marbles in a boy's pocket. But let the spirit of a
common love dwell in all their hearts and there is a family bound together
in glorious union.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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