We Love God!

God: "I looked for someone to take a stand for me, and stand in the gap" (Ezekiel 22:30)

A motive is an emotion, desire, a felt need, or an impulse of some kind that impels a person to action or to certain pursuits. Thus, motives are crucial to everything a Christian does. They not only have temporal repercussions, but God’s promises of future and eternal rewards are related to both faithfulness on the job and to motives. Proverbs tells us, “All the ways of a man are clean in his own sight, But the Lord weighs the motives” (Prov. 16:2). Thus, motives are vital to whatever we do. To the Corinthians he wrote, “For our reason for confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience, that with pure motives and godly sincerity, not by human wisdom but by the grace of God, we conducted ourselves in the world, and all the more toward you” (2 Cor. 1:12). Then in 1 Corinthians he wrote, “So then, do not judge anything before the time. Wait until the Lord comes. He will bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the motives of hearts. Then each will receive recognition from God” (1 Cor. 4:5).
J. Hampton Keathley

We are often told that we limit the atonement of Christ, because we say that Christ has not made satisfaction for all men, or all men would be saved. Now, our reply to this is, that, on the other hand, our opponents limit it: we do not. The Arminians say, Christ died for all men. Ask them what they mean by it. Did Christ die so as to secure the salvation of all men? They say, “No, certainly not.” We ask them the next question: Did Christ die so as to secure the salvation of any man in particular? They answer “No.” They are obliged to admit this, if they are consistent. They say, “No. Christ has died that any man may be saved if” – and then follow certain conditions of salvation. Now, who is it that limits the death of Christ? Why, you. You say that Christ did not die so as infallibly to secure the salvation of anybody. We beg your pardon, when you say we limit Christ’s death; we say, “No, my dear sir, it is you that do it.” We say Christ so died that he infallibly secured the salvation of a multitude that no man can number, who through Christ’s death not only may be saved, but are saved, must be saved and cannot by any possibility run the hazard of being anything but saved. You are welcome to your atonement; you may keep it. We will never renounce ours for the sake of it.
C.H. Spurgeon

    • CXCIX. Without God.

    Posted on

    EPH. ii. 12. “Without God in the world.”

    I AM told to believe that there is no God; and before
    doing so I wish to look on the world in the light of this
    solemn denial. In giving up this idea I shall have to make
    several sacrifices. Let us see what they are.
    I. I have to part with the most inspiring and ennobling
    books in my library.
    II. I shall have to banish the earliest and tenderest
    memories which have gladdened my days.
    III. I shall have to give up the hope that in the long
    run right will be vindicated and wrong be put to eternal
    shame.
    IV. I shall have to sacrifice my reason, my conscience—
    in a word, myself. My whole life is built upon the holy
    doctrine of God’s existence.
    Are you prepared to make this sacrifice to Him?
    It is possible to acknowledge God with the lips while
    the heart is far from Him.
    J. P.

    Related Articles: