TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE

[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE SAINTS' ATTENDANTS
by George B. Kulp

   
  # Psalm 23:6 -- "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life."

    Wonderful poem dictated by the Holy Spirit! I do not wonder at the praise lavished upon it by a brother who today is in the presence of the King. I linger on his words while my heart is stirred by their aptness and beauty. He says, "One of the things that we never get tired of is this Shepherd Psalm. More people read that poem than any poem ever written. More people know that poem than any poem that was ever written. Dr. McClure was not the first man, nor the last that, dying, limped his way through the poem of the Shepherd's Psalm. People have read that Psalm or repeated it with the rain of many tears dashing in their faces; people have loved that poem and have repeated it with the wildest winds of trouble that ever blew, blowing upon them; people have put that poem under their tired heads for a sleeping pillow; people have leaned on that poem for a staff better than alpen stock when they climbed the wicked winter mountains; people have had that poem when their way was dark and arduous. Oh, hearts, this is God's own pastoral! Some long since poet, he of the harp and the shepherd's voice, and the shining eyes and bounding steps, he saw it and felt it, and then did like all poets do -- said the thing he saw and felt, and that is the "Shepherd Psalm." And now, hearken, O child of God, the man who gave us the beautiful description of this Psalm one time after this said, "I am the saddest man in the world." The winds were blowing on his face as he went down to the valley, but thank God, this man, too gentle and Christ like to harm others, felt the blows that sin in others bring; but he had the attendance of God's own goodness and mercy, until the gates opened and he saw the glory of which he had often spake, and realized the blessedness of being in the presence of the Bishop and Shepherd of his soul.

    Out yonder by the side of the brook, whose waters refresh him, I see a man of God; and the birds of the air by divine appointment wait upon him. Ravens are his servants, bringing him food from afar. Morning and evening the Providence of God sets his table, and God's winged messengers place on it bread and meat.

    Again I see him lying under a juniper tree sleeping as only a worn and weary man, discouraged, can sleep, when an angel touches him and says, "Arise and eat," and before him was a cake, broken on the coals, and a cruse of water. First the birds of the air, then the angels from heaven, but all caring for one man of God.

    Out yonder near a city in Samaria, I see another man; his enemies are closing fast around him. There are legions of them, all intent upon His destruction, and to human eyes that destruction is certain and sure. But when God opens the eyes of that man's servant he sees above the head of his enemies on all hilltops round about, horses of fire and chariots of fire, a part of God's celestial army, an advance guard from the skies to help, aye, to deliver one man of God. In fact, that is the designation of this man. He is not known by the string of letters after his name, but friends and enemies know him as "the man of God." The schools do not confer this title; it comes first from the skies when God looks down and says of a converted, redeemed soul, "He is mine." Thank God, all may be known as such who will meet the conditions.

    Yonder in the jail, yes, in the inner prison, in Jerusalem, I see a sleeping apostle, at Easter time. Herod intends to behead him to please the Jews. Man proposes but God disposes, and in the darkness of the night an angel arouses him from his slumbers, leads him out of the cell, out of the prison, out through the gates of the city and bids him go on his way. Man is immortal till his work is done, and evidently God has more for this man to do.

    But two of these men are prophets, and the other one is an apostle; they are eminent men of God, but will God care for His children, His followers today as He did then? Have we any such evidences as will show a divine interest in man, now, as we see in these instances in the past? Is there present care, present deliverance, present attendance, for God's children now? Aye, to be sure there is. The visits of the ravens to the prophet by the side of the brook, of the angel to the sleeping man under the juniper tree, are only expressions of God's goodness given for our encouragement, object lessons from the past, lessons from the King's kindergarten of days gone by. Some time ago a friend said to a good old saint who was on the western slope, "How are you today?" And the reply was, "I am resting in God's easy chair." Oh, tell me where is that? "Romans 8:28: All things work together for good to them that love God. Philippians 4:19: My God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory through Christ Jesus my Lord." Fine piece of furniture to add to your belongings and it is free.
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE SAINTS' ATTENDANTS
by George B. Kulp

    Oh, yes, today we have, as children of God attendants every day who wait upon us. Many professing Christians today are like Moses: they pray "Show me thy glory," when it is the last thing they are fit to see. God answered that prayer, but not as Moses asked. He just put him in a cleft of the rock, and made His goodness pass before him, and eighteen hundred years afterward when he was unencumbered with a body, he showed him on the summit of Mount Tabor, His glory; and when Peter, James and John, in the body, saw the same glory, they were so overcome that they knew not what they said. God knew what was best for Moses, so He passed before him in the cleft of the rock, and proclaimed, "The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering and abundant in goodness and truth keeping mercy for thousands." But today far beyond the privilege that Moses enjoyed we are hid in the rock that was cleft on Calvary, and not for one day, but for three hundred and sixty-five days in every year, the goodness and mercy of the Lord passes before us. The Christians of the Twentieth Century are living on the tallest mount of the ages, nearer God in point of privilege than any age in the past. Go back to that time when just one man was privileged to see these things and tell the multitude? Go back to that time when Israel followed the cloud by day and the fire by night? Go back to that day when three men only go up in the Mount with Jesus? Nay, nay, nay; I prefer this blessed, Holy Ghost dispensation when every man can commune with God and when goodness and the mercy of God are to be seen every day. "Oh," someone says, "I wish I could see them!" Open your eyes, yes, the eyes of your soul. There is an old proverb, "Seeing is believing." I want to give you something better that is founded on God's Word. Get it, will you; let it burn into your very soul, "Believing is seeing. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the proof of things not seen. Blessed are they who having not seen with their mortal eyes yet have believed. Faith and trust are the eyes of the soul. Use them and be glad. You will see far down the future, and say with the sweet singer of Israel, "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life." Some folks testify, "Goodness and mercy have followed me all the days of my life." I am glad of that. No doubt it is true, but it is the privilege of you and every child of God to say, "shall follow me all the days of my life." The meaning and the experience are like this: they shall be my attendants -- God's goodness and mercy -- all the way.

    Let us examine this privilege. Goodness supplies all our need, is the treasurer of God's storehouse. Do not talk today about ravens to feed a man, angels to do his baking and cooking, the heavens to drop manna right on the pathway six days out of seven. Why, the believer today has as a constant attendant the goodness of God, goodness that in the years gone by has been feeding, warming, clothing, enriching, redeeming the millions of God's children. Why, I am ashamed that I haven't trusted more. Just to think for one moment! When the world's oppressed millions of God's own children needed a land in which they could grow to the stature of free men, goodness gave then, a continent; when the wood was giving out, and the timber was growing scant, goodness uncovered the coal mines that man might be warmed and cheered; when the great monsters of the deep decreased, and as humanity increased and homes were multiplied, that these homes might be illuminated, goodness uncovered the reservoirs of oil, and we have it in wonderful supply. Goodness is love in action, and goodness waits on man. Believe it? Aye, I can and do believe anything that magnifies the goodness of God. Ever since Christ was lifted up on Calvary's cross that man might be raised to a throne, I have been a believer in the text: Goodness shall attend me all the days of my life. Some time ago I saw an engraving. It represented several scenes in the life of man, as the artist saw them. First a little child -- standing on life's pathway. The path ran near a precipice, but between the child and the danger was a guardian angel. In another scene was a youth embarked on the stormy waters of life. Here and there were the rocks, but the angel still guided the boat and the youth was safe. There was still another scene. It was of an old man drawing very near to the eternal shore, peaceful, serene and triumphant, and still the angel pilot was there. When Admiral Farragut was dying in Chicago, at a hotel, he wanted his pastor, or some man of God, to pray with him, and his wife sent for the preacher. A servant in the hotel who was a Romanist sent for the priest and the priest came in a hurry. It would have been" sent all over the world that in his dying hours the hero of Mobile Bay had called for a priest. The priest approached the bedside and began with the services of the church, but the Admiral shook his head, again and again. His wife, seeing something was wrong, drew near and asked what was the matter, and the dying Admiral said, "I want my own pilot. I want my own pilot." Thank God, we can have, clear down to the end, goodness and mercy until faith is lost in sight, and we look on the King in His beauty and are inhabitants of the land that is now afar off. Oh, it is true, "The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him." They say in England that if a man walks, he is poor; if he sometimes calls a hack, he is better off; if he has a footman, he is rich; and if he has two footmen he has a great inheritance. Judging by that every child of God has a great inheritance, for two of God's servants goodness and mercy are always with him. Paul wrote to Timothy of an inexhaustible supply in Christ Jesus, for who can measure the riches of the grace of God as manifested in the gift of His Son to be our Savior? Think of it! goodness by your side all the time, in his hand the key to a never-failing storehouse. and in your possession the promise, "Every need shall be supplied!" Ask largely that your joy may be filled. Some one who evidently knew puts the Christian's privilege in verse:
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE SAINTS' ATTENDANTS
by George B. Kulp

    "I have a never-failing bank,
    A more than golden store;
    No earthly hank is half so rich
    How then can I be poor!

    'Tis when my stock is spent and gone,
    And I'm not worth a groat,
    I'm glad to hasten to my bank,
    And beg a little note.

    Sometimes my banker smiling says,
    'Why don't you oftener come!
    And when you draw a little note,
    Why not a larger sum!

    Why live so niggardly and poor?
    My bank contains a plenty.
    Why come and take a one-pound note?
    When you might have a twenty.

    Nay, twenty thousand ten times told
    Is but a trifling sum,
    To what my Father has laid up
    For me in God's own Son.

    Sure then my Banker is so rich
    I have no need to borrow.
    But live upon my notes today,
    And draw again tomorrow."

    But we must not pass by mercy for mercy does not pass us by. Mercy blots out all our sins. I remember when I went to the altar a poor penitent sinner, and the burden of my prayer was, "Lord, have mercy on me!" Mercy is the first thing a sinner, conscious of his guilt, applies for. At the battle of Bull Run a wounded soldier as he laid on the field cried, "God have mercy on my soul!" It seemed to be contagious; for here and there among the wounded, the cry was taken up, "Have mercy on me, O 'God." The Psalmist declares, "Thou art plenteous in mercy O God." But who counts the mercies? Who recognizes mercy as an attendant upon the believer? And yet we are the recipients of continual mercy. A benevolent person gave Rowland Hill a hundred pound note to dispense to a poor minister. It was too much to send all at once, so Mr. Hill put a five-pound note in a letter and also these words, "There is more to follow." In a few days he sent another letter, same amount and same words, and so until the hundred pounds were all sent. So God sends us one mercy after another and with every blessing comes the promise, "More to .follow." "I forgive your sins, but there is more to follow. I adopt you into my family, but there is more to follow. I sanctify you, but there is more to follow. I make you more than conqueror, in the very hour of death, but there is more to follow. I receive you unto myself in heaven, but there is more to follow."

    "When we've been there ten thousand years,
    Bright shining as the sun;
    We've no less days to sing God's praise
    Than when we first begun."
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE SAINTS' ATTENDANTS
by George B. Kulp

    Still always more to follow. Mercy and goodness not only follow us here, but they assure us of a home hereafter. I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. The Psalmist said, "I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. A day in thy courts is better than a thousand." God's worst, smallest, is better than the devil's best. Better have the lowest place in God's economy of grace than to sit on the devil's throne. Any place in God's Church is better than we deserve. When the poor prodigal made up his mind to come back to his father's house, he was so mindful of his unworthiness that he determined to ask, "Make me as one of thy hired servants, for I am not worthy to be called thy son." Paul speaking of this great privilege says, "But God who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he has loved us, Even when we were dead in trespasses and sins, hath quickened us together with Christ and hath raised us up together and made us to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." Beloved, are you sitting together in heavenly places in Christ? Are you singing as your present experience:

    "I am dwelling on the mountain,
    Where I ever would abide;
    For I've tasted life's pure water
    And my soul is satisfied.

    There's no thirsting for life's pleasures,
    Nor adornment rich and gay,
    For I've found a richer treasure,
    One that fadeth not away."

    "Oh, the blessed privilege of the children of God, sitting in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, dwelling in the House of the Lord! An old saint said one time, "Why, I live there." We do not have to wait until we die to sit there, to live there.' 'Tis heaven below, my Redeemer to know." "NOW are we the sons of God." To the Christian this world is just the ante room to .heaven, and death is just the corridor to the more beautiful part of the Father's house. Bye and bye we shall go through it, and with the mortal changed to immortality, with this earthy changed to the heavenly, with eye undimmed, seeing no longer through a glass darkly, but face to face

    "Knowing as we are known,
    How shall I love that Word,
    And oft repeat before the throne
    Forever with the Lord!"

    And that forever means, Home forever, trials all past, death and the grave past, inside the city of our God and Home forever, cruel partings past, our loved ones with us for ever.

    "No chilling winds nor poisonous breath,
    Shall reach that healthful shore; .
    Sickness and sighing, pain and death,
    Are felt and feared no more."

    I have imagined a Christian dying; no, not dying, that is a misnomer. I have imagined the homegoing of the Christian. Friends are weeping all around. Heart strings are snapping. Farewells are being said. Every breath is watched as the last, but I see that pilgrim step out of the house of clay, and mount upwards to the city of our God. I hear him as he shouts, "Old body farewell, earth farewell," and as the songs of the redeemed fall on his ear, with goodness and mercy his constant attendants still by his side, he enters in through the gates into the city of our God. And all the angels strike their harps of gold, and all the prophets shout, and all the redeemed sing, as our Christ rises from His throne to greet his last trophy from earth and says to him in tones that thrill the Church triumphant, and makes all the bells of heaven ring for joy, "Enter thou into the joys of thy Lord and sit down on His throne."

    "Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing,
    My great Redeemer's praise,
    The glories of my God and king,
    The Triumphs of His grace.

    Angels assist our mighty joys,
    Strike all your harps of gold,
    But when you raise your highest notes,
    His love can ne'er be told."

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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
IT IS WRITTEN
by George B. Kulp

   
   
  # Romans 10:15 -- "It is written."

    I have very little regard for that method of using the Bible that will permit one to open it at random, put the finger on the verse, and then take it as a message from God. It lacks common sense. One might as well go in a drug store, shut your eyes and reach out your hand and place it on a bottle, and then take it as a remedy from God, and expect to get well. God says in the Word, "Search the Scriptures ... for they are they which testify for Me." The disciples at Berea were more noble than those at Thessalonica, because they searched the Word as to whether these things were so. A knowledge of the Word can be obtained only by a faithful, systematic study of the Book. Suppose you lived in that age and state of the world in which human nature is found unenlightened by the revelation made in the Word. Just fancy yourself back there in the darkness of heathenism; the paths of virtue and safety obscured; your Maker hidden from your view; your origin, your future, your destination, unknown; the way to the tomb, your inevitable course, haunted with specters of doubt and dismay; your heart turning hither and thither, asking for light and direction, but finding only darkness and uncertainty. In the midst of this gloom, suppose the heavens opened and there descended to you a messenger bringing to you a book which informed you of your origin and destiny, which revealed to you the true God, and told you that He loved you, -- a book which made the path of every virtuous excellence plain before you, and disclosed to you a title, an eternal title to immortality. With what transportation you would receive it! The book which he gives you, you would press to your lips, hold to your heart, you would drop on it tears of excessive joy. As the messenger returns to the skies, you would follow him with benedictions until he vanished from your view, and the precious volume you would carry to your home with joy and exultation. You would call in your friends, your neighbors, all your loved ones, and you would tell them of the gift God had sent to you; and were the wealth of the world offered to you in exchange for it, you would clasp it to your heart and declare it to be above all price. Take away the Scriptures and what is your condition but that of unenlightened nature? Think of the inspiration of the Scriptures, and their important contents; and what is their value less than if brought to you immediately and directly from the skies? All the Scriptures are of God, and to you is the Word of this salvation sent. Yet who today regards them at their value? For the love and kindness of God in giving us the Word, no gratitude is too much, nor too excessive. But because we have always been in the enjoyment of it, its light and comfort are familiar to our minds; we be hold it as we do the sun in the heavens, unmindful of the majesty and benignity of its Author, and almost unconscious of the importance of its beams. When one thinks of the inspiration of the Scriptures, of their completeness, and of their end and uses, unless you are ungrateful to your Maker and unjust to yourselves, you would be like the Psalmist, -- as glad of God's Word as one that findeth great spoils. Hear him as he says, "Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against Thee." Oh, how men professing to be called of God do miss it when they resort to hymn books, and literature, to get a text or a subject, when they are to preach!

    Preaching is not a profession, -- it is a calling, and men are to preach for eternal results. This morning, while in prayer at the family altar, I asked God, when I was no longer a blessing, to take me out of the world and home to heaven. The ministry is to preach the Word, and win souls; and the preacher who does not do it, no matter how many letters are with his name in his weekly advertisements and bulletins, he is missing the teaching of the Word, and the call of God; and had better go to judgment from a land of darkness, than from a pulpit where he has been a miserable failure before God, the angels and the host of the redeemed. Would to God that every preacher would feel with Paul the burden of the ministry, and the value of souls, and could get a vision of the eternal results that follow! All men need this Book in life; they need it in the dying hour. They need the Christ it tells of, the One whom; men are to preach, if they meet the thought of God. A Southern Christian woman was dying, and in her delirium she imagined that she was riding in her carriage with her faithful servant in the carriage seat. "Is David driving?" she asked. "There is no danger if David is driving." "No, no, Missus," replied the weeping Negro at her side, "Poor Dave can't drive now, de Lord has hold on de lines." And he spoke the truth for all ages. The Lord of life holds the lines, and guides the saints through the gate of death into the Paradise of God. Rabelais, when dying, said, "I am going to meet the great Perhaps." Poor fellow, when the child of God comes to the end, taught by the Word, he exclaims with the dying Horace Bushnell, "Well, now we are all going home together, and I say the Lord be with you -- and in grace -- and peace -- and love -- and that is the way I have come along home." Thank God for a faith built on the Word -- thank God for the word, "It is written."
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
IT IS WRITTEN
by George B. Kulp

    The exhortations of the Spirit are here for our admonition, exhortation, and instruction in righteousness. "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches," -- and that is just as appropriate to the church and the world today as it was when first uttered. Jesus is not only the Savior of men, but He is the great Example; not example merely, and yet His life is teaching us the way to God, heaven, and victory. When He was assailed in the wilderness He was well equipped for the conflict. He was acquainted with the Jewish Scriptures, the Old Testament, that you and I have today; and to each suggestion of the tempter He never offered an argument, -- He merely replied with a portion of the Word of God. He was able to say at once to the enemy, "It is written," because He knew what was written. He knew what was in the Word, and by it He repelled effectively every assault of Satan. When Paul wanted to enforce an argument he would write, "For the Scripture saith," and to the old prophets, "Thus saith the Lord," was the rock from which they could not be moved. Paul writes to his son in the Gospel, "Give thyself to reading," knowing well that no one was equipped for the Christian life unless acquainted with the Word. During the late war, and also over in the Philippines, some of our men were armed with the old Springfield rifle, while others had the Krag Jorgensen. The Springfield was effective at half a mile while the Krag Jorgensen was effective at a mile or two miles. The Spaniards were armed with the Mowzer, and had a decided advantage over our men who were armed with Springfields. Our Government, knowing this, made a decided effort to arm all our soldiers with the K. J. rifle. They wanted them at their best and able to contend with any foe. The Bible is the best weapon for the Christian. It is an arsenal full of weapons. It has the Sword of the Spirit, -- the weapon that Jesus used in the wilderness, the dynamite of the Holy Ghost; and it is the duty of every child of God to be well acquainted with the Word. It fits him for any battlefield, any enemy that hell may inspire. It comforts in every hour of trial, and strengthens in moments of weakness. When we have such a book at our command, I do not wonder that the late Oswald Chambers said, "It is a crime to be weak." It enables the believer to say in the confidence born of the Word, when hell assails; "Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy; for though I fall yet shall I rise again." The Word of God was the weapon of Jesus Christ. He might have called on His Father for a legion of angels, and they would have been given to Him but, instead, for your encouragement and mine, He used the Word. It was the weapon of the Apostles. They preached Jesus. The great Apostle to the Gentiles said, "For I am determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified, to the Greeks foolishness and to the Jews a stumbling block, but to them which are saved Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God." Such were the victories they achieved that their enemies said, "These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also." An illiterate man who was called of God to preach one time went among his fellows and used this for a text, and his divisions were something like this, "The world is wrong side up. It needs to be turned upside down. Third. We are the fellows to do it." God blessed him? Of course He did. He takes the weak things to confound the mighty. There was a man whom some folks said did not have good sense, but he was impressed that since God had saved him he ought to work for God and get others saved. A lawyer attended the same church to which this man belonged. The pastor was very desirous of saving the lawyer and winning him for the church, so he prepared a sermon to meet the lawyer's case. One night he preached this sermon when the lawyer was present. Shortly after, the lawyer gave his heart to God and joined the church. The pastor felt that his sermon under God had done the work. But get the truth now, and see how God works: The brother who had not much sense went to the lawyer in meeting one night. He was interested in his salvation. The pastor saw him and wished he would stay away from the lawyer, for he knew he would drive him away. The brother said to the lawyer, "Don't you want to go to heaven?" "No," was the reply. "Then go to hell," was the rejoinder, and the brother left him. The lawyer was asked by the pastor, "What part of my sermon was it that convinced you?" "Oh," said the lawyer, "It was not your sermon. I could have answered every part of that, every point you made. It was that dunderhead who came to me and asked me if I wanted to go to heaven, and I told him, 'No.' He told me, 'Then go to hell.' And I got to thinking, 'That is where I am going, if I do not repent.' And I began to pray and asked God to save me. That is why I am here." God can bless any small effort even of the weakest when it is for His glory. He does do it. I have heard many sermons as unctionless as a last year's bird's nest, fine, some folks called them; and then I have heard others that were apparently without point, but God blessed them and souls were saved. Preach the Word. It holds good today, and is owned of God.

    There are promises in the Word of God for every condition of life, and an acquaintance with them inspires the soul with confidence. Peter says, "Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises; that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature." And that man called of God to preach the Word says, "Beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God." Let us use them, avail ourselves of them. Do you know what is here for you already provided? Is it not a wonderful provision of God that you can turn at any time to the Word and find there something that will defeat the enemy?
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
IT IS WRITTEN
by George B. Kulp

    When David was without a sword they told him there was none except the sword of Goliath; and, as he remembered how he had hewed off the head of the giant when he was but a stripling he said, "Give me that, there is none like it." So there are no weapons for you, my brethren, like these that have been proved and tried in the days gone by. When tried, ask the Holy Ghost to guide you in the selection, and then use it to the glory of God. By so doing you are in the Scriptural, Apostolic Holy Ghost line, and you will always find that victory is sure and yours. The Lord did it three times in the wilderness. The enemy charged on Him three times, but He received each assault on the point of the Sword, and the devil was glad to retreat. IT IS WRITTEN, it is written, it is written; you need no other; follow the example of the. Lord, and with Him have the victory. Look, here is a weapon for a storm -- tossed soul -- one who has taken his mind and his trust off the Lord. Look at him. He wakes in the morning and thinks of his cares; thinks of his troubles; dwells on them; regale's his friends with them; takes them to work with him; brings them home with him, and goes to bed with them. You have met him; you know him. Troubles assail him on every side, -- a whole phalanx of cares -- but there is a weapon in the Word of God that will put them all to flight. Use it. It is written, "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee; because he trusteth in thee." Here is another, "Casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you." Peter walked bravely on the waters until he looked on the waves, then he began to sink. Look to Jesus, and walk anywhere the providences of God call you.

    But here is another person. Cares? No. Sickness? No, never was sick a day in his life. But the devil assails him; casts his fiery darts at him day after day. The enemy comes in like a flood; temptations are sore; intense smell of the pit. What is there in the Word of God for such a time? Listen, "When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him," and the margin reads, "and put him to flight." Claim that at once. God still lives and the promise is true, true for you. Claim it and sing,

    "Should earth against my soul engage,
    And fiery darts be hurled,
    Then I can smile at Satan's rage
    And face a frowning world.

    Let cares like a wild deluge come;
    Let storms of sorrow fall;
    So I but safely reach my home,
    My God, my heaven, my all."

    You may have the victory by taking the Word. Simple? To be sure it is; but so many want another way, forgetting that God works by simple processes, that He may bring to naught the wisdom of the mighty. If some folks had been at Jericho they would have rejected rams' horns, and the marching six days, and, on the seventh day, marching seven times, and then worst of all, "shouting." They would have said, "No shouting, please." They would have silver trumpets, and dress parades, -- but God's way brought the victory. The heroes, of whom we have an account in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, put to flight the armies of the aliens by faith in God's Word. Cares, and trials, and afflictions, and temptations, and demons, stand in mortal dread of "it is written." O church of the living God, O ye men and women, ordained before the foundations of the world were laid to be holy and victorious, use the Word, and put to flight all that opposes. Oh, that the prophets of the land were sounding forth that which is written, instead of sermonettes on agnosticism, and evolution, and the state of affairs in Europe. "Go preach my Gospel," saith the Lord. "Bid the whole world my grace receive. He shall be saved who trusts my Word. He shall be damned who won't believe."

    Prepare yourself beforehand for time and eternity, for life and for death.

    Listen to this: "Perfect love casteth out fear;" all fear; fear of men and devils; fear of judgment. I surely am an admirer of Paul, -- he would walk in every path that God opened up to him. The Holy Ghost testified to him that bonds and afflictions awaited him in every city. Friends implored him with prayers and tears not to go. They dreaded the power of Rome, but lions and perils and demons and threatened death, all failed to stop him. He declared, "I am not only ready to be bound at Rome; I am ready to die for the Lord Jesus' sake also." Fear casts a shadow, -- brings gloom and dread into the heart; but just as when you open the shutters, and let in the sunlight, you drive out all the darkness, so the love of God perfected in the heart, drives out all fear and timidity, and makes the weakest one to say, "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me."
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
IT IS WRITTEN
by George B. Kulp

    With a full assurance of the value of the Word you can look adversity, and afflictions, and cross purposes, all in the face, and in advance shout the victory, saying, "I know whom I have believed;" and He has it written in the Word, "All things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose." "None of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself." You can bunch them all and say, "I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come ... shall be able to separate me from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus my Lord." For it is written, "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee." Look at Joseph in his dying hour: He gathers his brethren and kinsmen around him and in dependence on the Word of God he says, "God will surely visit you, as He swore unto Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence." He believed God's Word, and I have thought, as I read the last verse in the Book of Genesis, "And Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years old; and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt," that unburied coffin was standing evidence of their dependence on the Word: He will visit us as He said, and we shall go up out of this land. Victory and freedom are certain because, "It is written." Do you know what that WORD meant? Let me illustrate. Here is an acorn, a bushel of them. What do you see? "Oh," you say, "acorns, just acorns." Why, bless you, beloved, I see oak trees, and timber and bridges and ships and navies and conquests and victories, all right there in those acorns. So in that promise I see Red Seas crossed, rivers divided, walled cities taken, enemies defeated, Israel in Canaan, -- complete victories. So in "it is written" I see victory for every child of God over everything that may arise, -- victory in the midst of the darkness; victory when friends do not know what to make of you; victory when death comes into the home; victory, till in the very presence of death you may shout defiance to the grim monster and say:

    "Knowest thou not when my Master died,
    Thy sting was lost in His wounded side;
    And the gates of steel and the bars of brass
    Gave way that the King of kings might pass?"

    "It is written," "I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms shall destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God; whom I shall see for myself, and mine eves shall behold, and not another." Amen!

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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THERE IS CORN IN EGYPT
by George B. Kulp

   
   
  # Genesis 42:12 -- "There is corn in Egypt."

    Genesis is the book of beginnings. Many streams from which the saints of all ages have quenched their thirst have their source in these chapters. Man may turn from these lessons taught here and say to us who revere the whole Book, that we are "under the law," yet when I remember that this Old Testament was the Scriptures of Jesus which He advised the people of His day to search, declaring at the same time, "they are they which testify of Me," I conclude, for one, that I will stay by the whole Book. Genesis is the authentic basis of the Bible. Before I enter its portals to scan the treasures it contains, I am overwhelmed by the statement the Divine mind first makes to man, "In the beginning God." Remember, in this, no matter what great mysteries are revealed to my untutored mind, nor how massive the truths I meet, God is the explanation of all these. What He does not see fit to reveal to me now I shall know hereafter. But there are more facts left on record than I can comprehend. I learn that in all ages God has had a people, and, wherever He has had a people, there the providences of God were engaged in their behalf. The man who slept on the mountain top all alone said he "had God for his next door neighbor;" but as I step quickly along the history of man, passing from century to century, scanning the footprints of the race, I find also the footsteps of God Himself, always working good to man. And I am firmly convinced "His footsteps down the centuries beat one eternal rhyme." If man fails in the garden under the most perfect conditions, I find that God gives him another opportunity and brightens the clouds that lower over him with a precious glowing promise: 'The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." If I find man unrepentant and wicked until God in His wrath lets loose the reservoirs of the skies, and the fountains of the great deep are broken up until the waters, rising mountain high, sweep a race beneath their waves, thank God, I also find those very same waters bearing on their breast an ark of salvation that assures the coming of a mighty Deliverer who shall destroy all the works of the devil. In the loins of the occupant of that ark is the seed of the Comer (so the Jews call the Messiah), the Christ of Calvary. In the Book of Genesis I learn unmistakably this great comforting truth, you cannot thwart God. Shadows may come, but back of the shadows is God, keeping watch above His own. The clouds we so much dread are big with mercies. Man may say God is on the side of big battalions, but this book declares He is on the side of truth. "The eternal years of God are hers."

    Oh the calmness of the eternal God! He takes a man out of the midst of idolaters, transplants him into a strange land, puts him in to a deep sleep, so he will be still, and then holds converse with him. "Know of a surety thy seed shall be as the stars of the heavens for multitude, and they shall be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them, and they shall afflict them four hundred years, but that nation will judge and they shall come out with great substance." The promises of God are for the people of God. The promise made to Abraham is renewed to his son, and the same Providence cares for and watches over him. To his son's son, God again says, "Thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of." And right here I see in this man's history the story of your life and mine. God has outlined the plan for us, made it known to us in His Word, and by His Spirit, and yet we forget the Word; and, when trials come, when clouds cast their shadows, when God in love is exercising His parental right to strip us, we say, "All these things are against us." We sing with tears on our cheeks, aye, and mean it when we sing:

    "The soul that on Jesus doth lean for repose
    He'll never, no never forsake to its foes;
    That soul though all hell should endeavor to shake,
    He'll never, no never, no never forsake."

    And then within six hours or less we forget the promises of God and, distrusting His providences, let the great enemy of God and our souls get us on the run. Read carefully the context and get the lesson God would teach us.
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THERE IS CORN IN EGYPT
by George B. Kulp

    I see here the child of the promise in the midst of famine -- the land once so bountiful now blasted and withered, as if by the curse of God -- a child of God, an heir of the promise, surrounded by his children, and his children's children, all heirs of the same promise, and all threatened by the same famine. A mark of God's displeasure? Nay, a mark of His providential care. That famine is a hint from God to Jacob to move out of his nest; it is an assurance, if he but knew it, that the God of Abraham and Isaac is on the throne, and that His eyes are upon His people. We are so short-sighted that a little stress of circumstances makes us forget promises, forget the Promiser, and go to bemoaning our fate, forgetting that the "love of God is broader than the measure of man's mind, and the love of the eternal is most wonderfully kind." That famine means that the Almighty God is moving along the lines of His thought for His people, to get them where He wants them. He is pointing them to the fulfillment of His promises made to Abraham: "Thy seed shall be strangers in a strange land that is not theirs." It means that He is robbing them of sustenance, depriving them of corn; it means He wants to put them where there is corn in abundance. He cannot fail, He will not forget. To the child of promise "All things work together for good" -- all things temporal and spiritual. A man in Nebraska sowed sugar beet, and felt good over the prospect of an excellent crop. But one morning he went to his fields and the frost had nipped them badly. Discouraged, he went away to another farm that he owned, saying, "What a failure; what a disappointment!" Some weeks after, having occasion to return that way, he saw the finest crop of growing sugar beets, he had ever looked upon. The frost had only pruned the plants; the roots had struck down deeper and stronger, and he reaped bountifully from that field. When God sends a frost to nip your plans, when your prospects are blasted, hold still; God wants you to take a better grip, a firmer hold upon Himself. Paul on horseback surrounded by Roman soldiers, Paul on ship and wrecked, in charge of a Roman centurion, is more than the prisoner of Rome; he is the prisoner of the Lord Jesus Christ, who must testify for his Lord and Master at Rome, and he is on the way to greater triumphs, escorted by the cavalry of the greatest world power of the age. I hear him as he gives a trumpet blast from his Gospel trumpet, after looking over the entire field: "Who shall separate us from the love of God? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? ... Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors, through Him that loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." I am here reminded of a dying soldier boy left to perish, and no loved ones near. The chaplain came that way and found him, and, kneeling by the dying boy, he asked him of his faith, to what did he belong. "Belong?" asked the dying boy, not getting the import of the question. "Yes," said the chaplain, "of what persuasion are you?" "Oh," said the boy, not far from the glory to come, "same as Paul: I am persuaded that neither life nor death shall separate me from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus my Lord." And he responded to the last roll call, and went up to see God.

    This famine is a blessing to Jacob, if he would only look up, and it is the road to greater blessings, to promises fulfilled, to mighty displays of God's power. It is the road to divided seas, enemies overthrown, angels' food, smitten rocks, to the possession of wells already dug, cities already built, a land in which there is no scarceness of bread, that flows with milk and honey. But what trouble God does have with us to get us there! Their need was great, sure. The famine did pinch, sure. But let me say right here that God does always anticipate our needs. He is never surprised. There are no accidents with God. He is not shortsighted; He knows the end from the beginning. A gentleman visited an asylum of deaf and dumb children and, examining them, he wrote this question, "Does God reason?" One of the children wrote underneath immediately this answer, "God knows and sees every thing. Reason implies doubt and uncertainty, therefore, God does not have to reason." Aye, God knows . every need, every sigh, every heartache. God knew all about the famine, and made provision for it seven years before it came. . Down in Egypt, the richest bottom land in all the world had been producing bountifully, and the Egyptians had been storing it up for the heirs of the promise. I know the Egyptians had some, too, but that is God's way of doing. He blesses His own people so abundantly, that much of it runs over to bless other folks. There was corn in Egypt, God had not forgotten and, better yet, He had His man in charge of the corn. And more yet, His man was a friend of the famine stricken. God had not only prepared an abundance of corn, but He had been preparing the way to get the heirs of the promise to the corn. Jacob shall have corn, but God will have His way to get him there. Look at him, surrounded by his children, among them two upon whom he dotes, around whom his heartstrings seem to twine. The father's love for Joseph breeds envy in the hearts of the brethren, and they conspire to get rid of the dreamer. A dreamer sure enough he is, but his dreams are of God. In his youth God gave him intuitions of coming greatness. In his dreams of the night he saw the sun, moon and eleven stars make obeisance to him. He saw his own sheaf, standing upright in the field while eleven sheaves bowed to his sheaf. The world, aye, and the church, crucifies men who have visions from God. It sends a John Bunyan to jail while it keeps a cruel and God-defying Jeffries on the bench. And this dreamer was no exception. In his way to the future, to which God had called him to be the redeemer and preserver of his brethren, there was the pit, the dungeon, the slavery and the exile. His own brethren sell him to the Ishmaelites, take his coat of many colors, dip it in blood, and say to Jacob, "Know thou if this be thy son's coat?" And Jacob, mourning his son as dead, refused to be comforted, and said, "I will go down to the grave unto my son, mourning." Then his father wept for him. Did God permit it? Yes. Already His providence is at work for Jacob, and he is to learn the lesson, that the man who will live for God shall find that all things are his servants. Sorrows are not meant to disfigure tis; they are to transfigure. The folks who go through fiery furnaces, heated seven times hotter than they are wont to be heated; are on the way to promotion. Lions' dens and jails are stepping stones for saints. Crosses are wings by which they pass over mountains, and get within whispering distance of the throne. This sorrow is a stepping stone out of famine to plenty. Job had twice as much after his trial as he had before it. Don't let the devil frighten you by magnifying trials. Where he puts up a scarecrow depend upon it there is corn, go ahead, and find it, and find the devil's scarecrows are harmless things. My Bible says, "Many shall be purified, and made white and tried." Trials are an evidence of your sonship. By suffering with Jesus God is getting you ready to reign with Him. When famine comes He will tell you where the corn is; when trials come, grace will be nigh al hand. God is able to make all grace abound toward you that ye always having all sufficiency in all things may abound to every good work.
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THERE IS CORN IN EGYPT
by George B. Kulp

    There is an old adage, "Troubles never come singly." How we do remember such sayings of the world, proverbs born of their sorrows and unbelief! forgetting that God's Word assures us that there are two messengers of God that accompany every child of God. Listen to the sweet singer of Israel: "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life." No wonder he adds, "And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever." Trials are apt to double up, but, remember this, "When the tale of brick is doubled, Moses comes." Famine grows sore upon them, and death threatens, for Jacob says "Go down into Egypt that we may live and not die." And when they go in obedience to his command, and return with sufficient for awhile, they are told not to return unless they bring Benjamin, the son of Jacob's right hand. And very soon it is a question of life and death again, but then the Governor who has all the corn of Egypt at his command says: "No, Benjamin, no corn. Jacob, you want life; you want corn; you must let your Benjamin go." "What? Joseph is gone! Simeon is gone! Must Benjamin go, too? Will yet take him away also?" How like us today. God wants to bless us, to enrich us, to feed us, on the very same terms, but we hold on to our Benjamin though we sing,

    "The dearest idol I have known,
    Whate'er that idol be
    Help me to tear it from
    Thy throne,
    And worship only Thee."

    When God instituted the Church in the family of Abraham, He taught us a lesson we are so slow to learn. We admire the man who left everything else at the foot of the mountain, and went up with his Isaac, and deliberately bound him, and put him on the altar, but there are few Isaacs surrendered today. The church at large holds on to the dollars, the Mammon it worships, gives to build million-dollar churches, while it recalls missionaries from the fields, saying, "We have not the money." It burns incense to nets, while forgetting the world at large, dying and without hope. God help us, ministry and people, to practice what we preach! God says in His Word that there are great returns for giving up the best we have. "For iron I will give you brass, for brass I will give you silver, for silver I will give you gold." A man once said he got back more than he shoveled out, for God had the largest shovel. 'Tis true, as many of God's folks have found out. A lady of wealth being well saved took off her pearls and diamonds and, selling them, with the proceeds she built a Rescue Home. For months she visited it, taking great interest in the inmates. In a few years a precious soul saved through the instrumentality of the home was on her deathbed. She wanted to see the founder of the home, and when she came, in gratitude she told how the Lord saved her through the home, and admitting that if it had not been for the Home she would have been lost. As she bent over to kiss the lady's hand, the tears fell on the fingers where the diamonds were once worn. And as the lady looked at them, in gratitude to God she said, "My diamonds have come back again." Surely God gives us back again that which we have given Him.

    How loath we are to surrender the dearest! He says, "I want your boy for Africa, I want your girl for India." "O Lord, anything but that." "I want your property. I want to transmute your gold into jewels for my crown. I want to send the Gospel abroad. I want others to hear that there is corn in Egypt. Give Me your money." God wants our dearest and best, and we must surrender or starve our souls.

    I see old Jacob standing at the door of his tent: "Joseph is gone, Simeon is gone, and now Benjamin! I am bereft indeed!" But was he? How we do misinterpret God's dealings. Down yonder Joseph is Governor of all Egypt, and all the corn is in his hands, at his disposal, and his heart is longing for Jacob. Down yonder Simeon is boarding at Joseph's expense, and the land of Goshen, the garden spot of Egypt, awaits the whole family. Jacob, cheer up! "We scan His works in vain. God is His own interpreter, and He will make it plain." A lady was working on a piece of tapestry when her pastor came in and, seeing the wrong side of it, he said, "What a strange piece of work! No figure! The whole thing is askew." "Oh," she said, "you are looking on the wrong side of it. There is another side." When Joseph, and Simeon, and Benjamin are all gone, when the last surrender is made, then trust a little, and you will soon see the wagons coming, -- wagons that Joseph will send for you; for Joseph is alive and he will come with them. He is riding in the second chariot and holds the key to all the grain. Soon you shall eat at his table, feel his embraces, and know his kisses on your lips. Do we get the lesson? Do we find this Scripture profitable? Must God tear away our nest before we will try our wings? "He builds too low who builds beneath the skies." Our treasures are in heaven. This is not our abiding place. God wants us to move on and up. Our affections must be set on things above, where our Joseph sits at the right hand of the Father. All power is given him in heaven and on earth. Trust His Word! He says, "I am with you always;" "I am coming again to receive you unto myself, that where I am there ye may be also, I go to prepare a place for you." Jacob started for the corn and on his way met the chariot, and Joseph and a great company of Joseph's friends. We are on the way, and, at any moment, our Joseph is apt to come, in His chariot riding along the edge of the clouds and with Him a great company. He will receive us to Himself. We will sup with Him. Sorrow and saints will be divorced forever. "Then let our songs abound; let every tear be dry. We are marching through Immanuel's land to fairer worlds on high."

TO BE CONTINUED......
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE LIFE ABUNDANT
by George B. Kulp

   
   
  # John 10:10 -- "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly."

    There is a wonderful fullness in the Word of God, and oftentimes, as we read, our hearts are touched by the abundant promises, and the provision made for the human race, if they will but accept of it. If we do not see this provision when we read we should take the advice of the Spirit to the church of the Laodiceans, and anoint our eyes with eyesalve that we may see. This to my mind is what David wanted when he prayed for some of God's eyesalve, "Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law." And when God anoints man's eyes, when HE opens them, then we see the truth revealed in the light of God. The veil is not on the Word, but on the heart, yet the Spirit will take away the veil, and the Bible, the Word of God, teems with wonders. It is a wonderland; it not only relates miracles, but it assures believers that greater works than these that I do shall ye do also because I go to my Father. Walk with Jesus through the Word, and let Him open the understanding, by the Holy Spirit, and, as the disciples on the way to Emmaus felt their hearts glowing within them with the new spiritual life, so will our hearts burn within us by the way. Beloved, we do not need any new revelation; we just need to search and study and love the Word, the revelation that we now have, and God will wonderfully open up the whole Californias, and Sierra Nevadas, and Golcondas and Klondikes of spiritual wealth unto each one of us. The Bible is the best seller on the bookstands today, but we need more knowledge of the Book that lies unopened on our center tables. Jesus said, "Search the Scriptures; they are they which testify of Me: in them ye have eternal life." Oh, God has mines that very few love to explore; they go after the ashes of the world; they put money into pockets that have holes; they starve their souls on the world's dainties while they might be rich. Listen to what God says in the Word, "I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment that thou mayest be clothed." Buy it, buy it, buy it! The wise man said, "Buy the truth, and sell it not." Nowhere else can we find the abundant life but through Him who is the Life. The prayer of the heart should be as Adelaide Proctor has so well expressed:

    "I do not ask O Lord
    That life should be a pleasant road;
    I do not ask that thou shouldst take from me
    Aught of its load;
    I do not ask that flowers should ever spring
    Beneath my feet;
    I know too well the poison and the sting
    Of things too sweet.
    For one thing, Lord, dear Lord, I plead:
    Lend me aright,
    Though strength should falter, and though heart should bleed,
    Through peace to light."

    The Word makes known to us the way in the very word of Jesus who was Himself the Life,the Truth, the Way. He knew that man did not have the life abundant. He knew the misery of a soul in hell, and the joy of a soul in heaven. He knows the meanness of a life left unto itself and, because He knew, He pitied us in our lost estate, and, pitying us when there was no man to help, He brought life to us. And redemption was an assured fact from that very moment for every soul who would accept of the Way as He laid it down. The soul must rise above transitory things and soar into the environment of things spiritual if it would meet the thought of God for all men. God is now waiting to come into every heart, to take full possession, to give life, and life more abundant, but we are so slow to see. A woman very busy one time entered her room as the twilight shades were falling. She went directly to her desk, turned on the gas, and began to write. Page after page she wrote; five minutes she worked, ten, then half an hour. The solitude became oppressive. She wheeled her chair around and, with a shock of joyful surprise, looked squarely into the face of her dearest friend lying on the lounge by her side. "Why, I didn't know you were here! Why didn't you speak?"

    "Because you were so busy you didn't speak to me." So it is with God. The Holy Ghost, the representative of the Father and the Son, is here all the time, but we are so busy, so taken up with other things, so engrossed with temporal and material things, we fail to listen, to recognize His presence. We can never be alive to the Infinite unless we get the life which so abundantly awaits us, aye, is proffered us on every page of the Word of God; for all these things were written that ye might believe and believing might have life through His Name.
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE LIFE ABUNDANT
by George B. Kulp

    Someone may now say; "I thought grace was free!" So it is. Water is free, but you must drink it or you will die. Air is free, but you must inhale it or you will die. Grace is free, truth is free, salvation is free, and abundant, but you must accept of it, and accept of it on God's own terms. Here is God's own air, take it in, breathe it; fill your lungs with it, and live. If you close your lungs against it, your blood will stagnate and you will die. If you close your heart to the truth of God, you will die of spiritual stagnation. Open all the channels, pay the price, empty your hands, purify your hearts, and just let -- let -- let the Holy Ghost have His way, and you will know the power of this wonderful salvation. Yes, I love this fullness of this wonderful Word; I love it because it is the fullness of God, and it is for you and for me. Praise the Lord! I take a telescope and look up to the heavens and I see stars, stars innumerable. The telescope does not put them there, but it enables me to see them. These wonderful truths are in the Word, in this blessed old Bible, but we do not see them oftentimes because our affections and prejudices and pride and distorted judgment prevent. But just let the Holy Spirit come in, give Him full possession, and He will reveal their beauty and power unto us. Some years ago I was reading after that now sainted man of God, Rev. R. V. Lawrence of the New Jersey Conference, a man who knew what the abundant life meant, and I recall partly an illustration he once used. He told of an Irish boy who was away from home, and so homesick that every day he would go down to the water's edge and look toward home. One day a gentleman who was at the shore took with him a telescope and looked across the waters with so much pleasure that he did not fail to express aloud. The boy heard him, and also expressed a desire to take a look towards home any way, not expecting to see the cabin by the water side over there. The gentleman gratified the boy, and when the lad looked across the waters and saw everything brought right alongside, he began, "There it is! There is the cabin, there are the pigs, and the boys, and there is mother sitting by the door, and there is the green grass! Oh, I feel as though I was home again!" Then turning to the gentleman, that boy who didn't have a penny in his pocket said, "Say, Mister, what will you take for this?" I do not wonder he wanted to buy it. But here is a Book from God Himself. It is the Word of God, and I put it to my eyes and by faith I see, the unseen to mortal eyes. Yonder is my home, my portion fair. Yonder are the mansions of the blessed. Yes, yonder are the loved ones who wait our coming. Yonder my Lord awaits our arrival and, as the soul of the believer catches the inspiration and fire, he sings,

    "I am thinking of home, yes of home, sweet home,
    And my spirit doth long to be
    In that far better land where the saints ever sing
    Of the glory of God, my Redeemer and King,
    And salvation so full and so free."

    Oh, the richness of the Word of God! Oh, the blessedness of the faith that brings salvation nigh! It takes the very best that language can give to express, aye, we fail to express it; language is too poor to tell what one feels as waves of glory roll over the heart that just simply believes God, and takes Him at His Word. Listen, as my heart goes out in the Word, Where sin abounded, grace doth abound. That it? Nay, "grace doth much more abound." Hallelujah! Niagaras of grace! Oh do hear it! Oh do believe it, and get blessed! God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all things, may abound in every good work. Is that it? No! No! "That ye always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work." Men, women, brethren and sisters, here is something of which you can have enough. A woman who was always poor, and never had enough of anything, one time went down to the ocean, and as she watched the waves coming in, one after another, and no cessation, she stood in open-eyed wonder, and said, "Thank God, here is something of which you can have enough!" You may have, and you can have, all the salvation you want. And, beloved, let me say it kinds, you have all you want, for grace abounds. By the grace of God, Jesus Christ tasted death for every man. God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we can ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us; and again, "We are more than conquerors. through Him that hath loved us." Oh, do not say that you will be satisfied just to get into heaven; God wants you to be more than conqueror, to have an abundant entrance. Get the full import of the text, "I am come that ye might have life and that ye might have it more abundantly." O ye little ones in Zion, ye who are weak because of unbelief, ye who have been wounded in the conflict, God wants you to be strong in Him, to have life, to have abundant life. He can and will heal every wound that sin hath made. If you did fall down, do not lie there. Get up, call on God, give Him a chance to show His abounding grace, and He will gladly do it, and the angels will have a time of rejoicing over another brand plucked from the burning.

    I want to bring to you this thought: Life is the Gift of God. Natural life is the gift of God. "God breathed into man's body the breath of life and man became a living soul." When the Master stood before the grave of Lazarus, and spake to him saying, "Lazarus come forth," it is said that many of the Jews believed on Him. Why? Because they knew that none but God could impart life. Spiritual life is the gift of God. Do you accept of it? The Apostle says "Eternal life is the gift of God through Jesus Christ our Lord." And this morning, this very hour, it is your privilege to take God's gift and to know that you know you are one of God's live men. Life is the work of the Spirit.

    He is called the Spirit of Life. Jesus never spoke of the Spirit as "it". He did not regard the Spirit as an influence. I was preaching one time and in the course of the sermon I said I would not hold union services with any people who denied the Deity of Jesus Christ or the personality of the Holy Ghost. Immediately a person in the congregation asked me, "Can you give me a Scripture that proves the personality of the Holy Spirit?" Of course I did at once. "The Spirit said, Separate unto me Saul and Barnabas for the work whereunto I have called them," "The Comforter when He is come will guide you into all truth," "He will take the things of God and show them unto you," "He will guide you into all truth." He is a person. Never speak of Him as "it" or "itself." It is wrong to do so. Spell "Spirit" with a capital, and honor the Holy Ghost, for the Holy Ghost IS the Eternal Spirit, as we were taught in those days when children in the Sunday School had catechisms in their hands instead of lesson leaves that deny the Deity of Jesus and the efficacy of the blood.
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE LIFE ABUNDANT
by George B. Kulp

    I want to bring before you another thought with this text: Life more abundantly is a term of comparison, is a contrast with life that preceded it. It is comparing spiritual things with spiritual, life more abundantly. This is one of God's great inspiring truths. Believing this we can stand before valleys of dry bones and say, "These can all live," before a mighty chief of sinners, a very Saul of Tarsus, aye, in the very presence of spiritual indifference and wickedness in high places, and claim victory for our God. When God was on a mission to destroy, He would not do it until He talked to Abraham, for He said, "I know Him." And this man, because he believed God, was called the Friend of God. But there is something better than that for the believer today. Yonder goes Moses up to the Mount, and on its summit God comes down to meet with him, and for forty days God talks with Moses. I think those forty days were but as a few minutes to Moses he was so engrossed with communion with God, that he lost all thought of time, and when he came down his face shone with the glory of another world. But for the believer today, there is something better than that. "The Law came by Moses but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ." There was something helpful to a penitent sinner when the Urim and Thummim flashed on the breastplate of the high priest, and he knew that he was accepted of God. It was a blessed thing when the High Priest, after the sprinkling of the mercy seat with blood, would come out and with uplifted hands would pronounce the benediction on the multitude, and every man could go to his home a justified and forgiven man; but through Christ we have something better than that:

    "Jesus our great High Priest,
    Hath full atonement made .
    Ye weary spirits rest,
    Ye mournful souls he glad!
    The year of jubilee hath come,
    Return ye ransomed sinners home."

    Yonder on the side of old Mount Tabor I see Elijah at prayer; before him an altar, and on the altar a sacrifice, around him Israel and the prophets of Baal. I hear him pray. Listen! Did you ever hear such a prayer? He prays for fire -- fire from heaven, "O thou Lord God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, let it be known this day that thou art God in Israel, and that I am thy servant, and that I have done all these things at thy Word." And the fire comes -- fire from heaven, and it consumes the sacrifice. But we as the children of God today have something better than that. Fire, not for Israel's altars alone, but for every child of God, for every heart; in every church, for all time. Listen to the voice of one crying in the wilderness: "There standeth one among you the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose. He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire." The Baptizer with fire has come at last, and He says, "I am come not only that ye might have life, but that ye might have it more abundantly." If I had my choice to go back to Mt. Tabor where fire from heaven fell upon the altar, or back to Pentecost where the Holy Ghost as in cloven tongues of fire came upon each of them, I would say "Pentecost," every time. And we do not have to go back to either, for here and now we have the very same Jesus that was at Pentecost, and just as ready to give the fire, when we are as ready to receive the Holy Ghost as they were on that day.

    The Baptism of the Holy Ghost, the fullness of the Spirit, this is the Life Abundant. The Spirit and the Life go together. You cannot separate them. A Spirit-filled soul is a live soul. Listen! "The words I speak unto you they are Spirit and they are Life." To be spiritually minded is life. The Spirit is life because of righteousness. The letter killeth but the Spirit giveth life. The Spirit shall be in you a well of water springing up to everlasting life. The fullness of the Spirit is the privilege of every believer. This means life enough to help someone else. When Jesus was in the Mount of Transfiguration, there were nine disciples down on the plains, and a boy grievously vexed with a devil was brought to them, and they could not cast him out. But read of them after Pentecost. Read Acts 5th chapter and 11th verse: "There came a multitude from the cities round about Jerusalem, bringing sick folks and those which were vexed with unclean spirits, and they were healed every one." They had power from on high. They had the abundant life. I do not read of very many conversions through the labors of the disciples before Pentecost, but, after that, three thousand were converted in one day, and after that five thousand, and everywhere they went "the Word of God mightily grew and prevailed." When Thomas Harrison was young he wanted to do something for God. He had a passion for work for God. He went to the book stores and bought the Life of John Fletcher, and Carvosso, and Bramwell, and he studied books. He did everything but take the gift. But one day he got desperate. He said, "I'll have this cleansing, this fullness or I'll die. I'll put away all these books, and this afternoon shall be all knee work." And he gave his knees a talking to, and said, "You might just as well come down, for I am not going to get up until I get the victory, until God gives me the Holy Ghost." And he went to praying, when there flashed through his soul there was a better way than long and hard struggling with God for a human soul -- just take God at His Word, believe that He meant exactly what He said, that life, the fullness of the Spirit was the gift of God. And in just three minutes he was on His feet shouting aloud, "Glory to God, I've got it."
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[nChrist]

TRUTHS THAT TRANSFIGURE
THE LIFE ABUNDANT
by George B. Kulp

    God is no respecter of persons. If you want it, meet the conditions, believe God, and take it. Take it now. God sanctifies by the Holy Spirit. To them that believe on His Name all things are possible.

    This Life means life under all circumstances, life when your feet are growing cold, when your loved ones fade out from your vision, for it is life eternal. Pardon me for calling your attention to the hero of Pilgrim's Progress. He had the victory when he came down to the banks of the river, and he said, "I feel the bottom and it is good." Old Mr. Standfast, also one of the characters portrayed in this choicest piece of literature it has ever been my privilege to read, came down to the river. Hear him shouting, "This river has been a terror to many, yea, the thoughts of it has often frightened me, but now, methinks I stand easy, for my feet are fixed upon that upon which the feet of the priests that bare the ark of the covenant stood while Israel passed over this Jordan. The waters are indeed to the palate bitter and to the stomach cold, yet the thought of what I am going to and of the conduct that waits for me on the other side, lie as a glowing coal to my heart. I see myself now at the end of my journey. My toilsome days are ended. I am going now to see that Head that was crowned with thorns, and that face that was spit upon for me. I have formerly lived by hearsay and faith, but now I go where I shall live by sight, and shall be with Him in whose company I delight myself. I have loved to hear my Lord spoken of, and wherever I have seen the print of His shoe in the earth there have I coveted to set my foot, too. His name has been to me as a civet box, yea, sweeter than all perfumes. His voice to me has been most sweet, and His countenance have I more desired than the light of the sun. His Word did I gather for my food, and for antidotes against my faintings. He has held me and I have kept me from mine iniquities, yea, my steps has He strengthened in the way." And his last words were: "Take me, for I come unto Thee," and the angels and the trumpeters of the skies sang his welcome home to the city where cometh no night, where the inhabitants never Say, I am sick, and where the people are forgiven their iniquity. Home, forever at Home.

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