Joy And Strength

[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Proverbs 12:22 Ephesians 4:25

Telling the Truth

Lying lips are abomination to the Lord, but they that deal truly are His delight.
PROVERBS 12:22

Wherefore, putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor; for we are members one of another.
EPHESIANS 4:25

IT seems to me, that the shortest way to check the darker forms of deceit is to set watch more scrupulous against those which have mingled, unregarded and unchastised, with the current of our life. Do not let us lie at all. Do not think of one falsity as harmless, and another as slight, and another as unintended. Cast them all aside; they may be light and accidental; but they are an ugly soot from the smoke of the pit, for all that; and it is better that our hearts should be swept clean of them, without over care as to which is largest or blackest. Speaking truth is like writing fair, and comes only by practice; it is less a matter of will than of habit, and I doubt if any occasion can be trivial which permits the practice and formation of such a habit.
JOHN RUSKIN

If you tell the truth, you have infinite power supporting you; but if not, you have infinite power against you.
CHARLES GEORGE GORDON

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Psalm 119:54 Philippians 4:19

What We Can Bear

Thy statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage.
PSALMS 119:54

My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.
PHILIPPIANS 4:19

HOW must the pilgrim's load be borne?
With staggering limbs and look forlorn?
His Guide chose all that load within;
There's need of everything but sin.

So, trusting Him whose love He knows,
Singing along the road he goes;
And nightly of his burden makes
A pillow, till the morning breaks.
LUCY LARCOM

THEY live contented with what they have, whether it be little or much, because they know that they receive as much as is profitable for them; little, if little be profitable, and much, if much be profitable for them, but the Lord only can, who has an eternal end in view in all things which He provides.
EMANUEL SWEDENBORG

I hope you will learn, what I am always hoping to learn, to rejoice in God continually, knowing that He is really ordering all your circumstances to the one end of making you a partaker of His own good-ness, and bringing you within His own sympathy.
THOMAS ERSKINE

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Psalm 34:22 1 Thessalonians 4:13 Job 15:11

Accepting Consolation

None of them that trust in Him shall be desolate.
PSALMS 34:22 That ye sorrow not, even as others who have no hope.
1 THESSALONIANS 4:13 Are the consolations of God too small for thee?
JOB 15:11 (R. V.)

WHAT shall make trouble? Not the holy thought
Of the departed; that will be a part
Of those undying things His peace hath wrought
Into a world of beauty in the heart.
SARAH J. WILLIAMS

SHE spoke of those who had walked with her long ago in her garden, and for whose sake, now that they had all gone into the world of light, every flower was doubly dear. Would it be a true proof of loyalty to them if she lived gloomily or despondently because they were away? She spoke of the duty of being ready to welcome happiness as well as to endure pain, and of the strength that endurance wins by being grateful for small daily joys, like the evening light, and the smell of roses, and the singing of birds. She spoke of the faith that rests on the Unseen Wisdom and Love like a child on its mother's breast, and the melting away of doubts in the warmth of an effort to do some good in the world.
HENRY VAN DYKE

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference 2 Peter 1:11 Isaiah 61:3

Staying By the Way

That they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He might be glorified.
ISAIAH 61:3 For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
2 PETER 1:11

HAST thou a sense of the way to the Father? Then be careful that thy spirit daily bow before Him, that He would continue His mercy to thee; making thy way more and more clear before thee every day--yea, and bearing thee up in all the exercises and trials which may befall thee, in every kind; that, by His secret working in thy spirit, and helping thee with a little help from time to time, thou mayest still be advancing nearer and nearer towards the kingdom; until thou find the Lord God administer an entrance unto thee thereinto, and give thee an inheritance of life, joy, righteousness, and peace therein; which is strength unto the soul against sin and death.
ISAAC PENINGTON

Probably the greatest result of the life of prayer is an unconscious but steady growth into the knowledge of the mind of God and into conformity with His will; for after all prayer is not so much the means whereby God's will is bent to man's desires, as it is that whereby man's will is bent to God's desires.
CHARLES H. BRENT

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Isaiah 2:3 Job 34:32

He Will Teach His Ways

That which I see not teach Thou me: if I have done iniquity, I will do it no more.
JOB 34:32

He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths.
ISAIAH 2:3

YES, take my heart, and in it rule;
Direct it as it pleaseth Thee;
I will be silent in Thy school,
And learn whate'er Thou teachest me.
GERHARD TERSTEFGEN

PEOPLE cannot become perfect by dint of hearing or reading about perfection. The chief thing is not to listen to yourself, but silently to listen to God. Talk little and do much, without caring to be seen. God will teach you more than all the most experienced persons or the most spiritual books can do. You already know a great deal more than you practise. You do not need the acquirement of fresh knowledge half so much as to put in practice that which you already possess.
FRANCOIS DE LA MOTHE FÉNELON

To speak with the tongues of men or angels on religious matters, is a much less thing than to know how to stay the mind upon God, and abide with Him in the closet of our hearts, observing, loving, adoring, and obeying His holy power within us.
WILLIAM LAW

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference 1 Peter 3:8 Romans 12:10

Love One Another

Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love.
ROMANS 12:10

Love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous.
I PETER 3:8

LET your religion make you more considerate, more loving and attractive, more able to think of and enter into the pleasure and interests of others.
ARTHUR C. A. HALL

LOVE one another in spite of your differences, in spite of your faults. Love one another, and make the best of one another, as He loved us, who, for the sake of saving what was good in the human soul, forgot, forgave, put out of sight what was bad--who saw and loved what was good even in the publican Zaccheus, even in the penitent Magdalen, even in the expiring malefactor, even in the heretical Samaritan, even in the Pharisee Nicodemus, even in the heathen soldier, even in the outcast Canaanite. It is very easy to fix our attention only on the weak points of those around us, to magnify them, to irritate them, to aggravate them; and, by so doing, we can make the burden of life unendurable, and can destroy our own and others' happiness and usefulness wherever we go. But this was not the love wherewith Christ loved us; this is not the new love wherewith we are to love one another.
ARTHUR P. STANLEY

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Deuteronomy 26:16 Deuteronomy 16:20

The Life of Obedience

That which is altogether just shalt thou follow, that thou mayest live.
DEUTERONOMY 16:20

This day the Lord thy God hath commanded thee to do these statutes and judgments: thou shalt therefore keep and do them with all thine heart, and with all thy soul.
DEUTERONOMY 26:16

NEVER pass by or palter with the clear voice of conscience, with the plain command of duty; never let it be doubtful to your own soul whether you be-long to the right side or wrong, whether you are a true soldier or a false traitor. Never deliberate about what is clearly wrong, and try to persuade yourself that it is not.
FREDERICK TEMPLE

The first resolve of one who gives himself wholly to God must be never to give way deliberately to any fault whatever; never to act in defiance of conscience, never to refuse anything God requires, never to say of anything. It is too small for God to heed. Such a resolution as this is an essential foundation in the spiritual life. I do not mean but that in spite of it we shall fall into inadvertencies, infirmities, errors; but we shall rise up and go on anew from such faults--because they are involuntary, the will has not consented to them.
JEAN NICOLAS GROU

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Matthew 6:34 Joshua 1:5-6

The Search For Calmness

Be not therefore anxious for the morrow.
MATTHEW 6:34 (R. V.)

I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee; be strong and of a good courage.
JOSHUA 1:5,6

I have laid help upon one that is mighty.
PSALMS 89:19

THOU hast Thy help upon the mighty laid;
In Him I trust, nor know to want or fear,
But ever onward walk, secure from sin,
For He has conquered every foe within.
JONES VERY

WHY should we, then, burden ourselves with superfluous cares, and fatigue and weary ourselves in the multiplicity of our ways? Let us rest in peace. God Himself inviteth us to cast our cares, our anxieties upon Him.
MADAME GUYON

If we may take one test or sign by which to judge of advance in the spiritual life, it would be this,--whether more and more calmness is being maintained in the midst of all the disturbances and troubles which are wont to come, which may ever be looked for in some form or other,--whether there be peacefulness of mind, and order of thought in the midst of all that once too much distracted and agitated the soul.
T. T. CARTER

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Matthew 6:26-28

Growing Without Willing

Behold the fowls of the air ... consider the lilies of the field.
MATTHEW 6:26,28

WAS in the act of kneeling down before the Lord my God, when a little bird came and perched near my window, and thus preached to me: "O thou grave man, look on me, and learn something, if not the deepest lesson, then a true one. Thy God made me, and the like of me; and, if thou canst conceive it, loves me and cares for me. Thou studiest Him in great problems, which oppress and confound thee: thou losest sight of one half of His ways. Learn to see thy God not in great mysteries only, but in me also. His burden on me is light, His yoke on me is easy; but thou makest burdens and yokes for thyself which are very grievous to be borne. Things deep as Hell and high as Heaven thou considerest overmuch; but thou dost not 'consider the lilies' sufficiently. lf thou couldst be as a lily before God, for at least one hour in the twenty-four, it would do thee good: I mean, if thou couldst cease to will and to think, and be only. Consider, the lily is as really from God as thou art, and is a figure of something in Him--the like of which should also be in thee. Thou longest to grow, but the lily grows without longing; yes, without even thinking or willing, grows and is beautiful both to God and man."
JOHN PULSFORD

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Psalm 61:4

Comfort in Spirit

In God I will praise His word, in God I have put my trust; I will not fear what flesh can do unto me.
PSALMS 56:4

DO not fear circumstances. They cannot hurt us, if we hold fast by God and use them as the voices and ministries of His will. Trust Him about every one and everything, for all times and all needs, earth and heaven, friends and children, the conquest of sin, the growth of holiness, the cross that chafes, the grace that stirs.
ANTHONY W. THOROLD

I find that it is not the circumstances in which we are placed, but the spirit in which we meet them, that constitutes our comfort; and that this may be undisturbed, if we seek for and cherish a feeling of quiet submission, whatever may be the privations allotted us.
ELIZABETH T. KING

Wheresoever God may lead you, there you will find Himself, in the most harassing business, as in the most tranquil prayer.
FRANCOIS DE LA MOTHE FÉNELON

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Psalm 86:11

Maintaining Trust

Teach me Thy way, O Lord; I will walk in Thy truth; unite my heart to fear Thy name.
PSALMS 86:11

IF thou but suffer God to guide thee,
And hope in Him through all thy ways,
He'll give thee strength, whate'er betide thee,
And bear thee through the evil days;
Who trusts in God's unchanging love,
Builds on the rock that nought can move.
GEORG NEUMARK

IF we seek, indeed, that all our ways may be His ways, if we resolve and pray that we will keep to the path of obedience, of trust, of duty; then we know that His angels are in charge of us, and that they can bear us nowhere beyond our Father's eye, His hand, His care. Then we know that all worlds are His, all souls are His; we can trust to Him those He has taken from us, and know that when He has called them to pass out of our sight, He is with them still, to keep them in all their ways, even in that hidden path over which the dark shadow lies, until the day break and the shadows flee away.
JOHN ELLERTON

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Psalm 94:19

Thoughts That Disturb

In the multitude of my thoughts within me, Thy comforts delight my soul.
PSALMS 94:19

OH, listen then, Most Pitifull
To Thy poor creature's heart;
It blesses Thee that Thou art God,
That Thou art what Thou art!
FREDERICK W. FABER

WHAT the particular thoughts or temptations are that disquiet you, I know not; but, whatsoever they are, look above them, and labor to fix your eye on that infinite goodness, which never faileth them that, by faith, do absolutely rely and rest upon it; and patiently wait upon Him, who hath pronounced them all, without exception, blessed that do so.
ROBERT LEIGHTON

Thoughts that disturb and trouble us seldom come from God. It is generally best to put them away, and throw ourself, with increased trust in Him and mistrust of self, at His feet. And never forget, amid whatever may befall you,--dryness, coldness, desolation, and disappointment, consciousness of many faults, and of great weakness, and want of faith,--that where love is, there God is sure to be. He never yet has suffered any soul to fall wholly from Him which, amid all its frailties and falls, clings to Him in love.
H. L. SIDNEY LEAR

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Jeremiah 1:7

Seek Him in Everything

On whatsoever errand I shall send thee thou shalt go; and whatsoever I shall command thee thou shalt speak.
JEREMIAH 1:7 (R. V. MARGIN)

THERE is no change of time and place with Thee;
Where'er I go, 't is still with me the same;
Within Thy presence I rejoice to be,
And always hallow Thy most holy name.
JONES VERY

BE assured of this, you do not know God in truth, and have no true peace, if you are depending upon times and places. Remember that whatever God gives you to do, from moment to moment, that is the very best thing you could possibly be doing, and you little know where and when the Lord will meet you. He who does not seek and find God everywhere, and in everything, finds Him nowhere and in nothing. And he who is not at the Lord's service in everything, is at His service in nothing.
JOHN TAULER

God must be sought and seen in His providences; it is not our actions in themselves considered which please Him, but the spirit in which they are done, more especially the constant ready obedience to every discovery of His will, even in the minutest things, and with such a suppleness and flexibility of mind as not to adhere to anything, but to turn and move in any direction where He shall call.
MADAME GUYON

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Psalm 16:11

Art of Life

Thou wilt show me the path of life; in Thy presence is fulness of joy; at Thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.
PSALMS 16:11

LORD, it is not life to live,
If Thy presence Thou deny;
Lord, if Thou Thy presence give,
'T is no longer death to die.
Source and giver of repose,
Singly from Thy smile it flows;
Peace and happiness are Thine;
Mine they are, if Thou art mine.
A. M. TOPLADY

WE live from day to day, as it were, by chance; and forget that human life itself is as much an Art, governed by its own rules and precepts of perfection, as the most complicated profession by which that life is maintained or adorned.
WM. ARCHER BUTLER

The art of life consists in taking each event which befalls us with a contented mind, confident of good. This makes us grow younger as we grow older, for youth and joy come from the soul to the body more than from the body to the soul. With this method and art and temper of life, we live, though we may be dying. We rejoice always, though in the midst of sor-rows; and possess all things, though destitute of everything.
JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE

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[nChrist]

Author: Mary Wilder Tileston
Source: Joy and Strength
Scripture Reference Deuteronomy 20:3

No Fear on the Journey

Let not your hearts faint, fear not, and do not tremble, neither be ye terrified because of them.
DEUTERONOMY 20:3

SON of the living God! Oh, call us
Once and again to follow Thee,
And give us strength, whate'er befall us,
Thy true disciples still to be.

And if our coward hearts deny Thee,
In inmost thought, or deed, or word,
Let not our hardness still defy Thee,
But with a look subdue us, Lord.
HENRY A. MARTIN

HALF our difficulty in doing anything worthy of our high calling, is the shrinking anticipation of its possible after-consequences. But if Peter had tarried, and cast up all that was to come, the poverty, and wandering, and solitude, and lonely old age, the out-cast life, and chance of a fearful death, it may be he would have been neither an Apostle nor a Christian.
HENRY EDWARD MANNING

Some men will follow Christ on certain conditions--if He will not lead them through rough roads--if He will not enjoin them any painful tasks--if the sun and wind do not annoy them--if He will remit a part of His plan and order. But the true Christian, who has the spirit of Jesus, will say, as Ruth said to Naomi, "Whither thou goest I will go," whatever difficulties and dangers may be in the way.
RICHARD CECIL

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