Levi Thetford's Daily Thoughts

Mercy For The Greatest Sinners

Levi Thetford — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:11:33 +0000

“God who is rich in mercy…. loved us even when we were dead in our sins [and] quickened us together with Christ.” Why did He do all this? “That in ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace, in His kindness towards us in Christ Jesus” (Eph 2:4-7). So He allures others and their children to come to Him and partake of the same grace through Jesus Christ.
As the Jerusalem sinners were of the highest sort among the Jews, so these Ephesian sinners were of the highest sort among the Gentiles (Eph 2:1-3; 2:11, 12)…. When God saves one great sinner, it is to encourage another great sinner to come to Him for mercy.
—John Bunyan “The Jerusalem Sinner Saved”

In Everything Give Thanks

Levi Thetford — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 20:17:21 +0000

“See what cause the saints have to be frequent in the work of thanksgiving. In this Christians are defective; though they are much in supplication, yet little in gratulation. The apostle says. “In everything give thanks” (1 Thess. 5.18). Why so? Because God makes everything work for our good. We thank the physician, though he gives us a bitter medicine which makes us sick, because it is to make us well; we thank any man who does us a good turn; and shall we not be thankful to God, who makes everything work for good to us? God loves a thankful Christian. Job thanked God when he took all away: “The Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1.21). Many will thank God when He gives; Job thanks Him when He takes away, because he knew that God would work good out of it. We read of saints with harps in their hands (Rev. 14.2), an emblem of praise. We meet many Christians who have tears in their eyes, and complaints in their mouths; but there are few with their harps in their hands, who praise God in affliction. To be thankful in affliction is a work peculiar to a saint. Every bird can sing in spring, but some birds will sing in the dead of winter. Everyone, almost, can be thankful in prosperity, but a true saint can be thankful in adversity. A good Christian will bless God, not only at sun-rise, but at sun-set. Well may we, in the worst that befalls us, have a psalm of thankfulness, because all things work for good. Oh, be much in blessing of God: we will thank Him that doth befriend us.”

Taken from Banner of Truth’s Puritan Paperback, “All Things for Good,” by Thomas Watson, pp 62-63.

ARMOUR OF CHRIST

Levi Thetford — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:46:56 +0000

“It is not a man’s morality and philosophical nature that will repel a temptation sent with full charge from Satan’s canon..The graces of Christ—these are armour…To be without Christ is to be without armour …unfit to fight Christ’s battles against sin and Satan.
—William Gurnall “The Christian in complete armour.”

THE TEMPTERS MALICE

Levi Thetford — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:40:19 +0000

“We are in danger of Satan’s temptations. Consider his malice in tempting. This hellish serpent is swelled with the poison of malice…To see a clod of dust so near to God, and himself, once [once a glorious angel] cast out of the heavenly paradise, makes him pursue mankind with inveterate hatred (Rev. 12:12). If there is anything this infernal spirit of hell can delight in, is it to ruin souls, and bring them into the same condemnation as himself.
—Thomas Watson, “Practical Divinity”

DESPISING GRACE

Levi Thetford — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 16:13:50 +0000

“Let a king who of grace sends out to his rebellious people an offer of pardon if they accept it by such a day, yet beheads or hangs those that come not in for mercy until the expiry time be past, so Christ Jesus has set the sinner a day–a day of salvation—an acceptable time, but he who will not come and goes on in rebellion beyond that time, is liable to come off with the loss of all his soul.
To slight grace, to despise mercy, and to stop the ear when God speaks…so much to our profit is a great provocation. He offers, He calls, He woos, He invites, He prays, He beseeches us, in this His day of grace. He has provided us with the means of reconciliation himself. This despising must needs be provoking.
—-John Bunyan “The Jerusalem Sinner Saved.”

THE REAL SICKNESS OF SIN

Levi Thetford — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 16:39:58 +0000

“Sin is a real sickness (Isa. 1:5), yea, the worst of sickness; it is a leprosy in the head (Lev 13:44); the plague in the heart (1 Kings 8:38); it is brokenness in the bones (Psalm 51:8); it pierces, it wounds, it racks, it torments (1 Tim 6:10). A man may as well expect ease when his diseases are in their full strength, or his bones out of joint, as true comfort while in his sins.
—Joseph Alleine “A Sure Guide to Heaven.”

IMITATORS OF CHRIST

Levi Thetford — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 12:55:32 +0000

“Christ in His death aimed at our good. He was made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him….This proves Christ’s giving of Himself to be a fruit of His love…Let us learn to apply all that Christ did to ourselves…Let us also learn how to manifest love—namely, by seeking and procuring the good of others…If this were practiced, would there be such oppressing, such undermining, such deceiving, such wronging of on another as there is?
Let that mind be in us which was in Christ Jesus, and thus manifest our love….
—-William Gouge “Domestic Duties.”

The Lord’s Day Attitude

Levi Thetford — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 12:48:00 +0000

When we go to worship our great God today, let us do it with a heart panting after God. Here are a couple of quotes to think about as we gather together in our churches,

“We should set the Word of God always before us like a rule, and believe nothing but which it teacheth, love nothing but that which it prescribeth, hate nothing but that which it forbiddeth, and do nothing but that which it commandeth.” Henry Smith

“Christ is the sum of the whole Bible; prophesied, typified, exhibited, demonstrated. To be found in every leaf, almost in every line, the Scriptures being as it were but the swaddling bands of the Child Jesus.” Thomas Adams

PERSEVERANCE

Levi Thetford — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:33:24 +0000

“In perseverance, there is a concurrence of our care and diligence (Phi. 2:12, 13)…The main work is God’s: “He that has begun a good work must perfect it” (Phi. 1:6)…But yet there is a concurrence of our care and endeavours…We have a power to act and do what is necessary for the preservation of the spiritual life. Well, then, let us not neglect the means. You must not think that God must do all. He does all, indeed, but in us and by us. Idle wishes will do us no good as long as our hands refuse the labour.
We ourselves are prone to…a decay of both faith, love and obedience, which are the three main graces…We are assaulted with continual temptations…apt to grow secure and negligent…Let us make it our care to keep what graces we have gotten.
—-Thomas Manton, “Epistle of Jude.”

A MOST PERFECT TEMPLE

Levi Thetford — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:46:23 +0000

“The blessed God has laid the platform and the foundation of his temple, as it was to be restored and set up again among men, in and by that great Emmanuel, his own Son, made flesh… an incarnate God… a most perfect Temple….”God with us.”
Here [in Christ] were met together man that could die, and God that could overcome death; man that might suffer, and God that could give sufficient value to those sufferings; sufficient to atone the offended Majesty, and procure that life might be diffused…to all that should unite with him, whereby they might become living stones, joined to that living cornerstone–a spiritual temple, again capable of that divine presence which they had forfeited and where they were forsaken.
God was to have the first and leading part in reconcilations, as man has in disagreements.
—John Howe