Devotional Reading

What A High Privilege: God Counts Us His Friends
 
James 2:23 (KJV) “And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God.”
     

     The image of God in man cannot extend to every part of man's being, for God has attributes which He cannot impart to any of His creatures, however favored.
God is uncreated, self-existent, infinite, sovereign, eternal; these attributes are His alone and by their very definition cannot be shared with another.

But there are other attributes which He can impart to His creatures and in some measure share with His redeemed children.
Intellect, self-consciousness, love, goodness, holiness, pity, faithfulness—these and certain other attributes are the points where likeness between God and man may be achieved. It is here that the divine-human friendship is experienced!

God, being perfect, has capacity for perfect friendship. Man, being imperfect, can never quite know perfection in anything, least of all in his relationship to the incomprehensible Godhead.

The more perfect our friendship with God becomes the simpler will our lives be. Those formalities that are so necessary to keep a casual friendship alive may be dispensed with when true friends sit in each other's presence. True friends trust each other.

Unquestionably the highest privilege granted to man on earth is to be admitted into the circle of the friends of God. Nothing is important enough to be allowed to stand in the way of our relation to God. We should see to it that nothing on earth shall separate us from God's friendship!

KJV/RD/PAH/FGMBC   April 20, 2026



Power  of  the Cross.


 Scripture:   Galatians 6:14 (KJV) “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”
 
     Only a person with a perfect knowledge of mankind could have dared to set forth the terms of discipleship that our Lord Jesus Christ expects of His followers.
 
Only the Lord of men could have risked the effect of such rigorous demands: "Let him deny himself" (Matthew 16:24).
 
Can the Lord lay down such severe rules at the door of His kingdom?
 
He can and He does!
 
If He is to save the man, He must save him from himself. It is the "himself" which has enslaved and corrupted the man. Deliverance comes only by denial of that self.

No man in his own strength can shed the chains with which self has bound him, but in the next breath the Lord reveals the source of the power which is to set the soul free: "Let him take up his cross."

The cross was an instrument of death slaying a man was its only function. "Let him take his cross," said Jesus, and thus he will know deliverance from himself!
 
My Prayer:  Dear Lord, I have much to learn about denying myself and bearing my cross daily, especially in the midst of so many mundane activities. Have Your way with me, Lord.
 
MT/FGMBC/PAH. 3/31/2026