Monday, September 19, 2011

CRISIS ALWAYS REVEAL CHARACTER




“Those who have loss of character make a choice.” –Cindy Kasper

“It isn’t the tranquil and placid seas that bring out the sailor’s skill; It’s the wind and waves that pound his ship and toss it about at will. --Ritter

When wealth is gone, little is lost; when health is gone, something is lost; but when character is gone, all is lost!”

Sept. 13 Taken from Our Daily Bread, for personal and family devotions.


The following is taken from “Devotions for DEVOTIONS for MORNING AND EVENING with Oswald Chambers” for Sept. 10:
         
 “Worshipping as Occasion Serves.”                    

“We imagine we would be all right if a big crisis arose; but the big crisis will only reveal the stuff we are made of, it will not put anything into us.
                              
‘If God gives the call, of course I will rise to the occasion.’

You will not unless you have risen to the occasion in the workshop, unless you have been the real thing before God there.

If you are not doing the thing that lies nearest, because God has engineered it; when the crisis comes instead of being revealed as fit, you will be revealed as unfit.

Crisis always reveal character.

The private relationship of worshipping God is the great essential of fitness.

The time comes when there is no more 'fig tree' life possible, when it is out into the open, out into the glare and into the work, and you will find yourself of no value there if you have not been worshipping as occasion serves you in your home.

Worship aright in your private relationships, then when God sets you free you will be ready, because in the unseen life which no one saw but God, you have become perfectly fit, and when the strain comes you can be relied upon by God.

‘I can’t be expected to live the sanctified life in the circumstances I am in; I have not time for praying just now, no time for Bible reading, my opportunity hasn’t come yet; when I does, of course I shall be all right.’

No, you will not.

If you have not been worshiping as occasion serves, when you get into work you will not only be useless yourself, but a tremendous hindrance to those who are associated with you.

The workshop of missionary munitions is the hidden, personal, worshipping life of the saint.” (pg. 524)

March 16 pm “--the days that have furthered us most in character are the days of stress and cloud, the days when we could not see our way but had to stand still and wait; and as we waited, the comforting and sustaining and restoring of God came in a way we never imagined possible before.” (Also from Oswald Chamber’s devotional pg. 157).

Our Daily Bread, for personal and family devotions:

June 22   “The Lord provides the strength we need              
                        to follow and obey His will;
                      So we don’t need to be afraid
                 That what He asks we can’t fulfill. –Sper


     We can face any fear when we know the Lord is with us.”


June 27     “O Lord, You see what’s in my heart—
                    There’s nothing hid from You;
                   So help me live the kind of life
            That’s loving, kind, and true. –D. De Haan

                 If we take care of our character,
              our reputation will take care of itself!”


A quote from “Devotions for MORNING and EVENING with Oswald Chambers”:

“We are apt to think that everything that happens is to be turned into useful teaching, it is to be turned into something better than teaching, viz., into character.” (for October 1/11, pg.568)



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