Days of Heaven on Earth

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Friday, August 19, 2011

God requires of us a perfect faith, and He tells us that if we believe and doubt not, we shall have whatsoever we ask. The faintest touch of unbelief will neutralize our trust.

But how shall we have such perfect faith? Is it possible for human nature? No, but it is possible to the divine nature; it is possible to the Christ within us. It is possible for God to give us faith, and He does. But Christ is the Author and Finisher of our faith, and He bids us have the faith of God. As we have faith through the imparting of the Spirit of Christ, we believe even as He.

We pray in His name and in His very nature, and, [we] live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved [us], and gave himself for [us] (Galatians 2:20). The love that He requires of us is not mere human love, or even the standard of love required in the Old Testament, but something far higher. The new commandment is to love one another (John 13:34), not as ourselves but as He has loved us

How shall such love be made possible? Our love is simply His love working in us and imparted to us through the Spirit.

Scripture
Have faith in God—Mark 11:22

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Thursday, August 18, 2011

We little dream sometimes what a hasty word, a thoughtless speech, an imprudent act, or a confession of unbelief and fear may do to hinder our highest usefulness or turn it aside from some great opportunity which God has been preparing for us.

Although the Holy Spirit uses weak men, He does not want them to be weak after He chooses and calls them. Although He uses the foolish things to confound the wise, He does not want us to be foolish after He comes to give us His wisdom and grace. He uses the foolishness of preaching, but not necessarily the foolishness of preachers. Like the electric current which can supply the strength of a thousand men, it is necessary that it should have a proper conductor, and a very small wire is better than a very big rope.

God wants fit instruments for His power-wills surrendered, hearts trusting, lives consistent and lips obedient to His will. Then He can use the weakest weapons and make them mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.

Scripture
The three hundred blew the trumpets—Judges 7:22

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Wednesday, August 17, 2011

The Holy Spirit is very sensitive, as love always is. You can conquer a wild beast by blows and chains, but you cannot conquer a woman's heart that way, or win the love of a sensitive nature; that must be wooed by the delicate touches of trust and affection. So the Holy Spirit has to be taken by a faith as delicate and sensitive as the gentle heart with whom it is coming in touch. One thought of unbelief, one expression of impatient distrust or fear will instantly check the perfect freedom of His operations as much as a breath of frost would wither the petals of the most sensitive rose or lily.

Speak to the Rock do not strike it. Believe in the Holy Spirit and treat Him with the most tender confidence and unwavering trust, and He will meet you with instant response and confidence.

Have you come to the rock in Kadesh? (Numbers 20:1-8). Have you opened all your being to the fullness of the Spirit, and then, with the confidence of the child to the mother, the bride to the husband, the flower to the sunshine, have you received by faith, and are you drinking of His blessed life?

Scripture
Speak ye unto the rock—Numbers 20:8

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Oh, how it helps and comforts us in the plodding of life to know that we have with us the Christ who spent the first thirty years of His life swinging a hammer in the carpenter shop at Nazareth, covered with sweat and grimy dust, physically weary as we often are, and able to understand all our experiences of drudgery and labor! Moreover, He still loves to share our common tasks and equip us for our difficult undertakings of hand and brain.

Yes, housewife, He will help you at the kitchen range and sink as gladly as at the hour of prayer. Yes, busy laborer, He will go with you and help you to swing the hammer, or handle the saw, or hold the plow in the soil of life. You will be a better mechanic, a more skilled workman, a more successful man because you take His wisdom for the common affairs of life.

There is no place or time where Jesus is not able and willing to walk by our side, to work through our hand and minds, and to unite Himself in loving and caring partnership with all our needs and tasks and trials. In this way He proves Himself our all-sufficiency for all things.

Scripture
I am with you always—Matthew 28:20

Days of Heaven on Earth
Monday, August 15, 2011

The Holy Spirit does not come to give us extraordinary manifestations but to give us life and light. The nearer we come to Him the more simple will His illumination and leading be. He comes to guide [us] into all truth. He comes to shed light upon our own hearts and to show us ourselves. He comes to reveal Christ, to give, and then to illumine the Holy Scriptures and to make divine realities vivid and clear to our spiritual apprehension. He comes as a Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ, to enlighten the eyes of our understanding, that we may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power (Ephesians 1:18-19).

Spirit of Power! with heavenly fire,

Our souls endue, our tongues inspire;

Stretch forth Thy mighty hand,

Thy Pentecostal gifts restore,

The wonders of Thy power once more

Display in every land.

Scripture
He will guide you into all truth—John 16:13


Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Sunday, August 14, 2011

I would rather play with the forked lightning than to speak a reckless word against any servant of Christ. I would rather take in my hands live wires with their fiery current than to idly repeat the slanderous darts which thousands of Christians are hurling at others to the hurt of their own souls and bodies.

You may wonder why your sickness is not hea1ed, why your spirit is not filled with the joy of the Holy Spirit, why your life is not blessed and prosperous. It may be that some dart which you have flung with angry voice or in an idle hour of thoughtless gossip is pursuing you on its way. It is describing the circle which always brings back to the source from which it came every shaft of bitterness and every idle and evil word.

Let us remember that when we persecute or hurt the children of God, we are but persecuting Him and hurting ourselves far more.

Lord, make me as sensitive to the feelings and rights of others as I have often been to my own, and let me live and love like Thee.

Scripture
Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm—Psalm 105:15

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Saturday, August 13, 2011

The presence of clouds upon your sky and trials in your path are the very best evidence that you are following the pillar of cloud and walking in the presence of God. The disciples had to enter the cloud before they could behold the glory of the transfiguration. A little later that same cloud became the chariot to receive the ascending Lord, and it is still waiting as the chariot that will bring His glorious appearing.

Still it is true that while clouds and darkness are round about him, mercy and truth are ever in their midst and shall go before thy face (Psalm 89:14).

Perhaps the most beautiful and gracious use of the cloud was to shelter Israel from the fiery sun. Like a great umbrella, that majestic pillar spread its canopy above the camp and became a shielding shadow from the burning heat in the treeless desert. One who has never felt an oriental sun cannot fully appreciate how much this means-a shadow from the heat.

So the Holy Spirit comes between us and the fiery, scorching rays of sorrow and temptation.

Scripture
Clouds and darkness are round about him—Psalm 97:2

Days of Heaven on Earth
Friday, August 12, 2011

Your Christian influence, your reputation as a worker for God and your standing among your brethren may be an idol to which you must die before you can be free to live for Jesus alone.

If you have ever noticed the type on a printed page, you must have seen that the little "i" always has a dot over it. It is that dot that elevates it above the other letters in the line.

Now, each of us is a little i, and over every one of us there is a little dot of self-importance, self-will, self-interest, self-confidence, self-complacency- or something to which we cling and for which we contend. But it just as surely reveals self-life as if it were a mountain of real importance.

This i is a rival of Jesus Christ. It is the enemy of the Holy Spirit and of our peace and life. God has therefore decreed its death, and the Holy Spirit, with His flaming sword, is waiting to destroy it that we may be able to enter through the gates and come to the Tree of Life.

Lord, crowd me out by Thy fullness, even as the glory of the Lord left no room for Moses in the tabernacle.

Scripture
Not ourselves, but Christ Jesus—2 Corinthians 4:5


Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Thursday, August 11, 2011

The actual provisions of God's grace come from the inner vision.

He who gives to the bird the instinct to cross the continent in search of summer sunshine in a southern climate is too good to deceive it. And just as surely as He has put the instinct in the breast of the bird, so has He also put the balmy breezes and the vernal sunshine there to meet it when it arrives.

He who gave to Abraham the vision of the Land of Promise also said in infinite truth and love: All the land that thou seest will I give thee. He who breathes into our hearts the heavenly hope will not deceive or fail us when we press forward to its realization. There is nothing unfaithful in Him who has said: If it were not so, I would have told you (John 14:2), and we may know that God never will deceive us or fail us, but all that He reveals by His Holy Spirit He will make our own as we press forward and enter into its realization.

Lord, give me first the vision and then the victory. Show me all my inheritance, and then give it all to me in Christ Jesus.

Scripture
All the land which thou seest—Genesis 13:15

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Wednesday, August 10, 2011

The blessed Holy Spirit who possesses the consecrated heart is intensely concerned for our highest life and watches us with a sensitive and even a jealous love. Very beautiful is the true translation of that ordinary passage in James 4:5, The Spirit that dwelleth in us loveth us to jealousy.

The heart of the Holy Spirit is deeply concerned in preserving us from every stain and blemish and in bringing us into the very highest possibilities of the will of God.

The heavenly Bridegroom would have His Church not only free from every spot, but also from every wrinkle, or any such thing. The spot is the mark of sin, but the wrinkle is the sign of weakness, age and decay; Jesus wants no such defacing touch upon the holy features of His beloved. So the Holy Spirit, who is the Executor of His will and the Divine Messenger whom He sends to call, separate and bring home His Bride, is jealously concerned in fulfilling in us all the Master's will.

Lord, take from me every blemish and mark of weakness and decay and make me Thy spotless Bride.

Scripture
There is no spot in thee—Song of Solomon 4:7

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Tuesday, August 09, 2011

As any evil comes up and the consciousness of any unholy thing touches our inner senses, it is our privilege at once to hand it over to the Holy Spirit and to lay it upon Jesus as something already crucified with Him. Then, as was done with the sin offering, it will be carried outside the camp and burned to ashes.

There may be deep suffering, there may be protracted pain, and it may be intensely real; but throughout all there will be a very sweet and sacred sense of God's presence, of intense purity in our whole spirit and of our separation from the evil which is being consumed. Truly, it will be borne outside the camp, leaving not even the smell of the flames upon our garments.

It is so blessed to have the Holy Spirit slay things. No sword but His can pass so perfectly between us and the evil, so that it consumes the sin without touching the spirit.

Lord Jesus, my sin offering, I lay my sin, myself, my whole nature, upon Thy cross. Consume me by Thy holy fire, and let me die to all but Thee!

Scripture
Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel—Leviticus 16:21

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Sunday, August 07, 2011

It is purely a matter of faith. Faith and sight always differ. To your senses it does not seem to be so, but your faith must still reckon it so. This is a very difficult attitude to hold, and only as we thoroughly believe God can we thus reckon upon His Word and His working. But as we do so, faith will convert it into fact, and it will become reality.

These two words "yield" and "reckon" are passwords into the resurrection life. They are like the two edges of the "Sword of the Spirit" through which we enter into crucifixion with Christ.

This act of surrender and this reckoning of faith are recognized in the New Testament as marking a very definite crisis in the spiritual life. It does not mean that we are expected to be going through a continual dying, but that there should be one very definite act of dying, and then a constant habit of reckoning ourselves as dead and meeting everything from this standpoint.

Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 6:11).

Scripture
Knowing this, that our old man is crucified—Romans 6.6

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Friday, August 05, 2011

Some of us are starving and wondering why the Holy Spirit does not fill us. We have plenty coming in, but we do not give it out. Give out the blessing you have, start larger plans for service and blessing and you will soon find that the Holy Spirit is before you. He will prevent [precede] you with blessings of goodness (Psalm 21:3) and give you all that He can trust you to give away to others.

There is no music so heavenly as an Aeolian harp. The Aeolian harp is nothing but a set of stretched strings arranged in harmony and then left to be touched by the unseen fingers of the wandering winds. As the breath of heaven floats over the chords, notes almost divine float out upon the air as if a choir of angels were wandering around and touching the strings.

And so it is possible to keep our hearts so open to the touch of the Holy Spirit that He can play upon them at will, as we quietly wait in the pathway of His service.

Scripture
If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me-Revelation 3:20

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Thursday, August 04, 2011

A spiritual man is not so much a man possessing a strong spiritual character as a man filled with the Holy Spirit. So the apostle Paul said: Ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you.
The glory of the new creation, then, is not only that it recreates the human spirit, but that it fits it for the abode of God Himself, and makes it dependent upon the Son, as the child upon the mother. The highest spirituality, therefore, is the most utter helplessness, the most total dependence and the most complete possession of the Holy Spirit. The beautiful act of Christ in breathing upon His disciples and imparting to them from His own lips the very Spirit that was already in Him expressed in the most vivid manner the crowning glory of the new creation. And when the Holy Spirit thus possesses us, He fills every part of our being.

Scripture
Ye are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his-Romans 8:9

Simpson Devotional

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Wednesday, August 03, 2011

The pressure of hard places makes us value life. Every time we come through such a trial, it is like a new beginning, and we learn better how much life is worth and make more of it for God and man. The pressure helps us to understand the trials of others and fits us to help and sympathize with them.

There is a shallow, superficial nature that gets hold of a theory or a promise and talks very glibly about the distrust of those who shrink from every trial. But the man or woman who has suffered much never does this. Knowing what suffering really means, he or she is very tender and gentle.

This is what Paul meant when he said, Death worketh in us, but life in you (2 Corinthians 4:12). Trials and hard places are needed to press us forward, even as the furnace fires in the hold of the mighty steamship give the force that moves the Piston, drives the engine and propels that great vessel in the face of winds and waves.

Scripture
Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God—1 Peter 5:6

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Tuesday, August 02, 2011

The blessed Comforter is gentle, tender and full of patience and love. How gentle are God's dealings even with sinners. How patient His forbearance. How tender His discipline with His own erring children. How He led Jacob, Joseph, Israel, David, Elijah and all His ancient servants until they could truly say, Thy gentleness hath made me great.

The heart in which the Holy Spirit dwells will always be characterized by gentleness, lowliness, quietness, meekness and forbearance. The rude, sarcastic spirit, the brusque manner, the sharp retort, the unkind cut-all of these belong to the flesh and have nothing in common with the gentle teaching of the Comforter.

The Holy Dove shrinks from the noisy, tumultuous, excited and vindictive spirit and finds His home in the peaceful soul. The fruit of the Spirit is . . . gentleness, . . . meekness.

Lord, make me gentle. Hush my spirit. Refine my manner. Let me have Christ in my bearing and my very tones, as well as in my heart.

Scripture
Thy gentleness hath made me great—Psalm 18:35

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Monday, August 01, 2011

It will not always be the day of toll and trial. Some day we shall hear our names announced before the universe and the record read of things that we had long forgotten. How our hearts will thrill, and our heads will bow, as we hear our own names called, and then the Master shall recount the triumph and the services which we had ourselves forgotten! And, perhaps, from the ranks of the saved He shall call forward the souls that we have won for Christ, and the souls that they in turn have won. As we see the issue of things that have, perhaps, seemed unimportant at the time, we shall fall before the throne, and say, Not unto us, 0 Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory (Psalm 115:1).

Beloved, each day we are adding pages to the record of our lives. We are setting the type ourselves, by every moment's action. Soon the record will be read before the audience of the universe and amid the issues of eternity.

Scripture
For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done-2 Corinthians 5:10

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Sunday, July 31, 2011

Why should God have to lead us through troubles and allow the pressure to be so hard and constant?

In the first place, it shows His all-sufficient strength and grace much better than if we were exempt from pressure and trial. We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us (2 Corinthians 4:7).

Also, it makes us more conscious of our dependence upon God. God is constantly trying to teach us our dependence and to hold us absolutely in His hand and hanging upon His care.

This was the place where Jesus Himself stood and where He wants us to stand, not with a self constituted strength, but with a hand ever leaning upon His, and a trust that dares not take one step alone.

Troubles teach us trust. There is no way of learning faith except by trial. It is God's school of faith, and it is far better for us to learn to trust God than to escape trials.

The lesson of faith, once learned, is an everlasting acquisition and an eternal fortune made. Without trust even riches will leave us poor.

Scripture
We were troubled on every side—2 Corinthians 7:5

Days of Heaven on Earth
Sunday, July 31, 2011

Why should God have to lead us through troubles and allow the pressure to be so hard and constant?

In the first place, it shows His all-sufficient strength and grace much better than if we were exempt from pressure and trial. We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us (2 Corinthians 4:7).

Also, it makes us more conscious of our dependence upon God. God is constantly trying to teach us our dependence and to hold us absolutely in His hand and hanging upon His care.

This was the place where Jesus Himself stood and where He wants us to stand, not with a self constituted strength, but with a hand ever leaning upon His, and a trust that dares not take one step alone.

Troubles teach us trust. There is no way of learning faith except by trial. It is God's school of faith, and it is far better for us to learn to trust God than to escape trials.

The lesson of faith, once learned, is an everlasting acquisition and an eternal fortune made. Without trust even riches will leave us poor.

Scripture
We were troubled on every side—2 Corinthians 7:5




Days of Heaven on Earth
Saturday, July 30, 2011

Sometimes people fall because they lack confidence in the Physician. The very first requirement for your healing is that you trust the Physician, and trust Him implicitly-so implicitly that you go forward on His bare word and act as if you had received His healing the moment you claimed His promise.

You must also do what the Great Physician tells you, if you expect Him to make you whole. The pills prescribed by your doctor would do you no good if left on the cupboard shelf.

You cannot expect to be healed if you are living in sin, any more than you could expect the best physician to cure you while you lived in a malarial climate or inhaled poison with every breath. So you must move from doubt into the pure air of trust and obedience before Christ can make you whole. And then if you will trust Him and respond to His directions, you will find that there is balm in Gilead and a Great Physician there.

Scripture
If thou wilt diligently hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, . . . and wilt keep all his statutes—Exodus 15:26

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Friday, July 29, 2011

Christ's Church is overrun with captains. It is in great need of a few more privates. A few rivers run into the sea, but a larger number run into other rivers. We cannot all be Pioneers, but we can all be helpers. No man is fitted to go in first place until he has learned well how to go second.

A spirit of self-importance is fatal to all work for Christ. The biggest enemy of true spiritual power is spiritual self-consciousness. Joshua had to die to human plans and strategy before Jericho could fall.

God often has to test His chosen servants by putting them into a subordinate place before He can bring them to the front. Joseph had to learn to serve in the kitchen and to suffer in prison before he could rise to the throne. As soon as he was ready for the throne, the throne was waiting for Joseph. God has more places than accepted candidates. Let us not be afraid to go into the training class and even take the lowest place, for we shall soon move up if we really deserve to.

Lord, use me so that Thou shalt be glorified and I shall be hidden from myself and others.

Scripture
My helpers in Christ Jesus—Romans 16:3



Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Thursday, July 28, 2011

Jesus who once suffered in Gethsemane will be our strength and our victory, too. We may fear, we may also sink, but let us not be dismayed, and we shall yet praise Him and look back from a finished course and say, Not one thing hath failed of all the good things which the Lord [our] God spake concerning [us] (Joshua 23:14).

But in order to do this, we must, like Jesus, meet the conflict, not with a defiant but with a submissive spirit. He had to say, Not my will, but thine be done, but in saying it He gained the very thing He surrendered. The submission of Gethsemane is not a blind and dead submission of a heart that abandons all its hope, but it is the free submission that bows the head in order to get double strength through faith and prayer.

We let go in order that we may take a firmer hold. We give up in order that we may more fully receive. We lay our Isaac on Mount Moriah, and we receive him back, no longer our Isaac, but God's Isaac and infinitely more secure because he is returned to us in resurrection life.

Scripture
Not my will, but thine—Luke 22:42

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Wednesday, July 27, 2011

God is preparing His heroes. When the opportunity comes He can fit them into their places in a moment, and the world will wonder where they came from. Let the Holy Spirit prepare you by all the discipline of life. When the last finishing touch has been given to the marble, it will be easy for God to put it on the pedestal and fit it into its niche.

There is a day coming, when, like Othniel (see judges 3:9-11) we too shall judge the nations and rule and reign with Christ on the millennial earth. Before that glorious day can be, we must let God prepare us as He did Othniel at Kirjath-Sepher (Judges 1:11-13) amid the trials of our present life and in the little victories the significance of which, perhaps, we little dream. We may be sure of this, that if the Holy Spirit has an Othniel ready, the Lord of heaven and earth has a throne prepared for him.

Is it for me to be used by His grace,

Helping His kingdom to bring?

Is it for me to inherit a place,

E'en on the throne of my King?

Scripture
Unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ—Ephesians 4:13

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Tuesday, July 26, 2011

We must recognize the true character of our self-life and its real virulence and vileness. We must consent to its destruction, and we must take it ourselves, as Abraham did Isaac, and lay it at the feet of God in willing sacrifice.

This is a seemingly impossible task for the natural heart, but the moment the will is yielded and the choice is made, we are astonished to find that the agony is over and death is accomplished.

Usually the crisis in such cases hangs upon a single point. God does not need to strike us in a hundred places to inflict a death wound. There is one point that touches the heart and that is the Point God usually strikes. It will likely be the dearest thing in our lives, the decisive thing in our plans, the citadel of our wills, the center of our hearts. And when we yield there, there is little left to yield anywhere else. But when we refuse to yield at that point, a spirit of evasion and compromise enters into all the rest of our lives. Let us take Him to enable us to will His will in all things in our lives.

Scripture
Now mine eyes seeth thee—Job 42:5

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Monday, July 25, 2011

God can only use us while we are trusting Him completely. Satan cared far less for Peter's denial of his Master than for the use he made of it afterwards to destroy his faith. So Jesus said to him, I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not (Like 22:32). It was Peter's faith Satan attacked, and so it is our faith that he contests. The trial of your faith, being much more precious that of gold that perisheth (1 Peter 1:7).

Whatever else we let go, let us go, let us hold steadfastly to our trust. Cast not away therefore your confidence (Hebrews 10:35), and hold fast the confidence and rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end (Hebrews 3:6). And if you would hold your trust, hold your sweetness, your rightness of spirit, your obedience to Christ, your victory in every way.

Whatever comes, regard it as of less consequence than that you should triumph and remain steadfast. Accept every circumstance as something God is pleased to allow. Wave the4 banner of your victory in the face of every foe. Go on, shouting in Jesus' name, Thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ (2 Corinthians 2:14).

Scripture
He that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God-Romans 14:18

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Sunday, July 24, 2011

In our earlier experiences we know the Holy Spirit only at a distance, in things that happen in a providential direction or in the Word alone. But after a while we receive Him as an inward Guest, and He dwells in our hearts. He speaks to us in the innermost chambers of our being. The external working of His power does not cease; rather, it increases and seems even more glorious. The Power that dwells within us works outside us, answering prayer, healing sickness, overruling providences, doing exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us (Ephesians 3:20).

There is a double presence of the Lord for the consecrated believer. He is present in the heart and is mightily present in the events of life. He is the Christ in us and the Christ of all our days, with all power in heaven and earth.

The Holy Spirit is our wonder-worker, our all-sufficient God and Guardian. And He is waiting in these days to work as mightily in the affairs of men as in the days of Moses, of Daniel and of Paul.

Scripture
That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us—Romans 8:4

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Saturday, July 23, 2011

Why have you not received all the fullness of the Holy Spirit? Do you not long to be anointed with the rest of the oil? (Leviticus 14:17-18). Look around you at your situation. Are you not conscious of many needs at this very moment and almost overwhelmed with difficulties, trials and emergencies? These are all divinely provided vessels for the Holy Spirit's filling. If you would only understand their meaning, they will become opportunities for receiving new blessings and deliverances which you can obtain in no other way.

Bring these vessels to God. Hold them steadily before Him in faith and prayer. Keep still. Cease your own restless working until He begins to work. Do nothing that He does not Himself command you to do. Give Him a chance to work, and He will surely do so. Then the very trials that threatened to overcome you with discouragement and disaster will become God's opportunity for the revelation of His grace and glory in your life, as you have never known Him before. Bring them [all needs] to me.

Scripture
Bring them hither to me—Matthew 14:18

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Friday, July 22, 2011

Beloved, are you ministering to Christ? Arc you doing it with your hands? Are you doing it with your substance and with your gifts? Is He getting the best at your table? And when He does not come to fill the chair, is it free to His representative, His poor and humble children? Your words and wishes are cheap if they do not find expression in your actual gifts. Even Mary did not put Him off with the incense of her heart. Rather, she laid her costliest gift at His feet.

Busy person, you who work so hard to dress your children and furnish your home and table, what have your hands earned for the Master? What have you done or sacrificed for Jesus?

"Can you afford it?" was the question asked of an earnest woman as she promised a costly offering for the Master's work.

"No," was her noble reply, "but I can sacrifice it."

Let us today look around us and see what we are presently doing. Then let us give more to the loving Savior, who gave up His whole life for us.

Scripture
Or ministry, let us wait on our ministering—Romans 12:7

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Thursday, July 21, 2011

Let us think for a moment of the blessedness of faith. Our own littleness and nothingness sometimes becomes bondage. We are so small in our own eyes we dare not claim God's mighty promises. We say: "If I could be sure I was in God's will I could trust."

This is all wrong. Self-consciousness is a great barrier to faith. Get your eyes on Him and Him alone. Not on your faith, but on the Author of your faith; not with a half look, but with a steadfast, prolonged look, with a true heart and fixedness of purpose that knows no faltering, no parleying with the enemy and not a shadow of fear. When you become fearful you are almost sure to fail.

Travelers who have crossed the Alps know how dangerous those mountain passes are, how narrow the foothold, how deep the rocky ravines. They know how necessary to safety it is that they look up continually. One downward glance into the dizzying depths might be fatal. So if we would surmount the heights of faith we must look up-look up. Take your eyes off yourself, off surrounding circumstances, off means, off gifts, and turn them to the Great Giver.

Scripture
Look from the place where thou art—Genesis 13:14

Inspirational Readings by A.B. Simpson
Days of Heaven on Earth
Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Let us also go, that we may die with him-this was an outburst of impetuous love from the heart of Thomas. The disciples had been trying to dissuade the Master from going back to Judea because of the hate which the raising of Lazarus had aroused and the certainty of danger if He should return. But when Thomas saw that their persuasions did not avail and that Jesus was certainly going back to face His enemies, he cried in an impulse of desperation and devotion, "Let us also go, that we may die with him." Thomas's cry was that of a devoted soldier ready to follow his leader into the jaws of danger and death.

Thomas's words were wiser than he knew. It is true that he and his fellow disciples did not immediately share their Master's fate, but there was a deep and sacred sense in which they were to die with Him even before their literal persecution and martyrdom.

In a very real and solemn way, these words are true of every disciple of Christ. For His death is not only the source of our salvation, but it is also the pattern of our lives.

With an intelligent faith and a renewed dedication, let us with Thomas, "also go that we may die with Him."

Scripture
Let us also go, that we may die with him—John 11:16