How many knew that hymn before? All right. What other famous song did Anna Warner write? Everybody in this room knows it: “Jesus Loves Me, This I Know.” Yes. She was a precious sister.
Let us have another word of prayer.
Lord, we are very thankful that we can gather together. We come this morning thankful that, from the very beginning throughout this time, as we come to Your Word, we have a simple desire: to behold the Lamb of God.
Many things try to attract our attention. Many things try to draw us away, even things about You. But, Lord, there is one thing that is necessary: that we would be those who are looking off unto Jesus, keeping our eyes upon You, and beholding the Lamb of God day by day.
We worship You for the provision of life that we have in You, Lord. As we continue, Lord, we look unto You. As we break this bread of life, may we feast upon You. In Jesus’ name, amen.
I would like for us to turn this morning to Psalm 90, one of the psalms that Moses wrote. We are going to read verses 12 through 14.
So teach us to number our days,
That we may get us a heart of wisdom.
Return, O Lord; how long?
And let it repent Thee concerning Thy servants.
Oh satisfy us in the morning with Thy lovingkindness,
That we may rejoice and be glad all our days.
“Teach us to number our days.” I was considering this psalm in light of this being a new year—2018. We have to get used to writing that instead of 2017, for whatever times we ever write that. We do not write it very often anymore.
I was also considering it in light of the Lord’s soon return. As I was looking at this psalm, it touched me that Moses was the one who wrote it. Moses was saying, “Teach us to number our days.”
What touched me so much was that Moses did not write this as a young man. It was not when he was in Egypt, nor during the forty years when the Lord had set him aside to care for sheep.
Most think that he wrote this when he was an old man, after the Lord had used him to bring the people of Israel out of Egypt. He was in the wilderness, and he had much experience with the Lord. This is the voice of one who saw that he still needed to be taught.
The more Moses saw of the Lord, the more he said, “Lord, there is so much more I want to learn of You. Teach me, Lord, to number my days.”
What that is saying is, “Lord, teach me and help me to be given to You in such a way that each day counts for You.” We do not really need to be taught how to number. We can learn that in elementary school: one, two, three, and all that. It might take a little more to get up to 120, as old as Moses was, but this is not natural teaching.
Moses was learned in all the wisdom of Egypt. He had all the wisdom of this world. But he was coming to the Lord because he saw something beyond natural wisdom. There was something of the Lord, a character in the Lord, that he wanted to learn.
In regard to starting a new year and the Lord’s soon return, I see this as more and more important for us in these days: that simple place of coming back to Him and saying, “Lord, I want each day to count for You.”
As we look upon others in Scripture, they had similar prayers. David was testified of when Samuel found him as a man after God’s own heart. But later in David’s life, as you read through the Psalms, what is David praying? “Lord, teach me Thy way. Teach me of You.”
The more David went on in the Lord, the more he saw that he needed to be taught, because he saw more and more of the vastness of the Lord.
One of the tragedies we can fall into is becoming satisfied. We can think, “Oh, I have heard of the Lord. I know who the Lord is. I know about this.” But really, the more we touch of His life, the more we see how little we know and that there is so much more.
That is why I appreciate Paul’s testimony in Corinthians. After all that Paul had seen, his boast was that we only see in part.
Brothers and sisters, as we go through this life, we are thankful for all that we have seen of the Lord and for the many experiences we have had. But may the Lord touch us in such a way that we know we only see in part.
We have the Holy Spirit within us, and we have that promise in the Gospel of John that the Holy Spirit is going to teach us all things. He does not say, “I am going to teach you some things,” or, “I am going to teach you most things.” He says, “I am going to teach you all things.” All that you want to know of Christ, He is going to teach you.
As we come into an awareness of our need to be taught, may that be an avenue through which the Lord can work within us in a fresh and new way. When we come to the Lord and receive from one another with the attitude of a student, seeking to learn from Him, that opens the door of our hearts. It gives the Holy Spirit freedom and liberty to form Christ within us.
We have heard brothers share about how the Lord has us in the gymnasium of Christ. Brother Sparks speaks of the school of Christ. As He trains us and teaches us, He has a cycle which He uses. Teachers have systems; trainers have systems. Our Lord’s cycle for training us is one day at a time.
Every day He wants to teach us. Every day He wants to train us. Every day He wants to work within us more and more of the very life of His Son.
Moses saw the importance of each day. That is why he said, “Lord, teach me to number my days. Teach me that I could know You in a way that each day would really count for You.”
One of the great gifts that God has given us is the gift of time. Why has He given us this gift of time, this opportunity, this other year, this time until He returns? He has given us the gift of time for one simple reason: that Christ can be formed in us.
For those who do not know Him, they may come to that saving grace of knowing Him. For those who know Him, the gift of time has one purpose: that Christ can be formed in us.
Let us not waste the time we have. There are many things that compete for our attention and compete for our time. But may we be like Moses and see that each day—every day—would really count for Him.
It is so different from the way we as men think. Most of you know that I like sports, and my favorite sport is baseball. Do you know how to get into the Baseball Hall of Fame? All you have to do is fail two out of three times.
If a hitter fails two out of three times, he makes the Hall of Fame. What kind of Christian life would that be? It shows you the contrast between man’s thinking and God’s way. He wants every day to count.
If a batter hits .333, he is automatically a Hall of Famer—no question, first ballot. In football, a quarterback only needs to complete about two-thirds of his passes and he will be in the Hall of Fame. Actually, there is not one quarterback in the Football Hall of Fame who completed two-thirds of his passes.
Two of the greatest from my 49ers—Joe Montana and Steve Young—were about 63 or 64 percent. But nobody has reached two-thirds yet. We see how man sets his standards so low at times.
Even in our Christian life, do we set our standards low? Are we content to live most of our days for the Lord? Or are we seeing Him in such a way that we want every day to count for Him? This is what He is jealous for.
Moses saw that every day, as he allowed the Lord to work, he would gain that heart of wisdom spoken of in Psalm 90:12. Moses desired that he could present to the Lord a heart of wisdom—a heart full of Christ, because Christ has been made unto us wisdom.
It was not Moses’ natural wisdom. It was Christ, the Lord, formed in Moses. The more Moses yearned for the Lord, the more he cried, “Lord, how long before You return?” Would that be our prayer and our cry in these days?
I appreciate Psalm 90:14 as well: “Satisfy us in the morning with Thy lovingkindness.” Each morning, may we allow the Lord to meet us with His lovingkindness. His mercies are new every morning. Because of that, we can sing for joy and be glad all our days—not just some of our days, not a few of them, not most of them, but all of our days.
The Lord is jealous for every day of our life to count for Him. Moses also had a heart for the people of Israel and for the next generation. In Psalm 90:16, he prayed:
Let Thy work appear unto Thy servants,
And Thy glory upon their children.
Moses knew that as the Lord’s servants, the older ones who were going on with Him, had Christ formed in them and the Lord’s life seen through them, the children and the next generation would see the majesty of the Lord. They would have a hunger and thirst after that as well.
It is a great call upon all of us to display His life. As we heard this past weekend, we are all witnesses. What kind of witnesses are we? Are we witnesses of His majesty, in a way that draws not only the unsaved but also encourages believers to follow the Lord in a fuller and greater way?
The Lord not only trains us every day, but a day is significant to Him. His foundational unit of measure is a day. Remember Genesis 1 and how the Lord created the heavens and the earth? He created all things. He did so much one day, and He called it a day. He had a work to do the next day, and He did it that day.
Through those six days, He did a work every day. There was a purpose for that day, and He did it. At the end of that, He rested.
Why did the Lord take six days to create the earth? I think it was to teach us. Just as Moses said, “Teach us to number our days,” the Lord wanted to teach us: “This is My cycle for working. This is My unit of measure.”
We measure temperature by Celsius or Fahrenheit, distance by miles or kilometers, computer storage by bytes, and speed by hertz. Everything has a unit of measure. The Lord’s basic unit of measure is a day. He was trying to teach us, “This is the way I work: each day.”
The Lord, in His almighty power, could have created everything in one day. It was not because He was limited, as though He had to say, “Oh, I cannot do this in one day. It is going to take Me six whole days.” No, it was not His limitation; it was for our instruction.
He was showing His daily cycle of working and the significance of each day. Every day was important. He had something He wanted to do, and He completed it. Then He rested.
Even in Genesis 5, as it gives the lineage of people and tells how long they lived, how does the Lord measure life? It begins with Adam. Genesis 5:5 says, “So all the days that Adam lived.” It does not begin with years: “all the days that Adam lived.”
Then it says, “All the days of Seth,” “all the days of Enosh,” “all the days of Cainan,” and on and on. What the Lord was interested in was every day. These were the days of their lives.
At the end of David’s life, how does the Lord summarize it? David died full of days. Not full of years—full of days. That is how Job died as well: full of days.
What a wonderful testimony that would be on your tombstone. We talk about epitaphs and things like that: “This one died full of days.” We want each one to count for the Lord.
Even as we think about His provision, when He was providing for those in the wilderness, He provided manna every day so that they could learn that He was their daily provision.
Again, the Lord in His almighty power could have created manna that lasted for a week. It was not because He was limited—“I can only create manna that lasts one day.” No, He created manna to last one day so that we would learn of Him as our daily provision.
That is why, in what we call the Lord’s Prayer, He says, “Give us this day our daily bread.” We would learn every day that He is the provision of life for us.
The spiritual life that we have is pictured in the Old Testament through the nation of Israel. What was at the center of Israel’s life? It was the tabernacle. They were camped around it. It was the temple in Jerusalem.
What was going on every day at the center of the tabernacle? Every morning there was the continual burnt offering, and a burnt offering in the evening. Every day started with the continual burnt offering, reminding us of the fresh provision we have in Christ every day and of the complete work that He has done.
Every day started with that simple lamb being offered up. It did not matter whether it was a feast day. It could have been Passover, but it still started with that burnt offering, that lamb being offered.
They had feasts on the first day of the month, and they had all their feasts throughout the year, but every day started with that lamb being offered up. The mercies were new every morning.
Praise God, I am so thankful there were two burnt offerings every day. In the evening, there was that burnt offering to conclude the day.
Sometimes when we go through a day, it does not go so well. I probably should not say sometimes. Most days do not go—or every day does not go—like we thought it would. Maybe in our eyes, it did not count much for the Lord.
But praise God, at the end of the day, when we come back, we have that fresh Lamb of God. We can come and see the provision we have. We can confess our sins, and He is faithful and just to forgive us all our sins and unrighteousness, which makes that day count for Him.
The evening offering gives us a great hope: hope in what He has done and hope for tomorrow, when we see those new mercies and the provision in the morning. Praise God for the evening offering.
The enemy knows how significant every day is as well. Consider Joseph and Potiphar’s wife. How did she tempt him? Day by day by day. She was trying to wear him out. The same thing happened with Samson and Delilah: she attacked him day by day.
The enemy knows, “If I can just get him out of this day”—that day-by-day wearing-out tactic. Praise God, Joseph was strong enough to flee from temptation.
Brothers and sisters, if the enemy knows how significant each day is, may we come into a place of knowing how significant it is. May our prayer be, “Teach us to number our days.”
Our Lord, while He was here on earth, reinforced this. In Luke 9, He said:
If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.
There is this daily process that we go through. That is why I like the way the verse is shared in Luke, because it adds the word daily. Matthew does not have it, but Luke uses that word: daily taking up our cross, daily learning of Him, daily saying no to ourselves, and daily saying yes to Him.
As we were reminded this summer at the conference, when Dana was sharing, today is the day of salvation. We only have today. This is the day we have, and we need to make the most of it. This is the day when we can do those transactions with the Lord.
This was Paul’s testimony when he said, “I die daily.” I die daily to myself so that Christ can increase and Christ can be formed in me.
We see the simplicity of life in these dear ones who went on in the Lord. Sometimes we can think of the Christian life as so complicated, with so many things. But there is a simplicity to it that He is trying to convey through this call to live a daily life with Him.
On the day of Pentecost, when the church was born, it says that day by day they were together. It was a natural flow of life together. Out of that flow of life, day by day more were added to them. That was the gospel going forth. Out of a strong, healthy church, more life naturally went forth and others were drawn in.
When we speak about this matter of a daily life, is it too simple for us? Are we looking for some higher type of teaching? We often hear the question, “Are you ready? Be prepared.” People ask, “How can I be prepared for the Lord’s return? What do I have to do?”
Simply live each day for Him. That is all He has ever looked for. He is looking for us to live each day for Him, allowing Him to be Lord of our lives, giving ourselves to Him each morning, and allowing Him to be formed within us.
We can think that, in order to be ready for the Lord, we have to do something extra or something special. We may think we need unique knowledge, a great understanding of prophetic events, or something spectacular in order to be ready.
No. How do we ready ourselves? We live a normal daily life under His headship. As we daily go through transactions with Him, daily deny ourselves, and daily see Him as our provision, that is the preparation.
What is being prepared? His life in us. All He is looking for is a greater expression of His life in us. We decrease daily and allow Him to increase.
As I thought about preparing for the Lord’s return and the simplicity of it, I was drawn back to the parables the Lord shared on the Mount of Olives in Matthew 24 and 25. I do not want to get into the interpretation of these parables, but I want us to see what the Lord is looking for.
In the beginning of Matthew 24, the disciples asked Him, “When is all this going to take place? What are the signs?” The first part of the chapter deals with signs, some of the things that are going to occur.
Then, in Matthew 24:44, the Lord says:
Therefore be ye also ready; for in an hour that ye think not the Son of man cometh.
That is the call to be ready. Then, to show the disciples what being ready means, He shares more parables.
From verse 45 to the end of the chapter, we have the parable where the Lord puts His servant in charge of His house and goes away. When He returns, one servant is commended and one is not. Why is the one commended?
Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing.
What is that servant doing? He is simply caring for the things of his master.
He does not have any great special knowledge or an extra-special interpretation of prophecy. But he knows the value of the master’s house and the value of the master’s things, and he is simply caring for them. He cares for those within the house. He sees his brothers and sisters and cares for them.
He is ready each day for the Lord’s return. He does not know when, but he is not living for himself; he is living for his Master. All the Lord sees is a faithful one.
The Lord does not commend him for great knowledge of prophecy. He may have had that, but the issue is the life within that servant. The other servant said, “My master tarrieth,” and lived for himself. He was not taking time to know his Master and care for the things of his Master.
Let me ask a hypothetical question. I do not believe this is true, but just for the sake of illustration: we know the Lord can return at any time, but what if the Lord said to us—and I am talking about a true voice from the Lord—“I am not going to return in 2018. I am going to wait and return in 2019”?
How would we live this year? Would we say, “Oh, I have another year. I have always wanted to do this. I can go there. I can do this”? Would we immediately start thinking of ourselves?
Or would we say, “Oh, another year to learn of the Lord. Another year to be constrained by His love. Another year to be faithful and to draw others into Himself”?
We have to be honest with ourselves. One benefit of changing years is that it can cause us to reflect—not so much from a resolution point of view, but to make an honest evaluation before the Lord.
If we knew the Lord was not coming back for another year, are there things within our hearts that would be delighted? Are there things that would say, “Oh, wow. Maybe the Yankees could win the Series this year”? Are there things that we see would be distractions?
Praise God, as we give ourselves to the Holy Spirit and He points these things out, we have the wonderful opportunity to release them to the Lord, so that all our springs of joy would be found in Him.
This is the opportunity we have. We talked about the Lord’s gift of time. Every moment that we are alive is an opportunity to surrender more fully and more greatly to Him and not be so occupied with ourselves.
I always love the story of John Wesley. John Wesley put more miles on a horse than most of us put on a car. He would travel every day to two or three places.
One morning, he was in a family’s home, having porridge with a brother and sister. The sister asked him, “Brother Wesley, if you knew you were going to die tonight at midnight, how would you change your day?”
He said, “I would not change a thing. I would go on and do what I had intended to do, what the Lord showed me. I would finish this wonderful breakfast. I would go preach this morning. I would ride on to the next town. We would have lunch together. I would lie down for a nap after lunch. I would share a message in the afternoon. I would go to brother so-and-so’s house for dinner. We would have some fellowship. At ten o’clock, I would fall fast asleep and wake up in glory.”
Ten o’clock must have been his bedtime. He always said ten o’clock. If we knew the Lord was coming tonight, would our lives change?
Again, we have the gift of time to get things straightened out. Let us take advantage of that. The thing that amazes me most about that story is that John Wesley could actually fall asleep. At ten o’clock, knowing he was going to meet the Lord at twelve, he went on to sleep. That is what he normally did. That is resting in the Lord.
What a life he had. How precious is that? May we come to that place where day by day, every day counts for Him—knowing what He has for us that day and, by His grace, being faithful to it.
As we go into Matthew 25, the first parable is the one of the ten virgins. Five were ready, and five were not. We know that all of these were Christians, because they had oil, His life, within them.
Five are described as ready. They were anticipating the Bridegroom’s coming. How does it speak of them? It says they were the wise ones.
Remember how Moses prayed in Psalm 90 for a heart of wisdom. They simply knew Him and knew His heart. As they daily learned of Him, they allowed Christ to be formed in them. Christ has been made unto us wisdom.
These five did not have special wisdom of their own. They allowed Him to become their wisdom. It was not their wisdom. They did not have anything extra that the others did not have, except perhaps a little extra oil. But they lived a life dependent upon Him.
By taking the oil—the life of the Holy Spirit—with them, they showed an act of dependence upon the Lord. They were not going out in themselves. The other ones went out without oil because they were self-sufficient. They thought they could handle things in themselves. When they saw that they needed something extra, they tried to go back, but it was too late.
Brothers, we need the Holy Spirit. We need the life of the Lord every time. The wise one is simply the one dependent upon Him.
In the following parable, the parable of the talents, the Lord gives talents to each of His servants: five to one, two to another, and one to another. Everybody had a talent.
The Lord gave each servant a talent based upon what they could handle. It was not as though the Lord gave more than one could be expected to take care of. The Lord knew each one intimately. Then He went away and said, in effect, “Do business. Be faithful.”
The ones with five talents and two talents were simply faithful with what God had put in their hands. That is what the Lord was looking for: faithfulness. He had put this in their hands, and they knew Him and were faithful.
He said, “Because you were faithful in a few things.” Often we think the five and the two are great numbers, big things. But the Lord says those were just a few things. They were faithful in small things.
Most of the time, that is where the difficulty lies. Many of us can be faithful if we know something is big. It is in what may appear insignificant that the Lord is looking for faithfulness. These ones were faithful with that.
There were also those who were unfaithful. It says they were lazy. Why were they lazy? They did not really take the time to get to know their Master.
You see from the parable that they did not know their Master. They said, “You are a hard man,” and so on. They had a wrong concept of Him. Why? Because they were too lazy to learn of the Lord and to learn His true character and nature.
We have this time. We have this day. We have this opportunity to use it to know Him, know His heart, know His desire, and be like these faithful servants—the wise virgins and the servants with the five and two talents. They simply knew the Master’s heart, knew His desire, and went along with Him.
In the simplicity of His life, all the Lord calls us to do is follow Him. He says, “Follow Me, and I will make you.” You can fill in the blank there.
“Follow Me, and I will make you faithful. I will make you wise. I will make you My disciple. I will conform you to My image. I will make you a fisher of men.” I will, I will.
That is the great contrast between the old covenant and the new covenant. As we study Hebrews and come to the new covenant, the key words are “I will.” “I will do this. I will do that. I will put My Word in your heart. I will put My life within you. I will write this in you.”
As we daily give ourselves to Him and allow Him to do that, then that is being prepared for His return.
During our daily reading, we just finished the Old Testament and are back in Genesis now. As we were reading through the Old Testament, I was especially encouraged by the book of Daniel this time. Turn to Daniel 12.
There were many things going on in Daniel’s days, and in the days we are living in, there are many things going on that we do not really understand. There are many prophecies in Scripture that we do not really understand. Some people have more understanding than others.
The Lord showed Daniel what was going to happen—all future history, all the way to the end of time. Daniel was faithful to record it and pass it on to us. But did Daniel understand everything he was shown and everything that was written?
Daniel 12:8 says:
And I heard, but I understood not: then said I, O my Lord, what shall be the issue of these things?
Look at how the Lord responds to him. This is so precious to us. He does not say, “Go back and get more understanding,” or, “I cannot believe you do not understand.” What does the Lord say?
Go thy way, Daniel; for the words are shut up and sealed till the time of the end.
Then He concludes the book again with this wonderful word of encouragement:
But go thou thy way till the end be; for thou shalt rest, and shalt stand in thy lot, at the end of the days.
I am thankful for the humanity of Daniel. We see that he did not understand everything God had shown him. At times, when we do not understand something, we think, “I have to stop here until I gain this understanding. I cannot go on until I understand this prophecy or that prophecy.”
No. Daniel said, “I do not understand this,” and the Lord said, “You just continue on the way you have been. Continue following Me. Continue being faithful. Go on your way.”
As we walk in the light and have fellowship with one another, we see more and more of Him. At the right time, He will give the revelation. Even as we hear things in these days that we do not understand, do we really understand our salvation fully?
Jerry shared about the blood of the Lamb. There is a fullness and a vastness to that. Do we fully understand forgiveness, sanctification, justification, or the Lord’s return? No. There are many things we know only in part.
Thank God, in the Christian life, we do not have to stop until we fully understand something before we can continue. As we walk in the light and continue with Him, He shows us more and more.
That is what He told Daniel: “Go on your way to the end. Be faithful to the end.” For Daniel, that was unto death. That is all He says to us.
Whether we are young or old, when we hear things we do not understand, we commit them back to the Lord, knowing that in His time He will bring understanding to us.
Even with things we think we understand, we continue asking Him, “Lord, teach us more. I know there is more of You. I know there is more of that.”
As we start this year and ask the Lord to teach us to number our days, this is the attitude of our heart: learning of Him, allowing Him to be Lord of our lives every day, and having teachableness before Him.
There are many things that can hinder us. Sometimes it can be our lack of understanding. Sometimes even another brother or sister can hinder us from pressing on and following the Lord fully.
I love the story at the end of the Gospel of John. The Lord tells Peter that he is going to go where he does not want to go and that he is going to die. John, however, is going to continue living.
Peter looks around after the Lord tells him what will happen and asks about John: “What about him? How come I have to go this way? What about him?” What does the Lord say simply to Peter?
What is that to thee? Follow thou Me.
At times, as we are with brothers and sisters and go on together, one brother may be doing this, another may be doing that, and the Lord has told you that you cannot do that. You are not supposed to do that. You may wrestle back and forth.
I know many times in my own life I have heard the Holy Spirit say within my heart, “What is that to you? You follow Me.”
Someone gets away with something that you could not get away with. Someone is able to serve in a certain area where you really wanted to serve. Others are appreciated, and you are not appreciated. What is that to you? You follow Me.
That is the call the Lord has upon each of our lives in this day.
As we are starting this new year, I think this is a wonderful opportunity. It is a gift from the Lord for each of us, in our quiet times, to stop and pause and consider this prayer of Moses: “Lord, teach me to number my days.”
Moses was the meekest of all men. Many equate meekness and humbleness with teachability—one who is teachable.
As we know different brothers and sisters, we see that proud ones are not very teachable. With those who are teachable, we see a spirit of humility and a desire to learn of the Lord.
Would we have the prayer of Moses? Would it be a daily prayer for us? “Lord, as I wake today, I want this day to count for You. I do not want to live for myself.”
May we return to this place of simplicity and purity of devotion to Him. At times, we have made Christianity so complex. We feel that in order to be prepared for His return, we must have great biblical knowledge or extra-special revelation.
Do not take that wrongly. We should have biblical knowledge. We need to know the Word, and we need to be in it. But it is a matter of allowing that Word to come within us and, in a living way, allowing it to become real in our hearts and lives.
That is making each day count for Him: being available so that He can form us into His image. Whatever He puts in our hands, may we be faithful with that.
If the Lord puts something in our hands, let us be faithful with it. Let us not grumble, “Why did You put this in my hands? I would rather have that.” No, He put this there for a special reason, because He wants us to learn of Him.
There is a beautiful picture in Revelation 14. We started this morning with the Lamb of God. There on Mount Zion, they are before the throne of God, worshiping Him. Who are the ones who are there?
These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth.
That was their testimony. It was not their knowledge, this or that, or all their great spectacular testimonies. No, in the simplicity of life, they followed the Lamb wherever He went, and it led them to the throne. That is where we want to end up.
As the Holy Spirit searches our hearts, may He set us free from the complications of this life and return us to this place of simplicity. Where repentance is needed, that is always the first place. May we be those who repent.
On a recent Wednesday evening, the verse shared was from Habakkuk: “Revive Thy work in the midst of the years.” What does the word revive mean?
I studied Latin for four years, and revive comes from a Latin word. The first part means “back,” and the second part is “life.” Back to life. Return to life.
When EMS workers go out and resuscitate somebody, we say, “They revived them.” They are back to life.
What are we talking about when we say, “Revive Thy work in the midst of the years”? We are talking about reviving His life within each one of us, reviving His life within us as an assembly, and reviving His life among the people of God.
There would be that testimony in this late hour. How does much of this reviving come about? There is a simplicity to it: daily giving ourselves to Him, daily walking with Him, and daily allowing Him to lead us into all He would have for us that day.
Those are the ones prepared for His return, and those are the ones who hasten His return.
This is a very simple word, but I pray that the simplicity will not be lost upon our complicated minds. May we allow the Holy Spirit to speak to us, redeem the time that we have, and truly make each day count for Him.
Lord, we are so thankful that we are the redeemed of the Lord, and we shall say so. Lord, we are thankful that You have redeemed us out of the pit of hell. You have taken us out of the kingdom of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of Your beloved Son.
Lord, in that great transaction, there is simply a new beginning.
As we have this new beginning in You, we have a desire to be yielding unto You day by day. Lord, show each one of us the significance of each day. Convict our hearts of it, Lord. Show us Your desire that we live each day for You.
You showed one who knew You so well—Moses, at an old age, who had seen You in many mighty ways—yet he still wanted to be taught and learn of You.
Lord, we are nowhere near that, but we pray that You would be teaching us. We want to be available to You in this hour. We want to be those found being made ready.
We are thankful for the simplicity, Lord, of how You make us ready and how You prepare us, that we could be those used to hasten Your return. In Thy name we pray, amen.