Moments with Maclaren in 1 Samuel

 

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1 SAMUEL 3

"God ever calls His servants to tasks which only by degrees are made known." --The Child Prophet, 1 Samuel 3:1-14

"We must first put ourselves in God’s hands, and then He will lead us round the turn in the road, and show us our work. --The Child Prophet, 1 Samuel 3:1-14

I SAMUEL 7

"The best use of memory is to mark more plainly than it could be seen at the moment the divine help which has filled our lives." --Repentance and Victory, 1 Samuel 7:1-12

1 SAMUEL 8

"A great deal of unavowed and unconscious unbelief wears the mask of wise foresight." --Make Us a King, --1 Samuel 8 4-20

"One of the first lessons which we have to learn, and one of the last which we have to practise, is a wholesome disregard of other people’s ways. If we are to do anything worth doing, we must be content to be in a minority of one, if needful." --Make Us a King, --1 Samuel 8 4-20

". . . experience is the best teacher, though her school fees are high." --1 Samuel 8 4-20

1 SAMUEL 9

"Call nothing trivial, and seek to be conscious of His guiding hand." --The Old Judge and the Young King, 1 Samuel 9:15-27

"Fair beginnings may end ill, and those who are set in positions of influence have hard work to keep steady heads, and to sail with low sails. --The Old Judge and the Young King, 1 Samuel 9:15-27

1 SAMUEL 10

"We too have divine calls in our lives, and alas! we too not seldom hide ourselves among the stuff, and try to avoid taking up some heavy duty, by absorbing our minds in material good." --The King After Man's Heart, 1 Saumel 10:17-27

1 SAMUEL 12

"Our dim eyes cannot see the realities of the invisible world, and so we cleave to the illusions of the visible, which, at their best, are but shadows of the real, and are often made, by our weak hearts, its rival and substitute." --Samuel's Challenge and Charge, 1 Samuel 12:1-15

" The great point of the last three verses is that the new order of things has not changed the old law, which bound up well-being inseparably with obedience." --Samuel's Challenge and Charge, 1 Samuel 12:1-15

1 SAMUEL 15

". . . we are not meant to question the reality of the divine command, nor His right to give it." --Saul Rejected, 1 Samuel 15:10-23

"Partial obedience is complete disobedience." --Saul Rejected, 1 Samuel 15:10-23

"Disobedience which will not do a little thing is great disobedience." Saul Rejected, 1 Samuel 15:10-23

"The mingling of personal advantage with any sort of service of God, ruins the whole, and turns it into mere selfishness." --Saul Rejected, 1 Samuel 15:10-23

1 SAMUEL 16

"He gets light enough for the next step, but no more. That is always God’s way. Duty opens by degrees, and the way to see farther ahead is to go as far as we see." --The Shepherd-King, 1 Samuel 16:1-13

1 SAMUEL 17

"He who trusts in God should be as a pillar of fire, burning bright in the darkness of terror, and making a rallying point for weaker hearts. When panic has seized others, the Christian soul has the more reason for courage." --The Victory of Unarmed Faith, 1 Samuel 17:32-51

"If we modestly and boldly show the power of faith in our lives, we may kindle yearnings in some gloomy hearts, that would lead them to peace, if followed out." --The Victory of Unarmed Faith, 1 Samuel 17:32-51

"The more simply we keep ourselves to the simple methods which the word of God enjoins, and to the simple weapons which ought to be the easiest for a Christian, the more likely shall we be to conquer." --The Victory of Unarmed Faith, 1 Samuel 17:32-51

1 SAMUEL 24

"To repay evil with benefits, to abstain from retaliation when it is in our power, to keep our tongues from bitter and wounding words, to appeal to the adversary’s better self, even at the cost of our own ‘dignity,’-all that is not easy nor usual among professing Christians. But it ought to be." --Love for Hate, The True Quid Pro Quo, 1 Samuel 24:4-17

"It has taken nineteen hundred years to teach us that passive endurance is more heroic than fighting for our own hand, and that repaying scorn and hate with their like is less noble than meeting them with endless forgiveness." --Love for Hate, The True Quid Pro Quo, 1 Samuel 24:4-17

1 SAMUEL 29

"If any Christian man were to do as the monks of old did, fly into solitude to look after his own soul, then the question which came to Elijah would be suitable to him, ‘What doest thou here?’ Is there not work enough for you out there, in that wicked world? Is that not the place for you? Where is the place for the ‘salt’? Where the meat is in danger of putrefaction. Rub it in! That is what it was meant for. ‘Ye are the light of the world.’" --What Doest Thou Here?, 1 Samuel 29:3; 1 Kings 19:9

"I can quite believe that the theatre might be made an instrument of morality. I can quite believe that a race-course might be a perfectly innocent place. I can quite believe that there may be no harm in a dance. All that I say is that there are two questions which every Christian professor ought to ask himself about such subjects. One is, Can I ask God to bless this thing, and my doing it? And the other is, Does this help or hinder my religion?" --What Doest Thou Here?, 1 Samuel 29:3; 1 Kings 19:9

"So let me tell you, you will neither recommend your religion nor yourselves to men of the world, by inconsistently trying to identify yourselves with them." --What Doest Thou Here?, 1 Samuel 29:3; 1 Kings 19:9 

"The world respects an out-and-out Christian; but neither God nor the world respects an inconsistent one." --What Doest Thou Here?, 1 Samuel 29:3; 1 Kings 19:9

 

Moments with Maclaren in Judges and Ruth

 

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JUDGES 2

". . .  we are in danger of being ‘hindered,’ however ‘well’ we may have begun to ‘run,’ and that our only remedy is to renew continually our first-hand vision of ‘the great works of the Lord,’ and our consecration to His service." - A Summary of Israel's Faithlessness and God's Patience, Judges 2:1-10

"The strong earthward pull is ever acting on us, and, unless God hold us up, we too shall slide downwards." --Israel's Obstinacy and God's Patience, Judges 2:11-23

"There shall be no unnatural greenhouse shelter provided for weak plants. The liability to fall imposes the necessity of trial, but the trial does not impose the necessity of falling!" --Israel's Obstinacy and God's Patience, Judges 2:11-23

"His charity ‘suffers long and is kind, is not easily provoked.’ We can weary out all forbearance but His, which is endless. We weary Him indeed, but we do not weary Him out, with our iniquities. Man’s sin stretches far; but God’s patient love overlaps it. It lasts long; but God’s love is eternal." --Israel's Obstinacy and God's Patience, Judges 2:11-23

JUDGES 5

"Emotions evaporate very soon if they are not used to drive the wheels of conduct." --Recreant Reuben, Judges 5:16

JUDGES 6

" . . . there is a charm and a fascination in the thought, ‘the Lord is peace,’ which stills the inward tempest, and makes us quiet, waiting upon His will and drawing in His grace." --Gideon's Altar, Judges 6:24

" . . . the peace of God is the best preparation for strife. It gives courage, it leaves the heart at leisure to fling all its power into the conflict, it inspires with the consciousness of a divine ally." --Gideon's Altar, Judges 6:24

"If we are to come out of the battle with victory sitting on our helmets, we must go into it with the Dove of God brooding in our hearts." --Gideon's Altar, Judges 6:24

"The Christian life is continual warfare, but in it all, ‘the peace of God which passeth understanding’ may ‘garrison our hearts and minds.’" --Gideon's Altar, Judges 6:24

"If you would enter into peace, you must fight your way to it, and every step of the road must be a battle. The land of peace is won by the good fight of faith." --Gideon's Altar, Judges 6:24

"The strongest demonstration that the Church can give the world of its really being God’s Church is its unlikeness to the world." --Gideon's Fleece, Judges 6:37

RUTH 1

". . . no times are so wild but that in them are quiet corners, green oases, all the greener for their surroundings, where life glides on in peaceful isolation from the tumult." --A Gentle Heroine, A Gentile Convert, Ruth 1:16-22

"And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me." -Ruth 1:16-17 (KJV)

"How many hearts, since Ruth spoke her vow, have found in it the words that fitted their love best! How often they have been repeated by quivering lips, and heard as music by loving ears!" --A Gentle Heroine, A Gentile Convert, Ruth 1 16-22

 

Moments with Maclaren in Joshua

 

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JOSHUA 1

" No man is indispensable. God’s work goes on uninterrupted. The instruments are changed, but the Master-hand is the same, and lays one tool aside and takes another out of the tool-chest as He will." --The New Leader's Commission, Joshua 1:1-11

"Christian people that have their Christian principles to dig out of the Bible when the necessity comes, will likely find that the necessity is past before they have completed the excavation. The actual battle-field is no place to learn drill." --The Charge to the Soldier of the Lord, Joshua 1:7, 8

"The man that succeeds in obeying and translating God’s will into conduct is the victor, whatever be the outward fruits of his life." --The Charge to the Soldier of the Lord, Joshua 1:7, 8

JOSHUA 3

"We are all impatient of uncertainty, either in opinion or in conduct; but if you are not quite sure what God wants you to do, you may be quite sure that He does not at present want you to do anything." --The Untrodden Path and the Guiding Ark, Joshua 3:4

"God often opens His hand by one finger at a time, and leaves us face to face with some plain but difficult duty, without letting us see the helps to its performance, till we need to use them. If we go right on the road which He has traced out, it will never lead us into a blind alley." --The Waters Saw Thee; They Were Afraid, Joshua 3:5-17

" The best security for to-morrow’s wonders is to-day’s sanctifying." --The Waters Saw Thee; They were Afraid, Joshua 3:5-17

 

JOSHUA 5

"We have the right to be sure that God is on our side, when we have made sure that we are on God’s." --The Captain of the Lord's Host, Joshua 5:14



JOSHUA 6

"Keep on as you have begun, and for the six weary days turn out, however hot the sun, . . .  however wearisome and flat it may seem to be perpetually tramping round the same walls of the same old city; keep on, for in due season the trumpet will sound and the walls will fall." --The Siege of Jericho, Joshua 6:10,11

"It has always been faith that has bound men to God. That faith may co-exist with very different degrees of illumination. Not the creed, but the trust, is the all-important matter. 

Beware lest people with less light and more love get in before you, ‘who shall come from the east and the west.’" --Rahab, Joshua 6:25

"So we should not expect old heads on young shoulders, nor wonder if people, lifted from the dunghills of the world, have some stench and rags of their old vices hanging about them still. That thought should moderate our expectations of the characters of converts from heathenism, or from the degraded classes at home." --Rahab, Joshua 6:25

JOSHUA 7

"It is true to-day, and will always be true, that the victories of the Church are won by its holiness far more than by any gifts or powers of mind, culture, wealth, eloquence, or the like." --Achan's Sin, Israel's Defeat, Joshua 7:1-12

JOSHUA 10

"Life inexorably slides away from us." --The Sun Stayed, Joshua 10:12

"We are constantly startled to feel how long ago such and such a thing took place. The mother sees her little girl at her knee, and in a few days, as it seems, finds her a woman. How immense is our life in the prospect, how awfully it collapses in the retrospect!" --The Sun Stayed, Joshua 10:12

"Strenuous work is the true way to lengthen each day. Time is infinitely elastic. The noblest work is to do ‘the works of Him that sent me.’ There should be no care for the future. It is in His hand. There will be room in it for doing all His will . . . If so, the passing day will have results that never pass." --The Sun Stayed, Joshua 10:12

"So life, short as it is, will be long enough for all that we have to do and learn and be. Christ’s servant is immortal till his work is done." --The Sun Stayed, Joshua 10:12

JOSHUA 13

"We should be continually driven by a sense of our incompleteness, and drawn by the fair vision of unattained possibilities. In all regions, to be satisfied with the attained is to cease to grow." --Unwon, But Claimed, Joshua 13:1-6

"We each have our limitations, the defects of our qualities, the barriers of our environment, the brevity of our day of toil, and we have to be content to carry the fiery cross a little way and then to give it up to other hands. There is only One who could say,’ It is done.’ Let us see that we do our own fragment." --Unwon But Claimed, Joshua 13:1-6

JOSHUA 14

" The world, which only measures time by its own revolutions, has to lament over what seem to the sufferers long years of pains and tears, but in the calendar of faith ‘weeping endures for a night, joy cometh in the morning.’" --Caleb--A Green Old Age, Joshua 14:6

JOSHUA 22

"All God’s gifts in providence and in the Gospel are given that we may have somewhat wherewith to bless our less happy brethren. ‘The service of man’ is not the substitute for, but the expression of, Christianity." --The End of the War, Joshua 22:1-9

Moments with Maclaren in Deuteronomy

 

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DEUTERONOMY 8

"Let memory work under the distinct recognition of divine guidance in every part of the past." --The Lesson of Memory, Deuteronomy 8:2

"The future for the man who lives in Christ is but the prolongation, and the heightening into superlative excellence and beauty, of all that is good in the past and in the present." --The Lesson of Memory, Deuteronomy 8:2

DEUTERONOMY 30

"They err who think of God’s commandments as grievous burdens; they are merciful guide-posts. They do not so much lay weights on our backs as give light to our eyes." --The Spirit of the Law, Deuteronomy 30:11-20

DEUTERONOMY 32

". . . it is all meant as training. If we could only carry that clear conviction with us day by day into the little things of life, what different things these, which we call the monotonous trifles of our daily duties, would become! The things may be small and unimportant, but the way in which we do them is not unimportant." --The Eagle and Its Brood, Deuteronomy 32:11

"Character may be manifested in the great moments, but it is made in the small ones." --The Eagle and Its Brood, Deuteronomy 32:11

DEUTERONOMY 33

". . . he who knows himself to have God for his friend and his helper, can go through the world keeping a sunny face, whatever the clouds may be, erect and secure, light of heart and buoyant, holding up his chin above the stormiest waters, and breasting all difficulties and dangers with a confidence far away from presumption, because it is the consequence of the realisation of God’s presence." --At the Bush, Deuteronomy 33:16

". . . each of us may be sure that if God sends us on stony paths He will provide us with strong shoes, and will not send us out on any journey for which He does not equip us well." --Shod for the Road, Deuteronomy 33:25

 

DEUTERONOMY 34

". . . an offence of Moses could not be a small offence.’ Noblesse oblige! The higher a man rises in communion with God, and the more glorious the message and office which are put into his hands, the more intolerable in him is the slightest deflection from the loftiest level." --A Death in the Desert, Deuteronomy 34:5, 6

"It is the lot of all epoch-making men, of all great constructive and reforming geniuses, whether in the Church or in the world, that they should toil at a task, the full issues of which will not be known until their heads are laid low in the dust . . . But that is not the fate of epoch-making and great men only; it is the law for our little lives. If these are worth anything, they are constructed on a scale too large to bring out all their results here and now." --A Death in the Desert, Deuteronomy 34:5, 6

"Moses dies alone, with no hand to clasp his, none to close his eyes; but God’s finger does it. The outward form of his death is but putting into symbol and visibility the awful characteristics of that last moment for us all. However closely we have been twined with others, each of us has to unclasp dear hands, and make that journey through the narrow, dark tunnel by himself. We live alone in a very real sense, but we each have to die as if there were not another human being in the whole universe but only ourselves. But the solitude may be a solitude with God. Up there, alone with the stars and the sky and the everlasting rocks and menacing death, Moses had for companion the supporting God. That awful path is not too desolate and lonely to be trodden if we tread it with Him." --A Death in the Desert, Deuteronomy 34:5, 6

"God has many tools in His tool-chest, and He needs them all before the work is done. Joshua could no more have wielded Moses’ rod than Moses could have wielded Joshua’s sword. The one did his work, and was laid aside. New circumstances required a new type of character-the smaller man better fitted for the rougher work. And so it always is. Each generation, each period, has its own men that do some little part of the work which has to be done, and then drop it and hand over the task to others." --A Death in the Desert, Deuteronomy 34:5, 6  

Moments with Maclaren in Numbers

 

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NUMBERS 9

"Do not let us be in a hurry to run before God. When the Israelites were crossing the Jordan, they were told to leave a great space between themselves and the guiding ark, that they might know how to go, because they had ‘not passed that way heretofore.’ Impatient hurrying at God’s heels is apt to lead us astray. Let Him get well in front, that you may be quite sure which way He desires you to go, before you go. And if you are not sure which way He desires you to go, be sure that He does not at that moment desire you to go anywhere." --The Guiding Pillar, Numbers 9:16

"We need to hold the present with a slack hand, so as to be ready to fold our tents and take to the road, if God will. We must not reckon on continuance, nor strike our roots so deep that it needs a hurricane to remove us." --The Guiding Pillar, Numbers 9:16

NUMBERS 10

"We must take God’s cause for ours, in all the various aspects of that phrase. And that means, first of all, that we make our own perfecting into the likeness of Jesus Christ the main aim of our own lives and efforts." --The Hallowing of Work and Rest, Numbers 10: 35,36

"Most of us will not have many large occasions of trial and conflict in our career; and, if God’s fighting for us is not available in regard to the small annoyances of home and daily life, I know not for what it is available." --The Hallowing of Work and Rest, Numbers 10:35, 36

NUMBERS 13

 

", , , the wanderers had the end of their desert journey within sight; one bold push forward, and their feet would tread on their inheritance. But, as is so often the case, courage oozed out at the decisive moment, and cowardice, disguised as prudence, called for ‘further information,’-that cuckoo-cry of the faint-hearted." --Afraid of Giants, Numbers 13:17-33

" . . . there is no better cure for fear than action." --Afraid of Giants, Numbers 13:17-33

"Let us beware of the one-eyed ‘prudence’ which sees only the perils in the path of duty and enterprise for God, and is blind to the all-sufficient presence which makes us more than conquerors, when we lean all our weight on it." --Afraid of Giants, Numbers 13:17-33

NUMBERS 14

"Nothing is more hateful to resolute sinners than good counsel which is undeniably true." --Weighed, and Found Wanting, Numbers 14:1-10

"There is no limitation to the divine forgiveness; you cannot exhaust it." --Moses the Intercessor, Numbers 14:19

"There is but one thing that limits the divine pardon, and that is continuous rejection of it. Whoever seeks to be pardoned is pardoned." --Moses the Intercessor, Numbers 14:19

 

Moments with Maclaren in Leviticus

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LEVITICUS 25

"Other men will live in our houses, read our books, own our mills, use our furniture, preach in our pulpits, sit in our pews: we are but lodgers in this abiding nature, ‘like a wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night,’ and to-morrow morning vacates his rooms for a new arrival, and goes away unregretted and is forgotten in an hour." -- Sojourners with God, Leviticus 25:23

"Cherish, then, constant consciousness of that solemn eternity, and let your eyes be ever directed to it, like a man who sees some great flush of light on the horizon, and is ever turning from his work to look." -- Sojourners with God, Leviticus 25:23

"Use the transient as preparation for the eternal, the fleeting days as those which determine the undying ‘Day’ and its character." -- Sojourners with God, Leviticus 25:23

"Keep your cares and interests in the present rigidly limited to necessary things. Why should travellers burden themselves? The less luggage, the easier marching. The accommodation and equipment in the desert do not matter much. The wise man will say, ‘Oh, it will do. I shall soon be home.’ ‘Ye are strangers and sojourners.’" -- Sojourners with God, Leviticus 25:23

"We are strangers indeed, passing through a country which is not ours, but whilst we are sojourners, we are ‘sojourners’ with the king of the land. In the antique hospitable times, the chief of the tribe would take the travellers to his own tent, and charge himself with their safety and comfort. So we are God’s guests on our travels. He will take care of us." -- Sojourners with God, Leviticus 25:23

"True, we are strangers, and in our constant movement we lose many of the companions of our march, and the track of the caravan may be traced by the graves on either side. But, since we are ‘with Him,’ we have companionship even when most solitary, and even in a strange land shall not be lonely. Seek then to cultivate as a joy and strength that consciousness that the Lord of all the land is ever with you, Whoever goes, He abides." -- Sojourners with God, Leviticus 25:23

"With Him for our Host and companion, let us peacefully go on our road, while the life of strangers and sojourners shall last. It will bring us to the fatherland where we shall be at home with the King, and find in Him our ‘sure dwelling, and quiet resting-place, and peaceful habitation for ever.’" --Sojourners with God, Leviticus 25:23

LEVITICUS 26

" . . . He who gives is ever pouring forth His own self for us to take, and there is no limit to our reception but our capacity and our desire; nor any reason for a moment’s break in our possession of love, righteousness, peace, but our withdrawal of our souls from beneath the Niagara of His grace. As long as we keep our poor vessels below that constant downpour they will be full. It is all our own blame if they are empty." --The Old Store and the New, Leviticus 26:10

"Accept cheerfully the law of constant change under which God’s love has set us. Do not let the pleasant bonds of habit tie down your hearts so tightly to the familiar possessions that you shrink from the introduction of fresh elements. Be sure that the new comes from the same loving hand which sent the old in its season, and that change is meant to be progress." --The Old Store and the New, Leviticus 26:10

"Front the vicissitudes of life, not merely with brave patience, but with happy confidence, for they all come from Him whose love is older than your oldest blessings, and whose mercies, new every morning, express themselves afresh through every change. Welcome the new, treasure the old, and in both see the purpose of that loving Father who, Himself unchanged, changeth all things . . . ." --The Old Store and the New, Leviticus 26:10

"The great central truths of God in Christ are to be kept for ever; but we shall come to grasp them in their fullness only by joyfully welcoming every fresh access of clearer light which falls upon them; and gladly laying aside our inadequate thoughts of God’s permanent revelation of Himself in Jesus Christ, to house and garner in heart and spirit the fuller knowledge which it may please Him to impart." --The Old Store and the New, Leviticus 26:10