DISCIPLE

by William MacDonald Like every other good thing, grace can be abused. Fire and water can be great blessings, but they can be used wrongly. People can twist the sovereignty of God to teach fatalism: what is going to be is going to be, and there's nothing you can do about it. The doctrine of election is sometimes perverted to suggest that evangelizing is a waste of time and effort.     Sad to say, it is possible to use the grace of God as an excuse for careless living, for believers to use their freedom as a pretext for launching into all kinds of indulgence. This does not mean that the doctrine is faulty. It simply means that some people are desperate to justify ungodly behavior, and if they can do it by using Scripture, so much the better, or so they think.     It is true that believers are not under law but under grace. But that does not mean that they have a right to be lawless. They are not under the law, with all the penalty and condemnation that is involved. But

  By A.W. Tozer   T HINGS ARE FOR US NOT ONLY what they are – they are what we hold them to be. That is to say, our attitude toward things is likely in the long run to be more important than the things themselves. This is a common coin of knowledge, like an old dime wo rn smooth by use, yet it bears upon it the stamp of truth and must not be rejected simp ly because it is familiar.       It is strange how a fact may remain fixed, while our interpreta tion of the fact changes with th e generations and the years. One such fact is the world in which we live. It is here and has been here through the centuries. It is a stable fact, quite unchanged by the passage of time, but how different is modern man's view of it from the view our fathers held! Here we see plainly how great is the power o f interpretation. The world is for all of us not only what it is – it is what we believe it to be. And a tremendous load of woe o r weal rides on the soundness of our interpretation.     

Just as there are no special priviliges, advantages, opportunities and pleasures for prisoners in this world, so it is infinitely worse in Hell.   1. There is no Peace. The Devil, demons and the wicked rejecters of God are hateful and hate each other.  2. There is no Good. No Bibles, Churches, gospel tracts, preachers, missionaries, and none to help, advise, comfort, even prayer cannot help them.  3. There is no Hope, no Grace, and no Mercy. All chances to be saved there, are gone forever. JesusChrist saves here, but He can't in Hell, for He only died for man in this world. Just as demons in Hell cannot be saved, so man cannot be saved there.   4. There is no rest from the torment of a guilty conscience. 5. There is no end, no relief, no annihilation.  The torment is eternal. Newton Parker, adapted

“You cannot put one little star in motion; You cannot shape one single forest leaf; Nor fling a mountain up, nor sink an ocean; Presumptuous pygmy, large with unbelief! You cannot bring one dawn of regal splendor; Nor bid the day to shadowy twilight fall; Nor send the pale moon forth with radiance  tender; And dare you doubt the One Who’s done it all?” A. W. Pink