For most of us, Christmas will be a Season of joyful giving, receiving, and worshiping. However, there will be some who feel it practically impossible to participate in the Christmas spirit, perhaps on account of personal loss, or trial of various kinds. For such among us, Tribulation Worketh by George Watson may prove a blessing. In it, he talks about the work of suffering in our lives and the blessing it leaves in its wake. In the introduction to this little book, its author has this to say:
Broken Bread
Harvey Christian Publishers have published the book Broken Bread by John Wright Follette. Mr. Follette was a unique thinker and writer and was willing for God to lead him out of “the box” and into a wide panorama of spiritual truth which he imparted to hungry souls in seminars and conferences while living, and he still speaks through his writing to those of us who long for more of Christ’s inexhaustible supplies of grace. Below are some choice quotes from this book:
“Paul could have felt sorry for himself and so confused over the unkind things the people were saying that he might have developed an ugly spirit toward them. I like these lines of Edwin Markham:
‘He drew a circle that shut me out—
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win,
We drew a circle that took him in.’
Leonard Ravenhill
Leonard Ravenhill wrote to Edwin & Lillian Harvey while they still resided in Britain back in the 1970′s asking if he could be a representative for the two volumes of “Kneeling We Triumph” here in the US. Most of the time from then on he kept a quantity of price lists on hand to give or send to people and would highlight the books he especially wanted to emphasize. “Kneeling We Triumph” would invariably be among the highlighted titles. It was interesting for me when receiving an order to be quite sure it was a price list that originated from Mr. Ravenhill because there would be ten or so highlighted but not all ordered.
God has from time to time moved some of His servants to tell others of our books. That kind of advertizing is a reinforcement to us of the calling He has placed upon us. May the Lord find us always available to give, “Meat in due season.”
Eric or Little by Little
It is amazing and at times, discouraging, depending on how you look at it, to realize how slowly true progress is achieved. It is equally true that degeneration in any form often occurs “little by little,” in fact so gradually, that we can be totally ignorant of what is happening to us until some failure or perhaps even catastrophe awakens us to our true state.
Amanda Smith, An Autobiography: The story of the Lord’s dealings with Amanda Smith.
“Three months of schooling was all I ever had,” writes Amanda Smith. That was at a school for whites, though a few colored children were permitted to attend. To this school my brother and I walked five and a half miles each day, in going and returning, and the attention we received while there was only such as the teacher could give after the requirements of the more favored pupils had been met. In view of the deficiency in my early education, and other disadvantages in this respect, under which I have labored, I crave the indulgence of all who may read this simple and unvarnished story of my life.”
How They Prayed, Vol. Three: Be still, and hear what God shall say.
The book by Edwin and Lillian Harvey, entitled How They Prayed Volume 3, quotes from the diaries, letters, and sermons of pastors and missionaries who have come to acknowledge the part prayer must play in revivals, widespread and local. “To arouse one man or woman to the tremendous power of prayer for others,” says A. J. Gordon, “is worth more than the combined activity of a score of average Christians. What David Brainerd did, others may do. God is no respecter of persons.”
Father Calling: Called to save the children.
Can God call children or rather does God call children? What he can do is infinite; what he does do brings the question down to practicalities. The book Father Calling presents stories of children who received intimations of God’s plan for their lives at a young age. Take Charles Spurgeon for example, or Lord Shaftsbury, or Hudson Taylor, to mention a few. Sometimes the call was direct but more often it came as a result of life experience as in the case of William Quarrier who founded the Quarrier Homes in Scotland. Growing up in the slums of Glasgow, William knew what it was to feel hungry and sometimes homeless. And so he determined to give his life to help other children like himself find a place of comfort and safety from the cruelty of a fallen world.
How They Prayed, Vol. Three: What will it cost?
The book by Edwin and Lillian Harvey, entitled How They Prayed Volume 3, stresses the role of prayer in revivals, widespread and local, and the emphasis many pastors and missionaries placed on private and public prayer. The following quotations from missionaries to Africa and India encourage us to give communion with God top priority in our service for Christ:
“The danger of our day is devotion to duty to the neglect of personal communion. We will do far more and far better if we carefully guard against hindering our times of communion with Him.
“As well try to draw water out of a dry well as to try to carry on Christian service without drawing present life from the Living Vine.
How They Prayed, Vol. Three: When prayer becomes a Symphony
“‘If two of you shall symphonize on earth as touching anything that they shall ask it shall be done for them of my father which is in Heaven.’ The word, symphonize, is a musical term,” wrote A. T. Pierson, “referring to the harmony of notes in a chord, which is possible only when each accords with the whole instrument. One note, out of tune, will turn accord into discord. So the power of joint supplication depends not on the numbers gathered, but on the measure of real agreement of each with the mind and will of God. One out of accord with Him hinders perfect harmony with the rest; hence the smallest number that can agree is specified, because there is more power when two pray, provided they truly agree, than when a larger number apparently unite but such agreement is lacking. Numbers are of no importance, but perfect harmony is.”
How They Prayed, Vol. 3: Is prayer our chief work?
The book by Edwin and Lillian Harvey, entitled How They Prayed Volume 3, reveals the part prayer prayed in revivals, widespread and local, and the emphasis those men used of God in these revivals placed on private and public prayer. The following missionaries to the Orient exhort us out of their rich experience of prevailing prayer, to give communion with God top priority: