Are you filled with sorrow today?
. . . . Do not let faith waver. Fight the good fight of faith, and lay hold on Eternal Life. It will be a severe fight, but fight it at any cost; for the Promises of God are Yea and Amen in Christ Jesus (II Corinthians 1:20)
Put your hand in the hand of Christ. There are difficulties to be overcome, but angels that excel in strength will . . . . scatter the darkness which surrounds you !
Yea, He says, “Ask, and ye shall receive . . . !”
“For in Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men. And the Light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not . . . !” John 1:1-5
Fasten your eyes on the Sun of Righteousness. Do not try to adjust all the difficulties, but turn your face to the light, to the throne of God. What will you see there?–The rainbow of the covenant, the living promise of God. Beneath it is the mercy seat, and whosoever avails himself of the provisions of mercy that have been made, and appropriates the merits (worthiness) of the life and death of Christ, has in the rainbow of the covenant a blessed assurance of acceptance with the Father as long as the throne of God endures.
Faith is what you need. Do not let faith waver. Fight the good fight of faith, and lay hold on eternal life. It will be a severe fight, but fight it at any cost; for the Promises of God are Yea and Amen in Christ Jesus. Put your hand in the hand of Christ. There are difficulties to be overcome, but angels that excel in strength will cooperate with the people of God. Face Zion, press your way to the city of solemnities. A glorious crown, a robe woven in the loom of heaven, awaits the overcomer.
Though Satan would cast his hellish shadow athwart your pathway, and seek to hide the mystic ladder from your view that stretches from earth to the throne of God, on which ascend and descend the angels who are ministering spirits to those who shall be heirs of Salvation (deliverance, freedom, rescue, healing and restoration), yet press your way upward, plant your feet on one round after another, and advance to the throne of the Infinite.”
– Signs of the Times, May 2nd, 1895 Ellen White
It is these very difficulties that bring us to the audience chamber of the Most High, to seek counsel of the One who is infinite in wisdom. He loves to have us seek Him; He loves to have us trust Him and believe His Word. If we had no perplexities, no trials, we would become self-sufficient and lifted up in ourselves. The true saints will be purified, and made white, and tried.” – 1NL p. 59 (Letter 58, 1909)
Satan knows that without this knowledge we should be thrown into confusion and divested of our strength. Our faith in God would be gone, and we should be left a prey to every artifice of the enemy. He has laid subtle plans by which to destroy man. It is his purpose to cast his hellish shadow, like the pall of death, between God and man, in order that he may hide Jesus from our view, so that he may cause us to forget the ministry of love and mercy, cut us off from further knowledge of God’s great love and power to usward, and intercept every ray of light from heaven . . . !”
– RH, June 25, 1895
“You must put your foot right on the Word, and say, I believe; I will believe; I will press to the mark of the prize, and everything that hinders me shall be swept away; I will not allow anything to interpose between my soul and God. No, the dark shadow of Satan will come right across our pathway if we let our faith sink into it. But we must do as the eagle does when he is in the cloud and bewildered in the fog. He does not go one way and another as though distracted, but presses upward through the cloud, until he comes into the light above. And so we should press upward beyond the hellish shadow of Satan, when he tries to eclipse the rays of Light that come from God.
Now, we want the life of Christ in our hearts to make us one, and there will be united action. We must press to the mark of the prize of the high calling which is in Christ Jesus our Lord; and what we need is that living, active faith that takes God at His word. We must have it, and God will let us have it if we will.We must not be discouraged. We want to get rid of unbelief; we do not want to talk it, or act it, or think it, but press forward to the mark of the prize of the high calling that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. I feel anxious, because I know that the time has come when God’s people should put on their beautiful garments. “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.” It is the word of infinite power that He wants you to eat and drink. He wants you to eat His flesh and drink His blood, and then the power of God will be in your midst. Then the voice will be touched with a peculiar power.” ref: John 4:6-14, 6:32-40, 6:47-58, 6:63 & Psalm 34:7-8 – 1 SAT p.309“After His baptism, Christ knelt on the banks of Jordan and offered prayer to His Father, And as He prayed, the heavens were opened, and the glory of God, like a dove of burnished gold, rested upon Him, while from the highest heaven there came the Voice, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” [Matthew 3:17].Christ’s prayer was offered for us, and it cleaves through every shadow that Satan casts between us and God. In our behalf the Saviour laid hold of the power of Omnipotence, and as we pray to God, we may know that Christ’s prayer has ascended before, and that God has heard and answered it. With all our sins and weaknesses we are not cast aside as worthless. “He hath made us accepted in the Beloved.” The glory that rested upon Christ is a pledge of the love of God for us. It tells of the power of prayer–how the human voice may reach the ear of God, and our petitions find acceptance in the courts of heaven. The light that fell from the open portals upon the head of our Saviour, will fall upon us as we pray for help to resist temptation. The Voice that spoke to Jesus says to every believing soul, “This is My beloved child, in whom I am well pleased.”
– Sermons and Talks, Oct 1, 1902