Here’s more wisdom from Murray’s
With Christ in the School of Payer.
“Let us seek not only in prayer, but at all times, to joyfully accept the assurance that man’s prayer on earth and God’s answer in heaven are meant for each other.”
Our prayers and God’s answers — perfect together!
In his book, With Christ in the School of Prayer, Andrew Murray reminds us to look to our heavenly Father.
“God loves you not because you are clever or good, but because He is your father.”
Pray with Pastor Murray:
“Lord, teach us to live in such a way that the Father and His love may be nearer, clearer and dearer to us than the love of any earthly father.”
This week I plan to share a few nuggets of wisdom from Andrew Murray’s little book, With Christ in the School of Prayer. Pastor Murray (1828-1917) was a Dutch Reformed Church missionary sent from Scotland to South Africa. He had a knack for putting big ideas into simple words.
“Though in its beginnings prayer is so simple that the feeblest child can pray, it is at the same time the highest and holiest work to which man can rise . . .
At first there is no work that appears so simple; later on, none that is more difficult.”
Ready to work hard?
Proverbs 17:15 (NIV)
Acquitting the guilty and
condemning the innocent—
the Lord detests them both.
In God’s eyes, there’s no “lesser of two evils.” If it’s not right, it’s not justice.
“God in his infinite mercy has devised a way by which justice can be satisfied, and yet mercy can be triumphant. Jesus Christ, the only begotten of the Father, took upon himself the form of man, and offered unto Divine Justice that which was accepted as an equivalent for the punishment due to all his people.”
Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892)
Justice is satisfied, and mercy triumphs — 
Justice and mercy are not opposites.
Favoritism is the opposite of justice.
Favoritism pretends there was no harm. And that’s wrong.
James 2:9 (AMP)
But if you show partiality [prejudice, favoritism], you are committing sin and are convicted by the Law as offenders.
Justice acknowledges sin. Mercy forgives it. And that’s good.
Leviticus 19:15 (ESV)
You shall do no injustice in court.
You shall not be partial to the poor
or defer to the great,
but in righteousness shall you
judge your neighbor.
I’ve got my call for jury duty. I may or may not be selected to serve. But I already have my instructions — from the mouth of the Great Judge.
I got a card in the mail — it’s my turn for jury duty.
This set me thinking . . . about justice.
Isaiah 61:8 (ESV)
For I the Lord love justice.
Our holy God loves justice. Our all-knowing, all-seeing God loves justice.
I have some doubts about our system of justice. It is a human system. None of the people involved are all-seeing or all-knowing. We can be led astray by a clever argument or a touching story.
Lord, teach us to love justice. Teach us to know justice. Teach us to seek justice.
“O Lord, forgive me my sins,
the sins of my youth,
and my present sins,
the sin that my parents cast upon me,
original sin,
and the sins that I cast upon my children,
in an ill example;
actual sins,
sins which are manifest to all the world,
and sins which I have so labored to hide from the world,
as that now they are hid from mine own conscience,
and mine own memory . . .
Forgive me, O Lord,
O Lord, in the merits of thy Christ and my Jesus,
thine anointed, and my savior.”
John Donne (1571-1631)
Romans 7:19 (NLT)
I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway.
I’m with the Apostle Paul on this one.
This side of heaven, I will be wrong — sometime, somewhere, somehow. No doubt about it.
Romans 7:24-25
Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord.
Jesus was, is and will be the answer Forever and ever.
