Dears:
Yesterday’s devotion may have seemed confusing; and I had some typos in it. At the very bottom, those are corrected.
Here are some clearer words, from Thomas Goodwin. . . . “Do but possess your heart then with the thoughts that there is this fullness of grace, these great riches of mercy in God, and it will make your soul easily believe that there is a willingness in God to bestow them [those great riches of mercy], and that a He is resolved to give them out to you whenever you come to Him . . . "
“The believer’s faith has the freedom and liberty to draw in the ocean of God’s mercies, to draw (if it were possible) the whole of the sea itself to make a full stream for its support, and to help it off the ground, and to help its being borne aloft above all mire of temptations. Nor are there any restrictions about how much or how little it may let in; and to confirm this, why should not faith as well have this immediate recourse, in and with the promises while yet unperformed, unto these essential mercies beforehand, to bestow and give forth the things promised, as well as afterwards in thanksgiving, when we have received the mercies as performed unto us, we bless God for them, and we celebrate all those essential mercies in God as the original and immediate cause of them? . . . The great return which the Gentiles, and all the nations in the world, are said to bring unto God (when converted by the gospel), as the richest present of thankfulness, is set out by this, ’to glorify God for His mercy,’ (Rom. 15:9). . . . "
