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Saturday, December 21, 2013

We Beheld His Glory # 27

What Feeding Upon Christ Means

Feeding upon Christ! Remember that you have made a start by making Christ your life, and that has to be kept up as a habit.That it will not do, according to the Lord's Word and stipulation, to have done it yesterday, and not to do it today, or to think that that is enough for a few days; it has got to be continuous, daily, habitual. What then is feeding upon Christ? It relates to several simple things, but the importance and magnitude of these things, which are regarded as commonplace, can only be recognized from the standpoint of the testimony to which they lead. Is there a greater testimony than life triumphant over death? There is none! And you and I, as we go on with the Lord, will discover that it is the highest thing in our experience, and the thing concerning which all hell rages. We are really up against the naked forces of the devil, and they are against us, when once we have taken our place with the Lord Jesus, and the issue will be either the destruction of our testimony by the forces of death in bringing us to death spiritually, and in any other way, or the testimony will be maintained, the Testimony to Christ's tremendous victory over all the power of the devil. When you view things from that standpoint, related things take on importance, and when one speaks about feeding upon Christ as being, in the place a matter of prayer, then prayer is immediately related to the testimony of life triumphant over death.

Feeding By Prayer

We do feed upon Christ in prayer. To put that in another way, there is an imparting of Himself to His Own in prayer. We may go to prayer in weariness, and rise in freshness; we may go to prayer exhausted, and rise renewed. Is it that we have simply uttered some form of prayer, prayed some prayer? We know quite well if that is so we do not get up very much invigorated. Formal praying does not bring very much life. Going through a form of prayers sometimes only ministers death. But really seeking the Lord, reaching out, taking hold of the Lord, giving ourselves up to the Lord in prayer, never fails to have renewing, uplifting, strengthening results. You say prayer may wear you out? Yes, but there is a wonderful strength that comes by wearing out prayer. There is vitality given to the spiritual life even in prayer that tires us physically, and we go in the strength of it. Yes, prayer is a way in which Christ is ministered to us by the Holy Spirit. Prayer is a way in which we feed upon Christ; He becomes our life.

Feeding By the Word

Then of course, the Word: there is value, a strengthening, enriching, building up value in giving ourselves to the Word of the Lord, I mean spiritually. We can study the Bible in a technical way, and it may not mean a great deal of spiritual help. But to go to the Word of the Lord, in order that our spiritual life may be enriched; not with a congregation in view, not with increased information as our objective, but because of our own spiritual life; and to take pains with the Word of the Lord and to give ourselves, and not to be discouraged because for a little while we are getting nothing: there is a real value in that; and it is remarkable how, after the initial period of discouragement, you begin to get something. It seems as though the Lord tests us out, and then there is a ministration of Christ by the Spirit through the Word. Yes, but it is not only reading the Word of the Lord; there is a value in that; but that passage, quoted by the Lord in the wilderness to the devil, has a deeper meaning than that. Go back to the book of Deuteronomy with it, and you will find that it was not Israel's reading or studying of the Law that was in view, it was their obedience to it. They lived by obedience to the Word of the Lord, and in every act of obedience to the Word of the Lord there is a fresh ministration of Christ. You can never be obedient to any part of the Word of the Lord without gaining Christ. It is always so. That is how we live by the Word, being obedient to it. Obedience to the Word is life, because it is an increase of Christ.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 28 - "Sustenance by Fellowship")

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