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Welcome to your newsletter and we hope you enjoy it. In this issue we've featured a comforting yet thought-provoking article, God Is Enough, by Hannah Whitall Smith. Read her thoughts regarding those who "wait upon the Lord" with sound doctrines, their feelings, their righteous works or their fervent prayers: "To wait upon God only seems one of the unsafest things they can do, and to have their expectation from Him alone is like building on the sand."
We've also included more letters and guidance from the Word by Peter Wade, in a very informative piece that we've entitled, More of... Dear Peter Wade. Perhaps you'll see yourself in one of the letters! We did.
Please send us your comments by clicking or tapping in the blue and white LET US KNOW WHAT YOU THINK! box when you see it. You may comment about anything in the newsletter there.
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The last and greatest lesson that the soul has to learn is the fact that God, and God alone, is enough for all its needs. This is the lesson that all His dealings with us are meant to teach; and this is the crowning discovery of our whole Christian life. God is enough!
 If God is what He would seem to be from the revealings we have been considering; if He is indeed the “ God of all comfort,” as we have seen; if He is our Shepherd; if He is really and truly our Father; if, in short, all the many aspects we have been studying of His character and His ways are actually true, then we must, it seems to me, come to the positive conviction that He is, in Himself alone, enough for all our possible needs, and that we may safely rest in Him absolutely and forever.
Most Christians have, I suppose, sung these words in one of our most familiar hymns, "Thou, O Christ, art all I want, More than all in Thee I find." But I doubt whether all of us could honestly say that the words have expressed any reality in our own experience. Christ has not been all we want. We have wanted a great many things besides Him.
We have wanted fervent feelings about Him, or realizations of His presence with us, or an interior revelation of His love; or else we have demanded satisfactory schemes of doctrine, or successful Christian work, or something of one sort or another, besides Himself, that will constitute a personal claim upon Him. Just Christ Himself, Christ alone, without the addition of any of our experiences concerning Him, has not been enough for us in spite of all our singing; and we do not even see how it is possible that He could be enough.
The psalmist said in those old days: “My soul, wait thou only upon God: for my expectation is from him.” But now the Christian says, “My soul, wait thou upon my sound doctrines, for my expectation is from them”; or, “My soul, wait thou on my good disposition and feelings, or upon my righteous works, or upon my fervent prayers, or upon my earnest striving, for my expectation is from these.”
To wait upon God only seems one of the unsafest things they can do, and to have their expectation from Him alone is like building on the sand. They reach out on every side for something to depend on, and, not until everything else fails, will they put their trust in God alone. George Macdonald says: “We look upon God as our last and feeblest resource. We only go to Him when we have nowhere else to go. And then we learn that the storms of life have driven us, not upon the rocks, but into the desired haven.”
No soul can be really at rest until it has given up all dependence on everything else and has been forced to depend on the Lord alone. As long as our expectation is from other things, nothing but disappointment awaits us. Feelings may change, and will change with our changing circumstances; doctrines and dogmas may be upset; Christian work may come to naught; prayers may seem to lose their fervency; promises may seem to fail; everything that we have believed in or depended upon may seem to be swept away, and only God is left, just God, the bare God, if I may be allowed the expression; simply and only God.
We say sometimes, “If I could only find a promise to fit my case, I could then be at rest.” But promises may be misunderstood or misapplied, and, at the moment when we are leaning all our weight upon them, they may seem utterly to fail us. But the Promiser, who is behind His promises, and is infinitely more than His promises, can never fail nor change.
And should every promise be wiped out of the Bible, we would still have God left, and God would be enough. Again I repeat it, only God, He Himself, just as He is, without the addition of anything on our part, whether it be disposition or feelings, or experiences, or good works, or sound doctrines, or any other thing either outward or inward. “God only is my rock and my salvation; he is my defense: I shall not be moved.”
I do not mean by this that we are not to have feelings, or experiences, or revelations, or good works, or sound doctrines. We may have all of these, but they must be the result of salvation, and never the procuring cause; and they can never be depended upon as being any indication of our spiritual condition. They are all things that come and go, and are dependent often upon the state of our health, or the condition of our surroundings, or even sometimes upon the quarter of the wind.
Some people, for instance, can never believe that God loves them when the wind is in slightest degree as the groundwork for our confidence or our joy, we are sure to come to grief. What I do mean is that we are to hold ourselves absolutely independent of them all, resting in only the grand, magnificent fact that God is, and that He is our Saviour; our inner life prospers just as well and is just as triumphant without these personal experiences or personal doings as it is with them. We are to find God, the fact of God, sufficient for all our spiritual needs, whether we feel ourselves to be in a desert or in a fertile valley. We are to say with the prophet: “Although the fig-tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labor of the olive shall fail, and the field shall yield no meat, the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stall; yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.”
The soul is made for this, and can never find rest short of it. All God’s dealings with us, therefore, are shaped to this end; and He is often obliged to deprive us of all joy in everything else in order that He may force us to find our joy only and altogether in Himself. It is all very well, perhaps, to rejoice in His promises, or to rejoice in the revelations He may have granted us, or in the experiences we may have realized; but to rejoice in the Promiser Himself — Himself alone — without promises, or experiences, or revelations, this is crowning point of Christian life; and this is the only place where we can know the peace which passes all understanding, and which nothing can disturb.
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More of... Dear Peter Wade,
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Dear Peter Wade,
"I was taught at a young age not to ask God for anything unless it was important, because He has an entire universe to take care of. But right now I am having a problem and I worry about all day and night. I don't know what to do, but I believe that only God can make it go away. What's my first step?"
I remember the slogan from my youth. “When you are in a fix, look up Philippians 4:6,” so just do it! Here is the command: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God” (ESV). The Message Bible says, “Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns.” Using the artful aid of alliteration, the precept is to worry about nothing.
The prescription is prayer and petition with thanksgiving to God. The promise is peace (verse 7).
The precept is not lengthy or difficult to understand. We all have challenges, problems, difficulties in our earthly life. The command is short and to the point: “Don’t fret or worry.” Just stop worrying; that’s the imperative in the prohibition. As a citizen of heaven (Philippians 3:20), the King will always look after us wherever we are, unlike some modern countries some of us live in. So remember who you are!
Dear Peter Wade,
"I'm a fairly new Christian and I really want to pray correctly. A friend told me that when he prays, he just talks to God the same way he talks to his earthly dad. Isn't there a proper way to pray? "
No, there is no "proper way" to pray. Prayer is fellowship and devotion between a child and his parent. Christianity is not a religion. Christianity is the way of a Father with his family. Prayer and God’s Word are simply the ways that we have communication within the family.
Prayer is a time when we talk to God; we tell him all about the things we’re doing, all the everyday incidents of life, and then we listen to what He has to say; it is worship and devotion. So, talk to the Head of the country of which you are a citizen (heaven) about your cares. Just put it all in everyday language. If you’ve got a problem and you know that you could just pick up the phone at any time and talk to the head of the country about it, you would feel a little bit more confident, especially if he was on your side of the political fence. Wouldn’t you?
Dear Peter Wade,
"I have been a Christian for about 5 years and I still have a problem with worry. I should be much farther along in my walk, but I'm embarrassed to say that I'm not, because I still worry about my husband, my children, my parents and just about everyone. I am familiar with the phrase 'sick with worry' and I do think it makes me sick. Can you help?"
Yes, I can. Prayer with thanksgiving is the prescription. Say, “Thank you, Father,” and just have that continual time of talk with God. That’s the prescription. If you want to get rid of worry, stop doing it and start talking to God about it, and you’ll find the issue will get better.
And then the promise. “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:7 ESV). The peace of God, not peace with God, because Philippians is already written to Christians, and they have made their peace with God.
It’s the peace of God, the peace from God, which is already within you. Paul’s description of it is that it surpasses all our understanding. The peace of God “that is superior to every frame of mind” (CLV). It’s just so incredible, so fantastic. It says it will keep your hearts and minds.
Some translations have “will garrison your heart” which has a military thought. Shall guard your heart, stand guard over it. The peace of God is standing guard over your heart and mind.
The full promise is that that peace of God will keep guard over your heart and mind in Christ Jesus. So now you can go through life without worrying. You can go through life knowing that God is with you wherever you are and that he wants the best for you, that he’s given you the power to bring that best into manifestation in your life.
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You can comment on anything in this newsletter... we'd love to know what you think! Just click on the picture to the left.
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¿Sabía que muchos de los libros de Peter Wade están publicados en español?
If you read Spanish or know someone who does, reading Peter Wade's books that have been translated into this popular language is an exciting way to read and study the Word of God. Give yourself or a friend a treat, or help build a bridge for a Christian who needs a way to easily cross over to a deeper understanding of God.
 La epístola de Pablo a los Colosenses nos lleva a las alturas de la verdad acerca de Cristo quizás como ningún otro libro del Nuevo Testamento. Mientras que Efesios eleva nuestras mentes a los lugares celestiales, Colosenses nos revela Quien mantiene el universo unido, Cristo Jesùs. “La doctrina de la Persona de Cristo está aquí establecida con mayor precisión y plenitud que en cualquier otra epístola de San Pablo” (J.B. Lightfoot). Esta Epístola se puede leer en 20 minutos sin embargo, estará a disposición de toda la vida de la revelación.
Paul's epistle to the Colossians takes us to the heights of the truth about Christ perhaps like no other book in the New Testament. While Ephesians raises our minds to heavenly places, Colossians reveals to us Who holds the universe together, Christ Jesus.
Books available in Spanish: Me Entusiasma Colosenses; La Dinamica Del Vivir Positivo; Semillas y Secretos; En Christo: Una Nueva Creacion; Principios de Dios y tu Potencia.
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