Pondering Knoll: Seven Blessings

Monday, October 8, 2012

Seven Blessings

"Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written in it; for the time is near."

Revelation 1:3

"Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, 'Write: "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on." "Yes," says the Spirit, 'that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them.'"

Revelation 14:13

"Behold, I am coming as a thief. Blessed is he who watches, and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame."

Revelation 16:15

"Then he said to me, 'Write: "Blessed are those who are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb!" And he said to me, 'These are the true sayings of God.'"

Revelation 19:9

"Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection. Over such the second death has no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years."

Revelation 20:6

"Behold, I am coming quickly! Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book."

Revelation 22:7

"Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city."

Revelation 22:14

“In order to be a disciple we must deny ourselves - this is to exercise authority over our own spirit. We must take up the cross - this is to submit to Christ’s authority. And we must follow - this is continued obedience. This is the road not to confinement, to bondage, to a stunted or arrested development, but to total personal freedom. It means not death but life, not a narrowly circumscribed life but “abundant” life. The gate is narrow but not the life. The gate opens out into largeness of life.”

-Elisabeth Elliot

“No sigh ever reached the Most High, except through Christ—I mean so as to move His heart to pour out His grace. Prayers, groans, tears, all these are like arrows without a bow, till Christ comes and fits them to the string, and shoots them home for you and me. All our prayers are like a victim, with the wood and altar; Christ must bring the fire, and then the sacrifice smokes to heaven. He is the messenger. Oh Christian, do you not rejoice in Him then as the Messenger of the Covenant? He is doing thy errands before the throne tonight, pleading for me, pleading for you."

~C. H. Spurgeon

“Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might, He increases strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall, but those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”

Isaiah 40:28-31

"...The central place of faith in Christianity, and its significance...is precisely that which, on man's side, adjusts him to the living and merciful presence and action of a trusted God. In its nature, not by any mere arbitrary arrangement, it is his one possible receptive attitude, that in which he brings nothing, so that he may receive all. Thus "faith" is our side of union with Christ. And thus it is our means of possessing all His benefits, pardon, justification, purification, life, peace, glory."

-Handley Dunelm