To Draw Us to God,
April 1
I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee. Jeremiah 31:3.
I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee. Jeremiah 31:3.
The Lord of life and glory clothed His divinity with humanity to demonstrate to man that God through the gift of Christ would connect us with Him. Without a connection with God no one can possibly be happy. Fallen man is to learn that our Heavenly Father cannot be satisfied until His love embraces the repentant sinner, transformed through the merits of the spotless Lamb of God.
The work of all the heavenly intelligences is to this end. Under the command of their General they are to work for the reclaiming of those who by transgression have separated themselves from their Heavenly Father. A plan has been devised whereby the wondrous grace and love of Christ shall stand revealed to the world. In the infinite price paid by the Son of God to ransom man, the love of God is revealed. This glorious plan of redemption is ample in its provisions to save the whole world. Sinful and fallen man may be made complete in Jesus through the forgiveness of sin and the imputed righteousness of Christ.1Messages to Young People, 137.
In all the gracious deeds that Jesus did, He sought to impress upon men the parental, benevolent attributes of God.... Jesus would have us understand the love of the Father, and He seeks to draw us to Him by presenting His parental grace. He would have the whole field of our vision filled with the perfection of God’s character.... It was only by living among men that He could reveal the mercy, compassion, and love of His heavenly Father; for it was only by actions of benevolence that He could set forth the grace of God.2Sons and Daughters of God, 139.
Christ came to manifest the love of God to the world, to draw the hearts of all men to Himself.... The first step toward salvation is to respond to the drawing of the love of Christ.... It is that men may understand the joy of forgiveness, the peace of God, that Christ draws them through the manifestation of His love. If they respond to His drawing, yielding their hearts to His grace, He will lead them on step by step, to a full knowledge of Himself, and this is life eternal.3Selected Messages 1:323, 324.
The Lord of life and glory clothed His divinity with humanity to demonstrate to man that God through the gift of Christ would connect us with Him. Without a connection with God no one can possibly be happy. Fallen man is to learn that our Heavenly Father cannot be satisfied until His love embraces the repentant sinner, transformed through the merits of the spotless Lamb of God.
The work of all the heavenly intelligences is to this end. Under the command of their General they are to work for the reclaiming of those who by transgression have separated themselves from their Heavenly Father. A plan has been devised whereby the wondrous grace and love of Christ shall stand revealed to the world. In the infinite price paid by the Son of God to ransom man, the love of God is revealed. This glorious plan of redemption is ample in its provisions to save the whole world. Sinful and fallen man may be made complete in Jesus through the forgiveness of sin and the imputed righteousness of Christ.1
Messages to Young People, 137.
In all the gracious deeds that Jesus did, He sought to impress upon men the parental, benevolent attributes of God.... Jesus would have us understand the love of the Father, and He seeks to draw us to Him by presenting His parental grace. He would have the whole field of our vision filled with the perfection of God’s character.... It was only by living among men that He could reveal the mercy, compassion, and love of His heavenly Father; for it was only by actions of benevolence that He could set forth the grace of God.2
Sons and Daughters of God, 139.
Christ came to manifest the love of God to the world, to draw the hearts of all men to Himself.... The first step toward salvation is to respond to the drawing of the love of Christ.... It is that men may understand the joy of forgiveness, the peace of God, that Christ draws them through the manifestation of His love. If they respond to His drawing, yielding their hearts to His grace, He will lead them on step by step, to a full knowledge of Himself, and this is life eternal.3
Selected Messages 1:323, 324.
The Word Our Spiritual Food, April 2
He that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. John 6:35.
There are many in this age of the world who act as if they were at liberty to question the words of the Infinite, to review His decisions and statutes, endorsing, revising, reshaping, and annulling at their pleasure. We are never safe while we are guided by human opinions, but we are safe when we are guided by a “Thus saith the Lord.” We cannot trust the salvation of our souls to any lower standard than the decisions of an infallible Judge.
Those who make God their guide and His Word their counselor behold the lamp of life. God’s living oracles guide their feet in straight paths. Those who are thus led do not dare to judge the Word of God, but ever hold that His Word judges them. They get their faith and religion from the Word of the living God. It is the guide and counselor that direct their path. The Word is indeed a light to their feet and a lamp to their path. They walk under the direction of the Father of light, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. He whose tender mercies are over all His works makes the path of the just as a shining light, which shineth more and more unto the perfect day.
The Word of God is to be our spiritual food. “I am the bread of life,” Christ said; “he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.” The world is perishing for pure, unadulterated truth. Christ is the truth. His words are truth, and they have a greater value and a deeper significance than appears on the surface.... Minds that are quickened by the Holy Spirit will discern the value of these sayings....
By his conscience every honest Jew was convinced that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, but the heart, in its pride and ambition, would not surrender. When the truth is held as the truth only by the conscience, when the heart is not stimulated and made receptive, the mind only is affected. But when the truth is received as truth by the heart, it has passed through the conscience, and captivated the soul by its pure principles. It is placed in the heart by the Holy Spirit, who reveals its beauty to the mind, that its transforming power may be seen in the character....
True religion is embodied in the Word of God, and consists in being under the guidance of the Holy One in thought, word, and deed. He who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life takes the humble, earnest, wholehearted seeker, and says, Follow Me. He leads him in the narrow way to holiness and heaven.... And all who decide to follow the Lord fully will be led in the royal path (The Review and Herald, March 29, 1906).