A Clean Heart 
 
        Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.  Psalm 51:10
 
    "Man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart"--the human heart, with its conflicting emotions of joy and sorrow; the wandering, wayward heart, which is the abode of so much impurity and deceit (1 Samuel 16:7).  He knows its motives, its very intents and purposes.  Go to Him with your soul all stained as it is.  Like the Psalmist, throw its chambers open to the all-seeing eye, exclaiming, "Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting" (Psalm 139:23, 24).
 
    Many accept an intellectual religion, a form of godliness, when the heart is not cleansed.  Let it be your prayer, "Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me" (Psalm 51:10).  Deal truly with your own soul.  Be as earnest, as persistent, as you would be if your mortal life were at stake.  This is a matter to be settled between God and your own soul, settled for eternity.  A supposed hope, and nothing more, will prove your ruin. (Steps to Christ, 34)
 
Reflection:  As you see the enormity of sin, as you see yourself clearly, do not give in to despair.  Christ wants us to realize our sin so that we may call on Him.  It was sinners He came to save.

The Secret of Strength
 
        Be still and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.  Psalm 40:10
 
    An intensity such as never before was seen is taking possession of the world.  In amusement, in moneymaking, in the contest for power, in the very struggle for existence, there is a terrible force that engrosses body and mind and soul.  In the midst of this maddening rush, God is speaking.  He bids us come apart and commune with Him.  "Be still, and know that I am God" (Psalm 40:10).
 
    Many, even in their seasons of devotion, fail of receiving the blessing of real communion with God.  They are in too great haste.  With hurried steps they press through the circle of Christ's loving presence, pausing perhaps a moment within the sacred precincts, but not waiting for counsel.  They have no time to remain with the divine Teacher.  With their burdens they return to their work.
 
    These workers can never attain the highest success until they learn the secret of strength.  They must give themselves time to think, to pray, to wait upon God for a renewal of physical, mental, and spiritual power.  They need the uplifting influence of His Spirit.  Receiving this, they will be quickened by fresh life.  The wearied frame and tired brain will be refreshed, the burdened heart will be lightened. (Education, 260)
 
Reflection:  Personal contact with Christ is the strength of the soul.  In this world we live in, everything is a mad rush.  We must not allow Satan to keep us so busy--even in religious things--that we lose our vital connection with God.

Law Written on the Heart
 
        I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.  Psalm 40:8
 
    Only those who devote themselves to His service, saying, "Here am I; send me" (Isaiah 6:8), to open blind eyes, to turn men from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and inheritance among them which are sanctified" (Acts 26:18)--they alone pray in sincerity, "Thy kingdom come."
 
    "Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven" (Matthew 6:10).  The will of God is expressed in the precepts of His holy law, and the principles of this law are the principles of heaven.  The angels of heaven attain unto no higher knowledge than to know the will of God, and to do His will is the highest service that can engage their powers.
 
    But in heaven, service is not rendered in the spirit of legality.  When Satan rebelled against the law of Jehovah, the thought that there was a law came to the angels almost as an awakening to something unthought of.  In their ministry the angels are not as servants, but as sons.  There is perfect unity between them and their Creator.  Obedience is to them no drudgery.  Love for God makes their service a joy.  So in every soul wherein Christ, the hope of glory, dwells, His words are re-echoed, "I delight to do Thy will, O My God: yea, Thy law is within My heart" (Psalm 40:8). (Thoughts from the Mount of Blessing, 108, 109)
 
Reflection:  A sign of true conversion is our desire to please God through willing obedience to His commands.

Trust in the Lord
 
        Trust in the Lord, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.  Psalm 37:3
 
    The psalmist says, "Trust in the Lord, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed" (Psalm 37:3).  "Trust in the Lord."  Each day has its burdens, its cares and perplexities; and when we meet how ready we are to talk of our difficulties and trials.  So many borrowed troubles intrude, so many fears are indulged, such a weight of anxiety is expressed, that one might suppose we had no pitying, loving Saviour ready to hear all our requests and to be to us a present help in every time of need.
 
    Some are always fearing, and borrowing trouble.  Every day they are surrounded with the tokens of God's love; every day they are enjoying the bounties of His providence; but they overlook these present blessings.  Their minds are continually dwelling upon something disagreeable which they fear may come; or some difficulty may really exist which, though small, blinds their eyes to the many things that demand gratitude.  The difficulties they encounter, instead of driving them to God, the only source of their help, separate them from Him because they awaken unrest and repining. (Steps to Christ, 121)
 
Reflection:  Do all you can to bring about favorable results.  Jesus has promised His aid, but not apart from our effort.  When, relying upon our Helper, you have done all you can, accept the result cheerfully. (Steps to Christ, 122)

Contrite Heart
 
        The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.  Psalm 34:18
 
    The proud heart strives to earn salvation; but both our title to heaven and our fitness for it are found in the righteousness of Christ.  The Lord can do nothing toward the recovery of man until, convinced of his own weakness, and stripped of all self-sufficiency, he yields himself to the control of God.  Then he can receive the gift that God is waiting to bestow.  From the soul that feels his need, nothing is withheld.  He has unrestricted access to Him in whom all fullness dwells.  "For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones" (Isaiah 57:15).
 
    "Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted."  By these words Christ does not teach that mourning in itself had power to remove the guilt of sin.  He gives no sanction to pretense or to voluntary humility.  The mourning of which He speaks does not consist in melancholy and lamentation.  While we sorrow on account of sin, we are to rejoice in the precious privilege of being children of God. (The Desire of Ages, 300)
 
Reflection:  We often sorrow because our evil deeds bring unpleasant consequences to ourselves, but this is not repentance.  Real sorrow for sin is the result of the working of the Holy Spirit.  The tears of the penitent are only the raindrops that precede the sunshine of holiness. (The Desire of Ages, 300)

Beholding Christ
 
        They looked unto him, and were lightened: and their faces were not ashamed.  Psalm 34:5
 
    In the secret place of prayer, where no eye but God's can see, no ear but His can hear, we may pour out our most hidden desires and longings to the Father of infinite pity, and in the hush and silence of the soul that voice which never fails to answer the cry of human need will speak to our hearts.
 
    "The Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy" (James 5:11).  He waits with unwearied love to hear the confessions of the wayward and to accept their penitence.  He watches for some return of gratitude from us, as the mother watches for the smile of recognition from her beloved child.  He would have us understand how earnestly and tenderly His heart yearns over us.  He invites us to take our trials to His sympathy, our sorrows to His love, our wounds to His healing, or weakness to His strength, our emptiness to His fullness.  Never has one been disappointed who came to Him.  "They looked unto Him, and were lightened: and their faces were not ashamed" (Psalm 34:5). (Thoughts from the Mount of Blessing, 84)
 
Reflection:  As we make Christ our daily companion we shall feel that the powers of an unseen world are all around us; and by looking unto Jesus we shall become assimilated to His image.  By beholding we become changed.  The character is softened, refined, and ennobled for the heavenly kingdom. (Thoughts from the Mount of Blessing, 85)

My Hiding Place
 
        For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock.  Psalm 27:5
 
    The eye of God, looking down the ages, was fixed upon the crisis which His people are to meet, when earthly powers shall be arrayed against them.  Like the captive exile, they will be in fear of death by starvation or by violence.  But the Holy One who divided the Red Sea before Israel, will manifest His mighty power and turn their captivity.  "They shall be Mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up My jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him" (Malachi 3:17).  If the blood of Christ's faithful witnesses were shed at this time, it would not, like the blood of the martyrs, be as seed sown to yield a harvest for God.  Their fidelity would not be a testimony to convince others of the truth; for the obdurate heart has beaten back the waves of mercy until they return no more.  If the righteous were now left to fall a prey to their enemies, it would be a triumph for the prince of darkness.  Says the psalmist: "In the time of trouble He shall hide me in His pavilion: in the secret of His tabernacle shall He hide me" (Psalm 27:5). (The Great Controversy, 635)
 
Reflection:  Christ has spoken: "Come, My people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast.  For behold, the Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity" (Isaiah 26:20, 21). (The Great Controversy, 635)

The Good Shepherd
 
        The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.  Psalm 23:1
 
    "I am the Good Shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep."  "I am the Good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine.  As the Father knoweth Me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down My life for the sheep."
 
    Again Jesus found access to the minds of His hearers by the pathway of their familiar associations.  He had likened the Spirit's influence to the cool, refreshing water.  He had represented Himself as the light, the source of life and gladness to nature and to man.  Now in a beautiful pastoral picture He represents His relation to those that believe on Him.  No picture was more familiar to His hearers than this, and Christ's words linked it forever with Himself.  Never could the disciples look on the shepherds tending their flocks without recalling the Saviour's lesson.  They would see Christ in each faithful shepherd.  They would see themselves in each helpless and dependent flock.
 
    This figure the prophet Isaiah had applied to the Messiah's mission, in the comforting words, "O Zion, that bringest good tidings, get thee up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem, that bringest good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength; lift it up, be not afraid; say unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God!...He shall feed His flock like a shepherd: He shall gather the lambs with His arm, and carry them in His bosom" (Isaiah 40:9-11).  David had sung, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want" (Psalm 23:1). (The Desire of Ages, 476)
 
Reflection:  The Holy Spirit through Ezekiel had declared: "I will set up one Shepherd over them, and He shall feed them" (Ezekiel 34:23). (The Desire of Ages, 476)

The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.  Psalm 19:7
 
    Is he now free to transgress God's law? Says Paul: "Do we then make void the law through faith?  God forbid: yea, we establish the law."  "How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?"  And John declares: "This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments: and His commandments are not grievous" (Romans 3:31; 6:2; 1 John 5:3).  In the new birth the heart is brought into harmony with God, as it is brought into accord with His law.  When this mighty change has taken place in the sinner, he has passed from death unto life, from sin unto holiness, from transgression and rebellion to obedience and loyalty.  The old life of alienation from God has ended; the new life of reconciliation, of faith and love, has begun.  Then "the righteousness of the law" will "be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit" (Romans 8:4).  And the language of the soul will be: "O how I love Thy law!  It is my meditation all the day" (Psalm 119:97).
 
    "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul" (Psalm 19:7).  Without the law, men have no just conception of the purity and holiness of God or of their own guilt and uncleanness. (The Great Controversy, 468)
 
Reflection:  With a shallow understanding of God's Law, men will have a lower concept of righteousness.  Oh to be like King David and love to meditate upon His law.

Nebuchadnezzar also carried of the vessels of the house of the Lord to Babylon, and put them in his temple at Babylon.  2 Chronicles 36:7
 
    The first years of Jehoiakim's reign were filled with warnings of approaching doom....The Assyrian power to the northward, long supreme, was no longer to rule the nations.  Egypt on the south, in whose power the king of Judah was vainly placing his trust, was soon to receive a decided check.  All unexpectedly a new world power, the Babylonian Empire, was rising to the eastward and swiftly overshadowing all other nations.
 
    Within a few short years the king of Babylon was to be used as the instrument of God's wrath upon impenitent Judah.  Again and again Jerusalem was to be invested and entered by the besieging armies of Nebuchadnezzar.  Company after company--at first a few only, but later on thousands and tens of thousands--were to be taken captive to the land of Shinar, there to dwell in enforced exile. Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, Zedekiah--all these Jewish kings were in turn to become vassals of the Babylonian ruler, and all in turn were to rebel.  Severer and yet more severe chastisements were to be inflicted upon the rebellious nation, until at last the entire land was to become a desolation, Jerusalem was to be laid waste and burned with fire, the temple that Solomon had built was to be destroyed, and the kingdom of Judah was to fall, never again to occupy its former position among the nations of earth. (Prophets and Kings, 422)
 
Reflection:  Through the prophet Jeremiah, God had given the children of Judah many opportunities to avoid the coming controversy and calamity with Babylon.  They chose to put their trust in man rather than God and inevitable consequences followed.