2021 Daily Devotion - Day 304

-
Robert Robinson was what you would call an “unruly child.” At only eight years old his father died, and he was raised by his loving mother. In spite of Robert’s intellectual giftedness, he had a penchant for mischief. Robert’s mother sent him off for an apprenticeship when he was only 14, but once he got out of the home his life got worse. Instead of working and learning, Robert chose excessive drinking, gambling, and carousing with the wrong crowd. Caught up in his reckless life, Robert and his friends decided to go to an evangelist meeting one night just to heckle the preacher, George Whitfield. Sitting in that meeting, however, Robert felt as if the preacher’s words were meant for him alone. He couldn’t shake the feeling that God wanted him to surrender his life and serve him. When he was twenty, Robinson gave his life to God and entered the Christian ministry. At the age of 22, he wrote the song “Come Thou Fount,” for his church’s Pentecost celebration. It was written as his own spiritual story — a story of pursuing pleasure and joy, and only experiencing it when “Jesus sought me”. Millions of believers can relate to Robinson’s testimony — “Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,” and the glorious testimony, “O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be!”


“Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” by Robert Robinson, 1758

Come Thou Fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it
Mount of God’s unchanging love

Here I raise my Ebenezer
Hither by Thy help I’m come
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home
Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wandering from the fold of God
He, to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be
Let that grace now like a fetter
Bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above

The great theological truth in this story and hymn is God is always in pursuit. We can run from Him, but in His great love for us, He comes looking and searching for us. Many times, He simply ambushes us like He did with Robert Robinson. So, if you are far away from Him, know that He is looking for you. If you are running away from Him, know that in His passion for you, He is trying to rescue you from yourself. And if you are in a relationship with Him, know that He is the one who made it happen. This is what the Apostle Paul is trying to say to the Thessalonians:

1 Thessalonians 1:4 ESV
For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you.

Pray with me:
Heavenly Father, we too, raise our Ebenezer or “stone of hope” like Samuel did in 1 Samuel chapter seven. We need Your grace because we often tend to wander. But we pray Your grace will be like a heavy weight to keep us close to You. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Yours because of Him,
Pastor John R. Steward
Senior Pastor
Mount of Olives Church

Tags:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2021 Daily Devotion - Day 369

-
Palm Sunday Matthew 21:1-11NRSV When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, just say this, ‘The Lord needs them.’ And he will send them immediately.” This took place to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet, saying, “Tell the daughter of Zion, look, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them; they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them. A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. The crowds that went ahead of him and that followed were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes i...
More »

2020 Daily Devotion - Day 81

-
John 15:15 NRS I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. From an article on some of the great hymns of the church, we learn about the hymn, “What a Friend we have in Jesus”:   In 1844 a young Irishman, Joseph Scriven, had completed his college education and returned home to marry his sweetheart. As he was traveling to meet her on the day before the planned wedding, he came upon a horrible scene—his beautiful fiancée tragically lying under the water in a creek bed after falling off her horse. Later, Scriven moved to Canada and eventually fell in love again, only to experience devastation once more when she became ill and died just weeks before their marriage. For the second time, this humble Christian felt the loss of the woman he loved. The following year, he wrote a poem to his mother in Ireland that desc...
More »

2020 Daily Devotion - Day 120

-
"An optimist may see a light where there is none, but why must the pessimist always run to blow it out?" Many people often look at the negative side of life. President Reagan used to say that when people do this, it’s as if when you “give them a silver lining, they will find a cloud”. Of course, he was using the old saying “in every cloud, there is a silver lining” and reversing it to make a point. It is very important to be a “glass half full” kind of person. Looking for and expecting good things helps us to stay hope-filled. So, on this new day, be a positive person. Look for the good in everything. Look for hope in everything. Refuse to let yourselves dwell on the negative. Speak to others in inspirational ways, and you will find that your days will be better. Ephesians 4:29 ESV Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. Pray with Me: Heavenly Father, so many peop...
More »