Blessings Through Obedience

[Thompson, Darryl]

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Ellen G. White Estate, Devotional for August 6
Visit us at http://www.whiteestate.org
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Blessings Through Obedience

I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart. Ps.
40:8.

What a God is our God! He rules over His kingdom with diligence and
care, and He has built a hedge-the Ten Commandments-about His subjects
to preserve them from the results of transgression. In requiring
obedience to the laws of His kingdom, God gives His people health and
happiness, peace and joy. He teaches them that the perfection of
character He requires can be attained only by becoming familiar with His
Word.

The true seeker, who is striving to be like Jesus in word, life, and
character, will contemplate his Redeemer and, by beholding, become
changed into His image, because he longs and prays for the same
disposition and mind that was in Christ Jesus. . . . He longs after God.
The history of his Redeemer, the immeasurable sacrifice that He made,
becomes full of meaning to him. Christ, the Majesty of heaven, became
poor, that we through His poverty might become rich; not rich merely in
endowments, but rich in attainments.

These are the riches that Christ earnestly longs that His followers
shall possess. As the true seeker after the truth reads the Word and
opens his mind to receive the Word, he longs after truth with his whole
heart. The love, the pity, the tenderness, the courtesy, the Christian
politeness, which will be the elements in the heavenly mansions that
Christ has gone to prepare for those that love Him, take possession of
his soul. His purpose is steadfast. He is determined to stand on the
side of righteousness. Truth has found its way into the heart, and is
planted there by the Holy Spirit, who is the truth. When truth takes
hold of the heart, the man gives sure evidence of this by becoming a
steward of the grace of Christ.

Each steward has his own special work to do for the advancement of God's
kingdom. . . . The talents of speech, memory, influence, property, are
to accumulate for the glory of God and the advancement of His kingdom.
He will bless the right use of His gifts.

>From Devotional: Our Father Cares, pp. 201, 202.