“Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us” (Romans 8:37).

We go to Christ for forgiveness, and then too often look to the law for power to fight our sins. Paul thus rebukes us,

“O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified? This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?” (Gal. 3:1-3).

Take your sins to Christ’s cross, for the old man can only be crucified there: we are crucified with Him [Rom. 6:6].

The only weapon to fight sin with is the spear which pierced the side of Jesus. To give an illustration–you want to overcome an angry temper, how do you go to work? It is very possible you have never tried the right way of going to Jesus with it. How did I get salvation? I came to Jesus just as I was, and I trusted Him to save me. I must kill my angry temper in the same way. It is the only way in which I can ever kill it. I must go to the cross with it, and say to Jesus, “Lord, I trust You to deliver me from it.” This is the only way to give it a death-blow.

Are you covetous? Do you feel the world entangle you? You may struggle against this evil so long as you please, but if it be your besetting sin, you will never be delivered from it in any way but by the blood of Jesus. Take it to Christ. Tell him, “Lord, I have trusted You, and Your name is Jesus, for You save Your people from their sins; Lord, this is one of my sins; save me from it!”

Ordinances are nothing without Christ as a means of mortification. Your prayers, and your repentances, and your tears–the whole of them put together–are worth nothing apart from Him.

“None but Jesus can do helpless sinners good;” or helpless saints either. You must be conquerors through Him who has loved you, if conquerors at all. Our laurels must grow among His olives in Gethsemane.

Morning & Evening (April 23 am). Old English updated and KJV changed to NKJV, itlaics added.-JBW

Charles H. Spurgeon:

“The descendant of several generations of Independent ministers, he was born at Kelvedon, Essex, and became a Baptist in 1850… In 1854 he went to Southwark, where his sermons drew such crowds that a new church, the Metropolitan Tabernacle in Newington Causeway, had to be built for him. Apart from his preaching activites he founded a pastors’ college, an orphanage, and a colportage association for the propagation of uplifting literature. …He owed his fame as a preacher to his great oratorical gifts, humour, and shrewd common sense, which showed itself especially in his treatment of contemporary problems.”—The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church