God’s Providence.

Cast all your care upon Him; for He careth for you. 1 P e t.5 ,7.

    We believe that God richly and daily provides us with all that 

we need to support this body and life. To generation after genera-

tion of the earth’s millions our bountiful Father has unlocked the 

larder of the earth, and has always richly provided for all of them. 

Day by day He grants us life and all the necessaries of life. Each 

one is obliged to say: “ The eyes of all wait upon Thee, and Thou 

givest them their meat in due season. Thou openest Thine hand 

and satisfiest the desire of every living thing.”

    What prompts God to do all this, to provide for us daily and 

richly? When we survey God’s bounteous benefits, we cannot but 

acknowledge that we have received them purely out of fatherly, 

divine goodness and mercy. We cannot but confess that it is purely 

His unmerited love which induces Him to place all His creatures 

at our disposal, giving us dominion over the fish of the sea, the fowl 

of the air, and every living thing that moveth upon the earth, and 

commanding the sun to give us light, the clouds to give us rain, 

the earth to yield its products for us. His love induces Him to 

provide us with all the necessaries of life, with clothing and shoes, 

with meat and drink, and with everything that we need for the 

support and want of the body. It is the love of Him who first loved 

us, who gives daily bread even to the wicked, who is good to all, 

and whose tender mercies are over all His works.

    When we see this, we feel that we must not live unto ourselves. 

We say with the psalmist: “ What shall I render unto the Lord for 

all His benefits toward me?” And not only with our lips should 

we praise our kind Father in heaven, but also by cheerfully living 

a godly life according to His pleasure. What a lesson of Christian 

duty! What a lesson, too, of trust for Christian believers! And 

what a lesson, in all this, of submission and dependence on God!

FURTHER STUDY:

THE PROVIDENCE AND GRACE OF CHRIST – THE LEPER

By Bishop Jerry Ogles

(Matthew 8:1-4)

WHEN he was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him. 2 And, behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. 3 And Jesus put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed.4 And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man; but go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.

 

Our Lord Jesus Christ has just delivered the most comprehensive and beautifully meaningful sermon in all of recorded time. He has spoken from the mountain top the pure Words of righteousness, but now He descends to the level at which most of His people live and labor, rejoice and suffer, are pained and comforted. Like every word of Scripture, these verses, too, show us yet another marvelous aspect of the nature of Christ and His magnanimity. 

 

“When he was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him.” Christ most often resorted to the mountain to both pray and teach. Prayer is always addressed to Heaven. But after our prayers and preaching, we must always descend to the common problems of life and learn to await God’s answer to our prayers, and to apply the preaching of the Gospel to the practical and routine circumstances of everyday life. The air on the mountaintop may be clear and pristine, but when we go down to the valleys, we encounter the unpleasant odors of human failure and hurt.

 

“And, behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.” Please note the manner in which the leper approaches Christ. The leper CAME to where Christ was. We cannot bring Christ DOWN to our place of sin and debauchery – we must rise up and go to Him for our salvation and needs.  Secondly, we cannot approach Christ with impudence and irreverence – we must first worship Him in our prayers before stating our petitions. The leper came and WORSHIPPED Jesus! This is represented by the ‘Hallowed be thy Name’ phrase in the Lord’s Prayer. Boldly came against all restraint of law.

 

“Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.” The leper does not overtly ask anything of Christ but presumes upon His know compassion and grace. It was widely known of Christ that He willed all who came to Him to be made whole. The leper simply states the obvious fact and, in his statement, the leper anticipates the answer. 

 

“Lord, if thou wilt…not truly IF, for Christ DID always will that lepers be made clean thereby unraveling the dirty works of Satan to harm and to hurt. “…….thou canst make me clean!” This is a simple statement of fact. There was no doubt in the mind of the leper that, if Christ willed, He could make the leper clean; but there was also no doubt in the leper’s mind that Jesus did, indeed, will that he be made clean. 3 And Jesus put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. This is the essence of faith and hope. 4 And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man; but go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.

 

 

 let’s go back and review the nature of leprosy in its similitude to sin:

 

1.     Sin, like leprosy, renders its victim helpless of improving his condition. It will inevitably lead to final death.

 

2.     Sin, like leprosy, separates one from the pure and clean. The sinner is unfit for heaven and the society of pure and holy company. 

 

3.     Sin, like leprosy, is infectious by intimate contact. The people with whom we associate have critical impact on our hope of righteousness. 

 

4.     Sin is constitutional. The outward expressions and manifestations are but the effects of a disease which permeates the whole system. 

 

5.     The tendency to sin, like the tendency to leprosy, is hereditary. Our Federal head, the Common father in Adam, contracted this disease through disobedience in the Garden. His propensity to sin has become a part of our human condition through inheritance. 

 

6.     Sin, like leprosy, is deceitful in its working. It may not be visibly represented in the beautiful child of leprous parents, but as time advances, the beautiful child will slowly begin to incur the signs and debilities of the disease. 

 

7.     Sin, like leprosy, knows not geographic barriers. 

 

8.     Leprosy, at the time of Christ, was incurable by man. So is sin today. 

 

9.     Sin, like leprosy, does not bring immediate pain and death. 

 

There is no earthly cure for our sinful natures – just as only Christ could cure leprosy, so can he alone heal us of our sins.

 

Until next time, God bless you richly.