Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Heading for Heaven # 3

One Way

But I say further, to walk with God is to walk in God's Ways, to follow the laws He has given for our guidance, to look on His precepts as our rule and our counselor, to esteem all His commandments concerning all things to be right; to fear turning aside from the narrow path He has set before us for one single instant; to go straightforward, though all things seem against us, remembering the word on which He has caused us to hope.

And to talk with God is to walk in the light of God's countenance; to live as men who remember that all things are naked and  and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do, that the darkness is no darkness with Him, and remembering this, to aim at never thinking or saying or doing anything we should be ashamed of in the presence of the great Searcher of hearts.

And to walk with God is to walk after the Spirit - to look to the Holy Spirit as our Teacher, to lean on Him for strength, to put no confidence in the flesh, to set our affections on things above, to wean them from things on earth, to be spiritually-minded.

But truly, beloved, I might keep you here all day, and yet the half would not be told of the things which are contained in walking with God. To walk with God is to walk humbly confessing ourselves unworthy of the least of all His mercies, acknowledging that we have no power of ourselves to help ourselves, that we are constantly coming short and backsliding, that we are unprofitable servants, and without His grace are sure to fall. It is to walk circumspectly, bearing in mind our besetting sins and temptations, and avoiding all places and companies and employments in which we are likely to be assailed by them. It is to walk in love towards all, both God and man, full of the mind that is in our heavenly Father, kind and affectionate and gentle to every one, yea, even to the unthankful and the evil. To walk with God is to serve Him as a habit, continually; we are not to walk with Him on a Sunday and forget Him on a weekday; we are not to walk with Him in public but not in private; we are not to walk with Him before ministers and good men only, but in our own families and before our own household.

And lastly, to walk with God is to be always going forward, always pressing on, never standing still and flattering ourselves that we are the men and have born much fruit; but to grow in grace, to go on from strength to strength, to forget the things behind, and if by grace we have attained unto anything, to abound yet more and more.

Beloved, this is a very faint picture of a walk with God, but time will not allow me to draw another stroke. This was some part of Enoch's character; this was in some degree the meaning of the record God has given us about him.

Oh, it is a simple but a weighty record! No doubt there were many great and many wise and many noble in those days; but all we know of them is that they lived and they died and they begat sons and daughters. Of Enoch only is it written that he walked with God. Oh, this walk with God, beloved! It is the only talent which will never fail us, the only treasure which will prove eternal, the only character which will serve us beyond the grave; and in the day when names and titles and honors shall sink to nothing, and all shall stand upon a level, the poorest and the humblest in the land shall be more highly honored than the mighty and the rich, if he has walked with God and they have not; the first shall be last and the last first.

Comfort ye, comfort ye, all that belong to Christ's little flock; comfort ye, all that are thinking first about your souls; others may live in courts and palaces and have the praise of this world, but of you it shall be written in the books of heaven, "They walked with God"; the King of kings and Lord of lords was their Shepherd, their Guide, their Companion, their familiar Friend, and your joy shall no man take away.

~J. C. Ryle~

(continued with # 4 - "Enoch's Motive")

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