We anticipate the happy day when the whole world shall be converted to Messiah Yahshuah; when the gods of the heathen shall be cast to the moles and the bats; when kings shall bow down before the Prince of Peace, and all nations shall call their Redeemer blessed.

Some despair of this. They look upon the world as a vessel breaking up and going to pieces, never to float again. We know that the world and all that is therein is one day to be burnt up, and afterwards we look for new heavens and for a new earth; but we cannot read our Bibles without the conviction that:

We are not discouraged by the length of His delays; we are not disheartened by the long period which He allots to the church in which to struggle with little success and much defeat.

We believe that God will never suffer this world, which has once seen Messiah's blood shed upon it, to be always the devil's stronghold. Messiah came here to deliver this world from the detested sway of the powers of darkness.

What a shout shall that be when men and angels shall unite to cry, "Hallelujah, hallelujah, for the Lord (YHWH) God Omnipotent reigneth"! What a satisfaction will it be in that day to have had a share in the fight, to have helped to break the arrows of the bow, and to have aided in winning the victory for our Lord!

Happy are they who trust themselves with this conquering Lord, and who fight side by side with Him, doing their little in His name and by His strength! How unhappy are those on the side of evil! It is a losing side, and it is a matter wherein to lose is to lose and to be lost forever. On whose side are you?

C.H. Spurgeon, Morning & Evening, 12/24

The rush is spongy and hollow, and even so it is a hypocrite; their is no substance or stability in him. It is shaken to and fro in every wind just as formalists yield to every influence; for this reason the rush is not broken by the tempest neither are hypocrites troubled with persecution.

I would not willingly be a deceiver or be deceived; perhaps the text for this day may help me to try myself whether I be a hypocrite or not.

The rush by nature lives in water, and owes its very existence to the mire and moisture wherein it has taken root; let the mire become dry, and the rush withers very quickly. Its greenness is absolutely dependent upon circumstances; a present abundance of water makes it flourish, and a drought destroys it at once.

Is this my case? Do I only serve God when I am in good company, or when religion is profitable and respectable? Do I love the Lord only when temporal comforts are received from His hands? If so I am a base hypocrite, and like the withering rush, I shall perish when death deprives me of outward joys.

But can I honestly assert that when bodily comforts have been few, and my surroundings have been rather adverse to grace than at all helpful to it, I have still held fast my integrity? Then have I hope that there is genuine vital godliness in me.

The rush cannot grow without mire, but plants of the Lord's right hand planting can and do flourish even in the year of drought. A godly man often grows best when his worldly circumstances decay.

He who follows Christ for his bag is a Judas; they who follow for loaves and fishes are children of the devil; but they who attend him out of love to Himself are His own beloved ones.

Lord, let me find my life in Thee, and not in the mire of this world's favour or gain.

C.H. Spurgeon, Morning & Evening, 27/12