The Plan of God |
Discipleship |
Faith |
Sin |
Perseverence |
Prayer |
Communion With God |
Pursuing God |
Devotion |
Following Jesus |
Time With God |
Sanctification |
Spiritual Warfare |
Trust |
The Word of God |
View All Categories
Remember how we used to ask that question, "If you were arrested for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you. In the case of John Paton's father James, his devotional life caught the attention of his eventual wife Mary.
Recent Entries
Making Sense Of It AllJanuary 30, 2012
Where are things headed? Is there rhyme and reason to the endless cycle of summer, fall, winter and spring? Is there a plan in place, or is randomness the explanation?
Suffering Saints
January 25, 2012
We get nervous thinking about it - suffering for the sake of Christ. How necessary is it, and what does it produce in us?
George Herbert on Prayer Meetings
January 21, 2012
Prayer Meetings are a thing of the past. Or so it seems. What has been lost? Maybe more than we realize.
When Fear Is Good
January 7, 2012
NO FEAR, we are told. And the point is well taken. But fear can be healthy, at least when it comes to eternal matters.
Happy, Happy, Happy
January 4, 2012
The declaration of independence holds up the pursuit of happiness as a right. Did you ever consider the reading the bible might be the one source that will never let you down?
The Twelve Signs Of Grace
December 22, 2011
Self-examination is not easy to do. The tendency is to let ourselves off easy. But examine we must, for eternity is at stake.
"Ouch!!"
July 22, 2011
Spiritual pride is hard to detect. Jonathan Edwards gives some tips. The process can be painful, but necessary.
Guys, A Potential Wife Is Watching
January 16, 2009
Has not the Lord made them one? In flesh and spirit they are his. And why one? Because he was seeking godly offspring. Malachi 2:15
In the early part of the 19th Century in Scotland, young Mary Rogerson was a "bright-hearted, high-spirited, patient-toiling and altogether heroic little woman." So says her missionary son John Paton in the story of his time in the New Hebrides.
"For 43 years, she made and kept such a wholesome, independent, God-fearing, and self-reliant life for her family of five sons and six daughters, as constrains me, when I look back on it now, in the light of all I have since seen and known of others far differently situated, almost to worship her memory."
"She had gone with her high spirits and breezy disposition to gladden as their companion, the quiet abode of some grand or great-grand-uncle and aunt, familiarly refered to by all their neighbors as "Old Adam and Eve."
"Their house was on the outskirts of the moor, and life for the young girl there had not probably too much excitement. But one thing had arrested her attention. She had noticed that a young stocking-maker from the "Brig End, "James Paton, the son of William and Janet there, was in the habit of stealing alone into the quiet wood, book in hand, day after day, at certain hours, as if for private study and meditation."
"It was a very excusable curiosity that led the young bright heart of the girl to watch him devoutly reading and hear him reverently reciting (though she knew not then, it was Ralph Erskine's GOSPEL SONNETS, which he could say by heart 60 years afterwards, as he lay on his bed of death); and finally that curiousity awed itself into a holy respect, when she saw him lay aside his broad Scotch bonnet, kneel down under the sheltering wings of some tree, and pour out all his soul in daily prayers to God."
What a way to fall in love! Of course, they eventually married. And that marriage union produced in their oldest child John a man who stood tall under the most extreme of circumstances. Under constant threat of death, he persevered, until eventually a cannibalistic island in the South Pacific was converted to the One True God, being transformed from darkness into light.
Godly offspring indeed.
In the early part of the 19th Century in Scotland, young Mary Rogerson was a "bright-hearted, high-spirited, patient-toiling and altogether heroic little woman." So says her missionary son John Paton in the story of his time in the New Hebrides.
"For 43 years, she made and kept such a wholesome, independent, God-fearing, and self-reliant life for her family of five sons and six daughters, as constrains me, when I look back on it now, in the light of all I have since seen and known of others far differently situated, almost to worship her memory."
"She had gone with her high spirits and breezy disposition to gladden as their companion, the quiet abode of some grand or great-grand-uncle and aunt, familiarly refered to by all their neighbors as "Old Adam and Eve."
"Their house was on the outskirts of the moor, and life for the young girl there had not probably too much excitement. But one thing had arrested her attention. She had noticed that a young stocking-maker from the "Brig End, "James Paton, the son of William and Janet there, was in the habit of stealing alone into the quiet wood, book in hand, day after day, at certain hours, as if for private study and meditation."
"It was a very excusable curiosity that led the young bright heart of the girl to watch him devoutly reading and hear him reverently reciting (though she knew not then, it was Ralph Erskine's GOSPEL SONNETS, which he could say by heart 60 years afterwards, as he lay on his bed of death); and finally that curiousity awed itself into a holy respect, when she saw him lay aside his broad Scotch bonnet, kneel down under the sheltering wings of some tree, and pour out all his soul in daily prayers to God."
What a way to fall in love! Of course, they eventually married. And that marriage union produced in their oldest child John a man who stood tall under the most extreme of circumstances. Under constant threat of death, he persevered, until eventually a cannibalistic island in the South Pacific was converted to the One True God, being transformed from darkness into light.
Godly offspring indeed.
