February 7

“Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men.” (2 Corinthians 3:2)

I remember reading of a blind man who was found sitting at the corner of a street in a great city with a lantern beside him. Some one went up to him and asked what he had the lantern there for, seeing that he was blind, and the light was the same to him as the darkness. The blind man replied: “I have it so that no one may stumble over me.”

Where one man reads the Bible, a hundred read you and me. That it what Paul meant when he said we were to be living epistles of Christ, known and read of all men. I would not give much for all that can be done by sermons, if we do not preach Christ by our lives. If we do not commend the gospel to people by our holy walk and conversation, we shall not win them to Christ.

February 6

“Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honour the King of heaven, all whose works are truth, and his ways judgment: and those that walk in pride he is able to abase.” (Daniel 4:37)

When you find that a man has got to praising God it is a good sign. Nebuchadnezzar’s earlier edict said much about other people’s duty toward the God of the Hebrews, but nothing about what the king himself should do. Oh, let us get to personal love, personal praise! That is what is wanted in the church in the present day.

Nebuchadnezzar passes from the stage: this is the last record we have of him. But we may surely hope that his was a “repentance to salvation not to be repented of.” If so, we may well believe that to-day Nebuchadnezzar the king and Daniel the captive are walking the crystal pavement of heaven arm-in-arm together; and, it may be, talking over the old times in Babylon.

February 5 (Mr. D. L. Moody’s Birthday)

“He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him, even length of days for ever and ever.” (Psalm 21:4)

I was down in Texas some time ago, and happened to pick up a newspaper, and there they called me “Old Moody.” Honestly, I never got such a shock from any paper in my life before! I never had been called old before.

I went to my hotel, and looked in the looking-glass. I cannot conceive of getting old. I have a life that is never going to end. Death may change my position but not my condition, not my standing with Jesus Christ. Death is not going to separate us.

Old! I wish you all felt as young as I do here to-night. Why, I am only sixty-two years old! If you meet me ten million years hence, then I will be young. Read that ninety first Psalm, “With long life will I satisfy him.” That doesn't mean seventy years. Would that satisfy you?

Did you ever see a man or woman of seventy satisfied? Don't they want to live longer? You know that seventy wouldn't satisfy you. Would eighty? would ninety? would one hundred? If Adam had lived to be a million years old, and then had to die, he wouldn't be satisfied. “With long life will I satisfy him”—life without end! Don't call me old. I am only sixty-two. I have only begun to live.

February 4

“From within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness.” (Mark 7:21-22)

If a man should advertise that he could take a correct photograph of people's hearts, do you believe he would find any customers? There is not a man among us whom you could hire to have his photograph taken, if you could photograph the real man. We go to have our faces taken, and carefully arrange our toilet, and if the artist flutters us, we say, “ Oh, yes, that’s a first-rate likeness," and we pass it around among our friends. But let the real man be brought out, the photograph of the heart, and see if we will pass that around among our neighbors! Why, we would not want our own wives to see it! We would be frightened even to look at it ourselves.

February 3

“The promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the LORD our God shall call.” (Acts 2:39)

It is not only our privilege to have our names written in heaven, but also those of the children whom God has given us; and our hearts ought to go right out for them. The promise is not only to us, but to our children.

Many a father’s and many a mother’s heart is burdened with anxiety for the salvation of their children. If your own name is there, let your next aim in life be to get your children there also.

February 2

“If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” (2 Corinthians 5:17)

All the infidels in the world could not convince me that I have not a different spirit than I had before I became a Christian. “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit,” and a man can soon tell whether he is born of the Spirit by the change in his life. The Spirit of Christ is a Spirit of love, joy, peace, humility and meekness, and we can soon find out whether we have been born of that Spirit or not; we are not to be left in uncertainty.

February 1

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.” (Psalm 23:4)

Must not there be light where there is shadow? Can you get a shadow without light? If you doubt it, go down into the cellar to-night without a light, and find your shadow if you can. All that death can do to a true believer is to throw a shadow across his path. Shadows never hurt any one. You can walk right through them as you can through fog.

There is nothing to fear. I pity down deep in my heart any man or woman that lives under the bondage of death! If you are under it, may God bring you out to-day! May you come right out into the liberty of the blessed gospel of the Son of God!