by E.M. Bounds
“Study universal holiness of life. Your whole usefulness depends on this, for your sermons last but an hour or two; your life preaches all the week. If Satan can only make a covetous minister a lover of praise, of pleasure, of good eating, he has ruined your ministry. Give yourself to prayer, and get your texts, your thoughts, your words from God. Luther spent his best three hours in prayer.” – Robert Murray McCheyne
WE are constantly on a stretch, if not on a strain, to devise new methods, new plans, new organizations to advance the Church and secure enlargement and efficiency for the gospel. This trend of the day has a tendency to lose sight of the man or sink the man in the plan or organization. God’s plan is to make much of the man, far more of him than of anything else. Men are God’s method. The Church is looking for better methods; God is looking for better men. “There was a man sent from God whose name was John.” The dispensation that heralded and prepared the way for Christ was bound up in that man John. “Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given.” The world’s salvation comes out of that cradled Son. When Paul appeals to the personal character of the men who rooted the gospel in the world, he solves the mystery of their success. The glory and efficiency of the gospel is staked on the men who proclaim it. When God declares that “the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him,” he declares the necessity of men and his dependence on them as a channel through which to exert his power upon the world. This vital, urgent truth is one that this age of machinery is apt to forget. The forgetting of it is as baneful on the work of God as would be the striking of the sun from his sphere. Darkness, confusion, and death would ensue.
What the Church needs to-day is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Ghost can use — men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through men. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but men — men of prayer.
An eminent historian has said that the accidents of personal character have more to do with the revolutions of nations than either philosophic historians or democratic politicians will allow. This truth has its application in full to the gospel of Christ, the character and conduct of the followers of Christ — Christianize the world, transfigure nations and individuals. Of the preachers of the gospel it is eminently true.
The character as well as the fortunes of the gospel is committed to the preacher. He makes or mars the message from God to man. The preacher is the golden pipe through which the divine oil flows. The pipe must not only be golden, but open and flawless, that the oil may have a full, unhindered, unwasted flow.
The man makes the preacher. God must make the man. The messenger is, if possible, more than the message. The preacher is more than the sermon. The preacher makes the sermon. As the life-giving milk from the mother’s bosom is but the mother’s life, so all the preacher says is tinctured, impregnated by what the preacher is. The treasure is in earthen vessels, and the taste of the vessel impregnates and may discolor. The man, the whole man, lies behind the sermon. Preaching is not the performance of an hour. It is the outflow of a life. It takes twenty years to make a sermon, because it takes twenty years to make the man. The true sermon is a thing of life. The sermon grows because the man grows. The sermon is forceful because the man is forceful. The sermon is holy because the man is holy. The sermon is full of the divine unction because the man is full of the divine unction.
Paul termed it “My gospel;” not that he had degraded it by his personal eccentricities or diverted it by selfish appropriation, but the gospel was put into the heart and lifeblood of the man Paul, as a personal trust to be executed by his Pauline traits, to be set aflame and empowered by the fiery energy of his fiery soul. Paul’s sermons — what were they? Where are they? Skeletons, scattered fragments, afloat on the sea of inspiration! But the man Paul, greater than his sermons, lives forever, in full form, feature and stature, with his molding hand on the Church. The preaching is but a voice. The voice in silence dies, the text is forgotten, the sermon fades from memory; the preacher lives.
The sermon cannot rise in its life-giving forces above the man. Dead men give out dead sermons, and dead sermons kill. Everything depends on the spiritual character of the preacher. Under the Jewish dispensation the high priest had inscribed in jeweled letters on a golden frontlet: “Holiness to the Lord.” So every preacher in Christ’s ministry must be molded into and mastered by this same holy motto. It is a crying shame for the Christian ministry to fall lower in holiness of character and holiness of aim than the Jewish priesthood. Jonathan Edwards said: “I went on with my eager pursuit after more holiness and conformity to Christ. The heaven I desired was a heaven of holiness.” The gospel of Christ does not move by popular waves. It has no self-propagating power. It moves as the men who have charge of it move. The preacher must impersonate the gospel. Its divine, most distinctive features must be embodied in him. The constraining power of love must be in the preacher as a projecting, eccentric, an all-commanding, self-oblivious force. The energy of self-denial must be his being, his heart and blood and bones. He must go forth as a man among men, clothed with humility, abiding in meekness, wise as a serpent, harmless as a dove; the bonds of a servant with the spirit of a king, a king in high, royal, in dependent bearing, with the simplicity and sweetness of a child. The preacher must throw himself, with all the abandon of a perfect, self-emptying faith and a self-consuming zeal, into his work for the salvation of men. Hearty, heroic, compassionate, fearless martyrs must the men be who take hold of and shape a generation for God. If they be timid time servers, place seekers, if they be men pleasers or men fearers, if their faith has a weak hold on God or his Word, if their denial be broken by any phase of self or the world, they cannot take hold of the Church nor the world for God.
The preacher’s sharpest and strongest preaching should be to himself. His most difficult, delicate, laborious, and thorough work must be with himself. The training of the twelve was the great, difficult, and enduring work of Christ. Preachers are not sermon makers, but men makers and saint makers, and he only is well-trained for this business who has made himself a man and a saint. It is not great talents nor great learning nor great preachers that God needs, but men great in holiness, great in faith, great in love, great in fidelity, great for God — men always preaching by holy sermons in the pulpit, by holy lives out of it. These can mold a generation for God.
After this order, the early Christians were formed. Men they were of solid mold, preachers after the heavenly type — heroic, stalwart, soldierly, saintly. Preaching with them meant self-denying, self-crucifying, serious, toilsome, martyr business. They applied themselves to it in a way that told on their generation, and formed in its womb a generation yet unborn for God. The preaching man is to be the praying man. Prayer is the preacher’s mightiest weapon. An almighty force in itself, it gives life and force to all.
The real sermon is made in the closet. The man — God’s man — is made in the closet. His life and his profoundest convictions were born in his secret communion with God. The burdened and tearful agony of his spirit, his weightiest and sweetest messages were got when alone with God. Prayer makes the man; prayer makes the preacher; prayer makes the pastor.
The pulpit of this day is weak in praying. The pride of learning is against the dependent humility of prayer. Prayer is with the pulpit too often only official — a performance for the routine of service. Prayer is not to the modern pulpit the mighty force it was in Paul’s life or Paul’s ministry. Every preacher who does not make prayer a mighty factor in his own life and ministry is weak as a factor in God’s work and is powerless to project God’s cause in this world.
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Abiding
Are You Bless-able? English and Spanish [podcast]

Who is Going to be “Blessed”?
“A FAITHFUL MAN shall abound with blessings: but he that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent.” Proverbs 28:20
Like it or not, God has conditions to appropriate His blessings. Rebels hate this reality because they despise personal accountability, personal responsibility. Their rebellion changes nothing. Either repent, be saved, and walk humbly with Christ, or lose your soul for eternity in hell (Mark 8:34-38).
True followers of Jesus are doing the work of the Gospel, are diligent, are “not slothful,” and “inherit” “the promises” of God “through faith and patience.”
“For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister. 11 And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end: 12 That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.” Hebrews 6:10-12
In the New Testament, we don’t ever see disciples of Christ spending all kinds of time singing praise songs, numbing themselves out, etc. No, when the Holy Spirit truly fills a believer, it’s to be a witness of Christ and that person is sent out.
Jesus dwells large only in those who practically obey Him and not those just trying to get an emotional fix by soaking in a building in a “revival.”
“And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.” Joshua 24:15
Are We Bless-able?
“It is more blessed to give than to receive.” Acts 20:35
Have you given God your life?
“So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:33
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Articles
Mexico Mission Momentum Part 41

The first shipment of Spanish Bibles has arrived!
A staggering miracle has befallen Maria’s precious life and she still can’t believe it!
ALL because YOU have said “YES JESUS, I am going to lift this beloved sister in Christ, this laborer for our LORD in prayer.”… and you are giving to help her!
You my friend are guilty of delivering glory to God and a death blow to the enemy of all souls!
We are now finding out that Maria works and 3 different locations each day. This is how she is able to distribute hundreds of JESUS tracts daily.
When Jesus says “I will build my church” He was not speaking about collecting money to build physical buildings. That came in with the pagan catholic church hundreds of years later. No, Jesus was speaking of building His kingdom in the hearts of men, beginning with the revelation that He is the Messiah (Matthew 16:18).
If the money you give isn’t going directly into the Great Commission Jesus gave us, you are wasting your giving (Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:15-20).
Building up Gospel laboring fruit-filled diligent disciples such as Juan and Maria, is building Christ’s church! Oil the wheels that roll!
“The blessed word says that freely we receive, freely we give. For from His fullness we all receive grace upon grace, blessing upon blessing, brother. So Paul said, ‘Woe to me if I do not do it!’ Then we must do the Great Commission that God gave us for His honor and glory.” Juan
Juan and Maria are being continually tended to, supported with prayer etc.
Brother Mark went to spend some time with sister Maria for the first time and found out she needs a new cell phone. So, we bought her one……..
Maria is a widow and works 3 different “jobs” that are tips only. Her rental is $100 per month. She only told us this information because we asked her. Maybe someone would be prompted to begin paying sister Maria’s rent? God is able amen.
“That we might be fellowhelpers to the truth.”
We’ve been meeting with brother Juan and sister Maria regularly, sometimes daily.
“We therefore ought to receive such, that we might be fellowhelpers to the truth.” 3 John 8
Spiritually and supply wise, refreshing and re-stocking these disciples (and others) is our part, our opportunity and privilege. And you have been a big part of this saints. Your prayer and support have been and are vital.
Recently restocked brother Juan and brought Maria about 2k tracts last night.
She was elated.
Your prayers and support are making this possible.
“I will never cease to be amazed by how hungry these people are for God! From all the pictures it looks like they begin to read the Jesus tract as soon as they receive it! In America, it’s very hard to find people who truly want Jesus because they are rich and in need of nothing and have no idea how wretched, miserable, poor, and blind they are. Rev 3:17. Including those so-called Christians! Who just try to put Jesus over their filthy rags! Nothing but dead religion. Yet they believe they are good and will be in heaven, when inside they are white-washed tombs. It’s refreshing to see the hunger of the beloved Mexico people! Thank you for sharing all these stories of how the Lord is touching hearts! Blessed to be a small part of this ministry.” Karen Cochran | Mission Mexico
Your prayers and support are going a long way to help Mission Mexico!!
The Bibles God’s people sent just arrived and will be distributed to incarcerated Mexicans soon.
The JESUS tract is being distributed daily by the hundreds with the Word of God spoken in those exchanges.
“WE are labourers TOGETHER with God.” 1 Corinthians 3:9
“For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister.” Hebrews 6:10
Please allow me to remind you … that your prayers and financial fuel are essential to what is going on here and each of Christ’s participating disciples shall be rewarded equally, fully—no matter what part they play! 1 Samuel 30:24
Recently I became desperate as the need for financial supply dropped like a bless-ed bomb within a short window of time. Instead of trusting I panicked instead of taking it to the LORD and trusting Him. The reception of Juan and Maria has been earth shaking, a type of sign from God that He loves and desires to save the bless-ed and beautiful people of Mexico. America has rejected the LORD saints.
“And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.” Matthew 10:14
Can you even believe that our LORD is using us, you and I and others, to give His glorious Gospel to the nation, the people of Mexico?!
“For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. 14 How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?” Romans 10:13-14
The Gospel Momentum Continues to Grow
From brother Juan: “Brother Cresenciano asked me if I had any Jesus pamphlets he could take with him and hand out, and said he wanted to serve his neighbor with love. Glory to God!”
Over 20,000 JESUS tracts in print here in Mexico. More than 12,000 have been distributed to date. We are now beginning to take in love offerings to print the next 10,000 JESUS tracts.
Okay, from now on, if you see a pic of someone holding a stash or stack of JESUS tracts, it’s because they agreed to do so, they asked for more tracts in order to reach their world here in Mexico with the Gospel of Jesus. Gospel momentum!
Brother Juan and sister Maria and several others in Christ are blazing a Gospel trail (Mark 1:45). Jesus is coming.
Thank you for lifting Mission Mexico, the people of Mexico, in prayer.
Thank you for praying for Mission Mexico.
Your prayers and support are fueling the reaching of scores of precious Mexican people, daily!
You have the same reward as the foot soldiers….
1 Samuel 30:24
“For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” Luke 19:10
Mission Mexico – See more here. | Give support here. Many options
Download. Read. Print out your supply of the JESUS tract – English and Spanish.
Abiding
“Cursed be the Man that Trusteth in Man” [podcast]

A Nuclear Revelation
“Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD.” Jeremiah 17:5
“Cursed be the man that trusteth in man” is a powerful verse from the Bible, commonly associated with a specific warning against relying on human strength rather than God.”
So many act like Spurgeon or some other mere man’s writings are on the same level as Holy Scripture. NOT! They prove their idolatry. They are in sin. They glory in mere men and not the LORD! Hell awaits. Jeremiah 17:5; Isaiah 2:22; 1 Corinthians 1:29-31, etc.
God calls us to worship, love, seek, trust, and obey Him as the ultimate authority of our lives in this world.
Another example of this is the idolatry of the demonic fraud CS Lewis!
THIS JUST IN:
“Amen! Amen for Prov 10:22. All glory be to Him!
By the grace of God I discovered last night your website, praise Him, in search for exposure on CS Lewis.
By the grace of God I learnt as a baby believer, 20 years ago, that his teachings are dangerous including that witchcraft book and movie, Narnia. Sadly, so called mature Christians in the UK are considering him a saint, a born again believer.
I sent prayerfully (as I expected backlashes) to my friend last night, a few links exposing CS Lewis including the photo from your website which is brilliant exposure, praise Him but she is still claiming that he ‘was truly a born again’ ….. sending me his videos! It’s a principle: I don’t watch, read listen to CS Lewis and many others! The Bible is so rich in teachings, why do I need CS Lewis!?
My friend is a mature believer, born again believer for over 60-70 years and she cannot see it!
I had to use the VPN and duckduck search engine to get the website exposing CS Lewis, as in the UK, nothing will come up! Most of the Christians are bewitched by Narnia and Lord of the Rings! No wonder the country is in such a state of delusion! May the Lord have mercy!
Many blessings in His Name, V.”
“Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of?” Isaiah 2:22
Those who look to men, who receive un-biblical counsel instead of testing it against the Word of God, are trusting in mere man and have brought a curse upon themselves (Jeremiah 17:5-6; Acts 17:10-11; 2 Timothy 3:16-17, etc.). Those who look anywhere except to the LORD Himself are idolaters, are committing spiritual adultery, and will without exception depart from Him and be lost (v. 5). Their names “shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken the LORD, the fountain of living waters” (v. 13). The phrase “written in the earth” is in contrast to their names being “written in heaven” (Luke 10:20; Hebrews 12:23). Hell is in the bowels of the earth and that’s where every single person who is not looking wholly to the LORD will spend eternity (Revelation 20:11-15).
Let me get this straight, you pretend to be saved and yet run to some foolish sinner to get drugged for lack of peace or ability to sleep or depression. You are completely deceived and God is calling you to repent now. If you knew Him, would you not be trusting Him and not sinful mere men? “Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD (Jeremiah 17:5).
You’ve tried the CURSE and it never worked…. Are you ready to let CHRIST make you whole?
Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD. 6 For he shall be like the heath in the desert (spiritually dry, desolate), and shall not see when good cometh; but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, in a salt land and not inhabited. 7 Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is. 8 For he shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit. 9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? 10 I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings. 11 As the partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool. 12 A glorious high throne from the beginning is the place of our sanctuary. 13 O LORD, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken the LORD, the fountain of living waters. 14 Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.” Jeremiah 17:5-14
Psychology/psychobabble, therapy from mere men, sinners…. is a scam, and leaves the victim without hope. Jesus Christ is the only hope for man’s core dilemma—which is sin! ANY person pointing you to a “THE-RAPIST” is demon inspired. They speak against the Word of God and are the child of the devil! See Colossians 2:6-10. SINNERS need the Savior—not some sinner with an indoctrination in the fine of art of applying bandages, never getting to the root. Repent now (Jeremiah 17:9). Jesus alone can make a man whole! (Luke 4:18)
Man’s therapy and psychobabble are laughably insufficient and have never once gotten to the root issue of man’s dilemma which is sin. Jesus says that He “came into the world to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15).
Drugs and psychobabble are laughable mere band aids to rob unbelievers, gullible dupes of their money.
“Jesus Christ maketh thee whole”
Only One can make you whole—the One who made you and died and rose again for you.
“And Peter said unto him, Aeneas, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole: arise, and make thy bed. And he arose immediately.” Acts 9:34
“Yep that’s me, the woman with the Alabaster box. And that is all I need—my alabaster box and Jesus! No need for meds or to be psycho-analyzed by some quack. One touch from Jesus is all I need! Just as the woman who touched the hem of His garment and was immediately healed! Luke 8: 43-48. One touch is all she needed.” Karen Cochran
Support | STORE | Podcasts | Jail/Prison Ministry | Mexico Mission here | All Ministry Updates | Because You Care Page | The Greatest of these is Charity | Be Ready in the Morning [podcast] | The Sure Mercies of David [podcast] | That Repentance and Remission of Sins should be Preached [podcast] | At His Feet | Prepared to be Used of God | Walking with Jesus on His Stated Terms – the Cross | Fasting and Prayer | The Old Man Must be Put Down [podcast] | The 5 Sins That Keep God’s People Out of Their Promised Land [podcast] | What Did Paul Mean by “I Keep Under My Body”? [podcast] | “Jesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith” [podcast] | A Living Sacrifice unto God [podcast] | Departing from Hell Beneath | Prayer



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