In my wrath I struck you down, but in my favor I have had mercy on you.
✙ Isaiah 60:10
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Beloved, the cross is not made of feathers, or lined with velvet, it is heavy and galling to disobedient shoulders. But it is not an iron cross, though your fears have painted it with iron colors. It is a wooden cross, and a person can carry it, for the Man of sorrows tried the load. Take up your cross, and by the power of the Spirit of God you will soon be so in love with it, that like Moses, you would not exchange the reproach that comes with being a disciple for all the treasures of Egypt. Remember that Jesus carried it, and it will smell sweetly; remember that it will soon be followed by the crown, and the thought of the coming weight of glory will greatly lighten the present heaviness of trouble. The Lord help you to bow your spirit in submission to the divine will ere you fall asleep this night, that waking with tomorrow’s sun, you may go forth to the day’s cross with the holy and submissive spirit which becomes a follower of the Crucified.
✙ Charles Spurgeon
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God made you alive together with him, when he forgave us all our trespasses, erasing the record that stood against us with its legal demands. He set this aside, nailing it to the cross.
✙ Colossians 2:14
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Prayer after thinking about today's devotion:
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May I never fail to see the shadow of the cross on the promise of your cradle, Lord Jesus. And may I follow you from Bethlehem to Calvary that I might share with you your risen life in the New Jerusalem.
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After your own thanksgivings & petitions, close with the Lord's Prayer.
