From J. C. Philpot's Daily Portions
October 22 "And you shall seek me, and find me, when you shall
search for me with all your heart." Jeremiah 29:13 After the Lord has quickened our souls, for a time we
often go, shall I say, blundering on, not knowing there is a Jesus. We think
that the way of life is to keep God's commandments, obey the law, cleanse
ourselves from sin, reform our lives, and cultivate universal holiness in
thought, word, and action; and so we go, blundering and stumbling on in
darkness; and all the while never get a single step forward. But when the
Lord has allowed us to weary ourselves to find the door, and let us sink
lower and lower into the pit of guilt and ruin, from feeling that all our
attempts to extricate ourselves have only plunged us deeper and deeper, and
the Spirit of God opens up to the understanding and brings into the soul
some spiritual discovery of Jesus, and thus makes known that there is a
Savior, a Mediator, and a way of escape--this is the grand turning-point in
our lives, the first opening in the valley of Achor of the door of hope. And when the soul has once seen that there is a Jesus,
and once felt a measure of the power of his resurrection, it never goes to
any other quarter for pardon, justification, and salvation. When the Spirit
of God begins to open up with power in his conscience that there is a Jesus,
that he is the only Mediator, that the Son of God has come down and taken a
holy human nature into union with himself, and is now at the right hand of
the Father, it is the first break of day, the first dawn of hope; and upon
that bright spot does the shipwrecked soul fix his longing eyes until the
Sun of righteousness arises upon it with healing in his wings. It is a great
step in a man's experience to turn wholly and solely to the Lord, and
renounce all creature righteousness, all forms and ceremonies as a way of
salvation. It is a great mercy to turn away from them, as the shipwrecked
mariner turns away from his sinking ship, and looks to the rising sun to
show him some way of escape, and thus afford him some gleam of hope.