June 23

Morning

Ephraim is a cake not turned. — Hos 7:8

A cake not turned—is uncooked on one side; and so Ephraim was, in many respects, untouched by divine grace—though there was some partial obedience, there was very much rebellion left. My soul, I charge you, see whether this be your case. Are you thorough in the things of God? Has grace gone through the very center of your being—so as to be felt in its divine operations in all your powers, your actions, your words, and your thoughts? To be sanctified, spirit, soul, and body—should be your aim and prayer; and although sanctification may not be perfect in you anywhere in degree—yet it must be universal in its action; there must not be the appearance of holiness in one place and reigning sin in another, else you, too, will be a cake not turned.

A cake not turned is soon burnt on the side nearest the fire, and although no man can have too much religion, there are some who seem burnt black with bigoted zeal for that part of truth which they have received, or are charred to a cinder with a vain-glorious Pharisaic ostentation of those religious performances which suit their humor. The assumed appearance of superior sanctity, frequently accompanies a total absence of all vital godliness. The saint in public—may be a devil in private. He deals in flour by day and in soot by night. The cake which is burned on one side, is dough on the other. If it be so with me, O Lord, turn me! Turn my unsanctified nature to the fire of Your love and let it feel the sacred glow, and let my burnt side cool a little while I learn my own weakness and lack of heat when I am removed from Your heavenly flame. Let me not be found a double-minded man but one entirely under the powerful influence of reigning grace; for well I know if I am left like a cake unturned, and am not on both sides the subject of Your grace—I must be consumed forever amid everlasting burnings!

Evening

Waiting for the adoption. — Rom 8:23

Even in this world, saints are God’s children but others cannot discover them to be so, except by certain moral characteristics. The adoption is not manifested, the children are not yet openly declared. Among the Romans a man might adopt a child, and keep it private for a long time but there was a second adoption in public; when the child was brought before the constituted authorities, its former garments were taken off, and the father who took it to be his child gave it clothing suitable to its new condition of life.

“Beloved, now are we the sons of God and it does not yet appear what we shall be.” We are not yet arrayed in the apparel which befits the royal family of heaven; we are wearing—just what we wore as the sons of Adam; but we know that “when He shall appear” who is the “first-born among many brethren,” we shall be like Him, we shall see Him as He is. You can imagine that a child taken from the lowest ranks of society, and adopted by a Roman senator, would say to himself, “I long for the day when I shall be publicly adopted. Then I shall leave off these plebeian garments, and be robed as becomes my senatorial rank”. Happy in what he has received, for that very reason he groans to get the fullness of what is promised him. So it is with us today.

We are waiting until we shall put on our proper garments, and shall be manifested as the children of God. We are young nobles, and have not yet worn our coronets. We are young brides, and the marriage day is not yet come, and by the love our Spouse bears us, we are led to long and sigh for the bridal morning. Our very happiness makes us groan after more; our joy, like a swollen spring, longs to well up like an Iceland geyser, leaping to the skies, and it heaves and groans within our spirit for lack of space and room by which to manifest itself to men.