The Quiet Time There may be many times when I reveal nothing, command nothing, give no guidance. But your path is clear, and your task, to grow daily more and more into the knowledge of Me. That this quiet time with Me will enable you to do.
I may ask you to sit silent before Me, and I may speak no word that you could write. All the same that waiting with Me will bring comfort and Peace. Only friends who understand and love each other can wait silent in each other's presence.
And it may be that I shall prove our friendship by asking you to wait in silence while I rest with you, assured of your Love and understanding. So wait, so love, so joy.
"My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away." Song of Solomon 2:10

Your Search Rewarded
Lord, all men seek for the Thee.
All men seek for Me, but all men do not know what they want. They are seeking because they are dissatisfied without realizing that I am the object of their quest.
Count it your greatest joy to be the means, by your lives, sufferings, words, and love, to prove to the questing ones you know that their search would end when they saw Me.
Profit by My Example. I left My work -- seemingly the greatest work -- that of saving souls, to seek communion with My Father. Did I know perhaps that with many it was idle curiosity? Did I know that there must be no rush into the Kingdom, that the still small voice, not the shoutings of a mob, would alone persuade men I was the Son of God?
Why be surrounded by multitudes if the multitudes were not really desiring to learn from, and to follow, Me? Follow the Christ into the quiet places of prayer.
"Whom seek ye? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered, I have told you that I am he." John 18:7, 8

My Kingdom
And greater works than these shall ye do, because I go unto My Father.
While I was on earth, to the great number of those with whom I came in contact, Mine was a lost cause. Even My disciples only believed, half-doubting, half-wondering. When they all forsook Me and fled it was not so much fear of My enemies as the certainty that My Mission, however beautiful they thought it, had failed.
In spite of all I had taught them, in spite of the revelation of the Last Supper, they had secretly felt sure that when the final moment came, and the hatred of the Pharisees was declared against Me I should sound some call to action, and that I should lead My many followers, and found My earthly kingdom. Even the disciples who had eyes to see My Spiritual Kingdom had thought material forces had proved too strong for Me.
But with My Resurrection came hope. Faith revived. They would remind each other of all I had said. They would have the assurance of My Divinity, Messiahship, the lack of which had hindered My work on earth, and they would have all My Power in the unseen - the Holy Spirit - to help them.
Remember, I came to found a Kingdom - the Kingdom.  Those who lived in the Kingdom were to do the work -- greater works than I was able to do. Not a greater Power shown, not a greater Life lived, but, as men recognized My Godhead, opportunities for works in My Name would increase. My work on earth was to gather around Me the nucleus of My Kingdom, and to teach the Truths of My Kingdom to them.  In those Truths they were to live and work.
"But now it is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the Resurrection of the dead." 1 Corinthians 15:20-21

Man of Sorrows He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Isaiah 53:3
That these words strike a note of Beauty in the hearts of those attuned to hear the Beautiful, shows truly that the heart recognizes the need for the Man of Sorrows. That it sees nothing contemptible in One despised by the world. That it recognizes the vast difference between the values of Heaven, and those of the world. Fame and acclamations are accorded to earth's great, contempt and rejection to the Son of God.
One of the things My disciples must ever seek to do is to set aside the valuation of the world, and judge only according to the values of Heaven. These are not for you. Do not seek the praise and the notice of men. You follow a despised Christ. See the mob is hooting, throwing stones, jeering, and yet in that quiet little throng there is a happiness and Joy the reviling crowds could never know.
Follow that little throng with stones and gibes, and it appears to be of men, mean, ludicrous, contemptible. Be one of the throng, and you feel the Majesty of God in the presence of Him, Who was despised and rejected of men. Wreaths around His Brow, and shouts of applause, would belittle that Majesty.
In your dark hours, when human help fails, keep very close to the Man of Sorrows. Feel My Hand of Love press yours in silent but complete understanding. I, too, was acquainted with grief. No heart can ache without My heart aching too. "He was despised, and we esteemed Him not."
"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world .... For all that is in the world, ... is not of the Father, but is of the world." 1 John 2:15-16

Earth's Furies
In the world ye shall have tribulation; but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.  John 16:33
Then you may ask why have you, My children, to have tribulation if I have overcome the world.
My overcoming was never, you know, for Myself, but for you, for My children. Each temptation, each difficulty, I overcame as it presented itself.
The powers of evil were strained to their utmost to devise means to break Me.  They failed, but how they failed was known only to Me, and to My Father, who could read My undaunted spirit.  The world, even My own followers, would see a Lost Cause. Reviled, spat upon, scourged, they would deem Me conquered.  How could they know My Spirit was free, unbroken, unharmed?
And so, as I had come to show man God, I must show him God unconquered, unharmed, untouched by evil and its power. Man could not see My Spirit untouched, risen above these earth furies and hates, into the Secret Place of the Father. But man could see My Risen Body and learn by that, that even the last attempt of man had been powerless to touch Me.
Take heart from that, for you must share My tribulations. If evil is to leave you unchallenged you must be evil.  If evil challenges you, if trials press sore,  it because you are on My side, and, as My friends, exposed to the hate of evil.
But be of good cheer.  You walk with Me.  I conquered evil at every point, though man could only see it proved beyond all doubt when I rose from the dead. And in My conquering Power you walk unharmed today.
For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. 1 John 3:8

Only Love Lasts Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a a tinkling cymbal. 1 Corinthians 13:1
SEE that only Love tells. Only what is done in Love lasts, for God is Love, and only the work of God remains.
The fame of the world, the applause given to the one who speaks with the tongues of men and of angels, who attracts admiration and compels attention, it is all given to what is passing, is really worthless, if it lacks that God-quality, Love.
Think how a smile, or word of Love, goes winged on its way, a God-Power, simple though it may seem, while the mighty words of an orator can fall fruitless to the ground. The test of all true work and words is - are they inspired by Love?
If man only saw how vain is so much of his activity! So much work done in My Name is not acknowledged by Me. As for Love. Turn out from your hearts and lives all that is not loving, so shall ye bear much fruit, and by this shall all men know ye are My disciples, because ye have Love one toward another.
And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity. 1 Corinthians 13:13

Mysteries
Your Hope is in the Lord. More and more set your hopes on Me. Know that whatever the future may hold it will hold more and more of Me. It cannot but be glad and full of Joy.  So in Heaven, or on earth, wherever you may be, your way must be truly one of delight.
Do not try to find answers to the mysteries of the world.  Learn to know Me more and more, and in that Knowledge you will have all the answers you need here, and when you see Me Face to Face, in that purely Spiritual world, you will find no need to ask.  There again all your answers will be in Me.
Remember, I was the answer in time to all man's questions about My Father and His Laws. Know no theology. Know Me. I was the Word of God. All you need to know about God you know in Me. If a man knows me not, all your explanations will fall on an unresponsive heart.
Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? Hope in God; for I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance, and my God.  Psalm 43:5

Hills of the Lord
I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh form the Lord, which made heaven and earth. Psalm 12:1,2
Yes! always raise your eyes, from earth's sordid and mean and false, to the Hills of the Lord. From poverty, lift your eyes to the Help of the Lord.
In moments of weakness, lift your eyes to the Hills of the Lord.
Train your sight by constantly getting this long view. Train it to see more and more, further and further, until distant peaks seem familiar.
The Hills of the Lord. The Hills whence comes your help. A parched earth looks to the Hills for its rivers, its streams, its life. So look you to the Hills. From those Hills comes Help. Help from the Lord - who made Heaven and earth.
So, for all your spiritual needs, look to the Lord, who made Heaven, and for all your temporal needs look to Me, owner of all this, the Lord who made the earth.
Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up. James 4:10

Dazzling Glory
Arise, shine; for thy light is come and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.  Isaiah 60:1
The glory of the Lord is the Beauty of His Character.  It is risen upon you when you realize it, even though on earth you can do so only in part.
The Beauty of the Purity and Love of God is too dazzling for mortals to see in full.
The Glory of the Lord is also risen upon you when you reflect that Glory in your lives, when in Love, Patience, Service, Purity, whatever it may be, you reveal to the world a something of the Father, an assurance that you have been with Me, your Lord and Savior.
But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.  2 Corinthians 3:18

Quiet Lives
"Well done, thou good and faithful servant ... enter into the joy of thy Lord."  Matthew 25:21
These words are whispered in the ears of many whom the world would pass by unrecognizing.  Not to the great, and the world-famed, are these words said so often, but to the quiet followers who serve Me unobtrusively, yet faithfully, who bear their cross bravely, with a smiling face to the world.  Thank Me for the quiet lives.
These words speak not only of the passing into that fuller Spirit Life.  Duty faithfully done for Me does mean entrance into a Life of Joy - My Joy, the Joy of your Lord.  The world may never see it, the humble, patient, quiet service, but I see it, and My reward is not earth's fame, earth's wealth, earth's pleasures, but the Joy Divine.
Whether here, or there, in the earth-world, or in the spirit-world, this is My reward. Joy.  The Joy that carries an exquisite thrill in the midst of pain and poverty and suffering.  That Joy of which I said no man could take it from you.  Earth has no pleasure, no reward, that can give man that Joy.  It is known only to My lovers and My friends.
This Joy may come, not as the reward of activity in My service.  It may be the reward of patient suffering, bravely borne.
Suffering, borne with Me, must in time bring Joy, as does all real contact with Me.  So live with Me in that Kingdom of Joy , My Kingdom, the Gateway into which may be service, it may be suffering.
Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation.  Isaiah 12:3