Welcome to Rose's Devotional

Notice: Some of the information written in the Maranatha book might be new to some of you. You can find more information at www.sabbathtruth.com

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Forbidden to Buy or Sell

And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Revelation 13:17.

The time is coming when we cannot sell at any price. The decree will soon go forth prohibiting men to buy or sell of any man save him that hath the mark of the beast. }

In the last great conflict of the controversy with Satan those who are loyal to God will see every earthly support cut off. Because they refuse to break His law in obedience to earthly powers, they will be forbidden to buy or sell.

Religious powers, allied to heaven by profession, and claiming to have the characteristics of a lamb, will show by their acts that they have the heart of a dragon and that they are instigated and controlled by Satan. The time is coming when God's people will feel the hand of persecution because they keep holy the seventh day.

There is a time coming when commandment-keepers can neither buy nor sell. Make haste to dig out your buried talents. If God has intrusted you with money, show yourselves faithful to your trust; unwrap your napkin, and send your talents to the exchangers, that when Christ shall come, He may receive His own with interest. In the last extremity, before this work shall close, thousands will be cheerfully laid upon the altar. Men and women will feel it a blessed privilege to share in the work of preparing souls to stand in the great day of God, and they will give hundreds as readily as dollars are given now. If the love of Christ were burning in the hearts of His professed people, we would see the same spirit manifested today. Did they but realize how near is the end of all work for the salvation of souls, they would sacrifice their possessions as freely as did the members of the early church. They would work for the advancement of God's cause as earnestly as worldly men labor to acquire riches. Tact and skill would be exercised, and earnest and unselfish labor put forth to acquire means, not to hoard, but to pour into the treasury of the Lord.

Maranatha p. 183

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Prayer Requests

May 12---Please pray for Brian and Esther as they pack up their belongings and move to a new area to work for God. Pray also that God will guide Ronnie Jay as he decides where he wants to move. Rose

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Dear Friends,

This weekend, we went to southeastern Oklahoma with Ronnie Jay. He had rented a cabin at a state park so he could photograph some of the local animals. He was especially hoping to get some good pictures of black bear.

Before he goes on one of his photography adventures, he researches carefully what animals inhabit the area and the best places to find them. Normally, he is successful. Not this time. Those miles and miles of forested land should have been teeming with creatures, but we have never seen an area so devoid of animal life. The thick forest was beautiful to behold, but no amount of hiking, no amount of driving on narrow forest paths produced the desired results. We didn't even see a deer or a squirrel or the desired bear. We looked for the usual animal trails. There were none. We did see one set of deer tracks and a few raccoon hand prints on one of the hikes, but that was all. There was nothing but a few birds, a tarantula, a few turtles, and a couple of snakes. It was very unusual and disappointing.

That lush forest which seemed so lifeless is like the fig tree that Jesus passed one day. The fig tree had leaves but no fruit. He used that fruitless tree to teach His disciples a lesson in faith. “Now in the morning as he returned into the city, he hungered. And when he saw a fig tree in the way, he came to it, and found nothing thereon, but leaves only, and said unto it, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever. And presently the fig tree withered away. And when the disciples saw it, they marvelled, saying, How soon is the fig tree withered away! Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done. And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.” Matt 21:18-21

How often we are equally as fruitless as that fig tree. Isaiah speaks of this “Now will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard. What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes? And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down: And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.” Isa 5:1-6 Fearful warning.

Yet there is hope. We do not have to stay in that fruitless condition. If we allow Jesus to work His will in our life, we can yield an abundant harvest of the fruit of the Spirit which “is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance.” Gal 5:22, 23 He shows us the way to obtain these fruits. “I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.” John 15:1-8

May we “walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness” is my prayer. Col 1:10, 11

Rose

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