Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

It’s scary to read Jesus’ accounts in Matthew about the last judgment. According to Him, almost everybody is going to be surprised to discover finally where he really belongs:

(1) ”Many” who have been sure they are “saved” and have their tickets to heaven ready will hear Him say, “I never knew you.” Sorry; He represents Himself as telling them, The one you thought you knew was someone else. “Depart from Me, you who work iniquity” ( 7:23). In reading the account in Revelation 20, we see that they will want to run (vss. 12-14); one very perceptive writer has said that they will “welcome destruction.”

(2) Then, in contrast, those to whom “the King” will say, “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world,” will remonstrate with Him, look behind them to see if it must be someone else He is telling to “come,” we don’t deserve this, You must mean someone else. No, He says; I mean you: “Come.” (see 25:31ff).

Neither group, widely separated in faith, expected what their fate would be.

Jesus has tried to help us get ready for that day. He says, “‘When you are invited by anyone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in the best place, lest one more honorable than you be invited by him; and he who invited you and him come and say to you, “Give place to this man,” and then you begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit down in the lowest place, so that when he who invited you comes he may say to you, “Friend, go up higher.” Then you will have glory in the presence of those who sit at the table with you. For whoever exalts himself will be abased, and he who humbles himself will be exalted’” (Luke14:8-11).

So, how should we feel (and speak) about ourselves? How about: “Less than the least of all saints,” “the chief of sinners,” “unworthy servants.” That will be the true language of our hearts if (a) we comprehend what our sin is—that we share the corporate guilt of the murderous crucifixion of the Son of God, and (b) we appreciate what it cost Him to save us—that He died our second death.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The Book of Daniel is the one book of all the Bible that Jesus singled out in urging us both to “read” and “understand”: “When you see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place (whoever reads, let him understand)” (Matt. 24:15).

To read the book is not difficult; the problem is to understand it. But the understanding part is not “take it or leave it”; He commands us to understand it.

But how can one be commanded to understand something he doesn’t understand? Is understanding Daniel a duty laid upon us by our Savior?

Yes; He says “let” yourself understand it. In other words, the Holy Spirit is seeking to give you an understanding of Daniel; now don’t hinder Him in what He is trying to do for you.

The particular portion of Daniel that Jesus commands us to “understand” is the prophetic portion; but it can’t be only a coincidence that the narrative portions of the book are all concerned with life or death issues:

Chapter one is the test of the Hebrew boys on idolatry; chapter two is the test of understanding the king’s dream; chapter three is the test of the fiery furnace; chapter five is the test of Belshazzar’s feast; and chapter six is the test of the lions’ den. All serious!

Then Revelation picks up the story and tells us that understanding truth will be the issue in the final test of choosing the seal of God or the mark of the beast (chapts. 7 and 13). Our soul’s salvation will ultimately be bound up with deciding for ourselves what is the truth of a controversial issue of understanding Daniel and Revelation—the prophecies.

Jesus could well have added, “Let him that readeth tremble ...” Right now there are issues of truth that draw deeply on one’s soul. There’s never a vacation from the need of thinking clearly and truthfully. Every day you and I are facing King Nebuchadnezzar’s image of gold with his fiery furnace, and also his lions’ den.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The word “gospel” is a common one bandied about by almost everyone. It has come to cover all kinds of ideas.

But what the apostles actually preached is the only valid, authentic idea. What they said must be read in their own context, fully, not partially read and distorted to a wrong definition of that word.

Paul said that a correct understanding of the word “gospel,” if it is believed, “is the power of God unto salvation” (Rom. 1:16). It converted very “difficult” people when Paul preached it (1 Cor. 6:9, 10).

What happened at Corinth under Paul’s preaching will happen again on a worldwide scale in the proclamation of the Loud Cry of Revelation 18. So, let us inquire—what was the “gospel” Paul preached there?

He tells us: “When I came to you, [it] was not with excellence of speech or of wisdom, ... I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2), I used to wonder: was that a fanatical, monomaniacal trip he was on: preaching boring sermons?

If so, why did the people crowd in to hear him, and then embrace his “gospel” with “power”? There’s an answer: there is something in “the truth of the gospel” (Gal. 2:5, 9) of the cross that triumphs over all the imitation, false “gospels” Satan can invent.

“Christ crucified” meant infinitely more than anything the world’s great thinkers could come up with: the apostles’ idea was that He died the world’s second death. That was an idea no one had ever thought of at that time; no one had imagined that there was a love anywhere in the universe so great as that.

Even today, among the vast concourse of professed Christians, there are precious few who conceive of such an idea; and Muslims have not thought of it, nor Hindus, nor anyone. Even Jews have had great trouble embracing the idea. But it moved hearts and motivated people to take up their cross, and follow Him “whithersoever” He led.

How about you?

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

It’s nice to remember that if and when we die, we can come up in the first resurrection.

But is that the “blessed hope” Paul talks about in this passage?—

“The grace of God that brings salvation to all men [margin] has appeared, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:11-14).

Hardly! The “blessed hope” is that of being “alive and remain on the earth” (1 Thess. 4:15, 17) to welcome the Son of God at His second coming. Some say it doesn’t matter; we can come up in a special resurrection prior to His coming and thus “remain,” but this implies there is no real significance to “the signs of the times” we have witnessed for the past century and a half.

Multitudes of believers have died in the past 2000 years; but Daniel’s “time of the end” defines when these who cherish “the blessed hope” will be living, and that time is now. It’s Paul’s “last days” he speaks of (2 Tim. 3:1). And it’s the same time Jesus speaks of: “There will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, ... men’s hearts failing them for fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth. ... Know that the kingdom of God is near” (Luke 21:25-31). Matthew adds, “even at the doors” (24:33).

“The Son of man is coming in an hour when you do not expect Him” (vs. 44). The suddenness of His coming will surprise everyone.

Cherishing “the blessed hope” of seeing Him come in your lifetime is not a quirky little idiosyncrasy for unbalanced elders; it’s Christian duty for us all because it’s “present truth” faith (2 Peter 1:12).

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

One of the most popular axioms that everybody has on their lips continually, even the most righteous of people who say they wait for the second coming of Christ, is this: “Death awaits all of us, everybody has to die.” You see the statement over and over in church publications. It’s just taken for granted everywhere.

But the Bible squarely and directly contradicts it.

“We shall not all die,” says the apostle Paul in 1 Cor. 15:51.

Then he explains more minutely what will happen, in 1 Thess. 4: “We who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord” (vss. 15-17).

Yes, there will be some people who will be “alive and remain” at the coming of Christ, who will be ready to meet Him, and who will be translated.

Obviously they will have “overcome, even as [Christ] overcame” (Rev. 3:21). Although they are living in the same “flesh” and “nature” all of Adam’s descendants have always lived in, they will have “condemned sin in the flesh,” even as Christ did (cf. Rom. 8:3).

If everybody has to die on and on, century after century, and millennium after millennium, how could Christ win the “great controversy” with Satan? This nearly universal axiom is not good gospel news. It’s just not truth.

Just because some sincere Christians were disappointed 162 years ago does not mean that this fundamental truth of the gospel is not true. We must never abandon this good news!

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

It happened 162 years ago—a group of people joined a New York Baptist farmer, William Miller, in expecting the Lord Jesus Christ to return in fulfillment of His promise, “I will come again” on a certain date, October 22, 1844.

Of course, they were mistaken and their experience became known as “the Great Disappointment,” for it was widely publicized. Their belief grew out of the study of Daniel 8:14, “Unto 2300 days [which they correctly understood as literal years], then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.” It was the general assumption in the churches that “the sanctuary” is this earth to be cleansed with fire at the second coming. The assumption was wrong but they had the date right: “the sanctuary” is the heavenly one to be cleansed by the heart preparation of a people ready to meet Jesus when He does return.

Does the genuine Holy Spirit ever permit people to be “disappointed” if they haven’t studied? Yes! He permitted the Lord’s disciples to suffer a terrible disappointment in His crucifixion, because they misunderstood the event. The true Holy Spirit was working in that 1844 movement for it heralded the beginning of Christ’s closing ministry as High Priest in the Most Holy Apartment ministry of the heavenly sanctuary, just as Pentecost heralded the beginning of His ministry in the first apartment.

But the ridicule heaped on William Miller has burgeoned into a dislike to think of anyone living to see Jesus return. “Everybody will die” is freely said repeatedly; but the apostle Paul boldly says the opposite: “Listen! I will unfold a mystery: we shall not all die, but we shall all be changed in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet call. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will rise imperishable, and we shall be changed” (1 Cor. 15:50-52).

Now the question faces us: is the second coming of Christ near? Can we still cherish what Paul also said is “the blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of our great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ”? (Titus 2:11-14).

In our zeal to ridicule that sincere and godly Baptist minister of long ago let’s not sacrifice a fundamental Bible truth for today. Jesus is coming again—soon. And He intends that people now living will see Him come. Maybe more tomorrow.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The Bible doesn’t say it’s a sin always to be angry. A person who can’t get angry is probably a wimp. But the anger is always under strict control of love, which is why you never want a day to pass without making a particular wrong right as far as possible.

Satan constantly tries to intrude but you never give him permission, and he can’t intrude unless you do give him permission! We can be sure that the Lord is very angry watching all the injustice going on in this world. The more like Jesus we are, the more angry we are at injustice to innocent people. And we are also angry at injustice shown to Jesus Himself. He doesn’t deserve to be “crucified afresh”! Paul is emphatic: “be angry!” Just don’t sin at the same time (Eph. 4:26 [Psalm 4:4]). Don’t be a dishrag.

Spectacular corporation embezzlement is the news of almost every day. Even within church organizations it sometimes happens. Africans have sometimes claimed that London was built with wealth stolen from them in colonial days, especially days of slavery. To what extent First World people enjoy their luxury at the expense of Third World people, the most enlightened economist will find it difficult to estimate. But God’s angel economists have it all tabulated accurately.

The only safe way to prepare for the final judgment is to count all that we possess as not ours, but only lent to us temporarily to be used in trust for those less fortunate than ourselves. If you own a piece of property, don’t call it “mine.” Abraham did not possess even a foot of real estate, and he is our “father.” When Jesus died, He had no money to bequeath. All He had was His robe, which the soldiers gambled for.

“Steal no more”! A good prayer to pray is, Lord, give me the grace from your much more abounding store, to realize that I can claim nothing in this world as really mine! But I do have a Savior.

[From Ephesians:You’ve Been “Adopted” by the author of “Dial Daily Bread.”]

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

There is no checklist where you tick off “works” item by item which you think you have performed. That can lead to spiritual pride, or equally, to despair, because it’s the essence of Old Covenant living. It’s deceptive because it appears on the surface to produce results—outward “obedience to the law.”

But New Covenant living is a constant choice to believe the Lord’s promises. It’s a constant renewal of the distraught father’s prayer who prayed because of his demon-tormented son, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24). You can never perish while you pray that prayer! Even if you live to be 100, you’ll still be praying it, but you’ll be having victories constantly.

Paul says we are not to climb up to heaven to get righteousness, but the Lord Jesus descended from heaven to give it to us: “The righteousness of faith speaks in this way, ‘Do not say in your heart, “Who will ascend into heaven?”’ (that is, to bring Christ down from above), … but what does it say? ‘The word is near you, even in your mouth and in your heart’ (that is, the word of faith which we preach)” (Rom. 10:6-8). Instead of waiting for you to climb up into Heaven, the Holy Spirit is coming down to where you are. The Good Shepherd looks for and finds His lost sheep.

New Covenant living is the kind of life that Abraham lived. We don’t read that he ever made any promises to God, but he chose to believe God’s promises to him. They were these:

(1) “I will make of you a great nation.” In other words, you will have fulfillment,—super. You will be somebody (all this is Genesis 12:2, 3).

(2) “I will bless you,” which means simply, make you happy,

(3) “And make your name great.” You’ll become all you really want to become, in Him.

(4) “You shall be a blessing” everywhere you go. In other words, you’ll always be making other people happy. It’s life to the full!

(5) “I will bless those who bless you.” God will reward people who help you.

(6) “I will curse him who curses you.” This has to be, as part of the blessing on you. You are under the Lord’s special protection.

(7) “In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” That’s Christ, of course; but you are “in Christ” now, so you share in that joy.

Responding to these promises is beyond the level of mere emotion; all true obedience is based on the principle of simply believing these promises, that they are made to you. Ask the Lord to hold you by the hand as you follow Him step by step; He does!

[Excerpted from Ephesians:You’ve Been “Adopted” by the author of “Dial Daily Bread.”]

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Is the Book of Hosea the story of a finally lost love? If the world’s novelists had written it, the answer would have been yes. But Jesus Christ is in the business of restoring broken lives! Hosea’s love was not finally lost.

The prophet was reconciled to the Lord, obedient, and at-one. He loved that woman Gomer with the love the Lord had given him for her, in spite of her infidelities. Her lovers had all failed her and she went down into horrible personal ruin. Her husband “bought” her later in a slave market for a paltry sum (3:2); how more deeply crushed could any woman feel who was once loved by an honorable man? And she couldn’t blame him!

We hope that in some way the grace of the Lord Jesus could manifest justification and repentance to her clearly enough to rebuild a healthy sense of self-respect. No man could enjoy living with any woman with a shattered, unrestored sense of self-worth. The much more abounding grace of Christ teaches and imparts a healthy sense of sober appreciation for one’s own being and the gifts that He has given us with the measure of His grace realized (cf. Rom. 12:3; 2 Cor. 5:15-18).

We hope that when this poignant drama ended, Hosea and Gomer could walk off stage hand in hand and heart with heart in a blessed reconciliation and mutual love, until death did them part. In fact, we know that, because the original love tragedy on which Hosea’s and Gomer’s story is based did end, or rather will end, in glorious restitution of love for the Lord (3:5). And the Lord is too good to His children to permit poor Hosea to end his life broken-hearted, when His, the Lord’s heart, will be restored. (If anyone reads this who has suffered a love tragedy, please read Hosea.)

The reason why this book is in the Bible? Hosea was the Lord’s last effort to save Israel from ruin by the Assyrians. They put an end to the kingdom in 723 B.C. after their impenitence was hopeless. Elijah had tried to save them some 150 years earlier; what made the problem most difficult was that under Jeroboam II the kingdom had enjoyed great prosperity and material success. Just like Laodicea, the people and their spiritual leaders continually said, “We are rich and increased with goods, in need of nothing” (cf. Rev. 3:14-17). Hosea’s Israel and our Laodicea have an identical problem.


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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The question has troubled many who love the Bible and who want to think right thoughts about the Lord:

Why would He tell His faithful, dedicated prophet to “love a woman” who was “an adulteress,” yes, “a harlot”?

We remember with that word in Hosea 3:1, 3 the inspiring thought of a modern writer who said, “Love [of a man for a woman] is a precious gift which we receive from Jesus.” Then the problem of Hosea becomes even more perplexing.

If the Lord Himself “said” this to the prophet, it must be that He gave the “gift” to this man of loving this particular woman. And indeed the Bible is clear beyond question: our Creator and Redeemer is interested in our conjugal happiness; it was He who created us “male and female” and caused “the man” in the Garden to realize that “it is not good that [he] should be alone,” that he yearned at heart for someone to love who was “answering to him,” in other words, the right woman. The God of happiness “brought her to him” (Gen. 2:18, 22), like He brings every married couple together in that delightful happiness.

Now millennia later the same “LORD God” has virtually “brought” a woman named Gomer to His prophet Hosea and said to him, Love this woman! If the Lord gave him love for her, the poor man is a helpless captive; he simply says, “I love you truly!”

If you are surrendered to the Lord, you don’t rebel against the love that He has given you! (Which is another way of saying you don’t commit divorce, for the Lord says He hates it, Mal. 2:16). The Lord’s prophet Hosea is a flesh-and-blood man, tempted like anyone; but he is not fickle. In this drama he is cast in the role of representing the Lord, and the fickle woman is cast in the role of Israel. And Hosea is not merely play-acting temporarily; this is not a drama running a few nights in the town theater. This is his life.

This Bible book says something to us today. Is the soul of the Lord’s church fickle? Are we as poor, blind, and naked as ancient Israel was in Hosea’s day? More tomorrow.

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Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Before He ascended to heaven, Jesus made a promise that we hang on to: “I will come again, and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, there you may be also” (John 14:1-3). World population desperately clings to that as their only hope. Otherwise, our future is worse even than if the whole world were to become another Baghdad.

The second coming of Christ is not bad news even to those who say they don’t believe in Him, for many, when they finally hear the gospel presented clearly, will believe. They’ve been waiting for it all their lives. And for those who finally steel their hearts and souls against it, they’ll be glad that their hell is now at an end. Christ is always only “good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people,” as the angels originally said (Luke 2:10).

The coming last days events have terrorized many who say they long for Christ to come again, but they cannot bear the bad news that has given so many youth their nightmares and frightened them out of the church. The “mark of the beast,” for example, enforced by a death penalty as Revelation 13:15 predicts: it’s not God’s intention that our lives be shadowed by that heavy cloud of apprehension. Those who have come to understand “the everlasting gospel” of 14:6, 7, “the third angel’s message in verity,” walk into that crisis with “the joy of the Lord” on their faces. It will be the greatest soul-winning thrill they have ever known because at last the glorious days Isaiah predicted in chapters 49 and 60 will be happening all around them. (God will never let Isaiah come to nothing!)

Fear? Those who believe in Jesus won’t know it, no matter how precarious their situations may seem to be. They have at last learned what the love is that is agape, which “casts out fear” (1 John 4:18). It does it! At long last they have looked at the uplifted cross on which the Son of God died the world’s second death; they have “comprehended with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height—to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge.” Super-astounding as the truth may be, they are “filled with all the fullness of God” (Eph. 3:17-19). How could the desperate rantings of a frustrated devil with his empty “mark of the beast” threats disturb their peace now?

They are not enduring these trials “alone”! “Lo, I am with you always” is ringing in their souls’ ears. “Yea, though [they] walk through the valley of the shadow of death, [they] will fear no evil, for [the Lord] is with [them]” (Psalm 23:4).

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.
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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Everybody on earth is called to learn about the work of the Holy Spirit, especially in these last days. He is doing a mighty work; the vast universe of intelligent beings is concerned about what He is doing here on planet earth; how much more, we!

(a) The “early rain” of the Holy Spirit enables people to overcome all known sin (John 16:8).

(b) But the “latter rain” prepares believers to overcome all sin, even that now unknown to them. Don’t say that’s impossible: David prays our daily prayer, “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts, and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psalm 139:23, 24).

(c) Many great saints died before our Day of Atonement in which we now live, not knowing they were in transgression of God’s holy law; for example, Wesley who never kept the Bible Sabbath and Luther, died drinking his beer. Their level of faith was sufficient for their time; but now we face the final Time of Trouble and the call to be ready to be translated (1 Thess. 4:15-17). Frightening? No! Not if we understand the “everlasting gospel” (Rev. 14:6, 7)

(d) The greatest sins ever committed were unknown sin.

(e) “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do,” prayed Jesus at His cross.

(f) The “latter rain” prepares a people to sit with Christ on His throne, and exercise executive authority with Him in bringing to a close the great controversy with Satan (Rev. 3:21). The “early rain” merely extenuates it. Christ wants and deserves closure.

(g) The Lord cannot translate sin buried deep in a human heart, unknown. His presence is death to sin.

(h) The “latter rain” is not emotional excitement, but solid truth not previously perceived. That truth will enable believers to overcome, even as [Christ] overcame.



(i) If ever the gospel has been the power of God unto salvation to every one who believes (Rom. 1:16), it is now when it’s to be understood in the light of the cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary.

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

How are we to receive the Holy Spirit? He Himself of course is the same Person all through the ages; but His ministry in these last days has a different focus. We need to understand how:

(a) He manifested Himself at Pentecost 2000 years ago in the “early rain.” But in the end of time He will manifest Himself in the “latter rain.” “Rain” of course is rain, the same H-two-O whether it comes to sprout the planted seed, or whether it comes to ripen the grain for harvest; but its mission is vastly different. Another way of recognizing the difference is to consider the second coming of Christ in contrast with His first. They are not the same; in one He comes to die on a cross for the sins of the world, in the other He comes as King of kings and Lord of lords.

(b) The “early rain” was a gift that marked Christ’s ministry in the first apartment of the heavenly sanctuary; His ministry in the “latter rain” is a gift that comes from Christ’s work in the second apartment. When the High Priest enters the second, He closes the door to the first. Either His people “follow the Lamb wherever He goes” (Rev. 14:4) or they open themselves to deception by a counterfeit high priest in a counterfeit first apartment sanctuary (cf. Matt. 24:24).

(c) The “early rain” prepared people to die and come up in the first resurrection. This blessed ministry continued until the end of the 2300 year prophecy of Daniel 8:14. Then came a profound change—the blowing of the seventh trumpet (Rev. 11:15-19). The great High Priest is determined to see the great controversy brought to its climactic end; He is not in favor of its being extenuated for centuries more!

(d) This disturbs lukewarm people who would be content for time (and sin) to go on indefinitely, content for Jesus to postpone His second coming for a generation or two more. To face the close of probation and live through the seven last plagues—isn’t there an easier way to get to heaven?

(e) But the “latter rain” prepares people to go through that Time of Trouble and to stand before Jesus and meet Him personally when He returns (1 Thess. 4:16, 17).

(f) They must eventually elect to receive the latter rain with all that it entails, or renounce their faith they have long professed. The time to choose may be near.

e sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:
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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

A young man from far away has just written a letter saying he has recently gotten married, and he is asking the Lord to help him be true to one woman and to know how to love her.

That’s a prayer for the gift of the much more abounding grace of the Lord to be obedient to His holy law; it’s a law of love (agape), and although obedience to it is contrary to the fallen, sinful nature we have inherited from our fallen father Adam, such a prayer is a request for the “mind” of our new or “last Adam” or second Adam.

Such a prayer is therefore in harmony with what Philippians 2:5-8 tells us: “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” That “grace of God” wants to be our “Teacher,” actually “teaching us” how to say “No!” to the constant impulse of our fallen, sinful nature to indulge self and thus “let this mind be in us which was also in Christ Jesus” (see Titus 2:11-13, and check the NIV rendering which in this instance is good).

We don’t want to go through life and end up at last with a defective understanding of that “grace.” Let’s stop a moment and look:

(a) It “brings salvation to all men,” just what we need. If that’s true, it has brought the gift to you personally (and it’s true!). Let’s not waste precious time arguing how near that grace has brought this salvation—whether the Lord Jesus through the Holy Spirit placed it in our hands or merely within our reach; good people have argued both views (like how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?); what’s solid truth is that the Lord Jesus Christ has given Himself to you (cf. John 3:16), and you receive the Gift or you crucify Him afresh.


(b) That grace “teaches us to “deny” self—when a life of self-denial strikes us as the most miserable existence imaginable. Calculus or nuclear physics or chemistry would be an easier 101 university course than learning Christ-like self-denial. But never mind; that “grace of God” has set itself to the task of “teaching” you. It’s like my university professor of long ago: when I came back from Africa and enrolled in Greek translations I found that the Greek I had learned in college years was practically gone and I couldn’t keep up with all these bright young men in class so I’d better drop it. She said, “No, hang on; and I guarantee I’ll see you through to a pass.” She did; even an “A” at last! Don’t jump the Lord’s class!

Time’s up; maybe we can look at this “grace tuition” again tomorrow.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

To un-subscribe send an e-mail message with "un-subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

The path to happiness and stability for any marriage lies via the cross of Christ. Even in the case of those who are not [yet] Christians, the happiness they have is the gift of Christ, for He is “the true Light which gives light to every man who comes into the world” (John 1:9).

Christ is the world’s Creator, and He is also the world’s Redeemer and Savior (4:42); it was He who said “‘it is not good that man should be alone; I will make a helper comparable to him.’ ... And He brought [the woman] to the man. ... Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they [two] shall become one flesh” (Gen. 2:18-24).

But it was at the holy moment of the cross that the world caught a glimpse of what love (agape) means. That word includes love of man for woman and her response to his love—sexual love, for we read, “Husbands, love [with agape] your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it. ... So ought husbands to love [with agape] their own wives” (Eph. 5:25, 28). The command of God to love becomes the most exquisite joy man can know.

Thus, says an insightful writer, “Love [between husband and wife] is a precious gift which we receive from Jesus.” It’s a miracle seen all over the world in all time, that the Lord Jesus gives that “precious gift” of true sexual love for one woman to one man; love is by its very nature “jealous” (S.S. 8:6, 7). It would be cruel for the Lord God, our Creator and Savior, to give that true jealous love for one woman to two men, thus creating a lifelong pain for one. (There must be a distinction between sexual infatuation that dies overnight, with that “precious gift” which is “strong as death.”)

The Lord Jesus has warned us that in the last days “because lawlessness shall abound, the love [agape] of many will grow cold” (Matt. 24:12). The “light” that is yet to “lighten the earth with glory” (Rev. 18:1-4) will include the light of agape shining in the hearts of husbands and wives who have been awakened by the ministry of the last-days “Elijah” (cf. Mal. 4:5, 6; 2:14-16).

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

To un-subscribe send an e-mail message with "un-subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.

Dial Daily Bread

Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread":

Is there a halfway mark between being a fool and a wise person, in the words of Solomon? It seems that each of us ends up being one or the other. (And we ’re often surprised how we turn out.)

The publican’s prayer, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner” (Luke 18:13) is one we love to pray; but is there one in the Bible, “God, be merciful to me, a fool!”? Can a “fool” (in Solomon’s and David’s descriptions) ever be really converted?

One king of Israel confessed he had “played the fool and erred exceedingly” (1 Sam. 26:21), but we never read that he prayed the Lord to be merciful to him, a fool; King Saul died with his career in ruins. I remember a college president who once confessed (after an affair), in Saul’s words, that he had “played the fool and erred exceedingly.” King David may have felt good through much of his reign, that he had done better than his old enemy, King Saul, and had not “played the fool,” but after his affair with Bathsheba and her lawful husband’s murder, he may have had a little greater sympathy for Saul. The distance between a wise person and a fool can be a hairline.

Yes, the Lord can have mercy on a fool, even though “The Fool’s Prayer” is in the poetry book and not the Bible (Edward Sill wrote of the king after he had commanded his jester to “pray,” “The room was hushed; in silence rose / The king, and sought his gardens cool, / And walked apart, and murmured low, / ‘Be merciful to me, a fool!’”). King Solomon hopefully understood that the world’s Savior can save a fool; the Lord Jesus has sympathy for anyone who feels himself thus worse off than a common sinner. Even though a “fool” appears to have less latitude in asking for mercy, he can cast himself on the Lord for salvation from being himself, and know the Lord can save even fools.

(a) Christ is continually inviting lost people: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden” (Matt. 11:28). No human soul’s burden is heavier than that of a repentant fool.

(b) Said Christ’s enemies: “This man receives sinners, and eats with them” (Luke 15:2). He has a special sympathy for the down and out, for those who despise themselves.

(c) He was born in the lowliest place imaginable; from a Child He carried the apparent painful stigma of an illegitimate birth; He chose to die under the stigma of being cast out, despised, forsaken by the King of the universe, His own Father (Matt. 27:46).

(d) No fool can fall any more painfully low.

Be sure to check your e-mail for "Dial Daily Bread" again tomorrow.

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Please forward these messages to your friends and encourage them to subscribe. The "Dial Daily Bread" web page resides at: http://1888message.org/dailybread/

To subscribe send an e-mail message with "subscribe" in the body of the message to:

To un-subscribe send an e-mail message with "un-subscribe" in the body of the message to:

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Robert J. Wieland's inspirational "Dial Daily Bread" phone message is available via e-mail to anyone who wishes to receive a daily portion of uplifting Good News. "Dial Daily Bread" is FREE. Due to travel or other circumstances, there may be intervals when "Dial Daily Bread" will not be sent.