Mark 1:2 As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before your face, which shall prepare your way before you. Though the preparation of the heart for Christ is the special work of God's Spirit, yet He requires that we also should do that which lieth in us toward this preparing of ourselves: though God only can work this preparation, yet He will have us use the means by which it may come to be wrought. He does not work in us, as in stocks and stones that have no sense or motion; but He first moves us by His Spirit, and enables us to the preparation of our hearts, so that we being moved by Him may, after a sort, move ourselves in using the means to prepare our hearts. 1. We must labour to be truly humbled in the sense of our sins, and of our natural misery without Christ. We are never fit to embrace Him, till we feel how wretched we are without Him. 2. We must labour to forsake all sin in heart and affection, and we must purge the love of it out of our hearts. 3. We must get a hungering and thirsting desire after Christ. 4. We must use all means to get faith, whereby to receive Christ into our hearts. (G. Petter). Parallel Verses KJV: As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee. |
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