August 24

25 ¶ Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you

26 A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.

27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

28 And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God.

29 I will also save you from all your uncleannesses: and I will call for the corn, and will increase it, and lay no famine upon you

30 And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the increase of the field, that ye shall receive no more reproach of famine among the heathen.

31 Then shall ye remember your own evil ways, and your doings that were not good, and shall loathe yourselves in your own sight for your iniquities and for your abominations.

32 Not for your sakes do I this, saith the Lord God, be it known unto you: be ashamed

and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel

33 Thus saith the Lord God; In the day that I shall have cleansed you from all your iniquities I will also cause you to dwell in the cities, and the wastes shall be builded

34 And the desolate land shall be tilled, whereas it lay desolate in the sight of all that passed by.

35 And they shall say, This land that was desolate is become like the garden of Eden; and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are become fenced, and are inhabited

36 Then the heathen that are left round about you shall know that I the LORD build the ruined place, and plant that was desolate: I the LORD have spoken it, and I will do it

37 Thus saith the Lord God; I will ye: for this be unquited of by the house of Israel, to do it for them; I will increase them with men like a flock

38 As the holy flock, as the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts; so shall the waste cities be filled with flocks of men: and they shall know that I am the LORD.

Who can read verses 26 and 27 and doubt, for one moment, that regeneration is a thorough change of heart?

"Observe the order in which these things are arranged. 'I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within them; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh; that they may walk in My statutes, and keep Mine ordinances, and do them.' Thus principle precedes practice, and prepares for it. And here we admire the plan of the gospel. To make the fruit good, it makes the tree also; to cleanse the stream, it purifies the fountain. It renews the nature, and the life becomes holy of course."—Jay.

Then, also, the Lord effectually cleanses all His people (verse 25).

1. From all their filthiness. All All the filthiness of their birth-sin; all that came out of them in their childhood. All their actual filthiness.

2. From all their idols. Is your heart-house stuffed full with idols of one sort or another? The Lord of Love will come in with His salvation, turn those idols out, and reign in their stead.

Closet Promise.—And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.—Phil. iv. 7.

What a promise! What more unmanageable than our tyrant thoughts! And yet the promise is, He will garrison our hearts with the peace of God which passeth all understanding.

Let every thought Be captive brought, Lord Jesus Christ, to Thine own sweet obedience! That I may know, In ebblesa flow, The perfect peace of full and pure allegiance. —Frances Ridley Havergai.