Category: Daily Devotionals – Smith Wigglesworth

August 20

But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. — 2 Corinthians 3:18

Scripture reading: Psalm 34

There are glories upon glories, and joys upon joys, exceeding joys and an abundance of joys, and a measureless measure. Beloved, when we get the Word so wonderfully into our hearts, it absolutely changes us in everything. As we feast on the Word of the Lord, eat and digest the truth, inwardly eat of Him, we are absolutely changed every day from one state of grace to another.

Look into the perfect mirror of the face of the Lord, and you will be changed “from glory to glory.” You will never find anything else except the Word of God to take you there. So you cannot afford to put aside the Word.

I implore you, beloved, that you do not come short in your own lives of any of these blessed teachings we have been sharing. These grand truths of the Word of God must be your testimony, must be your life, must be your pattern. You must be in the Word; in fact, you are of the Word. God says to you by the Spirit that “you are an epistle of Christ” (2 Corinthians 3:3). Let us see to it that we put off everything so that by the grace of God we may put on everything.

Where there is a standard that hasn‘t been reached in your life, God, in His grace, by His mercy and your yieldedness, can equip you for that place. He can prepare you for that place that you can never be prepared for except by a broken heart and a contrite spirit, except by yielding to the will of God. If you will come with a whole heart to the throne of grace, God will meet you and build you on His spiritual plane. Amen. Praise the Lord!

Thought for today: Give Him all; let Him have all: your heart‘s joy, your very life. Let Him have it. He is worthy. He is King of Kings. He is Lord of Lords. He is my Savior. He died to deliver me. He should have the crown.

August 19

Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. — 2 Corinthians 3:17

Scripture reading: Galatians 5:1–15

We must never abuse liberty; we must be in the place where liberty can use us. If we misuse liberty, we will be as dead as possible, and our efforts will all end with a fizzle. But if we are in the Spirit, the Lord of Life is the same Spirit. I believe it is right to jump for joy, but don‘t jump until the joy makes you jump, because if you do, you will jump flat. If you jump as the joy makes you jump, you will bounce up again.

In the Spirit, there is a divine plan. If Pentecostal people come into this plan in meekness and in the true knowledge of God, every heart in each meeting will be moved by the Spirit.

Liberty has many aspects to it, but no liberty is going to help people as much as testimony. I find people who don‘t know how to testify properly. We must testify only as the Spirit gives utterance. We find in the book of Revelation that “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy” (Revelation 19:10).

Sometimes our flesh keeps us down, but our hearts are so full that they lift us up. Have you ever been like that? The flesh is fastening you to your seat, but your heart is bubbling over. At last the heart has more power, and you stand up. Then in that heart affection for Jesus, in the Spirit of love and in the knowledge of truth, you begin to testify, and when you are done, you sit down. Liberty
used wrongly goes on after you have finished saying what God wants you to say, and it spoils the meeting. Do not use your liberty except for the glory of God.

So many churches are spoiled by long prayers and long testimonies. If he stays in the Spirit, the speaker can tell when he should sit down. When you begin to speak your own words, people get tired and wish that you would sit down. The anointing ceases, and you sit down worse than when you rose up.

It is nice for a person to begin cold and warm up as he goes on. When he catches fire and sits down in the midst of it, he will keep the fire afterward. Look! It is lovely to pray, and it is a joy to hear you pray, but when you go on and on after you are truly done, all the people get tired of it.

This excellent glory should go on to a liberality to everybody, and this would prove that all the church is in liberty. The church ought to be free so that the people always go away feeling, “Oh, I wish the meeting had gone on for another hour,” or “What a glorious time we had at that prayer meeting!” or “Wasn‘t that testimony meeting a revelation!” That is the way to finish up. Never finish up with something too long; finish up with something too short. Then everybody comes again eager to pick up where they left off.

Thought for today: We are not to use liberty because we have it to use, but we are to let the liberty use us.

August 18

For our citizenship is in heaven. — Philippians 3:20

Scripture reading: Philippians 3

The law is truly “our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24). I am glad that laws are established on the earth. Law is good when it helps to keep things in order in society.

But, beloved, we belong to a higher, nobler citizenship, and it isn‘t an earthly citizenship, for “our citizenship is in heaven” (Philippians 3:20). So we must see that there is an excellent glory about this position we are holding in Christ. For if the natural law will keep an earthly city in somewhat moderate conditions, what will the excellent glory be in the divine relationship of the citizenship to which we belong?

All those who are getting ready for this glorious eternity have a consciousness of God within. God is working to change their very natures, preparing them for greater things. There is only perfect purification in looking upward to God. All the saints of God who get the real vision of this wonderful transformation are seeing every day that the world is getting worse and worse. It is ripening for Judgment. God is bringing us to a place where we who are spiritual have a clear vision that we must, at any cost, put off the works of darkness; we must be getting ourselves ready for the glorious Day—the excellent glory.

I call it an excellent glory because it outshines everything else. It makes all the people feel a longing to go to heaven. What there is about the excellent glory is this: the earth is filled with broken hearts, but the excellent glory is filled with redeemed men and women, filled with the excellency of the graces of the glory of God. Oh, the excellent glory is marvelous! Ah, praise the Lord, O my soul! Hallelujah!

Thought for today: There is no gravity to the spirit. There is no gravity to thought. There is no gravity to inspiration. There is no gravity to divine union with Christ. It is above all; it rises higher; it sits on the throne; it claims it purposes.

August 17

For if the ministry of condemnation had glory, the ministry of righteousness exceeds much more in glory. — 2 Corinthians 3:9

Scripture reading: Psalm 11

Nothing is as beautiful as righteousness. All the excellent glory is in Him. All righteousness is in Him. Everything that pertains to holiness and godliness, everything that denounces and brings to death the carnal, everything that makes you know you have ceased to be forever, is found in the knowledge of the endless power in the risen Christ. As Paul wrote, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

When you come to the very essence of Christ‘s ministry, you see the righteousness of His purpose. The excellence of His ministry was the glory that covered Him. His Word was convincing, inflexible, divine, and eternal. It never failed.

Oh, the righteousness of God. If Christ said it, it was there. He said it, and it stood fast (Psalm 33:9). It was an unchangeable condition with Him. When God spoke, it was done (v. 9). And His righteousness abides. God must have us in this place of righteousness. We must be people of our word. People ought to be able to depend on our word. God is establishing righteousness in our hearts so that we will not exaggerate about anything.

Jesus was true inwardly and outwardly. He is “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6), and on these things we can build; on these things we can pray; on these things we can live. When we know that our own hearts do not condemn us (1 John 3:21), we can say to the mountain, “Be removed” (Matthew 21:21). But when our own hearts condemn us, there is no power in prayer, no power in preaching, no power in anything. We are just sounding brass and clanging cymbals (1 Corinthians 13:1).

May God the Holy Spirit show us there must be a ministry of righteousness. We ought to stand by our word and abide by it. If we were cut in two, our persecutors should find pure gold right through us. That is what I call righteousness. Jesus was righteousness through and through. He is lovely! Oh, truly, He is beautiful!

One thing God wants to establish in our hearts is the importance of being like Him. Be like Him in character. Don‘t be troubled so much about your outward appearance, but be more concerned about your heart. Makeup won‘t change the heart. All the adorning of silks and satins won‘t create purity. Beloved, if I
was going down a road and I saw a fox tail sticking out of a hole, I wouldn‘t ask anybody what was inside. And if there is anything hanging outside of us, we know what is inside. God wants righteousness in the inward parts, purity through and through.

The Bible is the plumb line of everything. And so, may God the Holy Spirit bring us into that blessed ministry of righteousness. Amen! Glory to God!

Thought for today: Unless we are lined right up with the Word of God, we will fail in the measure in which we are not righteous.

August 16

How will the ministry of the Spirit not be more glorious? — 2 Corinthians 3:8

Scripture reading: 1 Peter 1:13–25

May the Lord help us to understand His word. I see the truth as it was brought to the Israelites in the law. Paul had something to glory in when he kept the law and was blameless, but he said he threw that to one side to win Him who is even greater than that (Philippians 3:8).

Now we come to the question: what is in the law that isn‘t glorious? Nothing. It was so glorious that Moses was filled with joy in the expectation of what it was. But what is ours in the excellence of glory? It is this: we live, we move, we reign over all things. It is not “Do, do, do”; it is “Will, will, will.” I rejoice to do. It is no longer “Thou shalt not”; it is “I will.” “I delight to do Your will, O my God” (Psalm 40:8). So the glory is far exceeding. And, beloved, in our hearts there is exceeding glory. Oh, the joy of this celestial touch!

Oh yes, the glory is exceeding. The glory is excellent. When Peter was describing that wonderful day on the Mount of Transfiguration, he said, “Such a voice came to Him [Christ] from the Excellent Glory” (2 Pet. 1:17). And so we are hearing from the Excellent Glory. It is so lovely.

If I were to say to you, “Whatever you do, you must try to exercise self-control in order to be holy,” I would miss it. I would be altogether outside of His plan. But by the Holy Spirit, I take the words of the epistle that says, “Be holy” (1 Peter 1:16). For when you lose your heart and Another takes your heart, and you lose your desires and He takes the desires, then you live in that sunshine of bliss that no mortal can ever touch.

Divine immortality swallows up all natural mortality. It is lovely to walk in the Spirit; then we will not fulfill any part of the law without the Spirit causing us to dwell in safety, rejoice inwardly, praise God reverently, and know that we are an increasing force of immortality swallowing up life. Hallelujah!

Thought for today: It is as easy as possible to be holy, but you can never be holy by trying to be.

August 15

The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. — 2 Corinthians 3:6

Scripture reading: John 6:53–71

As I go on with God, He wants me to understand all His deep things. We cannot define, separate, or deeply investigate and unfold this holy plan of God unless we have the life of God, the thought of God, the Spirit of God, and the revelation of God. The Word of Truth is pure, spiritual, and divine. If you try to discern it without the help of the Spirit, you will end up with a limited, human understanding.

People who are spiritual can only be fed with spiritual food. We must see that we not only need the baptism of the Spirit, but we also need to come to a place where there is only the baptism of the Spirit left. In John‘s gospel, Jesus says He does not speak or act of Himself: “The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works” (John 14:10).

We must know that the baptism of the Spirit immerses us into an intensity of zeal, into a likeness to Jesus; it makes us into pure, liquid metal so hot for God that it travels like oil from vessel to vessel. This divine life of the Spirit will let us see that we have ceased, yet we have begun. We are at the end for a beginning.

God, help us to see that we may be filled with the letter without being filled with the Spirit. We may be filled with knowledge without having divine knowledge. And we may be filled with wonderful natural things and still remain natural men. But we cannot remain natural men in this truth that I am dealing with here. No one is able to walk this way unless he is in the Spirit. He must live in the Spirit, and he must realize all the time that he is growing in that same ideal of his Master, “in season and out of season” (2 Timothy 4:2), always beholding the face of the Master, Jesus (Matthew 18:10).

Thought for today: We can understand the Word of God only by the Spirit of God.

August 14

We have such trust through Christ toward God. — 2 Corinthians 3:4

Scripture reading: Psalm 37

We need to get to a place where we are beyond trusting in ourselves. It is not bad to have self-confidence, but we must never rest upon anything in the human. The only sure place to rest is where you are trusting fully in God.

In His name we go. In Him we trust. And God brings us the victory. When we do not trust in ourselves, but when our whole trust rests upon the authority of the mighty God, He has promised to be with us at all times, to make the path straight, and to make a way through all the mountains. Then we understand how it was that David could say, “Your gentleness has made me great” (2 Samuel 22:36).

Ah, God is the lover of souls! We have no confidence in the flesh. Our confidence can only be placed in and rest upon the One who never fails, the One who knows the end from the beginning, the One who is able to come in at the midnight hour as easily as at midday. In fact, God makes the night and the day alike to the person who rests completely in His will with the knowledge that “all things work together for good to those who love God” (Romans 8:28) and trust in Him. And we have such trust in Him.

This is the worthy position; this is where God wants all souls to be. We would find that we would not run His errands and make mistakes; we would not be settling down in the wrong place. We would know that our lives were as surely in agreement with the thoughts of God as the leading of the children of Israel through the wilderness. And we would be able to say, “Not one good thing has the Lord withheld from me” (Psalm 84:11), and “All the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us” (2 Corinthians 1:20).

May the Lord help you to have less confidence in yourself, and to trust wholly in Him. Bless His name!

Thought for today: There is so much failure in self-assurance.

August 13

Clearly you are an epistle of Christ. — 2 Corinthians 3:3

Scripture reading: Colossians 3:12–25

Think about these words: “Clearly you are an epistle of Christ.” What an ideal position that now the sons of God are being manifested; now the glory is being seen; now the Word of God is becoming an expressed purpose in life until the Word has begun to live in God‘s children.

This position was truly evident in the life of Paul when he came to a climax and said, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God” (Galatians 2:20).

How can Christ live in you? There is no way for Christ to live in you except by the manifested Word in you, declaring every day that you are a living epistle of the Word of God.

It is the living Christ; it is the divine likeness to God; it is the express image of Him. The Word is the only factor that works out and brings forth in you these glories of identification between you and Christ. It is the Word richly dwelling in your hearts by faith (Colossians 3:16).

We may begin at Genesis and go right through the Scriptures and be able to recite them, but unless they are a living power within us, they will be a dead letter. Everything that comes to us must be quickened by the Spirit. “The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Corinthians 3:6).

We must have life in everything. Who knows how to pray except as the Spirit prays (Romans 8:26)? What kind of prayer does the Spirit pray? The Spirit always brings to your remembrance the Scriptures, and He brings forth all your cries and your needs better than your words. The Spirit always takes the Word of God and brings your heart, mind, soul, cry, and need into the presence of God.

So we are not able to pray except as the Spirit prays, and the Spirit only prays according to the will of God (v. 27), and the will of God is all in the Word of God. No man is able to speak according to the mind of God and bring forth the deep things of God by his own mind.

God, help us to understand this, for it is out of the heart that all things proceed (Matthew 12:34). When we have entered in with God into the mind of the Spirit, we will find that God enraptures our hearts.

“Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, ‘The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously?’” (James 4:5). I have been pondering over that verse for years, but now I can see that the Holy Spirit very graciously, very extravagantly, puts everything to one side so that He may enrapture our hearts with a great inward cry for Jesus. The Holy Spirit “yearns jealously” for us to have all the divine will of God in Christ Jesus right in our hearts.

When I speak about the “tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart” (2 Corinthians 3:3), I mean the inward love. Nothing is as sweet to me as to know that the heart yearns with compassion. Eyes may see, ears may hear, but you may be immovable on those two lines unless you have an inward cry where “deep calls unto deep” (Psalm 42:7).

When God gets into the depths of our hearts, He purifies every intention of the thoughts and the joys. We are told in the Word that it is “joy inexpressible and full of glory” (1 Peter 1:8).

Beloved, it is true that the commandments were written on tablets of stone. Moses, like a great big loving father over Israel, had a heart full of joy because God had shown him a plan by which Israel could partake of great things through these commandments. But God says that now the epistle of Christ is “not on tablets of stone” (2 Corinthians 3:3), which made the face of Moses shine with great joy. It is deeper than that, more wonderful than that: the commandments are in our hearts; the deep love of God is in our hearts; the deep movings of eternity are rolling in and bringing God in. Hallelujah!

Oh, beloved, let God the Holy Spirit have His way today in unfolding to us all the grandeur of His glory. Yes, He is mine! Beloved, He is mine!

Thought for today: No one is perfected or equipped in any area except as the living Word abides in him.

August 12

When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men. — Ephesians 4:8

Scripture reading: 1 Thessalonians 4:1–12

God has gifts for men. You ask, “What kind of men?” Even for rebels. Did they desire to be rebels? No. Sometimes there are transgressions that break our hearts and make us groan and travail. Was it our desire to sin? No. God looks right at the very canvas of our whole life histories, and He has set His mind upon us.

Your weakness has to be sifted like the chaff before the wind, and every seed will bring forth pure grain after God‘s mind. The fire will burn like an oven to burn up the stubble (Malachi 4:1), but the wheat will be gathered into the granary, the treasury of the Most High God, and He Himself will lay hold of us.

What is this process for? The perfecting of the saints. (See Ephesians 4:11–12.) Oh, just think—that brokenness of yours is to be made whole like Him; that weakness of yours is to be made strong like Him! You have to bear the image of the Lord in every detail. You have to have the mind of Christ (Philippians 2:5) in perfection, in beauty.

Beloved, don‘t fail and shrivel up because of the hand of God upon you, but realize that God must purify you for the perfecting of the saints. Oh, Jesus will help you. Friend, what are you going to do with this golden opportunity, with this inward pressure of a cry of God in your soul? Are you going to let others be crowned while you lose the crown? Are you willing to be brought into captivity today for God?

You must decide some things. If you are not baptized, you must seek the baptism of the Spirit of God. And if there is anything that has marred the fruit or interfered with all of His plan, I implore you to let the blood so cover, let the anointing of Christ so come, let the vision of Christ be so seen, that you will have a measure that will take all that God has for you.

Thought for today: There are no buts in the sanctification of the Spirit. But and if are gone, replaced with shall and will.

August 11

To each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ‟s gift. — Ephesians 4:7

Scripture reading: Romans 12

Grace and gifts are equally abounding in Jesus. As you place your strength on Jesus, as you allow the Holy Spirit to penetrate every thought, always bringing on the canvas of the mind a perfect picture of holiness, purity, and righteousness, you enter into Him and become entitled to all the riches of God.

How do you measure up today? God gives a measure. “To each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ‟s gift.”

I know that salvation, while it is a perfect work, is an insulation that may have any number of volts behind it. In the days when bare wires were laid, when electric power was obtained from Niagara, I am told that there was a city whose lights suddenly went out. Following the wires, the repairmen came to a place where a cat had gotten on the wires, and the lights had been stopped.

I find that the dynamo of heaven can be stopped with a smaller thing than a cat. An impure thought stops the circulation. An act can stop the growth of the believer.

So I find that if I am going to have all the revelations of Jesus brought to me, I must strive for all that God has for me through a pure and clean heart, right thoughts, and an inward affection toward Him. Then heaven bursts through my human frame, and all the rays of heaven flow through my body. Hallelujah! It is lovely!

The measure of the gift of Christ remains with you. I cannot go on with inspiration unless I am going on with God in perfection. I cannot know the mind of the natural and the mysteries of the hidden things with God unless I have power to penetrate everything between me and heaven. And there is nothing that goes through but a pure heart, for the pure in heart will see God (Matthew
5:8).

Thought for today: We must let Him be enthroned, and then He will lift us to the throne.