By Octavius Winslow [1808-1878]

                                                               (pp. 148-149)

“For this God is OUR GOD for ever and ever; He will be our guide to the end.” (Psalm 44:14)

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“What then are some of these distinctive attributes which especially identify Jehovah as the ‘OUR GOD’ of His people?

In the first place, “’this God’ of REVELATION is ‘our God’. This God, who has made such a divine and wonderful revelation of Himself—His Being and mind, His will and heart, in His Word, is ‘our God’.  In other word, the God of the Bible is ours. All that the inspired and precious volume declares concerning Him, all the thoughts of His mind it reveals, all the love of His nature it makes known, all the teaching of His Spirit it conveys, all the precious promises, all the gracious invitations, and the glorious hopes and solemn warnings and faithful admonitions it contains, are ours, because the God of the Bible is ours. 

Accept the Bible as your own. Read it as the letter of your Heavenly Father addressed personally to you. Let no sophistry shake your confidence in its divine inspiration. Beware that false reasoning that teaches that God’s Word is in the Bible, but that the Bible is not God’s Word. The giant evil of the day is infidelity unblushingly attacking the truth, and impeaching the integrity of the Sacred Scriptures. Be vigilant and prayerful here.  Lose your Bible and you lose your all.  If, then the God of revelation is yours, the revelation of God is yours.  All that this blessed volume contains belongs of a right to you. The Divine Redeemer, the glorious gospel, the free salvation, the precious promises, the gracious invitations, the rich consolations, the blissful hopes, the holy admonitions, all, all are ours, because the God who wrote the Bible, who gave the Bible, who has preserved the Bible, and who dwells in the Bible, is “OUR GOD”.

Place the hand of your faith upon this Divine Charter of blessings and exclaim, “it is mine, all, all is mine, because the God who inspired it is my God. In giving me Himself He gave me all that was His and this is His most precious gift, next to His beloved Son, whom it reveals. Let me believe it firmly, deal with it reverently, read it devoutly, and walk in its divine precepts wholly, and do all in my power to give to all who may not possess as I do, this heavenly chart, this divine compass, this unerring light in the soul’s solemn travel to eternity.”

Holy Bible, book divine, 

Precious treasure!  You are mine!

Mine to tell me where I came;

Mine to teach me what I am;

Mine to chide me when I rove;

Mine to share a Savior’s love;

Mine are you to guide my feet;

Mine to judge, condemn, acquit.

Mine to comfort in distress,

If the Holy Spirit bless;

Mine to show by living faith

Man can triumph over death;

Mine to tell of joys to come,

And the rebel sinner’s doom.

Oh, you precious book divine,

Precious treasure!  You are mine!”