Psalm 51:17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

Picking up where we left off yesterday, how do you recognize you are broken? I like to picture the process of breaking a wild horse. First you have to catch it, corral it, and ride it until it surrenders to the rider.

The catching of man is God’s sovereign will identifying the time for which any one of us needs to be prepared for surrender. This happens for us in life by situations and circumstances upon which we run wild and free, but suddenly it loses it excitement, it loses its luster. Life takes on a burden it never presented before.

The corral is that hedged in feeling that you cannot seem to escape the uneasiness that now weighs upon your conscience. Every which way you turn, you find yourself boxed in, trapped. There is for some a panic to escape that sets upon our souls.

Now the breaking begins as the Holy Spirit actively rides you into submission. There comes that point where you have no will to do anything but surrender.

This sounds like a severe example and perhaps the description is a little drastic but then again, some horses are easier to break than others. This does not take into account a horse born into the farm where the mother shows the colt that it is right to trust the rider. A colt who sees the mother’s joy in the rider cannot wait for the day they are old enough to be ridden themselves.

This analogy best fits those of us who lived a wild, reckless, and rebellious life. And now it is time to speak to the second part of what identifies a beneficiary, answering the door.

Revelation 3:20 Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

Hebrews 9:15 And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.

Yesterday we talked about inheritance and today I would like to address the beneficiaries. Here in this passage they are identified as those who are called. If you want to be on the list of beneficiaries, you should understand how that happens. Who is doing the calling and how do you answer the call?

John 6:54,56,65 Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him. And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.

It is God the Father that calls and the way to answer is in partaking in the life of Christ. These two things identify the beneficiaries.

What does it sound like when God the Father calls? If you do not hear the knocking at the door, you do not know to answer. What does it sound like when God calls on you?

Matthew 13:18,23 Hear ye therefore the parable of the sower. But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.

In this parable the seed is the good news, the gospel and it is received into good ground which is a heart prepared. Seeds are planted into a soil that is broken and tilled. The gospel is received into a heart that is broken and contrite.

Psalm 34:18,51:17 The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.