Evening, November 23
Go To Morning Reading
“Get thee up into the high mountain.”
Isaiah 40:9
Each believer should be thirsting for God, for the living God, and
longing to climb the hill of the Lord, and see him face to face. We
ought not to rest content in the mists of the valley when the summit
of Tabor awaits us. My soul thirsteth to drink deep of the cup which
is reserved for those who reach the mountain’s brow, and bathe their brows in heaven. How pure are the dews of
the hills, how fresh is the mountain air, how rich the fare of the
dwellers aloft, whose windows look into the New Jerusalem! Many saints
are content to live like men in coal mines, who see not the sun; they
eat dust like the serpent when they might taste the ambrosial meat
of angels; they are content to wear the miner’s garb when they might put on king’s robes; tears mar their faces when they might anoint them with celestial
oil. Satisfied I am that many a believer pines in a dungeon when he
might walk on the palace roof, and view the goodly land and Lebanon.
Rouse thee, O believer, from thy low condition! Cast away thy sloth,
thy lethargy, thy coldness, or whatever interferes with thy chaste
and pure love to Christ, thy soul’s Husband. Make him the source, the centre, and the circumference
of all thy soul’s range of delight. What enchants thee into such folly as to remain
in a pit when thou mayst sit on a throne? Live not in the lowlands
of bondage now that mountain liberty is conferred upon thee. Rest
no longer satisfied with thy dwarfish attainments, but press forward
to things more sublime and heavenly. Aspire to a higher, a nobler,
a fuller life. Upward to heaven! Nearer to God!
“When wilt thou come unto me, Lord?
Oh come, my Lord most dear!
Come near, come nearer, nearer still,
I'm blest when thou art near.”