Morning, September 12
Go To Evening Reading
“God is jealous.”
Nahum 1:2
Your Lord is very jealous of your love , O believer. Did he choose you? He cannot bear that you should choose
another. Did he buy you with his own blood? He cannot endure that
you should think that you are your own, or that you belong to this
world. He loved you with such a love that he would not stop in heaven
without you; he would sooner die than you should perish, and he cannot
endure that anything should stand between your heart’s love and himself. He is very jealous of your trust . He will not permit you to trust in an arm of flesh. He cannot bear
that you should hew out broken cisterns, when the overflowing fountain
is always free to you. When we lean upon him, he is glad, but when
we transfer our dependence to another, when we rely upon our own wisdom,
or the wisdom of a friend—worst of all, when we trust in any works of our own, he is displeased,
and will chasten us that he may bring us to himself. He is also very jealous of our company . There should be no one with whom we converse so much as with Jesus.
To abide in him only, this is true love; but to commune with the world,
to find sufficient solace in our carnal comforts, to prefer even the
society of our fellow Christians to secret intercourse with him, this
is grievous to our jealous Lord. He would fain have us abide in him,
and enjoy constant fellowship with himself; and many of the trials
which he sends us are for the purpose of weaning our hearts from the
creature, and fixing them more closely upon himself. Let this jealousy
which would keep us near to Christ be also a comfort to us, for if he loves us so much as to care thus about our love we may be sure that he will suffer nothing to harm us, and will
protect us from all our enemies. Oh that we may have grace this day
to keep our hearts in sacred chastity for our Beloved alone, with
sacred jealousy shutting our eyes to all the fascinations of the world!