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\ / Charles Spurgeon's MORNING & EVENING
http://www.heartlight.org/
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Monday, March 10, 2008
MORNING:
"In my prosperity I said I shall never be moved."
-- Psalms 30:6
"Moab settled on his lees, he hath not been emptied from vessel to
vessel." Give a man wealth; let his ships bring home continually rich
freights; let the winds and waves appear to be his servants to bear his
vessels across the bosom of the mighty deep; let his lands yield
abundantly: let the weather be propitious to his crops; let
uninterrupted success attend him; let him stand among men as a
successful merchant; let him enjoy continued health; allow him with
braced nerve and brilliant eye to march through the world, and live
happily; give him the buoyant spirit; let him have the song perpetually
on his lips; let his eye be ever sparkling with joy-and the natural
consequence of such an easy state to any man, let him be the best
Christian who ever breathed, will be presumption; even David said, "I
shall never be moved;" and we are not better than David, nor half so
good. Brother, beware of the smooth places of the way; if you are
treading them, or if the way be rough, thank God for it. If God should
always rock us in the cradle of prosperity; if we were always dandled
on the knees of fortune; if we had not some stain on the alabaster
pillar; if there were not a few clouds in the sky; if we had not some
bitter drops in the wine of this life, we should become intoxicated
with pleasure, we should dream "we stand;" and stand we should, but it
would be upon a pinnacle; like the man asleep upon the mast, each
moment we should be in jeopardy.
We bless God, then, for our afflictions; we thank him for our changes;
we extol his name for losses of property; for we feel that had he not
chastened us thus, we might have become too secure. Continued worldly
prosperity is a fiery trial.
"Afflictions, though they seem severe,
In mercy oft are sent."
EVENING:
"Man ... is of few days, and full of trouble."
-- Job 14:1
It may be of great service to us, before we fall asleep, to remember
this mournful fact, for it may lead us to set loose by earthly things.
There is nothing very pleasant in the recollection that we are not
above the shafts of adversity, but it may humble us and prevent our
boasting like the Psalmist in our morning's portion. "My mountain
standeth firm: I shall never be moved." It may stay us from taking too
deep root in this soil from which we are so soon to be transplanted
into the heavenly garden. Let us recollect the frail tenure upon which
we hold our temporal mercies. If we would remember that all the trees
of earth are marked for the woodman's axe, we should not be so ready to
build our nests in them. We should love, but we should love with the
love which expects death, and which reckons upon separations. Our dear
relations are but loaned to us, and the hour when we must return them
to the lender's hand may be even at the door. The like is certainly
true of our worldly goods. Do not riches take to themselves wings and
fly away? Our health is equally precarious. Frail flowers of the field,
we must not reckon upon blooming for ever. There is a time appointed
for weakness and sickness, when we shall have to glorify God by
suffering, and not by earnest activity. There is no single point in
which we can hope to escape from the sharp arrows of affliction; out of
our few days there is not one secure from sorrow. Man's life is a cask
full of bitter wine; he who looks for joy in it had better seek for
honey in an ocean of brine. Beloved reader, set not your affections
upon things of earth: but seek those things which are above, for here
the moth devoureth, and the thief breaketh through, but there all joys
are perpetual and eternal. The path of trouble is the way home. Lord,
make this thought a pillow for many a weary head!
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Morning & Evening is the classic devotional by 19th-century writer
and preacher Charles Spurgeon. It's part of HEARTLIGHT Magazine,
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