Evening, January 19
Charles Spurgeon · Morning and Evening: Daily Readings
Luke 24:45
"Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the
Scriptures."
Luke 24:45
He whom we viewed last evening as opening Scripture, we here perceive
opening the understanding. In the first work he has many
fellow-labourers, but in the second he stands alone; many can bring the
Scriptures to the mind, but the Lord alone can prepare the mind to
receive the Scriptures. Our Lord Jesus differs from all other teachers;
they reach the ear, but he instructs the heart; they deal with the
outward letter, but he imparts an inward taste for the truth, by which
we perceive its savour and spirit. The most unlearned of men become
ripe scholars in the school of grace when the Lord Jesus by his Holy
Spirit unfolds the mysteries of the kingdom to them, and grants the
divine anointing by which they are enabled to behold the invisible.
Happy are we if we have had our understandings cleared and strengthened
by the Master! How many men of profound learning are ignorant of
eternal things! They know the killing letter of revelation, but its
killing spirit they cannot discern; they have a veil upon their hearts
which the eyes of carnal reason cannot penetrate. Such was our case a
little time ago; we who now see were once utterly blind; truth was to
us as beauty in the dark, a thing unnoticed and neglected. Had it not
been for the love of Jesus we should have remained to this moment in
utter ignorance, for without his gracious opening of our understanding,
we could no more have attained to spiritual knowledge than an infant
can climb the Pyramids, or an ostrich fly up to the stars. Jesus'
College is the only one in which God's truth can be really learned;
other schools may teach us what is to be believed, but Christ's alone
can show us how to believe it. Let us sit at the feet of Jesus, and by
earnest prayer call in his blessed aid that our dull wits may grow
brighter, and our feeble understandings may receive heavenly things.