Evening, April 4
Charles Spurgeon · Morning and Evening: Daily Readings
Isaiah 2:3
"Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord."
Isaiah 2:3
It is exceedingly beneficial to our souls to mount above this present
evil world to something nobler and better. The cares of this world and
the deceitfulness of riches are apt to choke everything good within us,
and we grow fretful, desponding, perhaps proud and carnal. It is well
for us to cut down these thorns and briers, for heavenly seed sown
among them is not likely to yield a harvest; and where shall we find a
better sickle with which to cut them down than communion with God and
the things of the kingdom? In the valleys of Switzerland, many of the
inhabitants are deformed, and all wear a sickly appearance, for the
atmosphere is charged with miasma, and is close and stagnant; but up
yonder, on the mountain, you find a hardy race, who breathe the clear
fresh air as it blows from the virgin snows of the Alpine summits. It
would be well if the dwellers in the valley could frequently leave
their abodes among the marshes and the fever mists, and inhale the
bracing element upon the hills. It is to such an exploit of climbing
that I invite you this evening. May the Spirit of God assist us to
leave the mists of fear and the fevers of anxiety, and all the ills
which gather in this valley of earth, and to ascend the mountains of
anticipated joy and blessedness. May God the Holy Spirit cut the cords
that keep us here below, and assist us to mount! We sit too often like
chained eagles fastened to the rock, only that, unlike the eagle, we
begin to love our chain, and would, perhaps, if it came really to the
test, be loath to have it snapped. May God now grant us grace, if we
cannot escape from the chain as to our flesh, yet to do so as to our
spirits; and leaving the body, like a servant, at the foot of the hill,
may our soul, like Abraham, attain the top of the mountain, there to
indulge in communion with the Most High.