Evening and Morning
By Charles Haddon Spurgeon
April 26
Morning
"This do in
remembrance of Me."—1 Corinthians 11:24.
It seems then, that
Christians may forget Christ! There could be no need for this loving
exhortation, if there were not a fearful supposition that our memories might
prove treacherous. Nor is this a bare supposition: it is, alas! too well confirmed in our experience, not as a possibility,
but as a lamentable fact. It appears almost impossible that those who have been
redeemed by the blood of the dying Lamb, and loved with an everlasting love by
the eternal Son of God, should forget that gracious Saviour;
but, if startling to the ear, it is, alas! too
apparent to the eye to allow us to deny the crime. Forget Him who never forgot
us! Forget Him who poured His blood forth for our sins! Forget Him who loved us
even to the death! Can it be possible? Yes, it is not only possible, but
conscience confesses that it is too sadly a fault with all of us, that we
suffer Him to be as a wayfaring man tarrying but for a night. He whom we should
make the abiding tenant of our memories is but a visitor therein. The cross where one would think that memory would linger, and unmindfulness would be an unknown intruder, is desecrated
by the feet of forgetfulness. Does not your conscience say that this is
true? Do you not find yourselves forgetful of Jesus? Some creature steals away
your heart, and you are unmindful of Him upon whom your affection ought to be
set. Some earthly business engrosses your attention when you should fix your
eye steadily upon the cross. It is the incessant turmoil of the world, the
constant attraction of earthly things which takes away
the soul from Christ. While memory too well preserves a poisonous weed, it suffereth the rose of Sharon to wither. Let us charge
ourselves to bind a heavenly forget-me-not about our hearts for Jesus our
Beloved, and, whatever else we let slip, let us hold fast to Him.
Evening
"Blessed is he that watcheth."—Revelation 16:15.
We die daily," said
the apostle. This was the life of the early Christians; they went everywhere
with their lives in their hands. We are not in this day called to pass through
the same fearful persecutions: if we were, the Lord would give us grace to bear
the test; but the tests of Christian life, at the present moment, though
outwardly not so terrible, are yet more likely to overcome us than even those
of the fiery age. We have to bear the sneer of the world—that is little;
its blandishments, its soft words, its oily speeches, its fawning, its
hypocrisy, are far worse. Our danger is lest we grow rich and become proud,
lest we give ourselves up to the fashions of this present evil world, and lose
our faith. Or if wealth be not the trial, worldly care
is quite as mischievous. If we cannot be torn in pieces by the roaring lion, if
we may be hugged to death by the bear, the devil little cares which it is, so
long as he destroys our love to Christ, and our confidence in Him. I fear me
that the Christian church is far more likely to lose her integrity in these
soft and silken days than in those rougher times. We must be awake now, for we
traverse the enchanted ground, and are most likely to fall asleep to our own
undoing, unless our faith in Jesus be a reality, and
our love to Jesus a vehement flame. Many in these days of easy profession are
likely to prove tares, and not wheat; hypocrites with fair masks on their
faces, but not the true-born children of the living
God. Christian, do not think that these are times in which you can dispense
with watchfulness or with holy ardour; you need these
things more than ever, and may God the eternal Spirit display His omnipotence
in you, that you may be able to say, in all these softer things, as well as in
the rougher, "We are more than conquerors through Him that loved us."