Evening and Morning
By Charles Haddon Spurgeon
October 16
Morning
"Jesus saith unto them, Come and dine."—John 21:12.
In these words the believer
is invited to a holy nearness to Jesus. "Come and dine," implies the
same table, the same meat; ay, and sometimes it means to sit side by side, and
lean our head upon the Saviour's bosom. It is being
brought into the banqueting-house, where waves the banner of redeeming love.
"Come and dine," gives us a vision of union with Jesus,
because the only food that we can feast upon when we dine with Jesus is Himself. Oh, what union is this! It is a depth
which reason cannot fathom, that we thus feed upon Jesus. "He that eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, dwelleth in
Me, and I in him." It is also an invitation to enjoy fellowship with
the saints. Christians may differ on a variety of points, but they have all
one spiritual appetite; and if we cannot all feel alike, we can all feed
alike on the bread of life sent down from heaven. At the table of fellowship
with Jesus we are one bread and one cup. As the loving cup goes round we pledge
one another heartily therein. Get nearer to Jesus, and you will find yourself
linked more and more in spirit to all who are like yourself, supported by the
same heavenly manna. If we were more near to Jesus we should be more near to
one another. We likewise see in these words the source of strength for
every Christian. To look at Christ is to live, but for strength to serve Him
you must "come and dine." We labour under
much unnecessary weakness on account of neglecting this percept of the Master.
We none of us need to put ourselves on low diet; on the contrary, we should
fatten on the marrow and fatness of the gospel that we may accumulate strength
therein, and urge every power to its full tension in the Master's service.
Thus, then, if you would realize nearness to Jesus, union with
Jesus, love to His people and strength from Jesus, "come and
dine" with Him by faith.
Evening
"With
Thee is the fountain of life."—Psalm 36:9.
There are times in our
spiritual experience when human counsel or sympathy, or religious ordinances,
fail to comfort or help us. Why does our gracious God permit this? Perhaps it
is because we have been living too much without Him, and He therefore takes
away everything upon which we have been in the habit of depending, that He may
drive us to Himself. It is a blessed thing to live at the fountain
head. While our skin-bottles are full, we are content, like Hagar and
Ishmael, to go into the wilderness; but when those are dry, nothing will serve
us but "Thou God seest me." We are like the
prodigal, we love the swine-troughs and forget our Father's house. Remember, we
can make swine-troughs and husks even out of the forms of religion; they are
blessed things, but we may put them in God's place, and then they are of no
value. Anything becomes an idol when it keeps us away from God: even the brazen
serpent is to be despised as "Nehushtan,"
if we worship it instead of God. The prodigal was never safer than when he was
driven to his father's bosom, because he could find sustenance nowhere else.
Our Lord favours us with a famine in the land that it
may make us seek after Himself the more. The best
position for a Christian is living wholly and directly on God's
grace—still abiding where he stood at first—"Having nothing,
and yet possessing all things." Let us never for a moment think that our
standing is in our sanctification, our mortification, our graces, or our
feelings, but know that because Christ offered a full atonement, therefore we
are saved; for we are complete in Him. Having nothing
of our own to trust to, but resting upon the merits of Jesus—His passion
and holy life furnish us with the only sure ground of confidence. Beloved, when
we are brought to a thirsting condition, we are sure to turn to the fountain of
life with eagerness.