Evening and Morning
By Charles Haddon Spurgeon
October 2
Morning
"The hope which is laid up for you in heaven."—Colossians 1:5.
Our hope in Christ for the
future is the mainspring and the mainstay of our joy here. It will animate our
hearts to think often of heaven, for all that we can desire is promised there.
Here we are weary and toilworn, but yonder is the
land of rest where the sweat of labour shall
no more bedew the worker's brow, and fatigue shall be for
ever banished. To those who are weary and spent, the word
"rest" is full of heaven. We are always in the field of battle; we
are so tempted within, and so molested by foes without, that we have little or
no peace; but in heaven we shall enjoy the victory, when the banner
shall be waved aloft in triumph, and the sword shall be sheathed, and we shall
hear our Captain say, "Well done, good and faithful servant." We have
suffered bereavement after bereavement, but we are going to the land of the immortal
where graves are unknown things. Here sin is a constant grief to us, but there
we shall be perfectly holy, for there shall by no means enter into that
kingdom anything which defileth. Hemlock springs not
up in the furrows of celestial fields. Oh! is it not
joy, that you are not to be in banishment for ever, that you are not to dwell
eternally in this wilderness, but shall soon inherit Canaan? Nevertheless let
it never be said of us, that we are dreaming about the future and
forgetting the present, let the future sanctify the present to highest
uses. Through the Spirit of God the hope of heaven is the most potent force for
the product of virtue; it is a fountain of joyous effort, it is the corner
stone of cheerful holiness. The man who has this hope in him goes about his
work with vigour, for the joy of the Lord is his
strength. He fights against temptation with ardour,
for the hope of the next world repels the fiery darts of the adversary. He can labour without present reward, for he looks for a reward in
the world to come.
Evening
"A man
greatly beloved."—Daniel 10:11.
Child of God, do you
hesitate to appropriate this title? Ah! has your
unbelief made you forget that you are greatly beloved too? Must you not have
been greatly beloved, to have been bought with the precious blood of Christ, as
of a lamb without blemish and without spot? When God smote His only begotten
Son for you, what was this but being greatly beloved? You lived in sin, and
rioted in it, must you not have been greatly beloved for God to have borne so patiently with you? You were called by grace
and led to a Saviour, and made a child of God and an
heir of heaven. All this proves, does it not, a very great and superabounding love? Since that time, whether your path has
been rough with troubles, or smooth with mercies, it has been full of proofs
that you are a man greatly beloved. If the Lord has chastened you, yet not in
anger; if He has made you poor, yet in grace you have
been rich. The more unworthy you feel yourself to be, the more evidence have
you that nothing but unspeakable love could have led the Lord Jesus to save
such a soul as yours. The more demerit you feel, the
clearer is the display of the abounding love of God in having chosen you, and
called you, and made you an heir of bliss. Now, if there be
such love between God and us let us live in the influence and sweetness of it,
and use the privilege of our position. Do not let us approach our Lord
as though we were strangers, or as though He were unwilling to hear
us—for we are greatly beloved by our loving Father. "He that spared
not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him
also freely give us all things?" Come boldly, O believer, for despite the
whisperings of Satan and the doubtings of thine own heart, thou art greatly beloved. Meditate on the
exceeding greatness and faithfulness of divine love this evening, and so go to
thy bed in peace.