Evening and Morning
By Charles Haddon Spurgeon
January 24
Morning
"Surely
he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler."—Psalm 91:3.
God delivers His people from
the snare of the fowler in two senses. From, and out
of. First, He delivers them from the snare—does not let
them enter it; and secondly, if they should be caught therein, He delivers them
out of it. The first promise is the most precious to some; the second is
the best to others.
"He shall deliver thee
from the snare." How? Trouble is often the means whereby God
delivers us. God knows that our backsliding will soon end in our destruction,
and He in mercy sends the rod. We say, "Lord, why is this?" not
knowing that our trouble has been the means of delivering us from far greater
evil. Many have been thus saved from ruin by their sorrows and their crosses;
these have frightened the birds from the net. At other times, God keeps His
people from the snare of the fowler by giving them great spiritual
strength, so that when they are tempted to do evil they say, "How can I do
this great wickedness, and sin against God?" But what a blessed thing it
is that if the believer shall, in an evil hour, come into the net, yet God will
bring him out of it! O backslider, be cast down, but do not despair. Wanderer
though thou hast been, hear what thy Redeemer saith—"Return,
O backsliding children; I will have mercy upon you." But you say you
cannot return, for you are a captive. Then listen to the
promise—"Surely He shall deliver thee out of the snare of the
fowler." Thou shalt yet be brought out of all evil into which thou hast
fallen, and though thou shalt never cease to repent of thy ways, yet He that
hath loved thee will not cast thee away; He will receive thee, and give thee
joy and gladness, that the bones which He has broken may rejoice. No bird of
paradise shall die in the fowler's net.
Evening
"Martha
was cumbered about much serving."—Luke 10:40.
Her fault was not that she served:
the condition of a servant well becomes every Christian. "I serve,"
should be the motto of all the princes of the royal family of heaven. Nor was
it her fault that she had "much serving." We cannot do too
much. Let us do all that we possibly can; let head, and heart, and hands, be
engaged in the Master's service. It was no fault of hers that she was busy
preparing a feast for the Master. Happy Martha, to have an opportunity of entertaining
so blessed a guest; and happy, too, to have the spirit to throw her whole soul
so heartily into the engagement. Her fault was that she grew "cumbered
with much serving," so that she forgot Him, and only remembered the
service. She allowed service to override communion, and so presented one duty
stained with the blood of another. We ought to be Martha and Mary in one: we
should do much service, and have much communion at the same time. For this we
need great grace. It is easier to serve than to commune. Joshua never grew
weary in fighting with the Amalekites; but Moses, on the top of the mountain in
prayer, needed two helpers to sustain his hands. The more
spiritual the exercise, the sooner we tire in it. The choicest fruits
are the hardest to rear: the most heavenly graces are the most difficult to
cultivate. Beloved, while we do not neglect external things, which are good
enough in themselves, we ought also to see to it that
we enjoy living, personal fellowship with Jesus. See to it that sitting at the Saviour's feet is not neglected, even though it be under the specious pretext of doing Him service. The
first thing for our soul's health, the first thing for His glory, and the first
thing for our own usefulness, is to keep ourselves in perpetual communion with
the Lord Jesus, and to see that the vital spirituality of our religion is
maintained over and above everything else in the world.