Morning, January 22, edited from Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening

“Son of man, how is the wood of the vine better than any wood of a branch which is among the trees of the forest?” — Ezekiel 15:2

These words are for the humbling of God’s people; they are called God’s vine, but what are they in nature more than others? They have, by God’s goodness, become fruitful, having been planted in good soil; the Lord has trained them upon the walls of the sanctuary, and they bring forth fruit to his glory; but what are they without their God? What are they without the continual influence of the Spirit, birthing fruitfulness in them? O believer, learn to reject pride, seeing that you have no ground for it. Whatever you are, you have nothing to make you proud. The more you have, the more you are in debt to God; and should not not be proud of that which renders you a debtor. Consider your origin; look back to what you were. Consider what you would have been but for divine grace. Look upon yourself as you are now. Does not your conscience reprimand you? Do not your thousand wanderings stand before you, and tell you that you are unworthy to be called his son? And if he has made anything of you, do you not understand that it is grace which has made you different? Great believer, you would have been a great sinner if God had not made you to differ. O you who are valiant for truth, you would have been as valiant for error if grace had not laid hold on you. Therefore, do not be proud, even though you have a large estate, a wide domain of grace; you once did not have a single thing to call your own except your sin and misery. Oh! What a strange infatuation, that you, who has borrowed everything, should think of exalting yourself; you, a poor dependent pensioner upon the abundance of your Savior, one who has a life which dies without fresh streams of life from Jesus, and yet proud! Putrid are you, O foolish heart!