Evening, April 4, edited from Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord.” — Isaiah 2:3

It is exceedingly beneficial to our souls to ascend above this present evil world to something nobler and better. The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches are likely to choke everything good within us, and we grow fretful, despondent… perhaps proud and worldly. It is well for us to cut down these thorns and briers, for heavenly seed sown among them is not likely to yield a harvest; and where shall we find a better scythe with which to cut them down than communion with God and the things of the kingdom? In the valleys of Switzerland, many of the inhabitants are shrunken, and all have a sickly appearance, for the atmosphere is charged with fog, and is oppressing and stagnant; but up higher, on the mountain, you find a hardy race, who breathe the clear fresh air as it blows from the virgin snows of the Alpine summits. It would be well if the dwellers in the valley could frequently leave their homes among the marshes and the fever-causing mists, and inhale the bracing element upon the hills. It is to such an adventure of climbing that I invite you this evening. May the Spirit of God assist us to leave the mists of fear and the fever of anxiety, and all the evils which gather in this valley of earth, and to ascend the mountains of anticipated joy and blessedness. May God the Holy Spirit cut the cords that keep us here below and assist us to ascend! We sit too often like chained eagles fastened to the rock, except that, unlike the eagle, we begin to love our chains, and would, perhaps—if it came really to the test—be reluctant to have them snapped. May God now grant us grace, even if we cannot escape from the chain that binds our flesh, yet to do so as to our spirits; and leaving the body, like a servant, at the foot of the hill, may our soul, like Abraham, attain the top of the mountain, there to indulge in communion with the Most High.