Spurgeon’s Morning & Evening Devotions

Morning, August 23

"The voice of weeping shall be no more heard." – Isaiah
65:19

The glorified weep no more, for all outward causes of grief are
gone. There are no broken friendships, nor blighted prospects in heaven.
Poverty, famine, peril, persecution, and slander, are unknown there.

No pain distresses, no thought of death or bereavement saddens. They
weep no more, for they are perfectly sanctified. No "evil heart of
unbelief" prompts them to depart from the living God; they are
without fault before his throne, and are fully conformed to his image.

Well may they cease to mourn who have ceased to sin. They weep no
more, because all fear of change is past. They know that they are
eternally secure.

Sin is shut out, and they are shut in. They dwell within a city
which shall never be stormed; they bask in a sun which shall never set;
they drink of a river which shall never dry; they pluck fruit from a
tree which shall never wither. Countless cycles may revolve, but
eternity shall not be exhausted, and while eternity endures, their
immortality and blessedness shall co-exist with it.

They are for ever with the Lord. They weep no more, because every
desire is fulfilled. They cannot wish for anything which they have not
in possession.

Eye and ear, heart and hand, judgment, imagination, hope, desire,
will, all the faculties, are completely satisfied; and imperfect as our
present ideas are of the things which God hath prepared for them that
love him, yet we know enough, by the revelation of the Spirit, that the
saints above are supremely blessed. The joy of Christ, which is an
infinite fulness of delight, is in them. They bathe themselves in the
bottomless, shoreless sea of infinite beatitude.

That same joyful rest remains for us. It may not be far distant. Ere
long the weeping willow shall be exchanged for the palm-branch of
victory, and sorrow’s dewdrops will be transformed into the pearls of
everlasting bliss.

"Wherefore comfort one another with these words."

Evening, August 23

"That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." -
Ephesians 3:17

Beyond measure it is desirable that we, as believers, should have
the person of Jesus constantly before us, to inflame our love towards
him, and to increase our knowledge of him. I would to God that my
readers were all entered as diligent scholars in Jesus’ college,
students of Corpus Christi, or the body of Christ, resolved to attain
unto a good degree in the learning of the cross. But to have Jesus ever
near, the heart must be full of him, welling up with his love, even to
overrunning; hence the apostle prays "that Christ may dwell in your
hearts."

See how near he would have Jesus to be! You cannot get a subject
closer to you than to have it in the heart itself. "That he may
dwell"; not that he may call upon you sometimes, as a casual
visitor enters into a house and tarries for a night, but that he may
dwell; that Jesus may become the Lord and Tenant of your inmost being,
never more to go out.

Observe the words-that he may dwell in your heart, that best room of
the house of manhood; not in your thoughts alone, but in your
affections; not merely in the mind’s meditations, but in the heart’s
emotions. We should pant after love to Christ of a most abiding
character, not a love that flames up and then dies out into the darkness
of a few embers, but a constant flame, fed by sacred fuel, like the fire
upon the altar which never went out. This cannot be accomplished except
by faith.

Faith must be strong, or love will not be fervent; the root of the
flower must be healthy, or we cannot expect the bloom to be sweet. Faith
is the lily’s root, and love is the lily’s bloom. Now, reader, Jesus
cannot be in your heart’s love except you have a firm hold of him by
your heart’s faith; and, therefore, pray that you may always trust
Christ in order that you may always love him.

If love be cold, be sure that faith is drooping.

This daily devotional is published and distributed by
http://www.GOSHEN.net/ . It is written by Neil Anderson at
http://www.freedominchrist.com/ .

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