Spurgeon: June AM
* 06/25/AM
"Get thee up into the high mountain."
--Isaiah 40:9
Our knowledge of Christ is somewhat like climbing one of our
Welsh mountains. When you are at the base you see but little: the mountain itself appears to be but one-half as high as it
really is. Confined in a little valley, you discover scarcely
anything but the rippling brooks as they descend into the stream
at the foot of the mountain. Climb the first rising knoll, and
the valley lengthens and widens beneath your feet. Go higher,
and you see the country for four or five miles round, and you
are delighted with the widening prospect. Mount still, and the
scene enlarges; till at last, when you are on the summit, and
look east, west, north, and south, you see almost all England
lying before you. Yonder is a forest in some distant county,
perhaps two hundred miles away, and here the sea, and there a
shining river and the smoking chimneys of a manufacturing town,
or the masts of the ships in a busy port. All these things
please and delight you, and you say, "I could not have imagined
that so much could be seen at this elevation." Now, the
Christian life is of the same order. When we first believe in
Christ we see but little of Him. The higher we climb the more we
discover of His beauties. But who has ever gained the summit?
Who has known all the heights and depths of the love of Christ
which passes knowledge? Paul, when grown old, sitting
grey-haired, shivering in a dungeon in Rome, could say with
greater emphasis than we can, "I know whom I have believed," for
each experience had been like the climbing of a hill, each trial
had been like ascending another summit, and his death seemed
like gaining the top of the mountain, from which he could see
the whole of the faithfulness and the love of Him to whom he had
committed his soul. Get thee up, dear friend, into the high
mountain.