Spurgeon: December PM
* 12/13/PM
"I will make thy windows of agates."
--Isaiah 54:12
The church is most instructively symbolized by a building
erected by heavenly power, and designed by divine skill. Such a
spiritual house must not be dark, for the Israelites had light
in their dwellings; there must therefore be windows to let the
light in and to allow the inhabitants to gaze abroad. These
windows are precious as agates: the ways in which the church
beholds her Lord and heaven, and spiritual truth in general, are
to be had in the highest esteem. Agates are not the most
transparent of gems, they are but semi-pellucid at the best:
"Our knowledge of that life is small,
Our eye of faith is dim."
Faith is one of these precious agate windows, but alas! it is
often so misty and beclouded, that we see but darkly, and
mistake much that we do see. Yet if we cannot gaze through
windows of diamonds and know even as we are known, it is a
glorious thing to behold the altogether lovely One, even though
the glass be hazy as the agate. Experience is another of these
dim but precious windows, yielding to us a subdued religious
light, in which we see the sufferings of the Man of Sorrows,
through our own afflictions. Our weak eyes could not endure
windows of transparent glass to let in the Master's glory, but
when they are dimmed with weeping, the beams of the Sun of
Righteousness are tempered, and shine through the windows of
agate with a soft radiance inexpressibly soothing to tempted
souls. Sanctification , as it conforms us to our Lord, is
another agate window. Only as we become heavenly can we
comprehend heavenly things. The pure in heart see a pure God.
Those who are like Jesus see Him as He is. Because we are so
little like Him, the window is but agate; because we are
somewhat like Him, it is agate. We thank God for what we have,
and long for more. When shall we see God and Jesus, and heaven
and truth, face to face?