COME UP IN THE MORNING

“Come up in the morning... And present thyself unto Me on the top of the mount” (Ex. 34:2). Morning is the time fixed for my meeting the Lord. The very word “morning” is as a cluster of rich grapes. Let us crush them and drink the sacred wine. In the morning! Then God means me to be at my best in strength and hope. I have not to climb in my weakness. In the night I have buried yesterday’s fatigue, and in the morning take a new lease of energy. Blessed is the day whose morning is sanctified! Successful is the day whose first victory was won in prayer! Holy is the day whose dawn finds Thee on the top of the mount! My Father, I am coming. Nothing on the mean plain shall keep me away from the holy heights. At Thy bidding I come, so Thou wilt meet me. Morning on the mount! It will make me strong and glad all the rest of the day so well begun. - Joseph Parker My mother’s habit was every day, immediately after breakfast, to withdraw for an hour to her own room, and to spend that hour in reading the Bible, in meditation and prayer. From that hour, as from a pure fountain, she drew the strength and sweetness which enabled her to fulfil all her duties, and to remain unruffled by the worries and pettinesses which are so often the trial of narrow neighbourhoods. As I think of her life, and all she had to bear, I see the absolute triumph of Christian grace in the lovely ideal of a Christian lady. I never saw her temper disturbed; I never heard her speak one word of anger, of calumny, or of idle gossip; I never observed in her any sign of a single sentiment unbecoming to a soul which had drunk of the river of the water of life, and which had fed upon manna in the barren wilderness. - Farrar Give God the blossom of the day. Do not put Him off with faded leaves! From: Streams in the Desert by Mrs. Charles E. Cowman