The darkest cloud has a bright side to it, and even that which casts the deepest shadow across our path has a sunny face! Too often we see only the dark side with, it may be at times, a silver lining, but the silver lining should remind us that one side of the cloud is altogether bright. He who has ascended the mountain has seen the bright side of the clouds; he has watched their brilliancy as they hang above the valley under his feet. And how white have the little clouds then appeared, those flecks which ever hide the sunbeams from the valley, those dark spots with silver rims!
The troubles of life have their framing of silver, their heaven-lit edges, but they have more, they have their bright side. To see this, the mountain must be ascended, for the valley does not give the view of their shining face. We need to be above them, not under them, to see this. Our mountain is God’s presence, nearness to Himself; the rays of light which make the heaven-side of the cloud bright are His thoughts, His purposes, His plans. We need grace to mount above our troubles to get God’s mind about them, to be so near to Him that we may look down upon them. Not that earthly troubles will be the less sorrowful in themselves because of nearness to God, but they will be rejoiced in to His glory. “I take pleasure in infirmities,” said the Apostle; and why? because the Lord in glory was magnified in the trial to which the Apostle was subjected upon earth.
How many a believer is bemoaning the little troubles or worries of daily life! Climb the mountain, and you shall see that there is a bright side to every cloud. Seek that spiritual eminence from whence is seen the light of God shining upon the trouble. It is in these everyday difficulties that we are to glorify God. Seek that ye may live so in God’s presence as to be above the power of your cares, rather than having a fair sky and nothing to try your faith. Thus the very things which now are dark to you shall be bright; they shall prove your nearness to God; in them it shall be seen that the power of Christ rests upon you, and those who formerly saw how troubled your daily life was shall own the difference in you—the vast difference, which living near God on high produces, the change arising from being above the trial instead of being under it.