In Psalm 63 the Psalmist says, “O God, Thou art my God; early will I seek Thee.”
Last summer one wrote me saying, “I awoke early this morning, the sun was streaming into my room, so I read several chapters in the Gospel of Luke. One felt so fresh and ready for it.”
Yes, it is a good way to seek God early, before other things are allowed to take off the freshness of the appetite for the reading of the Word.
There is nothing down here for the new nature. It was “a dry and thirsty land where no water is” for the Lord Jesus, and the Christians find it the same. Jesus found all His refreshment in the Father, and from the Father. At one time He spent a whole night in prayer; at another time He arose a great while before day to commune with His Father, seeking, as the dependent One, from His Father, the strength and all He needed for each day’s toil and labor of love. He took this lowly place in grace, and trod this path of dependence, this path of faith before us, that we might learn from Him how to walk in it, how to look up to the Father as He did, for all that we need each day to walk in a way pleasing to Him.
Though there is nothing down here for the new nature, there is everything to attract and feed and please the old nature, and Satan tries to keep us so occupied with; things here that we may not long and thirst after God; that we may not find our delight in the Word and in prayer.
“Satan trembles when he sees
The weakest saint upon his knees.”
It has been said that we should seek to make the most of our time down here, as we shall never have another like it. If a Christian walks in a way pleasing to the Lord, it is a triumph of His grace, it brings glory to God.
When we get up there, faith will be changed to sight, and everything will be for us. Here we have to walk by faith where everything is against us, and if we are not watchful, will hinder us. Let us take heed to the words of the Lord Jesus to His disciples, “Watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation,” remembering if the Spirit is willing the flesh is weak; but if we trust in the Lord, when we are weak then we are strong—strong in Another.
By the grace of God “Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus.” Let us then, as one has said, “Run across the wilderness to glory.”
“Jesus the goal, before our soul,
The One we know in glory.”
“Christian pilgrim, watchful be,
Many eyes are watching thee.
Satan watches to enthrall;
Wordlings watch to see thee fall:
Savior, watch Thy servant too,
Guard and guide me safely through.”