There are times when solitude is better than society,
and silence is wiser than speech. We should be better
Christians if we were more alone, waiting upon God,
and gathering through meditation on His Word
spiritual strength for labor in His service. We ought to
muse upon the things of God, because we thus get
the real nutriment out of them. Truth is something like
the cluster of the vine: if we would have wine from it,
we must bruise it; we must press and squeeze it many
times. The bruiser's feet must come down joyfully
upon the bunches, or else the juice will not flow; and
they must well tread the grapes, or else much of the
precious liquid will be wasted. So we must, by
meditation, tread the clusters of truth, if we would get
the wine of consolation therefrom. Our bodies are not
supported by merely taking food into the mouth, but
the process which really supplies the muscle, and the
nerve, and the sinew, and the bone, is the process of
digestion. It is by digestion that the outward food
becomes assimilated with the inner life. Our souls are
not nourished merely by listening awhile to this, and
then to that, and then to the other part of divine truth.
Hearing, reading, marking, and learning, all require
inwardly digesting to complete their usefulness, and
the inward digesting of the truth lies for the most part
in meditating upon it. Why is it that some Christians,
although they hear many sermons, make but slow
advances in the divine life? Because they neglect their
closets, and do not thoughtfully meditate on God's
Word. They love the wheat, but they do not grind it;
they would have the corn, but they will not go forth
into the fields to gather it; the fruit hangs upon the
tree, but they will not pluck it; the water flows at their
feet, but they will not stoop to drink it. From such folly
deliver us, O Lord, and be this our resolve this
morning, ;I will meditate in Thy precepts.
From Spurgeon's Morning & Evening
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