Christ, Presence of – Charles Spurgeon
JESUS is actually present in the daily afflictions of believers. Jesus knocks at my door, and says, “Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse, with me from Lebanon: look from the top of Amana, from the top of Shenir and Hermon, from the lions’ dens, from the mountains of the leopards!” I look forth from the window into the cold and dreary night, and I answer him, “The night is black and cheerless. I have put off my coat, how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet, how shall I defile them? I cannot arise and follow you.” But the Beloved is not thus to be refused; he knocks again, and he says, “Come forth with me into the fields, let us lodge in the villages; there will I give you my loves.” Overcome by his love, I arise, and go with my heavenly Bridegroom. If the rain-drops fall pitilessly upon me, yet it is most sweet to see that his head also is filled with dew, and his locks with the drops of the night. The howling wind tosses his garments as well as mine; his feet tread the same miry places as my own; and all the while he calls me his beloved, his love, his dove, his undefiled, and tells me of the land which lies beyond the darkness, and speaks of the mountains of myrrh and of the beds of spices, the top of Amana, Shenir, and Hermon. My soul is melted while my Beloved speaks, and my heart feels it sweet beyond expression to walk with him; for lo, while he is near me, the night is lit up with innumerable stars, the sky is aglow with glory, every cloud flames like a seraph’s wing, while the pitiless blast is all unable to chill the heart which burns within while he talks with me by the way. In after years we are accustomed to speak to one another of that dark night and its marvelous brightness; of that cold wind that was so strangely tempered, and we even say to one another, “I would gladly pass through a thousand nights in such company; I would be willing to go on a midnight journey evermore with that dearest of friends, for oh! where he is night is day; in his presence suffering is joy; when he reveals himself pains are pleasures, and earth blossoms with flowers of Eden.” Thus does the Well-beloved by his presence make our darkness light.