Daily Devotional for June 4

“The kindness and love of God our Saviour.”
Titus 3:4

How sweet it is to behold the Saviour communing with his own belovedpeople! There can be nothing more delightful than, by the Divine Spirit, to be led intothis fertile field of delight. Let the mind for an instant consider the history of theRedeemer’s love, and a thousand enchanting acts of affection will suggestthemselves, all of which have had for their design the weaving of the heart into Christ,and the intertwisting of the thoughts and emotions of the renewed soul with the mind ofJesus. When we meditate upon this amazing love, and behold the all-glorious Kinsman of theChurch endowing her with all his ancient wealth, our souls may well faint for joy. Who ishe that can endure such a weight of love? That partial sense of it which the Holy Spiritis sometimes pleased to afford, is more than the soul can contain; how transporting mustbe a complete view of it! When the soul shall have understanding to discern all theSaviour’s gifts, wisdom wherewith to estimate them, and time in which to meditateupon them, such as the world to come will afford us, we shall then commune with Jesus in anearer manner than at present. But who can imagine the sweetness of such fellowship? Itmust be one of the things which have not entered into the heart of man, but which God hathprepared for them that love him. Oh, to burst open the door of our Joseph’s granaries, and see the plenty which he hath stored up for us! This will overwhelm us with love. By faith we see, as in a glass darkly, the reflected image of his unbounded treasures, but when we shall actually see the heavenly things themselves, with our own eyes, how deep will be the stream of fellowship in which our soul shall bathe itself! Till then our loudest sonnets shall be reserved for our loving benefactor, Jesus Christ our Lord, whose love to us is wonderful, passing the love of women.

“Received up into glory.”
1 Timothy 3:16

We have seen our well-beloved Lord in the days of his flesh, humiliatedand sore vexed; for he was “despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, andacquainted with grief.” He whose brightness is as the morning, wore the sackcloth ofsorrow as his daily dress: shame was his mantle, and reproach was his vesture. Yet now,inasmuch as he has triumphed over all the powers of darkness upon the bloody tree, ourfaith beholds our King returning with dyed garments from Edom, robed in the splendour ofvictory. How glorious must he have been in the eyes of seraphs, when a cloud received himout of mortal sight, and he ascended up to heaven! Now he wears the glory which he hadwith God or ever the earth was, and yet another glory above all—that which he haswell earned in the fight against sin, death, and hell. As victor he wears the illustriouscrown. Hark how the song swells high! It is a new and sweeter song: “Worthy is theLamb that was slain, for he hath redeemed us unto God by his blood!” He wears theglory of an Intercessor who can never fail, of a Prince who can never be defeated, of aConqueror who has vanquished every foe, of a Lord who has the heart’s allegiance of every subject. Jesus wears all the glory which the pomp of heaven can bestow upon him, which ten thousand times ten thousand angels can minister to him. You cannot with your utmost stretch of imagination conceive his exceeding greatness; yet there will be a further revelation of it when he shall descend from heaven in great power, with all the holy angels—“Then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory.” Oh, the splendour of that glory! It will ravish his people’s hearts. Nor is this the close, for eternity shall sound his praise, “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever!” Reader, if you would joy in Christ’s glory hereafter, he must be glorious in your sight now. Is he so?