This morning I have been going through one of my old Bibles. This Bible happens to be my NIV study Bible that I used for years. Tucked away in it's pages I am finding little treasures I left for later. This is one of them. I don't know where it came from. It looks like it was typed and photocopied, so I hope I'm not violating any copyright! It is not intentional.
The Sphere of Exaltation
"Jesus leadeth them up into a high mountain apart by themselves." Mark 9:2
We have all had times on the mount, when we have seen things from God's standpoint and have wanted to stay there; but God will never allow us to stay there. The test of our spiritual life is the power to descend; if we have power to rise only, something is wrong. It is a great thing to be on the mount with God, but a man only gets there in order that afterwards he may get down among the devil-possessed and lift them up. We are not built for the mountains and the dawns and aesthetic affinities, those are for moments of inspiration, that is all. We are built for the valley, for the ordinary stuff we are in, and that is where we have to prove our mettle. Spiritual selfishness always wants repeated moments on the mount. The times of exaltation are exceptional, they have their meaning in our life with God, but we must beware lest our spiritual selfishness want to make them the only time.
2 comments:
Is this something we got in our old time SS class with Nancy? I remember reading it before. It's wonderful to read again, and good for me too because I would love to stay on the mountaintop!
Neat quote, Kim!
It's interesting to me that in Scripture, you always find God dwelling on top of a mountain... eg. Eden where the headwaters (springs) of 4 rivers were; Mt. Sinai where God gave the 10 commandments to Moses; and later "up" in Jerusalem on the Temple Mount. There's also the Mount of Transfiguration where Jesus took Peter, James and John.
The latter must have been a totally transforming experience, because Peter later writes about it in his epistle. How sad for Peter (and for us) that "...when we have seen things from God's standpoint and have wanted to stay there; but God will never allow us to stay there."
Those times on the mountain do refresh us spiritually, and they empower us to "get down among the devil-possessed and lift them up."
Bless you!
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