The sun was slowly sinking toward the western horizon while I wended my
way up the rugged hillside. As I ascended the winding path ever higher and
higher, my horizon broadened. When at length I reached the summit and
turned to gaze back over the valley, the city lay spread out like a great
picture at my feet. The winding river, with a steamer slowly moving along
on its bosom, shimmered in the evening sunlight. The sounds from the city
were softened and blended until they rose to me like the musical strain of
far-away melodies. The low-hanging sun glorified the drifting clouds with
the hues of the autumn mountain-side. Crimson and orange and gold, they
burned in that western expanse. I gazed upon the scene, and its influence
seemed to exalt and enrapture my spirit. There stole into my being a sense
of rest and peace and joy that lifted me out of the monotony of ordinary
things. I sat there and drank in the beauties of the scene until the sun
sank out of sight behind the hills and the stars began to twinkle
overhead. The lights flashed out in the city beneath. The quiet hush of
the evening seemed to settle down over me, and it seemed good to be alive
and to be there.
The mountain-top is a delightful plate. There the soul reaches heights and
depths such as it reaches at no other time. Preachers love to preach and
poets love to sing of the mountain-tops of life. How delightful are these
times in our spiritual life, and how naturally we long for these seasons!
How often they are pictured up till one would suppose that they are the
principal things in the Christian life! Some people have fancied that when
they became Christians the mountain-top experience would be their constant
portion. They may have been led to expect this from hearing preaching that
exalted the emotional side of religion. It may be that when they were
converted their new-born joys seemed to be unending. They thought that
this exaltation of spirit was the normal state of a Christian. They
gloried in it as the days passed by. The time came, however, when this
emotional glow subsided. As the barometer of their feelings fell, they
began to question themselves thus: “What is the matter with me? Have I
done something wrong? Am I mistaken in thinking that I was saved?” Thus,
their faith fell with their emotions. After a while their emotions rose
again, and their faith rose with their emotions. Now they knew that they
were all right.
There are times when we seem to draw near to God in prayer, when the sight
and sound of the world is shut out. An inexpressible sweetness and joy and
satisfaction come into the heart. How near God seems! How calm and
precious is the hour! How our spirits drink in of the water of life! How
we seem to talk face to face with our Lord, and how the curtain seems
drawn back till our eyes behold the secrets of the Eternal! We give
ourselves over to the supreme enjoyment of the hour. But alas! in a short
time we find ourselves no longer on the mountain, but out in the broad
plain of life, and how tame and monotonous is that plain when we think of
the mountain!
In this the natural and the spiritual are alike. What would you think of
the man who would build a store upon the mountain-top, apart from the
throng of purchasers whose business he desired? Would you think that
wisdom was displayed? Do business men do this way? No, they seek the busy
street that is trodden by a multitude, where flows the constant stream of
traffic; and there, amid the noise and dust and hurry, they ply their
trade with little thought of the mountain-top.
The mountain-top is a very good place to which to make an excursion now
and then. It is the place to spend our holidays, but it is not the place
for the real accomplishments of life. When we wish to make a living, we
must leave the mountain-top with its far-flung panorama of beauty. We must
roll up our sleeves and take up the rugged toil and, mid sweat and grime
and noise and discord, produce the real results that feed and clothe and
shelter us. The real accomplishments of life are not on the mountain-top,
but in the monotonous, soul-trying daily grind of business. If you imagine
that you are to live in the idealism of a mountain-top experience you will
find yourself coming short of it most of the time. You will be continually
lamenting over your failure to make your experience measure to your ideal.
So long as you are reaching toward this ideal and are conscious of your
failure to reach it, your attention will be absorbed by this, and you will
be of little use to God. The sooner you come down to the place where you
stop condemning yourself because your emotions are not always joyous or
because you can not always pray with that full outpouring of soul, the
better it will be for you. You will never become a practical Christian
till you learn that the Christian life, like the natural life, is largely
made up of a monotonous round of duties.
There is little of glamor or brilliancy in labor or ordinary things. That
is reserved for the special things in life. It is true that there is joy
in the toil and in the hardness, yea, even in the bitterness, if there is
a consciousness of duty well done. It is the daily grind that tests the
faithfulness. God wants people who will be true in the daily toil of life,
who will do well the little, uninteresting things. He wants practical
Christians, people who are willing to do the work even if it means
weariness, even if it means little of emotion, even if it means sacrifice.
If you lived on the mountain-top always, the scene would soon lose its
beauty, and you would soon forget its loveliness. When, after the days of
toil, after the months of the prosaic, you lay aside your tools and turn
from your labors, it is then that you can go out and enjoy the beauties of
nature. It is then that you can enter into her moods and be her comrade.
You can enjoy her then and be refreshed by her as you could not be without
those weary days of toil. Many people are willing to enjoy, but they shun
the work. In natural things we call such persons lazy.
Idealism has its place in life, but it must not close our eyes to the
practical side of life. Enjoy what of the mountain-top God may give to
you, but do not count this the ordinary, usual thing of Christian life.
Learn to enjoy the toil. Learn to find the sweetness that is in it. Learn
to find the beauty in the common things of life, for some of the most
common things are among the most beautiful when our eyes are taught to see
their beauty. The Christian life is preeminently a life of service. That
is its highest and broadest purpose. To try to be a Christian merely for
the joy that is to be found in it is often to render ourselves miserable.
To seek happiness for ourselves as the chief end of life is a very
unworthy purpose, and is one that can but end in disappointment.
See that you do your part in life in the every-day things, and God will
permit you to live on the mountain as he sees best. Appreciate the
mountain experiences when they come, but do not let them make you despise
the common things.