July 8 Daily Devotional

Bible Verse

"For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come" (Heb. 13:14).

Devotional

The true believer in Jesus is a traveler. He is journeying to a city of habitation, to the Mount of God—and, blessed be God, he will soon be there! The apostle Peter dedicates his pastoral letter to the "elect exiles of the dispersion" (1 Pet. 1:1)—the people of God scattered over the face of the earth.

Such is the church of Christ. We sometimes call it "the visible church," but that idea can be misunderstood. The church is visible, but there is no one visible institution. The saints of God are "strangers and pilgrims" scattered abroad (Heb. 11:13). Here on earth they have no permanent abode, no certain resting-place. The church is in the wilderness, journeying through it. The present is called the "time of your exile" (1 Pet. 1:17). We are but wayfarers at an inn, abiding only for a night. "Here we have no lasting city" (Heb. 13:14). We are strangers, pilgrims, and sojourners, as all our fathers were.

But this, beloved, is the reconciling, vitalizing thought—we are journeying to the dwelling of God. We are on our way to the good Land which the Lord our God has promised us. We are traveling to the kingdom and the mansion which Jesus has gone to take possession of and to prepare for us. In a word—and this is the climax of our blissful expectation—we are hastening to our Father's house, the home of the whole family in heaven and in earth, the residence of Christ, the dwelling-place of God (John 14:2).

To this destination, each believer in Jesus is journeying. The road is difficult. The wilderness is tedious. Sometimes it is painful from its roughness. Sometimes it is perilous from its smoothness. At times its difficulty is wearying, its intricacy embarrassing. But who will complain of the path that leads him to his home? Who will give in to fatigue who is journeying to an eternal rest?

Much of the uneasiness and yearning distinctive to the pilgrimage of the saints grows out of the faint conceptions that the mind forms of the coming glory. Actually, we think too feebly and too rarely of heaven. The eye is fixed downwards, and seldom do we raise our heads in prospect of the redemption that is drawing near (Luke 21:28). And yet how much there is in the thought of glory, in the anticipation of heaven—its nature and associations—calculated to stimulate, to cheer, and to allure us onwards! It is the place where we shall be sinless. It is the residence where we shall see God. It is the mansion where we shall dwell with Christ. It is the home where we shall live with all the saints, our beloved brethren and dear friends. It is the point at which are collecting all the holy of earth, some of whom have already left our embrace for its holier and happier regions, and whom we shall meet again.

Why then should you be downcast because of the difficulty of the way? Why should you for a moment lose sight of the glory that awaits you? Why should you cease to strive for the fitness essential to its enjoyment? In a little while—oh, how short the journey!—and you shall be there. Then you shall realize, to their fullest extent, the beauty and the sweetness of the description so often read and pondered with tears of hope—"you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel" (Heb. 12:22–24).

O my soul! Will you not stretch every nerve, endure every deprivation, and put aside every weight, thus to reach this glorious city of God?

Lead on, O King eternal,
the day of march has come;
henceforth in fields of conquest
thy tents shall be our home:
through days of preparation
thy grace has made us strong,
and now, O King eternal,
we lift our battle song.

(Ernest W. Shurtleff, 1888)

Be sure to read the Preface by Octavius Winslow and A Note from the Editor by Larry E. Wilson.

Larry Wilson is an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In addition to having served as the General Secretary of the Committee on Christian Education of the OPC (2000–2004) and having written a number of articles and booklets (such as God's Words for Worship and Why Does the OPC Baptize Infants) for New Horizons and elsewhere, he has pastored OPC churches in Minnesota, Indiana, and Ohio. We are grateful to him for his editing of Morning Thoughts, the OPC Daily Devotional for 2011.