Awake, My Glory! Stirring Up Our Minds for Christ

The truth is that, as "the whole world lies in wickedness" (1 John 5:19), so the eyes of the whole world are misplaced. There are few that have a care of this choice, of this high gospel ordinance — looking unto Jesus.

In Not Pointing Their Minds Towards Jesus

"I write unto you," said the apostle "to stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance" (2 Peter 3:1). In the original Greek (diegeírō), "to awaken your pure minds," and it was but needed. See how David calls upon himself, "Awake, my glory!" (Psalm 57:8). And see how Deborah calls upon herself, "Awake, awake, Deborah, awake, awake, utter a song," (Judges 5:12). Awaking is a word that imparts rousing, as birds that provoke their young ones by flight, to make use of their wings. Now, how few are there, that thus call upon themselves? It was the prophet's complaint, "No man stirs up himself to take hold of God" (Isaiah 64:7). Oh what a shame is this! Is it fit that our understanding, which God has entrusted us with, should be no more improved? Is it fit that our minds (those golden cabinets, which God has given us to be filled with heavenly treasure) should either be empty, or stuffed with vanity, nothing, or worse than nothing? Oh, that such glorious creatures as our souls should serve every creature, which should be an attendant upon Christ, which should be like angels, waiting and standing in the presence of our God! Oh that such glorious things as our immortal spirits should run after vanity, and so become vain, which if rightly improved, should wake with angels, should lodge themselves in the bosom of the glorious God! Do we not see how Christ is sending out to us continually? The thoughts of His heart are love, eternal love; and shall not we send out our thoughts towards Him? Shall not we let our minds run out towards Him?

In Not Bending Their Minds to this Work

It may be the mind looks up, but it is so feeble, that, like an arrow shot from a bow weakly bent, it reaches not the mark. It is the wise man's counsel, "Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might" (Ecclesiastes 9:10). Oh that God's people should be so lazy, dull, sluggish, slothful in this spiritual work! As Jesus said to the multitudes concerning John, "What did you go out into the wilderness to see?" (Matthew 11:7). So may I ask believers in their looking unto Jesus. What did you go out to see? When you crawl, and move, as if you had no hearts, nor spirits within you, whom do you go forth to see? What, Him that is the Lord of glory? What, Him that is "the brightness of His Father's glory, and the express image of His person," (Hebrews 1:3). What, are such heavy and lazy aspects fit to take in such a glory as this is? You see in what large streams your thoughts fly forth to other things, and are you only languishing, weak and feeble in things of so great concernment? Oh that Christians should be so cold in spirituals, and hot in the pursuit of earthly temporal things?

In Not Staying the Eye on Jesus Christ

Some may give a glance at Christ, but they are presently wheeled off again: but why doesn't the eye abide there, at least till it comes to some profitable issue? Is not Christ worthy of whom or souls should dwell? Certainly, if we love our Jesus, that love will hold us: Christ then will be in our thoughts and minds, and we cannot be off Him. Christ Himself acknowledged such an operation of love upon Himself, "Turn away thine eyes, for they have overcome me. Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse, with one of thine eyes" (Song of Songs 6:5, 4:9). Christ was held in the galleries, and captivated with love to His people so that His eye was ever upon them. No, He could not get His eyes off them, "Can a mother forget her child? No more can I forget you," (Isaiah 49:15). And is Christ so tender in His love towards us, that He ever minds us, and shall our minds be so loose to Him? So fluttering, and fleeting? Shall there be no more care to bind ourselves in cords of love to Him, who hath bound Himself in such cords of love to us?

In Not Daily Exercising This Blessed Duty

It may be now and then they are awakened, and they get up into heaven to see their Jesus, but it is not daily. Oh, consider! Is this now and then going to heaven within the veil, to live the life of friends? Is this to carry ourselves as children? What, to be so strange at home? But now and then? Once in a month, in a year? There to be seldom, where we should always be? Is Jesus Christ so ordinary that a visit now and then should serve the turn? The queen of Sheba hearing Solomon's wisdom, Oh! said she, "Happy are your men and happy are these your servants, who stand continually before you and hear your wisdom!" (1 Kings 10:3-8). If she was so taken with Solomon, remember, "that a greater than Solomon is here" (Luke 11:31). Shall we deprive ourselves of the blessedness we might enjoy by standing always in the presence of Christ, to hear His wisdom, and to behold His glory? Oh! My brethren, let us take shame to ourselves, that to this day we have been so careless in sending, bending, binding our minds to this blessed object Jesus Christ: yes, let us blush that we have not made it our daily business. David describes the blessed man by his "delighting in the law of the Lord," and by his "meditating on that law day and night," (Psalm 1:2). How then is he to be reproved, that neither meditates on the law of the Lord, nor on the Lord the lawmaker, day and night? Oh alas! We keep not a constant course, we are not daily in the exercise of viewing Jesus. No, I fear we look upon this duty of looking unto Jesus as a questionable thing; it seems to many as a duty unknown, unheard of, unthought of, it is not in their notice, and how should it be in their practice?

Be Exhorted in the Fear of God

"I, Paul, myself am pleading with you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ" (2 Corinthians 10:1). "I beseech you, by the mercies of God" (Romans 12:1). "Now I beg you, brethren, through the Lord Jesus Christ, and through the love of the Spirit, that you strive together with me..." (Romans 15:30). Or, if my beseechings will not prevail, why, yet look on me as an ambassador of Christ, consider as though "God did beseech you by me," I beseech, "I implore you on Christ's behalf" (2 Corinthians 5:20). It is a message that I have from God to your souls to look unto Jesus: and therefore "set your hearts to all the words that I testify to you this day, for it is not a vain thing, but it is for your lives," (Deuteronomy 32:46–47).

Oh that I should need thus to persuade your hearts to look unto Jesus! What, is not your Jesus worthy of this? Why then, are your thoughts no more upon Him? Why aren't your hearts continually with Him? Why aren't your strongest desires, and daily delights in, and after the Lord Jesus? What is the matter? Will not God give you leave to approach this light? Will He not suffer your souls to taste and see? Why then are these words in the text? Why then doth He cry and double His cry, "Behold me, behold me?" Ah, vile hearts! How delightfully and unweariedly can we think of vanity? How freely and how frequently can we think of our pleasures, friends, labors, lusts? Yea, of our miseries, wrongs, sufferings, fears? And what, is not Christ in all our thoughts? It was said of the Jews, that they used to cast to the ground the book of Esther before they read it because the name of God is not in it; and Augustine cast by Cicero's writings because they didn’t contain the name of Jesus. Christians!

Thus should you humble and cast down your sensual hearts, that have in them no more of Christ: O chide them for their willful or weak strangeness to Jesus Christ! O turn your thoughts from off all earthly vanities, and bend your souls to study Christ, habituate yourselves to such contemplations, as in the next use I shall present; and let not those thoughts be seldom or cursory, but settle upon them, dwell there, bathe your souls in those delights, drench your affections in those rivers of pleasures, or rather in the sea of consolation. O tie your souls in heavenly galleries, have your eyes continually set on Christ!

Say not, "You are unable to do this, this must be God's work only, and therefore all your exhortations are in vain." A learned divine can tell you, (Baxter's Rest.) that though God be the chief disposer of your hearts, yet next under Him you have the greatest command of them yourselves. Though "without Christ, you can do nothing," yet under Him you may do much. Otherwise, it will be undone, and you undone through your neglect. Do your own part, and you have no cause to distrust whether Christ will do His. It is not usual with Christ to forsake His own people in that very work He sets them on.

‘Oh, but we can do nothing!’ How, nothing? What, are you neither spiritual nor rational creatures? If a carnal minister can make it his work to study about Christ through his lifetime, and all because it is the trade he lives by, and he knows not how to subsist without it, then a spiritual Christian should do much more. If a cook can labour and sweat about your meat because it is the trade that maintains him, though perhaps he tastes it not himself, then you for whom it is prepared, should take the pains to taste its sweetness and feed upon it. Christians! If your souls were sound and right, they would perceive incomparably more delight and sweetness in knowing, thinking, believing, loving and rejoicing in Jesus Christ, than the soundest stomach finds in its food, or the strongest senses in the enjoyments of their objects.

Now, for shame, never say you cannot reach it. "I can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth me," (Philippians 4:13). Oh it is our sloth, our security, our carnal mind, which is enmity to God and Christ, that keeps us off. Be exhorted! Oh be exhorted in the fear of God.