I’ve been coming across some really great quotes from Charles Spurgeon over the last week or so. If you haven’t heard that name before, he was a preacher and theologian in the 1800’s. He died more than a century and a quarter ago.

What’s amazing is that much of what the church does these days (especially these pandemic days) would be utterly unrecognizable for Spurgeon, and yet his words still resonate.

More than 125 years later, this is still a struggle. I think humans in general are better at focussing on our trials than our blessings. We’re more apt to think trials are permanent and blessings might disappear at any moment.

When really, the opposite is true. Tough times never last. They might feel endless (and the pandemic definitely feels that way right now), but they are not. This, too, shall pass.

And you know, every day of these long months, the sun has come up, the world has continued to be beautiful (the fall colours are outstanding in Ontario right now), and you have continued to be loved – both by your Heavenly Father, and by your friends/family/others who matter. Those blessings have been constant, never faltering.

So I am grateful for Spurgeon’s words, coming at me across the screen of my laptop – a device he probably couldn’t begin to dream up, and which I use as naturally as he would have used pen and paper. This is what the book of Hebrews means when it talks of the ‘great cloud of witnesses’ that surround us in faith.

Thank God for the legacy left by those who have run this race before us. Those who now surround us in a great cloud, encouraging and informing our faith. Thank God that we, too, have the opportunity to be part of that great cloud. All it takes is some prayer, encouragement and care of another.

Until tomorrow, dear friends, keep loving God by loving others!