Daily Devotionals

Music For the Soul

Devotional: March 24th

THE PERFECT JOY OF A PRESENT SALVATION

In Thy presence is fullness of joy: in Thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore. - Psalms 26:2

The present salvation points onwards to its own completion, and in that way becomes further a source of joy. In its depths we see reflected a blue heaven with many a star. The salvation here touches the soul alone; but salvation in its perfect form touches the body, soul, and spirit, and transforms all the outward nature to correspond to these and make a worthy dwelling for perfected men. That prospect brings joy beyond the reach of aught else to afford. The glory of that perfect salvation gleams already, and touches the Christian joy into nobleness and solemn greatness. And as the salvation is eternal, so the joy may be abiding. "Joys are like poppies spread," and when the opiate petals swiftly drop, an ugly brown head like a skull is left, full of poisonous seeds. But this joy blooms amaranthine flowers, and being the reflex of Christ’s own eternal joy, endures according to His promise, "that My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full."

That perfect salvation heightens our joy here by the hope of a perfect joy hereafter. We dare to look forward to a state when sorrow and joy shall no more be in strange juxtaposition, the white and the black dog in the same leash, but joy shall reign alone and sorrow be dethroned. Our partial experience of salvation here warrants that anticipation.

Here we are, like the Laplanders in their winter huts, pitched upon the snowy plain. Desolation and white death outside, but inside light and warmth, food and companionship. Without our hut are sorrow, and loss, and change, and care, and loneliness, and anxiety, and perplexity, and all the discipline that is needful for us, though within we have Christ. But then we shall journey south to the lands of the sun, where no storms rage and winter never comes. Here our joy is like an exotic plant, stunted and struggling with an ungenial sky and unkindly soil; there in its native place it spreads a broader leaf and bears a sweeter fruit. Here we taste of the river of His pleasures, there we shall drink from the fountain. All comes from Christ, the incomplete salvation and sorrow-shaded joy of the present, the perfect salvation and unmingled gladness of the future. The nearer we are to Him, the more of both shall we possess, till we reach His presence, where there is fulness of joy, and sit at His right hand, where there are pleasures for evermore.