"You have forsaken your first love." -Revelation 2:4

"Ever to be remembered is that best and brightest of hours,
when we first saw the Lord, lost our burdens,
received the roll of promise, rejoiced in full salvation,
and went on our way in peace.
It was springtime in our soul; the winter was past...

...Then the flowers appeared in our heart;
hope, love, peace, and patience sprung from the sod;
the hyacinth of repentance, the snowdrop of pure holiness,
the crocus of golden faith, the daffodil of early love,
all decked the garden of the soul.
The time for the singing of birds had come,
and we rejoiced with thanksgiving;
we magnified the holy name of our forgiving God, and our resolve was,

"Lord, I am Yours, wholly Yours;
all I am, and all I have, I would devote to You.
You have bought me with your blood-
let e spend myself and be spent in Your service.
In life and death let me be consecrated to You."

How have we kept this resolve?

Our espousal love burned with a holy flame of devotion to Jesus-
is it the same now? Might not Jesus justifiably say to us,
"I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love"?

Alas! We have done so little for our Master's glory.
Our winter has lasted all too long.
We are as cold as ice when we should feel a summer's glow
and bloom with sacred flowers...

...O alert us so that we may return to our first love,
and do our first works!
Send us a genial spring, O Sun of Righteousness."

C.H. Spurgeon
Morning and Evening