Every believer should be thirsting for God, for the living God, longing to climb the mountain of the Lord and see him face to face. Why settle for the fog of the valley when the summit of Tabor is calling? My soul thirsts to drink deeply from the cup reserved for those who reach the mountain peak and bathe their faces in heaven.

How pure is the dew on those heights! How fresh the mountain air! How rich the feast for those who dwell above, whose windows open onto the New Jerusalem!

Yet so many saints are content to live like coal miners who never see the sun. They eat dust like serpents when they could taste the ambrosial food of angels. They wear miner's rags when they could dress in royal robes. Tears stain their faces when they could be anointed with celestial oil. I am convinced that countless believers waste away in dungeons when they could be walking on palace rooftops, gazing out over the promised land.

Rouse yourself, O believer, from this low condition! Cast away your sloth, your lethargy, your coldness—whatever interferes with your pure love for Christ, your soul's true Husband. Make him everything: the source, the center, the circumference of all your soul's delight. What enchants you into such folly as to remain in a pit when you could mount a throne? Why live in the lowlands of bondage when mountain liberty has been given to you?

Stop settling for these dwarfish achievements. Press on toward things more sublime, more heavenly. Aspire to a higher life! A nobler life! A fuller life!

Upward to heaven! Nearer to God!

"When will you come to me, Lord? Oh come, my dearest Lord! Come near, come nearer, nearer still. I am blessed when you are near."