September 20

"Behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven."—Genesis 28:12.

"IN the days of Jacob," William Hazlitt writes wistfully and poignantly, "there was a ladder between heaven and earth; but now the heavens are gone farther off and are become astronomical." Let me rejoice that for the believing heart the very reverse is the case. The heavens have drawn nearer. They have become familiar and accessible. Is not Jesus the blessed Reality of which Jacob's rocky stair was only the symbol? Ye shall see, He assures me, the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.

He brings the Almighty Father near to me, as the Bethel ladder did for the patriarch; in Him the everlasting God clothes Himself in my nature and carries my infirmities. He proclaims the forgiveness of all my sin, as the divine Voice did for the guilty fugitive; for this end He was born, and died, and rose again. He transfigures my weary and wilderness life, as God ennobled the man whom He made the heir of His covenant; through Him a living pathway is open to me at every moment into the Holiest of all. He alters the aspect of the world, as He did for Jacob, who could see now in the darkest places the staircase climbing to the sky; I believe in Christ, and I know that there is hope and healing for all the children of men.

My heavens are not astronomical; they are my Father's house, and Jesus draws Him and them close to me. Through my Saviour His angels descend, and His grace, and His light, and His power. Through my Saviour my prayers ascend, and my faith, and my hope, and my songs of praise. Through Him I shall myself ascend one day.