th the final issue, and
life will become solemn, grave, and blessed, because it is the outer
court and vestibule of the eternal life with God in Christ. They that
hold communion with Him, and only they, will, as another prophet says,
'run and not be weary,' when there come the moments that require a
special effort; and 'will walk and not faint' through the else
tediously long hours of commonplace duty and dusty road.

III. The last of the thoughts here is--Communion with God brings
elevation.

'He will make me to walk upon my high places.' One sees the herd on the
skyline of the mountain ridge, and at home up there, far above dangers
and attack; able to keep their footing on cliff and precipice, and
tossing their antlers in the pure air. One wave of the hand, and they
are miles away. 'He sets me upon my high places'; if we will keep
ourselves in simple, loving fellowship with God in Christ; and day by
day, even when 'the fig-tree does not blossom, and there is no fruit in
the vine,' will still 'rejoice in the God of our salvation,' He will
lift us up, and Isaiah's other clause in the verse which I have quoted
will be fulfilled: 'They shall mount up with wings as eagles.' Communion
with God does not only help us to plod and to travel, but it helps us to
soar. If we keep ourselves in touch with Him, we shall be like a weight
that is hung on to a balloon. The buoyancy of the one will lift the
leadenness of the other. If we hold fast by Christ's hand that will lift
us up to the high places, the heights of God, in so far as we may reach
them in this world; and we shall be at home up there. They will be '_my_
high places,' that I never could have got at by my own scrambling, but
to which Thou hast lifted me up, and which, by Thy grace, have become my
natural abode. I am at home there, and walk at liberty in the loftiness,
and fear no fall amongst the cliffs.

Are you and I familiar with these upper ranges of thought and experience
and life? Do we feel at home there more than down in the bottoms,
amongst the swamps, and the miasma, and the mists? Where is your home,
brother? The Mass begins with _Sursum corda_: 'Up with your hearts,' and
that is the word for us. But the way to get up is to keep ourselves in
touch with Jesus Christ, and then He will, even whilst our feet are
travelling along this road of earth, set us at His own right hand in the
heavenly places, and make them '_our_ high places.' It is safe up there.
The ai