Deliver me from leanness, O Lord...

This was my C.H. Spurgeon devotional today. The words just arrested me with its metaphorical brilliance and spiritual insights that I needed to hear and chew on. May this minister to you as well...

~Sita~

"The illfavoured and leanfleshed kine did eat up the seven wellfavoured and fat kine."

Genesis 41:4

Pharaoh's dream has too often been my waking experience.

My days of sloth have ruinously destroyed

all that I had achieved in times of zealous industry;

my seasons of coldness have frozen all the genial glow

of my periods of fervency and enthusiasm;

and my fits of worldliness have thrown me back

from my advances in the divine life.

I had need to beware of

lean prayers,

lean praises,

lean duties,

and lean experiences,

for these will eat up the fat of my comfort and peace.

If I neglect prayer for never so short a time,

I lose all the spirituality to which I had attained;

if I draw no fresh supplies from heaven,

the old corn in my granary is soon consumed

by the famine which rages in my soul.

When the caterpillars of indifference,

the cankerworms of worldliness,

and the palmerworms of self-indulgence,

lay my heart completely desolate,

and make my soul to languish,

all my former fruitfulness and growth in grace

avails me nothing whatever.

How anxious should I be to have no lean-fleshed days,

no ill-favoured hours!

If every day I journeyed towards the goal of my desires

I should soon reach it,

but backsliding leaves me still far off

from the prize of my high calling,

and robs me of the advances

which I had so laboriously made.

The only way in which all my days can be as the "fat kine,"

is to feed them in the right meadow,

to spend them with the Lord,

in His service,

in His company,

in His fear,

and in His way.

Why should not every year be richer than the past,

in love, and usefulness, and joy?

-I am nearer the celestial hills,

I have had more experience of my Lord,

and should be more like Him.

O Lord, keep far from me the curse of leanness of soul;

let me not have to cry,

"My leanness, my leanness, woe unto me!"

but may I be well-fed and nourished in Thy house,

that I may praise Thy Name.

How about you?

Are you experiencing leanness right now? Do you need prayer?

Are you well nourished, willing to share?