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BUT what shall I say of the firstfruits which surely are given daily by
all who serve Christ faithfully? For when men waking from sleep and arising
with renewed activity after their rest, before they take in any impulse or
thought in their heart, or admit any recollection or consideration of
business consecrate their first and earliest thoughts as divine offerings,
what are they doing indeed but rendering the firstfruits of their produce
through the High Priest Jesus Christ for the enjoyment of this life and a
figure of the daily resurrection? And also when roused from sleep in the
same way they offer to God a sacrifice of joy and invoke Him with the first
motion of their tongue and celebrate His name and praise, and throwing
open, the first thing, the door of their lips to sing hymns to Him they
offer to God the offices of their mouth; and to Him also in the same way
their bring the earliest offerings of their hands anti steps, when they
rise from bed and stand in prayer and before they use the services of their
limbs for their own purposes, take to themselves nothing of their services,
but for His glory advance their steps, and set them in His praise and so
render the first fruits of all their movements by stretching forth the
hands, bending the knees, and prostrating the whole body. For in no other
way can we fulfil that of which we sing in the Psalm: "I prevented the
dawning of the day and cried;" and: "Mine eves to Thee have prevented the
morning that I might meditate on Thy words;" and: "In the morning shall my
prayer prevent Thee;" unless after our rest in sleep when, as we said
above, we are restored as from darkness and death to this light, we have
the courage not to begin by taking any of all the services both of mind and
body for our own uses. For there is no other morning which the prophet
"prevented," or which in the same way we ought to prevent, except either
ourselves, i.e., our occupations and feelings and earthly cares, without
which we cannot exist--or the most subtle suggestions of the adversary,
which he tries to suggest to us, while still resting and overcome with
sleep, by the phantoms of vain dreams, with which, when we presently awake,
he will fill our minds and occupy us, that he may be the first to seize and
carry off the spoils of our firstfruits. Wherefore we must take the utmost
care (if we want to fulfil in act the meaning of the above quoted verse)
that an anxious watchfulness takes regard of our first and earliest morning
thoughts, that they may not be defiled beforehand being hastily taken
possession of by our jealous adversary, and thus he may make our
firstfruits to be rejected by the Lord as worthless and common. And if he
is not prevented by us with watchful circumspection of mind, he will not
lay aside his habit of miserably anticipating us nor cease day after day to
prevent us by his wiles. And therefore if we want to offer firstfruits that
are acceptable and well pleasing to God of the fruits of our mind, we ought
to spend no ordinary care to keep all the senses of our body, especially
during the hours of the morning, as a sacred holocaust to the Lord pure and
undefiled in all things. And this kind of devotion many even of those who
live in the world observe with the utmost care, as they rise before it is
light or very early, and do not at all mix in the ordinary and necessary
business of this world before hastening to church and striving to
consecrate in the sight of God the firstfruits of all their actions and
doings.
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