a higher life to which they are as insensible as the inanimate stone is to the life of the bird.  You are one of God’s “hidden ones,” and a stranger on the earth, because you are unknown.  You are not found in the halls of worldly pleasure, but instead are to be found by the bedside of the sick, reading the Bible, praying, or speaking words of cheer and comfort, and the world wonders how you can enjoy yourself in such a way.  You have a joy that is unknown to them, because you have a life that is hidden from them.  That life of yours which is hid with Christ in God finds no enjoyment in the pleasures of the world.

When adversity comes the world does not understand how it is that you can rejoice; and when circumstances are very unfavorable, how you can be happy is a mystery to them.  It is because you do not live in the things of the world, but in a much higher realm.  If your life is hid with Christ in God, your heart’s longings will be for the things above; all your affections will be on things above.  Those who live upon earth are seeking the things of earth; but those who live above in God seek the things which are above.  Nothing of earth has any charms for them.  Christ has won their hearts.  They love him intensely.  They live in him.  They are sojourning here upon earth for a time, but their hearts are with Christ in heaven.  Their home, their love, their treasures, their hopes, their thoughts, their life,—­all are there, and they are seeking with eagerness for more of that sweet, precious life which is from above.  They walk here almost like one in a dream, as concerning this world; they know but little of earth, but much of heaven.

This earth is not my home,
  I live above,
Where peace and joys abound—­
  Sweet land of love.

My life is hid in God
  With Christ the Son,
Though here on earth I am
  By earth unknown.

I dwell in worlds above,
  By thought and prayer—­
Oh, blest eternal home! 
  My heart is there.

CONSCIOUSNESS OF GOD’S PRESENCE.

Happy and blessed is the soul that is conscious of God’s sweet indwelling presence.  Being conscious of God’s presence is what the Psalmist meant when he said, “O taste and see that the Lord is good.”  “Tasting God” is an expression incomprehensible to the unregenerate.  Those who have tasted him comprehend the meaning of this expression better than they can tell it.  When a bit of sugar is placed upon the tongue there is experienced a sweetness in the sense of taste.  When the soul tastes of God there is experienced a sweetness in the spiritual being.  The sweetness of God’s presence in the soul is as much more glorious than the sweetness of sugar to the taste as spiritual and heavenly things are above literal and earthly things.  God and his word are inseparable, or the word is God; therefore when the Psalmist says, “How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth,” it is in reality tasting the sweetness of God.