We are as a tiny shell on the beach. By Charles Spurgeon. Isaiah chapter 64, verse 3. You did awesome deeds beyond our highest expectations. The history of Israel is a series of surprises and unexpected mercies. It has been even more so in God's works of grace. See what God has done for us in His matchless mercy.

After our first parents fell into sin, could any onlooking angel have imagined in all this, that God intended to display the greatness of His mercy, so that where sin abounded, grace should much more abound? Did any seraph ever imagine that the Son of God would come down to be born into this rebellious race? Did it ever enter into their conception? that He would die, the just for the unjust, to bring sinful men to God. Was it ever thought of that wicked and rebellious men should be adopted into the family of God?

This was an honor that we did not expect. Moreover, God having made us to be His children, did we ever imagine that He would make us His heirs? Yet He says, now if we are children, then we are heirs, heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ. Did it ever enter into an angel's mind to conceive that every Christian would be married to Jesus, wedded to Him in bonds of everlasting love? Did it ever enter the dreams of any intelligent being that God would lift up poor, fallen man to sit with Jesus on His throne in glory?

This is astonishing. When our Lord takes us up into glory, how amazed we shall be. To talk about that glory now ravishes us, but to be in it, flooded with it, filled with it, crowned with it, this will be overwhelming. Surely we shall need stronger bodies and hearts, better than those which we now have, more able to endure the far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

How is it that we continue to be surprised at what God does for those who love Him? Because our largest conceptions of God fall short of the infinite reality. Ah, my brother, you do not know the heights and depths, the lengths and breadths of His wondrous love. God is infinite. We are as a tiny shell on the beach. We cannot hold the ocean, and therefore the measureless sea must always be a marvel to us. Therefore there must be in God's workings a great deal yet to come, of which poor, short-lived insects like ourselves can have no idea. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. Colossians chapter 3, verse 4.