Offering Our Firstfruits to the Lord

But what shall I say of the firstfruits, which are surely given every day by all who serve Christ faithfully? When people wake from sleep and rise with fresh energy after their rest, and, before they take in any impulse or thought in their heart, or admit any memory or consideration of business, consecrate their first and earliest thoughts as divine offerings, what are they doing but rendering the firstfruits of their produce through the High Priest Jesus Christ, for the enjoyment of this life and as a figure of the daily resurrection? So too, when they are roused from sleep in the same way, they offer God a sacrifice of joy. They call on him with the first movement of their tongue and celebrate his name and praise, and, throwing open the door of their lips first of all to sing hymns to him, they offer God the service of their mouth. To him, in the same way, they bring the earliest offerings of their hands and steps. When they rise from bed and stand in prayer, before they use the service of their limbs for their own purposes, they take nothing of that service for themselves. They move their steps forward for his glory and set them in his praise, and so render the firstfruits of all their movements by stretching out their hands, bending their knees, and lying prostrate with the whole body. For in no other way can we fulfill what we sing in the Psalm: “I came before the dawning of the day and cried out”; and, “My eyes came before the morning, that I might meditate on your words”; and, “In the morning my prayer will come before you.” We can fulfill it only if, after our rest in sleep, when, as I said above, we are brought back as from darkness and death to this light, we have the courage not to begin by taking any of all the services of mind and body for our own uses. [a]

For there is no other morning that the prophet “came before,” or that we in the same way ought to come before, except either ourselves, that is, our occupations and feelings and earthly cares, without which we cannot exist, or else the very subtle suggestions of the adversary. These he tries to plant in us while we are still resting and overcome by sleep, through the phantoms of empty dreams, so that when we presently wake he may fill our minds and occupy us with them, and be the first to seize and carry off the spoils of our firstfruits. So, if we want to fulfill in deed the meaning of the verse quoted above, we must take the greatest care that an anxious watchfulness guards our first and earliest morning thoughts. Otherwise our jealous adversary may defile them beforehand by hastily taking possession of them, and so make the Lord reject our firstfruits as worthless and common. And if we do not come before him with watchful care of mind, he will not give up his habit of wretchedly getting in ahead of us, nor cease day after day to come before us with his tricks. Therefore, if we want to offer God firstfruits of the fruits of our mind that are acceptable and well pleasing to him, we must take no ordinary care, especially in the morning hours, to keep all the senses of our body pure and undefiled in everything, as a sacred whole burnt offering to the Lord. Many even of those who live in the world observe this kind of devotion with the greatest care. They rise before it is light, or very early, and do not mix at all in the ordinary and necessary business of this world before they have hurried to church and tried to consecrate in the sight of God the firstfruits of all their actions and doings.