Broken Bread Part 14

LOOK IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION,

"Toward the sea." Do not go towards the dry land if you want rain, or in other words, if you want success in soul-saving, look not for it from those who get up entertainments and seek to make money by gambling in bazaars. Do not expect conversions from mere eloquence or rhetoric.

Large congregations do not always mean abiding success. Beautiful chapels are not always remarkable for attracting those who need a Saviour. Look at the place from whence Wesley, Whitfield, and the others who were to win souls derived their power.

DO NOT LET FAITH BE CHILLED BY WAITING!

If you wait upon the Lord you have a right to be of good courage. "They shall not be ashamed that wait for Me, saith the Lord." If our trust is in the Lord, we can afford to wait. The longer He keeps us waiting, the more He will give us. Never mind if the servant says, "There is nothing." It is not the Master's voice. Go again. Don't talk to me of nothing! Go again! Leave me to pray in peace till there is something to praise G.o.d for.

I CAN PRAISE HIM FOR THE SMALLEST SIGN.

Only "a man's hand," sayest thou? but what Man? It is the same Hand that wrote on the wall the sentence of Belshazzar. It is the Hand of which David sang "Thou openest Thine Hand and satisfiest the desire of every living thing." We who look for Jesus remember that when He left us He did not clench His fist at the world that had treated Him so ill. "He lifted up his hands and blessed them." He has not closed them yet, but sends blessings on even the rebellious. Faith sees in the open hand of Jesus the promise of great gifts for those who wait upon Him. We read, directly, "the heaven was black, and there was a great rain."

If we pa.s.s over a few years we see the end of these men, the end so far as this world is concerned. They both ride in chariots. He who rose up to eat and drink, rides disguised, but is not able to deceive the winged messengers of death. The murderer is found out, and dies in his chariot.

GOES TO h.e.l.l IN HIS CHARIOT!

So perish those who prefer to eat when others starve, though they might unite with those who bring blessings on the perishing!

A year afterwards, the man who prayed walks along the road; there is one by his side who watches him with eager glance, and now comes the chariot of heaven.

G.o.d SENDS HIS CARRIAGE TO MEET

the man who climbed the hill to pray, and soon he is parted from his young friend; but see! his mantle falls. Which of us will pick it up and wear it? Elijah's garment will fit any of us, and will always be new if we pray. It grows threadbare and shabby when worn by those who prefer the table to the altar, and love the pleasures of the world better than the companionship of angels.

My brothers, shall we not become mighty in prayer? This is a talent all have received, put it out to interest at once. Lose no time in its use.

Satan will gladly lend you a napkin, but then he will have your soul as the pledge. To cease to pray is to drift towards h.e.l.l. Is there not a needs be for crying mightily to G.o.d? Can we look around our congregations and not feel that it is high time we went up the hill to cry to G.o.d for the rain that means revival? Let us each ask the question, Am I most like the man who lived to gratify his desires, or the man who lived to pray for others?

WITH WHOM SHALL I SPEND MY ETERNITY, WITH ELIJAH OF AHAB?

If the angels see us on our face, crying for rain, they will know that some day they will have to meet us and take us home in the chariot of fire. If they see that we are those who eat and drink when they should pray, they will know that our possessions, like Ahab's chariot, will become a hea.r.s.e, and that we are riding to h.e.l.l in that which we have chosen for comfort.

x.x.xVII. "THE WIDOW WOMAN WAS THERE."

I KINGS xvii. 10.

Of course she was. All G.o.d's trains meet at the junction. They don't have to wait for one another. Elijah had left Cherith because the brook had dried up, and his first request shewed that he was in need of water.

The poor widow seems to have been relieved that water was all the prophet asked, but he called to her to fetch a bit of bread as well. This broke her down. "Ah, Master, we have not so much as a cake. I have only a handful of meal, and I had come out to gather some sticks that I might bake a little cake for me and the lad, and then we shall have to die of hunger!"

"Never fear, G.o.d has sent me, and with His servant there shall come a blessing.

MAKE ME A CAKE FIRST,

and then make for thyself, and G.o.d will keep on supplying our wants."

The woman did so, and never wanted. If she had gone on the principle of

TAKE CARE OF NUMBER ONE,

she would soon have been in her grave, and the lad too, but the way to live is to care for others. "He that loseth his life shall save it."

While we are writing this, we are thinking of the great number who all through these bad times have fed the Preachers and their horses. G.o.d will see to it that they do not lose by their unselfishness.

Some will read this who are just on the point of leaving a place where G.o.d has cared for them, but they do not see their way in the future. Are you going on G.o.d's errand? That is, are you in the path of duty? Then never fear. Ravens can wait at table as well as any tailed-coated white- cravatted serving man. And widows with only a handful of meal, can keep open house for G.o.d's servants. My G.o.d shall supply all your need, and the less there is in the barrel, the more room for G.o.d's hand!

"IT IS THE BLOOD THAT SAVES."

EXODUS xii.

The Israelites were not saved because they were children of Abraham, but because they followed the plan of salvation. Even Moses "kept the pa.s.sover and the sprinkling of blood," or there would have been a dead man in the house. If you and I are saved, it must be by the blood of the Lamb. The father who put the blood on his door posts was not ashamed to own his need of Divine protection, or that he trusted the word of G.o.d.

There is a false sentimentality that is abroad to-day, which would make us ashamed to speak of the atonement. We are told that it is sickening to hear of such terms as "The Blood of Jesus."

WHAT IS THE STANDARD OF TASTE?

We know of nothing higher than the word of G.o.d, and he whose fine feelings are shocked by Bible language, would find heaven not sufficiently aesthetic. May not such be said to count the blood of the covenant an unholy thing? When the destroyer is abroad, we shall be safe who hide behind the blood. We rejoice in the blood of sprinkling, when we believe there is wrath for the sinner. The giving G.o.d the lie, when He declares He will punish His enemies, fits the mouth of him who is too refined to speak of the precious blood of Jesus.

x.x.xVIII. "DO MEN GATHER GRAPES OF THORNS?"

This question was asked by a man who knew more than any one else, and he knew very well what the answer would be. We should suspect a man of insanity who looked for grapes on a thorn bush. And yet we see numbers of both men and women looking for happiness and comfort in the Public House, and judging from their appearance afterwards, we feel sure they went for grapes and found festering thorns!

It was our duty, some time ago, to be part of a deputation to support a memorial to the Magistrates at what is called "The Brewster Sessions."

There was a number of Ministers and others who represent the Temperance movement, with some ladies like-minded, and we took our places in the same court where the publicans and their friends were. Some of these had come to transfer licenses, others to seek to have in-beershops, and power to sell other kinds of drink. The Magistrates, however, refused both of the applications for new licenses, nor did we wonder, when we saw those who were waiting to be punished or pardoned, as the case might be.

In the gallery were a number of the friends of those who were waiting to have their names called upon, and then to appear in the dock. Besides these, were the usual loafers, many of whom have found, or will find work for the police, after going to seek grapes where thorns grow: and then others, like the writer, who were on the lookout for a profitable way to spend an hour or two. It was a most instructive time, and one wonders how it is that long-headed Englishmen can, after seeing the results of visiting the publichouse, ever be persuaded that grapes are to be got there without trouble.

The mistake many good people make is looking on drinking as a failing, and not as a crime. It must be a sin for any one to make himself eligible for doing all sorts of mischief and wrong, as men do who take, as they say, "a sup of drink." It is this sup of drink that gives them the impetus towards cruelty and l.u.s.t, and we must insist upon it that for a man to prepare himself for wickedness is a sin against himself and his G.o.d. If this be so, the social element in drinking makes it all the more dangerous. Men and women drink often because it is considered a kind and hospitable thing to offer it, and an ungenerous and churlish thing to refuse it. What is this but calling a thorn a vine?

While we were in the court, several cases came before the Magistrates--"Drunk and Disorderly," varied by obscenity and quarrelling.

One woman told the Bench that she had been teetotal for five and a half years, till she came into the town to pay a debt, and then she had a gla.s.s, "and it will be twenty years before I have any more." "Ah!" said "His Worship,"

"LISTEN TO NO FRIEND THAT WANTS YOU TO TAKE DRINK."

Another poor wretch was "Drunk and Incapable." She told the Magistrates that she had come to get a situation, that her box was at the station.

She had evidently seen better days. The Chairman said how sorry he was to see a woman like her, evidently a superior person, in such a case, and she gladly promised to be a better woman, but she had been more than once to the thorn for grapes, and we fear will go again. There was a young fellow brought up for drunkenness and obscenity, whose fine was paid by his mother. She looked a decent but poor woman, and one could not but wonder what she had parted with to raise the money, to keep what one of the Magistrates called a blackguard, out of prison. But what will not a mother's love do! These are a few of the cases which made us wonder that in our town we have so many places, licensed by the same Magistrates, to sell that which fits men and women to appear in the court to be punished.

We wonder how long it will take to make the English people see that so long as we allow drinking shops to abound, there will be a necessity for police and lock-ups, and that it is as easy to gather grapes of thorns as to expect peace and quietness and facilities for drinking to exist together?

G.o.d'S ANGER IS A FIRE THAT IS AS DIFFICULT TO STOP AS TO START.