Part 37 (2/2)

Distributed bread has a sacramental efficacy for our own souls. The man who feeds the hungry shall himself be ”satisfied as with marrow.”

And these ways of service are open on every side. There are millions of weary people waiting, like the woman at the well. ”_Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields: for they are white already to harvest!_” Be it mine to be a minister in the mighty service, and in the ways of obedience let me find delights and delicacies for my own soul.

”Bread of Heaven, Feed me till I want no more!”

AUGUST The Fifth

_BROOKS BY THE WAY_

ISAIAH xii.

The wells of the Lord are to be found where most I need them. The Lord of the way knows the pilgrim life, and the wells have been unsealed just where the soul is p.r.o.ne to become dry and faint. At the foot of the hill Difficulty was found a spring! Yes, these health-springs are lifting their crystal flood in the cheerless wastes of evil antagonisms and exhausting grief.

Sometimes I am foolish, and in my need I a.s.sume that the well is far away.

I knew a farmer who for a generation had carried every pail of water from a distant well to meet the needs of his homestead. And one day he sunk a shaft by his own house door, and to his great joy he found that the water was waiting at his own gate! My soul, thy well is near, even here! Go not in search of Him! Thy pilgrimage is ended, the waters are at thy feet!

But I must ”_draw_ the water out of the wells of salvation.” The hand of faith must lift the gracious gift to the parched lips, and so refresh the panting soul. ”I will _take_ the cup of salvation.” Stretch out thy ”lame hand of faith,” and take the holy, hallowing energy offered by the Lord.

AUGUST The Sixth

_WATERS OF CONTENTMENT_

ISAIAH lv. 1-7.

The refres.h.i.+ng waters are offered to ”everyone” that is thirsty. The evangel is like some clear bugle peal, sounded on some commanding upland, and which is heard alike in palace and cottage, in school and at the mill, by the child of plenty and by the child of want. ”Ho, everyone!” The appeal is to the common heart, whether the setting be squalor or splendour, whether the soul faints in the glare of the prosperous noon, or under the chill of the burdensome night. ”Ho, everyone that thirsteth!”

And the waters may be ours ”without money and without price.” We have not to earn them by the sweat of body, mind, or soul. We have not to make a toilsome pilgrimage, on bleeding feet, to some distant Lourdes, where the sacred healer abides. No, we are asked to pay nothing, and for the simple reason that we ”have nothing wherewith to pay.” The reviving grace is given to us ”freely,” and all that we have to present is our thirst.

And yet we spend and spend, we labour and labour, but we buy no bread of contentment, and the waters of satisfaction are far away. The satisfying bread cannot be bought; it can only be begged. The water of life cannot be taken from a cistern; it must be drunk at the spring.

AUGUST The Seventh

_RIVERS FROM THE SNOW_

REVELATION xxii. 1-7, 17-21.

The water of life flows out of the throne. Grace has its rise in sovereign holiness. This river is born amid the virgin snow. All true love springs out of spotless purity. ”Love” from any other source is illegitimately wearing a stolen name. ”Holy, holy, holy is the Lord!” That is the first note in the song of redemption. In that burning whiteness I discern the possibility of my own sanctification.

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