The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-12-07

ono even yet continue TO murmur.
multitude had been miraculously fed and
assembled on the following day to listen to
his words. He employed the incident to
impress new truth upon His disciples,
winch they were then and are now slow to
learn. Another sign is demanded, as If the
wonderful works of God had not shone in
the miracle OF the previous day. They ask
ior bread from heaven as their fathers had
received 1t, and hear a strange answer tina
they are not prepared to receive. Your
fathers did eat the mama in the wilder
ness and are dead. This is the bread which
cometh down out of heaven, that a man
may eat thereof and not die. am the Iy.
Ing bread which came down out of heaven ;
IL man eat Of this bread he shall live for
ever; yea, and the bread which will give
Is my flesh for the life of the world"
Many of these disciples failed to per-
ceive that He spoke in analogical words
and failing to drink of the spiritual foun-
tam erred from the truth and followed
HIM no more. Like their fathers who
drank of a spiritual rock that followed
them; and that Rock was Christ. How
belt with most Of them God was not well
pleased; for they were overthrow in the
wilderness" Let us not follow their fool
lsh example and fail of the grace of God.
Let US study further the figure employed
by the Son of Man.
Inc bread question supersedes every
other question of the day. tits the living.
actual. real, positive question that must
be met by every living person. 1t il an
issue that will not be put to silence. Rich
and poor, high and low, old and young
alike are compelled to recognize it. The
greatest calamities that befall nation are
Its lack of bread for its people. The heart
OF Russia is said to be sorely troubled on
this question today, while our shores are
being crowded with a pauper multitude
raising the cry for bread; multitude
fleeing to this land of plenty as the nations
fed to Egypt in other days. The bravest
heart faints when the bread fails finally.
think OF the hardy company who under
freely began few years ago
the polar explorations. How strong they
were, and how devoted. The prospect of
great labor and suffering did not daunt
them. On@and on, over mountains of
snow and ice, in perils by day and night
without murmur. Finally the supplies
were lost, hunger began to rage, the body
began to weaken. They were reduced to
the last extremity. Boots and garments
made from the skins of animals were
boiled and effort made to subsist on this.
They realized, as / do not wish to, the
bread necessity.
May | now suggest that Jesus meant to
tell the multitudes of their hopelessness
without Him? They had had access to
the greatest and purest fountain of truth
that had eyer been opened on earth. They
had been permitted to- dwell amid the
trees and flowers of q goodly land, read
and study the law of Moses under the
guidance of splendid rabbins, to hear the
warnings and foreshadowings of the great
est prophets, and to enjoy the goodly
providences of God. But with il all they
had wholly failed in meeting their own
souls cry for immortality. Death reigned,
and there was no sure hope that it would
not always reign. Their proudest mon
archs fell under its power, and all human
devices had been of no avail. The best Of
human character was tainted deep and
black with sin which no power on earth
could wash away.
Now came this Son Of Man to satisfy
this need and offer Himself as the solution
of all the spiritual problems affecting the
destiny of this and of all people. He is
the end of the law for righteousness to
every one that believeth. He fills the
measure of mans spiritual hunger and
satisfies his mouth with food, so that his
youth is renewed like the eagles. He re-
storeth his soul and maketh him to lie
down in green pastures. Under His power
men become better men and reach their
highest possibilities, life becomes infinitely
more charming and reaches out for higher,
hNI, and all Syxf,,
Christ is the bread of life.
In bearing the analogy further, observe
that daily and regular food is necessary to
the best development of the body and the
preservation Of health and strength. Few
persons have tried to live for protracted
period without the regular use of food at
frequent intervals; and the few have only
experimental at the expense of health
and strength. Regular and hard labor is
only possible to those who use food regu-
larry. So shall we find it in the use of
spiritual food. Those who endure are
those who recognize their daily need and
supply it. When Jesus taught His dis
cipies to pray He taught them to say:
"Give us this day our daily bread"
1t is in candor to be confessed that the
church has many wards who are not help
full, who call for much forbearance, who
need and demand constant nursing and
careful watching. Their spiritual muscle
is soft and their fiber coarse, but the cause
is easily traced-their food is not taken.
They are admirers Of DR.. Tanner, and ad-
vocate the forty days course. No wonder
they cannot bear the heat and burden of
the day, and faint before the trial reaches
them. The sturdy yeomanry of the
church that never grow weary, who cheer
fully bear its trials, pay its bills. attend its
services, maintain its good name, carry
forward its work, are found at the spiritual
feasts supplying the waste of strength and
RECALLING themselves with spirital deIica-
cles.
Again, we do well TO observe the charac-
ter of the food we eat. Disease and death
lie In the wake of improper food. If ply
sicians are interviewed on the source of
disease they refer much of 1t to improper
food. Children fed upon knick-knacks do
not wear the ruddy glow of health upon
the cheek. Nor can we hope from the use
of improper spiritual food that spiritual
health will follow. Tie Christ must
be received not IS n theory, not
as myth, not as good man
of history; but as food for the
soul, appropriated, assimilated, forming
the spiritual fiber in all the actual. real
manhood of every day. Allow that Christ
is 70 have his counterpart in every living
child of God. That His spirit is to inhabit
them. move them. inspire them 10 deeds of
charity and lives of purity. Let the ac-
cretions of fetichism die before the sunlight
Of His truth and the entity Of actual Chris
tian living. Let the weakness of the past
suffce As proof of the futiIity of the eti0r: