The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1910-01-14

- .sAl Liverpool docks
to find a prime
minister, or President Taft searching
among the fishermen of Marblehead
for a Secretary of State.
Yet that is precisely what the King
of This kingdom did. He deliberately
| passed by the wise, and influential
and mighty and took the majority of
his earthly cabinet from the fishing
boats of Galilee. Imagine the scene.
In the background the lake in the
grey morning, the mist slowly rising,
the deserted boats drawn up on the
shore An old man. Zebedee, standing
with bewildered look upon his face,
trying to imagine what he would do
without his sons, and what they would
do without him; and in the foreground
hve men walking along, four of them
without the least idea of where they
were going or of what they were GO
Ing to do. That is the beginning of
the kings cabinet, Could anything be
| more ridiculous? Doubtless other
fishermen talked it over among them
selves that day and said, Simon Pet
er and Andrew, James and John have
left their nets and gone off after that
man, Jesus of Nazareth, who imagines
himself king. He has made them
believe that he is the Jewish Messiah
and that he is to set up the kingdom
of heaven upon earth, and they have
forsaken everything and gone off on
FOOLS errand after him. Well. They
will soon realize their mistake, they
will be back again. Fortunate for
them Zebedee will keep the fishing
boats and the tackle. that they may
have something to fall back upon
when they discover how they have
been deluded"
1t Is almost impossible for us to real
ize what it meant in those days, to
those people, when Christ made up
his cabinet. Where was there ever
such a beginning? How could any
thing be more ridiculous in worldly
eyes-weakness in the Leader who
had such dreams of universal domin-
ion, weakness in the followers to
leave a paying business of which they
knew so much to take up a stupendous
task of which they knew absolutely
nothing.
And yet, as we look back upon that
scene, We recognize it now as one of
the grandest and most logical begin
nings the world has ever seen. No
wonder Paul says of it, God hath
chosen the foolish things of the world
to confound the wise, and God hath
chosen the weak things of the world
to confound the things that are
mighty, that no flesh should glory in
His presence"
The trouble with almost all men
who enter the service OF Christ is that
they have so much to unlearn before
know so many things that are not So
they are so much in love with their
own ideas and opinions, they have
such an overwhelming conviction of
their own importance, that they
consciously taint the water Of life
| with their own personalities, and hide
I their Master behind themselves. They
| are not satisfied to deliver His mes.
sage until they have rewritten 1t and
taken the heart out of it with their
! explanations, which do not explain
| The kings cabinet was not troubled
! with any of these things. They were
| to be witnesses unto Him and they
/ knew no more than to intelligently re.
! peat just what they had seen and
! heard. They never attempted to
! argue a case, they took the witness
box and unfinchingly told just exact.
| ly what they knew of Christ They
/ had nothing to unlearn, they were not
! troubled with the intellectual, social,
! spiritual, moral, political, sectarian
! difficulties of the high-browed profes-
sors and workings of their day. Their
minds were like unsoiled paper on
which the King could write his mes
sages to suit Himself. They carried
the seed of the kingdom in untainted
vessels, and all they had to do was to
SOW it far and wide. They were to be
merely the echo of His voice without
any attempt to originate ideas or to
speak their own message. AS timer
ant preachers whose work would de,
mand physical stamina and oblivious-
ness of weather conditions, those
brawny. sun-burned, rugged Galilee
fishermen were ideal timber for the
sills OF the spiritual temple Christ was
about to erect. The more one thinks
of it, the more one comes to realize
that when the King formed His cabi-
net He showed His infinite wisdom in
the selection Of the men who were to
carry on His work in the development
of His kingdom. No wonder the apos
tie in describing the church long after
ward said. "We are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and
prophets. Jesus Christ, Himself, be
ing the chief corner stone"