The log cabin Democrat., 1916-04-15
REST AND REFRESH
Well for All Christians That They
 Shall Take Time to Sit at the Feet of Jesus.

do not like many of the bold and obtrusive contrasts which have been built upon the viyidly depicted and ia. miliar scene revealed by St. Luke. l think they have been unwise and un. justifiable contrasts, many of them bearing hardly upon Mary, and others of them bearing with equal hardship upon Martha. The contrasts have been too sharp and definite. We can not separate the two characters like two sharply opposed and glaringly an. tagonistic colors. They are not like two strips of ribbon, one perfectly white and the other perfectly black; think we should find that each ribbon shades off into a gray where they both become one. Let us be careful that in our exposition we are unjust to neither.
 Let me give an interpretation. Mary had chosen the good part" because it included Martha's. A pound is bet. ter than a penny because it includes it. Mary both sat and served, she communed and labored, she had part. nership with her Lord and ministry for her fellows. Where have we got our assumption that Mary was always sitting and reading and moping! There was no buster woman in all Bethany than Mary! Where have we got our impression that the devout are the indolent, and that the prayerful are the inactive? Mary knew when sitting would help the running. She was nev- CT afraid of seeming to waste time in order to save it. Martha was so afraid of wasting time that there was a con- stant leakage of her power. Mary knew that for all her competent activi- ty it was needful to sit at the Masters feet. And so Mary's part included Marthas; she chose the good part which shall not be taken away from her.
 The Real Lesson.
 Now, what is the lesson of all this? Surely we are taught that deep com. munion with the Lord is the secret of all effective service of men. Do ing" is mparatively easy, but eff cient doing" demands the infinite. Why, in the very instance before us Martha's doing might have been much better done! There are signs of nerv. ous waste about her, of hot intensity, of irritableness and irritation. The woman Is overwrought. The Lord him. self describes her as distracted and
 
 ing. and her very doing is like the fir. ing of an ill-directed and feebly han. died gun. What does Martha need? She needs to sit down! Ay, but she must sit in the right place. At Jesus feet, to hear his word.'
 And there is still further advan- tage reaped from this retirement into the presence of God. We get a truer sense of the bustling about amid the manifold and clamant duties of the day, giving ourselves no time for thought, we are apt to lose the en- phasis of things, and mountains be- come valleys, and valleys are lifted up to the height of mountains.
 Now, quiet withdrawal from the bustling scene gives us the quiet eye" and we see things as they are. They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength they shall mount up with wings as eagles"
 All the best workers in the kingdom find time to sit at Jesus feet. We get our fighting power in the green pastures. The good part is not the gracious prerogative of few, some thing apart, of which the majority have been deprived. The Lord s good part is for everybody.-Rev. J. H. Jowett, DID.