The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-11-26
International
SundaySchoolLesson
By WILLIAM t. ELLIS.


| =
| For Nov rs is, How Jesus Was Re-
| ceived- Matthew IL.
Sorrows of the Mighty.
Did you ever sit on a rail fence
and talk politics with farmer? Is
| there single man whom you meet
as an equal or as a friend. who wears
| overalls and has callouses on his
! hands?"
Such was the challenge recently
hurled at an eminent politician by
an intense young lawyer, who had
himself come up thru the ranks OF
mill workers. The query is a pune
| turing one. and entirely fair.
Too many leaders have theories,
| but do not know folks. This is the
| Indictment that lies over against a
! large proportion of our .intellectuals."
| They are out of touch with real peo-
pie, and With life's hard actualities.
In the stern times that humanity is
now facing. the call is for the homely
qualities of loyalty to what is actual
Our aroused world will only, follow
men who can be called ''comrade."
| Philosophers and theorists go into the
discard nowadays because they are
usually detached from the everyday
ness of experience which presses upon
the big crowd of us.
Right here is where Jesus parts
company with all other leaders of hu-
mainly He was no distraught Bud
dha, sitting apart from and repudi-
ating lifes actualities. All the ex-
periences common to the average man
were shared by Him. He was tested
one of mans infirmities touched His
\ understanding heart. Loneliness,
tweariness, hunger, thirst, misunder-
Istanding-it was a heavy yoke his
shoulders bore. We find Jesus in this
lesson an itinerant preacher anc
1 n lor n all ha hnf n
burdens and joys of the life of a true
minister to fiesh-and-bl folk.
| The Carpenters Verse.
This fellowship of the Master with
| the common run of us is of most
i vital importance today. 1t makes
Him the one acceptable leader of
our world in the re-making. Rebel
under the belief that they have not
been understood or appreciated by
Igoverning classes and by 'intellec-
ltuals,' find, when He is fairly pre-
scented to them that Jesus really meets
their needs. The beautiful devotion
of an English woEkingman to the Car
/ penter of Nazareth has been glowingly
depressed in homely verse:
/" Isn't this Joseph's son?' Aye, it is He.
Joseph. the carpenter, same trade as
| mel
1 thought as I'd find it, I knew it was
But my sights getting queer.
II don't know. right where as His shed
| But often as I've been planning my wood,
I've took off my hat just with thinking
OF He
At the same work as me.
He warn't that set up that He couldn I
And work in the country for folks in the
| A. i Tnn H. e.. 1T. ,.,-.
| I've done,
At good job begun.
Il think of as how not the parsen hissen,
AS is teacher and father and shepherd of
men,
| Not he knowsas much of the Lord insthat
Where He earned His own bread
| misunderstanding a Man.
| ITO be great is to be misunder-
stood" One of the tragedies of sue
cess is that the farther a man adj
fvances, the less sympathetically he is
| Regarded even by those who have
cause to honor him most. Mankind
has ever gone back on its noblest rep
resentatiVes. Every age has illus
trated this: our own day has it's con-
spicuous instances. Even the prophet
| who introduced Jesus to the public,
and who voached for His divine mis-
sion, came to a period of doubt and
l
| have been mistaken. So John sent
representatives to ask whether the
| Galilean was the One Who Was To
Come, or whether they should look for
another
| Alas for our clouded visions; and for
the fogs that arise between friend and
friendl Much bitterness has it's root in
| simple misunderstanding. Consider
the heaviness of heart in which the
imprisoned Baptizer sent his inquiry
and the equal depression of spirit in
which Christ must have received 1t;
for of all meg on earth, He priced
Johns love and loyalty most. If mis-
understandings could arise between
John and Jesus, how slow we should
be to Judge harshly our fellow men.
Nixon Waterman's familiar lines are
| in point:
IF knew you as YOU know me-
| If both OF us could clearly see,
| And with inner sight divine
| The meaning of your heart and mine,
| I'm sure that we would differ less
| And clasp our hands in friendltuess:
| Our thoughts would pleasantly agree
| If knew You and you knew me.
| sIf knew you aud you knew me.
| As each one knows HIS own self. we
| Gould look each other in the face
| And see therein a tFuer grace.
| Life has so MANY hidden woes,
| So many thorns for every rose;
| The why of things our hearts would see,
| If / knew you and you knew me-
| When His authority was questioned
and here is a suggestion of value to
| the rest of us-Jesus did not enter
| into long. elaborate and heated de-
| Tense of Himself. He simply pointed
to His life and His work. If His
character and conduct did not vindi-
| cate Him, nothing else could. GO and
report to John what you see and hear,
replied u esus; blind eyes receive sight,
and cripples walk; lepers are cleansed,
and deaf ears hear; the dead are
| raised to life, and the poor have the
Good News proclaimed to them"
Christianity appeals to its fruits.
As Sturgeon once said. in preaching
upon Elijah's contest with the priests
of Baal, the God that answereth by
/ orphanages, let him be God!" What
| Christ is doing in the world today. in