THE K I N G ’ S BUS I NE S S naments in the Orient. They are con sidered as symbols of precious things especially the wise sayings of sages and philosophers. Pearls resemble some kinds qf grain which are fed to swine. The smaller kinds of pearls are called- seed pearls. The figure in the parable may suggest something like this. A man comes with a basket of seed pearls which he casts into the swine trough. The greedy pigs, hav ing no sense of humor, are greatly en raged at finding the hard stones be tween their teeth instead of the soft, succulent grain. They turn upon the man and rend him with their tusks, trampling thé deceptive pearls under their feet. The first warning is “ Do not give holy things to unholy per sons,” and the second, “ Do not give things of great price to those who can not appreciate their value.” WEDNESDAY, Oct. 27. Matt. 7:18-20. Known by Their Fruits. In every age the true and the false have existed side by side. The Scrip tures have many a warning against false teachers and false doctrines. How can We distinguish the true from the false, the wheat from the tares? There is one infallible test, “ By their fruits,” Fruit is the mature manifestation of life. The original law of reproduction is unchanged in the moral and mate rial world. “ After its kind.” Gen. 1:12. The nature of the tree is re vealed in its fruit. This is the rule to test all religious teaching and pro fession. There is a vital connection between inward faith and , outward fruit, Jesus submitted to this same test. “ If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not.” Christianity invites testing and experiment. “ Come and see.” It presents the highest and purest ideals of character and life. THURSDAY, Oct. 28. Matt. 7:21-23. Profession and Possession. Whenever Christianity becomes the accepted standard of a community, there are many who make a profession of religion in order to stand with thé majority. Profession does not save no matter how orthodox and complete the creed may be. It is the doing of God’s will that determines one’s standing in His sight. His will is made known through His Spirit and Word. How could those whom the Lord declares He never knew, accomplish such results?
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that Christians hare never seriously undertaken to translate the teaching into daily life. What iB the solution of the problem? Taking for granted that Christ meant His words to be obeyed, we may freely admit that it is impossible for the natural man to do so. The spiritual man, however, has an inward Divine dynamic which en ables him to actualize an otherwise impossible ideal. Gal. 5:16. It is necessary at all times to he clear as to what Christ meant and to dis tinguish between the letter of a com mand and the essential spirit of it, re membering that the letter killeth hut the spirit giveth life. MONDAY, Oct. 25. Matt. 7:1-5. The Splinter and the Rafter. If you were suffering from a speck of dust in your eye and someone should offer to extract it, and just as he was about to do so, you should see a great beam projecting from his own eye, would you judge him specially qualified for the task? Would you not say rather, “ Physician, heal thyself” ? Our Lord implies that those who carry a rafter in their own eye deem them selves most competent to remove splin ters from their neighbor’s eyes. In the moral world a rafter in the eye ac tually sharpens the eyesight. To have committed a fault does make us more sensitive to the faults of others- ^To have sinned opens our eyes to things of which we were before unconscious. The bigger the beam in our own eye, the more quickly do we detect the smallest splinter in our brother’s eye. On thiB account the devil is the master critic. Moreover, the rafter in our eye casts such a shadow into other eyes that we see splinters that are purely imaginary and so we make the blem ish that we could not find. Who will listen to a sinner rebuking sin? If in rebuking sin he affects a righteousness he does not have, who would not scorn both him and his rebuke? TUESDAY, Oct. 26. Matt. 7:6-12. The Pearls and the Pigs. That which is holy or more literally, “ the holy things,” refer ,to the sacri ficial meats upon the altar. To a Jew ish mind it would seem sacrilege for a priest to throw these holy meats to the dogs in the streets. Pearls are among the most prized and valued or
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