433
September 1929
T h e
K i n g ’ s
B u s i n e s s
virtue. The meaning given is that of a strong, clear-minded endurance, despite initial lack of success—the virtue of one who is ready to breast the blows of circumstance and win through to better things. Without a patience such as this we shall carry nothing through to full fruition. Hasty and ill-considered action—often because men and women are unready to think and to pray and to meditate until the way is clear—is productive in the last analysis of nothing really good. “Nothing would make him hurry a work,” says the biographer of Burne-Jones, the artist. He knew that “art is long.” So are the best results in other spheres. The apparent ease displayed by those who can do things is the usual result of a patient continuance in effort. The preacher, Christian worker, and reformer may rest assured that his patient continuance in well-doing will secure its reward in God’s good time. So “in patience possess ye your souls.” Men and women of the Church, you have need of patience.— Selected. .áte. M O u r O ne O p p o r tu n ity There is not a moment that passes that does not bring with it one or more opportunities to do good or to do evil. Life is full of opportunities, which we may improve to our good or neglect to our injury. In another sense, this whole world presents to us the sum total of one opportunity, and only one, which we may improve to our everlasting bliss or neglect to our everlasting woe. Turning to 1 Cor. 6:19, we read: “Ye are not your own.” Reason: “Ye are bought with a price.” We are apt to get the idea that it is because of the purchase price paid for our souls—the precious blood of Jesus—that we are not our own. But did it ever occur to you that even before we were thus purchased we were not our own? Compare 1 Cor. 6 :20 with 1 Cor. 7 :23. In both references the words, “Ye are bought with a price,” are found. Now com pare what follows each reference. The first—“Therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit”—we regard as logical; while the second—“Be not ye the servants of men”—we too often overlook. Our one opportunity in life is that of choosing mas ters. Under no circumstances are we our own—we belong to either God or the devil. Our opportunity: “Choose you this day whom ye will serve.” What use aré we making of this oppor tunity?— Gospel Herald. An Im p r e s s io n fo r C h r is t A friend of ours says, “I should always like to make an impression for Christ, and not for myself, on every life I meet.” We are forever trying to make impressions for ourselves, but this man wants to make an impression for Christ. We are con fident that many will agree that that is the only thing worth while —making impressions for Christ. It should be our ambition to make these impressions for Christ in all our contacts. The other day we were trying to get some one at a long distance over the phone. The operator was unusually stupid and dull it seemed to us. We began to be impatient and just then a loved one laid a hand on our arm and said, “Remember, you are a minister of Christ.” Over the phone, by the letters we write, by the way we welcome friends and strangers, on the elevator man and the post man, on the man or woman who serves us in the store we would make an impression for Christ. We should so live as to make these impressions unconsciously and naturally. We should not postpone these impressions until we get into the pulpit. The fact of the matter is, when we postpone these impressions for Christ until special times, we do not usually make much impression at such times.— Watchman-Examiner.
10:13. Temptation here means and includes all forms of trial). ¿AST UPON THE BED—There had apparently been a strug gle, as there usually was in such cases; the Devil does not easily give up his prey; the statement is a confirmation of the truth of the passage. 32—ONE THAT WAS DEAF AND STAMMERED—Or made unintelligible sounds; not actually dumb. TO PUT HIS HANDS UPON HIM—How ready we are to dictate to Him as to how He shall bless us, how apt to think there must be some visible channel of spiritual blessing. TOOK HIM ASIDE— Partly, perhaps, to lessen the shock when his ears were opened, but principally, no doubt, to concentrate the man’s attention on Himself. This man (although he could walk) had been brought, and perhaps did not, himself, look for any healing to follow. God has very often to take men aside from the world and things of earth that their gaze may be diverted to Him. PUT HIS FINGERS, etc.—These acts did not assist the healing;, they were for the benefit of the healed; he either did not know what Christ intended to do, or had but little faith in its accomplishment. In the one case the acts would indicate the pur pose; in the other, they would assist the faith. (It was, of course, useless to speak to him, as he was very deaf.) 34— LOOKING UP . . . SIGHED—The sigh was extracted by His sorrow over the results of sin; man’s fallen condition, and his sufferings, often wrung the Saviour’s heart, and they do so still (cf. Heb. 4:15). The looking up to heaven here was but the natural action of one sighing deeply over a sad sight. EPHPHATHA—The actual Aramaic word used; this was prob ably the common language of our Lord. BE OPENED—The word of Sovereign authority; there is no prayer for power; it is the fiat of the Divine; the instantaneous result proves the authority. 35— HIS EARS WERE COMPLETELY OPENED—Lit erally, “his organs of hearing,” to remind us that ears were given us to hear with— “He that hath ears, let him hear." The word in the original signifies that he was hard of hearing, rather than stone deaf. HE SPAKE PLAIN (Greek, “rightly”)—■ Whatever work Christ does for us or in us, He does perfectly. This miracle is to teach us that we must hear plainly the divine voice ere we can “rightly” testify for and of Him; also that the divine touch is needed for both our eyes and ears ere we can do that work effectively. 37—SUPERABUNDANTLY, AMAZED (literally, “panic- stricken”)—We learn from Matt. 15 :3 that “they glorified the God o f Israel." Probably in that region many of the multitude were heathen; they therefore would be panic-stricken by the miracles, whereas the Jews would not be, for they were used to them in their own Scriptures. Note again how that it is deeds rather than words that bring glory to God. HATH DONE ALL THINGS WELL—Man’s testimony to God’s new creation, re minding us of the Holy Spirit’s testimony to the old (cf. Gen. 1:31).' THE DEAF TO HEAR AND THE DUMB TO SPEAK—A literal fulfillment, as it was a type of the spiritual fulfillment, of Isa. 35 :5, 6. T h e S o u l’s N eed of P a tie n c e Impatience is one of the major sins of our present-day life. We must have our results on the dot, and if they are not forth coming, we pine and fret. We have not sufficiently grasped the fact that impatience is a form of unbelief, and that in the Christian life and in the world of events, we can not hurry God. Somehow or other we have acquired the idea that patience is a passive and supine virtue. I t has lost its primitive force through the centuries. In the New Testament there are thirty- three references to this virtue, and these references make it per fectly clear that the writers were not thinking of a merely passive
Made with FlippingBook Annual report