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TH E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
November 1924
V. 11. A table blessing is one of the simplest and easiest, but also one of the most 1 effective and inspiring tokens of the religious life, and it should be the invariable custom of Christian households. If there is one truth which ought to be revived in the church more than another, it is the priesthood of the laity. Christ has brought us in, He has fed us, He has trained us, He has blessed us; but He expects us to bless others; He gives us the food, and we have to take it to the multitude.— Ingram. V. 12. This example of thrift has been noticed as a strong mark of truth, most unlikely to have been invented by the writer of a fiction. How improbable, from a human point of view, that one who could multiply food at will should give directions about saving fragments!— Plummer.' Questions.-—What significant omission is there in John 6:15 compared with Matt. 14:23?, Can you not see the beauty and the pain of the effort of Jesus to lead the people by signs, by hints, by plain words, by deeds, by the most deli cate educational processes, from crass, material, political conceptions of His character and mission to a true spiritual faith? The devotional aspect of this lesson can well be made to Center around one .of the suggested topics: “How Jesus Satisfies.” 1. Think of the needy multitudes,^“ five thousand men, besides women and children” (Matt. DEVOTIONAL 14:21), tired and hungry, in a desert COMMENT place, with no prospect of getting any- John A. Hubbard thing to cat till they reached their homes, or went into the villages to buy food, as the disciples advised (Matt. 14:15). 2. Think of the lad and his simple lunch. (Count on the small boy to look out for the matter of something to eat!) “Five barley loaves” sjr-not, large loaves of bread such as we are accustomed to, but, rather “ cakes,” five of which a hun gry boy could dispose of without difficulty. Barley was the food of the poor. Andrew half apologized for even mention ing this lunch, so utterly inadequate was it to meet the need of the hungry crowd. ~ 3. Think of Jesus, in whose hands, and by whose bless ing, “ little is much.” Every one in the throng had, not “ a little,” but more than enough' All were fully satisfied. The next day Jesus used this miracle as the basis of a wonderful discourse, showing, that there is something even more essential than bread for the physical man,— “ the bread of life,” without which the real man will perish. To the same crowd which He had fed the day before He said: “ Verily, verily, I say unto you, ye seek me, not because ye saw signs, but because ye ate of the loaves, and were filled. Work not for the food which perisheth, but for the food which abideth unto eternal life, which the Son of man shall give unto you” (John 6:26, 27, R. V.). Today there are hungry multitudes, not numbered by thousands, but by millions. They are perishing for the “ Bread of Life.” Their soul-hunger cannot be satisfied by money, pleasure, fame, heathen religions, etc. Jesus alone can satisfy. As in feeding the bodies of the hungry multitude our Lord used means utterly inadequate in themselves, so He does now in passing on the spiritual food. We must give Him a chance to use us by unreservedly yielding to Him what we have and are. He can do great things with and through a humble, obscure Sunday School teacher who is really surrendered, just as He did with' the humble lad and his lunch of loaves and fishes. Teachers, are the members of your class really receiv ing the Bread of Life through your teaching? Nothing else will satisfy them.
Introduction.— It is not in tlie least difficult to believe that if what Jesus said of Himself in the fifth 'chapter is true, what John says of Him in the sixth chapter is also true. If all that God did was open to Jesus, and Jesus had with God the power of giving life, the COMMENTS feeding of the 5,000 is readily intel- FROM THE ligible to us. It was easily in His power, COMMENTARIES and how else could He reveal Himself Thomas Ii. Colwell and teach this truth than by putting it in object lesson, in symbol, in sign? That was the significance of the miracle. It was not merely to feed hungry people. It was to signify to them that God was near, the life giver, the satisfier of the soul. And thanks to the effectiveness of the sign we now need no such signs. We see God near always, in our daily bread, in all common experiences. We see -God everywhere because He once came in the flesh somewhere. The friend of the artist who kills the artist’s dreams by luxury, isi a friend only in name and intention, not in fact.; That issue had been settled once for all in the Temptation. When Giod provides, there is no lack. “ Thank God,” said an old woman at her first sight of the sea, “ Thank God there’s one thing of which there’s enough.”— Speer. V. 1. The other side was the eastern or northeastern side, as Jesus was probably at His Capernaum headquar ters when the Twelve returned to Him. Mark 5:31 tells us that Jesus crossed the lake to get retirement and rqst for His disciples.—Morrison. The sea of Tiberias is a later name for the lake, in vogue when John wrote, and the name is not found in the earlier Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. The city of Tiberias, on the western shore of the lake, was buiit during the lifetime of Christ by Herod Antipas, who named it after Tiberius, then the Roman Emperor, following the Herodian fashion of fawning on the imperial family.— Peloubet. ; V. 4. John’s story Renters around the passovers of Christ’s ministry, and it is his careful mention of these pass overs that shows us that the ministry extended i through three years, and was not confined-to a single year as might be inferred from the earlier Gospels. It may be that the nearness of the passover accounts for the crowds, for a large number of pilgrims would be going to Jerusalem along the:eastern shore of the lake.-' Peloubet. V. 5. The most potent of all the forces of salvation at the present.hour is the conviction held by great multitudes of men that Jesus still understands their perplexities, and bears upon His heart their burdens of sorrow and sin.-Hi Kelman. Our Lord was interested in the multitude. This is the true t.est of love and sympathy. Do,we feel an interest in the nameless crowd ? Can we work for people without knowing them?—Work. V. 6 . ;Christ thus gave Philip a chance to show his faith in Christ by suggesting that the Master might work a miracle to meet the emergency; but Philip’s faith had not risen .to that height. There were so many in the crowd! Philip was still virtually unacquainted with Christ’s resources.-— Peloubet. V. 7. The word translated shilling is denarius, the coin which Was a day’s wages for an ordinary laborer. The sum was therefore equal in purchasing power to four or five hundred dollars in this country-—a sum far beyond the meager resources of the disciples,, and even that would be insufficient.—Peloubet. , V. 9. It is not the lad’s own fishes,
Nor the lad’s own barley cakes That the loving Saviour blesses And with vast enrichment breaks. Likely ’twas his mother gave them From her poor, precarious hoard, And he only chanced to save them And to give them to the Lord. Mine or thine— who cares who buys it? Out of be.oks or out of head?— If the Saviour magnifies it, And the multitude are fed!
— Amos R. Wells.
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