The first is:
“Come Unto Me”
The sinner must come to Jesus that he might find life and rest. Christ says, “And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.” (John 5:40) Reader, is that true with you? Coming to Jesus to obtain life is only the starting point in the race along the narrow way to that fuller life in our “house which is from heaven.” (II Corinthians 5:2) But after you have received life there must be a constant, daily coming to Jesus for the bread of life. Those physical life principles and forces in the life of children call loudly for such food as will enable them to develop into higher and stronger life. The same is true of your spiritual life. It seeks after and must have nourishment that will expand the life principles into more vigorous life. This is the only way to soul rest. If your spiritual life is denied being fed for only one day you will suffer some loss of full assurance which is necessary to perfect rest. The growing child is a heavy feeder. The soul that is in health requires much at the bosom of God. It can become so habituated to stated hours for feeding that it will experience an unrest if the time is passed by. This is true in the life of a child, and why should it be less true in the spiritual life? And if regular feeding of the child is necessary to the best development of its life, why is not the regular feeding of the soul necessary to its development? We beseech you to not neglect the proper feeding of your spiritual life.
What is the best soul food? Jesus says, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” (Matthew 4:4) As the body feeds on bread, so the soul on the Word of God. It was in those early morning hours in the solitary place and those all night on the hillsides in prayer to the Father that Jesus fed His spiritual life. If it was needful for Him to do this, can it be less for us? Jesus says to us, “As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me.” (John 6:57) The words “hath sent me” teach us that Christ lived constantly in the thought that He was sent of God, and that He must always be about His Father’s business. To do this He must live by the Father. He must live by His Father’s strength, by His Father’s will, by His Father’s life. To feed on Christ is to not live ourselves, but for Christ to live in us. We live by His strength, we triumph by His power, we pray in His name, and we do all things for His glory.
To be constantly growing into the more abundant life there must be a prompt obedience to His every command to “come.” If you would walk on the water (keep above the things of the world, and the circumstances of life) you must heed His word, “Come.” Christ has the words of eternal life. In those words are just such nourishment as our spiritual life demands for its growth and development. “As new born babes desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.” (I Peter 2:2) Moffatt renders this, “Thirst for the pure, spiritual milk to make you grow up to salvation.” The word “salvation” here means maturity, or to the fulness of Christ. To neglect feeding on the word of God is to neglect the culture of the soul, and the consequence is to soon become weak and powerless in the Christian life. To have power to live a holy life the word of God must be brought into the heart (Psalm 119:11). The words of Jesus must be eaten in the heart, digested, assimilated, and thrown into our soul-life. When the oxygen in the air is taken into the lungs and there thrown into the blood it kindles a fire and fills us with a physical energy. There are just such elements in Christ’s word as are adapted to the needs of our spiritual life. When these elements are brought in contact with our spiritual life they kindle a fire and fill us with spiritual energy and power. The great mistake multitudes are making is that they are feeding their intellectual life instead of their spiritual life.
How to feed the soul on the word of God, is what many want to know. We shall tell you in the simplest way we know how, and that is the way God has taught us. Let there be a daily reading of the Bible and meditation upon it. Do not neglect the meditation. You will suffer in your spiritual life if you do. In proportion as we neglect to meditate on the word of God we shall be weak in our souls. Remember, I do not say that you must study your Bible. Thousands are studying it by one and another method, and are growing powerless in their soul life. There is a vast difference between studying the Word, and meditating upon it. Study will bring it into the mind, meditation brings it into the heart. Beware of those schools and “correspondence courses” in which you are required to pay a fee for your instruction. The Holy Spirit must be our Instructor and His instructions are free. We shall give you five general rules for the getting of God’s word into the heart. For example, let us take Matthew 6:24-34. We would advise you to follow no prescribed course of Bible study given by schools, but you pray God to guide you in the portion of Scripture for your meditation. If you follow man’s selection of Scripture you may miss that portion your soul needs most.
Physicians may prescribe a general course of diet that is good in a general way, but this is not safe for every one to follow, for what one needs may be the opposite to the needs of another. We may write books that are good in a general way, but we cannot select the Scripture portions that are the best for the culture of your spiritual life. What one needs another may not need. You and the Holy Spirit—your Teacher—know best the portion of Scripture that will best meet the needs of your life. Whatever portion of Scripture God leads you to read, we shall give you five rules for the reading of it. The Holy Spirit may give you more and other rules. I am giving you what the Spirit has given me.
First
Read your Scripture selection over carefully and prayerfully, inviting the Holy Spirit to interpret its hidden meaning to your understanding. If you are reading Matthew 6:24-34, we would say that there are depths in these words that few, if any, have ever descended into. They need to be read slowly and prayerfully while you ask God to give you light on their meaning.
Second
Gird up the loins of your mind. Concentrate your thoughts on the words. Do not let your mind wander. If it starts to wandering, bring it back. The school boy will have to do this if he understands his lesson. You must exercise your will power. If your will power is not exercised it will not increase, and if your will power is not increased by the reading of the Bible you are not reading it rightly. Do not think that you can get much out of reading this Scripture without great labor. The school boy needs to labor to get mental food, and you will have to labor to get soul food. It will cost you some effort to concentrate thoughts and mind upon your reading, and especially is this true if you have not been long in Christ’s school.
Third
But you must do more than give the close attention of your mind to your reading. There must be intention. Do not forget this. Attention is to study; intention is the purpose of your study. You are not to study the Bible that you might be able to preach it, or teach it, but read it for the purpose of feeding your spiritual life that you might grow up into the fulness of God. Turn your heart as well as your mind to the reading. By your spirit take such hold upon the words in such a way as to make them a part of your life. Christ’s words are spirit and they are life, and it is only by your spirit that you can feed on those spiritual words. Be praying while you are reading. Keep your soul lifted up to God while you read. Your mind and your heart are to feed at the same time. You are to read in the spirit. Reading the Bible is the listening side of prayer. You pray when you talk to God, and it is no less prayer when you listen to God talk to you through His word. Reading in the spirit deepens the union of your spirit with the Spirit of God. It will loosen the hold earthly things may have upon you, and deepen your interest in things eternal. It will bring God near, and reveal Him in wondrous beauty to your soul. It will fill you with renewed courage and make you strong on the battlefields of life. It will infuse into your inmost being a sense of holy fear, and make the acts of life an act of worship.
Fourth
Set your will aided by God’s power, to reproduce in your life what you read in the Book. Jesus says, “Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.” (Matthew 6:25) See that you put into momentary practice what you have read. It will do you but little good to read the Book if you do not practice what you read. It is the practicing that makes you strong. What you eat of physical food will give life to your muscles, but if you do not give exercise to those life forces it will all be lost. You had better not read the Bible at all than to read it and not practice it. How much time did Jesus ever spend thinking about what He should eat and wear? You may say that he had power to get Him what He needed. But Jesus never used that power out of God’s ordained way. He went into the field for wheat when He needed to have wheat to eat. He sent the disciples into the town to buy food when they needed it. He refused to turn stones to bread merely for his body’s sake. He did nothing for His body that He will not do for yours. If you are God’s consecrated child, your body is His, and He will care for it as certainly as He cared for His own body. That body that Jesus lived in while here was no more His own than is your body, and He loves your body, which is His, as much as He loved His own. There is a sense in which Jesus took thought about something to eat. He took enough thought to send the disciples into the town to buy something to eat, but He was not all the morning or even an hour or a few minutes thinking about what they were going to eat. He never took thought about the future. This means that He never borrowed any future trouble. He never became anxious about the things of tomorrow. He sought the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and God gave Him all He needed for His body. If you will make God’s business your business, He will make your business His business, and He will see that you get along in your business. It is your business to extend God’s kingdom and righteousness in your business. Do not leave God out of your business. This is the way the Book reads, and you should set your whole heart to reproduce in your life the truth taught in the Bible. Practice what you read.
Fifth
Be wholly consecrated to God. This, maybe, should have been our first rule of direction for the reading of the Bible. It should also be our attitude of heart at the close of each reading of the Bible. If you have read the Bible prayerfully and in the spirit—if you have listened in your heart to what God has been saying to you through the Bible, you will feel like renewing your consecration to Him. If in the reading of God’s word youfio not get a clearer vision of God, you have not received the good you should have. The Gospel of Christ is a mirror in which we are to see the face of God. If you have looked into it, and have not seen the face of God, there is some veil of the flesh over your eyes. Oh, that flesh! It hinders multitudes from seeing God in His Book.
As we get a clearer vision of God through the reading of His word our hearts will respond with a deeper dedication or consecration to Him, with a prayer that His beauty might be on us. When we come to see more clearly the beauty of God’s holiness, our hearts will reach out longingly, pleadingly that that beauty might grow upon us, and it will. Every prayerful, meditative reading the Bible makes us more like God. Jesus said, “Come unto me.” (Matthew 11:28) Let there be a daily coming to Jesus through His word. There can be no substitute for the Bible in the building of yourself up in the more abundant life. It is the Gospel of Christ that nourishes spiritual life. The Bible leaves an imprint on your soul by the prayerful reading of it. Go to your Bible reading with as full intention to feed your soul as you go to the table to feed your body. The Word in the heart is the secret of a holy and victorious life. If you will spend some time each day feeding the soul upon the “living word” you will be strong to triumph over every temptation. It will be a power in you causing you to live above the petty annoyances of every day life, and fill your soul with peace from heaven.
There needs to be a keener relish for the word of God in the life of many. Those who sit at the feet of Jesus and hear His word are not numberless. There are so few who pant after God’s commandments (Psalm 119:131). Oh, that there might be a greater panting for the Word of Life! There are not many who are rising at midnight to give thanks to God for His judgments (Psalm 119:62). It is not the multitudes, even among the holiest of God’s saints, whose souls are breaking for the longing they have for God’s Word at all times (Psalm 119:20); not too many today that are esteeming the words of God above their necessary food (Job 23:12). How our souls are grieved to hear of the religious conventions of the present day where the banquets, the watermelon cuttings, and sight-seeing trips are the greatest enticements. Rivers of water run down our eyes because they esteem the banquet and feasting and the socials more than they do God’s word. But our heart is still more grieved to see those of God’s own children so neglectful of the blessed Bible. God Almighty, give thy people a more ravenous appetite for Thy Word!
God’s word is a lamp to guide our feet as we are making the journey of life (Psalm 119:105). It is a sword to enable us to conquer the foes that may meet us on life’s way to heaven (Ephesians 6:17). It is a mirror to reveal ourselves to ourselves (James 1:23-25). It is a water to cleanse the soul and keep it pure (Ephesians 5:26). It is milk to nourish the soul (I Peter 2:2). It is meat to invigorate (Hebrews 5:14). It is honey to delight (Psalm 119:103). We beseech you, holy brethren, to keep an intense love in your heart for the Bible. Do not neglect to feed daily upon its sustaining food. Pray the Holy Spirit to bring it to your heart with power as you read it. You need to be greatly alarmed if your heart is getting calloused so the Word of God does not make much impression upon it. The finger of God wrote on stone tables in the law age, but now under grace the Holy Spirit inscribes God’s laws only on melted and tender hearts. Jesus, help us.