Notes of an Address given in London on Mark 6:31-52
This scripture brings before us a most touching incident, and one that has a special voice to us to-night, which I want you distinctly to take in, through grace.
There was a large multitude of hungry people around the Lord, and the time was far passed; circumstances were pressing, and the disciples come to Him and say, " Send them away." Now I am afraid the disciples were very like some of us in these days. " Send them away," they say; " we do not want to be burdened with this hungry multitude, we do not want to be troubled with their wants."
Observe how their wants are not questioned, their need is not denied, there is no doubt but that hunger and distress were fully represented. " Let them go," say the disciples, " into the country round about, and into the villages, and buy themselves bread: there is nothing here; send them away; " which meant, send them away from Jesus.
O beloved friends, do we say that -now? Well, I am afraid sometimes we do. " Give ye them to eat," says the Lord. May God make our ears hear that to-night. My beloved friends, do you ever think of giving other people to eat, or do you think only of eating yourselves? Have you ever thought that there are spiritually hungry men and women in multitudes at our doors, that there are people all round you starving for the bread of life? And have you not heard the Master's words, " Give ye them to eat? " These blessed, gracious words of His might well be an everlasting reproach upon the saints of God; words which might well ring in our ears forever, " Give ye them to eat."
They were thinking only of their miserable provision, and they say, How can we poverty-stricken people give to them? Then we find what is so blessed, and gives us the contrast between Him and all else beside. Hearken to His blessed words, " I have compassion." I love those words; 0 the sweetness 'and tenderness of those words to the heart, " I have compassion on the multitude."
0 that our blessed Master would give us more of His compassions? 0 to think of this great city, with its millions of immortal souls; here we are surrounded by a multitude of perishing ones; we are positively living in a kind of modern heathendom. Alas! that is what Christianity, so called, is; thickly populated places, cities and towns teeming with multitudes of immortal souls perishing for the bread of life. And think of our unconcern; I marvel at our little thought about it. I ask you affectionately to-night, do the walls of your room bear witness to your pleadings with God about it? I think I hear you say, " Oh! I am riot sent." Ah! what a very convenient way to escape from your responsibility; numbers of people think they get out of it like that. " I am not sent." Shall I tell you what strikes me? It is this, whether you would go if you were called! Bear with me in the plainness of the words, bin the one who says " I am not sent," be assured of it, that person would not go if he were sent. 4 see this very same unwillingness manifesting itself in the excuse. But what I do press upon you is this, while I fully grant we are not all sent to do the same kind of work, and are not all sent to preach, what I maintain is, that if 'the love of Christ were in our hearts as the grand constraining power, no need, or misery, or distress, however great or pressing, would hinder us from seeking in every way to give the gospel of Jesus Christ, Who is the true bread of life, to every hungry soul with which we come in contact. I confess I do not understand what Christianity and the religion of Jesus Christ is, nor what the ways of Jesus Christ were, if one of His own true, beloved people in this world, let them be ever so simple, let them be ever so feeble, refused to follow in His ways-assuredly they could by grace tell of what had satisfied their hunger and of what had met their thirst; assuredly they could say, " I know what met the cravings of my soul, and I can tell you it will meet yours." Who do you think knows the value of bread? The chemist? Not he; but the starving man that has eaten it. I have eaten that bread, he says. There is too much mere head-work, I fear, about us; hence our reasonings and our speculations and so forth, in reality a poverty-stricken state of soul. " Give ye them to eat," rings in our ears to-night. The Lord in His grace give us to hear it, and to heed it as well.
That is what introduces His departure in figure here; He sends His disciples, and He goes on high, as it were-that is what is represented by His going up into the mountain-and the disciples cross the water in a boat, and you have their vicissitudes. 0 how blessed it is to think what it says here, " He saw them." Now I want my brothers in the Lord to share with me the comfort that passage brings; " He saw them toiling in rowing."
Ah! brother, you are laboring, it may be in some sphere of service or work, and it is very uphill, very hard, and it takes a great deal out of you, and you are very often depressed. Now think of this, " He saw them toiling in rowing." Not the shades of night, nor the earnest vigil, which He kept in prayer on the mountaintop, nor the storm-lashed lake that they were crossing, none of these things had hidden His poor servants from the Master's eyes: " He saw them." 0 what a comfort that is! What a comfort for us all, whatever may be the character of the " rowing," whatever may be the character of the labor or danger as we sail over the sea of life, " He saw them."
0 what words are these! Those blessed eyes looked down in a tenderness which was all His own! And now mark this, in the darkest part of the night Jesus came to them. That is always the time Jesus comes. The fourth watch is just upon day dawn, and the dawn of day is, as we know, preceded by the darkest part of the night. Have you never watched by the bedside of some beloved one, and have you not witnessed the struggle between darkness and dawn? There is a sort of struggle between night and day at the very moment just preceding day dawn. That is the time Jesus comes. And observe how beautiful it is; He came walking on the water. Let us delight in contemplating the majesty of His love! It is not only that I see His divine power as He steps the waves, but I see the majesty of His mighty love. They could not be upon the stormy sea without His walking those waves too; they could not be, as it were, in difficulty and in danger without His drawing near to them; they could not be surrounded by the fury and hurricane of the tempest that came down from the mountain side and threatened to destroy their little barque, without His going near to them, too. He came to them walking on the water.
There is a little touch here of great beauty; have you ever thought of it? " He made as though He would have passed by them." Do you think it was a mere accident that this is recorded for us here? Do you think it is a mere little trifling circumstance in the history that the Spirit of God brings out? I believe it is exactly the same thing that you find in Luke 24., when He joined those two poor, heart-broken, weary ones upon the morning of His resurrection, as they walked and were sad, and had given up all hope in this world. It says, " He made as though He would have gone farther." It is the same kind of action here; He " would have passed by them." Why? To call out from them the faintest cry of want and need of Him; that is what it is. It is not that He was indifferent, that He did not feel; oh, assuredly it was not that!
He was never insensible to the distresses of His poor servants in their vicissitudes; but He delights to draw out confidence. Oh! if there is the feeblest confiding of trust in any of your poor hearts, if everything has fled but this one hope in Him, small though it be, be assured He wants that. That is the meaning of His action here; He would have passed them by; but only that He might awake up, and draw out, as it were, and minister to the dying embers of that faith which was in the heart. Then they " cried out." How grateful to His heart that cry! Was not He attentive? Did He not delight in that confidence so expressed?
Mark what He says; there are three words here, " Be of good cheer," " Be not afraid; " but note especially the words between them. Our beautiful old translation has it, " It is I; " but that in reality means " I am," the same as in John 8. Mark the connection, " Be of good cheer; " " I am; " " be not afraid." Oh, beloved friends, what a trinity of blessedness there is in these three expressions! " Be of good cheer: " might not that well wipe away every tear from the eye? " I am: " the mighty God in the glory and dignity and majesty of His own person walking the waves and waters. " Be not afraid: " the very words He is saying to us to-night.
Now, brother or sister (thank God we can all of us be engaged in work in different ways), you are " toiling in rowing: " may God in His infinite grace give us that blessed confidence in Christ's care and love, that amid every wind and storm, and our toiling through them, we may ever hear Him say, " Be of good cheer "-" I am "-" Be not afraid."
Oh, the luxury of being the means of blessing to some poor heart! The one who is so used knows its sweetness; but it must be tasted to be known and thus enjoyed. " There is that scattereth and yet increaseth and there is that withholdeth more than is meet, and it tendeth to poverty."
But remember, in all the vicissitudes of service, and in all the ups and downs so-called of life, whether it be at home or in the service of God, in the world or in the church, whether it be in the counting house or at the counter, wherever you are, remember this, there will be " toiling in rowing " while Jesus is absent; but in the darkest part of your night He is near, so we can sing,
" In darkest shades, if He appear
My morning is begun."
And " He talked with them." How blessed the rest of that intercourse! the divine familiarity; oh, how precious the intimacy expressed in those words, " He talked with them." Oh to hear those beautiful words, those wonderful words! The Lord in His grace use His own precious tidings to-night to encourage our hearts, beloved friends, that we may all go forth with a little more of the fire of Christ's love in our souls, and that we may have the comfort, whatever position we are in, as we toil through this world where He is not, of knowing for ourselves the solace and cheer of Himself, for His name's sake.