Part. 2 The Polar Bear.
WHEN I go to the park where the animals live, I always feel so sorry for the polar bear; he looks so hot, poor fellow! It is a cold land, he comes from— oh, so cold! The snow there never melts away, and the ice is so thick, that you can take long journeys on it quite safely. The polar bear lives on the ice. It is very cold and slippery, of course, but he doesn’t mind that. You remember how God made the camel, so that he could live in a hot country? Just the same way, God cares for the bear. His feet are covered with warm fur, even at the bottom, and those sharp black claws of his, help to keep him from slipping as he scrambles about. That same God, dear boys and girls, takes care of you, and knows all about you—why He has even counted how many hairs you have.
The polar bear is very fond of the water. He dives in and catches a big fish, or else a nice fat seal. But sometimes he can’t get food, and then he gets very hungry, and, like some other people, when he is hungry, he gets dreadfully cross. Sometimes he even turns into a thief, and tries to rob the poor Eskimo.
You must remember the Eskimo, the people of this frozen land. Such queer-looking people, something like huge bundles of clothes walking round! They have to wear heaps of clothes, you see, or they would freeze to death. Their houses are made of snow and ice. That sounds cold, doesn’t it? But really the little huts are almost too warm, when the father and mother and children are all inside. There is only one hole at the top of the hut—you can call it a chimney or a window, whichever von like—and another very small one at the side for a door. And, if you peeped inside—Ugh! what a horrid smell! Fishy. and oily and I don’t know what; and so dark! No lamp except a little dish of moss and nasty grease burning on the table.
How would you like to leave your pleasant house, with its pretty pictures, and big sunshiny windows, to live in a hut like this? Yet that is just what some brave missionaries have done. They have left their bright, happy homes to live among the poor, dull, dirty Eskimo. Why did they do it? Not for fun, you may be sure of that; no; they did it because they were full of love for the Lord Jesus. The dear Lord Jesus did much more than that, for He left His Father and His beautiful home to live as a poor man on the earth, where men were very unkind to Him. When He did all that for us, what can we do for Him? Was it not a good way those missionaries chose, when they went to teach other people about Him. They knew the love of God could keep their hearts warm, even in cold faraway Eskimo land, and they did so want to tell the people there about the Saviour, who had died for them. It was very hard work at first. The Eskimo did not seem to care for anything except catching seals, and killing whales, but at last they really began to listen, and numbers of them came to Jesus, and all their sins were washed away in His blood. Then they had to build places for the missionaries to preach to the people in, for the huts were too small to hold many. But even that was not easy, for one building ran away, and the other was eaten up by dogs. Now you think I am laughing, but it is quite true. One was carried away by a great stream of water, and the other was made of whalebone covered with sealskin, and some hungry dogs really did gobble it up for supper.
Dogs are used instead of horses in Eskimo land, and sledges instead of carts. They run smoothly over the top of the deep snow, a little army of dogs dragging it along. Is this the way the missionaries travel about? Yes, it is one way, but sometimes they go in boats. A great journey in a tiny boat takes a long time, but some of the missionaries there have a dear little steamer. Some kind people in England gave it to them, and puff-puff away it steams so quickly, taking God’s’ servants to so many more places than they could have gone otherwise, to tell the people the message that “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
You must pray for the Eskimo in their cold country, and the brave missionaries, who have gone to teach them; for it helps the missionaries very much when we pray for them at home. And can we do anything else? Yes, if you have accepted the Lord Jesus as your Saviour, you can tell others about His love. And if Jesus Christ is not your Saviour, then pray that you may find out how much you need your sins forgiven. You need not wait a minute, just tell Jesus that you need Him for your Saviour, and that you believe He died for your sins. That is the very best thing you can do, for all heaven would be happy if you came to Jesus.
ML 05/14/1916