“ How is it that ye do not understand?
”
With every trouble, great or small, go to God, and appeal to him, the God of your life. If your trouble is such that you cannot appeal to him, the more need you should appeal to him! Where one cannot go to God, there is something especially wrong. If you let thought for the morrow, or the next year, or the next month, distress you; if you let the chatter of what is called the public, annoy you; if you seek or greatly heed the judgment of men, you set open your windows to the mosquitoes of care, to drown with their buzzing the voice of the Eternal!
If you tell me that but for care, the needful work of the world would be ill done, I ask you what work will be better done by the greedy or anxious than by the free, fearless soul? Can care be a better inspirer than God? Is he worthy the name of man who, for the fear of starvation, will do better work than for the joy that his labor is not in vain in the Lord? I know as well as you that you are not likely to get rich that way; but neither will you block up the gate of the kingdom of heaven against yourself.
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Commentary
The Cause of Spiritual Stupidity
by Dave Roney
Think about it brothers and sisters, the astounding thought and revelation! A handful of men in a small boat, in their midst the Bread of Life Himself; lying there in the aft section is a single loaf of bread which became their major, in fact consuming, focus. And why? Namely because there were so many of them, not five thousand to be sure, but far too many for a single loaf to feed. And the loaf, quite different than what the modern Western mind envisions, was that of the poor man's fare, probably made of barley, perhaps unleavened but in any case smallish, hard, and round. Enough bread to satisfy temporarily the hunger of a single man, only a morsel to be shared each among so many. The very Manna, He Who is the very Bread of their lives, watches and listens as they converse about this bread for their bellies. They are troubled about bread; He is troubled for them.
How His great heart must have grieved in that hour as they worried themselves over the gift while ignoring the Giver of all good things. Why did they not think of their Lord and put Him first, pick up the loaf and say to Him “Here is bread for You!” Why did they not turn to Him and say “Your grace is sufficient for us!” The astounding question is this; why did they not by then know that He, representing His Father and theirs, was ever giving out from Himself, that His every miracle was the normal to His Father, that with the faith of a small child they could immediately resort to Him and say “Lord, if it be your will, then multiply the loaf for us but, if it be not Your will, then we shall have none of it; for we would hunger if You hunger, would eat only if You care to eat.”
In time St. Paul would address each such thought in his Epistles, but for now the truth was obscured to them because of what was in them. MacDonald writes:
“With the disciples as with the rich young man, it was Things that prevented the Lord from being understood.”
He, the rich young man who went away sorrowful—(his account is given two chapters henceforth in the 10th of St. Mark's gospel)—could not be parted from his wealth; they could not be parted from their vexation, the former's eyes were focused on his abundance, theirs on their poverty of bread—to these He could only ask, I think somewhat amazed, “Do you not yet understand?” “Yet?” Yes yet, till now, in view of everything they had seen and heard. How little they understood Him for Whom they had forsaken all things, all things that is save their Mortal-interests: From many Things they had turned away except the principle Thing which lies behind all other Things—the Self.
When the Lord fed the five thousand He was teaching a lesson, though neither they nor that throng were able to learn the one truth He presented, that God is Jehovah Jireh, “He Who Provides.” Here, in the small boat, and since their eyes were still blind, He would teach them the lesson again only from a different perspective. Consider His line of questioning to them, for He asks seven things. First, “Why are you concerned that you have no bread?” Then, in rapid succession, “Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see? And having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember?” After this sixth question He reiterates both the miracle and the residual fragments of bread they had gathered, then asks the final question, a restatement of the second one—“Do you not yet perceive?” And what was it they did not understand?
“With every trouble, great or small, go to God, and appeal to Him, the God of your life.”
Then, importantly, note the following verse 22; “And they came to Bethsaida.” In Matthew 16:5 it reads that they didn't realize they had no bread until they reached the shore; read either account and see that the Lord had gone as far as He could with these men; they had seen and certainly remembered the recent miracle itself, He had chastened them for their unbelief—no more will He say, for they are not ready to hear; He falls silent; there is no mention that, having attempted to shake them into wakefulness, that either they responded or that He subsequently turned their paltry little loaf into several. It is good that hungry men should eat their bread; it is sometimes best for men that bread be withheld. There are at least two basic forms of spiritual discipline, those of abstinence and engagement—of engagement they were immersed, of abstinence they knew little.
When He says “Ye have not because you ask not” it is to our bread, and the essential needs of living, but it is first to God—if men have not God real it is because they ask not for Him to become real to them; they are those whose eyes are still focused on Things which they possess or Things which they care to possess. Care? Cares speak of needs, of those things to which our attention is drawn, to which action is demanded—what is the only good to be found in cares? Namely this; the God Who created us created us with needs which only He can fill; are we not to cast all our cares upon Him? And why? Because He also has has needs, or cares; “For He cares for you” (1 Pet. 5:7). Made in His image, we are to reflect in our being that which is in His—and His care is the ever outflowing, self-forgetting, caring love which puts others first. Did we think that lest by caring for and about Things His work or our needs would be left undone, or that to do His will we must take care for other Things? At any time we suppose it we are but stitching gold embroidery on the robe of the Pharisee; let us be plain and seek the Lord within His simple gown, otherwise:
“If you tell me that but for care, the needful work of the world would be ill done, I ask you what work will be better done by the greedy or anxious than by the free, fearless soul? Can care be a better inspirer than God? Is he worthy the name of man who, for the fear of starvation, will do better work than for the joy that his labor is not in vain in the Lord? I know as well as you that you are not likely to get rich that way; but neither will you block up the gate of the Kingdom of Heaven against yourself.”
Think of it, brothers and sisters; He Who does more of Good in the world than all others combined, was He in this world ever troubled by the cares of the world? Nay! If He had stones instead of bread He trusted the maker of both stones and bread; if He had no place to lay His head, His slumber was nonetheless untroubled. When He fed the five thousand, did He Himself eat? I do not know, Scripture does not say; I only know He ate no more, nor more often, than did His men. There, in the boat, His appetite was no different from theirs, yet whereas their eyes were turned downward to the loaf, His were focused steadfastly on His Father; He had been tested and proven by God, had also tested and proven the Father by His faith and trust in Him; this lesson He was ever teaching His men.
It is by the physical need, that of hunger and thirst, that we are pointed toward and reminded of a far greater Sustenance, that which produces and sustains spiritual life, vitality, health and growth: “Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness.”
Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true Bread from heaven. For the Bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” Jesus said to them, “I am the Bread of Life; whoever comes to Me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in Me shall never thirst.” (John 6:32-35)
As We Ought
“How is it that you do not understand?” (Mark 8:21)
by Dave Roney
MacDonald asks the question; “Can care [which he defines as 'the needful work of the world'] be a better inspirer than God?” to which the obvious answer is “No!, never!” But the word “better” is, in any tongue, the middle condition among at least three possible Divine alternatives, which range from Good, through Better, to the Best. There are also three basic regions which combine to make a man; the Physical, Mental, and Spiritual parts of him. Let us see how the application of which Divine alternative among the three possibilities couple with the three basic areas of humanness; for it is in this combination we discover the motivations, strengths and weaknesses, purity and impurity of why a man does, or not, what he ought to do. To begin, let us consider man and the “Ought,” doing so in an ascending manner:
A man does what he Ought to do because he is caused to do what he ought to do
A man does what he Ought to do because he ought to do what he ought to do
A man does what he Ought to do because he desires to do what he ought to do
Lowest among these is the man who is doing what he ought to do because of external pressures applied to him, wherein he has no liberty to do other than what he is commanded; it is the condition of the slave, the prisoner, of those held in bondage by another, and of the renegade, rebel, and criminal brought to task. This lowest of region of influence (the Good) requires little other than the lowest part of his being, the Physical; he may concede and do by coercion a good thing though his mind and spirit are far from it. It is Good that the murderer, imprisoned, is forced not to murder again; Good that a man's conduct be governed by laws; Good that a child be sent to school though he goes not willingly, and that he be held accountable for his grades whether he likes it or not. Yet all such Good, predicated strictly on outer causation, is but a needful and lowly beginning; it is a start; a man must move beyond this condition if he is ever to improve himself; he must become Better.
At the next higher level of existence, that of a man doing what he ought to do simply because he ought to do it, we find correspondence to the intermediate level of his humanity; such a man does from a sense of duty, by self-discipline alone, a condition of Mind, the thing he knows must be done though in his inner self he would prefer to leave it to another or not to do it at all. This is a vastly Better reason for doing the “ought” than the mere physical motion of Good through external imposition, yet the man is still in bondage; though he be no prisoner or slave to another, he is yet in bondage to his own Self; his high moral character is become his very jailer. This is the level, the Better “ought,” the realm of Mind, and it is of such a man to whom MacDonald's question pertains; it is thought and action predicated on sense of duty and obligation, or “care.” Having risen to this level of “care” which is Better, the child of God can not content himself; he must further ascend.
If the man continues to climb toward the face of God, to seek the sublime level of his humanness, that strata where a man is free indeed, he is come to the actual and most true Spiritual plane of existence; and when a man is spiritual he does also, both Physically and Mentally, what he ought to do, neither by any coercion from without himself nor by Self's cold sterile duty-bound processes, but and only because he desires to do it: and this for him is not the Good, nor the Better, but the very and utmost Best; for in this state of being he most resembles Christ in his life and sends forth that Image into the world. This is the pinnacle for us, where there is no “better inspirer than God,” Who is our only loving constraint, possible to us by the renewing of Mind, of transformation, of indwelling Spirit, of very likeness of Jesus, the One express image and exact representation of God our Father. It is, in such case alone, that all three basic areas of our existence, the Physical, Mental, and Spiritual, are brought into a great unity which may be described as our conformity to the image of Christ Jesus. It is here, at this level of life, that a man lives in joy even though his circumstance, quite miserable, may make him unhappy; be free while in chains, live to God though dead to Self. We often would content ourselves with the Good, or the Better, but God can only give to us His Best; and the Best may not look at all like either the Good or the Better; those who are spiritual will know this, and recognize the difference, and praise God whatever their circumstance.
In closing, though I have, by such abbreviated remarks barely done any justice to the above subject, let me say that the only manner by which we can ascend to and also stay upon, such a lofty pinnacle which is the pleasing of our God, is to become the childlike children of our great Father, becoming those who by surrender of all self-will and our willingness to then be obedient to all which we know to be obedient, made possible by the daily, even momentary, self-crucifixion of all other passions, the continuous putting to death of the desires of our flesh and abhorrence of all within us which is ungodly, by the indwelling Spirit of Holiness, Who is the Agent of our Sovereign, Savior, King and Brother, and our compassionate longing to live, not to Self, but live unto Christ; herein we are able to do that which by any other means is impossible to us. What began as a meager Good, foisted upon us from sources without, has grown in us to be at least the Better, but God is neither pleased nor satisfied that we remain as merely Better people; He would have us be the Best. Let us, then, press on to this high calling of God; we shall do it with failings, we shall do it in the midst of unrelenting spiritual warfare, we shall do it as weak, as fraught with difficulties, we shall do it by the Fire which is Love, by coldness, by tempests, by humiliations, by a thousand different paths we shall follow after this Divine excellency set before us, knowing that God will help us, the Spirit will guide us, the Son will advocate for us, and that our Father has given us very great and precious promises, so that through them we, even now, participate in the Divine Nature, and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. It is with the surest confidence that we can, with the Apostle, exclaim and believe:
“And I am sure of this, that He Who began a Good work in you [a Start] will bring it to completion [the Best] at the day of Jesus Christ.” (Philippians 1:6)