for the encouragement of those who labor in prayer

"The Lord is working among us; among other things, adding to our number. Our dear, departed brother R.'s prayers are being answered one by one. Every one that he had on his list has either yielded or is gradually yielding to Christ. It is a lesson concerning prayer which I hope never to forget. " Yours affectionately,"

Dear readers:May we all pray more in faith, as did that beloved brother. Prayer to him was committing to God what was beyond his own power; and having committed it to God, the answer to it was looked for as though it were sin to doubt its coming. Such is prayer in the Spirit.

When one has had a measure of blessing in the Lord's service, how quickly Satan seeks to turn it to evil by stirring up the pride of our heart! He gets us then to think of ourselves more highly than we ought to think. We forget that it is not the vessel which, refreshes, but its contents. It is not the man who brings the message who blesses souls; it is the message itself. It is not the pitcher which quenches our thirst, but the water which the pitcher pours out.

How necessary, therefore, that each vessel whom the Lord calls and sends should be filled with that which edifies His people! Nothing but His word edifies them; therefore He says, " Preach the Word." How necessary, too, that the vessel should be in a state of soul suited to his message. If he realizes the responsibilities of his calling, it will prevent his being easily inflated over the success he may have. Every child added to the family brings its share of care as well as of joy.

Christ must needs fill our heart with Himself if we are going to be vessels for the refreshment of others. We must enjoy the Bread of Life if we set out to minister it to those who know it not. We must appreciate the grace which God has shown us if we are going to be proclaimers of His grace. There may be natural sweetness, courtesy, oratory; but that is not what meets the needs of dying men and women. I am very thirsty. Here on the table .is a showy pitcher. I cannot use it; it is filled with beautiful flowers. On the sideboard is a brilliant vessel of cut glass. I cannot use it; it is filled with sweetmeats. But there, in a corner of the pantry shelf, I find a plain tumbler; it is clean and bright, ready for use. It takes in the cool, refreshing water, and I drink from it with thankfulness. How constantly our natural things illustrate the spiritual! However superior the other vessels may have been in various ways, they were unsuited to my need. The plain tumbler, ready to be filled with fresh water, was the one which ministered to me. F.

Note.-A correspondent of ours questioned us concerning strange teaching in an English magazine which he received. We answered this in last December No. of our magazine. This brought on a correspondence between the two editors which we had no thought of publishing, but as the English editor insists on his communication being published we do so here, with the answer to it.

To the Editor of " Help and Food."

15, North Parade, Whitley Bay. Dear Brother:Dec. 31, 1912.

In the current No. of "Help and Food" yon pass an exceedingly severe stricture upon a paper entitled " New Birth and Eternal Life," which appeared in the October issue of "Scripture Truth," a magazine of which I am Editor.

As controversy in the precious truths of God should at all times be avoided, I should not have replied to your criticism, but several of your readers have communicated with me on the subject, and I feel, in consequence, that something ought to be said, and especially so, because, however unintentional on your part, your critique is certain to give a false impression as to the paper in question. I shall write as briefly as possible, and merely to clear away misunderstandings, for you will neither have space nor inclination to publish a lengthy defense of a paper which you consider to be "far from the truth."

First, our contributor points out that natural life is spoken of in two ways, namely, animate existence, and "the life lived and led continuously," and he uses these to illustrate the way that eternal life is presented very often in Scripture. This, in your judgment, is grave error. The distinction is, at all events, plain enough in natural life. We speak of a man's "domestic life," and we say " his whole life is in his family." We do not mean animate existence, the vitality within him, when we so speak, but the home circle and the relationships connected therewith, these go to make up his life. In virtue of the life within him, he finds his life objectively in this sphere and in these relationships.

We believe that this does illustrate the way in which one phase of eternal life is presented in Scripture. John 6 clearly speaks, not only of eternal life as what is vital within us, but also presents the "life lived and led continuously" (see verses 56, 57). John 17 speaks of the relationships and intimacies that belong to it, as also does 1 John 3 :14 ; 5 :11; while Col. 3 presents the home or sphere of it.

Second, you charge our contributor with representing eternal life as the condition and character of the spiritual life by which we live, and you say, "eternal life is not a condition or character," but neither does he say it is. You here misquote and misrepresent him. He does speak of the "character and new conditions of that life as revealed in the Son of God become man." Had not that life that was lived before the eyes of the disciples a character that was entirely its own, and such as had never been seen on earth before ? It was a heavenly life, finding no sustenance or joy in the things of the world. It was as much with the Father when it was being manifested to the disciples as it had been throughout eternity, and He was always the object of it. His disciples saw, heard and handled of the Word of life, and what they had seen and heard they declared. They had seen a life " lived and led continuously " by the Lord here below. They had listened to the words of it, which told of its blessed character, its relationships, joys and conditions, and this they tell to us that our joy may be full; and that life which He lived and which is in Him is given to us that it may be "lived and led by us continuously," for, through the infinite grace of God, what is true in Him in the Gospel is true "in Him and in you" in the Epistle. There is no word in this paper, as your remarks would lead your readers to suppose, that can be construed into the setting aside of the blessed fact that our Lord Jesus Christ is Eternal Life. The truth as to life is evidently many-sided, though it has been fully and completely set forth in Christ, it is in Him for us, and He is it.

You lead your readers to believe that the contributors to "Scripture Truth" teach that not all in God's family have eternal life. You say, "This cloudy, pretentious theory of eternal life means, of course, special intelligence of the mind of God. If you have not reached the measure of spiritual intelligence required, you have not eternal life yet." Such a thought is abhorrent to those against whom you charge it, simply because to say this would be to make God a liar. The babes have eternal life, as have also the young men and the fathers, all have it who have the Son, and it is in Him, the gift of God to them. But those to whom John wrote, and we also, were to become intelligent as to its character, conditions, and relationships that their joy might be full.

In closing may I offer a word of. I trust, brotherly criticism upon one of your statements? You ask, "What becomes of the fact that eternal life is given to keep us from perishing ? (John 3:15)." But John 3:15 does not say that eternal life is given to keep us from perishing, nor does any other scripture that I know of. It says:"The Son of Man must be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish." We shall not perish because He was lifted up and our faith rests in Him. This is the strong basis of our safety from perishing. Then comes the superabounding of God's love towards ns, nay, the great end He had in view in saving ns from perishing-" but have everlasting life." This statement of yours conveys to me the impression that you are viewing eternal life as preservation from perishing, instead of that glorious and blessed life into which we are now brought, that was manifested by the only begotten Son upon earth.

But I must forbear. The question will be dealt with more fully in the February No. of "Scripture Truth," if God will.

Believe me to be Yours faithfully in Christ, J. T. Mawson

ANSWER.

To Mr. J. T. Mawson, New York, Jan. 20, 1918. My dear brother in our Lord :

It was not in my mind to leave yours of last month so long unanswered, but my brother is away and I am in attendance here during his absence, and the pressure of work has necessitated putting off all that was not of immediate necessity.

Your statements astonish me somewhat. You say I "misquote and misrepresent" your contributor. Yon give no proof of the first. To prove the second you say, "Our contributor points out that natural life is spoken of in two ways, namely, animate existence, and the life lived and led continuously, and he uses these to illustrate the way that eternal life is presented very often in Scripture."
If your contributor had done this, beloved brother, I would heartily agree with him. He has not done this, however, but used these to illustrate the difference between the life received at new birth and eternal life.

And the rest of your letter is much in the same strain-apparently ignoring the fact that the contention is in no wise as to "the various ways in which eternal life is viewed, but concerning the difference between the life gotten at new birth and eternal .life.

You say, "The babes have eternal life, as have also the young men and the fathers," etc. lam thankful for this. Let me only ask, When does one become a babe ?

Your remarks seeking to set aside that use of eternal life which is in contrast with perishing, so plainly shown in John 3:16 and many other scriptures, saddened me. This has not been learned in the school of God. Sophistry does not become the man of God.

You acknowledge that eternal life, like natural life, is used in the sense of forming our existence as well as in that of our daily practical life. Why then do you resist it in John 3:15? If that passage does not declare our spiritual existence will you tell us which one does ?

No, dear brother, I have no desire for controversy, and I shall not enter into it. But I am in part responsible for introducing your magazine among God’s people on this side, and when they are offended at your teaching and question me, I shall endeavor in the fear of God and in conscientious fairness to all concerned to answer in the light of the word of God.

We have exercised, in that fear of God, a very careful censorship over our English brethren's publications these last 25 years or more, and I believe God has been pleased with it and preserved us in many ways. The people of God all over the land, those not with us as well as those with us, have on that account great confidence in what we put out, and we therefore feel the more the weight of responsibility resting upon us.

With sincere love in our Lord, Yours in Him, Paul J. Loizeaux.

More has been published since on the same subject. It is deep grief, and sincere, to see such efforts put forth to press a system of teaching which, to one who is not deceived by it, is a mass of such self-contradiction as to be condemned of itself.

It denies that faith can exist in connection with the new birth, for that would set aside man's total ruin; yet when Scripture has to be faced it must own that the new birth "cannot be entirely apart from faith, for it is by the word of truth which must be believed to be operative."

It dare not deny that one application of eternal life is to the life communicated by the Eternal Life Himself-a life which abides in the believer; by virtue of which he shall never perish; which identifies him with Christ the last Adam as natural life identifies every man who is born into this world with the first Adam; which constitutes the radical difference between Cain and Abel (1 John 3:12-15).
To deny this would be to contradict the apostle John and much beside. But it must not acknowledge it; it must hide it; it must reason and reason around it till good sense itself is offended, for what would then become of that other "spiritual life" gotten at new birth ? He was more consistent who once astonished us with the "double-quickening" doctrine.

This system tells us that new birth is for the earth, but eternal life for heaven, and that eternal life can only be since our Lord came. Where then did Abraham go when he died, and all the Old Testament saints ?

It tells us that when a man is born of God he is not yet a babe, not yet in the family of God; he has something to do now to get into that family. It seeks to establish a difference between New Testament saints which Scripture shows to have been only between the Old and New Testaments. What is such teaching but a return to bondage, a making experience the means of reaching a place before God. It saps at the very root of grace. It has destroyed the work of the Gospel wherever it has taken root. What a pity that such a dead fly should have fallen into the precious ointment of the magnificent testimony of truth rendered before, contradicting it in part, proving itself in all who seek to defend it that "little folly" which spoils what was "in reputation for wisdom and honor." May it please God to free from it those who are ensnared and preserve those who are not.

Matter crowded out this month will, D. V., appear later.

Enthusiasm wears itself out; imagination grows calmer; but the heart never grows old; like the eagle, it plumes itself with new wings in its old age.

FRAGMENT If I think of the -world, I get the impress of the world.

If I think of the trials and sorrows, I get the impress of my sorrow.

If I think of ray failures, I get the impress of my failures.

If I think of christ, I get the impress of Christ.

BY H. A. IRONSIDE

" Fear not, Paul; . . . lo, God hath given thee all them that sail with thee."-Acts 27:24.

COMMUNION.

God has given us His truth that our thoughts may be fashioned like unto His own. This is to enjoy communion with Him. Our previous study, on standing and state, naturally prepares the way for the consideration of this blessed theme of realized fellowship with God, " who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to His own purpose, and the grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began" (2 Tim. i:9, 1911 Vers.). He, who has thus so richly blessed us, desires to have us in living, happy communion with Himself, and this is the instinctive desire of every renewed soul. By nature and practice alienated and an enemy to God by wicked works, when grace has wrought in the soul, when new birth has taken place, at once there springs up a yearning for fellowship with the blessed One whom now we address by the Spirit as "Abba, Father."

Now this communion is not a human thing. Man in the flesh can have no fellowship with God. It is only known and enjoyed in the power of the Spirit. The direct means for its maintenance are the word of God and prayer. In the Bible God speaks to me. In prayer I speak to Him. I use the word prayer here in its widest application; not merely as offering petitions, but as lifting up the heart to God in praise likewise.

We have some blessed examples of this in the experience of Paul. Take, for instance, the first eleven chapters of the epistle to the Romans. In chaps, i to 8 inclusive, God, by His Spirit, unfolds what we might call the glorious divine philosophy of the plan of salvation; while in chaps. 9 to n He unfolds His dispensational ways. What is the result of the soul's apprehension of all this ? It leads to an outburst of praise that fairly bubbles up in exultant joy from the apostle's soul in verse 33 of chap, 11, "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out! " This is communion; and a most hallowed and blissful thing it is thus to be taken up with the marvelous counsels and ways of God.

In Ephesians i we have another lovely sample of the same thing. In the early part of the chapter there is a wonderful opening-up of God's eternal purpose. Then from verse 15 the apostle is in prayer that others may enter into and enjoy these precious things, so infinitely beyond mere human comprehension. Again in chap. 3 the truth of the great mystery, which I hope to take up in the next paper of this series, is opened up, and in verse 14 he says, "For this cause (that is because of the power of this truth over his own soul) I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ"-and what is the burden of this prayer? That the believers to whom he writes, "may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length, and depth and height [of this stupendous mystery], and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God " (vers. 18, 19). And once more a volume of praise goes up from his own heart:" Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto Him be glory in the Church in Christ Jesus unto all generations forever and ever. Amen" (vers. 20, 21, 1911 Vers.). The truth gets such a grip on Paul's soul that he longs for all saints to share it, and his heart goes out to God, the Author of it in unbounded adoration. Again, I repeat, this is communion.

It is not a happy feeling or a state of religious excitement. It is the soul's enjoyment of what God, in His word, has made known for our edification. He calls us His friends, and He would have His friends share His thoughts.

Thus it is now, there can be no true fellowship with God apart from feeding on the word of God. Reading good books will not take the place of this thoughtful meditation on the Holy Scriptures. Undoubtedly, the Spirit-taught soul will soon begin to discern God's mind, and see His glory manifested even in inanimate nature; but he needs a mind well stored with Scripture to lead him up to this.

And now another important point:there can be no true communion with God while unjudged evil is tolerated in the life. You cannot enjoy God and indulge in sin at the same time; even as you cannot enjoy meditation on the Scriptures while practicing that which is unholy. In Bunyan's Bible it was written, "This book will keep you from sin, or sin will keep you from this book." Don't overlook this, dear young believer. Be clean. Be practically holy; then you can enjoy God's word, and the Holy Spirit will use it as the means of leading out your heart to God and filling your soul with praise. And this is being in communion with the Highest.

Men talk of being "In touch with the Infinite," who both ignore the Scriptures as the written Word, and Christ Jesus the living Word. And by that they mean to reach a state of philosophic calmness of mind which, in the case of men proudly turning from the Cross of Christ, is but as though a blind man on the edge of a precipice refused the hand stretched forth to save him, and plunged headlong over, seeking calmly to assure himself that he would alight on a bed of down in place of jagged rocks. His calmness would be but foolhardiness; and so is all this empty talk of being in tune with the Spirit of the Universe while refusing God's testimony.

Do not be deceived by the sham, my reader; but with the word of God speaking in power to your soul, walk in the Spirit, fulfilling not the lusts of the flesh, and you shall know the real and the true. Thus shall you enjoy, on earth, a sweet foretaste of what is to be the everlasting portion of all the redeemed-participation in the joy of your Lord.

"My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest" (Ex 33:14).

Thou hast not gone this way before. But there is love about thee still. Go where thou mayest, there is the air; go where thou mayest, there is thy Father's love. Thou art going home, perhaps to bed, not to rise from it for some months. Thou hast no apprehension just now of what lies before thee. It is as well thou shalt not know. Trouble not thyself about the morrow. If thou art to be sick, if thou art to die, thy Father's love will be still with thee. Therefore go on:fear not; He cannot, will not turn away from thee. An omnipresent God means omnipresent love, and omnipotence will go with omnipresence. C. H. SPURGEON.

" I walked a mile with Pleasure;
She chattered all the way,
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow,
And never a word said she.
But oh, the lessons that I learned
When Sorrow walked with me."

(Concluded from page 305.)

Jonah finally went on his mission; but how much he could have saved himself had he obeyed at once! And God speaks to us, too. He would lead sinners to the feet of the Saviour, confessing their need and receiving Him into their hearts. Perhaps, like Jonah, you may be a child of God seeking your pleasure in the world, and God has been calling to you to come out from among them and be separated. Have you turned a deaf ear to Him and gone down to Joppa, to flee from the presence of the Lord ? Do you hate this pleading on the part of God and His servants speaking to you out of His Word ? Better listen and obey. Jesus is the lowly One, but remember that every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall confess Him Lord. He is the Lord; serve Him.

God destroyed the old world with a flood on account of its wickedness. He also destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah for the same reason; and He threatened to destroy Nineveh for the same cause. Jonah, however, knew of God's gracious ways, and how much rejoicing over Nineveh might he have known had he been in harmony with God, who rejoices "over one sinner that repenteth." Though Jonah knew of God's graciousness, he had, in figure, to pass through death and resurrection, as all God's people have to learn before they can serve Him intelligently. In this Jonah was a type of our Lord, who went through death in order to become the Saviour; having borne the sentence of death that was upon us, in resurrection He becomes the bearer of glad tidings-is our Saviour. At the cross God judged our sins in our Substitute; and in His resurrection He proclaimed justice's full satisfaction by the release of our Substitute; they are therefore the foundation of God's mercy and grace to sinners. Jonah thus passes through death and resurrection, in figure, ere he goes with his message to Nineveh. In Jesus' death believers are justified; they also are crucified to the world and the world to them. They are in a new creation. They have a new nature, with the capacity to enjoy God and the things of God. They love righteousness and hate iniquity. They love the people of God. Like a dead man raised to a new life, with a new nature, the Christian is to enjoy Christ and his heavenly portion, which the world neither knows nor loves.

Nineveh was of three days' journey-a fulness of wickedness. So Jonah (a dove) carries, after all, a message full of meaning-of patience, of mercy and pardon, with the awful threat of destruction if grace were spurned.

We see, however, that Jonah goes outside the city to watch what will become of it. What a lesson we have here! How small the heart, how unworthy of God when looking for self-glory in His service! Jonah's pride made him angry at the thought that God would, after all, pardon the Ninevites. And what patience in God as He pleads with His erring servant! God uses nature, and an insect, and the element-all things serve His might-to teach His proud and wilful servant:He prepares a gourd for a shelter from the heat, but though Jonah was glad because of the shade it afforded, he did not turn to God to own his failure. Then God removes His temporary blessing for which He had received no thanks. A worm then smites the gourd and it withered. The withdrawal of the comfort did not move Jonah's heart toward God. God then sends a sultry east wind-hat and oppressive, which caused him to faint (we are told not to faint when we are reproved), and see what a miserable ending is this story of Jonah :he wished to die, he was so angry and wretched. There can be no real lasting joy apart from communion and harmony with God. The unerring hand of God has delineated it all, before the eyes of all, both for the Christian and those who are yet in their sins, unreconciled to Him.

2. Jonah as a Type of Christ.-Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites who, no doubt, had heard of his being cast into the sea, and his miraculous deliverance from the fish. Men who seek a sign of Christ, find that the only sign given is His death and resurrection. If they believe not, why the Ninevites shall rise up in judgment with such and condemn them, "for they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and, behold, a Greater than Jonah is here." The resurrection shows the power of God. None but God can raise the dead. " I create; " "I kill, and I make alive." Man is dead in trespasses and sins- spiritually dead before God; and the cross of Christ has pronounced him judicially dead. However, God raises the dead; and to those who, like the serpent-poisoned Israelites, look to Him lifted up on the cross, He gives life, eternal life. Christ is that life, communicated from Him to those who look to the Crucified One. The grace of God reaches out to all:"The gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved "-shall have life in Christ, whom God hath raised from the dead. We who believe in Him have died with Him, have been buried and raised from the dead with Him, and one day, soon, we too shall be caught up to glory with Him, to go no more out from His presence forever.

Who, that has ever felt the weight of sin, realized the distance of the sinner from God in the blackness of despair reserved for the day of judgment; who, I say, experiencing what death, spiritual death, is, will not welcome that Saviour who gives life, life which death cannot touch-who saves for eternity ? See the new earth, clothed with new garments in the Spring-a type of resurrection and new life. How glorious is resurrection, the coming up out of death! So is the new-born soul; raised out of spiritual death, born into a new sphere, in the joy and life of God. It is ours to enjoy this. It is our portion; but, oh, to know the power of His resurrection!

And who shall separate us from the love of Christ ? "I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord " (Romans 8 :35, 38, 39).

3. Jonah as a Type of the Jewish Nation.-God meant Israel to be a blessing on the earth to all nations. God was to dwell in the midst of Israel, and they were to make Him known to the nations. But Israel refused to obey God, and followed their own wicked ways. Israel has not yet fulfilled the
command nor gone with "the preaching that I bid thee." God's purposes, however, shall be fulfilled, and in the latter days Israel, now dead as a nation, will be revived, raised as from the dead-for God will bring them again to their own land. Israel today is like Jonah in the great fish which God prepared to swallow him. And "as the whale could not assimilate Jonah, so also the nations cannot assimilate Israel." This is the time of Israel's captivity among the nations of the earth. God, however, will regather dead Israel, and the Spirit will move upon the dry bones and cause them to live-"an exceeding great army." (Read Ezek. 37:1-14; Isa. 66:7-10; Jer. 31:10-12.)

As Jonah, after his revival or resurrection, obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh (type of the Gentiles), so will Israel go, "And they shall declare My glory among the nations" (Isa. 66:19, 20). "And these glad tidings of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole habitable earth for a witness to all the nations, and then shall the end come " (Matt. 24:14). For God will gather His people Israel from the east, the west, the north and the south, and will bring them to their own land again, when they have passed, as it were, through death and resurrection. Then shall Israel be a blessing in the earth, and all nations shall be brought to the knowledge of God:"The knowledge of the Lord shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea."

Let us not forget whose death and resurrection this is a figure of-our ever blessed, adorable Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, who bore our sins in His own body on the tree. " He that believeth on Him is not condemned; but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God."

Jonah has four chapters, with an average of twelve verses each. God tells us in it of four things He "prepared" (chap, i:17; chap. 4:6, 7, 8). What a great story is told out in a small book of the Bible- and that book has been caviled at, and discredited by men of the world and false "Christians." Why? Let those answer who will not own themselves lost and guilty sinners in God's presence, and who do not, therefore, feel the need of a Saviour. "If they hear not Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." A. H. C.