CHAPTER 27 -- The Nutriment of Faith
"A day's portion every day." Ex. 16: 4.
"I will rain bread from heaven for you;
and the people shall go out and gather a day's portion every day, that
I may prove them whether they will walk in my law or no." In these
words we have announced to us what the rule is for the maintenance of
the spiritual life, the law for the growth and increase of the life of
faith. This law is in no respect different from that which we observe
in the natural life every day. Every man knows how the little child is
fed so as to grow up a strong man, how the strong man is supplied with
nourishment so as to maintain his strength. The daily regular use of a
little food gives man strength of body. Thus also is it with everything
in nature: the little tree becomes large, the poor man becomes rich,
the grandest building rises from its foundation, the longest journey
can be performed, not with great and violent strides, but by the
silent, persevering faithfulness, which does not despise the little,
invisible progress of every day, but uses it to reach the appointed
goal.
"A day's portion every day," the general
rule of the natural life prevails also in the spiritual; and yet there
are so many Christians who, by not acknowledging this, suffer dreadful
loss. They imagine that great exertion of strength at particular times,
that fervent prayers when we feel ourselves stirred up, are the means
of securing the increase and the flourishing of the soul's life. But
the golden rule, "a day's portion every day," the day by day, regular
continuance in the use of food, whereby the soul obtains its growth,
they do not understand. They have not yet apprehended the lesson that
faith and the life of faith must have nourishment, daily bread; and
that with the promise, "Iwill rain bread from heaven," there stands the
command "The people shall gather a day's portion every day that I may"
(this clause is added just for this very end) "prove them whether they
will walk in my law or no."
Beloved reader, have you not often
mourned over the unstable and changeable character of your spiritual
life; have you not often wondered how it comes about that your days of
hope are so shortlived, and asked on all sides what you had first to do
that it might be otherwise with you, that your faith might abide and
increase? Would it surprise you that you should be weak, if your body
remained without food for a couple of days, and that every time afresh?
And is it then to surprise you that your faith should not be living,
firm, and strong, if you do not faithfully partake of the word of God?
That is the nutriment of faith: from it and from it alone does faith
draw its strength. "Man shall live by every word that cometh from the
mouth of God." Confess that you too often yield to this and that
worldly circumstance, to idleness and apathy, and neglect the hidden
use of God's word, or use it so hastily and superficially that your
soul is not nourished. No wonder that you have to mourn over a leanness
in your soul. Begin today and henceforth let no day pass by without
eating of the heavenly manna, the word of God and the living Christ in
the word. Receive the word in faith. God gave manna every day in the
waste wilderness up until the homecoming in Canaan: if we go out and
gather there will be in the word, for every new day, instruction,
strengthening, purification, and salvation. And he who with faithful
perseverance continues day by day in the use of the word, even when he
does not at once observe the blessing that flows from it, shall
experience that the increase of faith, although it be unobserved and
slow, is yet certain and sure.