“My life is not my own, but Christ’s, who gave it,
And he bestows it upon all the race;
I lose it for his sake, and thus I save it;
I hold it close, but only to expend it;
Accept it, Lord, for others, through thy grace!”
We begin to live only when we begin to love, and we begin to love only when self dies and we live to bless others. We forget too often that we are the body of Christ in this world. The things he would do for men we must do. His pity for the lost must throb in our human hearts. His comfort for earth’s sorrow must be spoken by human lips. He is the bread of life which alone can feed men’s hunger, but it must pass through our hands. We must be the revealers of Christ to others. The love must flow to them through us. We are the branches, and from our little lives must drop the fruits which shall meet men’s cravings.
The importance of this human part is well illustrated in our Lord’s miracle of the feeding of the five thousand. When the need of the people was spoken of, the disciples proposed to send them away to buy bread for themselves. Jesus replied, “They have no need to go away; give ye them to eat.” No wonder the disciples were startled by such a command, when they realized the smallness of their own resources. Yet a little later they did give the multitudes to eat from their own small stores, and had abundance left for themselves.
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