Article April 11, 1908 Issue

TRUSTFUL OBEDIENCE

ELIZABETH E. SOUZA.

The reading of St. Mark's story of the feast of the passover which Jesus ate with his disciples, has always brought out many queries and much wonder at the unusual command which Jesus gave to two of the disciples, i.e., "Go ye into the city, and there shall meet you a man bearing a pitcher of water; follow him. And wheresoever he shall go in, say ye to the goodman of the house, The Master saith, Where is the guest chamber, where I shall eat the passover with my disciples? And he will shew you a large upper room furnished and prepared: there make ready for us." The command was rendered still more unusual by the fact that in those days it was not the custom for men to carry water, that duty devolving mostly upon the women of the household, yet the disciples never questioned how he could be sure that they would find a man carrying water, nor if by chance they should meet two men, how they should recognize the right one; nor did they question about addressing the goodman of the house into which the water-bearer should enter, as to what was to be done should they be met with a repulse, for the truth was not more kindly received in that day than in our own; but we are told that his disciples went forth, and came into the city;" thereby rendering unquestioning and immediate obedience to his unusual command. The result of such trustful obedience was that they "found as he had said unto them and when we who are striving for the true discipleship to-day learn how to render such unquestioning and accurate obedience to the commands of the Master and the requests of our revered Leader, then and only then will we find all things as has been said unto us, even the doing of the "greater works" which were promised.

All through the Bible we find striking examples of this trustful obedience in contradiction to what must have been the material seeming. When Abraham was commanded to offer up Isaac as a burnt offering, he did not rebel and cry out, "What! my only son? Oh! I cannot do that," nor did he seek to put his own interpretation upon the command, but in meek confidence and trustful obedience he did just as he was commanded to do, not more and not less; he offered his only son, his dearest, upon the alter of divine obedience. His reward was that a lamb was found for the sacrifice, thereby restoring his son, and Abraham became the father of a nation greater in numbers than the sand of the seashore.

When Moses was commanded to stoop down and pick up the serpent by the tail, egotistical knowledge did not exclaim, "Oh, but I know a better way than that. I will grasp him quickly, right close to the head, lest he turn and bite me;" but he meekly did as he was commanded, and the serpent became a staff for him to lean upon. When the widow appealed to Elisha to save her from her creditor, who was about to take her two sons to be bondmen, and she was so limited in means that she had but a pot of oil in the house, Elisha commanded her, "Go, borrow thee vessels abroad of all thy neighbors, even empty vessels; borrow not a few." She did not ask Elisha what she would put in the vessels after she borrowed them, nor did she say her neighbors would only laugh at her, knowing she had nothing with which to fill them, but she did even as he had commanded. The result of her trustful obedience was that she had plenty of oil to sell, and out of the proceeds was able not only to pay her debt but to support herself and her two sons. Again, in time of drought, when Elijah was told to go to the brook Cherith and there abide, and that ravens would feed him and he should drink of the brook, he did not question the ability of the ravens to find food enough for him nor ask about its quality, but in trustful obedience he went forth, and he, too, found everything as had been said unto him. When he had again to find shelter, and was sent to the widow of Zarephath, the reward of her trustful obedience and unselfish hospitality to the stranger within her gates was that her barrel of meal and cruse of oil did' not diminish, and her son — her only son — was restored her. The result of this demonstration of Life over death was that she knew the Word of the Lord in Elijah's mouth to be truth.

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