p. 16 | Learning to Fly

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Aug 5, 1913

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 40, No. 30.

Learning to Fly

Learning to Fly.—What a hopeful little lesson there is to the observing Christian in the story of a bee! First the egg is placed in a hexagonal cell, where there is food enough stored for its use till that bee reaches maturity. That is sealed over with wax. There is just enough to develop that bee, and no more. If that wax should be taken away and the honey eaten out, that egg would not develop into a full-fledged bee. The bee could never fly. But in that sealed hexagonal tube, when the time comes for the bee to emerge, there must be struggle and wrestling and straining to get through that capsule of wax. It is a strait gate for the bee, so close and narrow that in the agony of outgoing he tears away the membrane that enclosed his wings, and on the other side of the struggle he is able to fly. If the capsule had been eaten off, as a moth sometimes eats them off, the wings would never have been opened, and the bees would have stung the poor mummied young one to death. Do not worry because the hard things come in the Christian life. If there is no cross, there will be no crown; if no struggle, there will be no strength. If we want a time of ease, we will have to reap its fruitage. God knows that we need the struggle, or He would not give us the trial.