MEMORIES OF BETHLEHEM by C. M. Snow

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Feb 17, 1904

MEMORIES OF BETHLEHEM.

By C. M. Snow

WHEREVER the Gospel of Christ is preached the beautiful name Bethlehem is learned and loved. Thither came Ruth to leave the dutiful record of her filial love, and to give to posterity a lineage of kings. Thither came Samuel, the prophet of God, to anoint the great-grandson of that believing Moabitish maiden to be king of Israel in the place of Saul. There was he born through whom God gave to Israel, in unapproachable poetry, messages of mercy, songs of praise, and prophecies of great things yet to be. Thither fled the anointed but uncrowned David to escape the wrath of the ruler who had fled from the leading of God to take counsel of his own will.

THEN to this Bethlehem, or House of Bread, there came one day, when the fulness of time had come, that Babe who was destined to feed the world with the bread of life—He who was so fully to identify Himself with that life-giving work that He Himself was that "living bread which came down from heaven," and of which "if any man eat" "he shall live forever." To herald the coming of that Child, we hear the songs of angels under the star-sprinkled sky, with God's own message of assurance to the world. It tells us that the true God is not the god of war and strife, of hatred and cruelty, of jealousy and malignity. The will of God, expressed in angel song, was, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men." "Still does our Father love us, and God can not forget."

BUT closely written into the history of the coming of that Child is that sad story of senseless cruelty which filled the cemetery of Bethlehem with little graves and the homes of Bethlehem with sorrowing fathers and mothers. Blind selfishness set itself up to spend its little day and raise its withering arm against the purpose of infinite love. He filled his little place of pomp for a little day in feverish anxiety; but Herod has filled a larger and longer place in the loathing of the world than any other name in history, and justly so. What sadness and what gladness cluster around the name of ancient Bethlehem!

MICAH had long ago foretold the birthplace of that Child to whom the world must look for redemption and whom Israel had been taught to expect. "But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, tho thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth unto Me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting." "And He shall stand, and shall feed His flock in the strength of Jehovah, in the majesty of the name of Jehovah His God; and they shall abide; for now shall He be great unto the ends of the earth. And this Man shall be our peace." Micah 5 : 2, 4, 5. How appropriate that to the House of Bread (Bethlehem) should come He who was the bread of life, and who was to "feed His flock in the strength of Jehovah." With the manna that fell from heaven God fed the wandering hosts of Israel in the wilderness of Arabia; and in that manna God has symbolized the work of Christ for this world during all the history of sin. Born in Bethlehem, of Judea, He has been the inexhaustible Bethlehem for the whole starving world. To that House of Bread no hungry soul has ever come and found repulsion or emptiness. No king or pope or priest has ever been able to lock the door of that Bethlehem against the yearning importunities of a single unsaved soul. Tyrants have locked men and women in dungeon cells, or burned them at the stake, for going of their own free will to partake of that proffered bread; but they could no more cut off the supply of that bread of life than they could prevent the sun from shining or the clouds from pouring down their blessings on the earth. A sense of the thirst and hunger of soul are the only tickets required to secure for the applicant a bountiful supply of the water of life and the bread of life.

THE prophet declares of those who are fed by Him that "they shall abide; for now shall He be great unto the ends of the earth. And this Man shall be our peace." The time is drawing near when the kingdom of Christ, the Prince of Peace, will bear sway over all this world, which is now dominated by the kingdoms of men, ruled through force and fomenting strife. But they who are fed by His hand "shall not be moved," "shall abide," and abide in peace. Strife is running riot in the world to-day; but he who is truly fed of God will have peace in the very midst of this world's commotion.

He will not be moved, he will not be anxious, he will not be fearful of the outcome, because "this Man shall be our peace."

THE inn at Bethlehem in which the child Jesus was born had no place for Him in whose hands lay all the blessings of heaven for a lost world. The house was filled with the everyday traveler and trafficker. So with the hearts of the great mass of humanity to-day. Men are struggling, striving, surging, self-seeking, competing, crowding the heart walls for room, while the Saviour of the world stands without, knocking unheard, pleading unanswered, and still loving through it all, the souls that weave themselves as woof into the warp of this world. And when one does hear, and turn from the turmoil and the strife and the grasping and the soul-starving to the water of life and the house of bread, then heaven rejoices, and the long waiting and the scorn and the rebuffs and the mocking of the rabble that hounded Him to the cross then and follows His disciples now,—all are forgotten in the joy that fills the heart of Christ. He is seeing the fruit of soul-travail, and the seeing brings the satisfying which recompenses all.

O SOUL outside of Christ, why dwell longer in sin? Why wander longer in the wilderness of strife and doubting? Why walk longer in the way that has no other end, no other goal, than death? Why journey on toward the desert of death when you might return to the garden of God, with its flowing "river of life," its fruit-filled "tree of life," its "bread of life"? Why serve longer the prince of this world on his battle-fields of selfishness, strife, greed, and all manner of evil, when the Prince of Peace has unfurled His banner, in whose service all is love and joy and peace and all manner of good? The time for choosing is now, to-day. The hosts of evil are swelling to untold proportions, and soon the harvest they have sown they will reap. But out of this sin-sown soil God is bringing forth a remnant for His glory who shall walk over the ashes of the hosts of Satan, when the dross of sin has been burned out of this earth. To that remnant are all the promises of God. They shall live and reign with Him forever, even forever and ever. Souls are deciding every hour for death or for life. "Choose you this day whom ye will serve." The unbidden Guest of Bethlehem holds out to you the bread of life, and bids you drink of the water of life, and offers to you the joys and blessings of eternal life, where the canker of sin can never come. It is the richest offer that has ever been made to man. Accept it, and accept it now. C. M. SNOW.