The Waterer Is Watered

‘The liberal soul shall be made fat; and he that watereth shall be watered also hiuiselt” — xi. 25.

IT is announced here that the bountiful shall be enriched; and that law is expressed in a simple, intelligible, and memorable figure — u He that watereth shall be watered also himself.” How wisely and kindly God has bound his worlds into one, making all depend on each, and each on all! When we look up to the heavens, the moon and the stars which He hath made, we find there a law by Which all the worlds of space are linked together. Our earth affects the moon, and the moon affects the earth; each planet influences all the rest: the removal of one would disturb the order of the whole. The well-being of all is concerned in the right working of each. This law pervades the works of God. Souls are linked to souls in the spiritual firmament, by a bond equally unseen, but equally powerful. One necessarily affects for good or evil all the rest in proportion to the closeness of its relations, and the weight of its influence. You draw another to keep him from error: the weight thus laid upon your shoulders keeps y ou steadier in your path. You water one who is ready to wither away; and although the precious stream seems to sink into the earth, it rises to heaven and hovers over you, and falls again upon yourself in refreshing dew.

It comes to this: if we be not watering we are withering. There are only two things in time worthy of having the whole force of an immortal mind directed upon them, and these two are both here. The one is to be in Christ ourselves saved; and the other, to be used by Christ in saving others.” None of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the

Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord’s” (Rom. xiv. 7, 8).

To water green flowers that they may not wither, or withered ones that they may revive, is one of the sweetest employments that fall to the lot of man. Moral and natural beauty are so entwined together in the act, that his spirit must be dull indeed who is not drawn by the double attraction. When the tastes of the spiritual life are kept keen by frequent exercise, it must be a keen and pure pleasure to be employed as a vessel to convey water from the well of life to souls which would wither for want of it. To be the instrument of keeping fresh a lively plant, or making fresh a drooping one, in the garden of God, is an occupation that angels might eagerly apply for; but this work is all reserved for the children of the family: servants are employed in other and outer things.

There are diversities of occupation for the children, as well as diversities of operation by the Lord. To water flowers in a sheltered garden, at the going down of a summer’s sun, is one work for man; and to ply the hatchet on the hoary trunks of the primeval forest is another. The works are very diverse, and yet the same hand may do them both. The department of the Lord’s work which this text commends is of the gentlest and most winsome kind. It differs as much from direct assault on Satan’s stronghold for the first conviction of sinners, as that clearing of the first spot in the solitude which tries the strong arm of the emigrant differs from the watering of a garden-flower, which may be done by a woman’s hand; but it is a work commanded by God, and needful for a brother. If we are his, and yield ourselves to him as instruments, he will at one time nerve us for rough work, and at another solace us with gentle occupation. He has both departments in his power, and in dividing he does all things well.

Opportunities and calls swarm at every turn. The blind may never see the case or the time in which he can do any good; but where the eyes are opened the willing man sees a mountain full of them.

Here is a young woman, into whose heart the word came with power in early youth. Through a storm of terrible conviction she emerged into peace. She sat down at the Lord’s table in the church, and took the standing of the Lord’s disciple in the world

She has grown up, and come out: perhaps by her parents she was ostentatiously brought out from the kindly shade of youthful retirement into the blaze of the world’s hot light. Passions are kindled in her breast, — passions for dress, for company, for pleasure, which formerly she felt not and feared not. The sun has risen with a burning heat on the tender plant, not yet deeply rooted: forthwith it droops, and is ready to die. Run and water that weakling. Mingle faithful reproof with patient kindness. At the same moment touch her weakness with human sympathy, and her sin with God’s awful word. When she feels that a disciple cares for her, she may be more easily convinced that the Lord cares for her too. Gently lead her to the beauty of holiness, that there she may lose relish for the pleasures of sin. She may be saved, and you may be the instrument of saving her. I have seen a plant of a certain species that had been exposed all day, unsheltered, unwatered, beneath a burning sun, bent and withered towards evening, and to all appearance dead; but when one discovered its distress, and instantly watered it, the plant revived so suddenly and so completely as to strike inexperienced observers with astonishment.

Oh, it is sweet employment to be the waterer of a withering soul! It is gentle work for tender workers. “Who is on the Lord’s side let him come,” and labour in this department. The work is pleasant and profitable. In the keeping of this commandment there is a great reward. To be a vessel conveying refreshment from the fountain-head of grace to a fainting soul in the wilderness is the surest way of keeping your own spirit fresh, and your experience ever new.

LTX.

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