BREAD FOR THE HUNGRY

Part I

Great, yea very great, are God’s mercies toward the children of men. God makes His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain to fall on the just and on the unjust.

In the garden of Eden there was everything. Hunger was unknown there. Now there is a desire after food, after nourishment. What impotence, what poverty, and what emptiness. God lets us become hungry because we have eaten of the forbidden fruit; and from that time on, we have been consumed with hunger.

Because of sin, the whole earth has been cursed and ruined. It would bring forth thorns and thistles. We have brought death and destruction on ourselves, but also on the whole world, it being God’s creation. Because of Adam’s covenant breach and the imputation of his guilt and sins, we have lost all claim to the least of God’s blessings. But that the earth still brings forth herbs fit for our use, and that the earth is still filled with mercies of God, is due to God giving His Son. The blood of Jesus Christ, God’s Son, cleanses from all sins. And although Christ has merited His blessings only for His people, yet since that blood has dropped upon this cursed earth, therefore, so many temporal blessings are still bestowed upon us. Everything has been merited for God’s people, but the world may also share in those blessings. If the goodness of God does not lead us to repentance, then those temporal blessings shall also testify against us.

God preserves man and beast. He opens His hand and satisfies the desire of every living thing.

That great God of heaven and earth, that faithful and immutable God, gives bread to the hungry.

How great is the omnipotence, the goodness, and the care of God over all that lives and moves.

We have a natural existence, and that requires a daily fulfillment and maintenance, and behold, only God has the power to give it.

At the establishment of the Noachian covenant, the covenant of nature, God gave the promise, but also sealed that promise with the rainbow, that the earth would never again be destroyed by water, but while the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease.

And notwithstanding all sins and iniquities and curses which ascend up to heaven from the earth, God continues to fulful His promises. The Creator of the ends of the earth fainteth not, neither is weary in sustaining all that has been created. Great is His faithfulness!

The hungry includes the destitute, the poor, and those who suffer from the want of necessities. He giveth bread to those, too. The Lord, Who out of the fulness of the earth and the sea, satisfies every living thing, surely hears the cry of the hungry ones among the children of men; but especially those who belong to His people. There is a universal providence of God which includes all men, but there is also a special providence, which includes only those people that have been chosen from eternity by God, and that according to body and soul, have been purchased by Christ with His blood. For those people which have been quickened by God’s Spirit, being the property of Christ, God will provide maintenance.

The great apostle Paul wrote to the church at Philippi, “Be careful for nothing, but in everyting by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your request be made known unto God.” Yea, in the last part of that same chapter, Phil. 4:19, he assures the church of God with the comforting words, “But my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”

God’s people have such a rich and faithful God in heaven. They need not fear want. No, that does not mean that outwardly their vessels shall always run over with wine and with oil. Often God tries His own here in this life. But God’s favor strengthens more than the choicest meat. When Jeremiah, the faithful messenger of God, was taken out of the dungeon, he received daily a piece of bread out of the Baker’s Street. Jer. 37:21. It was not much, but it was sufficient. He has experienced indeed, as have so many of God’s dear people, “A little that a righteous man hath, is better than the riches of many wicked.” And why is it better? Because it comes to them out of God’s fatherhand, and also because in that, they may taste His lovingkindness and Fatherly favor. And then that blessed humbling under it, and that their heart which most of the time is like a stone, may break under it, that cannot be paid for with gold.

And then, just think of the prophet Elijah when the judgment of famine came in the days of the wicked king Ahab. The Lord hid him at the brook Cherith. At that brook, which of all the brooks and rivers in Canaan was the first one to dry up, God preserved His faithful servant. Every morning and evening the ravens brought him bread and flesh. It is clear what God is able to do, and how great His care is for His people. But a year later, when even Elijah had become accustomed to it, the Lord sent him to a poor widow in Zarephath.

Again and again there are new trials of faith in order that God’s child shall rely entirely upon the Lord, and take his refuge with God, Who gives food to the hungry.

And now we would think that after the widow had baked the cake, God would take care for the rest of the famine, and that they would receive a supply from which they could now live easily. But no, the way of God’s adorable wisdom is altogether different.

God sees to it that they remain hungry, and that the wonder remains a wonder. We always tend to forget God and not acknowledge Him. And now the ways in which God walks with His people, are often contrary, grievous, and painful to flesh and blood. Our flesh does not want tight bonds. Like a heifer, not accustomed to the yoke, we only want to graze in a wide pasture, but God loves His people so much that He constantly puts a tight band about their loins.

The Lord himself must constantly open a way for us to need Him. Our deep fall becomes manifest in everything. Oh, how much labor God spends upon us in order that we may look away from self, and that we may put our hope only upon Him for this time as well as for eternity.

During a time of scarcity and famine, the Lord sometimes feeds His people in wonderful ways. It is sure and certain that when there are Elijahs, there are ravens, too. God uses for that whom He will.

During the last war, there lived in a large metropolis of the Netherlands, a child of God who was sick and lacked everything that could serve for strengthening and nourishing her weak body. At a remote distance from that city, one night a farmer who had great love and respect for God’s people, felt impelled by the Lord to bring various provisions to that friend. The man was happy with that message. It was a great condescension that he was favored to do so. But for all that, a great many objections arose in the man’s mind. Due to the so-called black market, the government had appointed many inspectors who, especially on the train, searched the baggage of the passengers. Many were caught in that manner, and all that they had with them was confiscated. That fear rose up also in the heart of this man.

Nevertheless, he left with the various provisions while praying and sighing that it might please the Lord to make his journey prosperous.

That morning, not one inspector entered the train, but as soon as he alighted from the train at his destination, he was stopped by more than six of those officers. The man’s heart beat fast! There was a fierce inward struggle.

The trunk was opened and various questions were asked. The last question was where he had to go with those provisions, and to that he answered, while the tears were streaming down his cheeks, “To that address where a dear child of God lives.”

And wonder of wonders, they said to him, “Pack it all then, and take it to that address quickly.” Oh, how the woman wept when she saw that she had received it from God’s hand — and as fruit of that which her precious Surety had obtained for her. Thus we see that when we receive something, God often adds something to it. And that makes it so great and wonderful. What the future holds for us, we do not know, but this is certain, God continues to take care of his people, and He fulfils His promises also for this temporal life. Surely the truth is confirmed, “The young lions do lack and suffer hunger; but they that seek the Lord shall not want any good thing.”

Two times during His sojourn here below, the Lord Jesus fed thousands in such a wonderful way with a few loaves and a few fishes that the first time seven full baskets, and the second time, twelve full baskets remained. There is always something left for God’s people. God will not allow his people to perish. In a wonderful and surprising way the Lord cares for His favorites. They themselves have experienced in times of distress, “Before they call I will hear, and before they speak, I will answer.” God’s people have a faithful God and Father in heaven Who cares for His own. He knows all the needs of body and soul, and He also fulfils them. God is not only a God for eternity, but also for time. In the precious blood of that eldest Brother, a way has been opened whereby they may boldly approach the throne of grace.

His omnipotence is unbounded, and His love without beginning and without end.

“Which giveth food to the hungry.”

God takes care outwardly, but also inwardly God in Christ fulfils the need of the souls. By virtue of His covenant which is from eternity and is founded in the blood of the Mediator of the Covenant in which only the elect are included, He calls to his people in Psalm 81:14, Psalter 431:4b,

“I will if thou plead
Fill thine everey need,
All thy wants relieving.”

(To be continued.)

“The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life; and he that winneth souls is wise.”

Proverbs 11:30

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