directions, torn by internal conflict, “distracted,”
as we say, where precisely the same figure of speech
occurs. A similar counsel is to be found in another
and still more striking word which only Luke has recorded,
and which is rendered, “Neither be ye of doubtful
mind.” There is a picture in the word ((Greek:
meteorizesthe)) the picture of a vessel vexed by contrary
winds, now uplifted on the crest of some huge wave,
now labouring in the trough of the sea. “Be
ye not thus,” Christ says to His disciples,
“the sport of your cares, driven by the wind
and tossed; but let the peace of God rule in your
hearts, and be ye not of doubtful mind.”
It cannot surprise us that Jesus should speak thus;
rather should we have been surprised if it had been
otherwise. How could He speak to men at all and
yet be silent about their cares? For how full
of care the lives of most men are! One is anxious
about his health, and another about his business;
one is concerned because for weeks he has been without
work, and another because his investments are turning
out badly; some are troubled about their children,
and some there are who are making a care even of their
religion, and instead of letting it carry them are
trying to carry it; until, with burdens of one kind
or another, we are like a string of Swiss pack-horses,
such as one may sometimes see, toiling and straining
up some steep Alpine pass under a blazing July sun.
Poor Martha, with her sad, tired face, and nervous,
fretful ways, “anxious and troubled about many
things,” is everywhere to-day. Nor is it
the poor only whose lives are full of care. It
was not a poor man amid his poverty, but a rich man
amid his riches, who, in Christ’s parable, put
to himself the question, “What shall I do?”
The birds of care build their nests amid the turrets
of a palace as readily as in the thatched roof of
a cottage. The cruel thorns—“the
cares of this life,” as Jesus calls them—which
choke the good seed, sometimes spring up more easily
within the carefully fenced enclosure of my lord’s
park than in the little garden plot of the keeper
of his lodge. On the whole, perhaps, and in proportion
to their number, there is less harassing, wearing
anxiety in the homes of the poor than in those of the
wealthy. And what harsh taskmasters our cares
can be! How they will lord it over us! Give
them the saddle and the reins, and they will ride us
to death. Seat them on the throne, and they will
chastise us not only with whips but with scorpions.
It is no wonder that Christ should set Himself to
free men from this grinding tyranny. He is no
true deliverer for us who cannot break the cruel bondage
of our cares.
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