Faith, and Modesty, and Honesty-"Give us this day our daily bread."

This is also

IV. THE PRAYER OF BROTHERLY LOVE.

The word our has, or may have, two meanings it may mean our and not another's, not taken wrongly from him; and it may mean our as not mine only but as embracing all the children of our Father in heaven. Like

:

the other petitions, it is a social, not a selfish prayer it breathes the Spirit of Christ, who has taught us to pray for others, even as we pray for ourselves.

I wish to say three other things to you about our bread. To eat God's bread makes you God's guest. If you take it in the right spirit, you are in God's tent, and have divine guest-rights. This bread thus pledges for you all God's bounty. If in Bible lands you eat the bread of a chief, you thereby become his friend, and he will defend you to the last drop of his blood.

Here is the secret of David's joy and hope in the 23rd Psalm : "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies." Such divine hospitality moves him to say, "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever."

The eating of God's bread also binds you to all who eat it along with you. Companion means a bread-fellow (con, together, and panis, bread), just as chum is a shortened form of chamber-fellow. You and all God's children are bread-fellows. God has made you so, for you are all canopied over by the same tent and share the same heavenly hospitality: you eat of God's bread and drink of God's cup.

This prayer is not for the bread of the soul, but it suggests that better bread.

In

one of the longest of His reported addresses (St John's Gospel, ch. vi.), Christ links together the bread for the body and the bread for the soul. He finds great fault with those who labour for the bread of earth, and care not for the the bread of heaven; who, instead of finding in the bread a heavenly sign, find in the heavenly sign only perishing bread. He wishes us to rise from the perishing to the ever-during bread. I may do it in this way: God has wrought millions of miracles to provide bread for my body; will He do less for the bread of my soul? How bounteously He gives me this bread. Will be deny me that? No. He is always at the giving point, but often I am not in the receiving mood. If the Godgiven prayer is answered in the lower region,

it will not be rejected in the higher. I cannot believe that the God who has provided bread for us can mean ill to the soul. He who gives golden harvests to those who don't pray for them, will not refuse the bread of life to those who beg it in the name of Christ. As He counts the soul greater than the body, so the bread for the soul, I may be sure, will be freer and more abundant than the bread which perisheth.

We praise Thee, O Thou bounteous Breadgiver, for the living bread which came down. from heaven, of which, if a man eat, he shall live for ever. Lord, evermore give us this

bread,

No. VII

AND FORGIVE US OUR DEBTS

THE

HE Greeks and Romans of the old world were very fond of a being who was the offspring of their own fancy. He had all the looks of a young man-beautiful, strong, good-natured, full of fun and tricks, with splendid laughing eyes. Everybody liked him. But he had no conscience, and only a part of the reason of a man. A creature wholly given up to pleasure and heedless of others, he looked back without remorse, forward without care or fear, and upward without worship. His chief end in life was to eat and drink and amuse himself. Hence he was as glad as the frisking lamb or ing foal, and the young goat. a perfect young man, he was really only a fine animal. For, had you examined his body, you would have found a hairy tail hanging down from his back-a sure token of his race. That was the reason why he had no sense of responsibility, no idea of debt to God or He was called the Faun.

man.

kitten, the caperWhile he seemed

May there not be faun-like young fellows in

our Christian land? Are there not many who never think about God, nor Christ, nor the soul, nor the Hereafter? Such can never earnestly pray, "Forgive us our debts."

As beggars we pray, "Give us this day our daily bread," but this petition takes us a step lower yet: we are to pray as sinners, "Forgive us our debts." The forgiven beggar stands far higher than the unforgiven king. Forgiveness is thus the great need of the soul, as bread is of the body.

When you unroll a map, you begin at the bottom, and roll it upward and backward. This will be our plan in handling the subject. We begin at the end, and move towards the beginning, of our text.

This petition is about

I. Debts.

II. Our Debts.

III. The Forgiving of our Debts.

I. DEBTS.

The Bible has many words for sin, but debt is the only word for it in the Lord's Prayer. In explaining this petition, our Saviour calls sins "trespasses," but in the Prayer itself we have only "debts." A debt is what is due, but what has not been done or paid. "Debts," dues," and " duty" come from the same root. Sins are like debts in many ways, though not