fellowship with the Highest, which the Temple services rather
quickened than satisfied, Christ says He will satisfy. The Temple
service had been to them as a screen on which the shadows of things
spiritual were thrown; but they longed to see the realities face to
face, to have God revealed, to know the very truth of things, and set
foot on eternal verity. This thirst is felt by all men whose whole
nature is alive, whose experience has shaken them out of easy
contentment with material prosperity; they thirst for a life which does
not so upbraid and mock them as their own life does; they thirst to be
able to live, so that the one half of their life shall not be condemned
by the other half; they thirst to be once for all in the "ampler ether"
of happy and energetic existence, not looking through the bars and
fumbling at the lock. This thirst and all legitimate cravings we feel
Christ boldly and explicitly promises to satisfy; nay more, all
illegitimate cravings, all foolish discontent, all vicious
dissatisfaction with life, all morbid thirst that is rapidly becoming
chronic disease in us, all weak and false views of life, He will rid us
of, and give us entrance into the life that God lives and imparts--into
pure, healthy, hopeful life.

Christ stands and cries still in the midst of a thirsting world:
"Whosoever will let him take of the water of life freely." Has His voice
become so familiar that it has lost all significance? For all who can
hear and believe, His truth remains. There is life--abundant life for
us. Drink of any other fountain, and you only intensify thirst, and make
life more difficult, spending energy without renewing it. Live in Christ
and you live in God. You have found the centre, the heart, the eternal
life. As Christ stood and cried to the people He was conscious of power
to impart to them a freshly welling spring of life--a life that would
overflow for the strengthening and gladdening of others besides
themselves. He has the same consciousness to-day; the deep, living
benefits He confers are as open to all ages as the sunshine and the air;
there is no necessity binding any one soul to feel that life is a
failure, an empty, disappointing husk, serving no good purpose, bringing
daily fresh misery and deeper hopelessness, a thing perhaps manfully to
fight our way through but certainly not to rejoice in. If any one has
such views of life it is because he has not honestly, believingly, and
humbly responded