YEARS OF FAMINE

Years of Plenty, Years of Famine

Sermon: Years of Plenty, Years of Famine

Posted on January 13, 2012 by

I preached this sermon on Sunday, January 8, at the Church of the New Jerusalem in Dawson Creek, BC.

Readings: Genesis 41; Matthew 6:19-21; Arcana Coelestia 5342

“And all the land of Egypt was famished, and the people cried to Pharaoh for bread; and Pharaoh said to all Egypt, Go to Joseph; what he says to you, do.” (Genesis 41:55)

There was a famine throughout all the land.  Today, and in this part of the world, it may be hard for us now to imagine what a famine is like. Imagine the hungriest you’ve ever been, and then imagine that kind of hunger lasting over weeks, months, years. That’s the kind of famine we can picture taking place in our story, and the famine does not last one season, but seven long years.  But hope was not entirely lost – because there was food in the land of Egypt.  We can imagine people from all the nations around pouring into Egypt to receive sustenance – just enough food to survive for a little while longer, until the famine passed.  There was food in Egypt, but the famine was there too – the famine was unavoidable, but could be survived due to the seven years of plenty that came before.

But before any of that, before even the years of plenty began, Pharaoh had his dreams.  He dreamt of seven fat, beautiful cows that came up from the river, and ate grass by the river bank.  But after them came up seven skinny, ugly cows, that ate up those seven fat, good cows.  And again he dreamed: seven good ears of grain grew on one stalk – but after them came up seven dry, withered husks, and consumed the good ears of grain.  Both were disturbing dreams, and Pharaoh wanted to know the interpretation; but none of his counselors was able to tell him.  At that moment, Pharaoh’s butler remembered Joseph, who had interpreted his dream in prison; and after the butler had spoken to Pharaoh, Joseph was called up from prison to interpret the dream.  Joseph told Pharaoh the dream’s meaning: that there would be seven years of plenty, followed by seven years of famine.  Beyond this, though, Joseph told Pharaoh what he should do with the knowledge from this dream: appoint someone over the land of Egypt, and appoint governors, to store up the grain during the good years, and then to distribute it during the bad.  Pharaoh saw the wisdom in Joseph’s advice, and made Joseph himself that governor over all of Egypt.

Joseph’s interpretation of the dreams of Pharaoh was accurate – but it was a natural interpretation, not a spiritual one.  For the Word to be the Word, everything in it must have something to do with God, a deeper meaning about love to the Lord and love to the neighbour.  And there is a deeper meaning to the dreams of Pharaoh, and a deeper meaning to the events in the story, even though they really did take place as described.  Pharaoh’s dreams at first described a state of plenty, of good things.  They foretold seven years of plenty, when the crops yielded abundantly and there was more than enough food for everyone.  And this described something that happens in our lives.  We have times of plenty.  Every one of us experiences states where things go well – where we feel the Lord’s presence, where things come naturally to us, where we look forward to the day every morning.

The images in the dreams – the good cows and the good ears of grain – specifically represent things we learn and know.  The cows represent a deeper sort of knowledge, the things we know but might have a hard time putting into words; the ears of grain represent the more external knowledges, but still knowledges that contain goodness and love within them, just as an ear of corn contains the kernels of corn within it (see Arcana Coelestia 5198, 5212).  The cows are said to be beautiful and fat.  All true beauty, the Writings say, comes from an affection for truth, a love for truth.  And the fatness of the cows represents love to the neighbour, or charity.  These images are all images of true ideas that we learn with eagerness and affection, because they have to do with love.

And so these seven years, the seven cows, the seven ears of grain, represent times in our lives when we are seeing truth from an affection for it.  We learn about the ideals of marriage, and we love that picture, and we see how it could be possible.  We learn about what it means to be a good parent, by reading the Word and by seeing the example of people we admire.  We learn all the things it takes to follow the Lord: to follow the Ten Commandments, and to acknowledge that it is only with His help that we’re able to do this.  The state described by these seven years of plenty is a state where it’s not uncommon for us to say, “Yeah, I get it!” or “Hey, I just realized this,” or, “Listen to what I just read, isn’t it incredible?”

We all have these states, where we’re learning truth with affection.  Think of a time even when you were a child, when you were learning about something that touches your heart even now: that your parents loved you, that God loved you, that you were being taken care of, that there is a hope for true marriage love, that there is a heaven.  When children learn these things, they’re not just abstract concepts, and it’s not a struggle for them to accept them: of course a person can get married and live happily ever after, of course I’ll go to heaven, of course the Lord loves me.

Even in adulthood, we do have states where things come more easily than at other times.  And Joseph gives Pharaoh advice about these times: if you’re in a state of plenty, appoint someone to store those good things up.  In this story, Joseph represents something deeper in ourselves, and in the highest sense He represents something of the Lord with us.  And the truth is that anytime we’re learning truth with affection, the Lord is storing those truths up within our minds.  But we can also try to make sure we are open to that.  A truth is stored up within us when we see how it can apply to life and when we want to apply it to life.  And so in those good states, we can do several things to ensure that the Lord stores up those good things in us.  We can make an effort to immediately take what we know and see how it leads to greater love for the neighbour.  We can make an effort to learn as much as we can from the Lord.  And we can remind ourselves to thank the Lord for the good things He is blessing us with.  And the Lord does store up every single good and true feeling and thought that we have – we never lose those.

There are seven years of plenty.  But immediately following those seven years of plenty, the famine comes.  Remember, this is not merely talking about a time of hunger – this is talking about a time of complete desolation, of starvation and need.  And as much as we would like to avoid it – and it’s true that we do not want to seek it out – there will be times in our spiritual lives when we experience spiritual famine, spiritual desolation.  The Lord Himself experienced it, many times; He cried out on the cross, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46) – and He said, “I thirst” (John 19:28).  The Lord’s despair and thirst came from an inability, in that moment, to see how His goal could possibly be accomplished, to see the truth that the human race could be redeemed.  And just as there are times when we learn the truth and see it clearly, there are times in our lives when we feel blind and hungry.

Remember, those good cows and those good ears of grain represent things we know, things that come into our minds with affection.  But they are not the only things that we take in with our minds.  Even as we learn truth and rejoice in it, we have voices from hell pouring in thoughts and ideas that are harmful and destructive – those seven skinny cows, those seven parched ears of grain.  These are the ideas that say, “Look around you – what makes you think there’s anything other than the physical world?  We have a physical explanation for everything.”  We look around and see all the failed relationships, all the broken marriages, and we think that there’s no such thing as true, lasting love.  And those ideas start to eat up the good and true ideas we had earlier.  We lose our ability to see things that were so clear before.  We thought we knew what it meant to be a good parent, but now we find ourselves at a loss.  We thought we knew what it meant to love other people, but now we find that as much as we want to, we don’t know how.  We experience these times of desolation, when we want so, so much to follow the Lord – and yet the truth seems to be lacking.

These are times when there’s a disconnect between all those ideals we had before, and the way we experience our everyday natural lives.  The truth is, all those good things and true ideas we had before have not gone away.  They’ve been stored up more deeply inside of us, and at times we catch glimpses of them still.  But they can seem so foreign, so distant from where we are now, that they might as well not be there at all.  And often, we can’t even catch glimpses.  The Writings say that those true ideas tied to affections for goodness are drawn up within us for a reason.  There’s a reason for desolation – even though the Lord never wants us to have to experience desolation, He allows it so that good can come of it.  One primary reason that the Lord allows this to take place is that without experiencing times of famine, we do not really appreciate the times of plenty.  By contrast, we’re able to be grateful when we do have those times of plenty.  Also, by times of desolation – which the Word also refers to as times of temptation – we learn that there is nothing good or true that comes from ourselves.  Before experiencing those times, we can think that we know the things we do because we’re good people, or wise from ourselves.  But when those certainties are taken away – when everything is brought into doubt – then we realize that we are not in control of those things.  They don’t belong to us.  We don’t earn salvation – the Lord grants it to us, by giving us the ability to love Him and follow His truth.  By going through times of desolation, we come to a state where we can acknowledge that everything we have, we have because of the Lord’s mercy. And when they return to us, they are softer, more gentle – we do not hold them with pride, but with gratitude and humility.

But what do we do when we are in those times of famine?  Even if we have some idea of why the Lord allows them, we still feel the pangs of starvation.  We still have that desire to love, but lack the knowledge of how to do so.  And those goods and truths that are stored up within us, again, seem remote – the storehouses of Egypt are far away.  What can we do for those true ideas to come back down to the natural level of our levels, into our everyday reality, rather than just being a fading memory?

The people of Egypt did not have immediate access to the food that had been stored up.  Pharaoh told them how they would receive it.  He said to them, “Go to Joseph, and what he says to you, do.”  The way for them to receive as much food as was useful for them was to go to Joseph and then act in obedience to him.  Now remember, Joseph in this story represents something deeper within us, specifically a love for the Lord within the spiritual level of our mind.  And for us to receive food in times of famine, we need to submit the lower levels of our minds, and the natural level of our lives, to something higher.  The book Arcana Coelestia describes it this way:

It is the internal man that should command, and the external that should obey, and that does obey when the man does not have the world as the end, but heaven, and does not have self as the end, but the neighbor, consequently when he regards bodily and worldly things as means and not as the end. (Arcana Coelestia 5368)

The way to submit our external lives to what is higher is to act based on principles of love toward our neighbour.

Now, in times of famine, it is not always easy to see how we can do that.  That is where the hunger is.  But even if we can’t see the specifics of what we should do in a given situation, we can at least act in obedience to this general rule: we ought to submit our own desires for pleasure and worldly things to a higher desire that we act in love toward our neighbour.  This does not mean we have to do away with everything we find enjoyable – but it does mean that we have to look as our own enjoyment – our relaxation, our fun, our pleasure – as only a means so that we can better serve others.

The thing, is, though, that when we do this it does not usually feel very connected to those higher ideals.  It takes compelling ourselves to shun evils as sins, and when we compel ourselves, it mostly feels like hard work, and it contains almost nothing of that inspirational, higher delight that we had in those times of plenty.  The reason for this is that when we seemingly compel ourselves, it is really something deeper within ourselves compelling us, our true selves – but we are mostly conscious on the level of our external selves in those times of famine, and so we feel like we’re being pushed around.  And being fed in times of famine is not the same as being fed in times of plenty.  We do not suddenly end the famine, we do not suddenly force truth to start coming easily again.  But when we compel ourselves to shun selfishness, to shun harsh thoughts and actions even toward people we don’t like, when we force ourselves not to give into the things we’ve always given into before – then we can be fed.  Slowly but surely, we start to see that those deeper things, the things we thought might never have been real, start to take root even in our everyday, normal interactions.

All this takes place, though, only if we acknowledge that these things do not come from ourselves.  It takes place only if we rely completely on the Lord Jesus Christ, praying to Him and acknowledging that He is the source of everything good.  Even that self-compulsion, which feels so much like it comes from us, is actually from the the Lord and all His angels stirring those good things in us, causing us to desire them.  We can’t determine when or how we will once again start to see the Lord around us, or to feel His presence; in fact, the Writings say that the Lord does not answer prayers for a temptation to end, because He knows that if it were ended early, it would do more harm than good for a person.  But we can trust that He will give us as much wisdom and as much love as we need for every day – our daily bread.  And we can trust that, even though it may take seven long years of famine, years of scraping through, the times of plenty will come again.

Joseph himself experienced these cycles again and again.  From being his father’s favourite son, he found himself a slave in Egypt; from being the head of Potiphar’s household, he found himself in Pharaoh’s dungeon.  He experienced times of plenty, followed by times of hardship.  And yet, he trusted that even in the times of hardship, the Lord was doing what was best for him.  Because of the famine, his brothers came from the land of Canaan to seek food – and Joseph was able to save them, to forgive them, and to be reconciled to them.  And in their reconciliation, Joseph expressed the great truth about times of desolation: although the Lord does not cause it, and the evil spirits who bring it about do so for evil causes, yet the Lord uses it for good.  When Joseph’s brothers feared for their lives because of the evil they had done to him, Joseph said to them, “But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive” (Genesis 50:20).

Amen.

YEARS OF PLENTY, YEARS OF FAMINE

YEARS OF PLENTY, YEARS OF FAMINE

A Thanksgiving Sermon by Rev. Kurt Horigan AsplundhPreached in Bryn Athyn November 26, 1995

“… let them gather all the food of those good years …. Then that food shall be as a reserve for the land for the seven years of famine … that the land may not perish during the famine” (Gen. 41:35, 36).

At this season of the year we think of the harvests of the earth. We think of the Lord’s goodness and of His providence. One of the greatest harvests we read about in the Word took place in the land of Egypt in the days of Joseph. It was not one harvest, but seven years of great plenty. We know well that these years were followed by a famine in the land. Joseph had foretold this, and the king of Egypt put him in charge of the tasks of storing grain during the good years and of its allotment in the famine years. Through his foresight and provision, Joseph was able to save not only the Egyptians but his own family in Canaan.

In its inner sense, the account of Joseph’s administration in Egypt is about the Lord, whom Joseph represents, and His foresight and provision in our lives. By the seven years of abundance and the seven years of famine are described in the internal sense the states of man’s reformation and regeneration (see AC 5275). The cycle of plenty and famine in Egypt pictures the secret cycle of human spiritual development. The Lord oversees this development in our lives just as Joseph oversaw it in Egypt.

Joseph counseled Pharaoh to collect a fifth of all the harvest in the good years and store it up in their cities as a reserve supply for the years of famine. Recognizing his insight and wisdom, Pharaoh appointed Joseph himself to carry out this plan, putting him in charge of all the affairs of Egypt. Pharaoh retained only his right as a figurehead; “only in regard to the throne will I be greater than you,” he told Joseph (Gen. 41:40). The Lord is surely in charge of our lives, yet He leaves us the freedom of final decision in our throne of free choice.

The interpretation of Pharaoh’s double dream was about food. The interpretation also has an interpretation, for there are two kinds of food. While the body needs food and nourishment, so does the soul. The Lord said, “Man shall not live by bread alone …” (Matt. 4:4). We need food for the soul. Therefore He taught, “Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life …” (John 6:27).

In the interpretation of this account, the grain of Egypt signifies a kind of “spiritual food” which “properly signifies the things that nourish the soul …” (AC 5293). Remarkably, we need spiritual food even while living in the body, for “material food does not penetrate to the mind …” (AC 5293).

To better understand the inner meaning of these 14 years in Egypt, we need to explain what it is that feeds the mind or soul. The Lord hinted at the answer when He declared that those are blessed who “hunger and thirst for righteousness” (Matt. 5:6); also, when He said to His disciples, “I have food to eat of which you do not know … My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me …” (John 4:32,34). The Heavenly Doctrine plainly describes spiritual food as “… know[ing] what is good and true … and … will[ing] and do[ing] what is good and true…. These are the things that nourish the angels,” we are told, “and are therefore called spiritual and heavenly food”. (AC 5293).

The Writings go on to show that these same things are what really feed a person inwardly “even while he lives in the body.” “Be it known,” the Writings teach, “that truths and goods and the knowledges thereof make the spiritual life of those who are in heaven, for these are the celestial and spiritual foods with which they are nourished. These foods are given them daily by the Lord …”

The account of Joseph’s management of the grain in Egypt during the years of abundance and dearth is interiorly a parable of the Lord’s marvelous providence in our lives. For each one of us it is the story of how He gives us daily bread, storing up the food we will need for our spiritual growth and development. The Heavenly Doctrine tells us there is a secret in this that few know at this day. The secret is that there are times when we learn spiritual truths and goods with innocence and delight. These are the years of plenty with us. And there are times of desolation and confusion regarding truths. The Lord stores a portion of the plentiful harvest deeply within our spirit; “… unless such things were stored up in man by the Lord,” we are told, “there would be nothing to uplift him in a state of temptation and vastation, consequently nothing through which he could be regenerated …” (AC 5291).

The harvests of goods and truths in this storehouse are called “remains,” a term familiar to people of the church but unknown in the world. Remains are, we are told, “all things of innocence, all things of charity, all things of mercy, and all things of the truth of faith, which from his infancy a person has had from the Lord, and has learned” (AC 661:2). These gifts from the Lord are given to us and stored up in the interiors of our mind where they will remain and serve to moderate our life. “Each and all of these things are treasured up,” we are told, “and if a person had them not, there could be nothing of innocence, of charity, and of mercy, and therefore nothing of good and truth in his thought and actions, so that he would be worse than the savage wild beasts” (AC 661:2). It is from remains or by remains that a human being is human (see AC 1738). “Remains are like some heavenly star,” we are told “… the smaller it is, the less light it gives, and the larger, the more light” (AC 530).

Joseph commanded that a “fifth” part of the plentiful harvest be laid up in the cities from the fields around them. This signifies that truths conjoined with good are to be stored up in the interiors of the natural mind; and when these truths and goods have been stored up there, they are called “remains.” In them, we are told, “the veriest spiritual life of a person consists, and from [them] that person is spiritually nourished in every case of need and want, that is, in every spiritual famine” (AC 5297e), “for in remains alone is there spiritual and celestial life” (AC 560).

In this season of Thanksgiving, we must especially be thankful for the spiritual harvest of remains that the Lord has provided. This gift from the Lord is so important. Without remains we would have no defense against the assaults of hell, no hope of salvation. “The remains in a man are for the angels that are with him,” the doctrine explains, “… wherewith they defend the man against the evil spirits who excite the falsities in him, and thus assail him” (AC 737) “… [D]uring man’s regeneration … he is ruled by means of angels from the Lord by being kept in the truths which he has impressed upon himself to be truths, and by means of these truths in the affection with which they have been conjoined …” (AC 5893).

The Lord foresees our need for a spiritual storehouse – just as Joseph had foretold the needs of Egypt. Without that special harvest of remains stored up during the good years we would have no basis for a spiritual life, or even for being human. Without remains we would have no platform or plane of life on which the angels could stand in our defense.

Seven years of plenty and seven years of famine. What is our part in them? Can we increase this spiritual harvest even as the prudent farmer increases his crops? The secret is this, we are told: “from earliest infancy even to the first of childhood, an infant is being introduced by the Lord into heaven, and indeed among celestial angels, by whom he is kept in a state of innocence … When the age of childhood begins, the child gradually puts off the state of innocence, though he is still kept in a state of charity by means of the affection of mutual charity toward those like himself, which state with many continues up to youth, and meanwhile he is among spiritual angels” (AC 5243).

These are precious times, especially in our infancy and childhood, when the good ground of our mind is open to receive gladly the seeds which the Lord sows. These are times of tender innocence when angels are near, sharing their delight with us in the good things of charity and mutual love. These are times of abundant harvest. Storing up the spiritual things for our heavenly development is important, for our life will not always be tender, our loves not always selfless.

Let us add another idea: The spiritual work is not done when the storehouses are filled. We must survive the famine. The years of famine signify human states of life not so tender, not so open, not so full of mutual love. These are years of the awakening of our hereditary self-life. “Then, because a person begins to think from himself and to act accordingly, he can no longer be kept in charity as before,” we are told, “for he then calls forth inherited evils, by which he suffers himself to be led. When this state comes, the goods of charity and innocence that he had previously received … are withdrawn by the Lord toward the interiors and there stored up …” (AC 5342).

Survival in the seven years of famine signifies a stage of spiritual development as important as the multiplication of goods and truths signified by the seven years of plenty. It is not enough that the Lord provides us with remains. Yes, these are absolutely essential for the preservation of our spiritual life, but we must also make something of them. Remember the Lord’s parable of the rich man whose fields brought forth plentifully so that he had filled his barns. When he said he would take his ease, “eat, drink and be merry” because he had so many goods laid up, God called him foolish because he had laid up treasure for himself alone, and was not rich toward God (Luke 12:16-21).

We need to bring out and use the things the Lord has stored up in our soul. The famine gives us the opportunity to experience our desperate need for the Lord’s gifts. We must go to Him in repentance and humility to be fed. This is pictured in the Word by Joseph’s brothers coming to Egypt during the famine to buy food. They did not recognize him, yet felt deep remorse for having sinned against him.

It was the famine that brought Joseph and his brothers together again. A spiritual famine can reunite us with the Lord. A full spiritual life is more than a hidden store of truths and goods from the Lord. Remains are to be drawn out from our interiors and applied. We need to pursue a life in which we have conjoined truths with goods in a kind of marriage. Only then are we productive. Our thoughts and actions are to be strengthened by nourishments from spiritual things. Good affections and true thoughts sustain us in this world and in the life to come. This is the new birth called regeneration but it takes place only as we set aside what is from ourselves to receive what is from the Lord. All of this is signified by the seven years of famine.

The Writings teach that “during his reformation a man first learns truths from the Word or from doctrine, and stores them up in the memory…” But this is only the beginning. “The truths he has acquired must be initiated and conjoined with good” (AC 5270).

“… [T]he truths that are insinuated into a person, in the beginning, are indeed in themselves truths,” we are told, “but they are not truths in that person until good is joined to them … Good is the essential, and truths are its forms …. When the sphere of falsity is near, as is the case in the beginning … then truths seem to be banished; but they are laid by for a while in the interior where they are filled with good, and from thence are let back in succession” (AC 5207).

The Writings teach that “truth is conjoined with good when a man feels delight in doing good to the neighbor for the sake of what is true and good, and not for the sake of self or the world. When a man is in this affection, the truths he hears or reads or thinks are conjoined with good” (AC 5340).

That which makes possible our change of heart, our regeneration, are states of despair and desolation that come upon us in the world. Like a famine that causes natural anxiety and distress, these spiritual states of desolation awaken us to a sense of our spiritual inadequacy. The long continuation of the famine in Egypt is said to signify desolation “even to despair.” While no one seeks out despair, despair can have a positive effect on us. Listen to this teaching from the Heavenly Doctrine: “Despair causes those who feel it to acknowledge in an effectual and feeling manner that there is nothing of truth and good from themselves, and that from themselves they are condemned, but that they are delivered from condemnation by the Lord, and that salvation flows in by means of truth and good” (AC 6144). Coming to this humbling acknowledgment softens the hard heart and opens the closed mind. The Writings go further. “Despair,” we are told, “also causes people to feel the happiness of life which is from the Lord; for when they come out of that state, they are like those who have been condemned to death and are set free from prison” (AC 6144).

Let me summarize the spiritual meaning of the harvests of Egypt with this brief final teaching from the Heavenly Doctrine: “The man who is born within the church, from earliest childhood learns from the Word and from the doctrinal things of the church what the truth of faith is, and also what the good of charity is. But when he grows up to manhood he begins either to confirm or to deny in himself the truths of faith that he has learned; for he then looks at these truths with his own sight, and thereby causes them either to be made his own or else to be rejected; for nothing can become one’s own that is not acknowledged of one’s own insight, that is, which the man does not know to be so from himself and not from somebody else; and therefore the truths learned from childhood enter no further into the man’s life than the first entrance, from which they can either be admitted more interiorly or else be cast out.

“With those who are being regenerated, that is, who the Lord foresees will suffer themselves to be regenerated, these truths are greatly multiplied, for these persons are in the affection of knowing truths; but when they come nearer to the very act of regeneration, they are as it were deprived of these truths, for these are drawn inward, and then the man appears to be in desolation; nevertheless, as regeneration goes on, these truths are successively let back into the natural, and are there conjoined with good” (AC 5376). Therefore, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled” (Matt. 5:6). Amen.

 

 

Lessons: Genesis 41:25-40; Luke 12:22-31; AC 5576:2-4

Arcana Coelestia 5576:2-4

Hunger in the spiritual world or in heaven is not hunger for food, because the angels do not feed upon material food, which is for the body that man carries about in the world, but it is hunger for such food as nourishes their minds. This food, which is called spiritual food, is to understand truth and be wise in good; and wonderful to say, the angels are nourished by this food, which has been made evident to me from the fact that after little children who die have been instructed in heaven in the truths of intelligence and the goods of wisdom, they no longer appear as little children but as adults, and this according to their increase in good and truth; and also from the fact that the angels continually long for the things of intelligence and wisdom, and that when they are in the evening, that is, in a state in which these things fail, they are so far in what is relatively not happiness, and they then hunger and long for nothing more than that the morning may dawn for them afresh, and that they may return into their life of happiness, which is of intelligence and wisdom.

That to understand truth and to will good is spiritual food may also appear to everyone who reflects that when anyone is enjoying material food for the nourishment of the body, his food is more nourishing if he is at the same time in cheerful spirits and conversing on agreeable topics, which is a sign that there is a correspondence between spiritual food for the soul and material food for the body. And the same is further evident from the fact that when one who longs to imbue his mind with the things of knowledge, intelligence, and wisdom is kept from them, he begins to be saddened and distressed, and like one who is famished, longs to return to his spiritual food, and thereby to the nourishment of his soul.

That there is spiritual food which nourishes the soul as material food nourishes the body may also be seen from the Word, as in Moses: “Man doth not live by bread only, but by every utterance of the mouth of Jehovah doth man live” (Deut. 8:3; Matt. 4:4).