Sylvanus Stall

Suggestion:—The objects used are a green branch of a tree and a glass of clear water.

At the Feast of the Passover all the Jews living in Jerusalem had to throw open their homes, and entertain under the cover of their own roofs, all who came to them. They could not decline to receive the thousands of worshipers who came up to the Feast, but were required to afford them a place of shelter in their homes. Therefore it was that before the Feast of the Passover Jesus sent two of His disciples, and told them to go into the city, and they would find a man bearing a pitcher of water; they should follow him and ask him to direct them to a room in his house, where Jesus might eat the Passover with His disciples. (Matt. xxvi: 17; Mark xiv: 13.)

At the Feast of Tabernacles, which occurred in the fall of the year, after the harvest and the fruit of the vines and the trees had all been gathered in, it was very different. At this Feast, when the Israelites came up to Jerusalem, not only those who came from a distance, but even those who lived regularly in the city, were required to tent or live in booths made by simply placing some poles in the ground, with other poles reaching across the top, so as to form a roof or covering. This roof was not shingled, but was formed by laying branches of trees upon the sticks which had been laid across from one pole to the other. (Neh. viii: 14, 15.)

You now see why to-day I have chosen this branch of a tree to show you in connection with this sermon. I have chosen this to impress upon your mind the character of the arbors used at the Feast of Tabernacles; the tops or roofs of which were formed or made of olive, and willow and pine, myrtle and palm branches. These booths or arbors were to remind the Children of Israel of the journey of their forefathers through the desert, when for forty long years they did not live within the walls or under the roof of any house, but dwelt only in booths.

I am sure that you and I would like to have looked in upon Jerusalem at the time when one of these Harvest Home festivals was being celebrated. We would like to have seen the booths on the tops of the houses and along the side of the hills, outside of the walls of the city, and sloping down through the valleys and crowding far out into the country upon the Mount of Olives and beyond. We would like to have seen the bright faces of the happy throngs of people as they moved in procession through the streets, waving their palm branches; and to have listened to the music of the trumpeters of the Temple, as they sounded their trumpets twice every hour throughout the entire day. I am sure we would have been delighted to look down upon the festive crowd at night, when, instead of waving palm branches as they did during the day, they carried bright flaming torches, amid the clashing of cymbals and the blast of trumpets.

This Feast lasted for eight days. The first day and the last were especially sacred. And now I want to call your attention to this second object which I have; namely, this water, and I want to tell you how it was related to and used at this Feast of Tabernacles. On the morning of each day, while the smoke of the morning sacrifice was ascending in beautiful wreaths in the still air, a priest bearing a large golden bowl, and followed by a long procession of boys and girls waving palm branches, descended the side of the hill to the pool of Siloam, which was in a quiet recess at the foot of Mount Moriah, on the summit of which the Temple was built. When the priest had filled the golden bowl with water from this clear pool, he held it above his head and bore it aloft as he ascended the stairs. As the procession entered the Court of the Temple, the trumpets sounded, and all the throngs of people gathered within its walls took up the words of the prophet and sang, "With joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation" (Isaiah xii: 3), and as the priest came to the base of the altar he poured the water from the golden bowl into a silver basin amid shouts and gladness. Upon the eighth day, "the last day, that great day of the feast" (John vii: 37), the joy was greater than upon any of the other days. The priests in glad procession moved around the altar seven times, singing the Psalms.

It was at the last Feast of Tabernacles which Jesus attended, that He stood in the midst of this glad assembly, and beheld their joy as they remembered how God had supplied their fathers with water in the wilderness; and how God had given them a land of streams, and rivers, and wells of water, and it was then when Jesus heard them crying "Hosanna, blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord," that Jesus stood up in the midst of the Temple and of the people and said, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink." (John vii: 37.) To those of us who have always lived in the midst of a bountiful supply of fresh, clear, crystal water, these words are not as impressive as they were to the people to whom they were then spoken. For their land was surrounded by deserts, and they lived in the midst of nations whose people often famished and died, because there was not a sufficient supply of water to drink.

While we live in a country where there is always an abundant supply of water to satisfy the thirst of the body, yet spiritually, like these people at the Feast of Tabernacles we have the same spiritual needs that they had, and if you and I thirst for the water of life, if we desire everlasting salvation, if we thirst for the knowledge of sacred things and desire to do that which is right, Jesus invites you and me to come to Him, and says to us: "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters." (Isa. lv: 1.) "If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink," (John vii: 37.) "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." (John iv: 14.)