WHEAT AND CHAFF.
THE COMING SEPARATION.
Suggestion:—If the children can secure a few handfuls of some kind of grain and chaff, the idea of separation can be beautifully illustrated by pouring the grain and chaff from one hand to the other, and at the same time gently blowing the chaff, separating it from the grain. By turning it in this manner once or twice and blowing gently, the chaff may be entirely separated from the grain. If a larger quantity were used, it could be poured from one basket or pan to another while blowing the chaff from the grain with a palm leaf or some other fan. This would illustrate how the grain and chaff were separated at that period of the world in which Christ lived.
MY DEAR YOUNG FRIENDS: I want to read you a very beautiful little psalm, or hymn, or poem, written by David. It was originally written in metre or verse, but poetry when translated becomes prose. This first Psalm of David reads as follows:—
"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful; but his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in His law doth he meditate day and night; and he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
"The ungodly are not so; but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away; therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous; but the way of the ungodly shall perish."
We find in this Psalm how the righteous are set forth, and how the ungodly are compared to chaff. John the Baptist said of Jesus, "Whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly purge His floor and gather His wheat into the garner; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire."