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Chapter 11—Lessons of Life
The Great Teacher brought His hearers into contact with nature
that they might listen to the voice which speaks in all created things.
As their hearts became tender and their minds receptive, He helped
them to interpret the spiritual teaching of the scenes on which their
eyes rested. The parables, by means of which He loved to teach
lessons of truth, show how open His spirit was to the influences of
nature and how He delighted to gather the spiritual teaching from
the surroundings of daily life.
The birds of the air, the lilies of the field, the sower and the seed,
the shepherd and the sheep—with these Christ illustrated immortal
truth. He drew illustrations also from the events of life, facts of
experience familiar to His audience—the leaven, the hid treasure,
the pearl, the fishing net, the lost coin, the prodigal son, the houses
on the rock and the sand. In His lessons there was something to
interest every mind and appeal to every heart. Thus the daily task,
instead of being a mere round of toil, bereft of higher thoughts, was
brightened and uplifted by constant reminders of the spiritual and
the unseen.
So we should teach. Let children learn to see in nature an ex-
pression of the love and wisdom of God. Let the thought of Him
be linked with bird and flower and tree. Let all things seen become
interpreters of the unseen. In this way all the events of life will be a
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means of divine teaching.
As they learn thus to study the lessons in all created things and
in all life’s experiences, show that the same laws are given for our
good, and that only in obedience to them can we find true happiness
and success.
The Law of Ministry
All things both in heaven and in earth declare that the great law
of life is a law of service. The infinite Father ministers to the life of
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