1. The text should teach you your personal obligations and privileges
in reference to the Gospel. The feast is spread out before _you;_ to
_you_ are the blessings of it freely offered (chap. lv. 1-3).
2. The text teaches you the ground of missionary exertions. To
partake of the feast ourselves is our first duty: but, while we "eat
the fat and drink the sweet," shall we not "send portions unto them
for whom nothing is prepared?" Can any duty be more obviously founded
in reason and justice, humanity and piety, than that of sending the
bread of life to our perishing fellow-creatures? The most hateful and
inexcusable of all monopolies is the monopoly of Christian truths and
consolations.
3. There are great encouragements to such labour. (1.) The certainty
of Divine approbation. (2.) The certainty of consequent success
(H. E. I. 1166-1168). But remember, if you would share in the
triumphs of the Gospel, you must share in the labour and expense of
their achievement.--_Jabez Bunting, D.D.: Sermons,_ vol. i. pp.
453-483.