During the World War of 1914-1918 a British statesman, addressing an audience when inaugurating national food control, stated in substance that the only food controller who could have satisfied everyone was the man who had fed five thousand with five loaves and two small fishes, and even then had had a substantial surplus. At a time when the question of adequate supplies of all commodities and their efficient distribution is exercising the care and ingenuity of those responsible throughout the world, it is interesting and instructive to turn aside from human ways and means and to contemplate the methods of Jesus, methods which are so diametrically opposite to those most widely adopted today.
Jesus, the great Exemplar, had an acquaintance with the spiritual law of supply and demand that was always equal to every emergency that presented itself. He was therefore able to produce tribute money when it was needed and food for the many. He brought health to the sick and life where it appeared to be extinguished. He provided redemption for the sinner, a chamber for the celebration of the Passover, and in every instance a final answer to all critics and adversaries.
To understand that abundance is indeed an ever-present reality is to see it externalized as and whenever occasion calls for this, whatever the nature of the demand. And thus is the essence of the law of God available to men. In this way the hoarding of or emphasis on material possessions will become steadily less evident, in conformity with our knowledge of spiritual completeness and our ever-present and positive dominion over any form of lack.
