Acts 28:3

A Bundle Of Sticks

A bundle of sticks. Acts 28:3.

You can all tell what this is a bundle of sticks such as we gather to make a fire when we go for a picnic. But I wonder how many of you can say where a bundle of sticks is mentioned in the Bible? If you don't know, I should like you to look it up when you go home. I am going to tell you the story of it, and that will help you to guess where to search.

St. Paul was being taken as a prisoner to Rome when a terrible storm arose and the ship was cast ashore upon the island of Malta. The passengers and crew were all saved, but the vessel was broken to pieces. Fortunately the people of the island were friendly, and when they saw the shipwrecked men shivering in their wet clothes they did a very sensible thing they kindled a fire. But of course a fire kindled needs to be fed or it will soon go out; so Paul, the practical, set about gathering a bundle of sticks.

If I did not want to speak to you about the sticks themselves, we might have quite a long talk about Paul's common sense. He did not sit down to bemoan his misfortune. He set about at once to look for a remedy. Here were two hundred and seventy-six soaking people, and the main thing was to get them dry as soon as possible, so he must find the means to keep up the fire. And I have no doubt many of the others when they saw him working followed his good example. Paul had no stupid notions about things being beneath his dignity. He was not ashamed to turn his hand to anything. Whatever he did whether it was preaching a sermon, or making tents, or gathering sticks he did it with all his might.

Now, there are many different kinds of bundles of sticks. There are the neat bundles that we get from the grocer for lighting our fires, and there are the rather untidy looking bundles that we gather at picnics. There are the sticks the gardener uses to tie up his plants, and there are the bundles of brushwood with which he shields the tender seedlings from the cold spring winds.

You have sometimes heard your friends say of somebody, “Oh, she's just a stick!” And when they say that, they don't mean anything very complimentary. They mean that the person of whom they are speaking is stiff, and unbending, and uninteresting. Now I always think when I hear people talking in that way that they are being rather hard on the poor sticks. There is a great deal of good in sticks, so much that I should like you all to be sticks.

Let us think of some of the things that sticks do.

First of all, they light fires and help to keep them alight You know how cheery it is on a cold winter's night to gather round a big blazing fire with a glowing log in the middle of it. Well, I think people who are kind and cheerful are just like that blazing log; they send a sort of glow about our hearts. Wouldn't you like to be this kind of stick?

But there is another thing sticks do they give support. And I should like you to be this kind of stick too. I am thinking this time of the sticks the gardener uses to tie up his plants. If it were not for them many of the frail plants would get broken and dashed to pieces by the wind. How can we be a support? By helping to bear the burden of others. Would you like to hear the story of how one man bore another's burden?

In the year 1780, fifty English officers were taken prisoner and confined at Seringapatam by Tippoo Sahib, Sultan of Mysore. They were treated with such cruelty that many of them died. The Sultan sent to Seringapatam fifty sets of fetters one for each man; but among the men was a young officer Captain Baird who was so badly wounded that it would almost certainly have killed him to wear the chains. What was to be done? The Sultan had sent fifty sets and fifty sets must be put on. Another officer named Captain Lucas came to the rescue and offered to bear his friend's load as well as his own. And for many weary months, in the stifling heat of that Indian prison, he wore two sets of fetters, until at length the prisoners were liberated.

Perhaps we haven't the opportunity to do a grand deed like Captain Lucas, but when we are kind to those who are weaker than ourselves, when we dry the tears of those who are sad, when we take care of the little ones for mother, run her messages, and are bright and obedient, we, too, are doing something to lighten the burden of another.

Once when a great ship was being launched she stuck on the ways. A small boy who was standing near laid his shoulder against the side of the huge vessel saying, “I can push a pound.” That was all that was required. Swiftly the ship began to move, and soon she was floating safely on the water.

You may not be able to lift a big burden, but you can all push a pound, and there is no saying what you may accomplish by so doing.

I want to speak about one more purpose for which sticks are used protection. We are told that the sticks Paul gathered were brushwood, and those are just the sort of sticks the gardener uses for protecting his young plants. Sometimes he lays them on the ground in the winter to keep the cold away from the roots. Sometimes he makes a kind of hedge of them to shield the tender green shoots from the cold spring winds. They stand between the weak things and the things that would hurt them. This was what the knights used to do long ago they rode forth to defend the weak and helpless; this is what our British soldiers and sailors are still ready to do; and this is what our best British boys and girls are ready to do too. It's a fine thing to be strong, but it's a finer thing to use our strength well. Let us see to it that no small child is bullied in our presence, and that no helpless animal is ill-treated.

There is just one thing more I want you to notice. When Paul was gathering sticks he picked up a viper among them. The creature had made itself look so like a stick that he had not noticed it. It was numb with the cold, but the heat of the fire restored it, and springing out it fastened on Paul's hand.

Now what I want to say is don't be a viper, and pretend to be a stick. Not only was the viper no use for keeping the fire alight, but it tried to do all the harm it could. There are some things in us that, if we don't take care, will turn us into vipers although we may appear to be good useful sticks. There are the beginnings of envy, and malice, and selfishness, and discontent. The best way is to get rid of them when they are small, and to ask Jesus to put in their place love, and kindness, and unselfishness, and thoughtfulness for others.