This is a dark world, it is under the power of darkness. (Col. 1:13.) It is controlled by the "rulers of darkness" (Eph. 6:12). Unless it is enlightened by the Bible lamp it will go to its own place, "the blackness of darkness forever" (Jude 1:13). "God so loved the world, that he gave us his Lamp that whosoever should follow the Light, might not perish, but have everlasting life." Like the golden candlestick it shines upon divine things near at hand, and like the pillar of fire it lights up the way through the wilderness journey. All other lamps will go out, but this light shines more and more to the perfect day. Harken, ye children of men, listen, ye people of all nations, "The entrance of thy word giveth light." 2. A mirror. (2 Corinthians 3:18; James 1:25.) An ordinary looking-glass can be used here if it is put in an upright position. It shows me myself just as I really am, not as I think I am, but as I am. (Rom. 3:19.) The human heart shrinks from looking at it for it shows the heart as it really is. And yet, to see one's self as it is revealed in the mirror is the first step in the true way back to God. A missionary to China once read aloud, to a large audience, Romans 1. One of the Chinamen present said he thought it was very unfair and unkind for the "foreign devil" (as missionaries were there called) to come to find out all their secret sins and write them down in a book, and read them out in that public way. It is a truth that the Bible is a mirror, "Mine to tell me what I am." 3. A laver. (Ephesians 5:26.) A large silver bowl can be used here and placed in line with the lamp and mirror. The Bible not only shows us our sins as in a mirror, but shows us the way the remedy can be secured. In the old wilderness tabernacle, a laver was provided at the entrance of the tabernacle to give a means of cleansing from the defilement which would oftentimes render the worshiper unfit for God's presence; so a cleansing stream, seen only by the eye of faith, flows through this book. It broke forth from the first promise of the woman's seed (Gen. 3:15) and flowed all the way through the Bible until it broke into the trumpet-song of the redeemed in glory. "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood" (Rev. 1:5). As water cleanses by separating the body from the outward stains, so the Word of God applied by the Holy Spirit causes the heart to abhor the defilement of sin which would stain and defile the inward life. "Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee" (Ps. 119:11); and Jesus said, "Now are ye clean through the word which I have spoken unto you" (John 15:3). 4. Milk. (1 Corinthians 3:2; Hebrews 5:12,13.) Here place by the side of the laver a glass or bottle of milk.