 
Working   
for   
God

A 31-Day Study

A Sequel to Waiting on God

Andrew Murray

Contents

Introduction

Day 1: Waiting and Working

Day 2: The Light of the World

Day 3: Son, Go Work

Day 4: To Each One His Work

Day 5: To Each According to His Ability

Day 6: Work is Life

Day 7: The Father Does the Work

Day 8: Greater Works Will We Do

Day 9: Created in Christ Jesus for Good Works

Day 10: God Works in You

Day 11: Faith Working by Love

Day 12: Bearing Fruit in Every Good Work

Day 13: Abounding in the Work of the Lord

Day 14: Abounding Grace for Abounding Work

Day 15: The Work of the Ministry

Day 16: The Working Together of the Body

Day 17: Women Adorned with Good Work

Day 18: Rich in Good Works

Day 19: Prepared unto Every Good Work

Day 20: Furnished Completely unto Every Good Work

Day 21: Zealous of Good Works

Day 22: Ready to Every Good Work

Day 23: Maintain Good Works

Day 24: As His Fellow Workers

Day 25: The Working of His Power

Day 26: Laboring More Abundantly

Day 27: A Doer Shall Be Blessed in Doing

Day 28: The Work of Soul Saving

Day 29: Praying and Working

Day 30: I Know Thy Works

Day 31: May God Be Glorified

Andrew Murray – A Brief Biography
Introduction

The first objective of this little book is to remind all Christian workers of the greatness and the glory of the work in which God gives a share. As we see that it is God's own work that we have to work out, that He works through us, and that in our working, His glory rests on us and we glorify Him, then we shall count it our joy to live only and wholly for His work.

The purpose of this book at the same time is to help those who complain, or perhaps do not even know enough to complain, that they are apparently laboring in vain, by helping them discover what may be the cause of so much failure. God's work must be done in God's way and in God's power. It is spiritual work to be done by spiritual men in the power of the Spirit. The clearer our insight into, and the more complete our submission to, God's laws of work, the surer and richer our joy and reward in it will be.

I have also noticed the great number of Christians who practically take no real part in the service of their Lord. They have never understood that the chief characteristic of the divine life in God and Christ is love and its work of blessing men. The divine life in us can show itself in no other way. I have tried to show that it is God's will that every believer, without exception and whatever his position in life, give himself wholly to live and work for God.

I have also written in the hope that some who have the training of others in Christian life and work may find thoughts that will be of use to them in teaching the imperative duty, the urgent need, and the divine blessedness of a life given to God's service. I hope to awaken the consciousness of the power that works in them – even the Spirit and power of Christ Himself.

To the great host of workers in church and chapel, in Mission Hall and Open Air, in Day and Sunday Schools, in Endeavour Societies, in Young Men and Young Women Student Associations, and in all the various forms of Christian ministry throughout the world, I lovingly offer these meditations with the fervent prayer that God, the Great Worker, may make us true fellow workers with Himself.

Andrew Murray

Wellington, February 1901
First Day

Waiting and Working

They who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength. . . . – Isaiah 40:31

Neither hath the eye seen a God beside thee, which worketh for him that waiteth for him. – Isaiah 64:4 ERV

Here we have two texts in which the connection between waiting and working is made clear. In the first verse, we see that waiting brings the needed strength for working – it equips the person for joyful and unwearied work. Those that wait for the LORD shall have new strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint (Isaiah 40:31). Waiting on God has its value in that it makes us strong in work for God. The second verse reveals the secret of this strength: 'God worketh for him that waiteth for him. The waiting on God secures the working of God for us and in us, out of which our work must spring. The two passages teach the great lesson that as waiting on God lies at the root of all true working for God, so working for God must be the fruit of all true waiting on Him. Our great need is to hold the two sides of the truth in perfect conjunction and harmony.

Some people say they wait on God, but they do not work for Him. There may be various reasons for this. Someone may confuse true waiting on God (in living, direct communication with the Living One) and wholehearted devotion to Him with the slothful, helpless waiting that excuses oneself from all work until God, by some special impulse, has made work easy. Another may wait on God more truly, regarding it as one of the highest exercises of the Christian life, but never understand that at the root of all true waiting must lie the surrender and the readiness to be equipped for God's use in the service of men. And still another may be ready to work as well as wait, but is looking for some great, overpowering inflow of the Spirit's power to enable him to do mighty works. He forgets that more grace is only given to those who are faithful in the little; it is only in working that we can be taught by the Spirit how to do the greater works. All such individuals, and all Christians, need to learn that waiting has working as its objective, and it is only in working that waiting can attain its full perfection and blessedness. As we elevate working for God to its true place, the highest exercise of spiritual privilege and power, and the absolute need and the divine blessing of waiting on God can be fully known.

On the other hand, many work for God but know little of what it is to wait on Him. They have been led to take up Christian work under the impulse of natural or religious feeling at the bidding of a pastor or a society, but with very little sense of what a holy thing it is to work for God. They do not know that God's work can only be done in God's strength by God Himself working in us. They have never learned that just as the Son of God could do nothing of Himself except as the Father did the work in Him, so too the believer can do nothing except as God works in him. The Son lived in continual dependence upon the Father. These individuals do not understand that it is only as we depend upon Him that His power can rest on us. So they have no understanding of a continual waiting on God as being one of the first and essential conditions of successful work. Christ's church and the world suffer terribly today, not only because many of its members are not working for God, but also because so much working for God is done without waiting on God.

Among the members of the body of Christ is a great diversity of gifts and operations. Some who are confined to their homes due to sickness or other duties may have more time for waiting on God than opportunity of direct working for Him. Others who are exhausted by work find it difficult to find time and quiet for waiting on Him. These may mutually supply each other's lack. Let those who have time for waiting on God link themselves to some who are working. Let those who are working claim the aid of those with the special ministry of waiting on God. In this way, the unity and the health of the body will be maintained. Those who wait will know that the outcome will be power for work, and those who work will know their only strength is the grace obtained by waiting. So, God will work for His church that waits on Him.

Let us pray that as we proceed in these meditations on working for God, the Holy Spirit may show us how sacred and how urgent our calling is to work. May He show us how absolute our dependence upon God's strength is for that work and how sure it is that those who wait on Him shall renew their strength. May we find waiting on God and working for God to be inseparably one.

It is only as God works for me and in me that I can work for Him.

All His work for me is through His life in me.

He will surely work, if I wait on Him.

All His working for me and my waiting on Him has but one purpose – to equip me for His work of saving men.
Second Day

The Light of the World

Ye are the light of the world. . . . Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in the heavens. – Matthew 5:14, 16

A light is meant for the use of those who are in darkness – that by it they may see. The sun lights up the darkness of this world. A lamp is hung in a room to give it light. The church of Christ is the light of men, but the god of this world has blinded their eyes. Christ's disciples are to shine into their darkness and give them light. As the rays of light stream forth from the sun and scatter that light all about, so the good works of believers are the light that streams out from them to conquer the surrounding darkness with its ignorance of God and separation from Him.

What a high and holy place is thus given to our good works. What power is attributed to them. How much depends upon them. They are not just the light and health and joy of our life, but in every deed they are the means of bringing lost souls out of darkness into God's marvelous light. But they are even more. They not only bless men, but they also glorify God by leading men to know Him as the Author of the grace seen in His children. We propose a study of Scripture as it concerns good works, especially work done directly for God and His kingdom. Listen to what these words of the Master have to teach us.

The objective of good works

The simple objective is that God may be glorified. Remember how our Lord said to the Father, I have clarified thee on the earth; I have finished the work which thou didst give me to do (John 17:4). We read more than once of His miracles when the people glorified God. It was because what He had done was distinctly by a divine power. It is when our good works are more than the ordinary virtues of refined men and they bear the impression of God on them that men will glorify God. They must be the good works of which the Sermon on the Mount is the model – a life of God's children who do more than others and seek to be perfect as their Father in heaven is perfect. Men may not yet be converted when they glorify God, but a favorable impression of God is a preparation for conversion. The works prepare the way for the words and are evidence of the reality of the divine truth that is taught; without them, the world is powerless.

The whole world was made for the glory of God. Christ came to redeem us from sin and bring us back to serve and glorify Him. Believers are placed in the world for this purpose – that they let their light shine in good works to win men to God. As truly as the light of the sun is meant to lighten the world, the good works of God's children are meant to be the light for those who don't know and love God. We need to form a correct impression of good works, as they bear the mark of the heavenly and divine and have the power to verify that God is in them.

The power of good works

Of Christ it is written, In him was life, and the life was the light of men (John 1:4). The divine life gave out a divine light. Of His disciples Christ said, he that follows me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life (John 8:12). Christ is our life and light. When it is said to us, Let your light so shine, the deepest meaning is to let Christ, who dwells in you, shine. As in the power of His life, you do your good works, and then your light shines out to all who see you. And because Christ in you is your light, then your works, however humble and feeble they may be, can carry with them a power of divine conviction. The measure of the divine power in your works will be the measure of the power working in those who see them. Oh, child of God, submit to the life and light of Christ dwelling in you, and men will glorify your Father in heaven because of what they see in your works.

The urgent need for good works

As necessary as it is that the sun shine every day, even more necessary is it for every believer to let his light shine before men. We have been reborn in Christ for this purpose – to hold forth the Word of Life as lights in the world. Christ wants you, my friend, to let His light shine through you. Perishing men around you need your light if they are to find their way to God. God needs you to let His glory be seen through you. As wholly as a lamp is given to light a room, every believer should give himself to be the light of a dark world.

Let us undertake the study of what working for God is and what good works are as part of this, with the desire to follow Christ fully and to have the light of life shine into our hearts and lives and radiate from us to all those around us.

Ye are the light of the world. These words express the calling of the church as a whole. The fulfillment of her duty will depend upon the faithfulness of each individual member to love and live for those around him.

In all our efforts to waken the church to evangelize the world, our first objective must be to raise the standard of life for the individual believer who teaches. As truly as a candle only exists to give light in the darkness, the one objective of your existence is to be a light to men.

Pray that by His Holy Spirit, God will reveal to you that you have nothing to live for except to let the light and love of the life of God shine upon souls.
Third Day

Son, Go Work

Son, go work today in my vineyard. – Matthew 21:28

The father had two sons. He told each to go and work in his vineyard. The one went, but the other did not. God also told every child of His to work in His vineyard with the world as the field, but the majority of God's children are not working for Him, and the world is perishing.

Of all the mysteries that surround us in the world, isn't it one of the strangest and most incomprehensible that after eighteen hundred years, the very name of the Son of God is unknown to more than half of the human race?

Just consider what this means. To restore the ruin that sin had created, God, the almighty Creator, actually sent His own Son to the world to tell men of His love and bring them His life and salvation. When Christ made His disciples partakers of that salvation and the unspeakable joy it brings, it was with the understanding that they would make it known to others and be the lights of the world. He spoke of all who would believe through them and have the same calling. He left the world with the distinct instruction to carry the gospel to every creature and teach all nations to observe all that He had commanded.

At the same time, He gave the assurance that all power for this work was in Him, that He would always be with His people, and that by the power of His Holy Spirit they would be able to witness for Him to the ends of the earth. In His last words to the disciples, he commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, . . . ye shall receive the virtue of the Holy Spirit which shall come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me (Acts 1:4, 8). And what do we see now? After eighteen hundred years, two-thirds of the human race have heard little of the name of Jesus. And of the other third, the larger half is still as ignorant as if they had never heard.

Consider again what this means. All these dying millions, whether in Christendom or heathendom, have an interest in Christ and His salvation. They have a right to Him. Their salvation depends on their knowing Him. He could change their lives from sin and wretchedness to holy obedience and heavenly joy. Christ has a right to them. His heart would be glad if they came to be blessed in Him. But they are dependent on His people connecting them to Him. And yet His people do nothing compared to what needs to be done, to what could be done, and to what ought to be done.

Just consider once again what this means. What a revelation of the state of the church. The great majority of those who are considered to be believers are doing nothing towards making Christ known to their fellow man. Of the remainder, the majority are doing so little, and doing that ineffectively because of the lack of wholehearted devotion, that they can hardly be said to be giving themselves to their Lord's service. And of the remaining portion who have given themselves and all they have to Christ's service, many are occupied with the hospital work of teaching the sick and the weak in the church, such that the strength left for aggressive work and conquering the world is terribly reduced. The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few (Matthew 9:37). So, with a finished salvation, a loving Redeemer, and a church set apart to carry life and blessing to men, the millions are still perishing.

No question to the church is of more intense and pressing importance than this: What can be done to waken believers to a sense of their holy calling and make them see that to work for God and offer themselves as instruments through whom God can do His work ought to be the one purpose of their life? The vain complaints are heard of a lack of enthusiasm for God's kingdom on the part of the great majority of Christians. Vain attempts to waken an interest in missions proportionate to their claim or Christ's claim make us feel that nothing less than a revival like a revolution is needed – one that will raise even the average Christian to an entirely new type of devotion. No true change can come until the truth is preached and accepted, and that truth is the law of the kingdom: Every believer is to live wholly for God's service and work.

The father who called his sons to work in his vineyard did not leave it to their choice to do as much or as little as they chose. They lived in his home, they were his children, and he depended on what they would give him – their time and strength. God expects this of His children. Until it is understood that each child of God is to give His whole heart to his Father's interest and work, until it is understood that every child of God is to be a worker for God, the evangelization of the world cannot be accomplished. Let every reader listen, and the Father will say to him, Son, go work today in my vineyard.

Why do stirring appeals on behalf of missions often have so few permanent results? Because the command with its motives is brought to men who have not learned that absolute devotion and immediate obedience to their Lord is the essence of true salvation.

If it is seen and confessed that the lack of interest in missions is the result of a low and sickly Christian life, all who plead for missions will make it their first objective to proclaim the calling of every believer to live wholly for God. Every missionary meeting will be a consecration meeting to seek and surrender to the Holy Spirit's power.

The average standard of holiness and devotion cannot be higher outside the home than inside, or in the church at large than in individual believers.

Everyone cannot go abroad or give all his time to direct work, but everyone, whatever his calling or circumstances, can give his whole heart to live for souls and the spread of the kingdom.
Fourth Day

To Each One His Work

As the man who, taking a far journey, left his house and gave his estate to his slaves and to each one his responsibility and commanded the porter to watch. – Mark 13:34

What I have said of the failure of the church to do her Master's work or to insist upon the duty of every member to do the work has led me to ask the question, "What must be done to arouse the church to a right sense of her calling?" This little book is an attempt to give the answer. Working for God must take a different and more definite place in our teaching and training of Christ's disciples than it has in the past.

In studying the question of what must be done, I have been helped by the life and writings of a great educator. The opening sentence of the preface to his biography says, "Edward Thring was unquestionably the most original and striking figure in the schoolmaster world of his time in England." He attributes his own power and success to the prominence he gave to a few simple principles and the faithfulness with which he carried them out at any sacrifice. I have found them as useful in the work of preaching as in teaching, and to state them will clarify some of the chief lessons this book is meant to teach.

The root principle that distinguished his teaching from what was current at the time was this: Every boy in school, even the dullest, must have the same attention as the cleverest. At Eton, where Thring had been educated and graduated first in his class, he had seen the evil of the opposite system. The school kept up its reputation by training a number of men for the highest prizes, while the majority were neglected. He maintained that this was dishonest: there could be no truth in a school that did not care for all alike. Every boy had some gift; every boy needed special attention; with care and patience, every boy could be fitted to know and fulfill his mission in life.

Apply this to the church. Every believer, the weakest as much as the strongest, has the calling to live and work for the kingdom of his Lord. For in the manner that we have many members in one body, nevertheless all the members do not have the same operation (Romans 12:4). Every believer has an equal claim on the grace and power of the Holy Spirit according to his gifts to equip him for his work. Likewise many of us are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another. So that having different gifts according to the grace that is given to us (Romans 12:5-6). And every believer has a right to be taught and helped by the church for the service our Lord expects of him. When the truth that every believer, even the weakest, is to be trained as a worker for God, gets its true place, can there be any thought of the church not fulfilling its mission? Not one can be missed, because the Master gave to everyone his work.

Another of Thring's principles was this: It is a law of nature that work is pleasure. Make it voluntary and not compulsory. Don't lead the boys blindfolded. Show them why they have to work, what its value will be, what interest can be developed in it, and what pleasure may be found in it. He says a little time stolen for that purpose from the ordinary teaching will be more than compensated for by the spirit that will be thrown into the work.

What a field is opened for the preacher of the gospel in the responsibility he has for Christ's disciples. He can unfold before them the greatness, the glory, and the divine blessedness of the work to be done. He will have the opportunity to show the value in carrying out God's will and gaining His approval by becoming the benefactors and saviors of the perishing. He can help them develop that spiritual vigor, that nobility of character, and that spirit of self-sacrifice, which lead to the true bearing of Christ's image.

A third truth that Thring insisted on was the need to inspire the belief and assurance in the possibility of success in gaining the objective of pursuit. That objective is not much knowledge; not every boy can attain to this. The drawing out and cultivation of the power in himself is the only true education, and this is for every boy. As a learner's powers of observation grow under true guidance and teaching, and he finds within himself a source of power and pleasure he never knew before, he feels a new self that is beginning to live, and the world around him has a new meaning. "He becomes conscious of an infinity of unsuspected glory in the midst of which we go about our daily tasks . . . becomes lord of an endless kingdom full of light and pleasure and power."

If this is the law and blessing of a true education, what light is shed on the calling of all teachers and leaders in Christ's church! The "know-ye-nots" of Scripture – that ye are the temple of God, that Christ is in you, and that the Holy Spirit dwells in you – acquire a new meaning. Know ye not that ye are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? (1 Corinthians 3:16). It tells us that the one thing that needs to be awakened in the hearts of Christians is the faith in the power that works in us (Ephesians 3:20). As one sees the worth and the glory of the work to be done, believes in the possibility of being able to do that work, and learns to trust a divine energy, the very power and Spirit of God working in him, "he will become conscious of a new life with an infinity of unsuspected glory in the midst of daily tasks and become lord of an endless kingdom full of light and pleasure and power." This is the royal life that God has called all His people to. The true Christian is one who knows God's power working in him and finds his true joy when the life of God flows into him, and through him, and out from him to those around him.

We must learn to believe in the power of littles – the value of every individual believer. As men are saved one by one, they must be trained for work one by one.

We must believe that work for Christ can become as natural and as much an attraction and a pleasure in the spiritual world as in the natural world.

We must believe and teach that every believer can become an effective worker in his sphere. Are you seeking to be filled with love for souls?

* * *

 George R. Parkin, Edward Thring, Headmaster of Uppingham School: Life, Diary and Letters (London: Macmillan and Co. Limited, 1898).

 Edward Thring, Theory and Practice of Teaching (Cambridge: University Press, 1894).
Fifth Day

To Each According to His Ability

For it [the kingdom of heaven] is like a man travelling into a far country, who called his own slaves and delivered unto them his goods. And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one, to each one according to his faculty. – Matthew 25:14-15

In the parable of the talents, we have an instructive summary of our Lord's teaching about the work He has given His servants to do. He tells of His going to heaven and leaving His work on earth in the care of His church. He tells of giving everyone something to do, however different the gifts might be, expecting to get back His money with interest. He tells of the failure of the one who had received the least and what led to that terrible neglect.

He called his own slaves and delivered unto them his goods. . . . and straightway took his journey. This is literally what our Lord did. He went to heaven and left His work with all His goods in the care of His church. His goods were the riches of His grace, the spiritual blessings in heavenly places, His Word, and the Spirit with all the power of His life on the throne of God. As the apostle Paul proclaimed, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly things in Christ (Ephesians 1:3). All these He gave in trust to His servants to be used to carry out His work on earth. The work He had begun, they were to continue and finish. Like a rich merchant who leaves Cape Town to reside in London while his business is carried on by trustworthy servants, our Lord took His people into partnership with Himself and entrusted His work on earth to their care. Through their neglect, it would suffer, but their diligence would be His enrichment. Here we have the true root principle of Christian service; Christ has made Himself dependent on the faithfulness of His people for the extension of His kingdom.

Unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one, to each one according to his faculty. Though there was a difference in the measure, every one received a portion of the master's goods. It is in connection with the service we are to render to each other that we read of the grace according to the measure of the gift of the Christ (Ephesians 4:7). This truth, that every believer without exception has been set apart to be active in the work of winning the world for Christ, has almost been lost. Christ was first a Son, then a servant. Every believer is first a child of God, then a servant. It is the highest honor of a son to be a servant and have the father's work entrusted to him. Neither the home nor the foreign missionary work of the church will ever be done right until every believer feels that the one purpose of his being in the world is to work for the kingdom. The first duty of the servants in the parable was to spend their lives in caring for their master's interests.

After a long time the lord of those slaves came and reckoned accounts with them (Matthew 25:19). Christ keeps watch over the work He has left to be done on earth; His kingdom and glory depend upon it. He will not only hold reckoning when He comes again to judge, but He comes to also unceasingly inquire of His servants as to their welfare and work. He comes to approve and encourage, to correct and warn. By His Word and Spirit, He asks us whether we are using our talents diligently and, as His devoted servants, living only and entirely for His work. He finds some laboring diligently, and to them He frequently says, enter thou into the joy of thy lord (Matthew 25:21). Others He sees who are discouraged, and He inspires them with new hope. Some He finds working in their own strength, and He reproves them. Still others He finds sleeping or hiding their talent; to such His voice speaks in solemn warning: from him that has not shall be taken away even that which he has (Matthew 25:29). Christ's heart is in His work; every day He watches over it with the most intense interest. Let us not disappoint Him or deceive ourselves.

I was afraid and went and hid thy talent in the earth (Matthew 25:25). That the man with the one talent should have been the one to fail and be severely punished is a lesson of great seriousness. It calls the church to beware lest by neglecting to teach the weaker, one-talent men whose service is also needed, she allows them to let their gifts lie unused. In teaching the great truth that every branch is to bear fruit, special stress must be placed on the danger of thinking that this can only be expected of the strong and advanced Christian. When truth reigns in a school, the most backward pupil has the same attention as the more clever one. Care must be taken that the weakest Christians receive special training, so that they too may joyfully have their share in the service of their Lord and all the blessedness it brings. If Christ's work is to be done, not one can be left out.

Lord, I knew thee that thou art a hard man, . . . I was afraid (Matthew 25:24-25). Wrong thoughts of God and looking upon His service as that of a hard master are the chief causes of failure in service. If the church is to care for the weak ones, the one-talent servants who are apt to be discouraged due to their conscious weakness, we must teach them what God says of the sufficiency of grace and the certainty of success. They must learn to believe that the power of the Holy Spirit within them fits them for the work God has called them to. They must learn to understand that God will strengthen them with might by His Spirit in the inner man. Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves, but our sufficiency is of God (2 Corinthians 3:5). They must be taught that work is joy and health and strength. Unbelief lies at the root of laziness. Faith opens the eyes to see the blessedness of God's service, the sufficiency of the strength provided, and the rich reward. Let the church awaken to her calling to train the weakest members to know that Christ depends on every redeemed person to live wholly for His work. This alone is true Christianity and full salvation.
Sixth Day

Work is Life

My food is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish His work. – John 4:34

It is expedient that I do the works of him that sent me. – John 9:4

I have clarified thee on the earth; I have finished the work which thou didst give me to do. And now, O Father, clarify thou me with thine own self. – John 17:4-5

Read carefully the words of our blessed Lord at the beginning of this chapter and see what divine glory there is in His work. Christ showed His own glory and that of the Father in His works. Because of the work He had done, and because He had glorified the Father in it, He could claim to share the glory of the Father in heaven. The greater works that He was to do in answer to the prayer of the disciples was for the Father to be glorified in the Son. Work is indeed the highest form of existence, the highest expression of the divine glory in the Father and in His Son.

What is true of God is true of His creature. Life is movement and action; it reveals itself in what it accomplishes. The bodily life, the intellectual, the moral, the spiritual life – individual, social, and national – each of these is judged by its work. The character and quality of the work depends on the life; as the life, so the work. On the other hand, the life depends on the work; without work there can be no full development and expression and perfecting of the life; as the work, so the life.

This is especially true of the spiritual life – the life of the Spirit in us. There may be a great deal of religious work with its external activities, the outcome of human will and effort but with little true worth and power, because the divine life is weak. When the believer does not know that Christ is living in him or that the Spirit and power of God work in him, there may be much earnestness and diligence with little that lasts for eternity. On the contrary, there may be much external weakness and apparent failure, but with results that prove the life is indeed of God.

The work depends upon the life, and the life depends on the work for its growth and perfection. All life has a destiny; it cannot accomplish its purpose without work; life is perfected by work. The highest expression of its hidden nature and power comes out in its work. Work is the great factor by which the hidden beauty and the divine possibilities of the Christian life are brought out. For the sake of what it accomplishes through the believer as God's instrument, but also what it effects in the child of God, work must take the same place it has in God Himself. As in the Father and the Son, so with the Holy Spirit dwelling in us, work is the highest expression of life.

Work must be restored to its right place in God's scheme of the Christian life as the highest form of existence. To be the intelligent, willing channel of the power of God, to be capable of working the work of God, to be animated by the divine Spirit of love, and in that to be allowed to work life and blessing to men, gives nobility to life. It is for this we are created in the image of God. As God never ceases to work His work of love and blessing in us and through us, so our working out what He works in us is our highest proof of being created anew in His likeness.

If God's purpose in the perfection of the individual believer and the appointment of His church as the body of Christ to carry on His work of winning back a rebellious world to His allegiance and love is to be carried out, working for God must have greater prominence as the true glory of our Christian calling. Every believer must be taught that our work is to be our highest glory, because work is the only perfect expression and therefore the perfection of life in God and throughout the world. Shall it be so in our lives?

If this is to take effect, we must remember two things. The one is that it can only occur by beginning to work. Those who have not had their attention directed to it cannot realize how great the temptation is to make work a matter of thought and prayer and purpose without getting it done. In all labour there is fruit, but to talk and not do, brings poverty (Proverbs 14:23). It is easier to hear than to think, easier to think than to speak, and easier to speak than to act. We may listen and accept and admire God's will, and in our prayers we may profess our willingness to do and yet not actually do. Let us take up our calling as God's working men and work hard for Him with whatever measure of grace we have and pray for more. Doing is the best teacher. If you want to know how to do a thing, begin and do it.

Then you will feel the need for the second thing and be capable of understanding it – that there is sufficient grace in Christ for all the work you have to do. You will see with ever-increasing gladness how He, as the Head, works everything in you as the member, and how work for God may become your closest and fullest fellowship with Christ, your highest participation in the power of His risen and glorified life.

Life and work: beware of separating them. The more work you have, the more your work appears a failure. If you feel unfit for work, take all the more time and care to have your inner life renewed in close fellowship with God.

Christ lives in me: this is the secret of joy and hope, and of power for work. Care for the life, and the life will care for the work. Be filled with the Spirit (Ephesians 5:18).
Seventh Day

The Father Does the Work

Jesus answered them, My Father works until now, and I work. – John 5:17

Believest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself; but the Father that dwells in me, he does the works. – John 14:10

Jesus Christ became man that He might show us what a true man is, how God meant to live and work in man, and how man can find his life and do his work in God. In words like those above, our Lord opens up the inner mystery of His life and reveals to us the nature and the deepest secret of His working. He did not come to the world to work instead of the Father; the Father was always working – He works until now. Christ's work was the fruit, the earthly reflection, of the heavenly Father working.

And it was not as if Christ merely saw and copied what the Father willed or did. The Father that dwells in me, he does the works. Christ did all His work in the power of the Father dwelling and working in Him. So complete and real was His dependence on the Father that in explaining it to the Jews, He used strong expressions: The Son can do nothing of himself but what He sees the Father do; . . . I can of my own self do nothing (John 5:19, 30). What He said, which is literally true of us – without me ye can do nothing (John 15:5) – is true of Him also – the Father that dwells in me does the works (John 14:10).

Jesus Christ became man that He might show us what true man is, the true relationship between man and God, and the true way to serve God and do His work. When we become new creatures in Christ Jesus, the life we receive is the very life that was and is in Christ; only by studying His life on earth do we know how we are to live. As . . . I live by the Father, so he that eats me, he shall also live by me (John 6:57). His dependence on the Father is the law of our dependence on Him and on the Father through Him.

Christ counted it no humiliation to do nothing by Himself, to be always and absolutely dependent on the Father. He counted it His highest glory, because all His works were the works of the all-glorious God in Him. When shall we understand that to wait on God, to bow before Him in perfect helplessness, and to let Him work everything in us is our true nobility and the secret of the highest activity? This alone is the true Son life, the true life of every child of God. As this life is known and maintained, the power for work will grow, because of the God who hath prepared for him that waiteth on him (Isaiah 64:4 KJV). It is the ignorance or neglect of the great truths that hinder true work for God because God works it in us, but God cannot work in us fully unless we live in absolute dependence on Him. That is the explanation of the universal complaint of so much Christian activity with so little result. The revival that many are longing and praying for must begin with the return of Christian ministers and workers to their true place before God – in Christ and like Christ, one of complete dependence and continual waiting on God to work in them.

Let me invite all workers, young and old, successful or disappointed, full of hope or full of fear, to come and learn from our Lord Jesus the secret of true work for God. My Father works until now, and I work; the Father that dwells in me, he does the works. Divine Fatherhood means that God is all, and gives all, and works all. Divine Sonship means continual dependence on the Father, and the reception, moment by moment, of all the strength needed for His work. Try to grasp the great truth that because it is the same God who works all in each one, your one need is to wait for and trust in His working with deep humility and weakness (1 Corinthians 12:6). Learn from this that God can only work in us as He dwells in us. The Father that dwells in me, he does the works (John 14:10). Cultivate the awareness of God's continual nearness and presence, of your being His temple, and of His dwelling in you. For ye are the temple of the living God; as God has said, I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God, and they shall be my people (2 Corinthians 6:16). Offer yourself for Him to work all His good pleasure in you. You will find that work can become your greatest incentive, not a hindrance, to a life of fellowship and childlike dependence.

At first, the waiting for God to work will seem to delay your work. It may indeed – but only to bring the greater blessing when you have learned the lesson of faith that depends on His working even when you do not feel it. You may have to do your work in weakness and fear and much trembling. You will know that it is the excellency of the power of God and not of us. As you know yourself better and know God better, you will be content that it should always be His strength made perfect in our weakness.

The Father that dwells in me, he does the works (John 14:10). There is the same law for the Head and for the member, for Christ and for the believer. It is the same God who works all in each one (1 Corinthians 12:6).

The Father not only worked in the Son when He was on earth, but He also works in the Son now that He is in heaven. It is as we believe in Christ in the Father's working in Him, that we shall do the greater works. Read John 14:10-12:

Believest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself; but the Father that dwells in me, he does the works.

Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me, or else believe me for the very works' sake.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believes in me, the works that I do he shall do also; and greater works than these shall he do because I go unto my Father.

As the indwelling God, the Father, dwells in us, He works in us. Let the life of God in the soul be clear, and the work will be sure.

Pray for grace to say, in the name of Jesus, The Father that dwells in me, he does the works.
Eighth Day

Greater Works Will We Do

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believes in me, the works that I do he shall do also; and greater works than these shall he do because I go unto my Father. And whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If ye ask any thing in my name, I will do it. – John 14:12-14

In the words of verse 10, the Father that dwells in me, he does the works, Christ had revealed the secret of His and of all divine service – man yielding himself for God to dwell in and work in him. When Christ promises He that believes in me, the works that I do he shall do also, the law of the divine "in-working" remains unchanged. In us, even a thousand times more than with Him, it must remain – the Father that dwells in me, he does the works. With Christ and with us, the same God works in all.

How this can be is taught in these words – He that believes in me. These words do not only apply to salvation, a Savior from sin, but also to much more. Christ had just said, Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me, . . . the Father that dwells in me, he does the works (John 14:11, 10). We need to believe in Christ as the One in and through whom the Father unceasingly works. When we see the Father's working inseparably connected with Christ, we know that to believe in Christ is to receive the Father dwelling in Him and working through Him. The works His disciples are to do cannot possibly be done in any other way than the way His own are done.

This becomes clearer from what our Lord adds: and greater works than these shall he do because I go unto my Father. What are the greater works? The disciples at Pentecost with three thousand baptized and multitudes added to the Lord, and Philip at Samaria with the whole city filled with joy, are greater works. The men of Cyprus and Cyrene, and later Barnabas at Antioch with many people added to the Lord, are greater works. Paul in his travels and a countless host of Christ's servants through the ages have done what the Master calls greater works than He did in the days of His humiliation and weakness.

Our Lord makes it plain why it should be so: because I go unto my Father. When He entered the glory of the Father, all power in heaven and on earth was given to Him as our Redeemer. In a way more glorious than ever, the Father was to work through Him, and He then was to work through His disciples. Even as His own work on earth in the days of His weakness of the flesh had been in a power received from the Father in heaven, so His people in their weakness would do works like His, and greater works in the same way through a power received from heaven. The law of the divine working is unchangeable: God's work can only be done by God Himself. As we see this in Christ and receive Him as the One in and through whom God works everything, and so yield ourselves to the Father working in Him and in us, then we shall do greater works than He did.

The words that follow bring out still more strongly the great truths we have been learning – that our Lord Himself will work everything in us, even as the Father did in Him. Our responsibility is to be exactly what His was – one of entire receptivity and dependence. Greater works than these shall he do because I go unto my Father. And whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, that will I do (John 14:12-13). Christ connects the greater works the believer is to do with the promise that He will do whatever the believer asks. Prayer in the name of Jesus will be the expression of that dependence that waits on Him for His working to which He gives the promise – whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, that will I do. Then He adds, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. He reminds us of how He had glorified the Father by yielding to Him as Father to work all His work in Himself as Son. In heaven, Christ would still glorify the Father by receiving from the Father the power and by working in His disciples what the Father desired. The creature, as the Son Himself, can give the Father no higher glory than yielding to Him to work all. The believer can glorify the Father in no other way than through the Son with an absolute and unceasing dependence on the Son in whom the Father works to communicate and work all the Father's work in us. If ye ask any thing in my name, I will do it, and so ye shall do greater works.

Let every believer strive to learn the one blessed lesson. We are to do the works we have seen Christ doing; we may even do greater works as we yield ourselves to Christ, exalted on the throne, in a power He did not have on earth. We may depend on Him working in us according to that power. Our one need is the spirit of dependence and waiting, and prayer and faith, that Christ abiding in us will do the works, even whatsoever we ask.

How was Christ able to work the works of God? By God abiding in Him! How can I do the works of Christ? By Christ abiding in me!

How can I do greater works than Christ? By believing not only in Christ, the incarnate and Crucified One, but also in Christ triumphant on the throne.

Oh believer, in work, everything depends on the life, the inner life, the divine life. Pray to realize that work is vain except as it is in the power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in you.
Ninth Day

Created in Christ Jesus for Good Works

For by grace are ye saved through faith . . . Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has prepared that we should walk in them. – Ephesians 2:8-10

We have been saved, not of works but for good works. How vast the difference. How essential the comprehension of that difference is to the health of the Christian life. Not of works that we have done, as the source of our salvation have we been saved, but for good works, as the fruit and outcome of salvation as part of God's work in us – the one thing for which we have been created again. As worthless as our works are in procuring salvation, so infinite is their worth for what God has created and prepared us. Let's seek to hold these two truths to their spiritual meaning. The deeper our conviction that we have been saved by grace and not of works, the stronger the proof we will give that we have indeed been saved for good works.

Not of works, . . . For we are his workmanship. If works could have saved us, there would have been no need for our redemption, for if righteousness comes by the law, then Christ is dead in vain (Galatians 2:21). Because our works were all sinful and vain, God undertook to make us anew; we are now His workmanship, and all the good works we do are His workmanship too. His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus. The ruin of sin had been so complete that God had to do the work of creation over again in Christ Jesus. In Him, and particularly in His resurrection from the dead, He created us anew – after His own image. He created us into the likeness of the life that Christ had lived. In the power of that life and resurrection, we are able and perfectly fitted for doing good works. We who have been created in Christ Jesus for good works may rest assured that a divine capacity for good works is the very law of our being, just as the eye was perfectly adapted for light and the vine for bearing grapes. If we know and believe this is our destiny and live our life in Christ Jesus as we were created in Him to do, we can and will be fruitful unto every good work.

Created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has prepared that we should walk in them. We have been prepared for the works, and the works are prepared for us. Think of how God foreordained His servants of old – Moses and Joshua, Samuel and David, Peter and Paul – for the work He had for them and foreordained the works for them. The weakest member of the body is equally cared for by the Head as the most honored. The Father has prepared works for the humblest of His children as much as for those who are counted leaders. God has a life plan for every child, with work apportioned according to the power and grace provided according to the work. So just as strong and clear as the teaching of salvation apart from works, is its blessed counterpart of salvation for good works, because God created us for them and even prepared them for us.

Scripture confirms the double lesson this little book desires to bring to you. The one is that good works are God's purpose in the new life He has given you and ought to be just as distinctly your objective. As every human being was created for work and endowed with the necessary power, he can only live out a true and healthy life by working. So, every believer exists to do good works that in them his life may be perfected, his fellow men may be blessed, and his Father in heaven may be glorified. We educate all our children with the thought that they must have their work in the world, but when will the church learn that its great work is to train every believer to do his share in God's great work and abound in the good works for which he was created? Let each of us seek to take in the deep spiritual truth of the message, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has prepared for each one, and which are waiting for us to fulfill.

The other lesson is that waiting on God is the one great thing needed on our part if we desire to do the good works God has prepared for us. Let us take these words in their divine meaning into our hearts: we are God's workmanship, not by one act in the past, but by a continuous operation. We are created for good works as the great means for glorifying God. The good works are prepared for each of us that we might walk in them. Surrender to and dependence upon God's working is our one need. Let us consider how our new creation for good works is all in Christ Jesus, and that abiding in Him, believing on Him, and looking for His strength alone will become the habit of our soul. Created for good works will reveal to us at once the divine command and the sufficient power to live a life in good works.

Let us pray for the Holy Spirit to work the Word into the very depths of our consciousness: created in Christ Jesus for good works. In its light, we shall learn what a glorious destiny, what an infinite obligation, and what a perfect capacity is ours.

Our creation in Adam was for good works. It resulted in entire failure. Our new creation in Christ is for good works again, but with this difference: perfect provision has been made for securing them.

Created by God for good works, created by God in Christ Jesus, the good works prepared by God for us – let us pray for the Holy Spirit to show us and impart to us all that this means.

Let the life in fellowship with God be true, and the power for the work will be sure. As the life, so will be the work.
Tenth Day

God Works in You

Work out your own saving health with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. – Philippians 2:12-13

In the previous chapter, we saw that salvation is our being God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works. One of its chief and essential elements was that we should walk in all the good works that God has prepared for us. In light of this thought, we get the true and full meaning of the text in Philippians 2. Work out your own salvation such as God has meant it to be, a walk in all the good works that He has prepared for you. Study to know exactly what the salvation is that God has prepared for you. Discover all that He has made possible for you to be, and work it out with fear and trembling. Let the greatness of this divine and holy life that is hidden in Christ, with your own absolute insufficiency and the terrible dangers and temptations that you face, make you work in fear and trembling.

And yet, that fear doesn't need to become unbelief, nor that trembling discouragement, for it is God who works in you. Here is the secret of a power that is sufficient for everything we have to do; this is a perfect assurance that we can do all that God wants us to do. God works in us both to will and to do the work. First to will: He gives the insight into what is to be done, the desire that makes the work pleasure, and the firm purpose of the will that masters the whole being and makes it ready and eager for action. And then to do the work: He does not excite the will and then leave us unable to work it out ourselves. The will may have seen and accepted the work, and yet the power may be lacking to perform it. The renewed will of Romans 7 delighted in God's law, but the man was powerless to do until in Romans 8: For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ, Jesus, has made me free from the law of sin and death. . . . the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit (Romans 8:2, 4).

One great cause of the failure of believers in their work is that when they think that God has given them the will, they undertake the work in the strength of that will. They have never learned that because God has created us in Christ Jesus for good works and has prepared the good works for us, He must and certainly will work them all Himself. Some have never listened long to the voice speaking, it is God who works in you.

Here we have one of the deepest, most spiritual, and most precious truths of Scripture – the unceasing operation of almighty God in our heart and life. In character with the very nature of God as a spiritual Being not confined to any place but everywhere present, there can be no spiritual life except as it is upheld by His personal indwelling.

Scripture says, the same God works all in each one (1 Corinthians 12:6). Not only do all things have their beginning and end in Him, but they also prevail through Him who alone maintains them.

In the man Christ Jesus, the working of the Father was the source of all He did. In the new man, created in Christ Jesus, the unceasing dependence on the Father is our highest privilege, our true nobility. This is indeed fellowship with God: God Himself works in us to will and to do.

Let us seek to learn the true secret of working for God. It is not, as many think, that we do our best and then leave God to do the rest. By no means. The faith of God's working in us is the measure of our fitness to work effectively. The promises according to your faith be it unto you and all things are possible to him that believes have their full application here (Matthew 9:29; Mark 9:23). The deeper our faith in God's working in us, the more freely will the power of God work in us and the more true and fruitful our work will be.

What if a Sunday school worker reads this? Let me ask this: Have you really believed that your only power to do God's work is as one who has been created in Christ Jesus for good works, as one in whom God Himself works to will and to work? Have you yielded yourself to wait for that working? Do you work because you know God works in you? Don't say these thoughts are too lofty. Indeed, the work of leading young souls to Christ is too ambitious for us, but if we live as little children by believing that God will work everything in us, we shall do His work in His strength. Pray often to learn and practice the lesson in all you do: Work, for God works in you.

I think we begin to feel that the spiritual comprehension of this great truth, God works in you, is what all workers need.

The Holy Spirit is the mighty power of God who dwells in believers for life and for work. Ask the Lord for the Holy Spirit, so that in all your service, your first care will be the daily renewing of the Holy Spirit.

Obey the command to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Believe in His indwelling. Wait for His teaching. Yield to His leading. Pray for His mighty working. Live in the Spirit.

What the mighty power of God works in us we are surely able to do. Only give way to the power working in you.
Eleventh Day

Faith Working by Love

For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision avails anything nor uncircumcision, but faith which works by charity. . . . only do not use liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by charity serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. – Galatians 5:6, 13-14

In Christ Jesus, no external privilege is of value. The Jew might boast of his circumcision, the token of God's covenant. The Gentile might boast of his uncircumcision with an entrance into the kingdom apart from the Jewish law. Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision profited anything in the kingdom of heaven – nothing except being a new creature, in which old things are passed away and all things become new. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision avails any thing nor uncircumcision, but a new creature (Galatians 6:15). Therefore if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation: old things are passed away; behold, all things are made new (2 Corinthians 5:17). Or, as we have it in our text – as a description of the life of the new creature – nothing but faith which works by love makes us serve one another in love.

What a perfect description of the new life. First, you have faith as the root, planted and rooted in Christ Jesus. Then as its purpose, you have works as the fruit. Between the two, as the tree grows down into the root and bears the fruit upward, you have love with life sap that flows through the root and brings forth the fruit. We need not speak of faith here. We have seen how believing in Jesus does the greater works and how faith in the new creation and in God working in us is the secret of all work. Nor do we need to speak of works – this whole book aims at securing the place in every heart and life that they have in God's heart and in His Word.

We need to study particularly the great truth that all work is to be in love, that faith cannot do its work except through love, that no works can have any worth except as they come from love, and that love alone is the sufficient strength for all the work we have to do.

The power for work is love

Love moved God in all His work in creation and redemption. Love enabled Christ as man to work and suffer as He did. Love can inspire us with the power of self-sacrifice to seek not our own benefit but to be ready to live and die for others. Love gives us the patience that refuses to give up on the unthankful or the hardened. Love reaches and overcomes the most hopeless. Love is the power for work in ourselves and for those for whom we labor. Let us love as Christ loved us. Be ye therefore imitators of God, as dear children and walk in charity even as the Christ also has loved us and has given himself for us as an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour (Ephesians 5:1-2).

The power for love is faith

Faith roots its life in the life of Christ Jesus, which is all love. Faith knows the wonderful gift that has been given to our hearts by the Holy Spirit shedding God's love there, even when we cannot realize it completely. A spring in the earth may often be hidden or sealed. Until it is opened, the fountain cannot flow out. Faith knows that there is a fountain of love within that can spring up into eternal life and flow out as rivers of living waters. It assures us that we can love, that we have a divine power to love within us, as an unalienable endowment of our new nature.

The power to exercise and show love is work

Power does not exist in the abstract; it only emerges as it is exercised. Power at rest cannot be found or felt. This is especially true of the Christian graces, for they are hidden in the weakness of our human nature. Only by doing can we know what we have; a grace must be used before we can rejoice in its possession. This is the unspeakable blessedness of work that makes it so essential to a healthy Christian life that it awakens and strengthens love and makes us partakers of its joy.

Faith working by love

In Christ Jesus nothing profits us but this. Workers for God, believe this. Practice it. Thank God for the fountain of eternal love opened within you. Pray fervently and frequently that God would strengthen you with might by his Spirit in the inner man, that the Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye, being rooted and grounded in charity, may be able to well comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height and to know the charity of the Christ (Ephesians 3:16-19). Then, live your daily life in your own home, in all your communication with men, and in all your work as a life of divine love. The ways of love are so gentle and heavenly, you may not learn them all at once. But be of good courage; only believe in the power that works in you and yield yourself to the work of love, and it will surely gain the victory.

Faith working by love. In Christ Jesus nothing works but this. Let me press this message home for those who have never yet thought of or have only begun to think of working for God.

You owe everything to God's love. The salvation you have received is all love. God's one desire is to fill you with His love – for His satisfaction, for your happiness, and for the saving of men. Now I ask you – won't you accept God's wonderful offer to be filled with His love? Come and submit your heart and life to the joy and service of His love. Believe that the fountain of love is within you; it will flow as you make a channel for it by deeds of love. Whatever work you try to do for God, seek to put love into it. Pray for the spirit of love. Live a life of love and consider how you can love those around you by praying for them, by serving them, and by laboring for their welfare, both temporal and spiritual. Only faith working by love in Christ Jesus is of great value.

Faith, hope, love: the greatest of these is love.

Love is the nature of God. When it is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, love becomes our new nature. Believe this, give yourself over to it, and live it out.

Love is God's power to do His work. Love was Christ's power. To work for God, pray earnestly to be filled with love for souls.
Twelfth Day

Bearing Fruit in Every Good Work

That ye might walk worthy of the Lord, pleasing him in everything, being fruitful in every good work, and growing in the knowledge of God. – Colossians 1:10

There is a difference between fruit and work. Fruit is that which comes spontaneously without thought or will, the natural and necessary outcome of a healthy life. Work, on the other hand, is the product of effort guided by intelligent thought and will. In the Christian life, we have the two elements in combined effort. All true work must be fruit, the growth and product of our inner life, the operation of God's Spirit within us. And yet, all fruit must be work, the effect of our deliberate purpose and exertion. In the words, being fruitful in every good work, we have the practical summing up of the truth taught in previous chapters. Because God works by His life in us, the work we do is fruit. Because, in the faith of His working, we have to will and to work, the fruit we bear is work. In the harmony between the perfect spontaneity that comes from God's life and Spirit motivating us, and our cooperation with Him as His intelligent fellow laborers, lies the secret of all true work.

In the words that precede our text, filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, we have the human side, our need for knowledge and wisdom (Colossians 1:9). In the words that follow our text, strengthened with all might, according to the power of his glory, we have the divine side (Colossians 1:11). God teaches and strengthens; man learns to understand and patiently do His will; such is the double life that will be fruitful in every good work.

It has been said of the Christian life that the natural man must first become spiritual, and then the spiritual man must become natural. As the whole natural life becomes truly spiritual, all our work will partake of the nature of fruit, the outgrowth of the life of God within us. And as the spiritual becomes perfectly natural to us, a second nature in which we are wholly at home, all the fruit will bear the mark of true work.

Being fruitful in every good work. These words suggest the great thought that as an apple tree or a vine is planted solely for its fruit, and a great purpose of our redemption is that God may have us for His work and service. As Thomas Carlyle said, "The end of man is an action and not a thought, though it were the noblest." In his work, the nobility of man's nature as ruler of the world is proved, for we have been created in Christ Jesus for good works (Ephesians 2:10). When men see our good works, our Father in heaven will be glorified and have the honor that is His due for His workmanship.

In the parable of the vine, our Lord insisted on this: He that abides in me, and I in him, the same brings much fruit (John 15:5). In this is my Father clarified, in that ye bear much fruit (John 15:8). Nothing honors a husbandman more than to succeed in raising an abundant crop; much fruit is glory to God.

What does every believer need – even the weakest branch of the heavenly vine, the man with only one talent – to be encouraged, helped, and trained to aim at much fruit? A little strawberry plant may bear a more abundant crop than a large apple tree. The call to be fruitful in every good work is for every Christian without exception. The grace that equips us for the work is for everyone. Every branch fruitful in every good work – this is an essential part of God's gospel.

Being fruitful in every good work. Let's study to fully comprehend the two sides of this divine truth. God's first creation of life was in the vegetable kingdom. This was a life without any will or self-effort; all growth and fruit was simply His own direct work, the spontaneous outcome of His invisible working. In the creation of the animal kingdom, there was an advance. A new element was introduced – thought and will and work. In man these elements were united in perfect harmony. The absolute dependence of the grass and the lily on the God who clothes them with their beauty was to be the groundwork of our relationship. Nature has nothing but what it receives from God. Our works are to be fruit, the product of a God-given power, but to this was added the true mark of our God-likeness, the power of will and independent action; all fruit is to be our own work.

As we grasp this concept, we shall see how the acknowledgment of having nothing in ourselves is consistent with the deepest sense of obligation and the strongest will to exert our powers to the utmost. He that abides in me, and I in him, the same brings forth much fruit; for without me ye can do nothing (John 15:5). We shall learn to study the prayer of our text as those who must seek all their wisdom and strength from God alone, and we shall boldly give ourselves as those who are responsible to use that wisdom and strength with the diligence, sacrifice, and effort needed for a life bearing fruit in every good work.

For quality and quantity, much depends on the healthy life of the tree. The life of God, of Christ Jesus, of His Spirit, and the divine life in you is strong and sure.

That life is love. Believe in it. Live by it. Have it replenished day by day out of the fullness in Christ.

Let all your work be fruit; let all your willing and working be inspired by the life of God. Then you will walk worthy of the Lord, pleasing Him in everything – that ye might walk worthy of the Lord, pleasing him in everything, being fruitful in every good work, and growing in the knowledge of God (Colossians 1:10).
Thirteenth Day

Abounding in the Work of the Lord

Therefore, my beloved brothers, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. – 1 Corinthians 15:58

We all know the fifteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians with its divine revelation of the meaning of Christ's resurrection and all the blessings from it. It gives us a living Savior who revealed Himself to His disciples on earth and to Paul from heaven. It secures the complete deliverance from all sin for us. It is the pledge of His final victory over every enemy when He gives the kingdom to the Father, and God is all in all. It assures us of the resurrection of the body and our entrance into the heavenly life. Paul had closed his argument with his triumphant appeal to death and sin and the law: O death, where is thy sting? O Hades, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:55-57).

Then after fifty-seven verses of exultant teaching about the mystery and the glory of the resurrection life in our Lord and His people, comes one verse of practical application: Therefore, my beloved brothers, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. The faith in a risen, living Christ and in all that His resurrection is to us in time and eternity is to fit us for and prove itself in the abounding work for our Lord.

It cannot be otherwise. Christ's resurrection was His final victory over sin, death, and Satan, and it was His work of giving the Spirit from heaven and extending His kingdom throughout the earth. Those who shared the resurrection joy received the commission to make the joyful news known. It was so with Mary and the other women. It was so with the disciples on the evening of the resurrection day. As my Father has sent me, even so send I you (John 20:21). It was so with all to whom the charge was given: Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature (Mark 16:15). The resurrection is the beginning and the pledge of Christ's victory over all the earth. That victory is to be carried out to its completion through His people. The faith and joy of the resurrection life are the inspiration and the power for the work of doing it. So the call comes to all believers without exception: Therefore, my beloved brothers, be ye . . . always abounding in the work of the Lord.

In the work of the Lord. The connection tells us at once what that work is. It is nothing more, nothing less, than telling others of the risen Lord and proving that Christ has brought new life to us. As we know and acknowledge Him as Lord over all we are and live in the joy of His service, we shall see that the work of the Lord is but one work – that of winning men to know and bow to Him. Amid all the lowly, living, patient service, this will be the one purpose – in the power of the life of the risen Lord – to make Him Lord of all.

This work of the Lord is not an easy one. It cost Christ His life to conquer sin and Satan and gain the risen life. It will cost us our life too – the sacrifice of the physical life. We need to surrender all on earth in order to live in the full power of resurrection newness of life. The power of sin and the world in those around us is strong, and Satan does not easily release his servants to our efforts. This work needs a heart close to the risen Lord, truly living the resurrection life, to be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. That is a life that can be lived – because Jesus lives.

Paul adds: Forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not vain in the Lord. I have often mentioned the mighty influence that the certainty of wages or riches for work exerts on the millions of earth's workers. So, shouldn't Christ's workers believe that with such a Lord, their reward is sure and great? The work is often difficult and slow and apparently fruitless. We are apt to lose heart, because we are working in our strength and judging by our expectations. Let's listen to the message: Oh ye children of the resurrection life, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord (1 Corinthians 15:58). Do not let your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded (2 Chronicles 15:7). You know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.

In the Lord. This expression is a significant one. Study it in Romans 16 where it occurs seven times, and where the similar phrase – in Christ Jesus, or in Christ – occurs five times. Paul uses the expressions receive her in the Lord, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus, who also were in Christ, beloved in the Lord, approved in Christ, who labour in the Lord, and chosen in the Lord (Romans 16:2-3, 7-8, 10, 12-13). The whole life, fellowship, and service of these saints had the one mark – they and their labors were in the Lord. Here is the secret of effective service. Your labour is not in vain in the Lord. As we maintain a sense of His presence and the power of His life, and all works are accomplished in Him, His strength works in our weakness. Our labor cannot be in vain in the Lord, for Christ said, He that abides in me, and I in him, the same brings forth much fruit (John 15:5). Oh, don't let the children of this world, with the confidence and reward from their masters for the work they are doing, put the children of light to shame. Let's rejoice and labor in the confident faith of the Word: Therefore, beloved brothers, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.
Fourteenth Day

Abounding Grace for Abounding Work

And God is able to make all grace abound in you that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work. – 2 Corinthians 9:8

In the last chapter, we saw the great motive for abounding work – the spirit of triumphant joy that Christ's resurrection inspires. Our text in this chapter assures us that the ability for this abounding work is provided: God is able to make all grace abound that we may abound to every good work. Every thought of abounding grace is to be connected with the abounding in good works for which it is given. And every thought of abounding work is to be connected with abounding grace that equips it.

Abounding grace has abounding work for its purpose. Sometimes we think that grace and good works are at variance with each other. This is not so. Scripture calls our own works the works of the law, works of righteousness, which we have done. These are dead works – works by which we seek to merit or to be made fit for God's favor. These are indeed the very opposite of grace. But they are also the opposite of the good works that spring from grace for which grace alone is given. As irreconcilable as the works of the law are with the freedom of grace, so essential and indispensable are the works of faith, good works, to the true Christian life. God makes grace abound that good works may abound. The measure of true grace is tested and proved by the measure of good works. God's grace abounds in us that we may abound in good works. We need to have the truth deeply rooted in us: Abounding grace has abounding work as its objective.

Abounding work needs abounding grace as its source and strength. Often there is abounding work without abounding grace. Just as any man can be diligent in an earthly pursuit, or a heathen in his religious service of an idol, so men can be diligent in doing religious work in their own strength with little thought of that grace which alone is able to do true, spiritual, effective work. The grace of God is indispensable for all work that is to be really acceptable to God and truly fruitful, not only for visible results on earth but also for eternity.

Paul continually speaks of owing everything to the grace of God working in him: I laboured more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me (1 Corinthians 15:10), according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the operation of his power (Ephesians 3:7). And he also calls upon Christians to exercise their gifts according to the grace that is given to us (Romans 12:6). To each one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of the Christ (Ephesians 4:7). It is only by the grace of God working in us that we can do what are truly good works. It is only as we seek and receive abounding grace that we can abound in every good work.

God is able to make all grace abound in you that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work. Every Christian should praise God with thanksgiving for the abounding grace that is provided for him, and every Christian should confess that the experience of and the surrender to that abounding grace has been so defective. Every Christian should believe with confidence that a life abounding in good works is indeed possible, because the abounding grace for it is so sure and divinely sufficient. Then, with simple, childlike dependence, every Christian can wait upon God day by day to receive more grace, which He gives to the humble.

Child of God, take time to study and comprehend God's purpose for you that you abound to every good work. He means it. He has provided for it. Make the measure of your consecration to Him nothing less than His purpose for you. Then claim nothing less than the abounding grace He is able to bestow. Make His omnipotence and His faithfulness your confidence, and always live in the practice of continual prayer and dependence upon His power working in you. This will make you abound in every good work. According to your faith may it be unto you.

Christian worker, learn the secret of all failure and all success. To work in our own strength with little prayer and not waiting on God for His Spirit is the cause of failure. The cultivation of the spirit of absolute powerlessness in ourselves but unceasing dependence on God will open the heart for the workings of abounding grace. We shall learn to ascribe all we do to God's grace. We shall learn to measure all we have to do by God's grace. And our life will increasingly be in the joy of God making His grace abound in us and our abounding in every good work.

That ye . . . may abound to every good work. Pray about this now until you feel that this is what God has prepared for you.

If your ignorance and weakness appear to make it impossible, present yourself to God and tell Him you are willing to be a branch that brings forth much fruit if He will enable you to abound in good works.

Take into your heart the precious truth as a living seed: God is able to make all grace abound in you. Trust His power and His faithfulness:

[Abraham] doubted not the promise of God, with unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, being fully persuaded that he was also powerful to do all that he had promised. (Romans 4:20-21)

Faithful is he that has called you, who will also do it. (1 Thessalonians 5:24)

Begin at once by doing lowly deeds of love. As the little child in the kindergarten – learn by doing.
Fifteenth Day

The Work of the Ministry

And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints in the work of the ministry, unto the edifying of the body of the Christ. – Ephesians 4:11-12

When Christ ascended to heaven, He bestowed various gifts on His servants for three reasons. The first was for the perfecting of the saints. As saints, believers are to pursue holiness until they stand firm, perfect and fulfilled in all the will of God (Colossians 4:12). Epaphras labored for this in prayer. Paul wrote, whom we preach, warning every man and teaching in all wisdom that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus (Colossians 1:28).

This perfecting of the saints is, however, only a means to a higher end – unto the work of the ministry. It is meant to equip all the saints to take part in the service to which every believer is called. This same word is used in other texts: others who ministered unto him of their substance and having helped the saints and helping them (Luke 8:3; Hebrews 6:10).

This is also a means to a higher end: unto the edifying of the body of the Christ. As every member of our physical body takes part in working for the health, growth, and maintenance of the whole, so every member of the body of Christ is to consider it his first duty to take part in all that can help to edify the body of Christ. And the high purpose of building up is necessary, whether by helping and strengthening those who are already members or by reaching those who are to belong to it. Through its pastors and teachers, the great work of the church is to labor for the perfecting of the saints in holiness and love and fitness for service that everyone may take his part in the work of the ministry, so the body of Christ may be built up and perfected.

Of the three great objectives for which Christ has given His church apostles and teachers, the work of ministering stands in the middle. On the one side, it is preceded by what it absolutely depends on – the perfecting of the saints. On the other, it is followed by what it is to accomplish – the edifying of the body of the Christ. Every believer without exception, every member of Christ's body, is called to take part in the work of the ministry. Let every reader try to realize the sacredness of his holy calling.

Let's learn what the qualification is for our work. The perfecting of the saints prepares us for the work of the ministry. Lack of true sainthood and true holiness cause the lack and weakness of service. As Christ's saints learn that conformity to Christ means a life like His that is given up in self-sacrifice for the service and salvation of men, the work of the ministry will become the one thing we live for. His humility and love, His separation from the world and devotion to the lost, are the very essence and blessedness of the life He gives the work of the ministry, the ministry of love.

This will be what we live for. Humility and love – these are the two great virtues of the saint; they are the two great powers for the work of the ministry. Humility makes us willing to serve; love makes us wise to know how to do it. Love is inventive; it seeks patiently and suffers long, until it finds a way to reach its object. Humility and love are equally turned away from self and its claims. Let us pray for the church to labor for the perfecting of the saints in humility and love, and the Holy Spirit will teach us how to minister.

Let's look at what the great work is that the members of Christ have to do. They must minister to each other. Place yourself at Christ's disposal for service to your fellow Christians. Count yourself their servant. Study their interest. Actively promote the welfare of the Christians around you. Selfishness may hesitate, the feeling of inadequacy may discourage, and sloth and ease may raise difficulties, so ask your Lord to reveal His will to you and give yourself up to it. There are Christians around you who are cold and worldly and wandering from their Lord. Begin to think about what you can do for them. Accept that the will of the Head is for you as a member to care for them. Pray for the Spirit of love. Begin somewhere – only begin and do not continue hearing and thinking while you do nothing. Begin the work of the ministry according to the measure of the grace you have. He will give more grace.

Let's believe in the power that works in us as sufficient for all we have to do. As I think of the thumb and finger holding the pen with which I write, I ask how it is that during all these seventy years of my life, they have always known how to do my will. It was because the life of the head passed into and worked itself out in them. He that believes in me as his Head working in him, the works that I do he shall do also (John 14:12). Faith in Christ, whose strength is made perfect in our weakness, will give the power for all we are called to do.

Let us cry to God that all believers may awaken to the power of this great truth: Every member of the body is to live wholly for the building up of the body.

To be a true worker, the first thing needed is close, humble fellowship with Christ the Head – to be guided and empowered by Him.

The next is humble, loving fellowship with Christ's members, serving one another in love.

This prepares and fits us for service in the world.
Sixteenth Day

The Working Together of the Body

Let us grow up into him in all things, who is the head, the Christ: From whom the whole body fitly joined together and well tied together among itself by the nourishment that every connecting bond supplies, by the operation of each member according to measure they have received, making increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in charity. – Ephesians 4:15-16

The apostle is speaking here of the growth – the increase and building up of the body. This growth and increase has a double reference. It includes both the spiritual uniting and strengthening of those who are already members to secure the health of the whole body, and the increase by the addition of all who are still outside of the body and are to be gathered in. In the previous chapter, we saw the mutual interdependence of all believers and the calling to care for each other's welfare. In this chapter, we will look at the growth from the other side – the calling of every member of Christ's body to labor in love for the increase that seeks to bring in outsiders. This increase and building up of the body in love can only be by the working of every part.

Think of the body of a child; how does it reach the stature of a full-grown man? In no other way but by the growth and working of every part. As each member does its part by seeking and taking and assimilating food, the increase is made by building itself up. Not from without, but from within, comes the work that assures the growth. In no other way can Christ's body attain the stature of the fullness of Christ. As we grow unto Christ the Head, and from Christ the Head the body increases, so it is through that which every joint supplies according to the working of each part. Let's see what this implies.

The body of Christ is to consist of all who believe in Him throughout the world. There is no possible way in which these members of the body can be gathered in, except by the body building itself up in love. Our Lord has made Himself dependent on His members to do this work. What nature teaches us about our own bodies, Scripture teaches us about Christ's body. The head of a child may have thoughts and plans of growth, but they will all be in vain unless the members all do their part in securing that growth. Christ Jesus has committed to His church the growth and increase of His body. As He is the Head and lives for the growth and welfare of the body, Christ asks and expects every member of His body, even the weakest, to do the same – to build up the body in love. Every believer is to count it his one duty and blessedness to live and labor for the increase of the body, the ingathering of all who are to be its members.

What is it that is needed to bring the church to accept this calling, to train, and to help the members of the body to know and fulfill it? One thing. We must see that the new birth and faith, that all insight into truth with all resolve and surrender and effort to live according to it, is only a preparation for our true work. What is needed is for Jesus Christ to be formed in every believer, so He may dwell in every heart, and His life in us can become the impulse and inspiration of our love to the whole body, loving one another with brotherly love, with honour preferring one another (Romans 12:10).

It is because self occupies the heart that it is so easy, natural, and pleasing to care for ourselves. When Jesus Christ lives in us, it will be as easy, natural, and pleasing to live wholly for the body of Christ. As the thumb and fingers respond to the will and movement of the head, so will the members of Christ's body respond to the Head as the body grows up into Him and from Him increases itself.

The Head is entirely dependent on the service of the members in gathering from throughout the world and building up His body. Not only our Lord but also a perishing world is waiting and calling for the church to awake and give herself to this work – the perfecting of the number of Christ's members. Every believer must learn to know his calling – to live with this as the main object of this existence. This great truth will be revealed to us in power, and we will obtain the mastery as we give ourselves to the work of the ministry according to the grace we already have. We may confidently wait for the full revelation of Christ in us as the power to do all He asks of us.
Seventeenth Day

Women Adorned with Good Work

In like manner also that the women adorn themselves in an honest manner, with shyness and modesty, not with ostentatious hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing but with good works . . . Let a widow be placed on the list being not less than sixty years old, having been the wife of one man, having a good testimony of good works, . . . if she has diligently followed every good work. – 1 Timothy 2:9-10; 5:9-10

In the three pastoral epistles written to two young pastors to instruct them about their duties, good works are more frequently mentioned than in Paul's other epistles. In writing to the churches in Romans 12, Paul mentions the individual good work by name. In writing to the pastors, he had to use this expression as a summary of what they had to aim at both in their own lives and in their teaching of others. A minister was to be prepared for every good work, furnished completely to every good work, and be an example of good works. They were to teach Christians: the women were to adorn themselves with good works, diligently follow every good work, and be well reported for their good works. The men were to be rich in good works, zealous of good works, ready for every good work, and were to be careful and learn to maintain good works. No portion of God's work presses home more definitely the absolute necessity of good works as an essential, vital element in the Christian life.

Our two texts speak of the good works of Christian women. In the first, they are taught that their adornment is not to be with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing but with good works (as becomes women professing godliness). We know what adornment is. A leafless tree in winter has life; when spring comes, it puts on its beautiful garments and rejoices in the adornment of foliage and blossom. The adorning of Christian women is not to be in hair or pearls or clothes, but in good works. Christian women should seek good works whether they are the good works that have reference to personal duty and conduct or those works of benevolence that aim at the pleasing and helping of our neighbor. They should more definitely seek the salvation of souls – the adorning that pleases God, gives true heavenly beauty, and will attract others to come and serve God too.

John saw the holy city descend from heaven, prepared of God as a bride adorned for her husband (Revelation 21:2). The fine linen is the righteousness of the saints (Revelation 19:8). Oh, if only every Christian woman would seek to adorn herself to please the Lord who loves her.

In the second passage, we read of widows in the early church who were placed upon a roll of honor and given charge over the younger women. No one was to be enrolled who did not have a good testimony of good works. Some of these are mentioned: if she had done well in bringing up her children, if she had exercised hospitality to strangers, washed the saints' feet, and relieved the afflicted. Then this is added: if she has diligently followed every good work. If inside and outside her home, in caring for her own children, for strangers, for saints, and for the afflicted, her life has been devoted to good works, then she may indeed be counted fit to be an example and guide to others. The standard is a high one. It shows us the place good works took in the early church. It shows how a woman's blessed ministry of love was depended upon and encouraged. It shows how, in the development of the Christian life, nothing equips one for rule and influence as a life given to good works.

Good works are an essential part of the Christian life, as indispensable to the health and growth of the individual as they are to the welfare and extension of the church. And yet, what multitudes of Christian women there are whose active share in the good work of blessing others is little more than playing at good works. They are waiting for the preaching of a full gospel, which shall encourage, help, and compel them to give their lives to work for their Lord, so that they too may have a good testimony as diligently following every good work. The time and money, the thought and heart given to jewels or costly clothes will be redeemed to its true purpose. Religion will no longer be a selfish desire for personal safety but the joy of being like Christ, the helper and Savior of the needy.

Work for Christ will take its true place as the highest form of existence, the true adornment of the Christian life. And as diligence in the pursuits of earth is honored as one of the true elements of character and worth, diligently following good works in Christ's service will give access to the highest reward and the fullest joy of the Lord. As Paul said, And whatever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men, knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance, for ye serve the Lord Christ (Colossians 3:23-24).

We are beginning to awaken to the wonderful place women can take in church, schools, and missions. This truth needs to be brought home to every one of the King's daughters – that the adorning by which they are to attract the world to their Lord and enter His presence is good works.

Woman, as the image of the weakness of God, the meekness and clemency of the Christ, is to teach man the beauty and the power of the long-suffering, self-sacrificing ministry of love (1 Corinthians 1:25; 2 Corinthians 10:1).

The training for the service of love begins in the home life, is strengthened in the inner chamber, reaches out to the needy, and finds its full scope in the world for which Christ died.

* * *

 In 1 Timothy, good works are mentioned 4 times – 2:10; 5:10, 25; 6:18. In 2 Timothy, they are mentioned twice – 2:21; 3:17. In Titus, they are mentioned six times – 1:16; 2:7, 14; 3:1, 8, 14.
Eighteenth Day

Rich in Good Works

Charge those that are rich in this world, that they . . . do good, that they be rich in good works, liberal to distribute, willing to communicate, laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the future, that they may lay hold on eternal life. – 1 Timothy 6:17-19

If women are to regard good works as their adornment, men are to count them as their riches. As good works satisfy woman's eye and taste for beauty, they meet man's craving for possession and power. In the present world, riches have a wonderful significance, as they are often a reward for diligence, industry, and enterprise. They represent and embody the life-power that has been spent in procuring them. In this way they exercise power in the honor or service they secure from others. Their danger consists in their being of this world, drawing the heart away from the living God and the heavenly treasures. They may become a man's deadliest enemy: How hardly shall those that have riches enter into the kingdom of God (Mark 10:23).

The gospel never takes anything away from us without giving us something better in its place. It meets the desire for riches by the command to be rich in good works. Good works are the coin that is current in God's kingdom; according to these good works, the rewards in the world to come will be determined. By abounding in good works, we lay up for ourselves treasures in heaven. Even here on earth, they constitute a treasure in the testimony of a good conscience, in the consciousness of being well pleasing to God, and in the power of blessing others (1 John 3:11-24).

There is more. Wealth of gold is not only a symbol of the heavenly riches, but it is actually, though so opposite in its nature, also a means to it. Charge those that are rich . . . to do good, that they be rich in good works, liberal to distribute, willing to communicate, laying up in store for themselves a good foundation (1 Timothy 6:17-19). Make friends unto yourselves with the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when these fail, you may be received into eternal dwellings (Luke 16:9). Even as the widow's mite, when given in the same spirit, the gifts of the rich may be an offering with which God is well pleased (Luke 21:1-4; Hebrews 13:16). The man who is rich in money may become rich in good works, if he follows the instructions that Scripture gives. The money must not be given for recognition from men, but as unto the Lord. Nor should it be given as from an owner, but as a steward who administers the Lord's money – with prayer for His guidance. Nor should it be given with any confidence in its power or influence, but in deep dependence on Him who alone can make it a blessing. Neither should it be a substitute for that personal work and witness which each believer is to contribute. As in all Christian work, our money-giving has its value only from the spirit in which it is done – the Spirit of Christ Jesus.

What opportunities there are in the world for accumulating these riches, these heavenly treasures. In relieving the poor, in educating the neglected, in helping the lost, and in bringing the gospel to Christians and to heathens in darkness – what investment might be made if Christians sought to be rich in good works, rich toward God. We may ask the question, "What can be done to awaken in believers a desire for these true riches?" Men have made a science of the wealth of nations and carefully studied all the laws by which its increase and universal distribution can be promoted. How can the charge to be rich in good works find a response in the hearts that its pursuit shall be as much a pleasure and a passion as the desire for the riches of the present world?

All depends upon the nature or the spirit that is in man. To the earthly nature, earthly riches have a natural affinity and irresistible attraction. To foster the desire to acquire what constitutes wealth in the heavenly kingdom, we must appeal to the spiritual nature. That spiritual nature needs to be taught and educated and trained into all the business habits that go into making a man rich. There must be the ambition to rise above the level of a bare existence, the deadly contentment with just being saved. There must be some insight into the beauty and worth of good works as the expression of the divine life, God's working in us and our working in Him, as the means of bringing glory to God, as the source of life and blessing to men, and as the laying up of a treasure in heaven for eternity. There must be a faith that these riches are within our reach, because the grace and Spirit of God are working in us.

Then every opportunity of doing the work of God reveals to those around us the footsteps of Him who said, It is more blessed to give than receive (Acts 20:35). Study and apply these principles; they will open the sure road to becoming a rich man. A man who wants to be rich often begins on a small scale but never loses an opportunity. Begin at once with some work of love and ask Christ to help you – the one who for your sakes he became poor that ye through his poverty might be enriched, to help you (2 Corinthians 8:9).

What causes the request for money for missions to meet with such insufficient response? Probably the low spiritual state of the church is the reason for this. Christians do not understand their calling to live wholly for God and His kingdom.

How can the evil be remedied? Only when believers see and accept their divine calling to make God's kingdom their first concern and with humble confession of their sins yield themselves to God, will they truly seek the heavenly riches to be found in working for God.

Let us never cease to plead and labor for a true spiritual awakening throughout the church.
Nineteenth Day

Prepared unto Every Good Work

If a man, therefore, purges himself from these things, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and profitable for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work – 2 Timothy 2:21

Paul had spoken of the foundation of God standing sure, of the church as the great house built upon that foundation, and of vessels. These were not only of gold and silver, costly vessels to honor, but also of wood and earth, common and perishable vessels to dishonor. He distinguishes between those who gave themselves to striving about words and to vain babblings and those who sought to depart from all iniquity. In our text, he gives us the four steps for a man to become a vessel of honor in the household of God. These are the cleansing from sin, sanctification, suitability for the Master's use, and preparedness for every good work. It is not enough that we desire or attempt to do good works. As we need training and care to prepare us for every work we are to do on earth, we need to be prepared unto every good work even more so. This is what constitutes the chief mark of the vessels unto honor.

Purging from vessels of dishonor

A man must cleanse himself from that which characterizes the vessels of dishonor, such as the empty profession that leads to ungodliness, against which Paul had warned. We insist that every dish and cup we use should be clean. In God's house, the vessels must be much cleaner. Everyone who wants to be truly prepared for every good work must first see that he cleanses himself from all that is sin. Christ Himself did not enter upon His saving work in heaven until He had accomplished the cleansing of our sins. How can we become partners in His work unless we have the same cleansing? Before Isaiah could say, Here am I; send me, the fire of heaven had touched his lips, and he heard the voice say, thy sin shall be cleansed (Isaiah 6:8, 7). An intense desire to be cleansed from every sin lies at the root of fitness for true service.

Becoming a vessel of honor, sanctified

Cleansing is the negative side, the emptying out and removal of all that is impure. Sanctified, the positive side, is the refilling and being possessed by the Spirit of holiness, through whom the soul becomes God-possessed and partakes of His holiness. Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit first, and then perfecting holiness in the fear of God (2 Corinthians 7:1). In the temple, the vessels were not only to be clean, but they were also to be holy, devoted to God's service alone. He that desires to truly work for God must follow after holiness with a heart confirmed in holiness, a holy habit of mind and disposition, yielded up to God and marked by a sense of His presence, and fit for God's work (1 Thessalonians 3:13). The cleansing from sin secures the filling with the Spirit.

Profitable for the master's use

We are vessels for our Lord to use. In every work we do, it is to be Christ using us and working through us. The sense of being a servant – dependent on the Master's guidance, working under the Master's eye, instruments used by Him and His mighty power – lies at the root of effective service. That sense of servanthood maintains unbroken dependence and quiet faith through which the Lord can do His work. It retains that blessed consciousness of the work being all His, which leads the worker to become more humble. His one desire is to be profitable for the Master's use.

Prepared unto every good work

Prepared. This word doesn't refer only to equipment and fitness but also to the tendency and the readiness which keeps a man alert and makes him earnestly desire and joyfully avail himself of every opportunity of doing his Master's work. As he lives in touch with his Lord Jesus and holds himself as a cleansed and sanctified vessel, ready for Him to use, good works become the one thing he is to live for. He sees how good works are what he was redeemed for and how his fellowship with his Lord is to be proved. He is prepared unto every good work.

Profitable for the master's use is the central thought. The secret of true work involves a personal relationship with Christ, an entire surrender to His disposal, a dependent waiting to be used by Him, and a joyful confidence that He will use us.

Let the beginning of your work be a giving of yourself into the hands of the Master as your living, loving Lord.
Twentieth Day

Furnished Completely unto Every Good Work

Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that has nothing to be ashamed of, rightly dividing the word of truth. – 2 Timothy 2:15

All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. – 2 Timothy 3:16-17

A workman who doesn't need to be ashamed is one who is not afraid to have the master come and inspect his work. In hearty devotion to it, in thoroughness and skill, he presents himself approved to the one who employs him. God's workers are to study to present themselves approved to Him and have their work worthy of Him. They are to be as a workman who doesn't need to be ashamed. A workman is one who knows his work, gives himself wholly to it, and takes delight in doing his work well. He is known as a working man. Every Christian minister and every Christian worker should be a workman who studies and expects the Master's approval.

Rightly dividing the word of truth

The Word is a seed, a fire, a hammer, a sword, bread, and light. Workmen in any of these spheres can be our example. In work for God, everything depends upon rightly dividing the Word. Therefore, we see that the personal subjection to the Word and the experience of its power is the one means of our being completely furnished to every good work. God's workers must know that Scripture is inspired by God and has the life and life-giving power of God in it. Inspired is Spirit-breathed – as the life in a seed, God's Holy Spirit is in the Word. The Spirit in the Word and the Spirit in our hearts is One. As by the power of the Spirit within us, we take the Spirit-filled Word and become spiritual men.

This Word is given for doctrine, the revelation of the thoughts of God; for reproof, the discovery of our sins and mistakes; for correction, the discovery of what is defective that should be replaced with what is right and good, and for instruction in righteousness, the communication of all the knowledge needed to walk before God in His ways. As one yields himself wholly and heartily to all of this, and the true Spirit-filled Word gets mastery of his whole being, he becomes a man of God, complete and furnished completely to every good work. He becomes a workman approved of God, who doesn't need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of God. And so the man of God has the double mark – his own life molded by the Spirit-breathed Word and his whole work directed by his right division of that Word.

Perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works

In the previous chapter, we learned how the cleansing and sanctification of the personal life makes the worker a vessel profitable for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work (2 Timothy 2:21). Here we learn the same lesson – it is the man of God, who allows God's Word to do its work of reproving and correcting and instructing in his own life, who will be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. Completely equipped and ready for every good work – that is what every worker for God must aim at.

If any worker is conscious of how defective his preparation is and asks how this complete furnishing for every good work is to be attained, the analogy of an earthly workman who doesn't need to be ashamed suggests the answer. First, he would tell us that he owes his success to devotion to his work. He gave it his close attention. He left other things to concentrate his efforts on mastering one thing. He made it a life-study to do his work perfectly. Those who would do Christ's work as a second thing, not as the first, and are not willing to sacrifice all for it, will never be complete or completely furnished to every good work.

The second thing he will speak of will be patient training and exercise. Proficiency only comes through painstaking effort. You may feel as if you don't know how to work. Fear not – all learning begins with ignorance and mistakes. Be of good courage. Won't He who has endowed human nature with the wonderful power that has filled the world with skilled and cunning workmen give His children much more grace than they need to be His fellow workers? Let the necessity that is laid upon you – the necessity that you should glorify God, bless the world, and dignify and perfect your life and blessedness through your work – urge you to give immediate and continual study to be a workman completely furnished unto every good work.

Only in doing can we learn to do what is right. Begin working under Christ's training; He will perfect His work in you and fit you for your work for Him.

The work God is doing and seeking to have done in the world is to win it back to Himself.

In this work, every believer is expected to take part.

God wants us to be skilled workmen who give our whole heart to His work and delight in it.

God does His work by working in us, inspiring and strengthening us to do His work.

What God asks is a heart and life devoted to Him in surrender and faith.

As God's work is all love, love is the power that works in us to inspire our efforts and conquer its object.
Twenty-First Day

Zealous of Good Works

Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify us unto himself a people of his own, zealous of good works. – Titus 2:13-14

In these words we have two truths – what Christ has done to make us His own and what He expects of us. In the former, we have a rich and beautiful summary of Christ's work for us: He gave himself for us; He redeemed us from all iniquity; He cleansed us unto himself; He took us for a people of his own. He did all this with the one objective that we should be a people zealous of good works. The doctrinal half of this wonderful passage has had much attention given to it. Let's devote our attention to its practical part – we are to be a people zealous of good works. Christ expects that we shall be zealots for good works – eagerly and enthusiastically devoted to their performance.

We cannot say this about the feeling most Christians have toward good works. What can be done to cultivate this characteristic? One of the first things that awakens zeal in work is a great and urgent sense of need. A great need awakens strong desire, stirs the heart and the will, and rouses all the energies of our being. This sense of need rallied many to be zealous of the law; they hoped their works would save them.

The gospel has robbed this motive of its power. Has it taken away entirely the need for good works? No, indeed. It has given that urgent need a higher place than before. Christ urgently needs our good works. We are His servants, the members of His body, without whom He cannot carry on His work on earth. The work is so great – with the hundreds of millions of the unsaved – that not one worker can be spared. There are thousands of Christians today who think that their own business is urgent and must be attended to, but who have no concept of the urgency of Christ's work committed to them. The church must wake up to teach each believer this.

As urgently as Christ needs our good works, the world needs them more. Around you are men, women, and children who need saving. To see men swept past us in a river stirs our every power to try to save them. Christ has placed His people in a perishing world with the expectation that they will give themselves, heart and soul, to carry on His work of love. Oh, let us sound forth the blessed gospel message: He gave himself for us that he might redeem us for Himself, a people of his own, to serve Him and carry on His work – zealous of good works.

A second great element of zeal in work is delight. An apprentice or a student usually begins his work under a sense of duty. As he learns to understand and enjoy it, he does it with pleasure and becomes zealous in its performance. The church must train Christians to believe that after we give our hearts to it and seek training to make us skilled workmen, there is no greater joy than sharing in Christ's work of mercy and grace. As physical and mental activity give pleasure and call for the devotion and zeal of thousands, the spiritual service of Christ can awaken our highest enthusiasm.

Then comes the highest motive, the personal one of attachment to Christ, our Redeemer: the charity of the Christ constrains us (2 Corinthians 5:14). The love of Christ for us is the source and measure of our love for Him. Our love for Him becomes the power and the measure of our love for souls. This love, shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit as a divine communication and renewed in us by the renewing of the Holy Spirit day by day, becomes a zeal for Christ that shows itself as a zeal for good works. The love of Christ becomes the link that unites the two parts of our text, the doctrinal and the practical, into one. Christ's love is seen in that He gave Himself for us, redeemed us from all iniquity, and cleansed us for Himself. It made us a people for Him in the bonds of an everlasting loving-kindness; it believed in, received into the heart, and made the redeemed soul zealous in good works.

Zealous of good works. Let no believer, the youngest or the weakest, look upon this grace as too difficult. It is divine, provided for and assured in the love of our Lord. Let us accept it as our calling. Let us be sure it is the very nature of the new life within us. Let us, in opposition to all that nature or feeling may say, in faith claim it as an integral part of our redemption – Christ Himself will make it true in us. It is good to be always zealous to do good (Galatians 4:18).
Twenty-Second Day

Ready to Every Good Work

Admonish them . . . that they be quick unto every good work. – Titus 3:1

Admonish them

The word admonish suggests the need for believers to be reminded of specific types of conduct in their lives, one of which is their calling to good works. A healthy tree spontaneously bears its fruit, but even when the life of the believer is in perfect health, Scripture teaches us that its growth and fruitfulness only come through teaching and its influence on mind and will and heart. For all who have charge of others, the need is great for divine wisdom and faithfulness to teach and train all Christians to be ready for every good work. This is especially true for young and weak Christians. Let's consider some of the chief points of such training.

Teach them clearly what good works are

Lay the foundation in the will of God as revealed in the law and show them how integrity and righteousness and obedience are the groundwork for Christian character. Teach them how true religion is to be carried out in all the duties and relationships of daily life. Lead them on to the virtues that Jesus came to exhibit and teach – humility, meekness, gentleness, and love. Open up to them the meaning of a life of love, self-sacrifice, and generosity – entirely given to think of and care for others. Then carry them on to what is the highest, the true life of good works – the winning of men to know and love God.

Teach them how essential good works are

Good works are not a secondary element in the salvation that God gives. They are not merely to be done as a token of our gratitude, a proof of the sincerity of our faith, or a preparation for heaven. They are all this, but they are a great deal more. They are the very purpose for which we have been redeemed: we have been created anew unto good works. They alone are the evidence that man has been restored to his original destiny of working as God works and working with God, because God works through him. In becoming imitators of God and walking and working in love even as Christ loved us and gave Himself for us, we have the very image and likeness of God restored in us. The works of a man not only reveal his life, but they also develop, exercise, strengthen, and perfect it. Good works are the very essence of the divine life in us.

Teach them what a rich reward they bring

All labor has its market value. From the poor man who can hardly earn a shilling a day to the man who has made his millions, the thought of the reward for labor has been one of the great incentives to undertake the work. Christ appeals to this feeling when He says, Great is your reward (Matthew 5:12). Let Christians understand that there is no service where the reward is as rich as that of God.

Work is invigorating; work is strengthening; work cultivates the sense of mastery and conquest. Work awakens enthusiasm and calls out a man's noblest qualities. In a life of good works, the Christian becomes conscious of his divine ministry of dispensing the life and grace of God to others.

Those works bring us into closer union with God. There is no higher fellowship with God than fellowship in His saving work of love. It brings us into sympathy with Him and His purposes; it fills us with His love; it secures His approval. And, great is the reward on those around us. When others are won to Christ, when the weary, the erring, and the despondent are helped and made partakers of the grace in Christ Jesus, God's servants share in the very joy in which our blessed Lord found His reward.

Teach them that each of us can abound in good works

This is the chief thing. Nothing is so fatal to successful effort as discouragement or despondency. Nothing is a more frequent cause of neglect of good works than the fear that we don't have the power to perform them. Remind people of the power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in them. Show them that God's promise and provision of strength is always equal to what He demands, and there is always grace sufficient for all the good works to which we are called. Strive to awaken in them a faith in the power that works in us and in the fullness of that life, which can flow as rivers of living water (Ephesians 3:20). Train them to begin their service of love at once. Lead them to see that it is God working in them and encourage them to offer themselves as empty vessels to be filled with His love and grace. Teach them that as they are faithful in a little even with mistakes and shortcomings, the living out of the life will strengthen the life itself. Work for God will become a second nature, their true nature.

May God grant that the teachers of the church will be faithful to its commission in regard to all her members. Admonish them . . . to be quick unto every good work. Don't just teach them but train them. Show them the work is to be done by them; see that they do it; encourage and help them to do it hopefully. No part of the office of a pastor is more important, more sacred, or filled with richer blessing than this. Let the purpose be nothing less than to lead every believer to live entirely devoted to the work of God in winning men to Him. What a change it would make in the church and the world!

Comprehend and understand the great root principle. Every believer, every member of Christ's body, has a place in the body for the welfare of the whole body.

Pastors have been given for the perfecting of the saints in the work of the ministry, serving in love (Ephesians 4:12).

Christ will work mightily if ministers and members of the churches will wait upon Him.
Twenty-Third Day

Maintain Good Works

I desire that thou affirm this constantly, that those who have believed God might be careful to conduct themselves in good works. . . . Let ours also learn to maintain good works for necessary uses, that they not be unfruitful. – Titus 3:8, 14

In verse 8 above, Paul charges Titus to affirm the truths of the blessed gospel to the end, with the express objective that all who had believed should be careful, should make a study of it, to conduct themselves in good works. Faith and good works were to be inseparable; the diligence of every believer in good works was to be a main emphasis of a pastor's work. In the second passage, he reiterates the instruction with the expression let ours also learn. This suggests that just as all work on earth must be learned, so the good works of the Christian life need to be thought about, applied, and taught.

More than one reader of this little book may feel he has fallen short in living according to all the teaching of God's Word – prepared, thoroughly furnished, and ready for and zealous for good works. It appears difficult to get rid of old habits, to break through the conventionalities of society, to know how to enter upon a life full of good works to the glory of God. Let me try to give some helpful suggestions. They may also aid those who train Christian workers and show how the teaching and learning of good works may succeed. Come, young workers all, and listen.

A learner must begin by working at once. There is no way to learn an art like swimming or music, a new language or a trade, except by practice. Don't let the fear that you cannot do it or the hope that it will become easier keep you back. Learn to do good works, the works of love, by doing them. However insignificant they appear, do them. Practice giving – a kind word, a little help to someone in trouble, an act of loving attention to a stranger or a poor man, or the sacrifice of a seat to someone who longs for it. All plants we cultivate are small at first. Cherish the consciousness that for Jesus' sake you are seeking to do what would please Him. It is only in doing that you can learn to do.

The learner must give his heart to the work and take interest and pleasure in it. Delight in work ensures success. Let the tens of thousands around you in the world who throw their whole soul into their daily business teach you how to serve your blessed Master. Think of the honor and privilege of doing good works and serving others in love. It is God's work to love, save, and bless men. He works in you and through you. It makes you share the Spirit and likeness of Christ. It strengthens your Christian character. Without actions, intentions diminish and condemn a man instead of raising him. Only as much as you work, do you really live. Think of the godlike blessedness of doing good, communicating life, and bringing happiness. Think of the exquisite joy of growing up into a life of benevolence and being the blessing of all you meet. Set your heart upon being a vessel profitable for the Master's use, ready for all good works.

Be of good courage and fear not. The learner who says, "I cannot," will surely fail. A divine power is working in you. Study and believe what God's Word says about it. Let the holy self-reliance of the apostle Paul who was grounded on his reliance on Christ be your example: I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me (Philippians 4:13). Study and secure the wonderful promises about the power of the Holy Spirit, the abundance of grace, and Christ's strength made perfect in weakness. See how all this can be made true to you only in working. Cultivate the noble consciousness that as you have been created to do good works by God, He will equip you for them. Believe that just as natural as it is for any workman to delight and succeed in his profession, it can also be a delight to the new nature in you to abound in every good work. Having this confidence, you need never faint.

Above all, cling to your Lord Jesus as your Teacher and Master. He said, learn of me, for I am meek and humble of heart, and ye shall find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:29). Work as one who is a student in His school, who is sure that no one teaches like Him, and is therefore confident of success. Cling to Him and let a sense of His presence and His power working in you make you meek and lowly, and yet bold and strong. He who came to do the Father's work on earth and found it to be the path to the Father's glory will teach you what it is to work for God.

In summary, for the sake of any who want to learn how to work or how to work better:

Yield yourself to Christ. Lay yourself on the altar and tell Him you wish to give yourself wholly to live for God's work.

Believe quietly that Christ accepts and takes charge of you for His work, and He will equip you for it.

Pray that God will open the great truth of His own working in you. Nothing else can give true strength.

Seek to cultivate a spirit of humble, patient, trustful dependence upon God. Live in loving fellowship with Christ and obedience to Him. You can count upon His strength being made perfect in your weakness.
Twenty-Fourth Day

As His Fellow Workers

For we are labourers together with God; ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building. – 1 Corinthians 3:9

We then, as workers together with him, exhort you also that ye have not received the grace of God in vain. – 2 Corinthians 6:1

In chapters 9 through 23, we considered Paul's teaching on good works; let us turn now to his personal experience to see if we can learn some of the secrets of effective service.

Paul speaks in 2 Corinthians of the church as God's building; as the Great Architect, He is building a holy temple and dwelling for Himself. Of his own work, Paul speaks of himself as a master builder to whom a part of the great building has been given to his charge. According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another builds upon it (1 Corinthians 3:10). He had laid a foundation in Corinth; to all who were working there, he said, let each one see how the building is built (1 Corinthians 3:10).

We are God's fellow workers. This phrase is applicable not only to Paul but also to all God's servants who take part in His work. Because every believer has been called to give his life to God's service and win others to His knowledge, every Christian needs to have this word brought to him to embrace: We are God's fellow workers. We are labourers together with God. This suggests so much in regard to our working for God.

The work we have to do

The eternal God is building a temple for Himself; Christ Jesus, God's Son, is the foundation; believers are the living stones. The Holy Spirit is the mighty power of God through whom believers are gathered out of the world and made fit for their work in the temple. They are built up into it. As living stones, believers are at the same time the living workmen whom God uses to carry out His work. They are equally God's workmanship and God's fellow workers. The work God is doing He does through them. The work they have to do is the very work God is doing. God's own work, in which He delights, on which His heart is set, is saving men and building them into His temple. This is the one work on which the heart of everyone who desires to be a fellow worker with God must be set. It is only as we know how great and how wonderful this work of God is – giving life to dead souls, imparting His own life to them, and living in them – that we enter into the glory of our work, receive the very life of God, and pass it on to men.

The strength for the work

As a mere master builder, Paul says his work was according to the grace of God which was given him. For divine work, nothing but divine power is sufficient. The power by which God works must work in us. That power is His Holy Spirit. Study to see how absolute was Paul's acknowledgment of his own inability and his dependence on the teaching and power of the Holy Spirit. As this great truth lives in the hearts of God's workers – that God's work can only be done by God's power in us – we shall feel that our first need every day is to have the presence of God's Spirit renewed within us. The power of the Holy Spirit is the power of love.

God is love. All His works for the salvation of men is out of love; love alone can conquer and win the heart. In all God's fellow workers, love is the power that reaches the hearts of men. Christ conquered and still conquers by the love of the cross. Let that mind be in you, oh worker, which was in Christ Jesus, the spirit of a love that sacrifices itself to death – a humble, patient, gentle love – and you will be made profitable to be God's fellow worker.

Our relationship with God

In executing the plans of some great building, the master builder has but one care – to carry out to the minutest detail the thoughts of the architect who designed it. He acts in constant consultation with him, and he is guided by his will; his instructions to those under him all reference the one thing – the embodiment in visible shape of what the mastermind has conceived. The great characteristics of fellow workers with God should be that of absolute surrender to His will, unceasing dependence on His teaching, and exact obedience to His wishes. God has revealed His plan in His Word. He has told us that His Spirit alone can enable us to enter into His plans and fully master His purpose the way He desires to have it carried out. The clearer our insight into the divine glory of God's work of saving souls, the more we recognize our utter insufficiency to do the work. But with the provision of the divine love, the Spirit can animate us and will guide and strengthen us for the work. When we recognize a childlike teachableness, a continual looking upward and waiting on God will be our chief mark as one who is His fellow laborer. Out of the sense of humility, helplessness, and nothingness will grow a holy confidence and courage that knows that our weakness doesn't need to hinder us, that Christ's strength is made perfect in our weakness, and that God Himself is working out His purpose through us. Of all the blessings of the Christian life, the most wonderful will be that we are allowed to be God's fellow workers.

God's fellow worker! How easy to use the word and even comprehend some of the great truths it contains, but how little we live in the power and the glory of what it actually involves!

Fellow laborers with God! Everything depends upon knowing the God, in His holiness and love, with whom we are associated as partners.

He who has chosen us to do His great work in and through us will fit us for His use.

Let our attitude be one of adoring worship, deep dependence, great waiting, and full obedience.
Twenty-Fifth Day

The Working of His Power

Whom we preach, warning every man and teaching in all wisdom that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus, in which I continue to labour, contending according to his operation, which he works in me mightily. – Colossians 1:28-29

The mystery of the Christ, . . . of which I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the operation of his power. – Ephesians 3:4, 7

In the words of Paul to the Philippians, which we considered in chapter 9 where he called upon them and encouraged them to work because it was God who worked in them, we found one of the most comprehensive statements of the great truth that it is only by God's working in us that we can do true work. In our texts for this chapter, we have Paul's testimony about his own experience. His whole ministry was by means of the grace that was given to him according to the working of God's power. He said his labor was a striving, which corresponded to the power of Him who worked mightily in him.

We find the same principle here that we found in our Lord – the Father doing the works in him. Let every worker who reads this pause and say, "If the ever-blessed Son and the apostle Paul could only do their work through the working of His power who worked in them mightily, how much more do I need this working of God in me to fit me for doing His work correctly." This is one of the deepest spiritual truths of God's Word. Let's look to the Holy Spirit within us to impact our inmost life that He may become the deepest inspiration of all our work. I can only do true work as I yield myself to God to work in me.

We know the ground on which this truth rests: there is none good but one, that is, God (Mark 10:18); there is none holy as the LORD (1 Samuel 2:2); power belongs unto God (Psalm 62:11). All goodness and holiness and power are only to be found in God and where He gives them. He can give them to the created, not as something He parts with but by His own actual presence, dwelling, and working. God can only work in His people as He is allowed to have complete possession of the heart and life. As our will and life and love are yielded up in dependence and faith, and God is waited on to take possession and abide even as Christ waited on Him, God can work in us.

This is true of all our spiritual life, but especially of our work for God. The work of saving souls is God's own work; none but He can do it. The gift of His Son is the proof of how great and precious He counts the work, and how His heart is set upon it. His love never for one moment ceases working for the salvation of men. And when He calls His children to be partners in His work, He shares with them the joy and the glory of the work of saving and blessing men. He promises to work His work through them, as He inspires and energizes them by His power working in them. To the one who can say with Paul, I labour, contending according to his operation which he works in me mightily, his whole relationship to God becomes the counterpart and the continuation of Christ's relationship to God – a blessed, unceasing, and most absolute dependence on the Father for every word spoken and every work He done.

Christ is our pattern. Christ's life is our law and works in us. Christ lived his life of dependence on God in Paul. Why should any of us hesitate to believe that the grace given to Paul of laboring and striving according to the working of the power will be given to us too? Let every worker learn to say, "As the power that worked in Christ worked in Paul too, that power works no less in me." There is no possible way of working God's work correctly except by God working it in us.

How I wish that I could take every worker by the hand who reads this and say, "Come, my brother, let's quiet our minds and hush every thought in God's presence, as I whisper in your ears the wonderful secret: God is working in you. All the work you have to do for Him, God will work in you. Take time and think it over. It is a deep spiritual truth, which the mind cannot grasp nor the heart realize. Accept it as a divine truth from heaven; believe that this word is a seed from which the spiritual blessing can grow. Believing the Holy Spirit makes it live within you, say again, God works in me. All the work I have to work for Him, God will work in me."

Believing this truth and desiring to have it made true in you will constrain you to live humbly and closely with God. You will see that work for God is the most spiritual thing in a spiritual life. And you will bow in holy stillness: God is working; God will work in me; I will work for Him according to the power that works in me mightily.

The gift of the grace of God (Ephesians 3:7), the power that works in us (Ephesians 3:20), the strengthening with might by his Spirit (Ephesians 3:16) – these three expressions all contain the same thought of God working everything in us.

The Holy Spirit is the power of God. Seek to be filled with the Spirit and to have your whole life led by Him, and you will become fit for God working mightily in you.

Ye shall receive the virtue of the Holy Spirit which shall come upon you (Acts 1:8). With the Spirit dwelling in us, God can work in us mightily.

What holy fear, what humble watchfulness and dependence, what entire surrender and obedience become ours if we believe in God's working in us.
Twenty-Sixth Day

Laboring More Abundantly

By the grace of God I am what I am; and his grace towards me was not in vain, for I laboured more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. – 1 Corinthians 15:10

And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee; for my strength is made perfect in weakness. . . . in nothing am I behind the grandiose apostles, though I am nothing. – 2 Corinthians 12:9, 11

In both of these passages, Paul speaks of how he had abounded in the work of the Lord. In nothing am I behind the grandiose apostles. I laboured more abundantly than they all. He tells how it was all of God who worked in him, and not of himself. In the first he says, Yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. And then in the second, showing how this grace is Christ's strength working in us while we are nothing, he tells us, He said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee; for my strength is made perfect in weakness. May God give us the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him; illuminating the eyes of your understanding to see this wonderful vision, a man who knows himself to be nothing and glories in his weakness (Ephesians 1:17-18). He does this so the power of Christ may rest on him and work through him, so he labors more abundantly than all. What does this teach us as workers for God?

God's work can only be done in God's strength

Only by God's power, by God working in us, can we do effective work. Throughout this book, this truth has been frequently repeated. It is easy to accept it; it is far from easy to see its full meaning, to give it the mastery over our whole being, and to live it out. This requires stillness of soul, meditation, strong faith, and fervent prayer. As it is God alone who can work in us, it is equally God alone who can reveal Himself as the God who works in us. Wait on Him, and the truth that appears to be beyond your reach will be opened up to you through the knowledge of who and what God is. When God reveals Himself as the God who works in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure (Philippians 2:13), you will learn to believe and work according to his operation, which he works in me mightily (Colossians 1:29).

God's strength can only work in weakness

It is only when we truly say, not I, that we can fully say, but the grace of God which was with me. The man who said, in nothing am I behind the grandiose apostles, had first learned to say, though I am nothing. He could say, I am content in weaknesses, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake, for when I am weak, then am I strong (2 Corinthians 12:10). This is the true relationship between the Creator and the creature, between the divine Father and His child, between God and His servant.

Christian worker, learn the lesson of your own weakness as the indispensable condition of God's power working in you. Believe that to take time in God's presence to realize your weakness and nothingness is the sure way to be clothed with God's strength. Accept every experience by which God teaches you your weakness as His grace preparing you to receive His strength. Take pleasure in weaknesses.

God's strength comes in our fellowship with Christ

Paul says, I will rather glory in my weaknesses that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content in weaknesses, . . . for Christ's sake (2 Corinthians 12:9-10). And he tells how he besought the Lord three times that it [the thorn in the flesh] might be taken from me, but God answered, My grace is sufficient for thee (2 Corinthians 12:8-9).

Christ is the power of God, and the wisdom of God (1 Corinthians 1:24). We do not receive the wisdom to know or the power to do God's will as something that we can possess and use at our discretion. Only in the personal attachment to Christ in a life of continual communication with Him, can His power rest on us. It is in taking pleasure in weaknesses for Christ's sake that Christ's strength is known.

God's strength abounds in the work that is done in faith

It takes a living faith to find pleasure in weaknesses and to do our work in weakness, knowing that God is working in us. Without seeing or feeling anything, to continue in the confidence of a hidden power working in us is the highest exercise of a life of faith. To do God's work in saving souls, and persevere and labor in prayer while unfavorable circumstances and appearances persist, requires faith. Let us be strong in faith and give glory to God. God will show Himself strong towards him whose heart is perfect with Him.

My brother, be willing to yield yourself to the very utmost to God that His power may rest upon you and work in you. Let God work through you. Offer yourself to Him for His work as the one purpose for your life. Count upon His working everything in you to fit you for His service and to strengthen and bless you in it. Let the faith and love of your Lord Jesus, whose strength is going to be made perfect in your weakness, lead you to live as He lived – to do the Father's will and finish His work.

Let every minister seek the full personal experience of Christ's strength made perfect in his weakness; this alone will fit him to teach believers the secret of their strength.

Our Lord said, My grace . . . my strength. As we abide in close personal fellowship and love in Christ, and we have Christ abiding in us, His grace and strength can work.

A heart wholly given up to God, to His will and love, will know His power working in our weakness.
Twenty-Seventh Day

A Doer Shall Be Blessed in Doing

Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. But whosoever has looked attentively into the perfect law of liberty and has persevered in it, not being a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, the same shall be blessed in their deed. – James 1:22, 25

God created us not to contemplate but to act. He created us in His own image, and in Him there is no thought without simultaneous action. True action is born from contemplation. True contemplation, as a means to an end, always begets action. If sin had not entered the world, there never would have been a separation between knowing and doing. In nothing is the power of sin more clearly seen than in this fact: Even in the believer, there is a gap between intellect and conduct.

We can delight in hearing and be diligent in increasing our knowledge of God's Word; we can admire and approve the truth and even be willing to do it, but fail entirely in the actual performance. Hence the warning of James not to deceive ourselves with being hearers and not doers. Therefore, he pronounces the doer who works blessed in his doing.

Blessed in their deed

These words are a summary of the teaching of our Lord Jesus at the close of the Sermon on the Mount: Not every one . . . shall enter into the kingdom of the heavens, but he that doeth the will of my Father who is in the heavens (Matthew 7:21). Whosoever hears these words of mine and does them, I will liken him unto a prudent man (Matthew 7:24). To the woman who spoke of the blessedness of His mother, He said, Rather, blessed are those that hear the word of God and keep it (Luke 11:28). To the disciples in the last night, He said, If ye know these things, ye shall be blessed if ye do them (John 13:17).

One of the greatest dangers in religion is when we rest content with the pleasure and approval that a beautiful representation of a truth brings without the immediate performance of what it demands. Only when conviction has been translated into conduct can we have proof that the truth is mastering us.

A doer of the work, . . . shall be blessed in their deed

The doer is blessed. The doing is the victory that overcomes every obstacle; it illustrates and confirms the very image of God, the Great Worker; it removes every barrier to the enjoyment of all the blessing God has prepared. We are always inclined to seek our blessedness in what God gives in privilege and enjoyment, but Christ placed it in what we do, because it is only in doing that we really prove and know and possess the life God has bestowed on us. When one said, Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God, our Lord answered with, none of those men which were called shall taste of my supper. If anyone come to me and does not hate . . . his own life also, he cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:15, 24, 26).

The doer is blessed. As surely as it is only in doing that the painter or musician, the man of science or commerce, the discoverer or the conqueror finds their blessedness, so it is only in keeping the commandments and in doing the will of God that the believer enters fully into the truth and blessedness of deliverance from sin and fellowship with God. Doing is the very essence of blessedness, the highest expression, and therefore, the fullest enjoyment of the life of God.

Blessed if ye do them

This was the blessedness of Abraham, as we read, Dost thou not see how the faith worked together with his works, and the faith was complete by the works? (James 2:22). He had no works without faith; there was faith working with them and in them all. And he had no faith without works; through them his faith was exercised and strengthened and perfected. As his faith, so his blessedness was perfected in doing. It is in doing that the doer who works is blessed. The true insight into this is that a divine revelation of the true nature of good works in perfect harmony with all our experience in the world will make us take every command, every truth, and every opportunity to abound in good works as an integral part of the blessedness of the salvation that Christ has brought us. Joy and work, work and joy, will become synonymous; we shall no longer be hearers but doers.

Let's put this truth into immediate practice. Let's live for others; let's love and serve them. Don't let the fact of being unaccustomed to labors of love or the sense of ignorance and unfitness keep us back. Only begin. If you think you are not able to labor for souls, begin with the bodies.

Only begin, and continue, and abound. Believe the Word: It is more blessed to give than to receive (Acts 20:35). Pray for and depend on the promised grace. Give yourself to a ministry of love; in the very nature of things, in the example of Christ, and in the promise of God, you have this assurance: If you know these things, ye shall be blessed if ye do them (John 13:17). Blessed is the doer.
Twenty-Eighth Day

The Work of Soul Saving

Brethren, if any of you have erred from the truth, and someone should convert him; let that one know, that whosoever causes the sinner to convert from the error of his way shall save a soul from death and shall cover a multitude of sins. – James 5:19-20

We sometimes hesitate to speak of men being converted and saved by men. Scripture uses the expression twice here of one man converting another and once of saving him. Let's not hesitate to accept it as part of our work, our high privilege as the sons of God, to convert and to save men. For it is God who works in you (Philippians 2:13).

Shall save a soul from death

Every workman studies the material in which he works: the carpenter the wood, the goldsmith the gold. Our works are wrought in God (John 3:21). In our good works, we deal with souls. Even when first we can do no more than reach and help their bodies, our aim is the soul. For these Christ came to die. For these God has appointed us to watch and labor. Let's study these. What care a hunter or a fisherman takes to know the habits of the prey he seeks. Let's remember that one needs divine wisdom, training, and skill to become a winner of souls. The only way to get that training and skill is to begin to work, and Christ Himself will teach each one who waits on Him.

In that training, the church with its ministers has a part to play. The daily experience of ordinary life and teaching prove how often there exists unsuspected powers in a man; these must be called out by training before they are known to be there. When a man becomes conscious and master of the power he has as a new creature, his power and enjoyment of life is doubled. Every believer has the power hidden within him of saving souls. The kingdom of heaven is like a seed within us, and every one of the gifts and graces of the spirit are also a hidden seed. The highest objective of the ministry is to awaken the consciousness of this hidden seed of power to save souls. A depressing sense of ignorance or inability keeps many back. James writes, let that one know, that whosoever causes the sinner to convert . . . shall save a soul from death. Every believer needs to be taught to know and use the wondrous blessed power with which he has been endowed. When God said to Abraham, in thy seed shall all the Gentiles of the earth be blessed, He called him to a faith not only in the blessing that would come to him from above but also in the power of the blessing he would be in the world (Genesis 22:18). It is a wonderful moment in the life of a child of God when he sees that the second blessing is as sure as the first.

He shall save a soul

Our Lord bears the name of Jesus, Savior. He is the embodiment of God's saving love. Saving souls is His own great work and His work alone. As our faith in Him grows to know and receive all there is in Him, as He lives in us and dwells in our heart and disposition, saving souls will become the great work of our lives. We shall be the willing and intelligent instruments through whom He will do His mighty work.

Whosoever causes the sinner to convert

The words suggest personal work. We usually think of large gatherings where the gospel is preached; the thought here is of one who has erred, and another seeks. We increasingly do our work through associations and organizations. Whosoever causes the sinner to convert . . . shall save a soul; the love and labor of some individual believer has won the erring one back. We need this in the church of Christ, we need every believer who truly follows Jesus Christ to be looking out for those who are erring from the way, loving them, and laboring to help them back. Not one of us may say, Am I my brother's keeper? (Genesis 4:9). We are in the world as the members of Christ's body that we may continue to carry out His saving work. As saving souls was and is His work, His joy, and His glory, let it be ours; let it be mine too. Let me give myself personally to watch over individuals and seek to save them one by one.

Let that one know, that whosoever causes the sinner to convert . . . shall save a soul . . . If ye know these things, ye shall be blessed if ye do them (James 5:20; John 13:17). Let me translate these Scripture truths into action; let me give these thoughts shape and substance in daily life; let me prove their power over me and my faith in them by work. Isn't there more than one Christian around me who has wandered from the way and needs loving help? Someone who is willing to receive it? Aren't there some I could take by the hand and encourage to begin again? Aren't there many who have never been in the right way, for whom Christ Jesus would use me if I were truly at His disposal?

If I feel afraid, oh, let me believe that the love of God dwells within me as a seed, not only calling but also enabling me to do the work. Let me yield myself to the Holy Spirit to fill my heart with love and fit me for its service. Jesus the Savior lives to save; He dwells in me; He will do His saving work through me. Let that one know, that whosoever causes the sinner to convert . . . shall save a soul from death and shall cover a multitude of sins.

More love for souls, born out of fervent love for the Lord Jesus – isn't this our great need?

Let us pray for love and begin to love in the faith that more will be given as we exercise the little we have.

Lord, open our eyes to see You doing Your great work of saving men and waiting to give Your love and strength to the heart of every willing person. Make each one of Your redeemed a soul winner.
Twenty-Ninth Day

Praying and Working

If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask God, and he shall give him life that is, unto those that do not sin unto death. – 1 John 5:16

Let us consider one another to provoke unto charity and unto good works (Hebrews 10:24). These words in the book of Hebrews express what lies at the very root of a life of good works – the thoughtful, loving care we have for each other that not one will fall away. It's written in Galatians: Even if anyone is overtaken in a fault, ye who are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness (Galatians 6:1). And Jude writes, apparently of Christians who were in danger of falling away: receive some with mercy, discerning; And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire (Jude 1:22-23). As Christ's healing of men's bodies was always aimed at winning their souls, all of our ministry of love must be secondary to that which is God's great purpose and longing – the salvation of men unto life eternal.

In this labor of love, praying and working must always go together. At times prayer may reach those whom the words cannot reach. Sometimes prayer is primarily needed for ourselves to obtain the wisdom and courage for the words. Other times it may be especially necessary for the soul because of the lack of fruit from our words. As a rule, praying and working must be inseparable – the praying to obtain from God what we need for the soul and the working to bring to the soul what God has given us. The words of John here are most suggestive as to the power of prayer in our labor of love. It leads us to think of prayer as a personal work with a very definite objective and a certainty of an answer.

Let prayer be a personal effort. If any man see his brother . . . he shall ask. We are so accustomed to work through societies and associations that we are in danger of losing sight of our own duty to watch over those around us. Every member of my body is ready to serve any other member. Every believer is to care for the fellow believers who are within his reach, in his church, his house, or social circle. The sin of each is a loss and a hurt to the body of Christ. Let your eyes be open to the sins of your brothers around you, not to speak evil or judge or helplessly complain, but to love, help, care, and pray. Ask God to see your brother's sin in its sinfulness, its danger to himself, its grief to Christ, its loss to the body, but also as within reach of God's compassion and deliverance. Shutting our eyes to the sin of our brothers around us is not true love. See it and take it to God; make it part of your work for God to pray for your brother and seek new life for him.

Let prayer be definite. If any man see his brother sin . . . he shall ask God. We need prayer from one person for another person. Scripture and God's Spirit teach us to pray for all society, for the local church, for nations, and for special spheres of work. This is most needful and blessed, but more is needed; we need to embrace those around us, one by one, and make them the subjects of our intercession. The larger supplications have their place, but it is difficult to know when these prayers are answered. There is nothing that will bring God as near, nothing that will test and strengthen our faith as much, and make us know we are fellow workers with God, as when we receive an answer to our prayers for individuals. These answers quicken in us the new and blessed consciousness that we have power with God. Let every worker seek to exercise this grace of taking up and praying for individual souls.

Expect an answer. He shall ask God, and he shall give him life that is, unto those that do not sin unto death (1 John 5:16). These words follow those where John had spoken about the confidence that we have in God, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he hears us (1 John 5:14). People often complain about not knowing God's will. But here there is no difficulty. He desires that all men be saved (1 Timothy 2:4). If we rest our faith on this will of God, we shall grow strong and grasp the promise. He shall ask God, and he shall give him life that is, unto those that do not sin unto death. The Holy Spirit will lead us if we yield ourselves to be led by Him to the souls God would have us take as our special care and for whom the grace of faith and persevering prayer will be given to us. Claim the wonderful promise that God will give to him who asks life for those who do not sin unto death. He will stir us and encourage us in our ministry of personal and definite intercession as one of the most blessed among the good works in which we can serve God and man.

Praying and working are inseparable. Let all who work learn to pray well. Let all who pray learn to work well.

To pray confidently and perseveringly for an individual, one needs a close walk with God and the faith that we can prevail with Him.

In all our work for God, prayer must take a much greater place. If God is to work all, if our attitude is to be of entire dependence, waiting for Him to work in us, and if it takes time to persevere and receive in ourselves what God gives us for others, there needs to be a work and a laboring in prayer.

Oh, that God would open our eyes to the glory of this work of saving souls as the one thing God lives for and as the one thing He wants to work in us.

Let us pray for the love and power of God to come on us for the blessed work of soul winning.
Thirtieth Day

I Know Thy Works

Unto the angel of the congregation of Ephesus . . . in Thyatira . . . in Sardis . . . in Philadelphia . . . of the Laodiceans write; . . . I know thy works. – Revelation 2:1, 18; 3:1, 7, 14-15

I know thy works. These are the words of Him who walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands (Revelation 2:1), and his eyes were as a flame of fire (Revelation 1:14). As He looks upon the churches, the first thing He sees and judges are the works. The works are the revelation of the life and character. If we are willing to bring our works into His holy presence, His words can teach us what our work ought to be.

To Ephesus He says, I know thy works and thy labour and thy patience and how thou canst not bear those who are evil; and thou hast tried those who say they are apostles and are not and hast found them liars, and hast suffered, and doth suffer and for my name's sake hast laboured and hast not fainted. Nevertheless I have against thee that thou hast left thy first love, charity. . . . repent and do the first works (Revelation 2:2-5). There was much to praise here – labor, patience, and zeal; they had not fainted, but there was one thing lacking – the tenderness of the first love.

In His work for us, Christ gave us His love before and above everything – the personal, tender affection of His heart. In our work for Him, He asks nothing less. There is such a danger of work being carried on and even bearing much for Christ's sake, while the freshness of our love has passed away. And that is what Christ seeks. That is what gives power. That is what nothing can compensate for. Christ looks for the warm, loving heart, the personal affection that always keeps Him the center of our love and joy.

Christian workers, be sure that all your work is the work of love – tender, personal devotion to Christ Jesus.

To Thyatira He says, I have known thy works and charity and service and faith and thy patience and thy works and the last to be more than the first. Notwithstanding I have a few things against thee because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel (who calls herself a prophetess) to teach and to seduce my slaves (Revelation 2:19-20). Here again the works are enumerated and praised; the last had even been more than the first. But then there is one failure: a false tolerance of what led to impurity and idolatry. Then He adds His judgments: the congregations shall know that I AM he that searches the kidneys and hearts, and I will give unto each one of you according to your works (Revelation 2:23).

Along with good works, there may have been a form of error or evil tolerated that endangered the whole church. In Ephesus there was zeal for orthodoxy but a lack of love; in Thyatira was love and faith but a lack of faithfulness against error. If good works are to please our Lord, our whole life must be in harmony with those works and be completely separate from the world and its allurements. We must seek to be what He promised to make us – established in every good word and work. Our work will decide our estimate in His judgment.

To Sardis He says, I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest and art dead. Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die; for I have not found thy works perfect before God (Revelation 3:1-2).

There might be forms of godliness without power, and activities of religious organizations without life. There may be many works, but He may say, I have not found thy works perfect before God; none can stand the test and be acceptable to God as a spiritual sacrifice. In Ephesus, works lacked in love; in Thyatira, works lacked in purity; in Sardis, works lacked life.

To Philadelphia He says, I know thy works; behold, . . . thou hast a little strength and hast kept my word and hast not denied my name. . . . Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee (Revelation 3:8, 10).

On earth Jesus had said, He that has my commandments and keeps them, he it is that loves me; . . . He who loves me will keep my words, and my Father will love him (John 14:21, 23). Philadelphia, the church for which there is no reproof, had this mark – its chief work and the law of all its work was that it kept Christ's Word, not only in an orthodox creed but also in practical obedience. Let nothing less be the mark and spirit of all our work – a keeping of the Word of Christ. He will reward full, loving conformity to His will.

To Laodicea He says, I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot; I would thou wert cold or hot. Because thou sayest, I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing (Revelation 3:15, 17). There is not a church without works and religious activities, but the two great marks of Laodicean religion – lukewarmness and its natural accompaniment, self-satisfaction – may rob them of their worth. It not only teaches us the need for a fresh and fervent love but also the need for that poverty of spirit from which the absolute dependence on Christ's strength for our work will grow; it will no longer leave Christ standing at the door but will enthrone Him in the heart.

I know thy works. He who tested the works of the seven churches still lives and watches over us. He is ready in His love to discover what is lacking, to give timely warning and help, and to teach us the path in which our works can be fulfilled before His Father. Let us learn from Ephesus the lesson of fervent love for Christ; from Thyatira, the purity and separation from all evil; from Sardis, the need of true life to give worth to work; from Philadelphia, the keeping of His Word, and from Laodicea, the poverty of spirit that possesses the kingdom of heaven and gives Christ the throne of all. Workers! Let us live and work in Christ's presence. He will teach, correct, and help us, and one day He will give the full reward for all our works because they were His works in us.
Thirty-First Day

May God Be Glorified

If anyone ministers, let them do it according to the virtue which God gives, that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus, the Christ, unto whom is glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen. – 1 Peter 4:11 KJV

Work is not done for its own sake. Its value consists in the objective it attains. The purpose of him who commands or performs the work gives the real worth. The clearer a man's insight into the purpose, the better fitted he will be to take charge of the more advanced parts of the work. In the construction of some splendid building, the purpose of the day laborer may simply be as a hired hand to earn his wages. The trained stonecutter has a greater objective; he thinks of the beauty and perfection of the work he does. The master mason has a wider range of thought; his purpose is for all the masonry to be true and good. The contractor for the whole building has a higher goal – for the whole building to correspond perfectly to the plan he must follow. The architect has had a still higher purpose – that the great principles of art and beauty might find their full expression in material shape. With the owner, we find the end – the use of the grand structure when he presents the building as a gift for the benefit of his townsmen. All who have worked on the building honestly have done so with some true purpose. The deeper the insight and the keener the interest in the ultimate design, the more important the share in the work and the greater the joy in carrying it out.

Peter tells us what our purpose should be in all Christian service – that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ. In the work of God, a work not done for wages but for love, the humblest laborer receives a share in God's plans and an insight into the great purpose that God is working out. That purpose is nothing less than this: that God may be glorified. This is the one purpose of God, the Great Worker in heaven, the source and master of all work – that the glory of His love and power and blessing may be shown. This is the one purpose of Christ, the Great Worker on earth in human nature, the example and leader of all our work. This is the great purpose of the Holy Spirit, the power that works in us, as Peter says, the ability which God giveth. As this becomes our deliberate, intelligent purpose, our work will rise to its true level and lift us into living fellowship with God.

That God in all things may be glorified. What does this mean? The glory of God is that He alone is the Living One who has life in Himself, but not for Himself alone, because His life is love; His life is for the creatures as much as for Himself. The glory of God is that He is the only, ever-flowing fountain of all life and goodness and happiness, and that His creatures can have all this only as He gives it and works it in them. His working all in each one is His glory. And the only glory His creature, His child, can give Him is receiving all He is willing to give, yielding to Him to let Him work, and then acknowledging that He has done it. Thus, God shows His glory in us; in our willing surrender to Him and our joyful acknowledgment that He does all, we glorify Him. In this way, our life and work are glorified, as they have one purpose with all God's work, that God in all things may be glorified, for the glory is His forever and ever.

See how the Spirit exalts and consecrates Christian service according to Peter: He that serves (in ministering to the saints or the needy), let him serve by the strength that God supplies (1 Peter 4:11 ESV). Let me cultivate a deep conviction that God's work, down to the details of daily life, can only be done in God's strength by the power of the Spirit working in us. Let me believe firmly and unceasingly that the Holy Spirit dwells in me as the power from on high for all work to be done for God on high. Let me in my Christian work fear nothing so much as working in my own human will and strength and so losing the one thing needful in my work – God working in me. Let me rejoice in the weakness that renders me so dependent upon such a God and wait in prayer for His power to take full possession.

Let him serve by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. The more you depend on God alone for your strength, the more He will be glorified. The more you seek to make God's purpose your purpose, the more you will be led to submit to His working and His strength and love. Oh, that even the weakest worker might see what a nobility it gives to work, what a new glory to life, what a new urgency and joy in laboring for souls, when the one purpose has mastered us – that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ.

The glory of God as Creator was seen in His making man in His own image. The glory of God as Redeemer is seen in the work He carries on for saving men and bringing them to Himself.

This glory is the glory of His holy love that casts sin out of the heart and dwells in its place.

The only glory we can bring to God is to yield ourselves to His redeeming love and allow Him to take possession of us, to fill us with love for others, and to show forth His glory through us.

Let this be the one purpose of our lives – to glorify God by living to work for Him by the strength that God supplies and winning souls for His glory.

Lord, teach us to serve in the strength which God supplies, so that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, for the glory is His forever and ever. Amen.

Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in the heavens. – Matthew 5:16
Andrew Murray – A Brief Biography

Andrew Murray had a rich religious ancestry. His grandfather (Andrew) left the occupation of being a shepherd in order to work in the flour mills of Scotland. He was a godly man, and his deathbed prayers influenced his son John to enter the work of the ministry. John became an ordained minister in Scotland. John's younger brother, Andrew, became licensed in the Church of Scotland and was ordained by the Presbytery of Aberdeen. He became a missionary with the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa.

While in South Africa, Andrew met the woman who would be come his wife – Maria Susanna Stegmann. She was of German ancestry, and her great-grandfather was a Huguenot who had been driven out of France when the Edict of Nantes, which had granted the French Protestants some religious liberty, was revoked. Andrew and Susanna's first son was named John, and their second son, Andrew, is the subject of this brief biography and the author of this book.

Andrew Murray was born in South Africa on May 9, 1828. His father often read stories of revivals to his family. When Andrew was ten years old, he and his brother John were sent to Scotland to be educated. They stayed with their uncle John, the Scottish minister. In 1840, William Burns, the revivalist, spoke in Aberdeen, Scotland. He stayed with their uncle John while there, and Burns' preaching, along with his long, impassioned prayers for revival and the salvation of the lost greatly impacted young Andrew.

Andrew and John went on to attend Marischal College in Aberdeen when Andrew was almost seventeen years old, from which they graduated with the master of arts degree in 1845. From there they studied theology and refreshed themselves in the Dutch language at the University of Utrecht in Holland. Rationalism was popular then. Mr. Murray in South Africa had written to his sons in Holland to be careful of the teaching. In a letter to his sons, dated April 23, 1845, he wrote: "You may soon hear sentiments broached among the students, and even by professors, on theological subjects which may startle you, but be cautious in receiving them, by whatever names or number of names they may be supported. Try to act like the noble Bereans (Acts 17:11). By studying your Bibles and your own hearts I doubt not, under the guidance of the blessed Spirit, you will be led into all truth. . . . Whatever books may be recommended to you, be sure not to neglect the study of the Holy Scriptures. This must be a daily exercise, and must be attended to with humility and much prayer for the guidance of the Holy Spirit."

Reminiscent of George Whitefield and the Wesleys and their Holy Club at Oxford, the Murray brothers joined a similar group at the University of Utrecht. It was called Sechor Dabar (Remember the Word), and its purpose was "to promote the study of the subjects required for the ministerial calling in the spirit of the Revival." The members of this group were often mocked, but they desired to live fully for God. On May 9, 1848, John and Andrew Murray were ordained by the Hague Committee of the Dutch Reformed Church, and they returned to South Africa to begin their ministry work.

At the age of twenty-one, Andrew was given the responsibility of being the only minister in a 50,000 square-mile territory in remote South Africa. For weeks at a time, Andrew would ride on horseback to preach to the Dutch-speaking farmers. Andrew married Emma Rutherford, the daughter of an English pastor, in 1856. They had eight children together – four boys and four girls.

In 1860, Andrew Murray accepted the pastorate of a church in Worcester, South Africa, where they heard some speakers tell stories of revivals in North American and Europe. Murray and others prayed earnestly for revival, and experienced somewhat of a revival, though not as Murray had expected. He became increasingly interested in sanctification and what is now commonly called "the holiness movement."

Andrew Murray became the pastor of a church in Cape Town in 1864, and then became a pastor in Wellington in 1877. Also in 1877, Murray traveled to the United States and spent five weeks learning about Sunday schools, Moody's revivals, and the Dutch Reformed Church in America. Murray also attended the Presbyterian Council in Scotland and spoke elsewhere throughout the land, including visits to Holland and Germany.

Murray returned to South Africa where he became increasingly involved in Christian education and in training people for ministry. Murray's speaking schedule over the past few years led to an interesting and influential time in his life. His voice toward the end of 1879 began to be strained, and this difficulty continued for about two years, where he was not often able to speak publicly. He would write out his message at times, and it would be read to the congregation by others. Andrew tried visiting various doctors, traveling to drier climates, and more, but his throat did not improve. He did spend more time studying and writing, though.

After finding only temporary and inadequate improvements, Andrew Murray began studying more about healing by faith. In 1881, Murray was in London. He had wanted to be able to go to Switzerland to visit with a man he had met earlier in life and who was now the head of an institute for faith healing. Murray learned that this man, Otto Stockmaier, was then in London. They met together and discussed biblical passages related to healing and faith. Stockmaier urged Murray to attend the meetings of an American, Dr. Boardman, who had written on the topic of healing by faith and who then had an institute in London. Murray visited the institute and remained there for three weeks. He was taught that healing by faith was not just to heal the body, but to help one on to holiness and a life of consecration to God.

Murray's voice improved, and he wrote and spoke much on healing by faith after that. He did occasionally have less serious voice trouble later in life at times, and seemed not to place such an emphasis on healing by faith for everyone, but his experience and study certainly caused him to believe in the power and possibility of healing by faith for the rest of his life.

Andrew Murray continued writing and speaking. He was a speaker at the famous annual holiness Keswick conference. He was chosen to be the moderator of his church synod six different times. He wrote over 200 books and pamphlets, many on holiness and the deeper life. His books include Absolute Surrender, Humility, Abide in Christ, The Deeper Christian Life, The School of Obedience, Waiting on God, The Ministry of Intercession, The New Life, With Christ in the School of Prayer, The Two Covenants and the Second Blessing, and more.

Andrew Murray spent his last moments on earth praying and rejoicing in the goodness of God. He passed from this life on January 18, 1917, at the age of eighty-eight.
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Working for God – Andrew Murray

Revised Edition Copyright © 2018

First edition published 1901, Fleming H. Revell Company

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