‘If a man therefore cleanse himself from them, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified, meet for the Master’s use, prepared unto every good work.’–2 Tim. 2:21.

Paul had spoken of the foundation of God standing sure (2:19), of the Church as the great house built upon that foundation, of vessels, not only of gold, silver, costly and lasting, vessels to honor, but also of wood and of earth, common and perishable, vessels to dishonor. He distinguishes between them of whom he had spoken, who gave themselves to striving about words and to vain babblings, and such as truly sought to depart from all iniquity. In our text he gives us the four steps in the path in which a man can become a vessel unto honor in the great household of God. These are, the cleansing from sin; the being sanctified; the meetness for the Master to use as He will; and last, the spirit of 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 it no less, or rather we need it much more, to be–what constitutes the chief mark of the vessels unto honour–to be prepared unto every good work.

‘If a man cleanse himself from them’–from that which characterizes the vessels of dishonour–the empty profession leading to ungodliness, against which he had warned. In every dish and cup we use, how we insist upon it that it shall be clean. In God’s house the vessels must much more be clean. And every one who would be truly prepared unto every good work must see to this first of all, that he cleanse himself from all that is sin. Christ Himself could 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 there be with us the same cleansing first. Ere Isaiah could say, ‘Here am I, send me,’ the fire of heaven had touched his lips, and he heard the voice, ‘Thy sin is purged.’ An intense desire to be cleansed from every sin lies at the root of fitness for true service.

‘He shall be a vessel of honor, sanctified.’ Cleansing is the negative side, the emptying out and removal of all that is impure. Sanctified, the positive side, the refilling and being possessed of the spirit of holiness, through whom the soul becomes God possessed, and so partakes of His holiness. ‘Let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit’–this first, then, and so ‘perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord.’ In the temple the vessels were not only to be clean, but holy, devoted to God’s service alone. He that would truly work for God must follow after holiness; ‘a heart established in holiness’ (1 Thess. 4:14), a holy habit of mind and disposition, yielded up to God and marked by a sense of His presence, fit for God’s work. The cleansing from sin secures the filling with the Spirit.

‘Meet 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 effectual service. It maintains that unbroken dependence, that quiet faith, through which the Lord can do His work. It keeps up that blessed consciousness of the work being all His, which leads the worker to become the humbler the more be is used. His one desire is–meet for the Master’s use.

‘Prepared unto every good work.’ Prepared. The word not only means equipment, fitness, but also the disposition, the alacrity which keeps a man on the outlook, 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, and he sees how good works are what he was redeemed for, and what his fellowship with his Lord is to be proved in, they become the one thing he is to live for. He is prepared unto every good work.

1. ‘Meet for the Master’s use,’ that is the central thought. A personal relation to Christ, an entire surrender to His disposal, a dependent waiting to be used by Him, a joyful confidence that He will use us–such is the secret of true work.
2. Let the beginning of your work be a giving yourself into the hands of the Master, as your living, loving Lord.

‘Give diligence to present thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, handling aright the word of truth.’–2 Tim. 2:15.

‘Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction which is in righteousness; that the man of God may be complete, furnished completely unto every good work.’–2 Tim. 3:16, 17.

A workman that needeth not 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 him who employs him. God’s workers are to give diligence to present themselves approved to Him; to have their work worthy of Him unto all well pleasing. They are to be as a workman that needeth not to be ashamed. A workman is one who knows his work, who gives himself wholly to it, who is known as a working man, who takes delight in doing his work well. Such every Christian minister, every Christian worker, is to be–a workman that makes a study of it to invite and expect the Master’s approval.

‘Handling aright the word of truth.’ The word is a seed, a fire, a hammer, a sword, is bread, is light. Workmen in any of these spheres can be our example. In work for God everything depends upon handling the word aright. Therefore it is that, in the second text quoted above, the personal subjection to the word, and the experience of its power, is spoken of as the one means of our being completely furnished to every good work. God’s workers must know that the Scripture is inspired of God, and has the life and life-giving power of God in it. Inspired is Spirit-breathed–the life in a seed, God’s Holy Spirit is in the word. The Spirit in the word and the Spirit in our heart is One. As by the power of the Spirit within us we take the Spirit-filled word we become spiritual men. This word is given for teaching, the revelation of the thoughts of God; for reproof, the discovery of our sins and mistakes; for correction, the removal of what is defective to be replaced by what is right and good; for instruction which is 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 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 needs not to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of God. And so the man of God has the double mark–his own life wholly molded by the Spirit breathed word–and his whole work directed by his rightly handling that word.

‘That the man of God may be complete, thoroughly furnished unto every good work.’ In our previous meditation we learnt bow in the cleansing and sanctification of the personal life the worker becomes a vessel meet for the Masters use, prepared unto every good work. 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 complete, completely furnished unto every good work. Complete equipment and readiness for every good work–that is what every worker for God must aim at.

If any worker, conscious of how defective his preparation is, ask how this complete furnishing for every good work is to be attained, the analogy of an earthly workman, who needs not be ashamed, suggests the answer. He would tell us that be owes his success, first of all, 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. They who would do Christ’s work as a second thing, not as the first, and who 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 know not how or what to work aright. Fear not–all learning begins with ignorance and mistakes. Be of good courage. He who has endowed human nature with the wonderful power that has filled the world with such skilled and cunning workmen, will He not much more give His children the grace they need to be His fellow workers? Let the necessity that is laid upon you–the necessity that you should glorify God, that you should bless the world, that you should through work ennoble and perfect your life and blessedness, urge you to give immediate and continual diligence to be a workman completely furnished unto every good work.

It is only in doing we learn to do aright. Begin working under Christ’s training; He will perfect His work in you, and so fit you for your work for him.

1. The work God is doing, and seeking to have done in the world, is to win it back to Himself.
2. In this work every believer is expected to take part.

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

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

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

6. As God’s work is all love, love is the power that works in us, inspiring our efforts and conquering its object.

‘He gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify us for Himself, a people of His own, zealous of good works.’–Tit. 2:14.

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 for Himself, He took us for a people, for His own possession. And all with the one object, that we should be a people zealous of good works. The doctrinal half of this wonderful passage has had much attention bestowed on it; let us devote our attention to its practical part –we are to be a people zealous of good works. Christ expects of us that we shall be zealots for good works–ardently, enthusiastically devoted to their performance.

This cannot be said to be the feeling with which most Christians regard good works. What can be done to cultivate this disposition? One of the first things that wakens zeal in work is a great and urgent sense of need. A great need wakens strong desire, stirs the heart and the will, rouses all the energies of our being. It was this sense of need that roused 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 of good works? No, indeed, it has given that urgent need a higher place than before. Christ needs, needs urgently, our good works. We are His servants, the members of His body, without whom He cannot possibly carry on His work on earth. The work is so great–with the hundreds of millions of the unsaved–the work is so great, that not one worker can be spared. There are thousands of Christians to-day who feel that their own business is urgent, and must be attended to, and have no conception of the urgency of Christ’s work committed to them. The Church must waken up to teach each believer this.

As urgently as Christ needs our good works the world needs them. There are around you men and women and children who need saving. To see men swept down past us in a river, stirs our every power to try and 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 in it. An apprentice or a student mostly begins his work under a sense of duty. As he learns to understand and enjoy it, be does it with pleasure, and becomes zealous in its performance. The Church must train Christians to believe that when once we give our hearts to it, and seek for the training that makes us in some degree skilled workmen, there is no greater joy than that of sharing in Christ’s work of mercy and beneficence. As physical and mental activity give pleasure, and call for the devotion and zeal of thousands, the spiritual service of Christ can waken our highest enthusiasm.

Then comes the highest motive, the personal one of attachment to Christ our Redeemer: ‘The love of Christ constraineth us.’ The love of Christ to us is the source and measure of our love to Him. Our love to Him becomes the power and the measure of our love to souls. This love, shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, this love as a Divine communication, renewed in us by the renewing of the Holy Ghost day by day, becomes a zeal for Christ that shows itself as a zeal for good works. It becomes the link that unites the two parts of our text, the doctrinal and the practical, into one. Christ’s love, that gave Himself for us, that redeemed us from all iniquity, that cleansed us for Himself, that made us a people of His own in the bonds of an everlasting loving kindness, that love believed in, known, received into the heart, makes the redeemed soul of necessity zealous in good works.

‘Zealous of good works!’ Let no believer, the youngest, the feeblest, look upon this grace as too high. 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.

‘Put them in mind to be ready to every good work.’–Tit. 3:1.

‘Put them in mind.’ The words suggest the need of believers to have the truths of their calling to good works ever again set before them. A healthy tree spontaneously bears its fruit. Even where the life of the believer is in perfect health, Scripture teaches us how its growth and fruitfulness only come through teaching, and the influence that exerts on mind and will and heart. For all who have charge of others the need is great of Divine wisdom and faithfulness to teach and train all Christians, specially young and feeble Christians, to be ready to every good work. Let us 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 of Christian character. Teach them how in all the duties and relationships of daily life true religion is to be carried out. Lead them on to the virtues which Jesus specially came to exhibit and teach–humility, meekness and gentleness and love. Open out to them the meaning of a life of love, self-sacrifice, and beneficence entirely given to think of and care for others. And 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 what an essential part of the Christian life good works are. They are not, as many think, a secondary element in the salvation which God gives. They are not merely to be done in token of our gratitude, or as a proof of the sincerity of our faith, or as a preparation for heaven. They are all this, but they are a great deal more. They are the very object 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 with God, and because God works through him. God has no higher glory than His works, and specially His work of saving love. 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, they develop and exercise, they strengthen and perfect it. Good works are of the very essence of the Divine life in us.

Teach them, too, what a rich reward they bring. All labor has its market value. From the poor man who scarce can earn a shilling a day, to the man who has made his millions, the thought of the reward there is for labor has been one of the great incentives to undertake it. Christ appeals to this feeling when He says, ‘Great shall be your reward.’ Let Christians understand that there is no service where the reward is so rich as that of God. Work is bracing, work is strength, and cultivates the sense of mastery and conquest. Work wakens 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. They 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, too, on those around us. When others are won to Christ, when the weary and the erring and the desponding are helped and made partakers of the grace and life there are in Christ Jesus for them, God’s servants share in the very joy in which our blessed Lord found His recompense.

And now the chief thing. Teach them to believe that it is possible for each of us to abound in good works. Nothing is so fatal to successful effort as discouragement or despondency. Nothing is more a frequent cause of neglect of good works than the fear that we have not the power to perform them. Put them in mind 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; that there is always grace sufficient for all the good works to which we are called. Strive to waken in them a faith in ‘the power that worketh in us,’ and in the fulness of that life which can flow out as rivers of living water. Train them to begin at once their service of love. Lead them to see how it is all God working in them, and to offer themselves as empty vessels to be filled with His love and grace. And teach them that as they are faithful in a little, even amid mistakes and shortcomings, the acting out of the life will strengthen the life itself, and work for God will become in full truth a second nature.

God grant that the teachers of the Church may be faithful to its commission in regard to all her members–‘Put them in mind to be ready for every good work.’ Not only teach them, but train them. Show them the work there is to be done by them; see that they do it; encourage and help them to do it hopefully. There is no part of the office of a pastor more important or more sacred than this, or fraught with richer blessing. Let the aim 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!

1. Get a firm hold of the great root-principle. Every believer, every member of Christ’s body, has his place in the body solely for the welfare of the whole body.
2. Pastors have been given for the perfecting of the saints with the work of ministering, of serving in love.

3. In ministers and members of the churches, Christ will work mightily if they will wait upon Him.

XXIII: Careful to maintain Good Works

‘I will that thou affirm these things confidently, to the end that they which have believed God may be careful to maintain good works. Let our people also learn to maintain good works for necessary uses, that they be not unfruitful.’–Tit. 3:8, 14.

In the former of these passages Paul charges Titus confidently to affirm the truths of the blessed Gospel to the end, with the express object that all who had believed should be careful, should make a study of it, to maintain good works. Faith and good works were to be inseparable; the diligence of every believer in good works was to be a main aim of a pastor’s work. In the second passage he reiterates the instruction, with the expression, let them learn, suggesting the thought that, as all work on earth has to be learned, so in the good works of the Christian life there is an equal need of thought and application and teachableness, to learn how to do them aright and abundantly.

There may be more than one reader of this little book who has felt how little he has lived in accordance with all the teaching of God’s word, prepared, thoroughly furnished, ready unto, zealous of good works. It appears so difficult to get rid of old habits, to break through the conventionalities of society, to know how to begin and really enter upon a life that can be full of good works, to the glory of God. Let me try and give some suggestions that may be helpful. They may also aid those who have the training of Christian workers, in showing in what way the teaching and learning of good works may best succeed. Come, young workers all, and listen.

1. A learner must begin by beginning to work at once. There is no way of learning an art like swimming or music, a new language or a trade, but by practice. Let neither the fear that you cannot do it, nor the hope that something will happen that will make it easier for you, keep you back. Learn to do good works, the works of love, by beginning to do them. However insignificant they appear, do them. A kind word, a little help to some one in trouble, an act of loving attention to a stranger or a poor man, the sacrifice of a seat or a place to some one who longs for it–practise these things. 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 you can learn to do.

2. The learner must give his heart to the work, must 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 sometimes of the honor and privilege of doing good works, of serving others in love. It is God’s own work, to love and save and bless men. He works it in you and through you. It makes you share the spirit and likeness of Christ. It strengthens your Christian character. Without actions, intentions lower and condemn a man instead of raising him. Only as much as you act out, do you really live. Think of the Godlike blessedness of doing good, of communicating life, of making happy. Think of the exquisite joy of growing up into a life of beneficence, and being the blessing of all you meet. Set your heart upon being a vessel meet for the Master’s use, ready to every good work.

3 . Be of good courage, and fear not. The learner who says I cannot, will surely fail. There is a Divine power working in you. Study and believe what God’s word says about it. Let the holy self-reliance of St. Paul, grounded on his reliance on Christ, be your example: I can do all things–in Christ which strengtheneth me. Study and take home to yourself the wonderful promises about the power of the Holy Spirit, the abundance of grace, Christ’s strength made perfect in weakness, and see how all this can only be made true to you in working. Cultivate the noble consciousness that as you have been created to good works by God, He Himself will fit you for them. And believe then that just as natural as it is to any workman to delight and succeed in his profession, it can be to the new nature in you to abound in every good work. Having this confidence, you need never faint.

4. Above all, cling to your Lord Jesus as your Teacher and Master. He said: ‘Learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest to your souls.’ Work as one who is a learner in His school, who is sure that none 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 the path to the Father’s glory, will teach you what it is to work for God.

To sum up again, for the sake of any who want to learn how to work, or how to work better:

1. Yield yourself to Christ. Lay yourself on the altar, and say you wish to give yourself wholly to live for God’s work.
2. Believe quietly that Christ accepts and takes charge of you for His work, and will fit you for it.

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

4. 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.

‘We are God’s fellow workers: ye are God’s building.’–1 Cor. 3:9.

‘And working together with Him we intreat that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.’–2 Cor. 6:1.

We have listened to Paul’s teaching on good works (chaps. IX.-XXII.); let us turn now to his personal experience, and see if we can learn from him some of the secrets of effective service.

He speaks here of the Church as God’s building, which, as the Great Architect, He is building up into a holy temple and dwelling for Himself. Of his own work, Paul speaks as of that of a master builder, to whom a part of the great building has been given in charge. He had laid a foundation in Corinth; to all who were working there he said: ‘Let each man take heed how he buildeth thereon.’ ‘We are God’s fellow workers.’ The word is applicable not only to Paul, but to all God’s servants who take part in His work; and because every believer has been called to give his life to God’s service and to win others to His knowledge, every, even the feeblest, Christian needs to have the word brought to him and taken home: ‘We are God’s fellow workers.’ How much it suggests in regard to our working for God!

As to the work we have to do.–The eternal God is building for Himself a temple; Christ Jesus, God’s Son, is the foundation; believers are the living stones. The Holy Spirit is the mighty power of God through which believers are gathered out of the world made fit for their place in the temple, and 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 every one who would be a fellow worker with God must be set. It is only as we know how great, how wonderful, this work of God is–giving life to dead souls, imparting His own life to them, and living in them–that we shall enter somewhat into the glory of our work, receiving the very life of God from Him, and passing it on to men.

As to the strength for the work.–Paul says of his work as a mere master builder, that it was ‘according to the grace of God which was given me.’ For Divine work nothing but Divine power suffices. The power by which God works must work in us. That power is His Holy, Spirit. Study the second chapter of this Epistle, and the third of the Second, and see how absolute was Paul’s acknowledgment of his own impotence, and his dependence on the teaching and power of the Holy Spirit. As this great truth begins to live 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 He works for the salvation of men is love; it is love alone that truly conquers and wins the heart. In all God’s fellow workers love is the power that reaches the hearts of men. Christ conquered and conquers still by the love of the cross. Let that mind be in you, O worker, which was in Christ Jesus, the spirit of a love that sacrifices itself to the death, of a humble, patient, gentle love, and you will be made meet to be God’s fellow worker.

As to the relation we are to hold to 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 is guided in all by his will; and his instructions to those under him have all reference to the one thing–the embodiment, in visible shape, of what the master mind has conceived. The one great characteristic of fellow workers with God ought to be that of absolute surrender to His will, unceasing dependence on His teaching, 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 with the way he desires to have it carried out. The clearer our insight into the Divine glory of God’s work of saving souls, into the utter insufficiency of our natural powers to do the work, into the provision, that has been made by which the Divine love can animate us, and the Divine Spirit guide and strengthen us for its due performance, the more we shall feel that a childlike teachableness, a continual looking upward and waiting on God, is ever to be the chief mark of one who is His fellow-labourer. Out of the sense of humility, helplessness, and nothingness there will grow a holy confidence and courage that knows that our weakness need not hinder us, that Christ’s strength is made perfect in weakness, that God Himself is working out His purpose through us. And of all the blessings of the Christian life, the most wonderful will be that we are allowed to be–God’s fellow workers!

1. God’s fellow worker! How easy to use the word, and even to apprehend some of the great truths it contains! How little we live in the power and the glory of what it actually involves!
2. Fellow-workers with God! Everything depends upon knowing, in His holiness and love, the God with whom we are associated as partners.

3. He who has chosen us, that in and through us He might do His great work, will fit us for His use.

4. Let our posture be adoring worship, deep dependence, great waiting, full obedience

‘Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus; whereunto I also labor, striving according to His working, which worketh in me mightily.’–Col. 1:29.

‘The mystery of Christ, whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of that grace of God which was given me according to the working of His power.’–Eph. 3:7.

In the words of Paul to the Philippians, which we have already considered (Chap. IX.), in which he called upon them and encouraged them to work, because it was God who worked in them, we found one of the most pregnant and 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 as to his own experience. His whole ministry was to be according to the grace which was given him according to the working of God’s power. And of his labor he says that it was a striving according to the power of Him who worked mightily in him.

We find here the same principle 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, if the Apostle Paul, could only do their work according to 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 aright. This is one of the deepest spiritual truths of God’s word; let us look to the Holy Spirit within us to give it such a hold of our inmost life, that it 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 God’; ‘There is none holy but the Lord’; ‘Power belongeth unto God.’ All goodness and holiness and power are only to be found in God, and where He gives them. And He can only give them in the creature, not as something He parts with, but by His own actual presence and dwelling and working. And so God can only work in His people in as far 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 keep possession and to abide, even as Christ waited on Him, God can work in us.

This is true of all our spiritual life, but specially 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, inspiring and energizing them by His power working in them. To him who can say with Paul: ‘I labor, striving according to His power who worketh in me mightily,’ his whole relation to God becomes the counterpart and the continuation of Christ’s, a blessed, unceasing, momentary, and most absolute dependence on the Father for every word He spoke and every work He did.

Christ is our pattern. Christ’s life is our law and works in us. Christ lived in Paul his life of dependence on God. 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 aright, but by God working it in us.

How I wish that I could take every worker who reads this by the hand, and say–Come, my brother! let us 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 out of which can grow the very spiritual blessing of which it speaks. And in the faith of the Holy Spirit’s making it live within you, say ever again: God worketh in me. All the work I have to work for Him, God will work in me.

The faith of this truth, and the desire to have it made true in you, will constrain you to live very humbly and closely with God. You will see how work for God must be the most spiritual thing in a spiritual life. And you will ever anew bow in holy stillness: God is working; God will work in me; I will work for Him according to the power which worketh in me mightily.

1. The gift of the grace of God (Eph. 2:7, 3:7), the power that worketh in us (Eph. 3:20), the strengthening with might by the Spirit (Eph. 3:16)–the three expressions all contain the same thought of God’s working all in us.
2. The Holy Spirit is the power of God. Seek to be filled with the Spirit, to have your whole life led by Him, and you will become fit for God’s working mightily in you.

3. ‘Ye shall receive the power of the Holy Spirit coming on you.’ Through the Spirit dwelling in us God can work in us mightily.

4. What holy fear, what humble watchfulness and dependence, what entire surrender and obedience become us if we believe in God’s working in us.

‘By the grace of God I am what I am: and His grace which was bestowed on me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.’–1 Cor. 15:10.

‘And He hath said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for My power is made perfect in weakness. . . . In nothing was I behind the chiefest of the apostles, though I am nothing.’–2 Cor. 12:9, 11 .

In both of these passages Paul speaks of how he had abounded in the work of the Lord. ‘In nothing was I behind the chiefest of the Apostles.’ ‘I labored more abundantly, than they all.’ In both he tells how entirely it was all of God, who worked in Him, and not of himself. In the first he says: ‘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: My power is made perfect in weakness.’ May God give us ‘the Spirit of revelation, enlightened eyes of the heart,’ to see this wonderful vision, a man who knows himself to be nothing, glorying in his weakness, that the power of Christ may rest on him, and work through him, and who so 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.–It is only by God’s power, that is, by God Himself working in us, that we can do effective work. Throughout this little book this truth has been frequently repeated. It is easy to accept of it; it is far from easy to see its full meaning, to give it the mastery over our whole being, to live it out. This will need stillness of soul, and meditation, strong faith and fervent prayer. As it is God alone who can work in us, it is equally God who alone can reveal Himself as the God who works in us. Wait on Him, and the truth that ever appears to be beyond thy reach will be opened up to thee, through the knowledge of who and what God is. When God reveals Himself as ‘God who worketh all in all,’ thou wilt learn to believe and work ‘according to the power of Him who worketh in thee mightily.’

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 with me. The man who said, In nothing behind the chiefest of the Apostles! had first learnt to say, though I am nothing. He could say: ‘I take pleasure in weaknesses, for when I am weak then am I strong.’ This is the true relation between the Creator and the creature, between the Divine Father and His child, between God and His servant. Christian worker! learn the lesson of thine own weakness, as the indispensable condition of God’s Power working in thee. Do believe that to take time and in God’s presence to realize thy weakness and nothingness is the sure way to be clothed with God’s strength. Accept every experience by which God teaches thee thy weakness as His grace preparing thee to receive His strength. Take pleasure in weaknesses!

God’s strength comes in our fellowship with Christ and His service.–Paul says: I will glory in my weakness, that the strength of Christ may rest upon me.’ ‘I take pleasure in weaknesses for Christ’s sake.’ And he tells how it was when be had besought the Lord that the messenger of Satan might depart from him, that He answered: ‘My grace is sufficient for thee.’ ‘Christ is the wisdom and the power of God.’ 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 discretion. It is in the personal attachment to Christ, in a life of continual communication with Him, that His power rests on us. It is in taking pleasure in weaknesses for Christ’s sake that Christ’s strength is known.

God’s strength is given to faith, and the work that is done in faith.–It needs a living faith to take pleasure in weaknesses, and in weakness to do our work, knowing that God is working in us. Without seeing or feeling anything, to go on in the confidence of a hidden power working in us–this is the highest exercise of a life of faith. To do God’s own work in saving souls, in persevering severing prayer and labor; amid outwardly unfavorable circumstances and appearances still to labor more abundantly–this faith alone can do. Let us be strong in faith, giving 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, may work in you. Do let God work through you. Offer yourself to Him for His work as the one object of your life. Count upon His working all in you, to fit you for His service, 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 even as He did, to do the Father’s will and finish His work.

1. 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.
2. Our Lord says: ‘My grace, My strength.’ It is as, in close personal fellowship and love, we abide in Christ, and have Christ abiding in us, that His grace and strength can work.

3. It is a heart wholly given up to God, to His will and love, that will know his power working in our weakness.

‘Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deluding your own selves. He that looketh into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and so continueth, being not a hearer that forgetteth, but a doer that worketh, this man shall be blessed in doing.’–Jas. 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 of contemplation. True contemplation, as a means to an end, always begets action. If sin had not entered there had never been a separation between knowing and doing. In nothing is the power of sin more clearly seen than this, that even in the believer there is such a gap between intellect and conduct. It is possible to delight in hearing, to be diligent in increasing our knowledge of God’s word, to admire and approve the truth, even to be willing to do it, and yet to fail entirely in the actual performance. Hence the warning of James, not to delude ourselves with being hearers and not doers. Hence his pronouncing the doer who worketh blessed in his doing.

Blessed in doing.–The words are a summary of the teaching of our Lord Jesus at the close of the Sermon on the Mount: ‘He that doeth the will of My Father shall enter the kingdom of heaven.’ ‘Every one that heareth My words, and doeth them, shall be likened unto a wise man.’ To the woman who spoke of the blessedness of her who was his mother: ‘Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it.’ To the disciples in the last night: ‘If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them.’ It is one of the greatest dangers in religion that we rest content with the pleasure and approval which a beautiful representation of a truth calls forth, without the immediate performance of what it demands. It is only when conviction has been translated into conduct that we have proof that the truth is mastering us.

A doer that worketh shall be blessed in doing.–The doer is blessed. The doing is the victory that overcomes every obstacle it brings out 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 ever inclined to seek our blessedness in what God gives, in privilege and enjoyment. 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. When one said, ‘Blessed is be that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God,’ our Lord answered with the parable of the supper, ‘Blessed is he that forsakes all to come to the supper.’ 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 find their blessedness, so, and much more, is it 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 manifestation, and therefore the fullest enjoyment of the life of God.

A doer that worketh shall be blessed in doing.–This was the blessedness of Abraham, of whom we read (Jas. 2:22): ‘Thou seest that faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect.’ 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 that worketh is blessed. The true insight into this, as 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, and every truth, and every opportunity to abound in good works as an integral part of the blessedness of the salvation Christ has brought us. Joy and work, work and joy, will become synonymous: we shall no longer be hearers but doers.

Let us put this truth into immediate practice. Let us live for others, to love and serve them. Let not the fact of our being unused 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 go on, and abound. Believe the word, It is more blessed to give than to receive. 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, in the promise of God you have the assurance: If you know these things, happy are ye if ye do them. Blessed is the doer!

‘My brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him, let him know that he which converteth a sinner from the error of his ways shall save a soul from death, and shall cover a multitude of sins.’–Jas. 5:19-20.

We sometimes hesitate to speak of men being converted and saved by men. Scripture here twice uses the expression of one man converting another, and once of his saving him. Let us not hesitate to accept it as part of our work, of our high prerogative as the sons of God, to convert and to save men. ‘For it is God who worketh in us.’

‘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.’ In our good works we deal with souls. Even when we can at first 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 us study these. What care a huntsman or a fisherman takes to know the habits of the spoil he seeks. Let us remember that it needs Divine wisdom and training and skill to become winners of souls. The only way to get that training and skill is to begin to work: Christ Himself will teach each one who waits on Him

In that training the Church with its ministers has a part to take.. The daily experience of ordinary life and teaching prove how often there exist in a man unsuspected powers, which must be called out by training before they are known to be there. When a man thus becomes conscious and master of the power there is in himself he is, as it were, a new creature; the power and enjoyment of life is doubled. Every believer has bidden within himself the power of saving souls. The Kingdom of Heaven is within us as a seed, and every one of the gifts and graces of the spirit are each also a hidden seed. The highest aim of the ministry is to waken the consciousness of this hidden seed of power to save souls. A depressing sense of ignorance or impotence keeps many back. James writes: ‘Let him who converts another know that he has saved 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: ‘I will bless thee, then shall all the nations of the earth be blessed,’ He called him to a faith not only in the blessing that would come to him from above, but in the power of blessing he would be in the world. 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, is 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 to which our life will be given. We shall be the willing and intelligent instruments through whom He will do His mighty work.

‘If any err, and one convert him he which converteth a sinner shall save a soul.’ The words suggest personal work. We chiefly think of large gatherings to whom the Gospel is preached; the thought here is of one who has erred and is sought after. We increasingly do our work through associations and organizations. ‘If one convert him, he saveth a soul;’ it is the love and labor of some individual believer that has won the erring one back. It is this we need in the Church of Christ,–every believer who truly follows Jesus Christ 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?’ We are in the world only and solely that as the members of Christ’s body we may continue and carry out His saving work. As saving souls was and is His work, His joy, 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.

‘Know that he which converteth a sinner shall save a soul.’ ‘If ye know these things, happy are ye if you do them.’ 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. Is there not more than one Christian around me wandering from the way, needing loving help and not unwilling to receive it? Are there not some whom I could take by the hand, and encourage to begin again? Are there not many who have never been in the right way, for some of 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 as a seed dwells within me, not only calling but enabling me actually to do the work. Let me yield myself to the Holy Spirit to fill my heart with that 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. ‘Know that he which converteth a sinner shall save a soul from death, and cover a multitude of sins.’

1. More love to souls, born out of fervent love to the Lord Jesus–is not this our great need?
2. Let us pray for love, and begin to love, in the faith that as we exercise the little we have more will be given.

3. Lord! open our eyes to see Thee doing Thy great work of saving men, and waiting to give Thy love and strength into the heart of every willing one. Make each one of Thy redeemed a soul winner.