March
15
God
was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him (Colossians 1:19 NIV).
The next thing I am
going to say may be difficult to accept, just as it is difficult to say, and
yet faithfulness demands that things like this should be said. There is going
to be a tremendous surprise one day over this matter. There is a tremendous
amount of energy, and activity, and machinery, and zeal and devotion in the
work of the Lord, in the service of the Lord, which seems to be producing
something quite big, and carrying on something quite extensive. It is not for
us to judge, but it is for us to lay down laws and recognize those laws, or,
rather, recognize laws that are laid down by God. When eventually all work, all
service, all activity, is weighed in the balances, which will determine what
abides forever or passes away forever, all that which was merely human
energy for God will go; all that which was merely man's enterprise for the Lord
will go; all that which was in any way out from man himself, even though in
devotion to God, will go. Only that which was the energy of Christ, the wisdom
of Christ, the power of Christ, will remain.
God is not using your
energies and my energies. He is calling upon us to use the energies of Christ.
God cannot set His seal upon anything that is of man.
God's seal only
rests upon that which is of His Son, and we must not say that because a thing
is big, extensive, and seems to be a great work for God, that
it necessarily is such. What we have got to be quite sure about is that that
thing is not being carried on by the momentum of man, or the momentum of
organization, the momentum of machinery, the momentum of human zeal and energy
for God, nor by the momentum of a program, but that it is being energized by
the Holy Ghost, that it is Christ Himself who is the Life and the power of that
thing. In so far as human personalities, energies and all that kind of thing
are the mainspring, we may be sure that in the end there is going to be a good
deal that goes. That can be seen as you look back over the history of things
which claimed to represent God. The object of saying this is not for one moment
to cast a cloud of suspicion or doubt over anything, but it is to emphasize
this truth, this basic truth. It is along the line of jealousy for Christ.
Nothing will remain in this universe eventually but what is Christ, and we must
recognize that everything for God's ultimate purpose is bound up with and in
Christ, and it IS Christ.
By T. Austin-Sparks
from: Christ in
You
This photograph is by Charlie Burnell.
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