p. 218 | Work Not Worry

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Apr 8, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 14.

Work Not Worry.

A MAN who is Christ's, and who has Christ's work to do, would do better to devote himself to that work of Christ which he has to do, than to worry over his lack of fitness for that work, or even than to agonize after a fuller fitness for its prosecution. It requires no self-examination to convince an intelligent disciple of Christ that he is imperfect, and that he is full of faults. And when that fact is fairly before his mind, if he waits to attain to perfectness before beginning to work for Christ, he will wait indefinitely.

If, however, simply recognizing the truth that Christ can use even such a person as he is, a disciple of Christ will give himself to be used accordingly, he will best honor Him who chooses the weak things of the world, and the base things of the world, and the things that are despised, yea, and the things that are not, for the compassing of the mightiest results, in order that no flesh shall glory before God. Personal prayer for personal gifts and personal graces is sometimes a misuse of time on the part of those who ought to forget themselves in their absorbed devotedness in the work to which they have been set of God, and whose prayers ought to be rather for guidance and strength in the use of the graces they have, than for a larger supply of graces. And an undue emphasis of one's personal unworthiness as an instrument in God's hand may be a result of too much thought of one's self, and too little thought of God's ability to do everything he chooses to do with even such an instrument as this. "Then said I, Ah, Lord God! behold, I cannot speak; for I am a child. But the Lord said unto me, Say not, I am a child; for thou shalt go, to all that I shall send thee, and whatsoever I command thee thou shalt speak." As it was thus in the case of Jeremiah, so it may be with every child of God who is called to work for God.—S. S. Times.