Trust and Work by Archdeacon Farrar

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Dec 30, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 50.

Trust and Work.

By Archdeacon Farrar

Do your work, but do it in quietness and confidence; do your duty, but do it without this corroding anxiety; and he who even in the desert spreads his table for the birds, who clothes the flowers in their embroideries of beauty, will feed and clothe you. That trust which, unconsciously, God's humbler creatures show, that do ye show reflectingly and consciously. Trust in God for these lower things, because he gives, and will give, and has given to you, higher things than these. Do not degrade and drag down your life in the mire by the spirit of mean, selfish, grudging, untrusting accumulations. If you seek first the kingdom of God, all these other things, or things transcendently better than these, shall be added unto you.

There is nothing wrong in your trade or your merchandise, and your daily work to earn your own living; that is altogether right; so far from being a rival business to these, the seeking of the kingdom of Heaven is a divine law which should regulate, a divine temper which should pervade and transfigure them. Only for the sake of all that make your life worth living, for the sake alike of your temporal and eternal happiness, do not seek the dross of earth more, and love it better, than the gold of Heaven.

Let conscience and faith enter into every necessary act of your daily life. Learn to discriminate the transcendent. Learn to feel habitually that the life, the true life, the spiritual life, is more than food, and the body than raiment. Let justice, goodness, kindness, purity, be your aim; not the selfish scramble of scheming competition, not the brutal appetences of sensual desire. Do not let your daily necessities blunt the edge of your ideal aspirations; do not sink into groveling appetites or money-making machines. Man lives indeed by bread, but he does not live by bread alone.—Archdeacon Farrar.