BYM ONLINE DESK Blessing English E-magazine March 2018 | Page 8

March 2018
Let us note a few hints which may be of
assistance to Christian workers:
Work from Pure Motives
Alas! how much of our work vanishes without
note in heaven because it springs from no motive that
can pass muster there. With what shame do many of
us review the ignoble and worthless motives by
which we have been prompted. To gain a livelihood;
to win a name; to excite applause; to out vie some
neighbour; to win a victory; to accomplish a difficult
and almost impossible task; these have inspired us in
many deeds of Christian service, which have
received the commendation of those who judge by
appearance, and not by heart. How could our God be
pleased with us or accept our service! Our most
splendid deeds have been irreparably spoilt by the
meanness of the motives that prompted them.
Our motives must be pure. The root will affect
all the fruit. The stream cannot rise higher than its
source. We must get rid of the constant thought of
self. We must become oblivious to the praise or
blame of man. We must let the sun of divine love
burn out the fire of selfish ambition and personal
aims. We must bring our weak and weary hearts to
the Heart-physician, asking Him to cleanse them by
the inspiration of His Holy Spirit, disentwining the
clinging evil of self and filling us with His own sweet,
ingenuous, and perfect love. May our hearts burn
with the pure flame of devotion that trembles in the
hearts of seraphs! This our cry in life and death:
“Glory to God in the Highest!”
Work According to God's Plan
One of the most suggestive texts in the Bible,
far-reaching in its many applications, is that in which
God says to Moses, “...See that you make everything
according to the pattern that was shown you on the
mountain” (Heb 8:5). Not a stake or a curtain or an
atom of fragrant spice was left to the genius of the
artificer or the fancy of the lawgiver. All was
unfolded to Moses in elaborate detail, and all he had
to do was to produce that plan in careful and exact
obedience until at last it stood complete before the
wondering host of Israel. And God provided the
material in abundance out of which the plan was to be
elaborated. If we will execute His plans, we need
have no anxiety about the stuff; He will make
Himself responsible for that.
Does not this touch the secret of much of our
failure? We reason thus: “This seems a feasible
thing; it promises well; other men are doing it;
success seems within grasp and would be very sweet;
I shall certainly go in for it.” We do not stay to ask
whether it is one of those good works which God has
before prepared for us to walk in (Eph 2:10). We do
not seek to know, by prayer and waiting whether it is
in God's plan for us. We do not humbly wait to be
taught if God wants our help in this special direction.
And it is only when we have plunged deeply
into our course and have met with all manner of
discouragement that we begin to question whether
we should have adopted it at all. Then we run to ask
God to extricate us, to help us out, and to forgive us
for having built and launched and chartered our ships
without asking Him if we were acting in accordance
with His will. The fact is, we start an enterprise and
presently ask God to help us, instead of first asking
R
O F I N T E G
call forth our faculties, and use them and manipulate
them for His glory, and to our joy. Oh, what could not
the Lord Jesus do by us if only we were wholly
yielded to Him!
*2018*
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