Thursday, February 2, 2012

Small, Inglorious Things


Christians often think, "It is wonderful to be a Christian, but I am such a small person, so limited in talents-or energy or psychological strength or knowledge-that what I do is not really important." The Bible, however, has quite a different emphasis: With God there are no little people… and there are no little places….
Nowhere more than in America are Christians caught in the twentieth-century syndrome of size. Size will show success. If I am consecrated, there will necessarily be large quantities of people, dollars, etc. This is not so. Not only does God not say that size and spiritual power go together, but he even reverses this (especially in the teaching of Jesus). We all tend to emphasize big works and big places, but to think in such terms is simply to hearken back to the old, unconverted, egoist, self-centered Me.

When we’re asked to do a thing, especially in the Lord’s work, it really doesn’t matter whether the thing is “important” or not.  Our real attitude toward service is probably not measured by our performance in the big, glorious situations but rather by our steadfastness in the small, inglorious ones. So Paul said, “Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 15:58).

Only one thing is important: to be consecrated persons in God's place for us, at each moment. Those who think of themselves as little people in little places, if committed to Christ and living under his Lordship in the whole of life, may, by God's grace, change the flow of our generation.

- Francis Schaeffer

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