WHO SUCCEEDS?
WHO SUCCEEDS?
In a day of confusion, opposition, and difficulty, it is of the utmost importance to learn who succeeds. Who is the one to surmount the various and accumulating obstructions in the path? I believe the true answer is the devoted one. By devotedness I mean the purpose to follow the Lord at any cost, so that the one thing before the heart is not the measure or extent of the surrender, but the intent of it, in every way to set forth the name and honour of our Lord.
[p. 54] The Lord has ordained that the action most gratifying to the true heart and the highest practice should be one and the same. “If any man serve me, let him follow me”. There could be nothing more gratifying to the heart than to follow the Lord. If a dog has such real delight in following its master, how much more the heart, touched and taught in His perfect love!
If I follow the Lord, I cannot but go where He has gone, and this is obedience in its simplest and truest order. Hence He says, “If a man love me, he will keep my words”. How could you tell where His path lay without the word? Therefore, the one following must be governed by the word. The word is, if I may so express myself, the scent which assures the spiritual soul that he is on the right track. The one thought of devotedness is, “Whither thou goest, I will go”; hence in any difficulty or strait the one simple inquiry is, Which way went the Lord? And surely if I am in His way I must succeed. But it is not for success that I am seeking, but to be where He is, for as I follow Him, “where I am, there shall also my servant be”. If it be mere success or present advantage that I seek, I shall be deceived; it is then not the word which determines my course, but the weight of circumstances; like one retreating, as it were, into a certain creek where he could reckon on safety and escape. But the way of the Lord, in which the word directs me, is one always at first arduous and apparently impossible. It is a path which the keenest natural eye cannot detect, and it is one that is so superhuman in its character that the power of Christ could alone uphold us in it. But once I am in it, on the scent, I am like Peter on the water, surprised and entranced at the wonders His grace can effect for me, and have the sense that I am in His path.
The devoted one, like Ruth, says, “Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee”. When the devotedness is not simple and true, then there is soon a turning aside, even though with tears like [p. 55] Orpah, or like the young man in Mark 10. Invariably there is an easier and surer way of success for the natural man than the way enjoined by the word; and if there be not devotedness to seek and adhere to the leading of the word, and through faith to accept and be prepared for every difficulty, there will not be success according to God; so that in every case it is the measure of devotedness which decides and determines one’s course.
Another thing must be noted. Devotedness is called to act on the moment. There is no prolonged scheme which is eventually to issue in success. Devotedness is ready in a moment to take the field, to be in action. Abram went forth not knowing whither he went; “Get thee ... unto a land that I will shew thee” was enough for him. However devoted one is, he will have to learn the treachery of his own heart in his course. It is not that Abram never fails, but through his devotedness he at length succeeds; while the one who, by natural sagacity, had at first gained every advantage gradually fell from his acquired height to the lowest point. The path of faith is not easy, but the more difficult it is to enter on, the brighter will the end be. Here we find that the devoted man succeeds when the sagacious one, who at first seizes every advantage, is eventually degraded.
Again, many are characterised more by zeal than by devotedness. The zealous man is occupied with his works and his own doings, very interesting and valuable in their place; but it will be found that zeal does not ensure success. Moses was zealous when he sought to liberate his people by his own hand. How different his way and course after he had learned to follow the Lord wholly! Peter was zealous when he gave up his time and his ship for the service, but the Lord led him on from that to leave all and follow Him. It is a great thing to be started in devotedness, for though there may arise distraction and consequent delays, yet assuredly the desire and purpose in the heart to follow the Lord, as in Moses and Peter, will eventually triumph; and the more decided [p. 56] the devotedness, the more signal the success. We have seen that the sharp-sighted cleverness of Lot to seize and appropriate present gain is not really a success, while the slow and often baffled or hindered faith of the devoted Abram proves in the end a real success. We have seen that great zeal, as with Moses, eventually fails, if not superseded by devotedness, and we shall see the same with regard to intelligence. The real lack in the man who knew his Lord’s will and did it not was devotedness. What is the charge against Israel? “They come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their mouth they shew much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness. And, lo, thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument: for they hear thy words, but they do them not”, Ezekiel 33: 31, 32. They are intelligent, but not devoted. What is the good seed among the thorns but that there was not that devotedness which gained everything for Mary Magdalene? she outstripped the ardent Peter, and the intelligent disciple whom Jesus loved; she succeeded. By simple devotedness she attained to the highest honour and intelligence.
Devotedness, then, succeeds when intelligence in the morally highest does not. A nazarite was the figurative representation of a thoroughly devoted soul; the true nazarite scrupulously adhered to the terms of his vow. Thus Samson illustrates how devotedness succeeds, and what failure there is in departure from it. As long as he was true to this rigid separation he was singularly successful; when he diverged from it his failure was most marked.
Now while Samson shows us how success follows strict righteousness and separation, yet we do not see the success proper to devotedness till we come to Samuel. There is an occasional success in the rigid legalist, but when his heart is detached from the Lord by the things [p. 57] in the world, his failure is inevitable. Now Samuel’s heart is in it; he follows the Lord, and depends only on Him, and he succeeds in a surpassing degree beyond Samson. In adhering to strict rule and order there is often success, but then it is more of the conscience than the heart; and hence with Samson, when the allurement for his heart was strong enough, he declined from the true course. But true devotedness finds its delight in following the Lord, just as Joshua and Caleb did in another day. Their comfort and stay was in the fact that “if the Lord delight in us, then he will bring us into this land”. Devotedness is not overborne by numbers any more than by the prospect of danger. Devotedness follows the Lord wholly. What difficulties would be overcome in this day, what questions solved, if there were more devotedness, more of that simplicity of eye that cannot be diverted from one object! When we examine the hindrances or delays now to the settlement of any contention between the Lord’s people, we shall find that it is one or other of these activities which interferes with and obstructs devotedness. The quick ready sagacity of a Lot in seizing and appropriating a desired advantage, instead of pursuing the unhasty path of faith, carries away many at this moment. But success eventually is with the one who, like Abram, pursues the path of faith, though he has nothing to point to.
Again, how ready is one to be carried away by zeal, as Jehu said, “Come ... and see my zeal for the Lord”. No doubt it is good to be zealously affected in a good matter; but zeal is like the life of a hunter, it lives on its own spoils; it declines as the excitement declines. Whereas devotedness feeds the heart more intensely when there is nothing to be gained from around; as Ruth in following Naomi, or David’s mighty men in fetching water for him from the well of Bethlehem. Devotedness survives when everything else has succumbed and disappeared. “Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried”.
[p. 58] Because of zeal many obtain a credit and place for which they have not moral power and many are characterised by this leadership; like master, like man. The only true leader is the devoted one, the one who can say like Gideon, “As I do, so shall ye do”, or in some degree as the apostle said, “To make ourselves an ensample unto you to follow us”. “Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ”.
In the present state of christendom nothing — neither sagacity, nor zeal, nor intelligence, nor the best of rules — can influence morally the conscience and hearts of the people of God mixed up in the world, nothing but devotedness. Devotedness declares that the heart has got someone worth losing all for in the present, and the life and ways of such an one speak attractively and convincingly to every awakened soul. Let anyone inquire, and it will be found that, as with Gideon in another day, the real leader is the devoted one, and the real power to lead and to win is devotedness; whereas nothing has so tended to weaken and neutralise the testimony as the prominence and leadership of those who attract more by other qualities, however good, than by their devotedness. How is it possible for those who have advanced in the world, since they are called of God, to lead in a day like this? And if they do, surely, as devotedness cannot be their characteristic, there cannot be a clear testimony. The world may be given up politically, as it is in many instances, but the things of the world are sought after for comfort in the world. I need not add more; but I thank God that there is a way, and one the most gratifying to the heart, to rise up and triumph for the Lord, even in an evil day like this.
May He lead many of us heartily to do so.