SELF-JUDGMENT BEFORE SERVICE
SELF-JUDGMENT BEFORE SERVICE
“He that watereth shall be watered also himself” (Proverbs 11: 25). The more you impart to others what you have received, the more will be committed to you. The lapidary [p. 249] increases his wealth, not only by acquiring diamonds, but in setting them to the best advantage. In the same way will you increase your possessions in Christ the more you discover the value of each of His, and devote yourself to make them brilliant. It is not enough for you to loathe yourself. This is the negative; and though always necessary to make room for the positive, yet it becomes a snare if the positive be not added; you will not have roasted that which you took in hunting. The more you abhor yourself before God, the more you will depend on Him, because you lose self-dependence. The loss of everything here does not, as we see in Job’s case, lead to self-repudiation, but to self-justification. Not until he sees God does he feel the true state of his nature. When it is abhorred in His presence, in the light in which it is, you find, like Peter, the only One to cling to. A man might dwell for ever on his ruin and shame, and yet never reach the new ground, where God’s favour could greet him in a way double to any he had ever known. The fact of condemning oneself where there is conscience is a relief; and occupation with it leads to morbidness and inaction, and consigns one to a kind of despair, expressing itself in useless regrets and repinings. But when you see yourself in the light of God’s countenance, because Christ is the light, you at the same moment, must utterly abhor yourself, and find the One to whom you can cleave. As the abhorrence of yourself increases, your dependence on Him increases. “Behold, he prayeth”, is the evidence of one really convicted of God. Now if there is thorough self-repudiation because of what you are in God’s presence, there is no dwelling on it, or reference to it; for the heart turns to Him in whom it rests, and who is the source of a new life and a nature suited to God.
And here it finds itself interested in all His. As Job prayed for his friends, so do you now show that you not only abhor yourself, but that you have interests [p. 250] outside yourself; and as you do, lost favours are doubled. The lapidary augments his wealth by making the most of each precious stone. The part of greatness is not the faculty to see, but the power to give light. The sun that rules the day shines to impart light. The Creator on the earth was the light of the world. The true evidence that you abhor yourself before God is that you are engrossed with Him who gives you a perfect place before Him, and is the source of every blessing to one otherwise so ruined. And then nothing of yourself can interest you; the only thing here which attracts your heart is what belongs to Him; and to that, and that only, do you devote yourself; not to note where they are defective, but to see how you may most effectively serve them.
If it is thus with you, you will be the first ripe grape hasting to maturity, in order that it might minister to and refresh the weary; or, like the ear of ripe corn, declining downward, to supply the want of the needy; and as you are, your soul will be deepened in the perfection and resources in Christ; you will have confidence toward God, and whatsoever you ask you will receive of Him. “Blessed of the Lord” will be your land, “for the precious things of heaven, for the dew, and for the deep that coucheth beneath” (Deuteronomy 33: 13). From the highest point to the lowest, you will be watered in your soul with the grace of Christ.