205
T H E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
June, 1940
unyieldedness and worldliness. It has been said that a living argument is in vincible. That is what God wants. The only Bible that most folk read is your life and mine, but if we mar that mes sage, what a vitiated ygospel the world gets! How essential it is that we as Christian workers going forth to our God-appointed tasks shall give forth a message of crystal clarity, not only by word of mouth but by manner of life as well! Nothing is so sad to witness as a faltering or fallen servant of God, a minister of the gospel who fails. Oh, if we could only learn to practice what we preach, we would not be ashamed to preach what we practice! Above all things as you go forth, give the world a clean-cut demonstration of the power of the message you proclaim. Be as ear nest and effective out of your pulpit as you are in it. - The finger is used when we eat, and it is an exceedingly useful member in this respect. Jesus is the Bread of Life. He becomes a living reality to us and a satisfying portion as the finger of God applies Him to our hearts and lives. No one can get hold of Jesus apart from the Spirit. Spiritual things are spiritu ally discerned, and not until the Spirit of God does His office work within our hearts do we come to know, love, and appreciate the Saviour. The more we have of the Spirit, the more we will possess and manifest the presence of the Master, for His supreme task is to take the things of Christ and show them to us and to manifest the presence of Christ through us. Other Functions Continuing the analogy of the finger, we observe that we use the finger in taking hold of an object. By this means we can bring things into close contact with ourselves. And this is the way God gets hold of the sinner. It is by means of His finger—His Holy Spirit— that God touches men to convict and to convince them. His Spirit working through His redeemed children is as the finger of God Himself taking hold of souls and drawing them into contact with Himself. The finger points out, and thus we see another striking point parlson. Jesus said of the Spirit, “How- beit when he, the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide you into all truth; . . . and he will show you things to come.” He has come to point out Christ Jesus the Lord and to show us the way to go. I am sure He will guide every one of you into the path that God has chosen for you to follow. You can depend upon Him. His directing is unfailing. Paul knew this. I feel that the greatest day in the history of foreign missions was the one when Paul had the dream where in he saw the man of Macedonia with beckoning finger and heard him cry, “ Come over . . . and help us.” That was indeed the finger of God. In your missionary work or in the pastorate you will be confronted with difficult situations and with most baffling cir cumstances. When these come to-you, do not move until the finger of God has pointed out the way, and as you wait upon God in faith and confidence, you will ascertain the dlvu.e mind. Wounding the Finger of God Finally, I want you to note that the finger may be injured. Sinners injure God’s finger by resisting Him and by turning a deaf ear to the Word of God. And how painful must be the injury if men persist until the heart is hardened! Christians, though indwelt by the Spirit, may likewise injure Him tnrough their careless and indifferent ways. In Ephe sians 4:30 there is the warning, “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God.” We can not grieve Him away since He has taken up a permanent abode within these bodies of ours. We grieve Him by worldliness and by prayerlessness. Again there is a word of warning which says, “Quench not the Spirit.” It is by our unyieldedness that He is quenched and stifled and unable to work through us the purposes of God. God forbid that we should injure His blessed finger, but rather let us allow Him to bless us, to heal us, and to use us. We recall how plague after plague came upon the Egyptians in the days of Moses and Aaron, but each time Pha raoh hardened his heart and would not permit the release of the people of God. Then came the miracle whereby the dust was turned to lice and the magi cians found themselves powerless and utterly unable to reproduce it. Seeing such a manifestation of power, they were compelled to cry out, “This is the finger of God” (Ex. 8:19). As you go forth, dear young people, let it be with the blessed realization that God wants you to so live and con duct yourselves that the world will be compelled to take knowledge of you, that you have something, and better yet, Someone that the world has not, whose power is ever present in your ministry and in your manners. “And be not drunk with wine, wherein is ex cess; but be filled with the Spirit.” Miraculous Revelations by the Finger of God The finger makes a specific mark or imprint; so also the finger of God. No two finger prints are exactly alike— hence, the immense value of the finger print in identifying persons. The Spirit of God makes a mark that is differ ent. Nothing is like it in all the uni verse. Everything around us is marked with the skull and crossbones because death reigns. The finger of God im parts a life-giving touch, for “the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death” (Rom. 8:2). To be touched by God’s finger means to be made a néw creature in Him; it means to have the image of Christ imprinted upon the soul. The touch of God’s finger marks and distinguishes the religions of the world. It puts Christianity in a class by itself and lifts it beyond the realm of com parative religions. Christianity is not a system of works or ethics or charac ter building. It is a life—the divine life imparted in His glorious touch. The finger has still another function; it is used in writing. Referring to the Ten Commandments and how God gave them to him, Moses declared in Deuter onomy. 9:10, “And the Lord delivered unto me two tables of stone written with the finger of God.” The Scriptures were written by the finger of God. There is no escaping this. Peter made it plain when he said that “holy men of God spake as they were moved [liter ally, ‘borne along’] by the Holy Spirit.” The Spirit of God took hold of human personalities as we take hold of a pen cil, and He controlled every movement in giving forth a revelation of His will. Nothing was left to human devising and to human phraseology. Personali ties differ just as crayons and pencils may differ in color and are noticeable upon the page. So the varying features of personality and vocabulary are to be seen, yet all employed and controlled by the finger of God which gripped them and swayed them hither and yon in giv ing forth the Word of truth. This fact gives authority to the Book, makes its message vital and eternal and makes it more than any other book. And this is the Book you are called to preach and the Book which gives you your distinc tive message. But the Spirit has not confined His writing to tables of stone and to an cient parchments. He writes upon the hearts of the people of God. Thus we read in 2 Corinthians 3:3, “Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, writ ten not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshly tables of the heart.” The great tragedy among many who name His name is that the message becomes illegible to the world because of human
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker