The Expositor's Bible: The Book of Joshua — John Shaqi
The Expositor's Bible: The Book of JoshuaBlaikie, William Garden
Religion
The Expositor's Bible: The Book of Joshua
Blaikie, William Garden
Bible. Joshua -- Commentaries
This faith in Divine power qualifying feeble mortals for the hardest
tasks has originated some of the noblest enterprises in the history of
the world. It was a Divine voice Columbus seemed to hear bidding him
cross the wild Atlantic, for he desired to bring the natives of the
distant shores beyond it into the pale of the Church; and it was his
faith that sustained him when his crew became mutinous and his life
was not safe for an hour. It was a Divine voice Livingstone seemed to
hear bidding him cross Africa, strike up into the heart of the
continent, examine its structure, and throw it open from shore to
shore; and never was there a faith stronger or steadier than that
which bore him on through fever and famine, through pain and sickness,
through disappointment and anguish, and, even when the cold hand of
death was on him, would not let him rest until his work was done.
Often in the spiritual warfare it is useful to apply this principle.
Are we called to believe? Are we called to make ourselves a new heart
and a new spirit? Are we summoned to fight, to wrestle, to overcome?
Certainly we are. But is not this to tantalize us by ordering us to do
what we cannot do? Is not this like telling a sick man to get well, or
a decrepit old creature to skip and frisk like a child? It would be so
if the principle of partnership between God and us did not come into
play. Faith says, God is my partner in this matter. Partners even in
an ordinary business put their resources together, each doing what his
special abilities fit him for. In the partnership which faith
establishes between God and you, the resources of the infinite Partner
become available for the needs of the finite. It is God's part to give
orders, it is your part to execute them, and it is God's part to
strengthen you so to do. It is this that makes the command reasonable,
"Work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God that
worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure." Faith
rejoices in the partnership, and goes forward in the confidence that
the strength of the Almighty will help its weakness, not by one sudden
leap, but by that steady growth in grace that makes the path of the
just like the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the
perfect day.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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