The Great Commission. Miscellaneous Writings of C. H. Mackintosh, vol. IVMackintosh, Charles Henry
Religion
The Great Commission. Miscellaneous Writings of C. H. Mackintosh, vol. IV
Mackintosh, Charles Henry
Theology
But we must never, for one moment, lose sight of the grand fact that
we are converted to the service of God. The outcome of the life which
we possess must ever take the form of service to the living and true
God. In our unconverted days we worshiped idols, and served divers
lusts and pleasures; now, on the contrary, we worship God in the
Spirit, and we are called to serve Him with all our ransomed powers.
We have turned to God, to find in Him our perfect rest and
satisfaction. There is not a single thing in the entire range of a
creature's necessities, for time and eternity, that we cannot find in
our own most gracious God and Father. He has treasured up in Christ,
the Son of His love, all that can satisfy the desires of the new life
in us. It is our privilege to have Christ dwelling in our hearts by
faith, and to be so rooted and grounded in love as to be able to
comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth,
and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge,
that we may be filled with all the fulness of God.
Thus filled, satisfied and strengthened, we are called to dedicate
ourselves, spirit, soul and body, to the service of Christ; to be
steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. We
should have nothing else to do in this world. Whatever cannot be done
as service to Christ ought not to be done at all. This simplifies the
matter amazingly. It is our sweet privilege to do everything in the
name of the Lord Jesus, and to the glory of God. We sometimes hear
people speak of "a secular calling," as contrasted with what is
"sacred." We question the correctness of such a distinction. Paul made
tents and planted churches, but in both he served the Lord Christ. All
that a Christian does ought to be sacred, because it is done as
service to God. If this were borne in mind, it would enable us to
connect the very simplest duties of daily life with the Lord Himself,
and to bring Him into them in such a way as to impart a holy dignity
and interest to all that we have to do, from morning till night. In
this way, instead of finding the duties of our calling a hindrance to
our communion with God, we should actually make them an occasion of
waiting on Him for wisdom and grace to discharge them aright, so that
His holy name might be glorified in the most minute details of
practical life.
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