February 10, 1897
The Spirit of Prophecy. - No. 2.
A. T. Jones
(Wednesday Forenoon, Feb. 10, 1897.)
….
The power which God implants, taken into the heart, will enable
the man to stand under temptation, and in the midst of his weakness. It will
give him that which he does not possess, and it will make him what he is not by
nature.
When a man makes a failure in a position in which he is placed, we
are liable to think that God has made a mistake in allowing him to be placed
there; but this does not follow. God made no mistake in having Saul to be king
of Israel; but Saul made a mistake in not becoming what God wanted him to be.
He made a mistake in following his own ways and schemes, rather than listening
to the voice of God. So also God made no mistake in making Jeroboam king over
Israel. Although the purpose of God in separating the ten tribes from Judah was
not carried out on account of the perversity of the people, yet God had a plan,
but Jeroboam would not permit it to be carried out. God may call me or you to a
position, and if we have some point of weakness which will prevent our
usefulness, and God sends us a message, that message is to make us what he
wants us to be, that through his grace we may stand where he wants us to stand.
"Day by day men are revealing whether the kingdom of God is
in them. If Christ rules in their hearts, they are gaining strength of principle, power, ability to stand as
faithful sentinels, true reformers; for there can be no reform unless there is
a thorough co-operation with Jesus Christ.
Through the grace of Christ men are to use their God-given
faculties to reform themselves [not to
reform others, but to reform themselves]; by this self-denying, action, which
the Lord of heaven looks upon with approval, they gain victories over their own
hereditary and cultivated tendencies.
Then, like Daniel, they
make impressions upon other hearts that will never be effaced. The influence
will be carried to all parts of the world."
The work of reformation begins with self.
I can make impressions upon other hearts only when I have reformed
myself. God reaches others by reaching us, and reaches others through us.
Turn to 2 Cor.1:3, 4:-
Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the
Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforteth us in all our
tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by
the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.
God comforts us that we may comfort others; God helps us that we
may help others. We are brought in a place where we need the comfort of God,
that we may be able to comfort others.
He has others in mind when he comforts us. "And if we be
afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation." If I am afflicted,
it is for the consolation and salvation of some other man. I may not meet for
years that man whom I am to comfort; but sometime I shall meet him, and the
experience I have had prepares me to sit down by his side, or take him by the
hand, and be a help and a comfort to him. He receives from me that which I have
received from God, and he receives it that he may in turn communicate it to
others, and these to others; and thus the influence of God's grace imparted to
us extends to all the earth, although we may not move out of the State in which
we live.
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