Practicable by New Life

“O blessed life! the heart at rest

When all without tumultuous seems, That trusts a higher will, and deems That higher will, not mine, the best.

“O blessed life; the mind that sees

Whatever change the years may bring; A mercy still in everything, And shining through all mysteries.

“O blessed life! the soul that soars, When sense of mortal sight is dim, Beyond the sense — beyond to Him Whose love unlocks the heavenly doors.

“O blessed life! heart, mind and soul From self-born aims and wishes free In all — at one with Deity And loyal to the Lord’s control.

“O life! how blessed, how divine! High life, the earnest of a higher! Saviour, fulfil my deep desire. And let this blessed life be mine.”

W. TiDD Matson.

In writing to the Philippians, Paul says, “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to work, for His good pleasure” (ii. 13). This statement occurs between two injunctions. The first has reference to personal salvation, and the second declares the duty of man in relation to the world. The first reads, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling “; and the second, “Do all things without murmurings and disputings; that ye may be blameless and harmless, children of God without blemish, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom 125 ye are seen as lights in the world.” The declaration referred to brings both the positive and relative statements within the realm of practical possibility, “For it is God which worketh in you.” This Divine inworking makes the human outworking easy, and simple, and delightful. For every demand made upon us as Christian men and women, there is sufficient, overwhelming supply in the communication of Divine energy.

“God worketh in you.” This implies the actual presence of God at the centre of our being. The very simplicity of these words renders them difficult of understanding; for no man understands the complex and marvellous mechanism of his own personality. God worketh in you — not outside, but in — in the place where thought is born, and the throne of the will is set up, and the affections have 126 their seat; in the inward shrine of the being God worketh.

Put emphasis now on another word. “God zvorketh in you.” He is there, not merely holding possession while we work, but also to

“Direct, control, suggest each day, All we design, or do, or say; That all our powers, with all their might, In His sole glory may unite.”

“God worketh in you.” The value of this statement may be learned by inserting another word in place of “in.” “For it is God which worketh for you.” By this alteration the message is robbed of its power in a moment. To work for us, may be to work apart from us, without consultation with us. This is suggestive of duality, which is not always necessarily a harmony.

Try another preposition. “It is God 127 which worketh with you.” That would indicate some one by the side of us, willing, when the burden becomes too heavy, to help to bear it; willing when the pathway becomes difficult, to come into consultation. This also is suggestive of dual personality, and perchance conflict.

“God which worketh in you” implies perfect union. God in you, creating desire, energizing the will, so that the will becomes, not merely as a poetical sentiment, but as a glorious fact, the Will of God. That is, indeed, the supreme glory of the Christian position — “it is God which worketh,” not “for” merely; not “with” only; but “it is God which worketh in you.”

“It is God which worketh in you both

to will and to do.” Two facts are here

stated which are yet one, for willing and

doing are always united. “To will” —

128 that touches the inner life, the springs of action; “to do” — that touches the outer life, the streams of action.

Think first of the inner, “to will.” This word has within it the thought of active determination of what is to be done. Not determination apart from ourselves, but God in us, taking hold of our wills, creating our desires — sometimes through indirect agencies — giving us desire in a certain direction, affecting and moulding our wills, drawing them into the avenues of true action, by His own indwelling. “It is God which worketh in you to will.” If this be true, then the will, so created, must necessarily result in the harmony of our wills with His own.

The work of God does not end here. “It is God which worketh in you to will and to do.” As the thought of the in- 129 working God, wz7//n, touches the springs of action, so necessarily the thought of God doing touches the streams of action. “It is God which worketh in you to will and to work.” It might truthfully be translated “to effectually work.” The suggestion is not of the doing that fails, but of the doing that succeeds: not of the effort that tries, but of the effort which triumphs.

This union of the purified will, and the energized life, is equal to the accomplishment of the double purpose: “Work out your own salvation,” and “be blameless and harmless ... in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world.” The poor, weak, paralysed, sin-smitten soul rises into the dignity of a new life, confronts the future with hope, faces his enemies with defiance, and says: “I can 130 do all things in Him that strengtheneth me. I will work out my own salvation: I will live the life which is blameless, harmless, without rebuke, because it is God which worketh in me to will and to do.”

What will be the result? “His good pleasure;” that which gives His heart satisfaction. If we shrink from that, we shrink from all the blessedness within the thought. “His good pleasure,” the thing that pleases Him. Go back to the story of creation. When God had made the earth, and put man upon it, “God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good” — God’s good pleasure. God was pleased with His own work; found delight in its perfection.

There came a day when God could say this no more — a day when sin had en- 131 tered. The sigh and sob of humanity began amid the trees of the garden of God, and the great surging sorrow of the race was born amid the hills of perfection. From then onward the heart of God was not at rest until, long, weary, and yet necessary centuries having passed, there came “the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, the quickening Spirit.”

If we would know the good pleasure of God, man must be seen in all his perfection. In Christ we have the revelation of perfect manhood. Think of His perfection of tenderness. His beauty of character, of all the great overwhelming strength which centred in His sacred Person. In beholding Him, behold the “good pleasure of God.” “It is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure.”

To make us what Jesus was, God 132 works within us; and until that is finally accomplished, the heart of God will never be at rest concerning- us: not until that moment dawns, which must come for all who put their trust in Him, when the perfect Son of the living God shall present the many sons whom He brings to glory, in the presence of His glory, without blemish in exceeding joy. That is the intended issue; that is the consummation; that is the crowning and the joy. This view of life contained within vital Christianity is a declaration of our possibilities. We are equal to this, because God is equal to it. We have nothing which we have not received; but we have received something in our creation which makes us equal to that. Before any being can reach the altitude of true success, there must be within that being the possibility of reaching the altitude. We 133 are made in the image of the invisible God, with the stamp of Divine possession upon us. Shall we not swing the heart’s door widely open that He may come in, to work in us ‘’ both to will and to work, for His good pleasure “?