| Making the Most of Life |
Chapter 23 |
Page 6 |
The lesson form all this is, that we should finish our work; that we should allow nothing to draw us away from our duty; that we should never weary in following Christ; that we should hold fast the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end. We should not falter under any burden, in the face of any danger, before any demand of cost and sacrifice. No discouragement, no sorrow, no worldly attraction, no hardship, should weaken for one moment our determination to be faithful unto death. No one who has begun to build for Christ should leave an unfinished, abandoned life-work to grieve the heart of the Master and to be sneered at as a reproach to the name he bears.
Yet we must remember, lest we be discouraged, that only in a relative, human sense can any life building be made altogether complete. Our best work is marred and imperfect. It is only when we are in Christ, and are co-workers with him, that anything we do can ever be made perfect and beautiful. But the weakest and the humblest, which are simply faithful, will stand at last complete in him. Even the merest fragment of life, as it appears in men’s eyes, if it be truly in Christ, and filled with his love and with his Spirit, will appear finished when presented before the divine Presence. To do God’s will, whatever that may be, to fill out his plan, is to be complete in Christ, though the stay on earth be but for a day, and though the work done fulfill no great human plan, and leave no brilliant record among men.
“Thy work unfinished! Do no fear
Though at his coming may be found
The stone unset.
Yet, for thy faith, beyond the skies
Thine own shall be the longed for prize.
He knoweth best who calls from labour now
To rest, to build no more.”
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