Living with Significance — Part Two

Father, we pray that as we study the Bible again together now, before our friends are baptized, that again the words of our lips may be the genuine discovery of our hearts, if they’re not presently our hearts’ reality; that all of our life and hope and joy and peace may be found in you; that significance in our living may all be wrapped up in our life in the Lord Jesus Christ. To this end we seek you. In his precious name. Amen.

Well, we continue from where we left off this morning. We began to consider Luke 19:11–27 under the heading “Living with Significance.” I recognize that only a handful, at most, of the congregation will recognize the name Tony Hancock. I’m not going to embarrass you or me by asking how many do. Suffice it to say that he was a very fine comedian in the ’50s and ’60s in Great Britain. I happen to be just old enough to have been able to laugh at his humor. His last television monologue took place when I was twelve—that is, 1964. It proved to be profoundly ironic. It was very sadly humorous, no one realizing just quite how much it expressed this man’s existence. I’m going to quote it for you. You can imagine him standing and simply doing a soliloquy, as it were. It’s a monologue; there’s no one else around. And he’s talking to himself, and he says,

What have you achieved? What have you achieved? You lost your chance, me old son. You contributed absolutely nothing to this life. A waste of time, you being here at all. No place for you in Westminster Abbey. The best you can expect is a few daffodils in a jam jar, a rough-hewn stone bearing the legend, ‘He came, and he went! And in between—nothing!’ Nobody will even notice you’re not here. After about a year afterwards, somebody might say down the pub, ‘Where’s Old Hancock? I haven’t seen him around lately.’ ‘Oh, he’s dead, you know.’ ‘Oh, is he?’ A right raison d’être that is. Nobody \will ever know I existed. Nothing to leave behind me. Nothing to pass on. Nobody to mourn me. That’s the bitterest blow of all.

That was 1964. In 1968, the British newspapers carried the headline “Tony Hancock in Suicide Overdose.” Clearly, despite all of his success and all of his fame, he found life to be absolutely meaningless. With nothing big enough to live for, with nothing apparently to look forward to, he lived his life and he died his death in utter despair.

Now, this parable told by Jesus leaves us in no doubt that the individuals who are to be numbered among the faithful servants need never live their lives with any sense of despair. Rather, they are able to look forward always; they are to be those who are filled with hope. Indeed, their actions are to emerge from lives that are stirred by the hope that is held out to them. The parable, as we considered it this morning, leaves the reader in no doubt that history as we know it today will not continue indefinitely—that history is not cyclical, but rather it is linear; that it is moving towards a destination; there is going to be a conclusion to world history as we know it; and that that day will dawn when Christ the Messiah returns. And while he’s gone, even though his enemies—as the parable makes clear—may plot against him, he expects those who are his servants to be working faithfully for him.

And in verse 13 in the parable, the nobleman, having called his ten servants and having given them the money, he says, “I want you to put the money to work until I come back.” “Until I come back.” And the whole of the New Testament is filled with this emphasis: that as surely as the Lord Jesus Christ came as a baby in Bethlehem, as surely as he died a death for sin, as surely as he was resurrected and ascended into heaven, so he will return, as he said—as the angels said to the disciples on the occasion of his ascension: “Why stand ye gazing up into heaven? Do you not know that he will return in like manner as you have seen him go?”[1] And in the interim, the Lord Jesus calls all of his followers to make the most of every opportunity to put to work all that he has given us in his service.[2]

Now, in this parable, of course, each of these men is given a mina, which is simply a sum of money. There are ten servants, and each of them is given the same. The commentators wax eloquent about what this may be or may not be, and I could go all around on it, but with little profit to anyone, not least of all yourselves. If we ask the essential and simple question, “What is it that Jesus in leaving has given equally to all his followers?” there is only one answer, and that is: he has given the gospel message. He has given the good news. We have different talents. We have different responsibilities. We differ in our gifts. The Spirit of God has disbursed them sovereignly as he chose, and we may be distinguished from one another on the strength of those multivarious gifts. But the one thing that each of us has in common with the other, in terms of our service of Jesus, is that we have been given the gospel, and it is this good news—this message that Jesus has died and is risen for the sins of men and women—that we are then to employ in his service. That’s why we ended this morning by singing the hymn which reminded us,

We bear the torch that flaming
Fell from the hands of those
Who gave their lives proclaiming
That Jesus died and rose;
Ours is the same commission,
[And] the same glad message ours;
[And] fired [with] the same ambition,
To [Christ] we yield our pow’rs.[3]

Now, in this story, you will notice that there are a number of characterizations. And I want to identify just three for you and make three statements in doing so.

The Rebels

First of all, we dare not find ourselves numbered with the rebels. We dare not find ourselves numbered with the rebels. Look at verse 14: the nobleman’s’ “subjects hated him,” and they “sent a delegation after him to say, ‘We don’t want this man to be our king.’” This is a flat-out rebellion against the nobleman’s authority—which, of course, is a picture of the rebellion that exists in the world against the Lord Jesus. This is representative of those who do not want Jesus to interfere in their lives at all. Oh, they may be religious people. They may be content to participate in a variety of what are regarded as “churchy” activities. But then, when it comes to the matter of their life and their private affairs, their bank balance and their relationships, their career and their designs and their desires, frankly, their response is the same as the group in the parable: “We do not want to have this man as our King.”

Many individuals like to couch this in all kinds of statements. Some will say, “Well, you know, I’m just… I have my doubts, and really it’s because of my doubts that I don’t want him to be King.” Another person will say, you know, “I believe that the gospel story is intellectually untenable, and that’s why I don’t want him to be King.” But you will notice in the way in which Jesus expresses this that he understands that the root of rebellion in the life of a man or a woman is not intellectual; it is moral. It’s not a matter, ultimately, of the mind; it is a matter of the will. We flat-out don’t want this man to be our King.

Now, the consequences of this kind of rebellion are conveyed with frightening severity there in the final verse that we read, verse 27: “Those enemies of mine who did not want me to be [a] king over them,” says the nobleman in the parable, “bring them here and kill them in front of me.” It’s a quite staggering statement, isn’t it? T. W. Manson says, “We may be horrified by the fierceness of the conclusion; but beneath the grim imagery is an equally grim fact, the fact that the coming of Jesus to the world puts every man [and woman] to the test; compels every[one] to a decision. And that decision is no light matter. It is [in fact] a matter of life and death.”[4]

And here’s the message: reject the King, and you will have no place in his kingdom. Why would somebody who does not want Christ to be their King be welcomed into his kingdom? Surely it was rebellion which destroyed the affairs in the rebellion of Satan in the very inception of the world. And look at all of the chaos that has ensued. If Christ were to allow such a rebel into his kingdom, it would be a disaster zone within twenty-four hours. And in our culture today, these are strange and fierce words, but they are the Bible’s words. They are Jesus’ words. Therefore, I say to you again, we dare not find ourselves numbered with the rebels.

The Wicked Servant

Secondly, we should shudder at the thought of being in the category marked “wicked servant.” We should shutter at the thought of being in the category marked “wicked servant.” Look at verse 22: “I will judge you by your own words,” says the nobleman, “you wicked servant!” You remember the inquiry was “What have you done with the money I left you?” And the response on the part of this man is “I have kept it.” Now, you might say, “Well that’s commendable, is it not? He was given it, and so he kept it.” But no, he was given it for a purpose. He was given it to use. He was given it in order that it might yield a return. And, of course, the picture is clear: the gospel is put into the hands of those who profess to follow Jesus not so that we might clutch it to our chests and rejoice in the fact that we’re okay but in order that we might then invest this good news so that others may come to enjoy its message also.

This individual, this wicked servant, seeks to defend his inactivity by a very unfair characterization of his master in verse 21: “I was afraid of you, because you[’re] a hard man.” “You can get, you know, blood out of a turnip,” as it were. “You take out what you did[n’t] put in and [you] reap what you did[n’t] sow.” Well, it’s so clearly bogus. The master replied, “Well, if you want to think of it in those terms—if I’m really that kind of individual—you know, if you think about it, I just took ten minas, and I gave one to you, and I gave one to nine other people. I took all of my resources, and I gave them to you. If I’m the kind of individual who simply hoards it all for myself, your characterization is off.”

You see, the real problem with the wicked servant is that there is in his life no initiative, no energy, no enterprise. And he seeks to excuse himself on the basis of fear. Verse 21: “I was afraid of you.” “I was afraid of you.” What? Afraid of what would happen if he failed? Afraid of being unsuccessful? Afraid of launching out with what you’ve given me? Afraid of putting it to use?

Again, we have to constantly stand far enough back from this story to make sure that we don’t insert in it what isn’t there, that we don’t draw from it that which is of our own creating. You’re sensible people. Do you think it’s fair for us to say that Jesus, in drawing attention to this servant, is warning his followers against keeping the gospel to themselves? Isn’t that the warning? “This is what I’m giving you. Now, I don’t want you to be like wicked servants who keep it to themselves. I don’t want you to live insular lives. I don’t want you to be lazy. I don’t want you to embrace passivity. I don’t want you to become parochial in your concerns”—which is so easily the case in each of our lives. Instead of the gospel being an energizing force that wells up within us—something that we long to share with our friends and neighbors—it can so easily become something that absolutely stultifies us. We have now simply a way of life. We come to certain events at regular times and a regular place, and we sing certain songs, and we do certain things, and we keep our external activities in line with the expectation of the crowd. And as long as everyone in the group seems to think that we are in place and doing the right thing and expressing ourselves in the right way, then all is well with the world. But this is not the world! The world’s outside, my friend! This was not given to us for ourselves! It was given to us in order that we might pass it on.

William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, in his day, seeing so much of the smug parochialism of the churches around him, he said of them, “Some want to live within the sound of church and chapel bell, but I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of hell.”[5] And this lazy servant decided that he was going to hang on to stuff. And the Bible makes it clear—Jesus makes it clear—that when you try and hang on to stuff, you lose it. And when you’re prepared to lose it, you’ll find out that you get more back. Matthew 16: “He who wants to save his life will lose it. And whosoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”[6]

It’s an amazing paradox, isn’t it? “I was afraid. I just hid it in a cloth.” And so it’s taken from him, and it’s given to the one who has ten. And the people are all around and saying, “Hey, wait a minute! This fellow’s already got ten! Why are you giving him any more?” Well, simply because the man whose abundance is so plainly obvious is displaying to the world that what he has is as a result of him investing that which he’s been given. The man who made no use of the opportunity loses the little that he has.

Now, the question, of course, with which the commentators wrestle is: Well, this wicked servant, is he descriptive of a true believer, or is he not? Well, I couldn’t say with confidence either way, I don’t think. At best, I think we can see in this individual the kind of individual whose prospect of reaching heaven is described in 1 Corinthians chapter 3. You needn’t turn to it; I’ll just quote it for you:

No one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is [in] Jesus Christ. If any man builds on this foundation using gold, [and] silver, [and] costly stones, wood, hay or straw, his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man’s work. If what he has built survives, he will receive his reward. If it is burned up, he will suffer loss.[7]

And as unpalatable it is to many of our minds, the fact of the matter is that the way we are living our lives and the way we are investing our lives and the way we are using that which has been entrusted to us has some eternal ramifications. As you’re about to see, one servant received ten cities. Another servant received five cities. You and I will be rewarded according to our endeavors in Christ. It’s not just a matter of happenstance. It’s not that everybody’s in for the same, and we’re all getting the same deal. No, we’re not. Nobody in eternity will be disappointed with what they get, but everyone in eternity will not get the same. And some will reach heaven as “through the flames.”[8] And at best, this wicked servant is such an individual. At worst—and it may be safest to describe him in these terms—at worst, what you have here is a merely nominal Christian: someone who is Christian in name alone, and he is not a believer at all.

In some twenty-five years, now, of pastoral ministry, one of the saddest things along the journey is to see men and women who have neglected the opportunities given to them in the gospel, who have become unfaithful in the Lord’s service. And as a result of neglect and unfaithfulness, they’ve become spiritually impoverished. And as a result of having become spiritually impoverished, the opportunities that they once had at an earlier point on the journey seem to be dissipating. And the prospect that they face is this: that they will appear in the judgment before God poor and naked when he comes. And you look at them, and you say, “There’s a couple that has missed out.” They have missed out! Because what they were entrusted with they have either never fully understood, or they have determined that they would simply wrap it in a blanket and enjoy it by themselves.

Good and Faithful Servants

So we dare not find ourselves numbered with the rebels. Secondly, we shudder at the thought of being in the category marked “wicked servants.” And finally, we want to live in such a way as to hear Christ say to us what the nobleman said to these first two servants—namely, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”[9]

In this story, we are reminded that there are two mistakes that people habitually make about going to heaven. The first mistake is to think that you can get there by good works. Most of us here, of course, would say, “Oh no, no, you can’t. We know, because we already did the parable: the story of the tax collector and—the publican and the Pharisee. And the publican went down to his house justified, not on the basis of anything that he’d done but only on the basis of God’s grace alone.”[10] Wonderful! So, clearly, mistake number one is not something that we may be wrestling with. Well, then, we should pay attention to mistake number two. Mistake number one is “to think that you can get to heaven by good works”; mistake number two is “to think [that] you can get to heaven without good works.”[11]

Can you get to heaven without good works? No. Ephesians 2: “For by grace you have been saved, and that through faith, not of yourselves. It’s the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”[12] You have not been saved by good works, but you have been saved for good works.[13] The Reformers put it like this: It is faith alone that saves, but the faith that saves is not alone. And what this story is reminding us of is the importance of the evidence being produced in the lives of those who have been entrusted with the good news.

So, for example, in Zacchaeus immediately before: What happens in the life of Zacchaeus when the good news grabs him? It affects his wallet! The one thing that he was known about—his money! He was a wealthy man. He had a wonderful house. He was fiddling the books. And he stood up, and he said to the people, “If I’ve been taking stuff from people, I’m going to pay them back. I’m going to pay them back more than the law demands. I want to do this with my money, and I want to do that with my money.”[14] Why? Because it was a rule or a regulation? No! Because it was the evidence, you see, of a new life.

What right do any of us have to claim that the gospel has been entrusted to our custody without the evidence in our lives of the good works which God has foreordained for us to do? Mistake number one: “You can get to heaven by good works.” No, you can’t. Mistake number two: “You can get to heaven without good works.” No, you can’t. Because our works are the evidence—not of a salvation earned but of a salvation given.

You have not been saved by good works, but you have been saved for good works.

So herein lies significance, you see: when the gospel is entrusted to the life of an individual… And it doesn’t matter what your job is. It doesn’t matter where you work. It doesn’t matter whether the corporation regards your position as strategic or demanding or influential, or whether people look at you and say, “You know, that’s a fairly trivial exercise that she’s involved in. That’s a fairly mundane thing.” Because all of those things ultimately serve this purpose: that having been entrusted with the good news, our goal, then, is to do all that we do to the glory of God and in order that, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9:19, we might, in identifying with men and women at their particular points of need, win as many as possible. So tonight, my dear friends, your significance is in this: that once in Christ, all of your days and all of your deeds may be good for someone and good for something. Because we are assured that our labor in the Lord is not in vain.[15]

When Richard Baxter, from whom I quoted this morning, confronted the listeners of his day with this matter, he put it in these stirring terms. Listen to this carefully. “Oh,” he says,

if you have the hearts of Christians or of men in you, let them yearn towards your poor ignorant, ungodly neighbours. Alas, there is but a step betwixt them and death and hell: many hundred diseases are waiting ready to seize on them, and if they die unregenerate they are lost for ever. Have you hearts of rock, that cannot pity men in such a case as this? If you believe not the word of God, and the danger of sinners, why are you Christians yourselves? If you do believe it, why do you not bestir yourself to the helping of others? Do you not care who is damned, so you be saved? If so, you have sufficient cause to pity yourselves, for it is a frame of spirit utterly inconsistent with grace.

In other words, it’s the wicked servant’s approach.

Dost thou live close by them, or meet them in the streets, or [work] with them, or travel with them, or sit and talk with them, and say nothing to them of their souls, or the life to come? If their houses were on fire, thou wouldst run and help them; and [will] thou not help them when their souls are almost at the fire of hell?[16]

I’d say that makes the point pretty graphically, don’t you?

We dare not be numbered amongst the rebels. We shudder at the thought of being caught up in the category marked “wicked servant.” Our earnest desire is that we might be included in the “Well done, good and faithful servant” which comes from Christ.

The Christian Activist

So some of us are sitting there going, “Okay, I have the message clear. Let me out of here. Get this service over. I’m out! Tracts in my hand, I’ll buttonhole everyone I see now for the next little while. I know what I’m supposed to do. I’ll get on and do it. Just tell me what it is; point me in the right direction! I’ll go! I got it clear now! It’s about everything I do. I’m going to be a doer now! I’m going to be an activist now! I’ve understood the parable of the minas. I never knew it before. I’m out there! I’m ready to go! He pumped me up! We’re ready to go!”

I have a final word for you, just to pull the carpet immediately out from underneath you. And here’s the word: relax. Relax! Because this address today is dangerous for the Christian activist. Every time we read and study a portion of the Bible, there is an ever-present danger that we respond to it in such a way as to fail to balance the emphasis of that passage with the counteracting emphases of the totality of biblical revelation. In other words, if you fasten on something which is true and elevate it to a point of emphasis which is not given to it in the totality of Scripture, then what you end up doing is making an error of what is true. And particularly when this comes to the matter of activity for Christ, it needs to be balanced equally with the emphasis of our resting in Christ.

You remember in Mark chapter 3, it says that then Jesus called the Twelve to be with him. I’ve always loved that. He called the Twelve—Mark 3:14, I think it is—he called the Twelve to be with him! The call of Christ to the individual is to be with him. It is for Christ to be in us. It is for us to be in Christ.

And yet we’re bombarded by all kinds of materials on discipleship. They’re through in the bookstore. They’re not all bad. It’s not an unbiblical truth that they affirm. But the fact of the matter is, it appears like a poisonous snake, you know—especially to those of us who are energetic and well organized. We know that we didn’t come to Christ as a result of being energetic and well organized. We know that we were brought to Christ as a result of his amazing grace. But somehow or another, we’ve developed a mindset that we keep ourselves in Christ as a result of being energetic and well organized—that we keep our tally high on account of our ability to get out and do. And when we take the emphasis of the doing of our Christian lives and absent it from the emphasis of the Scripture on the being of our Christian lives, then we make a mockery of that which we propound.

The call of Christ to the individual is to be with him. It is for Christ to be in us. It is for us to be in Christ.

There isn’t much that I’ve read concerning this that has been of help to me at all. But last year I received a manuscript from a friend in the UK—from a publishing company in the UK—and they asked me if I would write just a line that could perhaps be included on the flyleaf of the book. When I read it, it was very short; it has now come out at ninety-three pages. I found them to be some of the most challenging and riveting pages that I’ve read in a long, long time. My comment, which has eventually emerged on the book, which arrived this week, simply reads, “Only read if you’re prepared to be challenged and changed.” I’ve been keenly awaiting the arrival of this book because I’ve beginning to wonder to myself, “I wonder if it’s really as good as I remembered it,” because I remembered it as being profoundly helpful and amazingly influential in this respect. And so I want to read it in conclusion now, before these baptisms. Not the whole book, you’ll be pleased to know, but a little bit.

The heart of legalism is an attitude [as follows]: “I can make myself acceptable to God by what I do.” …

Of course, very few of us would ever say that we are legalistic. But it is the practical approach to the Christian life that is all too commonly pressed upon us in our churches and fellowships, even though it is never articulated as such. The approach has a rationale which goes something like this. As far as my conversion was concerned, that was a matter of God’s grace. We aren’t saved by anything that we have done; in fact we could do nothing to merit forgiveness even if we were given all the Sundays that there will ever be. … But then, once saved, it’s a different matter. Now we can, no, we must do these things which [we] can … [to] ensure our continuing acceptability to God. We were initially accepted by God on the basis of his love for us, but now, being capable of doing good, we must maintain our acceptability by keeping the good works tally high. In slightly more theological language, we were justified by God’s grace through faith in Christ, but practically speaking we think and act as if we[’re] sanctified by pulling ourselves up by our own boot straps. We thus come to God (in worship, [and] service, [and] discipleship …) on the basis of our works for God and not on the basis of God’s abiding work for us in Christ.

This is subtle.

Thus we set sail on a vast swamp of troubles. Acceptance becomes a matter of performance appraisal; therefore assurance goes right out of the window. How can we ever know that [we have] done well enough? Or else assurance becomes the expression of our arrogance and pride because we actually think that we have done well enough. Jesus’ amazing invitation … Matthew 11:28, which should be such a relief to us, becomes an impossible burden; [it’s] as if Jesus said: “Come to me all you who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you … a treadmill!” Discipleship becomes a specialised course in the University of Legalistic Living.

You listening to this? This is so subtle that a whole congregation, a whole church’s orientation, can go completely south by missing this. That’s why I’m telling you: this is a profoundly influential little book.

What does this kind of approach to being a disciple of Christ look like in practice? … First, it becomes task-oriented, rather than relationship-oriented. The tasks we undertake for God in that corner of existence known as Christian service become more important than the quality of our relationship and fellowship with him.

“I’ve got to do that Sunday school thing.” Yes, but do you walk with Christ? Do you talk with Christ? “I’ve got to be present for that event.” Yes, but is he the lover of your soul? “I have to make sure that I’m doing this.” That’s my accretion.

Secondly, the “energy” is all the wrong way round. Instead of being motivated by love, we become motivated by the wrong sort of fear [“I was afraid of you”]—akin to insecurity. Christian work becomes draining instead of joy-giving. The reward for doing work well is uneasily hoped for instead of the work being its own reward. Those [who are] in “full-time Christian work” (“salaried Christians” among whom I was included [most recently]) easily overwork, afraid of failing to reach the standard. We behave like those who are driven rather than those who are called. [And thirdly], we develop, in our task-oriented sub-culture, a hectic life that is split three ways: the life of Christian work, the life of secular work and family [life]. Rarely do the demands of each coincide to build us up in our faith; usually they form a kind of spiritual Bermuda Triangle, in which our Christian being disappears off the radar screen. Fearing that we might not make the grade in all departments, we ricochet off the incessant demands of each. Sincere, conscientious, promising Christians suffer the most.

In this Christian world, “discipleship” becomes one of those words that makes anyone who has an ounce of normality still functioning within them groan. Rightly so. Keen, bright-eyed, I’ve-got-my-act-together, “successful” Christians are good at it; but it makes them intimidating or nauseating, unpleasant to live or work with. The rest of us, particularly if we’re putting a bit of weight on already, will probably fail. On this line, “discipleship” is not life, it’s an added extra, like the turbocharger unit put in the engines of cars that most of us [would enjoy].

[It is] “being in Christ” [that] rescues us from this swamp of legalistic discipleship. First, you can rest in Christ—in fact [you] must rest in [Christ]. Of course his burden feels light to us! It is his burden, and though we now carry it with him, he does[n’t] need our help. It’s rather like a felled tree being carried by an elephant and a flea. Overworked Christians can [relax and] take a day off. Second, you can come to God without insecurity, and with precisely the kind of confidence and boldness that he has told us he wants to see—the fruits of security in Christ, who is our sanctification and the new and living way into the presence of God. [And thirdly], we avoid the compartmentalised life in which God is only really interested in the religious compartments. All life is embraced and redeemed by God. I[’m] in Christ in the office, taking the kids to school, waiting in the doctor’s surgery, at the supermarket, putting the business plan [together], [going] on holiday, sign[ing] off with depression, [joining] the Bible study. Your whole life is in him and for him. Not just the religious bits. Music, the visual arts, the imagination, windsurfing, cooking, volleyball, basket-weaving (though possibly not … mud-wrestling)—your whole life is discipleship in him and for him. And most crucially, in all these aspects of your life, in your “whole discipleship”…

Listen!

… your communion with him becomes more important than your operational efficiency.

“Your communion with [Christ] becomes more important than your operational efficiency.”

Jesus [Christ] gave [his] disciples remarkably little to do. … In the Son, I live my whole life also as a son or daughter of the Father, not as an operative in a deity’s factory. Which means, of course, that when I fail, I fail him who loves me, which makes it … more hurtful and, praise God, more hopeful, [’cause] I do[n’t] face the sack.[17]

Well, I’m just telling you this tonight, lest in my preaching, out of a desire to be zealous in calling you, as I call myself, out of the realm of laziness and wickedness and passivity and inactivity, that I fall foul of being more interested in the operational efficiency of Parkside Church and your operational efficiency in it than your communion, your walk, your relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. It is our being in Christ that is the foundation of all our going for Christ. Therefore, as you review our study of today, I hope you’ll keep this little PS in mind.

Let us pray together:

O God our Father, grant, then, that the words of my mouth and the thoughts of our hearts may be found acceptable in your sight, for you, O Lord, are our strength and our Redeemer.[18] And we pray in Christ’s name as we bring to you our lives afresh and our offerings this night. Amen.

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[1] Acts 1:11 (paraphrased).

[2] See Ephesians 5:16.

[3] Frank Houghton, “Facing a Task Unfinished” (1931).

[4] T. W. Manson, The Sayings of Jesus as Recorded in the Gospels according to St. Matthew and St. Luke (London: SCM, 1949), 317.

[5] C. T. Studd, quoted in Norman P. Grubb, C. T. Studd: Athlete and Pioneer (Harrisburg, PA: Evangelical Press, 1933), 170. Paraphrased.

[6] Matthew 16:25 (paraphrased). See also Matthew 19:29; Mark 10:29–30.

[7] 1 Corinthians 3:11–15 (NIV 1984).

[8] 1 Corinthians 3:15 (NIV 1984).

[9] Matthew 25:21, 23 (NIV 1984).

[10] See Luke 18:9–14.

[11] Roy Clements, A Sting in the Tale (Leicester: Inter-Varsity, 1995), 129.

[12] Ephesians 2:8–9 (paraphrased).

[13] See Ephesians 2:10.

[14] Luke 19:8 (paraphrased).

[15] See 1 Corinthians 15:58.

[16] Richard Baxter, quoted in C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, vol. 5, Psalm CXI. to CXIX. (London: Marshall Brothers, n.d.), 420.

[17] Dominic Smart, When We Get It Wrong: Peter, Christ and Our Path Through Failure (Carlisle, UK: Paternoster, 2001), 10–14.

[18] See Psalm 19:14.