the Fourth Week after Easter
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Daily Devotionals
Mornings and Evenings with Jesus
A faithful man who can find? - Proverbs 20:6.
WE have here an intimation of the rareness of consistency. Who can find a man faithful, first, In his civil concerns? How do men run down and undervalue the article they mean to buy, and enhance the value of what they mean to sell! What deceit, equivocation, perjury, fraud, is practised between man and man!
Secondly, In his friendship. The true friend loveth at all times. But “confidence in an unfaithful friend, in time of trouble, is like a broken tooth or a foot out of joint.” He who attempts to eat with the one or to walk with the other would find it useless and painful. Job, David, and Paul found it so; and how was it with the Saviour himself? He suffered in all points like unto us; his disciples all “forsook him and fled.”
Thirdly, To his trusts. We are all stewards; and “it is required of stewards that a man be found faithful.” We are to consider all our endowments in the nature of a trust, all of which are to be employed for Him who conferred them upon us. Riches! Oh, what a trust is wealth! and how difficult to spend it as becometh Christians! Time! what a jewel! And the Scripture tells us to “redeem the time.” Authority! what a trust is this! Some are placed over families, and are faithless to their trust unless they “bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” Some are servants; well, and these are stewards, and are to be faithful to their employers, not only not purloining, (this is only half,) but not wasting; and also showing all good fidelity, that they may “adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things.”
Fourthly, To his convictions. Few are so hardened as not to have many of these. God only knows what many do with them. Some they assassinate, some they check, some they starve, some they put off, saying, “Go thy way for this time.”
Fifthly, To his religious professions. How many there are to whom the Saviour says, “Why call ye me Lord, and do not the things which I have commanded?” Why do ye assume the name of Christ and not depart from iniquity? A Christian is never more useful than when he avoids inconsistencies. But in considering the inconsistencies of others, we may push the matter too far and become censorious. There are many faithful men, and their number is increasing, and “the Lord add unto them, how many soever there be, an hundredfold.” And they are as excellent as they are rare. They have defects and blemishes; but even now “their rejoicing,” not their glorying, “is the testimony of a good conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity they have their conversation in the world.” Such men are likely to rise in the esteem of those around them; but if not, if men should overlook them, God has his eye upon them; if they are now beclouded, they shall soon shine in the firmament of God.
As the stars sparkle in the heavens, so do the promises of Scripture shine upon them:-“For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give grace and glory, and no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.”
The Son of man came not to he ministered unto. - Matthew 20:28.
THERE is something in this that fills us, at first, with astonishment. When we consider his grandeur, the place from which he descended (for he came down from heaven), and the honour and glory and homage he enjoyed there, it is natural for us to conclude that when he enters our earth, he will be welcomed in a manner becoming his dignity, that he will have numerous attendants who will be all ready to run and fly at his nod, and to anticipate all his wishes. But what was the fact? “He was in the world, and the world knew him not; he came unto his own and his own received him not.”
When a sovereign visits a part of his dominions, when he enters the mansion of one of his own subjects, what exertion and sacrifices are made! Our Saviour could derive nothing from external appendages. What could any of those distinctions have added to the greatness of a Being who opened the eyes of the blind, raised the dead, calmed the sea in a moment-a Being who by a word could make worlds, and before whose look the heavens and the earth shall flee away. He could therefore dispense with all those things; and, though he knew how much they were valued and idolized in our world, and that persons are very much estimated according to them, yet he would dispense with them. “He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister.” We read of “women who ministered unto him of their substance,” and their names are recorded in the book of life; and wheresoever the gospel is preached, that which they did shall be told for a memorial of them.
But, alas! this very ministering unto him was a part of his humiliation. How reduced must he be to stand in need of assistance and succour of the very creatures of His power! His reproached followers should remember that he was “a worm and no man,” and “a reproach among the people.” And let his poor and afflicted people remember also, that while the “foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, he had not where to lay his head.” He assumed no state, and required no waiting upon. We only read of his riding once in his life, and then it was “upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass;” all his other travels were on foot, and many a stray step did he take for us.
"He went about doing good,” and not only seized opportunities when they offered, but sought after them when they did not present themselves. And for this purpose how often did he refuse himself needful refreshment, and give up the enjoyment of the sweets of retirement! See him in the house of Lazarus, lamenting that he had given so much trouble, and commending Mary who sat at his feet to hear his word, while he kindly reproved Martha for her being “cumbered about much serving,” to indulge an appetite which he never indulged; for he came to feed, not to be fed, “he came not to be ministered unto, but to minister.”
