by This is not my original work, but was so good I wanted to pass it along…
If God has called you to be really like Jesus, He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility, and put upon you such demands of obedience, that you will not be able to measure yourself by other Christians; and in many ways He will seem to let other good people do things which He will never let you do.
Other Christians and ministers, who seem very religious and useful, can push themselves, pull wires and work schemes to carry out their Christian goals, but these things you simply cannot do. Others may boast of their work or their writings or their successes, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing, and if you ever try it, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all your good works.
Others may be allowed to succeed in making money, but most likely God will keep you poor, because He wants you to have something far better than gold, namely, a helpless dependence on Him and the joy of seeing Him supply your needs day by day out of an unseen Treasury.
The Lord may let others be honored and keep you hidden and unappreciated because He wants to produce some choice, fragrant fruit for His coming glory, which can only be produced in the shade. He may let others do a work for Him and get credit for it, but He will make you work on and on without knowing how much you are doing; and then, to make your work still more precious, He may let others get the credit for the work you have done, and this make your reward ten times greater when Jesus comes.
The Holy Spirit will rebuke you for little words or deeds or even feelings, or for wasting your time, which other Christians never seem to be concerned about, but you must make up your mind that God is an infinite Sovereign and He has a right to do whatever He pleases with His own. He may not explain to you a thousand things which puzzle your reason in the way He deals with you, but if you will just submit yourself to Him in all things, He will wrap you up in a jealous love and bestow upon you many blessings which come only to those who are very near to His heart.
Settle it, then, that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that He does not seem to use with others. Now, when you are so possessed with the living God that your secret heart becomes pleased and delighted with this peculiar, personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit over your life, then you will have entered the very vestibule of heaven itself.
That is good, I’d never read it before. It’s especially true that we can’t measure ourselves by other Christians, and why is it that we’re tempted to be only as “good” as the competition? Not that it’s a competition, I’m just saying we look around too much horizontally when we need to be looking vertically.
On making money, here’s good one: Never measure your wealth with money…
There are a lot of places in the New Testament epistles where Paul reminds us that it is the verticle relationship that God is interested in– we are to compare ourselves to Christ.
The author of this post (Watson) pointed out something that Tozer says in a lot of his writings, namely, that God wants all of us and that sometimes means that we don’t get to do things others feel that they can.
Wow, that was moving, nearly brought me to tears. Is it wise of me to wish that for myself? I don’t know sounds scary! I love AW Tozer and am currently re-reading his book “The Pursuit of God”. It was excellent the first time, but this time I am feeling less moved… My walk is a bit dry right now, I feel I am in the valley… I don’t doubt God, but I seem to be having trouble dilligently pursuing HIM and Him alone! Like you say Mary, my eye is on the horizontal, and not the vertical view… I know it, but I can’t seem to get over it! *sigh* I know God will bring me through sooner or later… I keep trying, maybe you all will think to pray for me.
Loving the Lord from a Dry Valley,
Mrs. Meg Logan
We’ll be praying for you Mrs. Logan. The best advice I can give is that how you feel is effected by what you think and do. Get in the Word and serve God, and I’m sure you’ll find yourself out sooner than you thnk!
Will be praying for you here too! Been through those valley days myself.
Thanks for your prayers, and MIN I do remember to get into the Word, praise God I am able to do that… but it seems so dry lately… But anyway, that is no reason to stop seeking His face and to stop reading His Word.
Thanks for the encouragement.
I seem to read very deep articles today. This one included.
I have a lot of soul-searching to do because of those texts.