2 COR. iii. 5. “Our sufficiency is of God.”
THE doctrine in these words is no more true of ministers
than of Christians in general. The station is different, but
the strength is the same.
I. This sufficiency of God may be considered either as
proper or communicated. By God’s proper sufficiency we
mean that He is self-existent and independently happy.
1. He is sufficient for the preservation of the universe
which His hands have made.
2. He is sufficient for the preservation and the perpetuity
of the gospel plan in the salvation and ultimate happiness
of every individual believer. Christianity is a course of
Divine operations meeting with formidable opposition, but
completed at last.
II. Let us look at the authority which believers have to
accept this sufficiency for themselves.
We have a right to expect it, because it is promised to us
in the Bible. We expect it, because we see that it was
given to the saints of old time. We expect it, because we
see it given to the saints now. What trial is there that we
cannot bear, what work is there that we cannot accom-
plish, if we take hold of the sufficiency of God.
W. Morley Punshon, D.D.