THE SUCCESSFUL CHRISTIAN By Bill Jackson (Part Two)
. Several years ago, at a preachers' breakfast, the visiting speaker (whose name I forgot but to whom I am indebted) gave a very simple outline for having victory and success in the Christian life. His three points were: total surrender, unconditional obedience and implicit faith.
. In thinking about these qualities against the backdrop of following Jesus, I realized that they are very basic to this concept. . Even in the natural, when you are following someone, you must surrender your will to him. You do not tell him that you will gladly follow him half of the time; even if you were to follow 90% of the time, you wouldn't get to the destination. Neither do you attach conditions — I'll turn right if you are leading me down a pleasant, shady street. You unconditionally follow him; and it is utmost folly to follow a person who either does not know the way or a person whom you suspect might not know the way.
. I remember once when I was staying at a home after the Sunday evening service, the young son volunteered to ride with me and show me the way. At night every street looked the same to him, and we drove around in circles for some time before we found home. You always follow a person who knows how to get there, and you follow him unconditionally and completely.
. "All to Jesus I surrender" – how many times have you sung it, and how often you have meant it when you were in the glow of Christian fellowship. But how real is your surrender when it comes down to the practical? Can you say you have laid down all rights to yourself, to your aims and ambitions, to your tastes and desires, to your pleasures and cares? Should not we, as Christians, begin to realize that the word "all" is much bigger than the three letters that comprise it? It truly is one of the biggest words in our vocabulary. . When you are asked by another Christian, "What are you doing these days?", is your first response to list the areas in which you have been successful, or is the primary joy of your life that you are following Him?
. Have you surrendered your rights? When our rights are surrendered, do we have any? Do we really yearn after and prize our recognition by man, and feel deprived when he does not recognize us? If your pastor were to list all the Christian workers or prayer warriors in your church and leave you out, would you be stung by the oversight? Can you stand to have others congratulated and yourself spurned? If He should lead others into bright avenues of public acclaim and lead you down a dark alley of loneliness, do you follow? Are you really surrendered to Him?
. Because we all have an old nature that is constantly trying to resurrect itself, we will always have temptations to react in the wrong way to others' success and our seeming failure. It is not sin to be tempted, but it is a denial of our surrender to bathe in selfpity and seek for acclaim. Real surrender will be tested, and by His Grace and Power we can prove the reality of our surrender. . If others are promoted and you are not even mentioned, what is your reaction?
. If your advice is not followed, what is your reaction? . If the good things you did are not noted, and the bad things you did are broadcast to all, what is your reaction? . If you are severely wronged and God seems not to notice, what is your reaction?
. We might sum up these questions and others by asking — ARE YOU TOTALLY SURRENDERED? While others are "Superman" and "Captain Marvel", are you willing to appear like "Ziggy" or "Charlie Brown"? Will you be anything – if that is what He wants you to be? . Total surrender can likewise be measured by unconditional obedience. There may be many who would gladly follow as long as the road is going up to higher, more exciting ground, and that is their only condition. "Lord, I will gladly preach the Gospel, if you will make me a great preacher." "Lord, I will be a fisher of men, if you will give me a lot of souls." "Lord, I will do anything, just so long as I'm a success."
. Probably the best Biblical example of conditional, rather than unconditional, obedience is found in Genesis 28:20-22. There Jacob prefaces his faithfulness to God by four conditions, and displays his incomplete consecration that God refined during the very difficult process that finally ended when Jacob became Israel, a prince with God.
. Unconditional surrender is a very rare commodity these days, and perhaps the primary reason is that much of the public ministry on the subject calls for what is called "unconditional surrender" by promising some prize that this will merit. But the fact that our obedience is based on the hopes of a prize keeps it from being unconditional.
. It has been said, "You don't catch fish with a frying pan", which means that you don't show the fish the end of their being caught – you rather use alluring bait to catch them, and then you put them in the frying pan. The usual way to try to get men to be truly committed Christians is to lure them with the bait of reward, and then try to get them to conform themselves to the "frying pan" of true discipleship. Yet this is the exact opposite of Jesus' methods – He does catch fish with a frying pan!
. He said, "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me." You might say, "Lord that is not a very good way to fish for men-they will never come under those conditions." He does tell us that the glorious promise is that where He is, there His servant will be – but we must be willing to follow Him, and the direction He is taking is not that wonderful to our human nature.
. Our expectation is that we should work for God, really sacrifice (once in a while) and be ready for the pat on the back which we expect. He says that after we have done all these things, we should still say, "We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which was our duty to do." (Luke 17:10.) The truth is that if we have been this kind of servant, He Himself will come and serve us, but as soon as that marvelous reward becomes our motive for doing anything for Him, we have lost out on the privilege of unconditional obedience. . Unconditional obedience is not a fruit of the flesh, or of the old nature. So often we come to the Word of God, see what He wants us to do, then read the promise and say that on the condition that He will give us the promise, we will do His Will. We should do His will even if what we will receive falls short of what we expect. . We might bear the burden and heat of the day in sacrificial service to Him. Then, on pay day, we will grumble if we are not rewarded more than those who, we feel, have not merited nearly as much reward as we (Matthew 20:1-16) However, most of us who read that parable think those earlier laborers were justified in their complaint. They had worked harder. They had done more than the others. It seems so unfair – yet unfair is not a word that can be used when there is unconditional obedience. . Unconditional – what a hard word! Certainly having done certain things I now have certain rights, but that is denying the obedience being unconditional. If I obey Him, am I not entitled to the headlines, the praise, the glory? Am I not entitled to see some success? Many of us are hard workers as long as success is on the horizon, but we faint in the way when we cannot see any reward for our sacrificial labor. It has been said that sacrifice for someone else is relatively easy when there is reciprocated love and gratitude, but God wants us to be willing to sacrifice for Him and others when there is no promise of immediate payment. We do what we are bidden to do. If he blesses and rewards, so be it. But if He does not bless, it is still our duty to unconditionally obey. All that is within us as human beings rebels against this; that is why a true disciple must die to himself to follow Christ.
. Implicit faith is not natural to our fallen nature, but it is an absolute requisite for following Him. How can we pretend to follow if we do not completely trust the One we are following? Implicit faith has two antagonists: (1) our desire to see where we are going and (2) our desire to have other options available just in case He fails. . It is relatively easy to follow Him when the way is through well – lighted and pleasant scenes, when the wild beasts that would assail us are obviously chained, and when we have sufficient resources to feel we can make the goal. It is just human nature to feel better about a trip if the roads are well – marked and well – lighted, if the rocks have all been cleared off the road and if we have a spare tire and sufficient money to pay for gas enroute. It is a tragedy that we so often transfer these normal and justified human feelings to a walk that is now supposed to be on entirely different premises. We would not think of driving our car blindfolded, yet we often try to walk by faith with our eyes wide opened. As long as we can see the goal, we will follow – IF that goal is consistent with what others are doing. There are circumstances in which we would not find it hard to have faith and follow Him.
. We must learn to say, with the hymn-writer:
. "No matter if the way be sometimes dark . No matter though the cost be ofttimes great . He knoweth best how I shall reach the mark."
. It is a fact of life that the extent of our arrival at the goal will equal the extent of our following, and if we do not implicitly trust Him Whom we are following, how can we ever hope to arrive at the right destination?
. "We walk by faith, not by sight", and while this should not entice us to embark upon mad schemes that we could not possibly expect to complete, or do foolish things and excuse them by saying we are walking by faith. Trusting Him should have more scriptural foundations, and if we learn to truly trust Him in these, He will guide us in any leading that is unusual. . The problem is that we often do not trust Him in areas in which He has clearly spoken, and in some of the affairs of life we have provided secondary means of achieving our goals just in case He should fail.
. He plainly said, "Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth" and yet it is normal for a Christian to have a savings account, sometimes quite large, that he can call upon should his normal income fail. We do not "Consider the lilies of the field" and we often succumb to the brains of business men and have our churches so solvent that we are ridiculous even to think we are doing His work by faith. . On the other hand, we often hear of needs, imagined or real, accrued by those "in the Lord's service" and since, we are told, these folks/projects are being carried on "by faith", we should respond to the stated need. One reads with wonder and nostalgia at the practices of those who were first used by God to found faith missions. One of their primary stands as faith missions was to tell their needs only to God and expect an answer from God. Now we tell our needs to our prayer partners and expect an answer from them. Christians (prayer partners) have told me they like to have it so, because they can then evaluate the needs that they can be used to meet. Therefore the missionaries who refuse to walk by faith not only disobey the Lord, they rob other Christians of the joy of being led by the Spirit in their giving and make them lazy Christians. The Christian giver should learn to walk by faith in his giving, even as the "givee" should learn to trust the Lord in his asking. . I just received a very attractive "prayer folder" from a couple going overseas with a reputable mission. On the first page it said this mission is a faith mission, and on page 9 the needs were listed so that this couple's missionary project would be possible. Without reference to monthly support, the needs totaled over $7,000. Can you imagine the Apostle Paul, responding to the man of Macedonia and telling him that he will be in Macedonia as soon as the churches in Asia Minor provided him with a means of transportation, rent for a meeting room, audio-visual equipment, 15,000 tracts and pledges for his monthly support? What is the difference? . Modern missionaries are following a prescribed plan (which has ALWAYS worked???) of how to be a missionary and what one needs to be a missionary. ("I couldn't possibly be a missionary without a car, Lord.") Then they are trained to solicit funds for these things from Christians who are too lazy to pray for how their money should be used, too stingy to really sacrifice, and too business – like to invest "their money" in anything that does not guarantee results. . We have sadly inherited a hundred years of degenerating missionaries thinking and have produced a brand of missions that neither exalts or follows Christ, and we have resigned to oblivion or nostalgia that missionary that has a heart for faith missions that once fired men of God of the past to venture forth on God alone. . Hudson Taylor insisted on a pure "faith missions" concept for all in the old C.I.M. When speaking at a church, he would often refuse gifts lest they had been given purely out of an emotional feeling. He would instruct the giver to go home and pray and then send the money if the Lord told him to. (Was he crazy? How would he ever hope to get to the field like that?) In areas where Taylor had every right to remind folks of financial obligations, he chose rather to let the Lord remind them and receive from His hand.
. C.T. Studd gave many thousands of pounds away (a tremendous fortune in those days) so that he would be able to live by faith – and he endured "as seeing Him who is invisible" (Hebrews 11:27). Rees Howells, called by God to go overseas but without the train fare to get to his port of embarkation, so implicitly trusted God that he stood in line at the ticket window in the railway station because that is where he would have stood if he had the money, and he might as well have had it in his hand, for God had promised to send him overseas. And God did provide.
. Such wonderful, exciting stories are these. How we read them and ooze with a warmth that tells us God did such great exploits through these men. How we admire their faith! Then we are somehow content to slip back into the old paths of our present – day, highly mechanized, faithless "exploits" for God, trusting everything but the raw Hand of God to meet our need.
. There is nothing wrong with a missionary honestly answering questions directed to him about his financial needs. We don't want to produce a super – spiritual cult that has its head so in the clouds that our humanity is forfeited. But we certainly want to come apart from the face of modern faith missions and learn to trust Him. We also have to be careful that the needs we mention are not desires, but needs. Do we need a car to be a missionary, or do we desire a car. Paul minded to go afoot from Troas to Assos, but it would be too much to ask me to cover all those miles without a car. Maybe covering all those miles is not God's will – you might be in the center of His Will if you were to walk a mile rather than drive one hundred. . This comes close to home, too. If a present – day pastor came out of his home in the morning to find his car destroyed, would he spend the day in prayer, study and witnessing to his neighbors; or would he frantically run around trying to compensate for his loss of wheels and imagine that he must keep to his busy schedule to be in the perfect Will of God?
. But can we heap blame on missionaries who are only doing what they have been told is the norm for missions? The lack of trusting God is not only present in full – time workers; it is in almost every believer and church.
. Today is a great day to have insurance of every kind. One could not fault the concept of life insurance, for that is a provision for dependents left behind, who would have otherwise been supported by our labor. It is not selfishly motivated, it is not the result of being unable to trust God to meet our needs, nor does it profit the owner of the insurance policy. One could as well speak against having a job to make an honest living.
. But what of other types of insurance? Can we scripturally justify these? Can we make a decision between health insurance and trusting God? Must we put ourselves in the position that whatever happens to ourselves or our property, we are covered? Does not this rob God of His position as being the One who safeguards His people and rob us of learning to trust Him? Is our life on this earth geared around the protection of the few paltry possessions we have accumulated, or is our life taken up with knowing, trusting and following Him? Is "a piece of the rock" better able to take care of me than the "Rock of Ages"? Do we maintain, for our cars, the minimum insurance required by law, or do we make sure that if our car is destroyed, stolen or wrecked we have an insurance company into whose good hands we place ourselves – and thereby never knowing the security of the Everlasting Arms? What of our old age? We may never have an old age and if we do, I trust by then we will have learned the lessons of faith that will keep us constantly in His care. . As we apply these practical truths to every day living, should not this concept of total surrender, unconditional obedience and implicit faith govern all we do? How about the speed limit? "Well, Lord, I know the law says 55 and I know I should obey the law, but I have a lot I want to do for you today, so I will just go 60 – or 65 – or 70; anyway, I'll just keep up with the stream of traffic." . Are we not thus saying, "I know I should obey, because obeying the law is obeying Jesus, but I probably won't get caught (Romans 13:5) and my time is so important." Is my time as important as I think? Is not obeying Him more important? . Suppose some Bible characters had walked so little by faith? Paul, with the viper on his hand, would summon the doctor with whom he had insurance rather than shake the viper into the fire to demonstrate God's Power. Epaphroditus would be thankful for his hospitalization policy rather than God's mercy. Believers would take the spoiling of their goods joyfully because they had a good insurance policy. Yet we claim to be New Testament Christians! What frauds we are. . When the Christian who was later martyred in Ecuador by the savage Auca Indians said, "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose" he captured much of the genius of true Christian discipleship.
. Many Christian homes have this motto displayed prominently, but in how many of us does our lifestyle just as plainly say, "I don't believe it." You do not become a spiritual follower of Christ by displaying Jim Elliott's motto, or even by agreeing with it. You can only be a true follower by following Him, and living out that fact by proving by your actions and motives that things which are eternal are more important than anything temporal. This includes your possessions, your popularity, your family, your very life – and it is only when we get all these in heavenly perspective that we can really begin to understand what He meant when He said, "Follow Me." He then pointed the way we are to follow, which is down instead of up, and gave us His Word that, in His good time, the result would be glorious. . "Rejoice, and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in Heaven."
. God does give earthly blessings, but these are never the goal of the truly spiritual person.
. God gives us things to enjoy, but the loss of these things which could not last anyway should not cause us any undue grief. I have a car that the Lord gave me, and which I appreciate. One day that car (if the Lord tarries) will end up in the junk yard and become scrap metal to make new cars. When that happens, if I need a car, it will be God's responsibility to provide. If it happens prematurely and I come out one day to find my car destroyed by fire or stolen – and I am convinced that it is absolutely essential for me to be 500 miles away that night, it is God's responsibility to work out some way for me to get there. He got Philip from the Ethiopian desert to Azotus without an automobile. So many times we have alternate schemes ready in case something terrible should happen, because we feel "successful" people are never the victim of circumstances, but always figure out some way to rise above circumstances. Such a thought indicates a "going up" syndrome and not being willing to follow Jesus because that doesn't seem successful.
. It is nice to be popular, but how many of us preachers would be quite willing to preach the message He gives us, leave the results entirely with Him, and then have to face a hundred glum faces as the folks who objected to our sermon left the church without even a handshake. We don't preach to be popular, but it sure helps sometimes. And it should – human encouragement is often used by God for our benefit. But we still must not feel defeated if only One Person in the Universe approves of our message. . Even our families, as essential as it is for us to have them on a high scale of priority, must never stand between us and our walk with God. Gianovello, the great Waldensian leader, when faced with the venomous wrath of the Duke of Savoy, once faced a difficult decision. The Duke had captured his wife and children and threatened to burn them alive unless Gianovello capitulated. His reply was that, while he dearly loved his family, he must commit them to the Lord. If the Duke caused them to go through the fire, it would but destroy their bodies, and their souls would be safe with God. His faith was rewarded, and they were released – but if not, said noble Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, be it known to you we will not surrender our faith to you.
. They loved not their lives. Because of the God – given inbuilt instinct of self-preservation, this is the ultimate. We all look forward to Heaven, but no one wants to go today. It is extraordinary faith that captures the reality of being with Christ as far better. We should desire to live as long as He gives us breath, but we must not be so in love with our life on earth that we go to any extreme to safeguard it and leave little energy for the work of the Kingdom. . However, we must be willing to use whatever safeguards to our lives that God provides and not go to silly extremes like some cultists that refuse some valid medical means of healing that was provided by God.
. What do we read as the bottom line? We are human, human, HUMAN. Such living is beyond my scope as a person, and the very walk of faith is impossible. My flesh will always seek to impose conditions on Him, and total surrender is so final. As frail people (and He knoweth our frame) we always fall short. Yet that persistent but still Voice of our Beloved continually comes to our hearts. "Follow Me."
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