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‘By the grace of God I am what I am: and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain.’
1Co_15:10
I. It is a great blessing to us that the guardian hand of God is over us at all times; one that we could in no wise do without, though we do not value it as we ought. We are not left to the mercy of our own ignorance and blindness and sin. It is well for us that we are not. The will of God guides and shapes our course from birth to death.
II. It is a great responsibility.—God will expect us to use the degree of grace that He gives us; to use it in glorifying His Name and in becoming holy. He does not give us all wealth; He does not give us all high station; He does not give us all great ability; but His grace He gives to all. He wills that all should be saved, and He gives His grace to all. And the channels of God’s grace are manifold.
III. The grace of God may be in vain—given in vain, received in vain; may be wasted, like water spilt on the sand, and so leave the soul unfertilised and bringing forth no fruit for eternal life. This is a very awful thought for us, because it means that the soul is lost if it has wasted or resisted, or left unprofited by, the grace given by God for its salvation. Since each of us is entrusted with the responsibility of ‘working out our own salvation,’ and because we are unable to do this in our own moral strength and power of acting and resisting, the grace of God is given to each—how grave is the thought, how terrible is the possibility—that this powerful aid may prove ineffectual, and that we, unhappy souls, may through attachment to the evil, may through weakness and instability of purpose, through love of the world, receive this Divine grace and aid, and find it in vain!
And so we must gather from the text before us two things—a fact and a warning. The fact—that of the providential work of the Divine Spirit in and on the soul of man: the warning—that by our own fault the grace may be bestowed in vain.
Illustration
‘We labour and struggle here, and desire hotly, and enjoy eagerly, and lament bitterly, all because we do not sufficiently remember how much the will of God and the Providence of God have to do with all these events of joy or sorrow which happen to us; and that it is not merely our own will or the wills of other people which bring them about. It is indeed so; and so truly that even our great poet could write as a fact, a well-known fact to secular wisdom—
“There’s a Divinity which shapes our ends,
Rough hew them as we will.”
It would be a very incomplete idea of God which considered Him as ordering one or two great events in our lives and forgetting or neglecting all the rest.’
‘
‘Grace … not in vain;’ ‘Labour … not in vain.’
1Co_15:10; 1Co_15:58
I. Because if we do not, God’s grace has been bestowed upon us in vain.—An ample supply of that grace comes to every child of God: on every penitent soul the Divine bounty descends in the form of virtue and power to lead a new life. Judging by Apostolic language we each have more than enough (see 2Co_9:14 and 1Pe_4:10). That grace is given for the distinct purpose of service; and if it is not thus received, or thus employed, it is vain, it is rendered void, it becomes an empty thing! Bad enough to be unmoved by human kindness; a far greater sin not to be affected by the grace of God; not to be stirred to sacrifice and service (vide 2Co_6:1).
II. Because if we do, He will see that such labour is not in vain.—This follows our first thought admirably: ‘God gives His grace, do you give your labour,’ for if you see that His grace is not lost, He will see that your labour is not lost. But if men will not hear, is not our labour necessarily in vain? So we sometimes think; but the Apostle reminds us of the Resurrection, when the Master will assuredly give the increase, produce some fruit for all our labours, for the work of grace cannot be lost. There may be few signs of harvest to-day; but they will appear to-morrow when He cometh, ‘Whose reward is with Him.’
Rev. A. B. G. Lillingston.
‘I laboured more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God.’
1Co_15:10
I. Christianity came to set the world on fire.—It came to work a revolution. It came to create a new heaven and a new earth. And for this high work it needs all the energy of health, of hope, of youth, of aspiration that you can bring it. It will put all splendid gifts to service. It looks out on the brave audacities of souls dauntless and untamed, and loves them, as our Lord loved Simon Peter. It will rebaptise them with the new name, but they will be the same men who once gloried in girding themselves and going whither they would, and now, committed to Christ’s humility, are content to be girded by another and to be carried whither they would not.
II. Christ calls for men of this generous impulsiveness, of this strenuous passion.—He invites the men of high desires—men who will ever ask and seek and knock; men who press ever forward and set no limit to their aspirations. To them, and to them only, who ask is it given. So the Faith cries aloud, invoking holy ambitions. Only those who seek, find; only to those who knock can gates be opened. That is the one law of grace! Such men will go on asking more and more, not for selfish greed, but out of sheer trust in the immeasurable goodness of a God Who exists to give; Who always longs to give more than they ever dare to ask for, crying to us, ‘Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it!’ It is not self that prompts them to seek out ever new treasures, but reliance upon a God Who has prepared for those that love Him things far beyond what eye hath ever seen or heart conceived.
It is out of faith in God that they ask or seek or knock. It is in God that their aspirations are set free to act. And therefore it is that our youth and our health, no less than our sickness and our sin, find their sole interpretation in Jesus Christ.
III. Come, then, and bring Him all that He so dearly loves and so sorely needs.—Come with your youth, hot with desire! Come with your heart aflame. Come with your body sound and fair and free, now while the blood runs warm, and the strength of your pure manhood is in you, undimmed and untainted. Come with your muscular force and your keen vitalities. Come with your laughter and your gladness, you that are joyous-hearted. Come with your music and your song, your emotion and imagination, you that are artists and poets! Come with your high courage and your noble dreams, and your revolutionary ardour, you men of hope. Come while still you have something to bring Him which may be of service for the royalty of His name. For Christianity is the greatest adventure ever set on foot. It has set itself to create the world anew. Christianity is a romance. It appeals to all who can give themselves away. Christianity is a mighty effort to build the city of God on earth, and it wants those who will labour on with their tools in one hand and their weapons in another, in defiant and holy glee. Christianity is a war, and the foe is strong, and the ‘blood-red banner streams afar,’ and who will follow in that train but those who are strong enough to dare all for the good cause?
IV. Take the measure of the task that Christ has undertaken, and then consider whether He will not need all the power and all the splendour that men and women can ever bring Him, if He is to work out this victory—as He has sworn to do—through human flesh and blood. He needs the very best and finest instruments for such a task; and if you have any power of hand or brain, of body or mind; if you have high motives astir and kindling hopes; if you have youth and health, and force and joy; then here, in Christ, is their noblest use; in Him they will find their freedom. Not in self, not in egotism, will they find themselves alive. You will never know your full capacity until you can cry, ‘Lo! I find myself labouring more abundantly than I could have dreamed possible. Yet not I! not I! not I! but the grace of God that is with me.’
—
Rev. Canon H. Scott Holland.
Illustration‘The more splendid the achievement, the more intolerable would be the claim made by self, the more impossible would egotism become. “What!” the Apostle would cry, “when I think of all the incredible wonders wrought through me; when I recall how I, the least of all, who was not worthy to be called an Apostle, yet laboured more abundantly than they all; do you suppose I can calmly attribute all that to my own credit? Can I see myself in it? Can I recognise my own hand in it? Do you suppose I dare review it and pronounce ‘that is all mine: I did it’? It is just because I ‘laboured more abundantly than they all’ that I cannot possibly have done it of myself. The glory of my achievement is the very thing that convinces me of my own nothingness. As I look at the stupendous task I am lost, I disappear. I have forgotten myself. Oh, no! it is not I who so abundantly laboured. Not I, not I! How could it be? Not I, but the grace of God that was with me. It was all God. Nothing but God. God in me. God through me. God and God alone.” ’