XXIV

As His Fellow-Workers

‘We are God’s fellow-workers: ye are God’s building.’—1 Cor. 3:9

‘And working together with Him we intreat that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.’—2 Cor. 6:1

We have listened to Paul’s teaching on good works (chaps. IX.-XXII.); let us turn now to his personal experience, and see if we can learn from him some of the secrets of effective service.

He speaks here of the Church as God’s building, which, as the Great Architect, He is building up into a holy temple and dwelling for Himself. Of his own work, Paul speaks as of that of a master builder, to whom a part of the great building has been given in charge. He had laid a foundation in Corinth; to all who were working there he said: ‘Let each man take heed how he buildeth thereon.’ ‘We are God’s fellowworkers.’ The word is applicable not only to Paul, but to all God’s servants who take part in His work; and because every 124 believer has been called to give his life to God’s service and to win others to His knowledge, every, even the feeblest, Christian needs to have the word brought to him and taken home: ‘We are God’s fellowworkers.’ How much it suggests in regard to our working for God!

As to the work we have to do.—The eternal God is building for Himself a temple; Christ Jesus, God’s Son, is the foundation; believers are the living stones. The Holy Spirit is the mighty power of God through which believers are gathered out of the world made fit for their place in the temple, and built up into it. As living stones, believers are at the same time the living workmen, whom God uses to carry out His work. They are equally God’s workmanship and God’s fellow-workers. The work God is doing He does through them. The work they have to do is the very work God is doing. God’s own work, in which He delights, on which His heart is set, is saving men and building them into His temple. This is the one work on which the heart of every one who would be a fellow-worker with God must be set. It is only as we know how great, how wonderful, this work of God is—giving life to dead souls, imparting His own life to them, and living in them—that we shall enter somewhat into 125 the glory of our work, receiving the very life of God from Him, and passing it on to men.

As to the strength for the work.—Paul says of his work as a mere master builder, that it was ‘according to the grace of God which was given me.’ For Divine work nothing but Divine power suffices. The power by which God works must work in us. That power is His Holy Spirit. Study the second chapter of this Epistle, and the third of the Second, and see how absolute was Paul’s acknowledgment of his own impotence, and his dependence on the teaching and power of the Holy Spirit. As this great truth begins to live in the hearts of God’s workers, that God’s work can only be done by God’s power in us, we shall feel that our first need every day is to have the presence of God’s Spirit renewed within us. The power of the Holy Spirit is the power of love. God is love. All He works for the salvation of men is love; it is love alone that truly conquers and wins the heart. In all God’s fellow-workers love is the power that reaches the hearts of men. Christ conquered and conquers still by the love of the cross. Let that mind be in you, O worker, which was in Christ Jesus, the spirit of a love that sacrifices itself to the death, of a humble, patient, gentle love,126 and you will be made meet to be God’s fellow-worker.

As to the relation we are to hold to God.—In executing the plans of some great building the master builder has but one care—to carry out to the minutest detail the thoughts of the architect who designed it. He acts in constant consultation with him, and is guided in all by his will; and his instructions to those under him have all reference to the one thing—the embodiment, in visible shape, of what the master mind has conceived. The one great characteristic of fellow-workers with God ought to be that of absolute surrender to His will, unceasing dependence on His teaching, exact obedience to His wishes. God has revealed His plan in His Word. He has told us that His Spirit alone can enable us to enter into His plans, and fully master His purpose with the way he desires to have it carried out. The clearer our insight into the Divine glory of God’s work of saving souls, into the utter insufficiency of our natural powers to do the work, into the provision, that has been made by which the Divine love can animate us, and the Divine Spirit guide and strengthen us for its due performance, the more we shall feel that a childlike teachableness, a continual looking upward and waiting on God, is ever to be 127 the chief mark of one who is His fellow-labourer. Out of the sense of humility, helplessness, and nothingness there will grow a holy confidence and courage that knows that our weakness need not hinder us, that Christ’s strength is made perfect in weakness, that God Himself is working out His purpose through us. And of all the blessings of the Christian life, the most wonderful will be that we are allowed to be—God’s fellow-workers!

1. God’s fellow-worker! How easy to use the word, and even to apprehend some of the great truths it contains! How little we live in the power and the glory of what it actually involves!

2. Fellow-workers with God! Everything depends upon knowing, in His holiness and love, the God with whom we are associated as partners.

3. He who has chosen us, that in and through us He might do His great work, will fit us for His use.

4. Let our posture be adoring worship, deep dependence, great waiting, full obedience.