This is the third post of a sermon from the book No Little People by Francis Schaeffer published in 1974. The heart of this message is about learning to depend not on ourselves, but on God’s Spirit to do his work in his way. Schaeffer has begun to focus on our pride as the greatest hindrance to us doing the Lord’s work in his way.
Christ taught His disciples that they were not to be called “Rabbi”or “Master” (Matt. 23:8, 10) and that the greatest among them would be the servant of all (Mark 10:44). Doesn’t each one of us tend to reverse this, following our natural inclinations as fallen men while ignoring the Word of God? Don’t we like the foremost place? And if this is our mind-set, isn’t this living in the flesh, and to that extent leaving the Spirit no place?
Seeking the highest place is in direct contradiction to the teaching of the Lord. Christ instructed His disciples, “But when thou art bidden [to a wedding feast], go and sit down in the lowest room” (Luke 14:10). If we are going to do the Lord’s work in the Lord’s way, we must take Jesus’ teaching seriously: He does not want us to press on to the greatest place unless He Himself makes it impossible to do otherwise. Taking the lower place in a practical way (thus reflecting the mentality of Christ who humbled Himself even to death on a cross) should be a Christian’s choice.
Even if we have an “office,” like a parent with a child or an elder in a church, it is only the office that sets us apart. We are not greater than those over whom we have authority. If we have the world’s mentality of wanting the foremost place, we are not qualified for Christian leadership. This mentality can lift us into ecclesiastical leadership or fit us for being a big name among men, but it unfits us for real spiritual leadership.
To the extent that we want power we are in the flesh, and the Holy Spirit has no part in us. Christ put a towel around Himself and washed His disciples’ feet (John 13:4). We should ask ourselves from time to time, “Whose feet am I washing?” Some churches have made foot-washing into a third sacrament; members wash each other’s feet during their worship service. While most of us think it is a mistake to make this a sacrament, let us admit that it is 10,000 times better to wash each other’s feet in a literal way than never to wash anybody’s feet in any way. It would be far better for us to make a mistake and institute a third sacrament of literal foot-washing than to live out our lives without once consciously choosing to serve each other. Doing the Lord’s work in the Lord’s way is not some exotic thing; it is having and practicing the mentality which Christ commands.
SEEKING GOD’S APPROVAL
In addition to teaching us not to seek power, the Lord Jesus taught us not to seek human praise. Those who seek the praise of men, He said, have their reward when they have the praise. We often read this pietistically and miss the point. Jesus meant what he said: if our aim has been praise and power and we have it, either in the world or in the church, we have had it. It is the one who does not seek it now who will have the praise when he stands before the dear Lord’s face. Scripture is clear that we must either humble ourselves now or be humbled in the future.
In 1 Corinthians, Paul pictures a “believers’ judgment,” when every Christian will stand before Christ, not for salvation (that is determined at the cross when the individual accepts Christ as Savior), but to have his works as a Christian tried. No Christian will lose his salvation in this judgment, but whatever he has done for himself (including seeking power and the praise of men) will be lost. If he has not humbled himself in this life, he will be humbled then. There is no third way.
TRUSTING GOD’S METHODS
Is it not amazing: though we know the power of the Holy Spirit can be ours, we still ape the world’s wisdom, trust its forms of publicity, its noise, and imitate its ways of manipulating men! If we try to influence the world by using its methods, we are doing the Lord’s work in the flesh. If we put activity, even good activity, at the center rather than trusting God, then there may be the power of the world, but we will lack the power of the Holy Spirit.
The key question is this: as we work for God in this fallen world, what are we trusting in? To trust in particular methods is to copy the world and to remove ourselves from the tremendous promise that we have something different—the power of the Holy Spirit rather than the power of human technique.
Under the leadership of Moses and Joshua, the Jews marched when the ark marched and they stood still when the ark stood still. They did not rush ahead if God did not order the ark (which represented Himself) to be moved. Sometimes they stayed in one place for long periods. We Christians, individually and corporately, must learn to wait like this. Tongues of fire are not for us if we are so busy doing the clever thing that we never wait quietly to find out whether the ark of the Lord has gone ahead or stayed.
Once after I had given a message like this, a man told me, “You have opened a door for me. What you say is true. I am on many Christian boards, and I have large holdings in cotton mills. So I am in one kind of business meeting at one time and another kind of business meeting at another. And sometimes in the midst of a meeting I will suddenly look up and say, Which meeting am I in?” He could see no difference whatsoever; in both cases just the clever thing was being done. This is not the way to have spiritual power. The Lord’s work must be done in the Lord’s way.