Living In The Light

July 10, Missionary Spirit Of Old Needed Now

And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands for us; yes, establish the work of our hands.
—Psalms 90:17 LL 204.1

It has cost self-denial, self-sacrifice, indomitable energy, and much prayer, to bring up the various missionary enterprises where they now stand. There is danger that some of those now coming upon the stage of action will rest content to be inefficient, feeling that there is now no need of so great self-denial and diligence, such hard and disagreeable labor, as the leaders in this message experienced; that times have changed; and that since there is now more means in the cause of God, it is not necessary for them to place themselves in such trying circumstances as many were called to meet in the rise of the message. LL 204.2

But were there the same diligence and self-sacrifice manifest at the present stage of the work as at its beginning, we should see a hundred times more than is now accomplished. LL 204.3

If the work is to go forward on the high plane of action upon which it started, there must be no falling off in moral resources. New accessions of moral power must continually be made. If those now entering the field as laborers feel that they may relax their efforts, that self-denial and strict economy not only of means but of time are not now essential, the work will retrograde. The workers at the present time should have the same degree of piety, energy, and perseverance that the leaders had. LL 204.4

The work has been extended so that it now covers a large territory, and the number of believers has increased. Still there is a great deficiency, for a larger work might have been accomplished had the same missionary spirit been manifested as in earlier days. Without this spirit the laborer will only mar and deface the cause of God. The work is really retrograding instead of advancing as God designs it should. Our present numbers and the extent of our work are not to be compared with what they were in the beginning. We should consider what might have been done had every worker consecrated himself, in soul, body, and spirit, to God as he should have done.— Testimonies for the Church, vol. 6, pp. 419, 420. LL 204.5

Further Reflection: : Have you consecrated yourself to the work of God? If you could do one thing today to make the work of God more effective in the world, what would you do? LL 204.6