Search My Heart O God

From Victorious Christian Service by Alan Redpath
p. 157 - "Some years ago, when I was preaching at a little church on the south side of London, I was asked to visit a young woman who had been completely paralyzed for nine years. Up to the age of twenty-one she had been an active worker in the church and Sunday school, and God seemed greatly to have blessed her ministry. But suddenly she was stricken with this dreadful disease and since that time had never been able to move.

I gladly assented to go to see her, but as I went along the road to the house I wondered to myself, "What can I say to this dear soul? I have never known anything about suffering like that." And it seems to me that before you can really bring comfort to others you have to know something of the experience through which they have passed.

So I asked that the Lord would give me some word to say to her that might be a blessing, and as I knocked on the door, her mother answered and led me into the sick room. There lay this young woman, absolutely helpless, on her back. I went up to her bedside and began to utter a word of sympathy. She looked at me, and I shall never forget the look in her face when she said, "Please don't offer your sympathy. I don't need it. I would not have missed the experience of these past nine years for anything in the world.

"When I was twenty-one years of age serving the Lord at church," she said, "I remember yielding my life completely to Him, saying to Him, 'Lord, I am ready for anything You may want me to do for You or be for You.' Only a few weeks later His hand touched my body and laid me aside. Through these past years He has become so infinitely more precious to me than He could ever have been in all the busy round of Christian service."

As I listened to her, I felt so utterly unworthy, and I wondered just how much I had suffered for Jesus. It seemed to me here was a young woman, quite out of the public eye, who had been not laid aside in sickness but called aside for stillness, so that during these nine years the Lord had drawn so very close to her, and she to Him.

I discovered that she had a long prayer list, and every day she spent hours in prayer for missionaries, preachers, and teachers of the Word. She put me on her prayer list that day, and eternity alone will reveal how much I owe as a minister of the gospel to the prayers of that dear woman who for so long had been helpless and crippled. Surely this is just one example out of thousands where the Lord has permitted the suffering and the crushing that out of such a life there might come fragrance and fruitfulness and inspiration to others.

I believe the King of kings has a very special portion for such dear souls because their ministry is so mighty and so effective. Delegation, yes, to a very precious task but a very costly one. I wonder if you and I would be willing to have it delegated to us? Just suppose every bit of Christian work we do were taken from us, that our health and strength departed, and we were laid aside like that. Would we be bitter, or could we accept such a thing as from the hand of the Lord?

Somehow I feel that some day when we see our Lord face to face there will be come great surprises. Many of us who have held prominent positions in Christian work may not be so prominent then. Many who have been obscure, lonely souls, to whom little attention has been paid and whose ministry has never been recognized or praised, will be among those who are the first to hear His "Well done!" -- end of quote

--So easy to say, "Here I am, send me." Yet when you feel shelved and out of service (my view of service) it is so easy to feel lonely, useless and forgotten. This story, and other stories that have come my way, have been searching me and showing me how far I still have to go before "dying to self". This flesh dies o so slowly and o so painfully. To grow where we are planted. To learn to be content in all things. Hearing Pancho Juarez (pastor for Calvary Chapel Montebello) the other day he said something about the Lord pruning the fruit that is on the tree so that the tree can continue to give more fruit. He said that this was o so painful. And so we continue on this journey, this pilgrimage until we see Our Savior face-to-face and what a glorious day this will be. Then, nothing else will matter...even so come Lord Jesus!!!