[(JD)]

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And he, trembling and astonished said, "Lord what wilt thou have me to do?
And the Lord said unto him, "Arise and go into the city and it shall be told thee what thou must do." Acts 9:6

When Stephen died the Church suffered a great loss, but God cares for His work and raises up others to replace those who are promised to heaven. The work of Christ is never dependent upon the survival of one person.

Often the Lord calls the most unlikely into His service. Saul had stood guard over the coats of those who stoned Stephen. Who would have suspected that he would soon be converted to Stephen's Saviour?

Saul's conversion teaches that the most difficult cases are not hopeless.

It is unlikely that any of those early Christians expected Saul to be saved...certainly not to become the greatest missionary ever. If the believers in Damascus knew that Saul was headed that way, they may have prayed for deliverance from his persecution but probably few would have dared believe he would be born again enroute to their city.

The secret of Saul's usefulness as a Christian may be found in his initial reaction to his encounter with Christ. His response: "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" indicates immediate and total surrender. He gave his life to the Saviour with no strings attached. From that point on his desire would be to know the will of God, and to do it.

Every useful servant of Christ has come to the point of unconditional surrender. D.L.Moody was determined to be a man who was completely yielded to the will of God, and the world still reaps the benefit.

[SeptemberMorn]

GOD EXPECTS YOUR SURRENDER

Yes, it has its foundation in the very nature of God. God cannot do otherwise. Who is God? He is the Fountain of life, the only Source of existence and power and goodness. Throughout the universe there is nothing good but what God works. God has created the sun, the moon, the stars, the flowers, the trees, and the grass. Are they not all absolutely surrendered to God? Do they not allow God to work in them just what He pleases? When God clothes the lily with its beauty, is it not yielded up, surrendered, given over to God as He works in it its beauty? And God's redeemed children, can you think that God can do His work if there is only half or a part of them surrendered? God cannot do it. God is life, love, blessing, power, and infinite beauty, and God delights in communicating Himself to every child who is prepared to receive Him. But this one lack of absolute surrender is just the thing that hinders God. And now He comes, and as God, He claims it.

You know in daily life what absolute surrender is. You know that everything has to be given up to its special, definite object and service. I have a pen in my pocket, and that pen is absolutely surrendered to the one work of writing. That pen must be absolutely surrendered to my hand if I am to write properly with it. If another holds it partly, I cannot write properly. My coat is absolutely given up to me to cover my body. A church building is entirely given up to religious services. And now, do you expect that in your immortal being, in the divine nature that you have received by regeneration, God can work His work, every day and every hour, unless you are entirely given up to Him? God cannot. The temple of Solomon was absolutely surrendered to God when it was dedicated to Him. And every one of us is a temple of God, in which God will dwell and work mightily on one condition-absolute surrender to Him. God claims it, God is worthy of it, and without it God cannot work His blessed work in us.

God not only claims it, but God will work it Himself.

[nothemama8]

this is so easy to say but hard to do

[SeptemberMorn]

God not only claims it, but God will work it Himself.