Monday, December 3, 2018
Luke 1:37 For with God nothing will be impossible.
MIGHTY OAKS FROM LITTLE ACORNS
J. Hudson Taylor (1832-1905) said, "How often do we attempt work for God to the limit of our incompetency, rather than to the limit of God's omnipotence?" He started the China Inland Mission, which at his death had 125 stations with 800 missionaries and 125,000 Chinese Christians. Based upon work like the CIM's, when the Communists took over forty some years later in China, the church could go underground and prosper even in adversity.
Though we would not work in the interdenominational approach that Taylor used, we cannot deny the small beginning and God's work through the Word. After a 5 1/2-month ship journey from England he landed in Shanghai. His arrival was during a civil war with its attendant fires, famine and stalking death. He was 22. From the very beginning he stressed dependence on God for everything without the haranguing for more money and workers so common in some churches. His supporting passage for this was Luke 6:38, "Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For the measure you give will be the measure you get back." We never lose what we give to Him who owns it. Another favorite passage in Taylor's work was Genesis 22:14, "The Lord will provide." And He did. For the CIM there were 24 workers, then 70 were added, then 100 came out.
We look at the acorn and think that it is a tough nut to crack. We ponder on the mighty oak and think, "How could that come from the tiny acorn?" The answer: "For with God nothing will be impossible" (Luke 1:37). "With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible" (Matthew 19:26). "All things are possible to him who believes" (Mark 9:23). We humbly cry out with the father of the child, "I believe; help my unbelief" (Mark 9:24).
