Things to Avoid from Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones - This is a very dangerous condition for the soul, because what generally happens is that such people become overtired, and overstrained. The spiritual tone of their lives then suffers. This principle is true in every realm and department of life. Any man who overdoes things—I do not care what he is doing—will soon discover that, first of all, the quality of his work begins to suffer. A man who preaches too much, who works too hard in t he ministry, a man who is over active, a man who sings too much—in all cases the first thing to go will be the quality. The general public will not detect it for some time. The critics, however, will recognize it; they will say that the man is being carried along by his past reputation, but that he is not the master he used to be, that the finesse is not there, that he has lost something. It is simply because the man is overworking, is getting tired, and the result is that he is steadily losing something vital. This is particularly true in the spiritual realm. There are many who, with very good intentions, and feeling that they must be doing something to justify their Christianity, often get into this state because they are afraid of the criticisms of the devotees of this popular teaching at the present time. Many Christians, because of their fear of the glib clichés that are being used so much, feel that they must be always doing something. This is a very real problem. Some Christian professional men are out at meetings almost every night of the week. That is even wrong from the standpoint of family life; but I am not concerned about that at the moment. I am concerned about the danger to themselves. They find themselves exhausted, with nothing to give in the end; they are just mechanically doing something which is of very little value. I call their fault ‘dissipation of energy’—it is unintelligent activity. Every man has to sit down and plan his life, and decide what he can do and what he cannot do. He must be resolute, and not be governed by ‘what people say’. He is the one who is in the best position to know how much he can do, when he is to do it, and where he is to do it. Never allow yourselves to be dictated to by others. Do not allow ‘the thing to do’ in any realm to determine what you do. We must be in charge of ourselves, otherwise we shall become weary and tired and exhausted simply through dissipating, throwing away, our energy
Posted on: Sat, 03 Jan 2015 19:48:34 +0000
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