God's object and end ought to be ours. The means ought never to supersede the end with us. What a strength and power in the words, "To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I might bear witness to the truth!" Paul says, he labors to present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. What an aim was this!
A man's aim gives a character to all his acts. A low aim can never carry a man high, but a high one has power to attract from a very low position; and when it is divine, it will be like the path of the just, becoming more positive and clear, the more it is pursued. No minister of the gospel ought to be satisfied with a condition for any believer inferior to what would satisfy the heart of Christ, not only with regard to the infancy of such a soul, but to its fruitful maturity. "Feed My sheep," is the claim of true affection for Christ; but if His present organization for the Church, and His future glory in her, be now disregarded, or untaught, are not the most precious secrets of His love suppressed or overlooked? One, who, in ministering to God's people, proposes to himself God's end and object for them, and nothing short of it, while feeling increasingly the responsibility of the trust, knows also that he need only deal out honestly and faithfully what has been committed to him, and abundantly will the need be supplied.
Truth is so fallen in the streets in these days, that the call to each is to be valued for the truth, and not merely to be convinced of the Tightness of a position. Truth, being fully revealed by our Lord Jesus Christ, there will be no further revelation of it. If any part of it be misrepresented, there will be an imperfect evangelization; for the Gospel is, that "grace and truth are come by Jesus Christ." Are we sufficiently alive to the responsibility of seeing that the truth of God, so long undeclared, but now fully declared by our Lord Jesus Christ, should not suffer in our attempts to expound the fulness and greatness of it? What painful misrepresentations of our Lord's doings and intentions down here, do we find in the current religious publications of the day! Therefore, I am bold to say, that if a soul does not see how he is called to vindicate Christ in these days, I see little use in gaining his approval of my position. If we were called to vindicate God, we must at once retire from a work for which we are utterly incompetent; but the Lord Jesus has vindicated Him by declaring the truth; and it is only a veritable adherence to what He has done that we are called to. If the '''Spirit of truth" be working in a soul, there will be exercise as to what is truth, and, in teaching souls, how necessary to be assured that they are learning the truth, that the Spirit is thereby guiding them into it.
Full truth alone can keep us from slipping off from our proper place; the more fully we know it the better we know our position; for truth is but the mind and judgment of Him, whom the better we know, the more are we bound to love, for we thus find how absolutely He is for our blessing. The more one line of truth becomes diffused, the more does every other line require to be pressed, or there will be departure from the moral symmetry belonging to the body of Christ on earth. The Lord keep us loving His truth-the unfolding of Himself! He is but a poor friend who would not like to know more, and all about me, or I must be very unworthy. How blessed to be allowed of God to set the seeds of His truth in the souls of His people; and how we ought to rejoice at every apprehension a soul gets of the truth of our God!
"This God is our God for ever and ever:He shall be our Guide even unto death."
From "The Present Testimony"