A CO-WORKER WITH GOD
‘Now I have prepared with all my might for the house of my God.’
I. It is a natural and reasonable custom that we should pay great respect to the last words of the dying.—In truth what we call last words might very often be first words of faith and hope, a kind of link in the conversation that continually should go on unbroken through eternity. The words of the text are last words, or the first words of a man who was after God’s own heart—King David. It was work for God’s house, for the Church of God, that was satisfactory to the soul of David. He worked hard, and so there is a lesson for us. Even Adam in Paradise before the Fall had to till the ground and keep it. Labour is good for all in whatever station in life they may be. The Son of God laboured, so we may put away the fallacy that is current in some people’s minds that they should work until they get enough money to do nothing.
II. But there are different kinds of labour.—Would they say that the man who was called to some great position in political affairs had an easier life than the clerk in his office, or that a greater weight of responsibility was not felt by the general on the eve of battle than by the soldier serving in the ranks? The reward in the end, however, was one and the same, for we read in the Bible, ‘She hath done what she could.’ If a man did what he could, God would give him his full reward. The soldier whose name perhaps was never known, except in the roll, would receive his reward just as much as the general who won the battle. God knew our capacities, and required that we should all do what we could. David handed over the pattern of the building which Solomon was to build, and he gave them an example of self-disciplined work. If every one sang strictly from music, instead of sometimes introducing their own notes, how different the harmony would be! So it is in our own lives. Discipline is needed, and if we wanted to know what God would have us to do we must study the Bible and attend to the ordinances of the Church, which was the witness and depository of the faith. We were earnest about the Church because we believed that man would find his great wants satisfied there, and we were also desirous that the sacred edifices in which we worshipped should be befitting the holy purposes for which they were called into use. A bare, beggarly church does not suggest to the people that it is the House of God. David said he had prepared for the house, but Solomon built it; and so those I am addressing have something to do to hand on the pattern to their children, for it is a noble and glorious work.
—Bishop C. Wordsworth.
Illustrations
(1) ‘In April, 1848, there was gathered a great crowd in the square of Bologna. Garibaldi’s friend, Ugo Bassi, had been calling on the people for their gifts, to aid the patriot-leader in his venturesome campaign. Soon there was a mighty heap in the centre of the square: money, and tapestries, and Venetian crystal, and precious stuffs from Eastern looms, and the jewels of princely houses. But then a poor girl, dressed in coarse blue serge, barefooted, took from her neighbour’s belt the hanging shears and cut off her tresses of golden hair, and sprang forward and laid them in Ugo Bassi’s arms, and said: “Sell that for Italy!” And she gave more than all the rest.’
(2) ‘So long as the king prepared for the House of God from the spoils of war, we do not read of the uprising of national enthusiasm. His zeal might be interpreted as emanating from the desire to leave a great monument to himself, and nothing so kills public generosity as the least suspicion of vanity or self-seeking; but when the people realised that he was giving his own private stores, then they answered in a magnificent outburst of generosity. The king could make the appeal, and the people would respond to it. Altogether a sum of £17,000,000 was contributed; and it was done with the most exquisite grace. Oh, that Christian people realised the abounding joy of offering willingly and with a perfect heart that which costs them something!’
(3) ‘David’s devotion to the Lord’s House was very beautiful. He had set his affection on it. He refused merely to incite others to generosity by his words, but gave in a princely fashion of his own property. As the figures stand, David contributed of his own resources eighteen million pounds, and his rulers thirty-one millions; but these amounts are so immense that it is supposed that some error has crept into the copies from the original text. He was surely justified in saying that he had prepared with all his might.’