Ten-pound Christians!

(J.R. Miller)  LISTEN to audio! Download audio

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"So he called ten of his servants and gave them ten pounds. 'Put this money to work,' he said, 'until I come back.'" Luke 19:13

We are doing business in this world for Christ. Each one of us has something of His-a pound which He has entrusted to us, to trade with as His agent. Our life itself, with all its powers, its endowments, its opportunities, its privileges, its blessings, its possibilities-is 'our pound'.

Our life is not our own. We are not in this world merely to have a good time for a few years. Life is a trust. We are not done with it either, when we have lived it through to its last day. We must render an account of it to Him who gave it to us. Our business is to gather gains, through our trading with our Lord's money. We are required to make the most that is possible of our life!

"The first came forward and said: Master, your pound has earned ten more pounds!" Luke 19:16

We always find a few of these ten-pound Christians among the followers of Christ. They are those Christians who, from the very beginning, through divine grace-strive to reach the best things attainable in life. They are not content with being merely saved from sin's guilt, with being mere members of the church. They make their consecration to Christ complete, keeping nothing back. They set their ideal of obedience to their Lord, at the mark of perfectness, and are not slack in their striving, until they reach the mark in Heaven. They seek to follow Christ entirely, fully, with their whole heart. They accept every duty, without regard to its cost. They seek to be like Christ, imitating Him in all the elements of His character. They give their whole energy to the work and service of Christ. They lie, like John, on the Master's bosom, and their souls are struck through, as it were, with the Master's loving spirit.

These ten-pound Christians grow at last into a Christ-likeness, a spiritual beauty, and a power of usefulness and influence, by which they are set apart among Christians, shining with brighter luster than other stars in the galaxy of the church. Their one pound has made ten more pounds! Their high spiritual attainment has been won by their diligent and wise use of the one pound with which they began!

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Something to ponder:
J.R. Miller: A Christian is not called to an easy, comfortable, self-indulgent life-but to self-denial, sacrifice, and cross-bearing.
"Then Jesus said to his disciples: If anyone would come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me!" Matthew 16:24