117. SERVICE     --page 914--

         Present your body a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service (Rom.12:1).

         1. Only one life--'twill soon be past!
         Only what's done for Christ will last!
         2. Prepare thy work without and make it fit for thyself in the field, and afterwards build thine house. Pro.24:27.
         3. There is no discharge in this war! (Ecc.8:8)
         4. When love and skill work together, expect a masterpiece.
         5. Any farmer who has gone to the great trouble of plowing and sowing and watering and fertilising and seeding a tremendous crop, who then neglects to get in there and harvest it, is crazy! The farmer's got to plan for the future, and we're farmers of souls!
         6. Labour is light where Love doth pay.
         7. Art thou called being a servant? Seek not to be loosed.
         8. Every calling of God is great when greatly pursued.
         9. Your service is nothing without your love!
         10. Men are worth more than money to the Lord--the workers are worth more than the work!
         11. God is more interested in people than in money. He is more interested in souls than in income. He is more interested in your safety and usefulness than in mere prosperity.
         12. Service for God hurts, but service for the Devil hurts more. You bear a yoke for Jesus, but it's lighter than the Devil's.
         13. There is no higher position than to be a child of God and no greater honour than to be a voice for Him.--(By a teenage martyr burned at the stake in the 1500s!)
         14. One of the first things you learn in the Lord's work, living by faith, is the humility to be willing to receive.
         15. You've got the worthiest cause in the World!
         16. Our job is to witness, win souls and take care of the results!
         17. If you're not willing to work just as hard or harder for the Lord than you did for the System, then you ought to quit God's business and go back into the System and work for money.
         18. God's servant is more valuable than His money.
         19. If you turn your back on God's job, you're turning your back on God!
         20. What is the greatest work in the World?--To witness the Words of God, to preach the Gospel, to tell people about God's love, to show them the Love of Jesus!
         21. Nobody else is going to be able to do your job. Somebody else may be able to do their job, but God has given you this job.
         22. Only this one things is needful: To sit at His feet and learn of Him and pass on His Words to the World!
         23. God's servant is even more important than His work.
         24. The number one question in any situation is, are we getting the job done?
         25. When it comes to God's Work in the realm of the Spirit and the ministry of the Church, there is no male nor female in Christ Jesus.
         26. This is big business--the Lord's business, the biggest in the World!
         27. Nobody is totally indispensable.
         28. Salvation, souls, children and service for the Lord are forever!
         29. The work's going to be no good if you don't take care of the worker.
         30. There's a place for everybody, and everybody ought to be in their place!
         31. Sometimes we need big blobs to accomplish big jobs!
         32. Our work is our pleasure, and when we want to have fun we go to work!
         33. We believe in working more than ever before, but now not just for ourselves and our own living, but for others, to give them a better life.
         34. The Gift of God is Eternal Life, but it cost Jesus His to give it to you, and it'll probably cost you yours to live it!
         35. I cannot comprehend people's hesitation to serve the Lord all the way! If He's worth serving at all, He's worth serving full time and all the way!
         36. All you need to do is be Christians and help witness and win souls for Christ. That's your religious obligation.
         37. Work for the Lord should be a pleasure and not boring, and should supply "all your needs according to His riches in Christ Jesus."
         38. We're in a business that cannot fail!
         39. Our job is show business for the Lord--to show people the love of God!
         40. Too many of us have been cumbered with too much serving and not enough listening. We've had too many Martha's and not enough Mary's. We feel we must serve to exist when we should live to listen.
         41. Everybody's got their ministry, and unless you fail in yours, the Lord's not going to take it away from you unless He wants too give you a different one.
         42. I'm against anybody ever giving up their duty to God and man for so-called romantic love. Even if they are really in love, I don't think that's enough excuse to give up a duty to the Lord and to His work.
         43. It's His work, His business, so He'll have to take care of it. And we're His employees, so He'll have to take care of us.
         44. There is no unimportant job in God's Kingdom.
         45. We have to live that others may get ready to die.
         46. We all work--but not for money!
         47. We're in a dangerous business, but a wonderful one!
         48. Neither wise men nor fools can work without tools.
         49. It's newsboys who need to be numerous--not management with overgrown staffs and outgrown housing!
         50. Management and machinery are nothing without labourers.
         51. One of our greatest of all ministries: To save the children of the World and make them useful and helpful to each other and God's Kingdom!
         52. Whatever your place is, you're a very necessary part of God's Kingdom!
         53. We are in the business of trying to make people rich--spiritually!
         54. Our job is to try to clean up the World, and the best way to do it is by cleansing people's hearts and minds with the love of God, the power of Christ, and the pure knowledge of His Word.
         55. Passing on the Lord's Word to His children is fun, but it's a job you'll never get done!
         56. May you have a very happy new year in His thrilling, exciting, rewarding, loving Family service for Him and others!
         57. Now they can join hands and dance with David!
         Now they can share the kisses of the King!
         Now they can join hands and dance with Jesus!
         Now they can join hands and work for the king!
         58. Nothing is more important than God and His Work of love to save the youth of today!
         59. He that shall not work shall not eat!
         60. You're sure not saved by your works, but if you're saved, you'll sure work like everything to give salvation to others, and it'll cost you everything!
         61. The Words are the cause, those won are the effect!
         62. Our main purpose in life is "to love God and enjoy Him forever", and to help others enjoy life by telling them of God's love and the happy life we live together!
         63. The quicker we're done--the quicker He'll come!
         64. Your works can never save you--but you get to save your works, like saved souls!
         65. My job as a Prophet is to get the Word--your job is to give it!
         66. It's just as dangerous today to be the kind of Christian we are as it was for the Early Church.
         67. The most important thing in our service to Thee, Lord is our faithfulness.
         68. A talent is a test--use it for God's best!
         69. God could not make Antonio Stradivarius' violins without Antonio.
         70. The real purpose of our existence is not to make a living but to make a life.
         71. Paul's thorn in the flesh didn't keep him from serving God, it didn't keep him from doing God's work, it just kept him from being proud, that's all.
         72. A Christian cannot do a good job of serving God while he spends most of his time working for money--unless it's a lot of money and he gives nearly all of it to the Lord!
         73. How much do you really worship and serve God?--Only as much as you actually work for God.
         74. If your service for God hasn't got the Spirit, it stinks, and people are going to hold their noses and run the other way!
         75. To be the servant of all is the road to greatness.
         76. Burning the candle at both ends may look crazy, but it sure gives a better light, even though briefer!
         77. The great use of a life is to spend it for something that outlasts it.
         78. He never errs who sacrifices self for others.
         79. Life is like a tennis game; you can't win without serving.
         80. It requires more courage to suffer than to die.
         81. Only by giving ourselves in love do we begin to realise what it means to be complete.
         82. Prayers and praise!--The sacrifices of your lips and the sacrifices of your heart are the most important sacrifices of all!
         83. I don't believe in reminding yourself of your losses, like putting up a picture of a lost loved one to cry over all the time.
         84. Teach me, O Lord,
         To give and not to count the cost
         To fight and not to heed the wounds
         To toil and not to seek for rest
         To labour and not to ask reward
         Save that of knowing that I do Thy will.
         85. What costs nothing is worth nothing.
         86. We are God's expendables, created to burn out on the altar of sacrifice, made to wear out as His tools of design, to die that others might live!
         87. You can save your life now by living it for today, but in so doing lose it eventually forever.--Or you can lose your life now by giving it for Christ and in so doing keep it forever.
         88. It is better to wear out than to rust out.
         89. He died to save us, why should we not die to save others?
         90. Keep on loving for Jesus, amen?--Even if it means some suffering, it's worth it for the saving, praise God?
         91. It's got to hurt a little bit or it's no sacrifice!
         92. Spend your life losing your life for others--that's the secret of saving it!
         93. Jesus didn't go halfway to the cross for you, or almost all the way, but He went all the way and gave all His life for you! How much are you willing to give for others?
         94. It is better to burn the candle at both ends, and in the middle too, than to put it away in the closet unused.
         95. Are you going to reign now a little while and suffer a lot later?--Or are you going to suffer a little now and reign forever?
         96. Pity just feels sorry!--Compassion does something about it!
         97. Be not good for nothing, be good for something.
         98. Real love will cost you your life, and you can't pay any price greater than that!
         99. The picture of waiting on the Lord is like waiters and waitresses waiting on a customer, where the customer is king and can do no wrong! That's serving the Lord, that's waiting on the Lord, that's ministering to the Lord and others.
         100. Except you die, you'll never truly live; except you give forth, you can't truly take in.
         101. He has no hands but your hands and He has no lips but yours and He has no eyes but your eyes and no body but your own, for you are His body, His Bride for whom He died that you might live and love others as He did, with your hands, your lips, your mouth, your tongue, your eyes and your body broken for them as His was for you, your life given for them as His was for you, to even die for them as He did for you!
         102. Jesus has healed your heart, and some day He is going to heal your body. You must bear your cross for Jesus' sake and show your faith in spite of afflictions. As Jesus bore the cross, you bear this cross for Jesus because it shows a testimony to those who don't have a testimony, that through suffering you shall learn obedience, through the things you suffer as Jesus did.
         103. We can only offer you an invitation to come and die with us--to die to the flesh that ye may live in the Spirit.
         104. Many are called but few are chosen, because so few choose to be chosen.
         105. When you join God's army it has to be all or nothing at all. There's no halfway with the Lord.
         106. With us it's not your money or your life!--But both--everything you've got! That's what God expects! That's what He gave.
         107. Are you willing to sign a blank sheet of paper and let God fill it in without your ever knowing what His program for you is going to be?
         108. God may appreciate the bedroom slippers you're making for Him, but He'd rather have you.
         109. God will not take second place, even to His service.
         110. Probably the greatest mistake of sincere Christians is to make a god of God's Service.
         111. If you want to throw your life away, why not give it away?
         112. The real victory in all service is won in secret beforehand by prayer. Service is gathering up the results.
         113. Your "best" is to call on the Lord.
         114. We're in the investment business.--Souls for the Kingdom of God that reap eternal dividends.
         115. What does God need from you?--Most of all your intimate fellowship and love, but also your sacrificial service.
         116. What is it about His wife that makes Him the most proud?--That she's willing to bear His children and have His babies! That's the proof that she really loves Him.
         117. That's what we do for the house of God: We are His servants taking care of His House, His children. We feed and clothe them and take care of His babies, so He really is grateful for that and He really admires us for our service.
         118. If the primary purpose of your existence was to be saved, them the moment you got saved, your existence should have been ended, and you might as well have died and gone home to be with the Lord. So why did the Lord let you live on?--To save others!
         119. Our goal is to try to persuade everyone to love God and his neighbour as himself and this would solve all the problems of the whole World.
         120. You are engaged in the ministry of Christ, stooping to conquer! You're going down there as far as you possibly can go and getting dirty with their dirt to make them clean!
         121. Your children are a part of the Lord's service, and you need to recognise the fact that you need to take care of your own children as a service to God as well as to them!
         122. One lays down the cross, another takes it up. One forsakes the crown, another cherishes it. One deserts his birthright, another inherits it.
         123. Are you willing to give till it hurts?--Jesus did: he gave His life! God did: He gave His Son! David did: He said, "I will not give unto the Lord of that which has cost me nothing!" (2Sam.24:24)--They gave until it hurt! God gives His wife, the church, continually in loving service to others. He's constantly engaged in trying to woo and win the World!
         124. None of the Lord's workers are ever going to be out of a job! The whole World can go broke and unemployed or even bankrupt, but you're not ever going to be out of a job! You've always got a job and it's going to last as long as you last or until the Lord comes! It's always going to be the same job, preaching the Gospel, one way or the other.

         (See also No.S, 31, 48, 74, 182, 207, 241, 266, 314A, 510, 551, 564, 565, 566, 641, 662, 675, 697, 703, 727, 957, 960, 974, 1180, 1316, 1330, 1373, 1374, 1551.)

         125. 1SA.12:24 Only fear the LORD, and serve him in truth with all your heart: for consider how great things he hath done for you.
         126. MAT.16:25 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for My sake shall find it.
         127. MAT.20:28 Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.
         128. MAT.23:11 But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant.
         129. MAT.23:23b This ye ought to do...
         130. LUK.9:23 And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.
         131. LUK.17:10 When ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.
         132. JOH.4:34 Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish His work.
         133. 1CO.3:9 For we are labourers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.
         134. 1CO.6:20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.
         135. 2CO.5:15 And that He died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them, and rose again.
         136. 1TH.2:9 For ye remember, brethren, our labour and travail: for labouring night and day, because we would not be chargeable unto any of you, we preached unto you the gospel of God.
         137. 2TH.3:13 Brethren, be not weary in well doing.
         138. JAM.2:14 What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? Can faith save him?

Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family