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Oswald Chambers
Oswald Chambers (1874–1917). Born on July 24, 1874, in Aberdeen, Scotland, to a Baptist minister’s family, Oswald Chambers became a renowned Bible teacher and author, best known for My Utmost for His Highest. Raised in a devout home, he studied art at the University of Edinburgh and Dunoon Theological College, developing a gift for preaching influenced by Charles Spurgeon, whom he heard at 16. Converted in his teens, he felt called to ministry after a profound spiritual experience and traveled globally, teaching at Bible schools in the UK, U.S., and Japan. In 1910, he married Gertrude “Biddy” Hobbs, who later compiled his teachings; they had one daughter, Kathleen. Chambers founded the Bible Training College in London (1911–1915), closing it to serve as a YMCA chaplain in Egypt during World War I. There, he ministered to soldiers at Zeitoun Camp until his death from appendicitis complications on November 15, 1917, in Cairo, at age 43. His books, like Biblical Psychology and Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, were published posthumously from Biddy’s shorthand notes. Chambers said, “The great essential of the missionary is that he remains true to the call of God.”
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Oswald Chambers emphasizes that the key to a missionary's work is the authority of Jesus Christ, not the needs of the lost. He challenges believers to see Jesus as the absolute sovereign and supreme Lord over His disciples, calling them to go and make disciples of all nations based on the revealed truth of His sovereignty. Chambers highlights the importance of knowing Christ personally through worship and meeting Him in times of labor and weariness, as expressed in Matthew 11:28.
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The Key to the Missionary's Work
The key to the missionary’s work is the authority of Jesus Christ, not the needs of the lost. We are inclined to look on our Lord as one who assists us in our endeavors for God. Yet our Lord places Himself as the absolute sovereign and supreme Lord over His disciples. He does not say that the lost will never be saved if we don’t go— He simply says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations….” He says, “Go on the basis of the revealed truth of My sovereignty, teaching and preaching out of your living experience of Me.” “Then the eleven disciples went…to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them” (Matthew 28:16). If I want to know the universal sovereignty of Christ, I must know Him myself. I must take time to worship the One whose name I bear. Jesus says, “Come to Me…”— that is the place to meet Jesus— “all you who labor and are heavy laden…” (Matthew 11:28)— and how many missionaries are! We completely dismiss these wonderful words of the universal Sovereign of the world, but they are the words of Jesus to His disciples meant for here and now. “Go therefore….” To “go” simply means to live. Acts 1:8 is the description of how to go. Jesus did not say in this verse, “Go into Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria,” but, “…you shall be witnesses to Me in [all these places].” He takes upon Himself the work of sending us. “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you…” (John 15:7)— that is the way to keep going. Where we are placed is then a matter of indifference to us, because God sovereignly engineers our goings. “None of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus…” (Acts 20:24). That is how to keep going until we are gone from this life.
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Oswald Chambers (1874–1917). Born on July 24, 1874, in Aberdeen, Scotland, to a Baptist minister’s family, Oswald Chambers became a renowned Bible teacher and author, best known for My Utmost for His Highest. Raised in a devout home, he studied art at the University of Edinburgh and Dunoon Theological College, developing a gift for preaching influenced by Charles Spurgeon, whom he heard at 16. Converted in his teens, he felt called to ministry after a profound spiritual experience and traveled globally, teaching at Bible schools in the UK, U.S., and Japan. In 1910, he married Gertrude “Biddy” Hobbs, who later compiled his teachings; they had one daughter, Kathleen. Chambers founded the Bible Training College in London (1911–1915), closing it to serve as a YMCA chaplain in Egypt during World War I. There, he ministered to soldiers at Zeitoun Camp until his death from appendicitis complications on November 15, 1917, in Cairo, at age 43. His books, like Biblical Psychology and Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, were published posthumously from Biddy’s shorthand notes. Chambers said, “The great essential of the missionary is that he remains true to the call of God.”