We Are His Workmanship
We are God's workmanship, created for good works that He has prepared for us, and we can receive them by faith and go forward in His power and provision.
A.B. Simpson emphasizes that we are God's workmanship, created for good works that He has prepared for us. He encourages believers to serve not in their own strength but by relying on Christ's resources and might. Simpson highlights the importance of faith in our work, even when we feel weak and helpless, assuring that God will provide the power and fruits of our labor. He draws on the metaphor of working in the wilderness, where true fruitfulness often emerges from barrenness. Ultimately, he calls us to walk and work by faith, leading to the salvation of souls and eternal fruitfulness.
Text
Christ sends us to serve Him, not in our own strength, but in His resources and might. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before [prepared] that we should walk in them (Ephesians 2:10). We do not have to prepare them but to wear them as garments made to order for every occasion of our lives. We must receive them by faith and go forth in His work, believing that He is with us and in us as our all-sufficiency for wisdom, faith, love, prayer, power and every grace and gift that our work requires. In this work of faith we shall have to feel weak and helpless and even have little consciousness of power.
But if we believe and go forward, He will be the power and He will send the fruits.
The most useful services we render are those which, like the sweet fruits of the wilderness, spring from hours of barrenness. [I] will bring her into the wilderness, . . . And I will give her vineyards from thence (Hosea 2:14-15). Let us learn to work as well as walk by faith. Then we shall receive the end of our faith, the salvation of precious souls, and our lives will bear fruit which shall be manifest throughout all eternity.
Sermon Outline
- We Are His Workmanship
- Receiving Works by Faith
- Fruitful Services in the Wilderness
- Created for Good Works
- Walking in God's Prepared Works
- Believing in God's All-Sufficiency
- Going Forward in Faith
- Springing from Hours of Barrenness
- Manifest Fruit Throughout Eternity
Key Quotes
“We do not have to prepare them but to wear them as garments made to order for every occasion of our lives.” — A.B. Simpson
“The most useful services we render are those which, like the sweet fruits of the wilderness, spring from hours of barrenness.” — A.B. Simpson
Application Points
- We must learn to work as well as walk by faith, trusting in God's all-sufficiency and provision.
- Our most useful services to God come from times of feeling weak and helpless, but still trusting in His power and provision.
- The end of our faith is the salvation of precious souls, and our lives bearing fruit that will be manifest throughout all eternity.