WHO IS GOING TO DO THE WORK?

Andrew Carnegie was a fabulous little Scotsman. He started in poverty and built one of the world's greatest business empires. Once, someone asked him what he believed about the future of his businesses.

He said, "You can take from me all my plants. You can take from me all my money. You can take from me all my equipment. But if you leave me my men, I will build it all again." Carnegie's genius was that he knew an organization is not finances or techniques or equipment. It is human resources.

God's method is always a person. When God chose to speak to human history decisively, to get under the load of human weakness and sin, his method was a person, Jesus Christ, God in flesh and blood.

But the principle of incarnation was not just used during the lifetime of Jesus on earth. It is the principle by which the church operates today. The church is the body of Jesus Christ. God works through flesh and blood, men and women who are committed to his cause. This is the reason that the laity is called today to be God's people wherever they are, whatever they are doing.

One of the critics of Abraham Lincoln's administration of the Civil War once said, "Mr. Lincoln you must throw General McClellan overboard." Lincoln asked who he should put in General McClellan's place, and the critic said, "Anybody." Lincoln coolly replied, "Anybody will do for you. But I must have somebody."

Who is going to do the work of Jesus Christ in deed and in word? You might say that anybody can do it. No, my friend, God must have somebody.

And God intends that somebody be you and me.

--Howard Butt, http://www.thehighcalling.org/Library/RecentBlogs.asp?CategoryID=2&BlogID=610&WID=411&T=H&SID=12675