Others May, You Cannot
Anonymous Tract (see info below)
If God has called you to be really like Jesus He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility, and put upon you such demands of obedience, that you will not be able to follow other people. You will not be able to measure yourself by other Christians, and in many ways He will seem to let others do things which He will not let you do.
Other Christians and ministers who seem very religious and useful may push
themselves, pull wires, and work schemes to carry out their plans, but you
cannot do it, and if you attempt it, you will meet with such
failure and rebuke from the Lord as to make you sorely penitent.
Others may boast of themselves, of their work, of their success, of their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all your good works.
Others may be allowed to succeed in making money, or may have a legacy left to them, but it is likely God will keep you poor, because He wants you to have something far better than gold, namely, a helpless dependence upon Him, that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by day out of an unseen treasury.
The Lord may let others be honored and put forward, and keep you hidden
in obscurity, because He wants to produce in you some choice, fragrant fruit
for His coming glory, which can only be produced in the shade. He may let
others be great, but keep you small. He may let others do a work for Him
and get the credit for it, but He will allow you to work and toil without
knowing how much you are doing. Then, to
make your work still more precious, He may let others get credit for the
work which you have done, and thus make your reward ten times greater when
Jesus comes.
The Holy Spirit will put a strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and
will rebuke you for little words and feelings or for wasting your time, which
other Christians never feel distressed over. So make up your mind
that God is an infinite Sovereign, and has a right to do as He pleases with
His own. He may not explain to you a thousand things which puzzle your reason
in His dealings with you. But, if you absolutely sell
yourself to be his love slave, He will wrap you up in a jealous love, and
bestow upon you many blessings, which come to those who are in His inner
circle.
Settle it forever, then, that you are to deal directly with the Holy Spirit, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, chaining your hand, or closing your eyes in ways that He does not seem to use with others. When you are so possessed with the living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this peculiar, personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit in your life, you will have found the secret of Heaven.
VICTORY
When you are forgotten or neglected, or purposely set at naught, and you smile inwardly, glorying in the insult or oversight, because thereby counted worthy to suffer with Christ - that is victory!
When your good is evil spoken of, when your wishes are crossed, your taste offended, your advice discarded, your opinions ridiculed, and you take it all in patient, loving silence - that is victory!
When you are content with any food, any raiment, any climate, any society, any solitude, any interruption by the will of God - that is VICTORY!
"Lord Jesus, make Yourself to me
A living, bright Reality;
More present to faith's vision keen
Than any earthly object seen;
More dear, more intimately nigh
Than e'en the dearest earthly tie."
Originally published as Tract 76 by
Faith, Prayer and Tract League
2627 Elmridge Drive
Grand Rapids, MI 49544-1390
You can see the rest of their tracts at TractLeague.com