John 4:35
To me, it is very simple, I must finish the task simply because Jesus told me to. Like Him, I don’t want to leave behind an unfinished task. I don’t want to be a halfway person. I do not belong to a halfway church – a church that does things halfway, slipshod, and haphazard. Jesus was no halfway, slipshod haphazard Savior – He did all things with excellence. He created with excellence all things! He redeemed in excellence all things! He operates in supreme excellence and if we are going to operate and represent Him, then we will have to do all things in excellence.
He doesn’t start anything that He does not finish. On the cross He amazingly, triumphantly declared – It is finished! (Jn 19:30) I would so love it that at the hour of my death – I can declare – it is finished! All that the Father gave me to do – is done! It is finished! No regrets! I am seeking to live my short life with no regrets! I may not have had a lot of money or the fanciest of clothes, or the opportunities of others, but No Regrets!
The Apostle Paul so lived his life that he was able to write his own epitaph and deliver his own eulogy – “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only but unto all them that love his appearing” (II Tim 4:7,8). However, he forewords this amazing testimony of his God–charged life by declaring – “For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time of my departure is near” (II Tim 4:6 NIV). The Message Bible puts it this way “You take over. I am about to die, my life an offering on God’s Altar. This is the only race worth running. I have run hard, right to the finish, believed all the way. All that is left now is the shouting – God’s applause! Depend on it, He is an honest judge. He will do right not only by me, but by everyone eager for His coming.”
May the Almighty help us not to try to hold anything back, trying to save ourselves, but may everything within us be completely, absolutely, unreservedly, poured out. This church must pour everything out for Him and in His service – Poured out as a drink offering on His altar. Everything given in His service and in His cause!
Now that COVID is on the wane – the church must get on with the task. COVID did not stop us. COVID intensified us. It motivated us. It propelled us! It enlightened us as to new ways to get this message across and we must not abandon these new ways but learn to do them better. Souls are dying, men are crying! How urgent is our task! Like Jesus, we declare “. . . My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me and to finish His work” (John 4:34). We so rejoice in what has been accomplished thus far. However, Jesus instructed us, “Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? Behold I say unto you, lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest” (John 4:35). May the Lord of the harvest remind us constantly of the urgency of the task and the compelling nature of our unchanging mission mandate. We must get on with the task at hand! Finish the task!
Leroy V. Greenaway
Presiding Bishop – Northeast Region
