'That I _may_ finish my course ... I _have_ finished my course'; in the
same lofty meaning, not merely _ended_, though that was true, but
'completed, accomplished, perfected.'
Now some hyper-sensitive people have thought that it was very strange
that the Apostle, who was always preaching the imperfection of all
human obedience and service, should, at the end of his life, indulge in
such a piece of what they fancy was self-complacent retrospect as to
say 'I have kept the faith; I have fought a good fight; I have finished
my course.' But it was by no means complacent self-righteousness. Of
course he did not mean that he looked back upon a career free from
faults and flecks and stains. No. There is only one pair of human lips
that ever could say, in the full significance of the word, 'It is
finished! ... I have completed the work which Thou gavest Me to do.'
Jesus Christ's retrospect of a stainless career, without defect or
discordance at any point from the divine ideal, is not repeated in any
of His servants' experiences. But, on the other hand, if a man in the
middle of his difficulties and his conflict pulls himself habitually
together and says to himself, 'Nothing shall move me, so that I may
complete this bit of my course,' depend upon it, his effort, his
believing effort, will not be in vain; and at the last he will be able
to look back on a career which, though stained with many imperfections,
and marred with many failures, yet on the whole has realised the divine
purpose, though not with absolute completeness, at least sufficiently
to enable the faithful servant to feel that all his struggle has not
been in vain.
Brethren, no one else can. And oh! how different the two 'courses' of
the godly man and the worldling look, in their relative importance,
when seen from this side, as we are advancing towards them, and from
the other as we look back upon them! Pleasures, escape from pains,
ease, comfort, popularity, quiet lives--all these things seem very
attractive; and God's will often seems very hard and very repulsive,
when we are advancing towards some unwelcome duty. But when we get
beyond it and look back, the two careers have changed their characters;
and all the joys that could be bought at the price of the smallest
neglected duty or the smallest perpetrated sin, dwindle and dwindle and
dwindle, and the light is out of them, and they show for what they
are--nothings, gilded nothings, painted emptinesses, lies varnished
over. And on the other hand, to do right, to discharge the smallest
duty, to recognise God's will, and with faithful effort to seek to do
it in dependence upon Him, that towers and towers and towers, and there
seems to be, as there really is, nothing else worth living for.
So let us live with the continual remembrance in our minds that all
which we do has to be passed in review by us once more, from another
standpoint, and with another illumination falling upon it. And be sure
of this, that the one thing worth looking back upon, and possible to be
looked back upon with peace and quietness, is the humble, faithful,
continual discharge of our appointed tasks for the dear Lord's sake. If
you and I, whilst work and troubles last, do truly say, 'None of these
things move me, so that I _might_ finish my course,' we too, with all
our weaknesses, may be able to say at the last, 'Thanks be to God! I
_have_ finished my course.'