^ In Millet's " Angelus " we see the toil-worn peasants, who have been bending over the ground through the long afternoon, standing up from their work to think reverently and prayerfully of God, as the notes of the evening bell come floating over the fields from the dim church tower. The pious men of Israel con- tinually heard a Divine monition, as clear and sweet as the sound of the Angelus-bell, reminding them that life's labours were part of a godly service, and that the eyes of the Lord were upon them in the midst of the common occupations of each returning day.^
III.
Work as Fellowship with God.
1, St. Paul more than once in his Epistles describes himself and his companions in service and sacrifice as fellow- workers with
1 Phillips Brooks, Seeking Life, 347. ' J. C. Lambert.
32S THE DAY'S WORK
God. The words speak of conscious and voluntary co-operation, of willing and intelligent oneness of purpose and effort, with the will and work of God. In creating and perfecting His world, in getting His will done on earth as it is in heaven, God has made Himself dependent upon the help and fidelity of His human children. And the more we understand of the nature of God and the range of His working, the more shall we realize the extent to which it is possible for man to have a share in doing God's work. Our Lord's teaching about the Fatherhood of God and His personal care for every detail of every life has thrown a new light both on the nature of human work and on the spirit in which it may be done. Since all the trivialities of life and the petty drudgeries are steps in the progress towards one end, there is no sphere of human activity which is excluded from contribut- ing towards the realization of the Divine purpose for the comfort and good of man.
All service ranks the same with God.
And there is no labourer, however humble, who may not be inspired at his toil by the child's proud consciousness that he is helping his Father. Under all circumstances he is called to co-operate with God in the service of man.
^ Her devotion and her power of work were prodigious. " I work in the wards all day," she said, " and write all night " ; and this was hardly exaggeration. Miss Nightingale has been known, said General Bentinck, to pass eight hours on her knees dressing wounds and administering comfort. There were times when she stood for twenty hours at a stretch, apportioning quarters, distribut- ing stores, directing the labours of her staff, or assisting at the pain- ful operations where her presence might soothe or support. She had, said Mr. Osborae, " an utter disregard of contagion. I have known her spend hours over men dying of cholera or fever. The more awful to every sense, any particular case, especially if it was that of a dying man, the more certainly might her slight form be seen bending over him, administering to his ease by every means in her power, and seldom quitting his side till death released him." ^
^ You remember George Eliot's fine poem on the famous violin-maker of Cremona and its lesson :
' Sir Edward Cook, The Life of Florence Nightingale, i. 284.
PSALM CIV. 23 329
. . . Not God Himself can make man's best Without best men to help Him. . . .
'Tis God gives skill, But not without men's hands: He could not make Antonio Stradivari's violins Without Antonio.
It is a bold saying, but true. We have a work to do in the world which God cannot do, which we must do, or it will be left un- done. Only as we co-operate with Him, can His will be done on earth as in heaven.^
2. The Divine power in the world is not an abstract, im- personal energy. God is in the world creating and perfecting, His power and spirit dwelling in and working through industrious, righteous, faithful, beneficent lives. The unit of power in the world is not God isolated from man, and not man isolated from God ; but God and man united, working purposely and continu- ously together; God quickening and inspiring man, and man opening his life to be a part of the Divine life of the world. The religion of Jesus Christ represents this union of man and God in purpose and work. Man works with God : God inspires man. " My Father," said Jesus, " works continuously and I work. The works I do are not Mine, but the Father's who sent ^le. I do what I see My Father doing. And as the Father sent Me so send I you. The glory He has given to Me I give to you — that we may all be one, doing the same thing, working the same work."
^j We have all been tired in our time, one may presume ; we have toiled in business, or in some ambitious course, or in the perfecting of some accomplishment, or even in the mastery of some game or the pursuit of some amusement, till we were utterly wearied : how many of us have so toiled in love ? How many of us have been wearied and worn with some labour to which we set ourselves for God's sake ? This is what the Apostle has in view in his phrase " labour of love," and, strange as it may appear, it is one of the things for which he gives God thanks. But is he not right ? Is it not a thing to evoke gratitude and joy, that God counts us worthy to be fellow-labourers with Him in the manifold works which love imposes ?2