Isaiah 49:4 Then I said, I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing, and in vain: yet surely my judgment is with the LORD… Draw near to those giants of the spiritual order, those workmen of God who in different ages have been called Elijah, St. Paul, Chrysostom, St. Bernard, Luther, or Whitefield, and who confound you by the immense work which they have accomplished, you will hear them groan under the small results of their works. Elijah cries out to God: "Take away my life; I am not better than my fathers." Isaiah pronounces the words of my text: "I have spent my strength for naught, and in vain." St. Paul trembles in fear of having been a useless labourer; St. Bernard expresses in his last letters the painful feeling of having accomplished almost nothing. Calvin, dying, said to those who surrounded him: "All that I have done has been of no value. The wicked will gladly seize upon this word. But I repeat it, all that I have done has been of no value, and I am a miserable creature." What must we conclude? That these men did nothing? No, but that, in the presence of the ideal which God has put in their heart, their work appeared to them almost lost. (E. Bersier.) Parallel Verses KJV: Then I said, I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, and in vain: yet surely my judgment is with the LORD, and my work with my God. |
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