Friday: AMinimum of Strain with aMaximum of Result
WEEK 31
FRIDAY
A MINIMUM OF STRAIN WITH A MAXIMUM OF RESULT
Psalm 66:16-19
We left off yesterday with the mission-board doctor suggesting that if I were a regular missionary of the board, he would not let me go to Japan. I am a regular missionary of the board; but since I pay my own way, I can do as I like. The diabetic specialist said, “You have a marginal case. It can be controlled by diet.” I wondered how I could keep to a diet traveling to seventy-three cities in Japan in three months!
But the Lord’s assurance was clear: “You go. In Me you are well and whole. And there will be a minimum of strain with a maximum of result.” When I asked how I should know I am well and whole, God replied, “The test tube.” That was specific. For two months after my arrival in Japan the test tube was not clear, so I had to walk by faith. Then in April 1953, the test tube cleared, and it has been clear ever since. When I had a thorough checkup at the Lahey Clinic under the president of the American Diabetic Association, he said, “You not only are fine; you are extraordinarily fine.”
As to the “minimum of strain with a maximum of result” that too proved true—gloriously true. I was speaking from two to five times a day for three months and traveling between times, and I came out at the end without exhaustion—even felt fresh. I finished a book I was writing, though I had only thirty-five weeks of the fifty-two when I began. And there was a maximum of result. In three months, 36,000 people, from high officials down signed cards to become Christians. It was perhaps the most fruitful three months I’ve ever had in forty-seven years of evangelistic work. There was literally a “minimum of strain with a maximum of result.”
But we cannot ask for healing unless we are doing our part in having continuous health. My prescription for continuous health is (1) exercise—I take it the last thing before I go to bed; (2) right habits—I go to bed at a decent hour; (3) right thinking and emotions; (4) grace. These four things have been the basis of my marvelous health at seventy—abounding health!
O Lord God, I thank you that you will good health for us; if I get in line with your will and purpose, I can have all the health I can use. Help me to get in line. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: Since my health is my wealth, I shall take God’s health and make it my own.