Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to our first reading, the Gospel
according to Luke, chapter 5, and reading for our text, verse
5. And Simon answering said unto
him, Master, we have toiled all the night and have taken nothing. Nevertheless, at thy word, I
will let down the net. This must have been a very perplexing
time for the dear disciples. They were professional fishermen,
they knew the sea and what they were doing. And yet this had
happened to them, toiling all night, no fish, nothing at all. And then they were called upon
to listen to a sermon of our Lord Jesus Christ as he preached
to them, as he spoke to them from their ship. We're not told
what he said, what he spoke on this occasion, but it must have
been hard for them to be listening to the Word of God when they
had in the back of their mind the events of the previous night,
no doubt bearing upon them. I wonder how many of us know
what it is to listen to a sermon, to be found in the house of God
under the sound of the truth, but in the back of our mind there's
a perplexing providence, something that has been happening maybe
even in the last night or in the day, and it puzzles us, and
it is a stumbling block to what we are hearing. And the disciples
hear their reaction when our Lord asks them to launch out
into the deep and let down their nets. Then it is that Simon speaks
the words of our text, Master, we have toiled all the night,
and have taken nothing, nevertheless at thy word I will let down the
net. Now many, many of the Lord's
people have providences that they wonder why has it been so
fruitless? Why has it been labour that's
been for the wind? There's been no fruit, nothing
resulted from maybe many hours of toil. Many a preacher has
felt that, I have laboured in vain, I've spent my strength
and aught, I've prepared the word, I've delivered the word,
and yet it seems not to have brought forth any fruit at all.
Sunday school teachers, the same. Those that labour in word and
in doctrine. And it may be the real inquiry
of many, Lord, Why this? Why these unfruitful times? Why this wasted labour? Well, there are many lessons,
many warnings and encouragements that can be gleaned from looking
at such cases. This evening, I want to think
of the fruitless labour. Why? and not just confine my
remarks to this account here, but look at through scripture,
because there's not one reason and one purpose in each case,
there are several, and I want to look at these, there's seven
of them, that upon my spirit to bring before you, beginning,
beginning with what we have before us here. fruitless labour that
is to prepare for the Lord's blessing of fruitfulness. That's what is happening here.
What had happened on the previous night was a preparation for the
miracle that was to be performed. It was to be a contrast A stark
contrast. Not a contrast with them saying,
well, we had an average catch last night, and now there's this
great catch, this wonderful miracle. They had to have the contrast
so great. And the Lord made it so great. He saw that these providences,
they happened. And that the blessing was so
clearly seen. that this not only was something
that man could not have done, such a remarkable draft of fishes,
but in one sense I believe they saw the miracle as professional
fishermen that they had toiled all night and caught nothing. It can't have been something
that always happened, they wouldn't have much income if that was
the case, but here they had a a real contrast on how many times the
Lord may do that in our lives. We can see in the account of
David and Goliath, we had 40 days where they couldn't be found
any that would rise against Goliath. And then David comes and through
his hand, the Lord delivers Israel. The Lord is pleased to lay low
first and then raise up the man that was 38 years at the pool
of Bethesda. Why could it have to be proved
that he couldn't ever find the speed or ability to step down
and be healed? The Lord knew he had been a long
time in that case. was waiting for that miracle.
The man that was born blind, that had to wait until he was
of age. And then the Lord says that he
wasn't born blind for some sin in him or his parents, but that
the power of God might be shown in him. And there was this waiting
time of blindness. And many times, and we need to
Really remember this, if we're going through a time that is
proving our inability, is proving our weakness, proving that we
cannot bring forth fruitfulness, then may the thought arise in
our heart, is not the Lord waiting for that time that He'll bring
a wonderful contrast, make a very clear difference, And if the
Lord does that, then we're not going to turn around and say,
well, it was all my effort. It was all my work. It was all
my diligence. That's what brought out this
fruitfulness. That's what gave this increase. No, the Lord lays it low. We have it in Psalm 107. Again
and again, they came into situations, they fell down, there was none
to help. Then they cried unto the Lord
in their trouble. and He saved them out of their
distresses. The Lord is a preparing God,
and many that seek Him do so because He has prepared their
hearts, He's prepared the ground, and this is one of the ways that
He prepares to work His miracles, to show His power, show His might,
in showing our inability, our weakness, And even in what we
are skilled in, even in what we are trained in, those of us
who are trained in engineering to prove that we cannot perform
and cannot perhaps design something or do something, but then we
have the fisherman here, or maybe a carpenter, or whatever it is,
and the Lord deals in that of which we should be proficient,
and He proves that we're not, and then appears and helps in
that very thing, and appears in such a way. What an effect
this had upon them. Peter, when he saw it, verse
8, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me, for I
am a sinful man, O Lord. For he was astonished, and all
that were with him at the draught of the fishes. which they had
taken. And it may not escape our notice
that the Lord goes right from this to saying to them, and saying
unto Simon, fear not, from henceforth thou shalt catch men. And remember
they had to tarry at Jerusalem until they were endued with power
from on high. I wonder if Peter remembered
this. and thought, yes, even when I
was a fisherman fishing in the sea, I needed the Lord to come
and give me a catch. And how much more now? I'm a
fisher of men. I need the power of God. It's not my preaching. It's not
my efforts. It is God's work. And so our
first point is that fruitless labor and the interpretation
of it is to prepare for the Lord's blessing of fruitfulness. The second one I'll bring before
you is based upon our second reading in Matthew. In Matthew
chapter 7, verse 26, We have an account of one that
heareth the sayings of the Lord and he does not do them. And the Lord said, he likened
him unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand. The rain descended, the floods
came, the winds blew and beat upon that house and it fell.
Great was the fall of it. Labour that ends in destruction. What a solemn thing. Over in
Australia, when I was working over there, one of our colleagues,
he built a house, and it was on a slab of concrete. And unknown
to him, the builders did not mix the concrete to the right
strength it should have been. And it wasn't until the weight
of the house came on it, and the house was nearly completed,
that then they started to see cracks in the foundation. Now,
thankfully, they had made the slab thicker than what they really
needed, and so they were able to save the building. But there
was a very real possibility that all the work that they'd done
in building that house would have all come down. They would
have had to demolish the whole thing. And you have times over
here, you read of someone building a beautiful house. You've got
a lovely house. And the local council says, destroy
it. Raise it to the ground. Why?
Because they hadn't asked permission. Or they'd gone against the council
permission. They'd done something different.
They hadn't got the law on their side. And so all that building
was just fruitless labour. It was wasted. It ended up in
destruction. And what a reminder it is. There
may be those that labour all their lives and they think that
they're laying up for themselves a foundation for heaven. Yet
they are relying upon their own works, their profession is just
of their own making, they are resting on their own righteousnesses. Paul says of those in Romans
10 that there were those who were his own countrymen, ignorant
of God's righteousness and they were going about to establish
their own. There is only one righteousness
whereby we may be saved and that is the Lord, our righteousness. His righteousness, His blood
is our only plea. We sung in our opening hymn as
Christ being that foundation stone and is absolutely vital,
the same as those building our house. They need planning for
mission. They need the law on their side. They need the foundation to be
firm. Otherwise, they spend all that
money, all that labor, all that time, and at the end, there's
just destruction. The law deliver us from deceiving
ourselves or building upon a false foundation. The Word of God sets
forth the foundation. Foundation can no man lay than
that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ and Him crucified. By grace ye are saved, through
faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. The Lord
gives faith, and we are to build upon Christ as that one foundation,
any other foundation, however long our profession, however
supposedly good our works are, however much praise we might
have of men, or if we were a minister, how many conversions may be under
our ministry, that does not save us. The Lord's servants rely
solely upon the precious blood of Christ, upon His mercy, upon
His grace, upon His work alone. And so labour that ends in destruction
is labour that is labouring to attain heaven and salvation and
forgiveness in a way other than described in the Word of God. May we be very, very careful
that our faith is based upon the Word of God as a true faith
is resting on a right foundation. The third way that I'll bring
before you is hard labour. So, not so much fruitlessness,
but it is fruit brought forth with great hard labour. And we have in the book of Ecclesiastes, in chapter 10, in verse 10, If the iron be blunt, and he
do not wet the edge, then must he put to more strength, that
wisdom is profitable to Durand." And you have this picture of a man cutting wood with either
a saw or with an axe especially, and the axe is very, very blunt. And he must put great strength
into it, but it's not effectual work. It's very, very hard work. It doesn't cut well at all. If
only he said to himself, if I just stop for a few minutes and sharpen
this axe, if I use that time, that won't be wasted time. As
soon as that axe is sharp, then I'm going to much more make up
that time that I stopped. And so there is hard labor because
the axe is not sharpened. Now in a spiritual way, the ways
of looking at it, one is everything by prayer and supplication. Like Peter, like with the fishes,
we need the power of God, we need the Lord's blessing. Now
I know there might be that aspect, account that Mr. Ramsbottom tells
in one of his books, two girls running to the train to catch
a train. They realised that they could
easily miss it. One of them said, well, let us
stop and pray that we might catch the train. The other one said,
no, let us keep running and pray while we run. And in one sense
that is using the wisdom, but it's also bringing it to the
Lord in prayer. sharpening that axe. And what a reminder it is for
us, how many of us perhaps are trying very hard, diligently,
and with much hard labour to do something, whether in the
Word, whether in our homes, whether amongst our families, and it's
hard work, and it's not very effectual. But how sharp is that
axe, how much is brought before the Lord in prayer, How much
are we using wisdom, as in this word, that wisdom is profitable
to direct, instead of rushing straight into something to think
how it could actually be done effectually, profitably, what
is the right way of doing something, and how quickly then that it
can be done with that wisdom and how many times that wisdom
is given in answer unto prayer. You think of our Lord's words
to Peter, cast the net on the right side of the ship. The Lord
knows where to cast our nets. He knows where we are to labour. He knows what is going to be
fruitful labour And it does not need to be hard labor. But then fourthly, there's unfruitful
labor. And I'm thinking here of that
which is recorded in the prophet Haggai and Zechariah. And it was at the time that the
children of Israel had come back from captivity. And they had
commenced to build the temple, but then they were discouraged
in that. The inhabitants of the land wrote
to the kings, caused them to stop building it. But instead
of trying to press through those setbacks, they just settled down
and built their own houses and spent their time on their own
things. and let the Lord's temple run
into decay. That didn't prosper at all. And so what the Lord did, the
Lord touched all that they were doing. When they sow their seed,
they put a lot of seed in the ground, that little sprang up. When they harvest much, then
all the money just vanished. And there's those things that
happened, very discouraging outwardly, seeming completely unconnected
to the temple, to the building of that. And then the Lord sent
Haggai, sent Zachariah to interpret to them, tell them what was happening,
tell them why it was happening. Well, you and I can understand
it, can't we, if we get discouraged in the Lord's work? Discouraged
in the house of God? How easy it is to say, well,
we'll just spend our time in worldly things and for our own
profit and our own homes and we'll leave the work of the Lord
because we're so discouraged. We've got so many adversaries
and so many against us. But the Lord didn't just leave
them. He gave them those things that were to remind them, and
not only those things that happened in Providence, but interpreted
to them through the prophets, why these things were happening.
Have we got unfruitful labour? Is the Lord touching our works?
In one sense, it could be looked at like the Egyptians. I know
that was to their destruction, but the Lord took off their chariot
wheels. They drove them heavily. Maybe
with our lives the Lord's taking off chariot wheels and bringing
things into our lives that means we have multiple troubles and
sorrows. Why is that? Why is that unfruitful
labour, the Lord's house, neglected? In the fifth place I bring before
you labour that is fruitless in the first aim, but used by
God for another purpose. My thoughts on that are when
the heirs of who was to be King Saul, his father, were lost. And so Saul, he went and was
sent to find those heirs. They sought and sought, looking
for the asses. They never found them. It was fruitless labour as far
as the asses were at odds. But the Lord had another purpose
for that, and that was that Saul was to be brought to Samuel. Samuel was to anoint him as the
next king, or as the first king, over Israel. And the Lord said
to Samuel, that I will bring thee a man. Well, the Lord was
using these lost asses to bring the man to Samuel. And Samuel
then tells him of what God has in mind, tells him that he is
to be the king and anoints him with oil, and also tells him
that the asses are found. And his father has left caring
for the assets and now he is concerned about his son. But we see how one thing is ending
up fruitless. We're set to a task and we're
trying to achieve it and trying to do it, but the Lord's using
it as a stepping stone to something different. to leading to something
different. Without those asses lost, and
without that trying to find them, then Saul is not brought to Samuel. And so there's another thought,
an encouraging thought. Maybe we should not be all the
time so cast down in something that we haven't achieved, haven't
accomplished, hasn't done, hasn't been fruitful, And what we need
to think is, what has the Lord achieved apart from that? To take our eyes off what we
thought was the aim, like the asses to be found, and to think,
well, if we hadn't been set in this course, if we hadn't endeavoured
in it, then many of these other things would not have happened.
They would not have come to pass. So instead of being so downcast
at what seems to be a failure, no answers found, we realise
the Lord has used him, used him for good. It's like with Zacchaeus,
he's been curious really, wanted to see the Lord, who he was,
climbs up into the sycamore tree, but the Lord had a different
purpose than just to satisfy Zacchaeus' curiosity. And so
the Lord says, come down, I must dine at thy house. So the Lord may give us those
things that at the first time we think, well, this is what
it is. But no, the Lord has some other
message. You might think with David going
to, with Goliath, Well, all he was told by his father was to
take these cheeses, take these victuals, and see how thy brothers
fare. The Lord had another purpose
in view. Yes, he no doubt gave them those
things. The same with Joseph as well.
A menial task, as it were, to go to his brethren, see how they
did. But the Lord had a greater purpose. But that was a necessary stepping
stone to it. And so, labour fruitless in the
first aim, but used of God for another purpose. But then in the sixth place,
there's labour without the Lord. And in that we go to Psalm 127. We read there, except the Lord
build the house, they labour in vain that build it. Except
the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain. It is vain
for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread
of sorrows, for so he giveth his beloved sleep. And all the time there's a message,
you leave the Lord out, and it is vain. It won't prosper, it
won't work. When the disciples were sent
forth, we read how the Lord blessed the word, the Lord working with
them and confirming the word with signs following. It is the
Lord that builds Zion, that builds the house of God, and except
he does, Then our labour, however diligent or whatever we're doing,
is in vain. It will not prosper. It will
not work. And what a test this is. There may be some things that
we labour in. If only we asked of the Lord,
we wouldn't labour at all. We think of those after the flood
that laboured to build the Tower of Babel. The Lord came down
and confounded their language so that they were scattered and
they ceased to build the tower. Why was that so unfruitful labour? It's not the Lord's desire they
should stay in one place. He said, overspread the earth,
replenish it. And they said, no, we'll build
a tower lest we be scattered. And what they were doing was
not what the Lord's will was at all. And so In that sense,
they weren't with the Lord, the Lord was not in the building,
the Lord was not in the work. Now we need to be persuaded of
this. Is this the Lord's will? Is this the Lord's way? Are we
labouring in that of which we can honestly ask the Lord's blessing
upon what we do, and that we know the Lord? is with us in
it. Except the Lord build the house,
they labour in vain that build it. Seeking to build, but it
is not built. And we have with the keeping
of the city as well. The watchman with all his diligence,
we read in another place, watchman, what of the night? The Lord can
see through the night, but a watchman can't. And you and I, the limited
knowledge, limited understanding, we need the Lord to be the master
builder, the builder, the one that is working. We, we are the
servants. Sometimes we put it the other
way around. We say, I'm the builder. And Lord, I want you to do this,
I want you to do that, I want you to do that. Instead of the
Lord saying, I'm the builder, you're the servant, you do that
and that and that. And we put it round the wrong
way. May we have regard to the master builder and watch his
hand, and watch his directions, and watch his openings. It's
like when Paul would go to Asia. No, says the builder, you don't
go there. Bithynia, his spirit suffered
him not. And then a vision, come over
into Macedonia and help us. The master builder saying, there,
you go over there. And we read Paul, he immediately
discerned the Lord would have them to go and preach the word
in Macedonia. And so they did. And the Lord
is the one, the daughter said, with the children of Israel going
through the Red Sea. It was the Lord. that ordered
how they left Egypt, all the great signs, the appointing of
the Passover lamb, a beautiful time of our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ, that directed them by the way of the Red Sea and not
the land of the Philistines, that gave them the cloudy pillar
to go before them and the fiery pillar by night. It was the Lord
that was directing them. The Lord that was adding to their
tribes, that was building them up and blessing them. And so labour without the Lord
will be labour in vain, be fruitless labour. And the last one I bring
before you is labour trying to stop judgment. We read in the case of Jonah
that when the Lord sent the wind and the storm, as Jonah was fleeing
from the presence of the Lord, that he would not go and preach
the word in Nineveh, that Jonah said, that he was
a servant of the Lord, he was fleeing from the Lord, and said
to them to cast him, take him up, cast him into the sea, for
this wind, this terrible danger is for my sake. But we read that
the mariners, they did not want to do that, and that they toiled
hard, they laboured hard to bring it to land. The Lord was saying
through Jonah, cast him into the sea, They were saying, no,
we don't want that way. We're going to go another way.
We're going to avoid this. But they couldn't. However much
they tried, they couldn't. And in the end, he was thrown
into the sea, and then the Lord had provided the fish, prepared
a great fish to swallow up Jonah. When the Lord decrees a thing,
when he appoints a thing, however much we might say no, and try
to resist and fight against it, it won't be effectual. Be fruitless
labour. Are we fighting against the Lord,
resisting His will, going against conscience, trying everything
we can not to do what we know the Lord would have us to do?
We have a similar thing with the
children of Israel. When they had gone who refused
to go into the promised land. They'd seen the giants there.
Caleb and Joshua, they encouraged the people. They said, the Lord
is very able to deliver them into our hands. But the other
10 spies, they spoke of stoning Moses and Joshua and Caleb. They stirred the people up. They
discouraged them. And the Lord judged the children
of Israel and said to them that they were to go 40 years then
back into the wilderness. And their children that they
had said would be a prey, that they would go into that land.
But all those over 19 years of age, they would perish in the
wilderness. And the Lord passed that judgment on them. And you
know, when they heard that judgment, then they said, well, we will
go up. We now will go up. And they tried
to go up against Ai. They tried to reverse the judgment
of the Lord. But the Lord said, do not go
up. Or Moses said, the Lord is not with you, do not go up. But
those of Ai came out and chased them, killed some of them. They
could not prosper. They could not overcome. In a way, their labor, their
efforts at that time was to overturn the judgment of the Lord. And it wasn't effectual at all. We have another solemn account,
in a way, in the New Testament, where our Lord was making known
to his disciples his coming sufferings, his death. And Peter, he said
to the Lord, He said, be that not unto thee, Lord, that shall
not be unto thee. Now, just prior to that, Peter
had made a wonderful confession when the Lord asked, who do men
say that I, the Son of Man, am? And then, who do you say that
I am? And Peter had made that confession,
thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. The Lord had
blessed him, and said, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, flesh
and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which
is in heaven. But now, when Peter is trying
to turn away what the Lord is going to do, to stop what he
is doing, the Lord says, Depart from me, Satan, thou savest not
the things that be of God. but the things that be of men. And really, Peter, he was trying
to turn away the judgment of the Lord. And the Lord made that
very ineffectual. We have it later on, even with
the two swords in the garden, put up thy sword within thy sheath,
the cup that my father hath given me to drink, shall I not drink
it? May the Lord has a path for his
people. However bitter, however trialed,
however difficult it may be, he will overcome all those attempts
to prevent it. The cup might be, or the bud
may be bitter at first, but sweet will be the flower. But where
there is a holding back as it were, trying to escape the cross,
escape the path of tribulation. The Lord has said so very clearly,
in me you shall have peace, in the world you shall have tribulation,
but be of good cheer, I've overcome the world. And if our labour
is to Just find ease and quietness. It doesn't matter if we deny
this doctrine or that doctrine, or do that a bit different, as
long as it gives us a nice, peaceful and easy life. But if the Lord
has a mercy to us, that labour, those efforts will be ineffectual. It won't pacify, it won't overcome
that path of the Lord. has appointed for us, to do it
in the right way, to do it in the throne of grace, to do it
in the Lord's ways, the right way like dear Jacob did when
Esau was coming against him. I will not let thee go except
thou bless me, wrestled for the blessing. It brought him closer
to the Lord. And often the test of these things,
does it bring us closer to the Lord or further from the Lord? Are we fighting against the Lord
or are we wrestling for the blessing and for the Lord's presence?
Labor, trying to stop judgment. It will be a fruitless labor. You think of that solemn judgment
that is to come. And you know the Lord will bring
it about. He's appointed unto men once
to die and after that the judgment. And the only way to avoid that
is through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the one way. And what a difference the Gospel
is, because it is a Gospel of done, it is finished, it's the
Lord's work, and it is trusting in what the Lord has done. The
Lord's labour, the Lord's work, is not unfruitful, never was,
never will be, That finished work of salvation and that which
he accomplished at Calvary is done. He is brought in not just
a salvation, but an everlasting salvation. What a difference
of the emphasis. The Old Testament, the Jews,
the people of God, they labored for six days, and then they rested
on the seventh day. They followed the creation pattern. The Lord created the world in
six days and then he rested and he hallowed the seventh day.
But in the New Testament, our Lord rose from the dead on the
first day of the week. And we find the disciples meeting
each time on the first day of the week. Thomas had to wait
eight days. He wasn't with the disciples
when the Lord appeared in the upper room on that first day
of the week. So he had to wait another eight
days. And the Lord sanctified that teaching that now, for the
Christian, for his people, the day that is hallowed and set
apart for the worship of God is the first day of the week. So we rest first, and then the
rest of the week we work out our salvation. Our works are
not to obtain salvation, but they are to work out what has
been obtained for us. They are fruits of Christ's work. With the Old Testament, Even
in the sacrifices, so much labour in all of those sacrifices, tremendous
amount of work and labour to bring them about. But in the
new, the sacrifice is offered, is done. And by works shall no
man prevail, but by faith. It is Christ that died, yea,
that is risen again, and that has ascended up on high. The
Lord's labour is an effectual labour, and his work is a sure
work. And we have the seal of the empty
tomb. He hath given assurance unto
all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. And so in
the preaching of the gospel, so in the calling of his people,
the Lord's work is a sure work. Man's work will fail. God's work
will not fail. Man's labours must cease. The Lord shall continue. He which
hath begun a good work in you will perform it unto the day
of Jesus Christ. May we then be blessed with being
able to discern when we have fruitless labour, when things
aren't going right, they don't seem to bring forth fruit at
all. So think of these points as to
what the Lord has in view. What is the purpose of this?
Is there a greater blessing that is in store that we do not know
of yet? And the Lord will appear like
with these fishes and give us that great in gathering? Or is it that really we seem
to be prospering? We seem to be building? But may
we ask ourselves, is it on a right foundation? Or is it, and will
it prove to be at last, labour that ends in destruction? Or
is it that all our hard labour, all our toil, or their weariness,
how much easier it would be if we put more to prayer and with
more wisdom to direct our way, that it was much more effectual
labour. Or maybe it is, that the house
of the Lord is neglected and our hard labour is that, trying
to fulfil our own pleasures And maybe also where we feel
so discouraged, disheartened, that our labour has not brought
forth the fruit that we thought, that we should step back and
think that the Lord has achieved something greater and better. And think of those lost asses
and what happened instead. Saul was crowned the king and
the Lord's word was brought to pass. And if we're trying to build
the house of the Lord, but it is not being built, is the Lord
with us? Are we looking to Him, or is
there expectation to our own labours? May we heed what the Lord speaks
to us. Word was precious to me years
ago, thy teachers shall not be removed into a corner anymore,
but thine eyes shall see thy teachers, thine ears shall hear
a word behind thee saying, this is the way, walk ye in it, when
you turn to the right hand, when you turn to the left. And the
message, the word, this evening, is like that. A teacher to be
seen, a word to be heard, when there is fruitless labour, is
not for no purpose. The Lord has a purpose in everything. We know that all things work
together for good, to them that love God, to them that are called
according to His purpose. Even the toiling all night worked
for good, for Simon and those of his partners. May it be that our toiling all
night in darkness, darkness of soul, darkness of circumstance,
may yet end in such a miracle and such a blessing. May the
Lord add his blessing. Amen.