All our failures may be ultimately traced to a defect of faith…The life of faith, therefore, is the life of the Minister’s work and the spring of his success…

The main difficulty, therefore, is not in our work, but in ourselves; in the conflict with our own unbelief…Difficulties heaped upon difficulties can never rise to the level of the promise of God…

It is faith that enlivens our work with perpetual cheerfulness. It commits every part of it to God, in the hope, that even mistakes shall be overruled for his glory; and thus relieves us from an oppressive anxiety, often attendant upon a deep sense of our responsibility. The shortest way to peace will be found in casting ourselves upon God for daily pardon of deficiencies and supplies of grace, without looking too eagerly for present fruit. Hence our course of effort is unvarying, but more tranquil…Unbelief looks at the difficulty. Faith regards the promise. Unbelief therefore makes our work a service of bondage. Faith realizes it as a “labour of love.” Unbelief drags on in sullen despondency. Faith makes the patience, with which it is content to wait for succes, “the patience of hope”. As every difficulty…is the fruit of unbelief; so will they all ultimately be overcome by the perseverance of faith.