Words of Grace

“I am only one, but I am one; I cannot do everything, but I can do something.” 

This saying, often quoted, has been around for a long time. Few people know that it is attributed to Canon Farrar. The rest of the quote is: 

“What I can do, I ought to do, and what I ought to do by the grace of God, I will do.” 

Farrar was referring to the Scriptures. The apostle Paul wrote in I Corinthians 15:10 that we are what we are only by the grace of God. It is God’s grace bestowed on us that enables us to do what we ought to do. 

We would say that Paul was the greatest of all the apostles. What he said of himself, however, was “I am the least of the apostles.” (V.9) He went on to write, “I labored more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.” 

A certain French Monarch was raised to his exalted position from very humble surroundings. He had been a shepherd in his earlier days, so to remind himself of where he came from, he had a room in the palace known as “the shepherd’s room.” 

In that room were reproductions of hills and valleys and streams and sheepfolds. The staff that he carried and the clothes he had worn were also there. When he was asked the meaning of all this, he answered: 

“If ever my heart is tempted to be proud, I go into that room and remind myself of what I once was.”