I am made all things to all men,
that I might by all means save some
1 Corinthians 9:22
Paul's great object was not merely to instruct and to improve,
but to save. Anything short of this would have disappointed him; he
would have men renewed in heart, forgiven, sanctified, in fact,
saved. Have our Christian labours been aimed at anything below this
great point? Then let us amend our ways, for of what avail will it be
at the last great day to have taught and moralized men if they appear
before God unsaved? Blood-red will our skirts be if through life we
have sought inferior objects, and forgotten that men needed to be
saved. Paul knew the ruin of man's natural state, and did not try to
educate him, but to save him; he saw men sinking to hell, and did not
talk of refining them, but of saving from the wrath to come. To
compass their salvation, he gave himself up with untiring zeal to
telling abroad the gospel, to warning and beseeching men to be
reconciled to God. His prayers were importunate and his labours
incessant. To save souls was his consuming passion, his ambition, his
calling. He became a servant to all men, toiling for his race,
feeling a woe within him if he preached not the gospel. He laid aside
his preferences to prevent prejudice; he submitted his will in things
indifferent, and if men would but receive the gospel, he raised no
questions about forms or ceremonies: the gospel was the one all-
important business with him. If he might save some he would be
content. This was the crown for which he strove, the sole and
sufficient reward of all his labours and self-denials. Dear reader,
have you and I lived to win souls at this noble rate? Are we
possessed with the same all-absorbing desire? If not, why not? Jesus
died for sinners, cannot we live for them? Where is our tenderness?
Where our love to Christ, if we seek not His honour in the salvation
of men? O that the Lord would saturate us through and through with an
undying zeal for the souls of men.
