1 Corinthians 9

1 Corinthians 9:25-27

SELF-MASTERY AND SUCCESS 1 Corinthians 9:25-27PAUL was much given to figures of speech brought from the customs in Grecian athletics. There can be little question that his audience, or rather the readers of his letters, were quite familiar with these games, and doubtless much enamored of them. It is a fact worthy of remark that Paul never speaks against them, while his perfect familiarity with their details indicates that he might have been an attendant upon them. In admitting so much one does not even remotely suggest that Paul would commend all that has characterized twentieth century field sports. The simple fact is, that the common Grecian games were civil and humane, as compared with the gross and brutal customs of this hour. Theirs consisted chiefly in running, leaping, wrestling, and throwing the quoit, therefore calculated every one to build up the physical man, without doing so at the expense of the moral. In fact, the Apostle tells us that the competitors on these public occasions were temperate men; and in this his statement is in perfect accord with the words of old Horace which have been thrown into rhyme, “The youth who hopes the Isthmic prize to gain, All arts must try, and every toil sustain; Extremes of cold and heat must often prove, And shun the weakening joys of wine and love.” Those who think that civilization and Christianity are making such strides and that mankind is fast approaching such perfection as to make a millennium a mere prospect, do well never to institute a comparison between ancient and modern athletics. The present football game, played on the fields of our institutions of learning, would suffer in that its brutality would appear all the more prominent when contrasted with the gentility of the Grecian customs, while even the living picture representation of the prize fight upon which thousands of our so-called respectable citizens are gazing at the many theatres, not to speak of its original, would have been revolting in the extreme to these same Corinthians. The Bible favors the athletics that build up bodies, but it knows no sympathy with such customs as mangle and degrade them. Paul believed in such self-mastery as puts the body to best uses, making that which is regarded the lower in man serve the highest possible end. Three suggestions for our consideration from the Apostle’s speech:SELF-MASTERY IS TO SUCCESS “Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things”. He who is going to get on in the world, who is going to push to the front, who is going to make much of life, must be master of himself.Such self-mastery is essential to money-making. In our judgment, one of the lower ends of living is the end of money-making; and yet, so many people are moved by this consideration that the question is often asked, What is essential to success here? We believe Paul has answered it for such men. “Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things”.It is not necessary for a man to be an heir to a fortune in order to attain to financial strength, but it is necessary that he be master of himself. We often hear men say in extenuation of their poverty, “Well, one must have money to make money”. Girard, Philadelphia’s early millionaire, said, “I began life with a sixpence.” His riches refuted any such a claim. James Gordon Bennett, chatting one day with George W.

Childs, remarked, “How unfortunate it is for a boy to have rich parents? If you and I had been born that way we would not have done anything worth mentioning.” The difficulty with most men is not that they have no ability at money-making, but that they fail in self-mastery.“Now, therefore thus saith the Lord of Hosts; Consider your ways. “Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with hole” (Haggai 1:5-6). This leakage in the pockets of men is largely attributable to ungoverned passions.Some years ago when Dr. Talmage was interviewed concerning the business depression which characterized the times, he spoke of the politician’s cry, “Let us restore confidence, and the anvil will ring, and the wheel whirl, and the shuttles flash again, and want will fly before the presence of rewarded industry”. “But,” said the Doctor, “we cannot legislate prosperity. We need something beside tariff laws to banish idleness and to fill hungry mouths with bread. It is the whisky bill that brings hunger and brings famine. Over one billion annually was spent in United States for whisky, wines and beer. The flour mills close, but the gin mills are always doing a rushing business.

The foundries shut down, but the bars never shut up. Banks stop payment, but the brewery continues.

Dry-goods merchants, and hardware merchants and grocers fail for want of trade, but the saloon flourishes”. Much of that is true even since the Eighteenth Amendment, and all of it means that when men master themselves there will be plenty of money. “Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things”.Self-mastery also means mind-building. Here a part of our text is equally appropriate, “Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.”Take all the sins—secret and open—that debilitate the mind, and turn those appointed to be wise unto fools, and they are all in consequence of failure to master one’s self. A few days since I looked into the face of a young newspaper reporter, and read there the evident marks of most of the vices that destroy men, and as I followed the curling smoke back to his finger, and regarded for a moment the filthy, debilitating cigarette, it was easy to explain why he would shortly be out of job. Chauncey M. Depew attributed his success to breaking off the habit of smoking, and, as every one knows, the eminently successful thing about Depew is his brilliant mind.

Luther Prescott Hubbard, another of New York’s brainy men, was given to chewing and smoking when a mere lad, but on the advice of a friend, parted once for all with the filthy weed. When, years since, Francis Willard inquired of Thomas Edison why he were a total abstainer, adding, “Was it home influence that made you so?” the great inventor replied, “No, madam; I think it was because I always felt I had a better use for my brains.”But in order to have the best mental development one must not only be a sufficient master of himself to resist the temptation to such sins as injure the intellect, but also to so employ the mind as to make its use the means of its growth.

One of the points at which few people are in control of themselves is this of having every faculty of the being so subject to the will as to do its bidding.Many a young person at school is sufficiently ambitious for an education, but when it comes to the studious habits that make for mental development, the will, which ought to be a tyrant, is a weak master. Slothfulness in study, with its resultant stupidity, is the consequence.Dr. J. B. Hawthorne told how, when he was a student at Richmond College, there was a young fellow who was of magnificent physical proportions, but was larger still in his laziness. One day as Hawthorne was crossing the campus he came upon this fellow, lying full in the sun, working at the ground with a straw which he held in his hand.

Hawthorne, looking over his shoulder said, “What are you doing there?” The great indolent rolled his eyes up good-naturedly and said, “I am trying to tickle this doodle bug out of his hole”. “Ah,” said Hawthorne, “it is the doodle-bug business that keeps many a brain from its better development.” One needs only to contrast the conduct of such a man with that of an Abraham Lincoln poring over his books till late at night before the flickering light of a pine-knot fire, or a Thurlow Weed doing the same by the light of a camp-fire in a sugar orchard, or a John Scott beginning his studies at 4 A. M. to be found at 11 P.

M. tying a cold wet towel about his head that he might a little longer continue awake; or a Henry Wilson, who, coming to his manhood in ignorance, determines even thus late to be a master in the realm of learning, and manages to read a thousand good books before he leaves the farm, to see that the reason why Hawthorne’s student friend is unknown to the world, while these are among the most honored names. It is the difference between self-mastery upon the part of the latter and the lack of all self-control on the part of the former. For, indeed, the crown that sits upon the intellect is an incorruptible one, and can only sit upon his brow who knows the experience of self-control.My second suggestion is this:SELF-MASTERY SHOULD HAVE A PURPOSE With Paul, it looked to soul-supremacy. If he kept his body under, it was only that his soul might be on top. It was not that the Apostle believed that the body was without honor, only that he regarded the soul as of greater consequence, and its supremacy the superior thing.You have heard of the little girl, who, when she returned from church, was asked, “What was the text?” and answered, “I keep my soul on top,” and when asked where this strange text should be found, replied, 1 Corinthians 9:27 “I keep under my body”.While mistaken in the Apostle’s language, she had caught his idea.The man who privileges the physical passions to rule him, instead of being ruled by spiritual aspirations, is rapidly moving to his own ruin. Dr. Davidson says, “You may have seen in Paris a sculptured representation of Bacchus, the god of drink and of revelry. He is riding on a panther at a furious bound.

How suggestive and true! A man begins a career of vice, and thinks he has mounted a well-broken steed, that he has the reins in hand and can keep it in control, and stop it when he please, but lo, * * he finds that he is astride a savage and furious brute that no human power can curb or tame.” But Paul realizes that there is a Divine power that can put the passions of the body under, and bring all their powers into captivity to the aspirations of the soul. And this is the truest power indeed, and this is the superior end of living indeed.“For tho’ the giant ages heave the hill And break the shore, and evermore Make and break, and work their will; Tho’ world on world in myraid myraids roll Around us, each with different powers And other forms of life than ours, What know we greater than the soul?” Soul-supremacy gives glory to God. Paul knew perfectly that in proportion as he was master of himself, temperate in all things, running well the race that was set before him, fighting successfully the good fight of faith, keeping under his body and bringing it into subjection, he was giving glory to God. The longer one lives, the farther into the Christian experience one goes, the more one realizes that this is the supreme end of living. The Presbyterian catechism is right, “The chief end of man is to glorify God.” The question is not, What will advance me? The question is not, What will bring me honor? The question is, What will glorify my God?

I think the most spiritually-minded man of last century was George Mueller. On one occasion he summed up his idea of Christianity by saying, “My whole life is one single service for God. The caring for the bodies of the children is the mere instrumentality. My heart felt, my heart bled for the poor orphan children, and I desired to see them well-housed and fed. But that was not my motive. My heart desired to benefit them with a good education, but that was not my motive; my heart longed for the salvation of their souls, but even that was not my motive.

The glory of God—that it might be seen of the whole world, and the whole Church of God, that yet, in these days, God listens to prayer, and that God is the same in power and love as He ever was—to illustrate that, I have devoted my whole life”.Paul wrote to these same Corinthians, “Ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Corinthians 6:20).SELF-MASTERY IS TO GOD’S SERVICE It was of God’s service that Paul was speaking here when he said, “I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway”. A castaway is not destroyed; it is simply laid aside and left unused.Paul was not afraid of losing his soul. People who think that Paul was an Armenian and feared “falling from grace”, and who base their opinion upon this single text, forget at once the meaning of a castaway, namely, left in disuse, and the many speeches in which the Apostle declares his assurance. It was Paul who wrote to Timothy, “I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day” (2 Timothy 1:12). It was Paul who wrote to the Romans,“I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, “Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39). Dr. F. B. Meyer tells of Rowland Hill, his great predecessor at Christ Church, London, that when he was an old man of 84, and just before he died, one Sunday night, when the lights had been put out in Surrey Chapel, the verger in attendance heard him go to and fro in the aisles singing to himself,“When I am to die, receive me I’ll cry, For Jesus has loved me, I cannot tell why; But this I do find, we two are so joined, He’ll not be in Heaven, and leave me behind.” That was Paul’s faith.What Paul did fear was an end of his soul-winning service. Dr. Meyer says, “You must know that this man loved to save men. It was the passion of his life. Send him to Philippi, and he will not be there a day before he has turned the devil out of the poor demoniac girl. Let him be put in jail, and before midnight he will have baptized his jailor. Send him to Athens, and though he is all alone, he will gather a congregation upon Mars’ Hill within a week or two. Put him alongside of Aquila and Priscilla at the bench, and he will make tents and talk to them in such good wise that they will become Christians.

Stand him before his judge, and the latter will cry, “Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian”. Let him go to Rome, tied to a Roman sentry, and he will speak to these men, one after another, in such fashion that the whole Pretorian camp will be infused with the love of God. His passion was to save men. I do not believe that if he were alive today, he would be in a street-car, or a railway-car, or on board a steamer without button-holing some man and speaking to him about his soul and his Saviour. The whole passion of the man was to save some; but he feared that unless he took good care, the hour might come in his life when Christ would say, “Thou hast served Me well, but thou shalt serve Me no more. Of late thou hast become indolent, and choked with pride, and I have not secured thy whole obedience.

I am now compelled to call upon some soul more alert, more obedient than thee; and that man I will use to do the work that thou mightest have done, but which thou didst fail to accomplish”.When I first entered the ministry, I used to be afraid that men might cast me away, and that if I did not do to suit them, they might set me aside and bring my service to an ignominious close; and as I witnessed this done for a few of my ministerial brethren, it made me all the more afraid. Such an end to one’s ministry is sad, if such can bring an end to one’s ministry.

For myself, I have ceased to fear at that point. I don’t believe it is within the power of man to end a brother’s ministry, if that ministry be by Divine appointment. More and more I have come to enter into Paul’s fears, that, lest after having preached to others, I should prove myself so poor a servant of God, that He would cast me aside and accept another in my stead, who would do that service more fervently, more fearlessly, and with greater love. And to be set aside from God’s service by God Himself, that indeed would be the saddest of all experiences. My heart is never so moved in pity as when I see a man who has once been under the Divine blessing, living in barrenness; and when I see a man who was once used of God in honor of God, side-tracked and left in disuse, because he did not continue to do the Divine bidding. And I say to you, beloved, that if those of us who are saved and destined at last to come into Heaven are not to know the experience of castaways, our crown taken from us, and our powers left unemployed, we must remain faithful to the call of our God to soul-winning service.Dr.

Davidson said, “Down at the sea-coast I marked one and another and another little steam vessel prowling about in the offing, ever on the outlook to hail some wanderer of the deep, some ship seeking its way home, that they might tug it safely up channel, and bring it to the quiet haven; and I saw there a picture of what the members of such a church as this should be, ever on the watch for some soul that needs guidance and comfort, ever ready with the loving smile and the helping hand for any lonely and friendless brother!”But I would not conclude this sermon on “Self-Mastery” without inquiring whether all have surrendered to the Great Master to be saved. I wonder if the young here are redeemed every one.

Salvation must precede service. I wonder if any of the old are out of the Ark. If so, why not come in, the young and the old together, that God may receive you, save you, and use you.On Thursday evening in our prayer-meeting a father and a daughter were received for membership. They came from the Mission work. One evening some time ago God used a sermon of my assistant to touch this little daughter’s heart. She sought the Lord and found Him willing to forgive; but, on going home, she said to her father, “How can I live a Christian life with no one here to help me? You do not love God, and mother is not a Christian. Oh, that I had the assistance of my own”!

And it broke the father’s heart. He came up to the Mission and told how this statement had touched him, and there together the father and daughter confessed Christ, mingling their tears of penitence, and together they entered the waters of baptism! Beautiful! Christ is Saviour of young and old!