June 26

"I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified."—1 Corinthians 2:2.

Not to know anything. But is not this to starve mind and soul, to forego much that is desirable, to condemn myself to a meagre and ascetic experience? Will not the Pauline gospel narrow and circumscribe my life?

No; for it touches all my activities. Only from Jesus and the Cross can I derive power to live aright. Here is the pardon which sets me free to serve intensely, to rejoice daily, to dare and endeavour and do. Here is the motive to ardent zeal and patient diligence. Here is the channel too, rough and stony, through which the Holy Spirit comes to me—the Spirit who strengthens me with might.

And it transfigures all my sorrows—this Pauline gospel. If I am familiar with Jesus Christ and Him crucified,—if I know that innermost peace which has its fountain on the hill of Calvary,—I have a balm for every pain and a solace in every grief. The wood of this shameful and saving Tree turns my Marahs into Elims, my bitterness into sweetness, my loneliness and desolation into rest and company and calm. His Cross is my health.

And it ennobles all my future, through the years of time and eternity. It is a gospel which will not fail me in any emergency that can confront my soul. It will make bright round about me the Valley of the Shadow of Death. It will open before me the golden gates of the City of God. It will continue a wonder and a delight through the everlasting years of heaven.

There is no impoverishment of my nature in the knowledge of Jesus Christ and Him crucified.