Matthew 16:25 For whoever will save his life shall lose it: and whoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.… One of the moral paradoxes of Scripture — the most decided, the most contradictory, the most reckless (if we may so say) of them all. A complete inversion of language. And it is no isolated expression. It is forced on our attention again and again. We cannot wander far in any direction without encountering this startling signpost, announcing the path of destruction as the only high-road to salvation. The context, moreover, enhances the paradox. We are told that a man's life (or soul, for it is the same word in the original) is absolutely priceless to him; that no exchange can be an equivalent; that no compensation will requite him for the loss: yet in the same breath we are bidden to despise it, to abandon it, to fling it away like a broken potsherd or a rank weed. The contradiction is direct and positive; and in this contradiction the lesson is to be sought. I. WHAT IS MEANT BY THIS SOUL OR LIFE OF MAN? It is the living principle; the centre of man's capacities, passions, energies; the very seat of his personality. A man's soul is everything to him. Obviously, then, the health or sickness, the saving or the losing, the life or death of this soul, must be a matter of infinite moment, both in time and eternity; for it guides his actions, regulates his affections, influences his feelings. It is to his whole being what the mainspring is to a watch. II. WHAT ARE THE FACULTIES AND DURATION OF THE SOUL? This question cannot be evaded; it must be faced. Its practical consequences are too momentous to admit of delay. If this life which we call " life " is only a passing moment of an infinite future, only the seed-time of a heavenly harvest, the infancy of an eternal manhood, — then treat it as such, educate and discipline it as such. You cannot go on drifting through life, till you find yourself at the edge of a cataract. No man going on a journey neglects so to arrange his route that at nightfall he shall halt at some place where food and shelter will be obtained. Darkness will overtake him, perhaps, in any case, for even the grateful interposition and warding of the twilight may not be sufficient; but what sane man would not shrink from finding himself in the darkness in a barren, trackless desert, exposed to the pitiless storm? III. How IS THE SOUL TO BE SAVED? By losing it. The meaning of these words in their primary application is simple. To Christ's disciples and their immediate followers, no comment was necessary. In an age of persecution, the willingness to lose the lower life for the salvation of the higher would be only too often tested in a literal sense. And the corresponding application now need create no difficulty. Whoever purchases ease by dishonesty, or comfort by neglect of duty, or popularity by concession of principle — preferring self where truth, honour, love, purity, or reverence demands self-negation, self-abandonment — that man loses his soul, loses his life, by saving it. IV. BUT THOUGH THE MAN WHO SAVES HIS SOUL IS SURE TO LOSE IT, THE CONVERSE DOES NOT NECESSARILY FOLLOW. Here an important proviso comes in — "for My sake." There are many ways of losing the soul; but only one way of losing it so as to save. The profligate libertine squanders his means, and neglects his health, and flings himself away; but he does it selfishly, and to him the promise does not apply. V. LOSS FOR CHRIST'S SAKE IS GAIN. This does not merely apply to sacrifices made consciously and directly in the cause of Christianity. If Christ be (as we believe) the very and eternal Word of God; the very expression of the Father's truth, righteousness, purity, love; then the sacrifice of self to any one of these things is a saving of the soul by losing it; then the martyr to truth, to holiness, to purity, to love, may claim his portion along with the martyr to religion, for he has thrown himself away, has lost his soul for Christ's sake. VI. THE SAME CONTRAST AND THE SAME ALTERNATIVE MAY EXIST WITHIN THE SPHERE OF RELIGION ITSELF. It is possible to be anxious about saving the soul, to be extremely religious in a certain sense, but yet to risk the losing of it in the very desire of saving it. The soul must brace itself by vigorous exercise — spend and be spent. The true method of salvation is a great venture of self, a forgetfulness of self, a going out of self. Lose your soul in energy; spend yourself in alleviating some misery, instructing some ignorance, or reforming some vice. Fling your soul away, that, after many days, you may recover it again, purified, strengthened, renewed, living once more. (Bishop J. B. Light foot.) Parallel Verses KJV: For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. |
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