rusting to Jesus
Christ, and that is not hard to do. It is a very hard thing to be a
Christian in another aspect, because a real Christian is a man who,
by reason of his trusting Jesus Christ, has set his heel upon the
neck of the animal that is in him, and keeps the flesh well down, and
not only the flesh, but the desires of the mind as well as of the
flesh, and subordinates them all to the one aim of pleasing Him. 'No
man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life' if
his object is to please Him that has called him to be a soldier.
Unless we cut off a great many of the thorns, so to speak, by which
things catch hold of us as we pass them, we shall not make much
advance in the Christian life. Rigid self-control and abstinence from
else legitimate things that draw us away from Him are needful, if we
are so to run as the poor heathen racer teaches us.

III. The last grace that is suggested here, the last leaf to take out
of these racers' book, is definiteness and concentration of aim.

'I, therefore,' says the Apostle, 'so run not as uncertainly.' If the
runner is now heading that way and now this, making all manner of
loops upon his path, of course he will be left hopelessly in the
rear. It is the old fable of the Grecian mythology transplanted into
Christian soil. The runner who turned aside to pick up the golden
apple was disappointed of his hopes of the radiant fair. The ship, at
the helm of which is a steersman who has either a feeble hand or does
not understand his business, and which therefore keeps yawing from
side to side, with the bows pointing now this way and now that, is
not holding a course that will make the harbour first in the race.
The people that to-day are marching with their faces towards Zion,
and to-morrow making a loop-line to the world, will be a long time
before they reach their terminus. I believe there are few things more
lacking in the average Christian life of to-day than resolute,
conscious concentration upon an aim which is clearly and always
before us. Do you know what you are aiming at? That is the first
question. Have you a distinct theory of life's purpose that you can
put into half a dozen words, or have you not? In the one case, there
is some chance of attaining your object; in the other one, none.
Alas! we find many Christian people who do not set before themselves,
with emphasis and constancy, as their aim the doing of God's will,
and so sometimes they do it, w