it should be the truth--I bear in my body the tokens of His
possession.

III. Now, once more notice the glorying in the slavery and its signs.

'I bear,' says Paul; and he uses, as many of you may know, a somewhat
remarkable word, which does not express mere bearing in the sense of
toleration and patient endurance, although that is much; nor mere
bearing in the sense of carrying, but implies bearing with a certain
triumph as men would do who, coming back victorious from conflict, and
being received into the city, were proud to show their scars, the
honourable signs of their courage and constancy. So, with a triumph that
is legitimate, the Apostle solemnly and proudly bears before men the
marks of the Lord Jesus. Just as he says in another place:--'Thanks be
unto God, which always leadeth us about in triumph in Jesus Christ,' He
was proud of being dragged at the conqueror's chariot wheels, chained to
them by the cords of love; and so he was proud of being the slave of
Christ.

It is a degradation to a man to yield abject submission, unconditional
service to another man. It is the highest honour of our natures so to
bow before that dear Lord. To prostrate ourselves to Him is to lift
ourselves high in the scale of being. The King's servant is every other
person's master. And he that feels that he is Christ's, may well be, not
proud but conscious, of the dignity of belonging to such a Lord. The
monarch's livery is a sign of honour. In our old Saxon kingdom the
king's menials were the first nobles. So it is with us. The aristocracy
of humanity are the slaves of Jesus Christ.

And let us be proud of the marks of the branding iron, whether they come
in the shape of sorrows and pains, or otherwise. It is well that we
should have to carry these. It is blessed, and a special mark of the
Master's favour that He should think it worth His while to mark us as
His own, by any sorrow or by any pain. Howsoever hot may be the iron,
and howsoever deeply it may be pressed by His firm, steady, gentle hand
upon the quivering flesh and the shrinking heart, let us be thankful if
He, even by it, impresses on us the manifest tokens of ownership. Oh,
brethren! if we could come to look upon sorrows and losses with this
clear recognition of their source, meaning and purpose, they change
their nature, the paradox is fulfilled that we do 'gather grapes of
thorns and figs of thistles.' 'I bear in my body,' with a solemn triumph
and patient hope,