hall come into the midst of the purposes
of God and have the unspeakable privilege in these few years of doing
something of His work. And yet so is our life all one, so is the kingdom
of God which surrounds us and infolds us one bright and blessed unity,
that when a man has devoted himself to the service of God and his
fellow-man, immediately he is thrown back upon his own nature, and he
sees now--it is the right place for him to see--that he must be the
brave, strong, faithful man, because it is impossible for him to do his
duty and to render his service, except it is rendered out of a heart
that is full of faithfulness, that is brave and true. There is one word
of Jesus that always comes back to me as about the noblest thing that
human lips have ever said upon our earth, and the most comprehensive
thing, that seems to sweep into itself all the commonplace experience of
mankind. Do you remember when He was sitting with His disciples, at the
last supper, how He lifted up His voice and prayed, and in the midst of
His prayer there came these wondrous words: "For their sakes I sanctify
myself, that they also might be sanctified"? The whole of human life is
there. Shall a man cultivate himself? No, not primarily. Shall a man
serve the world, strive to increase the kingdom of God in the world?
Yes, indeed, he shall. How shall he do it? By cultivating himself, and
instantly he is thrown back upon his own life. "For their sakes I
sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified." I am my best, not
simply for myself, but for the world. My brethren, is there anything in
all the teachings that man has had from his fellow-man, all that has
come down to him from the lips of God, that is nobler, that is more
far-reaching than that--to be my best not simply for my own sake, but
for the sake of the world into which, setting my best, I shall make that
world more complete, I shall do my little part to renew and to recreate
it in the image of God? That is the law of my existence. And the man
that makes that the law of his existence neither neglects himself nor
his fellow-men, neither becomes the self-absorbed student and cultivator
of his own life upon the one hand, nor does he become, abandoning
himself, simply the wasting benefactor of his brethren upon the other.
You can help your fellow-men: you must help your fellow-men; but the
only way you can help them is by being the noblest and the best man that
it is possible for you to be. I