WE CONTINUE WITH another portion of the passage from yesterday: “that in every way you were enriched in him” (1 Cor. 1:5). This passage is important. Does religious faith enrich or impoverish human personality? No more important question can be asked.
A religion that dictates what you should read and what you should listen to weakens you. The Muslim could reply, “Up to a certain point my religion strengthens me, but since it is a religion of rules instead of principles when I grow up to those rules and want to go beyond them, I am caught and cramped by the rules and hence weakened.” The Hindu could reply, “My religion weakens me at the point where it tells me that this earthly life is maya, an illusion, hence it unfits me for continuous motivation for social and material change.” The Buddhist could say, “My religion weakens me at the point of believing in life itself. It tries to get me beyond life into Nirvana, the state of the snuffed-out candle.” The religion of Mysticism could say, “My religion weakens me in that it is a retreat—a retreat inward into mystical states, apart from the needs and problems of the world.”
Only the real Christian faith, believed in fully and applied in its total implications could say, “In every way you are enriched in Him.” And you are! I visited the Central Congo in Africa. I listened to people who less than a generation ago were just out of the Bush, now intelligently and ably discussing how to meet the demands of imminent independence. Had independence been given into their hands instead of into the hands of the politicians, the story of the Congo might have been different. These men and women were in every way enriched in Him. Their minds, their bodies, their emotions, their outlook, their motives—their total persons have been enriched in Him.
O Jesus, Lord, Savior, and Enricher, I thank Thee that when we are exposed to Thee we are enriched. Thou art to us what sunlight is to greenness and growth, what air is to the lungs—Thou art life, and life abundant. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: I am an enriched person—enriched by the only riches in the universe—the riches of God.
