Week 15—Friday Luke 9:23-26
Luke 9:23-26
THE SELFISH PERISH—THE UNSELFISH SURVIVE
The view of creation of an imperfect universe which we can help God finish, and so complete ourselves in the process, fits in with the declared purpose of creation: “So God created man in his own image . . . and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it’ ” (Gen. 1:27-28). “Subdue it” would imply that the earth is not perfect—it is recalcitrant, resistant, needs to be subdued to the higher purposes of God and man. But “God saw that it was good”—not perfect, but “good” for God’s purposes to make character in human beings.
The research medical man, mentioned before, after his own conversion said: “I’m going back to my laboratory to convert the worst pagans in the world—cancer cells. They are my mission field.” Cancer cells are cells turned selfish. They do not serve the rest, they make the rest serve them. They are basic enemies of nature’s process: “Serve or be eliminated.” Everything in nature and human nature is pagan—alien to God and God’s creation—when they serve themselves and refuse to serve the rest. They are on their way to death and destruction. The universe eliminates them. They are breaking the deepest law of the universe: “Whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake, he will save it.” That law is the same in lower nature and among human beings. So the God of Grace and the God of nature has written one law in both nature and man: “The servant of all becomes the greatest of all. The servant of itself alone perishes.” Note “servant of all”—the catch is in the word “all.” You may be willing to be the servant of some—your race, your class, your family, your religion. That service doesn’t make you great—only a great snob! Only the servant of all becomes the greatest of all.
O Father God, we thank you for the revelation of your purposes—your purposes of redemption. You are redeeming us and the mold in which we live—nature. You have long-range purposes and we follow breathlessly their unfolding. We thank you. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: Everything that happens to me—good, bad, indifferent—can be used for my redemption.