Morning & Evening Devotional Reading–

December 7– Evening

by C. H. Spurgeon, revised and edited by W. C. Neff

“I have become all things to all men that I might by all means save some.”

—1 Corinthians 9:22

The Apostle Paul’s great object was not merely to instruct and to improve but to save. Anything short of this would have disappointed him; he strived to have men renewed in heart, forgiven, sanctified, and, in fact, saved.

Have our Christian labors been aimed at anything outside of this target? Then let us amend our ways, for of what benefit will it be at the last Great Day to have taught men to improve their morals if they appear before God unsaved? Our skirts will be blood-red if through life we had sought lesser objectives and had forgotten that men needed to be saved.

Paul knew the ruin of man’s natural state and did not try to educate people but to save them. He saw men sinking to hell and did not talk of refining them but of saving from the wrath to come. To lead them to their salvation, he gave himself up with untiring zeal to proclaiming the gospel everywhere, warning and pleading with men to be reconciled to God. His prayers were unrelenting and his labors incessant. To save souls was his consuming passion, his ambition, his calling. He became a servant to all men, feeling an anguish within him if he did not preach the gospel. He laid aside his preferences to prevent prejudice. In matters of indifference, he submitted his will to others. The gospel was the one all-important business with him. If he could only save some, he would be content. This was the crown for which he strove.

Dear reader, have you and I lived to win souls like this? Are we possessed with the same all-absorbing desire? If not, why not? Jesus died for sinners. Can’t we live for them? Where is our tenderness? Where our love to Christ if we aren’t seeking his honor in the salvation of men? O that the Lord would saturate us through and through with an undying zeal for the souls of men. [M&E]