| Secrets of a Beautiful Life |
Chapter 2 |
Page 4 |
Your friend does not come to you and say, “I want to cheer you up. I want to cure you of that bad habit. I want to give you more wisdom. I want to help you to be noble.” If he came thus, announcing with flourish of trumpets his benevolent intention toward you; he would probably defeat his purpose. But he comes as your friend, with no programme, no heralding of his desire — comes simply loving you, and bringing into your life the best that is in his own life, sincerely yearning in some way to be a help to you. Then virtue passes from him to you, and new happiness and blessing come to you from him, you know not how. You have new courage, new gladness, and new inspiration. Sin seems even more ignoble and unworthy, and holiness shines with brighter radiance. You are strengthened in your purpose to live worthily. You are more eager to make the most of your life. Thus love unconsciously, and without any definite plan, quickens and inspires another life to do its best. There is no other way of paying our debt to others which is so Christlike as this. Love gives itself, its own very life, to become life to others.
“O Lord, that I could waste my life for others,
With no ends of mine own;
That I could pour myself into my brothers,
And live for them alone!”
The whole drift of Christian teaching and impulse is on the line of this lesson. Our Lord’s definitions and illustrations of love all emphasize this quality of helpful serving. “Not to be ministered unto, but to minister,” was the saying that epitomized the whole motive of His own blessed life. The Good Samaritan was the Master’s ideal of the working of love in human experience. When asked who was greatest in the kingdom of heaven, His reply was very plain and clear — he who serves the most fully and the most unselfishly.
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