And our life must be consecrated even as His was.  What shall the consecration be?  Far be it from me to undervalue the exaltation into humility that comes to a man when he consecrates himself to any great and noble cause.  I believe that it helps to save any man from pride when he gives himself to his family or his country or his fellow men, to truth, to liberty, to purity, to anything outside of and above himself, but there is a consecration higher and fuller and more saving than any such can be.  We go back to the Cross.  Jesus is dying there for us.  He dies and we are saved.  What then?  When a soul “knows its full salvation” and sees it all bought by, all wrapt up in, that Redeemer, then in the outburst of a grateful love, he gives himself to the Redeemer Christ.  There is no hesitation, no keeping back of anything.  He is all offered up to Christ; and then to serve that Christ, to follow Him, to do His will, to enter into Him, that is the one great object of the whole consecrated life, and in that consecration, the straining of the life toward that One Object, the “pride of life” is swept down and drowned.  Not merely the life then, but the use of the life, comes from the Father.  It is not of the world.  The soul is saved!

The salvation of the Cross!  Its center is the forgiveness of sins which the cross alone made possible; but is not its issue here, in the lifting of the soul above the pride of life and consecrating it in the profoundest gratitude to “Him who redeemed us and washed us from sins in His own blood”?  What humility!  What self-forgetfulness!  What unworldliness!  What utter childhood to the Father!

My friends, my people, would you be saved, saved from your sins, saved from yourselves, saved from the pride of life?  You must be His that you may not be your own!  He died for you that you might not henceforth live to yourself but unto Him.  You must be consecrated to your Savior.  If there is one soul in my church to-day who is weary and dissatisfied with his self-slavery, I offer him Jesus for Savior, for Master!  If any man thirst let him come unto Him and drink.  Turn unto Him and be ye saved!  You can, you must!  His service is life, life in its fullest because life in humility.  Outside of His gospel and His service there is the pride of life, and the pride of life is death.

GLADDEN

THE PRINCE OF LIFE

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

Washington Gladden, Congregational divine, was born at Pottsgrove, Pa., in 1836.  After graduating at Williams College he was ordained pastor, and occupied pulpits in Brooklyn, Morrisania, N.Y., and Springfield, Mass., until 1882, when he assumed charge of the First Congregational Church of Columbus, Ohio.  He has also occupied editorial positions, and has published many books on social and civil reform and the practical application of Christian truth to popular and common life.  His style, whether he is writing or speaking, combines vigor with grace.