A SERVANT OF MEN

’For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more. 20.  And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; 21.  To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law. 22.  To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak:  I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. 23.  And this I do for the gospel’s sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you.’—­1 COR. ix. 19-23.

Paul speaks much of himself, but he is not an egotist.  When he says, ‘I do so and so,’ it is a gracious way of enjoining the same conduct on his readers.  He will lay no burden on them which he does not himself carry.  The leader who can say ‘Come’ is not likely to want followers.  So, in this section, the Apostle is really enjoining on the Corinthians the conduct which he declares is his own.

The great principle incumbent on all Christians, with a view to the salvation of others, is to go as far as one can without untruthfulness in the direction of finding points of resemblance and contact with those to whom we would commend the Gospel.  There is a base counterfeit of this apostolic example, which slurs over distinctive beliefs, and weakly tries to please everybody by differing from nobody.  That trimming to catch all winds never gains any.  Mr. Facing-both-ways is not a powerful evangelist.  The motive of becoming all things to all men must be plainly disinterested, and the assimilation must have love for the souls concerned and eagerness to bring the truth to them, and them to the truth, legibly stamped upon it, or it will be regarded, and rightly so, as mere cowardice or dishonesty.  And there must be no stretching the assimilation to the length of either concealing truth or fraternising in evil.  Love to my neighbour can never lead to my joining him in wrongdoing.

But, while the limits of this assumption of the colour of our surroundings are plainly marked, there is ample space within these for the exercise of this eminently Christian grace.  We must get near people if we would help them.  Especially must we identify ourselves with them in sympathy, and seek to multiply points of assimilation, if we would draw them to Jesus Christ.  He Himself had to become man that He might gain men, and His servants have to do likewise, in their degree.  The old story of the Christian teacher who voluntarily became a slave, that he might tell of Christ to slaves, has in spirit to be repeated by us all.

We can do no good by standing aloof on a height and flinging down the Gospel to the people below.  They must feel that we enter into their circumstances, prejudices, ways of thinking, and the like, if our words are to have power.  That is true about all Christian teachers, whether of old or young.  You must be a boy among boys, and try to show that you enter into the boy’s nature, or you may lecture till doomsday and do no good.