The Christian Home (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1920 Excerpt: ...9: 24-27. "Know ye not that they that run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? Even so run; that ye may attain. And every man that striveth in the games exerciseth self-control in all things. Now they do it to receive a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible. I therefore so run, as not uncertainly; so fight I, as not beating the air: but I buffet my body, and bring it into bondage: lest by any means, after that I have preached to others, I myself should be rejected." 72 Paul's utterance here is characteristic. From it we learn: (1) That, though a Jew, he had been providentally directed to observe Grecian customs. (2) That he had been profoundly impressed by Greek athletics, in their costly ministry to the formation of character. (3) That he felt play to be a valuable if not a necessary factor in the shaping of character, whose use ought to be systematized as the Greeks had systematized it, and projected from childhood into adult life as had been done by the Greeks. (4) That strenuousness in play tends to promote wholesome strenuousness in the weightier affairs of life, and must be carried over into these if we are to grow like Christ and serve him effectively. (5) That self-control, achieved at savage cost, is not duly nurtured in the average child or adult without the stimulus and exactions of organized play, while yet it is of imperious necessity in the Christian life--of preachers and other Christian leaders as well as of the laity. (6) That while much that Paul said and wrote has necessarily been relegated to oblivion, the divine Author and Preserver of Scripture has been at pains to preserve this sharp and striking bit of Paul's personal experiences and apostolic exhortations for our use--in part because the matter of duly regu...