Read Luke 2:1-20.
XXXIV
AIMING HIGH
Say, fellows, on the train sometimes a fellow-passenger becomes confidential and tells a story right out of his heart. One of this kind came to me the other day.
There were two brothers—clever boys, keen, alert, ambitious. They lived in a Christian home. God spoke very clearly to both of them, calling them to lives of consecrated service for Him.
A—— decided to train for the ministry. B—— said the ministry was poorly paid. He felt that A—— was needlessly committing himself to a life of sacrifice. He shuddered at the prospect of a poor preacher's hand to mouth existence. As for him, he would sell his talents in the world market, where brains and training counted for something and brought a large price. Not for him the narrow life in a small corner, when a young man of ambition and push could live and have a good time in the big current. A fortune, a fame, and a life on the high road of ease and pleasure were the things really worth striving for, and for these he proposed to drive.
Twelve or fifteen years have passed since these decisions were formed. A—— finished his seminary training, was licensed as a minister, and accepted a little country charge. It was hard sledding, the salary was small, and the work was more or less discouraging, but it was a clean course and a clear road, and he buckled down, throwing into his work all his resources.
B—— went to a large city and got a trial job as reporter on a big daily. He had a mind for writing—a good vocabulary, and a flow of language which gave promise of carrying him to the goal of his ambition. He wrote verses in good style, and had had a number of poems in his college magazine. B——'s program, you remember, put special emphasis upon "having the good things of this life while you may." Putting the emphasis there is likely to warp one's judgment as to what are really "the good things," and so it proved in B——'s case, for he spent his salary on luxuries, and for the temporary gratification of his appetite and his ideas of "a good time."