Part 4 (1/2)

Fellows, start a day like that--honestly--and _you cannot fail_!

_Read Matthew 22:15-46._

IX

LOYALTY

Say, fellows, what is the most loyal thing you ever did? I should like to know. Was it when you waded into a big bully who was licking your little brother, and took the drubbing yourself? Or was it when some fellows accused you of being tied to your mother's ap.r.o.n strings, and you flashed back at them: ”Yes, and she is the finest mother a boy ever had!” Or was it when you sat up all night in a coach on a railroad trip to root for your team next day on the enemy's field?

I heard of a British boy in Flanders who was brought back of the lines for surgical treatment, and when they opened his s.h.i.+rt they found tattooed on his breast the words: _For My King!_ I read of a French lad whose arm had to be amputated at the shoulder, having been shattered by a German sh.e.l.l. When he regained consciousness, the surgeon, moved with deep sympathy, said, ”Oh, my poor boy, I am so sorry you lost your arm!” The boy's eyes snapped as he answered: ”Lost! No, don't say that; I _gave_ it to France!”

Each one of you fellows has a tremendous capacity for being loyal to some thing, some principle, or _somebody_. It is a costly part of your make-up, because it will cause you to make sacrifice. What are you choosing as the object of your loyalty?

Fellows, I want to offer you King Jesus as the One upon whom you can spend your loyalty to the limit. There is none like Him. He is the chief among ten thousand. When He gives you a task He gives you at the same time the power to do it. When He sends you to men, He opens the hearts of those to whom you are sent. You can undertake anything for King Jesus without fear, no matter how difficult or how impossible the task may seem.

Why, fellows, think of those two disciples going after that colt for Jesus their King to ride upon! He sent them for it. The beast belonged to some one else, yet they were to untie it and bring it. If the owner objected, all they were to say was: ”The Lord hath need of him.” That would settle it. They brought it as directed. That was faith, and that was loyalty.

To-day King Jesus wants messengers--not to send out for a.s.ses, but into the haunts of sin for lost men and women; and into the social, commercial, and industrial world to present His claims. Some, hearing the call, are answering, ”But how do I know I will succeed in that sort of business? Will I be contented in such work? Will it pay? Will it keep me in a comfortable living? Will men come when I tell them?”

Listen, fellows, King Jesus says: ”All power is given unto me--Go!--and lo, I am with you alway!” That is sufficient, it is the King's own word for it; and here is the place where you can exercise your priceless loyalty to the limit, and never know a moment's regret. The King Himself goes with you.

The loyal servants of King Jesus never have to root for a losing game; victory is a.s.sured from the beginning.

_Read Mark 11:1-11._

X

A GOOD SPORT

Say, fellows, I overheard a remark the other day as I pa.s.sed a bunch of boys down on the corner. One of the boys was saying, ”Oh, he's a good sport, all right,” and I wondered just what that boy thought it took to make a good sport. About that time one of the boys whom I knew pulled out of the crowd and coming my way overtook me, so I asked him who was the ”good sport” the fellows were talking about.

”Why,” he said, ”it was Jim Love; when he was in the two-mile cross-country foot race the other day, with a good chance of getting ahead of Tom Locke, who won it, Jim stopped long enough to help a guy across a footlog with a sack of potatoes or something--and even then came in just a few yards behind Tom. He would have won, but for that stop; but he said the old man looked as if he was about to fall off the footlog. Tom saw it, too, but he waded the creek and got a better lead on Jim.”

It did me good to think of those fellows cla.s.sing Jim up as ”a good sport,” after I knew what had happened. They had the right idea. I believe our Lord would have called Jim a good sport, too, if He had been telling the boys of to-day about it, because the Christ spirit in a fellow is what makes him a ”good sport” in the highest sense. Once when a proud Pharisee was trying to trap our Lord with a ”catch question,” Jesus answered him with a story very much like that which made the boys call Jim Love a good sport.

The Pharisee asked Jesus, ”Who is my neighbour?” and Jesus told him about the Good Samaritan. A man was travelling from Jerusalem down the rough mountain road to Jericho, and was attacked by bandits, beaten, robbed, and left lying beside the road half dead. A priest came along, but he was in a hurry; he had important religious duties awaiting him, and besides, that fellow looked as if he was in bad and it would take a lot of time and trouble to ”undertake” him, so Mr. Priest just hummed a little tune to himself, looked at the sky and pa.s.sed on.

Then came a Levite. He got down off his donkey and stepped over and looked at the poor fellow. Yes, he was breathing, but so near dead he probably would not last long, so why worry? So pa.s.sed on the Levite.

But next came along a man whom the priest and the Levite despised because he was a Samaritan. They regarded him as a very poor sort of a citizen.

But the Samaritan had a heart in him and he had a way of saying to himself when he saw anybody in distress: ”Suppose I was in that fellow's fix, what would I like to have done for me?” When he asked himself that question on this occasion, the answer came quick and strong: ”Get down and help him all you can; yes, your business is urgent, too, but here is a fellow-man in hard luck and you've got the stuff to help with!”

That is the way the heart of a good sport talks back to a fellow, and a good sport listens when his heart speaks, and a good sport acts quickly. So the Samaritan got down off his donkey and ran to the man, felt his pulse, spoke to him, loosened his s.h.i.+rt and looked into that ugly wound all bleeding. Then back to his travelling sack and out with the oil and wine.