Scripture: "I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly."—JOHN x. 10.
Everyone can understand the difference between life that is; weak and sickly, and life that has abundant vitality. Thus St. Paul speaks of the Christian life of the Corinthians as not spiritual but carnal, as of young children in Christ incapable of assimilating strong meat, or of understanding the deeper truths of the Gospel (see 1 Cor. iii. and Heb. v.). There are some, the majority of Christians, who never advance beyond first principles. They are dull of hearing and remain carnal Christians. There are others again, a minority, who indeed show forth the abundant riches of grace. All through the history of the Church we find this difference. In our day, too, the number is small of those who seek to live wholly for God, and being spiritually minded have large thoughts of the abundant life there is in Christ. They witness to the glory of Christ "full of grace and truth." "For of His fulness we all received, and grace for grace" (John i. 16).
The preacher's aim should be, so to declare the fulness of God's grace in Jesus Christ as to make Christians ashamed of the poverty of their spiritual life, and to encourage them to believe that "life abundant" in the fulness of the Spirit is for them.
Dear Reader, ask yourself if you are living such an abundant life as Jesus came to bestow? Is it manifest in your love to the Saviour and in the abundant fruit you bear to the glory of God in soul-winning? If not, pray God to strengthen your faith that He is able to make all grace abound toward you that you always having all sufficiency may abound in every good work. Let Jesus be precious to you, and daily communion with Him indispensable. He will teach you by His Holy Spirit to honor Him by an abundant life.
