Will You Have True Riches?
By R. F. Cottrell
What shall a man be profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own life? Eternal life is set before us on the conditions of repentance, faith, and a life of faithful obedience to God. He that gains eternal life in the world to come, gains everything that is desirable; but he that loses it, loses everything. What a wretched choice men are making! They boast of making good bargains, while they are selling their birth-right for a mess of pottage. He only is truly the gainer who secures a part in the world to come. All else is loss. Reader, are you laying up a good foundation against the time to come, that you may lay hold on eternal life? If so, you are on the road to riches and true honor. There will be no end to that life. A hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand, a million, a thousand million of years may pass away, and an eternity of life and bliss is yet before us. If we may secure this, what folly to lose it for the riches or honors of this fleeting life. Give me a part in the world to come, if it be at the loss of all things, even of life itself. He that loses his life for Christ’s sake shall find it. Shall we make a whole sacrifice to God? The Lord help us to do so; He that has not force of character sufficient to break from his evil habits, his debasing appetites and passions, how shall he hope to secure the precious boon of life. He is selling eternal life for less than a meal of victuals, for this would prolong life a little, while his indulgences are cutting it short. It is time to be awake to these things. We have had light, line upon line. Are you heeding it? When do you intend to heed it? If you are neglecting it you are losing time, losing life.