Life – More Abundantly – Sunday, January 5, 1941
As we contemplate the new year, it would be interesting to know what men desire in their hearts that it should hold for them. These hopes, no doubt, could be stated in broad generalities for most of us. We all want peace, of course.
We all want to be permitted to use our energies and powers of thought in constructive activity. We all want to be loved, and respected, and cherished by someone who esteems us more than casually. We all want the necessities of life, and what each of us considers to be our share of its comforts. In short, everyone is hoping that the new year will hold happiness for himself and for those whom he wishes well. That, of course, is the basis of the phrase “Happy New Year”, which is spoken so often and so thoughtlessly that it has lost much of its meaning. But in hoping for a Happy New Year, it would be revealing to know what it is that men think would make them happy.
So often when we speak of living abundantly, we are thinking in terms of material comforts and advantages. If man were a creature only of flesh and bone, food and raiment and the physical comforts would be the end of all his needs. But he is also a creature of mind and of spirit and of immortal continuance, and that abundant life of which we speak must go beyond a full stomach; a new car; a fur coat and such things.
The material side of our existence is an important, indeed, essential consideration, but it is by no means the only consideration. He who makes possible by his creative ingenuity or inventive genius or powers of organization, the wider distribution of more and more desirable things, is a common benefactor of mankind, but he who supposes that life begins and ends with the accumulation of this world’s goods, is misguided in his thinking.
It was of such as he of whom this parable was spoken: And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take things easy; eat, drink and be merry. But God said unto him; Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee. Then whose shall those things be, which thou has provided?” (Luke 12:19, 20). And the conclusion of the hatter, according to the record of Luke, is this: “That life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment.” (Luke 12:23) And so, when we say “Happy New Year” we speak of that happiness wherein “men might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10) Remembering, in the words of Paul to the Romans, that: “The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy.” (Romans 14:17)
January 5, 1941
Broadcast Number 0,594