Suffering, the Measure of Worth
H. W. Beecher. 1 Corinthians 8:11-13 And through your knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died?… I. THE "WEAK BROTHER" IS NOT OF MUCH VALUE IN HIMSELF; BUT HE IS MADE VALUABLE BY THE FACT THAT CHRIST DIED FOR HIM. 1. How much of themselves men will give for one another, measures the worth in which that other is held. "I love you," may mean only "you are my plaything," or "I love myself"; but true love will give up for another's sake time and convenience. It will employ all the resources of its being for the sake of that friend. And when, in some great exigency, all this will not avail, then love, in the glory of its power, goes to death as to the consummation of itself, and leaves a witness to itself which all mankind recognises (John 15:13). 2. Even when this is the fruit of instinct, it is impressive. The bear that dies defending its cubs, the hound that pines and dies on its master's grave, the little sparrow that fights the hawk and owl, not for itself, but its nest — one must be heartless indeed to feel no admiration for these fidelities of love. 3. But how much more when one's love and suffering spring from a perception of excellence in an object loved? The greater the nature that suffers, the higher is the estimate which his example gives of that for which he suffers. And by this analogue, the suffering and sacrifice of a Divine Being carries out the witness to its utmost conceivable extent. 4. We see at once a new element in the hands of the apostles after this testimony of the Master. No sooner was He gone up than they began to preach that man was valuable on account of what Christ suffered for him. A man for whom Christ died became a very different creature from a man before Christ had died for him. The fact that Christ died for a man made him worth protecting if he was weak. 5. This suffering was not founded upon man's character. It would be a testimony to the value of good character if Christ had come to die for it; but that was the very point of conflict between Him and the Pharisees. They held that Christ ought to suffer and identify Himself with them; but He most scornfully rejected that, and said, "I came not to call the righteous, but sinners. I came to give My life for the lowest and worst men." He more sharply than any other discriminated between good and bad character; yet there was something behind character to which Christ was bearing witness, viz., the abstract original value which inheres in human life. The death of Christ is a testimony to the value of man in his very substance, if I may so say; so that the least and the lowest have the essence of value in them. II. THE EFFECT WHICH THIS FACT HAS OF DETERMINING MAN'S PLACE, HIS RIGHTS, AND HIS WORTH. 1. Consider what the world's way of estimation has been in judging men. Earliest, men measured physical power. Now the habit of society is to classify men into relative ranks of value by the effects which they are able to produce; by what they are worth to society. Therefore, when a great man dies men say, "The world has met with a great loss." If a poor man dies, men say, "The world has one less incumbrance." The dog that hunts well is better than a pauper that does not do anything, in the estimation of men. If a race are not able to hold their own against aggressive peoples men say, "There is no help for it; they must go." They judge men by the standard of political economy. There is no such contempt on the globe for anything as man has for man. We need therefore to go back to this testimony of our Master's example, who came by His suffering and death to bear a testimony of that element in human nature which every man has like every other. 2. This view interprets the future. A man in the lowest condition here is not the man that he is to be; and when you have measured and weighed him, you have not estimated what he is worth in the kingdom to come. He has before him another world; and we are told most solemnly by our Saviour that the men who are the most regarded here will be worth the least there. "The first shall be last, the last first." Many of the plants of our northern summer come up quickly, and do exceedingly well; but they are coarse and rank at that. And there are many seeds that I plant by the side of them every spring, which in the first summer only grow a few leaves high. There is not sun enough to make them do what it is in them to do. But if I put them in some sheltered hot-house, and give them the continuous growth of autumn and winter, and then, the next summer, put them out once more, they gather strength by this second planting, and lift up their arms and spread out the abundance of their blossoms. The plants that grew quickest the year before, are now called weeds by their side. And I doubt not that there is many a man who rushes up to a rank growth in the soil of this world, and of whom men seeing him, say, "That is a great man," but there are many poor, feeble creatures in this world who will be carried safely on and up, and rooted in a better clime; and then, lifting up their whole nature, they will come out into that glorious summer of fervent love in heaven, where they will be more majestic, more fruitful, than those who so far surpass them here. III. THE EFFECTS WHICH THIS DOCTRINE WILL HAVE UPON OUR FEELINGS AND CONDUCT TO OUR FELLOW-MEN. 1. Let us suppose that we are in full possession of the Christian feeling — Christ died for that man. It will be a powerful restraint upon lawless liberty, and will bring us into such sympathy with all our fellow men, that, at the sacrifice of our own convenience and rights, it will be a privilege and a pleasure for us to serve them. Some men go through life, saying, "I will take care of myself, and you must take care of yourself"; and they feel that they have a right to go through life thus. Now no one who has drunk deeply of the spirit of the Master will refuse to accept the injunction, "We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak." It is as if a strong swimmer should turn back and lend a helping hand to buoy up and lift across the flood one that was weaker or less able to swim than himself. We have no right to disregard, much less to hinder, the welfare of any human being. Have I a right to go tramp, tramp, tramp, according to the law of my physical strength, among little children? If I have had better privileges than others, and have come to conclusions which they cannot understand, have I a right to scatter sceptical notions through society? A man is bound to hold his knowledge, his conscience, his pleasures, &c., subject to this great law: "Christ died for men, and I must live for men, and restrain my power, and forego my rights, even for their sake." We have a right to employ men, of course; but there is a habit which prevails in society of thinking that a man has a right to just so much of his fellow-men as he is able to extract from them. A man may fleece a hundred men during the week, and take the communion on Sunday, and nobody thinks that there is any violation of good-fellowship or of orthodoxy. But that great law of fellowship which knits every man to every other man on the globe says not only "Thou art his brother," but, "Thou art responsible for his weal as well as thine own. Thou shalt not in any wise harm him." 2. This is one of the most precious of doctrines to those that look and long for a better period of the world. It was almost the only thing we could urge when slavery rent our land. The single strand that held against the storms of avarice and the fire of lurid lusts was the single argument, "For these Christ died." And that held; and the most wonderful change toward regeneration that the world ever saw has taken place by the simple operation of that great law. And what have we now for the weak races? Men of a hard heart and an iron-shod foot are preparing to tread these people down and deny them their rights. And I take my stand by the side of every weak creature, whatever his nationality may be, and I say, "For him Christ died." Give men at the bottom a chance to come up. God, the highest, bowed down His head and came upon the earth and suffered for the weakest and the worst. 3. Christian brethren, we must arm ourselves betimes. The seeds of a better public sentiment must be sown. Then let no man be discouraged because he is labouring with a very much neglected class. There is no material in this world which is un-promising. No man is beyond salvation since "Christ died" for him. (H. W. Beecher.) Parallel Verses KJV: And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died? WEB: And through your knowledge, he who is weak perishes, the brother for whose sake Christ died.