So the old man
arose from his bed, and took the clothes that had covered him in his
sleep, and reverently wrapped them about his statue to save it, then
lay down himself in the cold, uncovered. In the morning, when his
friends came in, they found the old sculptor dead; but the image was
preserved unharmed.
We each have in our soul, if we are true believers in Christ, a vision
of spiritual loveliness into which we are striving to fashion our
lives. This vision is our conception of the character of Christ.
"That is what I am going to be some day," we say. Far away beyond our
present attainment as this vision may shine, yet we are ever striving
to reach it. This is the ideal which we carry in our heart amid all
our toiling and struggling. This ideal we must keep free from all
marring or stain. We must save it though, like the old sculptor, we
lose our very life in guarding it. We should be willing to die rather
than give it up to be destroyed. We should preserve the image of
Christ, bright, radiant, unsoiled, in our soul, until it transforms our
dull, sinful, earthly life into its own transfigured beauty.
No other aim in life is worthy of an immortal being. We may become
like the angels; what debasement, then, to let our lives, with all
their glorious possibilities, be dragged down into the dust of shame
and dishonor! Rather let us seek continually the glory for which we
were made and redeemed.
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