MY SOUL OR MY SERVICE

There is no more subtle temptation than that which sets the soul as a
hindrance to the service we should render. A surprise awaits him who
carefully will compare the emphasis laid upon the individual soul and
its salvation by the modern church with the place given this in the
teachings of the Bible. Perhaps he will find in modern preaching, with
its insistent appeal to men to save their own souls, an explanation of
prevalent selfishness. The moral effect of urging a man to save his
soul is not much better than that which comes from advising him to save
his skin at any cost.

The most serious objection ever made to religion is that it produces a
narrow, self-centred type of mind. That type of religion cannot be
right, regardless of its doctrinal orthodoxy, which produces a wrong
type of men and women. But may not failure here be accounted for by
the selfish basis on which men build the plea for what they call
personal salvation?

What could be more selfish than this continual appeal to fear, this
urging of men to escape from punishment, to make sure of a house in the
heavenly city, this offering of crowns and perpetual rest, plenty and
peace, this emphasis on the great object of saving your own soul? It
is opposite directly to what the great Teacher told men. Did He not
say that the man who would save his own life should lose it?

The concentration of mind on the self, whether in the name of religion
or in any other name, is but moral suicide. People who have no other
object in life than that of saving their own souls are but little