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The Friend on the Road and Other Studies in the Gospels: Chapter 36 - Self-Possession

By John Henry Jowett


      "In your patience ye shall possess your souls."--Luke xxi. 19.

      To possess one's soul is an infinitely grander thing than to possess some magnificent estate. There is many a man who owns thousands of broad acres who has never owned the fair realm of his own soul. Ask him for an inventory of his estate, and he will produce one recording the contents of every nook and corner in his wide domain. Ask him for an inventory of his soul! Ask him what sacred powers he has in the world within, and what control he has of them, and whether there is peace and harmony in that mysterious Kingdom! He can record his wealth in personality; ask him what treasures he has in personality! In what measure does he possess his own soul? There is something grimly ironical in a man owning many things and yet not owning himself. He has gained the world; he has never gained his own soul.

      Now the secret of self-possession is to be found in Christ. It is through Him that we discover our souls. We find ourselves in finding Him. Our wealth of being is unveiled to us in the measure in which we enter into the revelation of His glory. Our endowments troop out at the call of His communion. The deeper our communion the wealthier is the response. The finer the climate the more luxurious is the growth. We never know how much there is in us until we are discovering how much there is in Christ. Our powers remain like sleeping seeds until "the heavenly air is breathing round."

      We do not come into these possessions in a day. The title-deeds may be ours in a moment. They become ours by faith in the living Christ, and they are handed to us in the moment when faith is born. But every day of faithful walking with the Lord brings us more and more into the possession of our spiritual estates, as every day we have new surprises in "the unsearchable riches in Christ." Therefore "in your patience ye shall possess your souls."

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See Also:
   Chapter 1 - Critics and Surgeons
   Chapter 2 - The Challenge of the Closed Door
   Chapter 3 - How the Best Things Become Ours
   Chapter 4 - Sixpennyworth of Miracle
   Chapter 5 - The Peace of the Larger Life
   Chapter 6 - Education by Contagion
   Chapter 7 - The Tares Among the Wheat
   Chapter 8 - Things New and Old
   Chapter 9 - The Buoyancy of Faith
   Chapter 10 - Sound the Great Recall
   Chapter 11 - The Bright Cloud
   Chapter 12 - Mercy and Obligation
   Chapter 13 - The Simplification of Life
   Chapter 14 - Life's Perilous Heats
   Chapter 15 - Feverishness
   Chapter 16 - The Truly Sensational Life
   Chapter 17 - The Dominant Passion
   Chapter 18 - Doing the Impossible
   Chapter 19 - The Life I Should Live
   Chapter 20 - The Blessing and Discipline of Retirement
   Chapter 21 - Endless Possibilities
   Chapter 22 - The Price of Liberty
   Chapter 23 - The Dynamics of Expulsion
   Chapter 24 - Evils That Never Arrive
   Chapter 25 - Returning in Power
   Chapter 26 - The Old Tackle and the New Presence
   Chapter 27 - The Noble Dissatisfaction
   Chapter 28 - The Malady of Not Wanting
   Chapter 29 - Sentimentaltsm
   Chapter 30 - The Pedantic Conscience
   Chapter 31 - A Receiver of Wrecks
   Chapter 32 - The Supreme Test
   Chapter 33 - Fainting
   Chapter 34 - Doing the Impossible
   Chapter 35 - Divine Visitations
   Chapter 36 - Self-Possession
   Chapter 37 - The Treacherous Kiss
   Chapter 38 - The Friend on the Road
   Chapter 39 - Dull Scholars
   Chapter 40 - The Unknown Christ
   Chapter 41 - The Worst and the Best
   Chapter 42 - Increase and Decrease
   Chapter 43 - Hating the Light
   Chapter 44 - Heroic Goodness
   Chapter 45 - Living Words
   Chapter 46 - The Last Bridge
   Chapter 47 - The Ministry of Infusion
   Chapter 48 - Breaking the Awful Silence
   Chapter 49 - Preparing for the Miracle
   Chapter 50 - The Inner Door
   Chapter 51 - The Revelation in the After Days
   Chapter 52 - The Troubled Heart
   Chapter 53 - The Gift of Peace
   Chapter 54 - Settling Down in Christ
   Chapter 55 - The Joy of the Lord
   Chapter 56 - The Joy of Christian Life
   Chapter 57 - The Sense of Mission
   Chapter 58 - Living at Second Hand
   Chapter 59 - The Great Act of Receiving

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