“One kind of moral training uses self-sacrifice as punishment. Because you have done so much which you ought not to have done, therefore you shall surrender so much which it would give you pleasure to possess. Another uses self-sacrifice as an expression of the essential badness of the thing surrendered. Because the earth is inherently, intrinsically wicked, therefore come away from it, and be separate; because the body is accursed, therefore pluck out thy right eye, cut off thy right hand. But to Jesus self-sacrifice always is a means of freedom. That is what always gives to the self-denials which He demands a triumphant and enthusiastic air.
“Not because you have not deserved to enjoy it, not because it is wicked to enjoy it, but because there is another enjoyment more worthy of your nature, for which the native appetite shall show itself in you the moment that you really lay hold of it, therefore let this first enjoyment go; and by this conception of the purpose of self-sacrifice, Christ’s law and limit of self-sacrifice is always settled.”
“Whose service is perfect freedom.”
Book of Common Prayer [Anglican]
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