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This text may refer to two things: wisdom in winning souls, or the wisdom of winning souls. He who assumes, as the errand and purpose of his life, the conversion of his fellow-men to Christ, has given the highest proof within his reach that he himself is a wise man.

I. HE HAS SELECTED THE NATURAL FIELD FOR SUCCESSFUL HUMAN EFFORT. It is time to drop our suspicion in reference to honest work. Butler's definition says, "Happiness consists in a faculty having its proper object." That is, let any one of our powers fasten itself upon a legitimate end, and proceed at once unto vigour, and a feeling of true continuous joy will spring up from the mere exercise. Our reason is the happiest in reasoning; our judgment in deciding; our imagination in the poetic drawing of pictures; our affections in lavishing their love on chosen friends. There needs only to be added the element of success. That is, we must be able to gain the ends we aim at. If we are baulked, we are disappointed and discontented. Hence it is important for each man to understand his own adaptations and possibilities, so that he may seek right ends. Winning souls is the true work for human souls to do. For it flings into successful action the whole Christian man, body, mind, and spirit. There is intelligence in it; there is faith in it; there is hope in it; there is activity in it; there is excitement and exhilaration in it. And success is sure to follow fidelity. The old fable was that one who always carried a myrtle-wand in his hand would never grow weary in the way. But here is no fable. The love of Christ in the heart, and the zeal of Christ in the life, are what evermore satisfy, exercise, and rest the soul.

II. THE SPECIFIC END TO BE REACHED IN WINNING SOULS EVIDENCES WISDOM IN THE CHOICE. Even a ministry of destruction has something grand about it, fearful as it seems to gaze upon, awful as it must be to exercise. But a ministry of relief is better than any of retribution. It has in it all the sublimity of power, and then the additional grace and glory of help, the beauty of being serviceable. A ministry of salvation is simply transcendent. It deals with a man's highest nature, and touches upon the destinies of eternity. Everywhere God seems to look upon human beings as just so many souls. To save a man is to deliver a fellow-man from sin and hell, and bring him to holiness and heaven. To save a soul is to incorporate with the eternal destiny of a sentient and reasoning being a new spring and force of exultant and exhilarant life; to quicken all its susceptibilities; to renew the will into a profitable obedience to God; to unfold all the capacities of intellect and affection. In a word, to save the soul is more than to create the soul.

III. THE PROPRIETORSHIP WE GAIN IN THE SOULS WE INSTRUMENTALLY WIN. We love what we work for more than what costs us nothing. Value to you is measured by this sum of yourself you have put in possession. A soul we help to save possesses a value to us unlike that of any other soul. For we gain a kind of proprietary right in it. God lets us feel so.

1. Present companionship. The soul we lead into the joys of this new life becomes our helper, and returns the benefit. If we put into active, beneficent, useful, attractive life any human soul, may we not share all the benedictions its sweet, gentle, Christlike career is scattering around it?

2. Eternal communion. Those who are with us here will go with us to be in our company hereafter.

IV. THE GRAND AWARDS OF THE GOSPEL FOR THIS WORK SHOW THE WISDOM OF WINNING SOULS.

1. The growth of personal graces. He who watereth others shall be watered himself. He who carries a lantern for darkened men finds his own path lit the clearest.

2. The day of approval. Every soul which saves a soul shares in the satisfaction his work gives to the Master. Oh, the exquisite joy of that supreme moment when a Christian labourer presents a new prince or princess to Christ, the King of Glory, in the midst of heaven!

(C. S. Robinson.)

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KJV: The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life; and he that winneth souls is wise.

WEB: The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life. He who is wise wins souls.