Tommy was all the time saying that when he grew up he wanted to be a great soldier. He meant to conquer men, and whole armies.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut,\u201d answered his mother, \u201cisn\u2019t there some conquest that you can make before you grow up?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy, how can that be?\u201d said Tommy; \u201cI surely am not to fight the other boys, am I?\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cNo, indeed,\u201d said his mother; \u201cbut did you ever know that no one can conquer others until he has first conquered himself?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy,\u201d said Tommy, \u201csurely I do not need to conquer myself. I can make myself mind,\u2014see,\u201d and with that he doubled up his fists, and stretched out his feet, and showed his mother how he could turn his body in any way he wished.<\/p>\n
\u201cAh,\u201d said his mother, \u201cyou promised me this morning that you would weed the front walk. I wonder what would happen if you should command your body to do that! Would it obey you?\u201d <\/p>\n
Tommy saw the point, and went out without a word to weed the walk. It was hard work, and he found it difficult indeed to make his hands obey his will, especially when the boys came by and wanted him to go swimming with them. He went to ask his mother.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere are the boys going?\u201d she inquired. And then, when Tommy answered, \u201cTo Reed\u2019s Pool,\u201d she said, \u201cYou know your father thinks that that is a dangerous place, and I cannot let you go. But what is this, Tommy?\u201d for his mother saw his lips beginning to quiver and the tears beginning to come; \u201cI thought you said this morning that you did not need to conquer yourself, and now I see that you cannot even command your feelings.\u201d At this Tommy went out with a smile on his face, and told the boys he could not go with them.<\/p>\n
Later in the same day his neighbor Paul came to play croquet, but before they had played two games his mother heard angry words, and, looking out, saw the two boys almost come to blows. Paul went away sulkily as she approached, and Tommy explained that he had not been playing fairly. \u201cAh, but, my son,\u201d said his mother, \u201cyou also got angry; and isn\u2019t it necessary for one who expects to command others to be able to command his temper?\u201d<\/p>\n
And so it went on all day. Tommy found that it was hard work to command his feet to go on an errand. He found himself unable to keep his hands from meddling with his father\u2019s new chess men. He found it quite impossible to restrain his tongue from answering back when an impudent boy made fun of him down street. And by the time night had come, talking it all over with his mother, he owned up that it was harder to command himself than he thought.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I am not going to give up,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ll get the better of myself yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWith Christ\u2019s help,\u201d answered his mother, as she kissed him good-night.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tommy was all the time saying that when he grew up he wanted to be a great soldier. He meant to conquer men, and whole armies. \u201cBut,\u201d answered his mother, \u201cisn\u2019t there some conquest that you can make before you grow up?\u201d \u201cWhy, how can that be?\u201d said Tommy; \u201cI surely am not to fight … Continue reading “TOMMY, THE CONQUEROR\u2014A SERMON-STORY ON
\nSELF-RESTRAINT”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13237"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13237\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}