The Christian faith is so paradoxical in many ways. No other religion, no other philosophical thought,

no any concept that you can think about anywhere in the world is as paradoxical or even close to it.

It cannot compare to it. In fact, the very paradoxes of the Christian faith is what causes

some people to stumble over it and causes some people to reject the faith. The fact that the

God, the creator of the universe, can become man. And that is the greatest paradox of all.

And from this paradox, all other paradoxes seem to stem and be born.

For example, the Bible said that if you want to be strong, you have to surrender, that if you

want power, you have to serve, that if you want happiness, you must be willing

to mourn over your sin. That if you want to be fulfilled, you have to hunger for righteousness.

That if you want to inherit the earth, you have to exercise meekness that is power under control, that if you

want to live eternally, you have to die to self. And today we come to the tenth secret for the

power of positive living. And we have seen nine secrets that the Apostle Paul revealed in 2nd Corinthians,

and we come to number 10, which is a paradox in itself. I'm calling it getting through giving.

Imagine that. Like all paradoxes, this one runs contrary to the social and societal norms.

It runs contrary to the natural mind.

In our natural world, we are told that if you want to get, you better grab everything you can get.

We are told that if you want to get ahead, don't worry about how many people you step over

in order to get to your destination.

We are told that if you want to succeed, you better not help anybody else succeed.

We are told that if you want to be rich, you better look out for number one.

And on and on and on. And I was thinking about this

this week, and I thought of a story that I read several years ago about the British ship,

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