“For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” [Matthew 16:25-26]


The Previous edition in “My True Life” Series, titled “A Man’s Net Worth” tries to explain the Net worth of a man. We examined the measuring scale used to calculate the value or the net worth of a man in the world today, and questioned its rational. The things a man has, the goods and garbage he has acquired, things we call assets today, are all weak and unreasonable ingredients used to determine the value of man, because anything perishable is not a proper yardstick to calculate or measure a man’s worth.

A man popularly known as a millionaire today, cannot be realistically confirmed as a true millionaire by the monetary worth he has amassed overtime, or by the physical things he has acquired, because all these tangible yardsticks are perishables. You should instead be checking how much of treasures he has stored up in heaven, how much of God's grace, God's presence, God's Spirit, and the volume of Godliness he has accumulated overtime. This is how we know who a real millionaire is. If your millions are measured by the amount of cash, assets, properties, investments, bank accounts, and all these perishable things you pride in, sorry, your are NOT a millionaire, but a confirmed pauper and a poor man, becuase in a jiffy, those things are going to be wiped off.


For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

A careful and closer look at this verse shows that its contents and expressions are that of an Economist because of the use of economic languages and terms in the verse. We see words like 'profit', 'gain', 'lose' and exchange (which could also mean a 'trade by barter'). Hence, in this verse, Jesus Christ wants to reason as an economist, He is trying to present life in the language everyone understands. Jesus knows that everybody understands trade, therefore, He tries to bring the issue of life closer to the understanding of man, so that man can have true clarity and proper perspective of what life actually is. Going via economics therefore in deciphering this verse as Jesus tries to present it, a clearer understanding comes to one. Let's try and look at the verse closely as an economist:


what is a man profited...?

The first consideration is THE PROFIT. For any venture in life, be it business, or relationship, a man’s first consideration is the profit. The question of concern here is: "What is the profit?", "What will a man get as profit in this?"


if he shall gain...?

The next word is GAIN. Now, the word "gain" and "profit" actually look like synonyms. But a deeper understanding of the context here shows that ’gain’ and ’profit’ are not the same. "Gain here will mean the "REVENUE". This is the turnover generated from sale of goods or services, it is the income a company receives from normal business activities. So, in this venture presented by Jesus, the gain/revenue will be ‘the whole world’.

and lose...?

"LOSE" here means "spend", "expend", "use up", or "burn up". ’LOSE’ therefore, is the COST or CAPITAL ploughed into this venture. Hence, in this venture described by Christ, the SOUL of man represents the Cost spent, expended or used up.
In other words, if the Cost Price spent to engage in this venture is the SOUL, and all the proceeds (Revenue or Income) gathered from the business, is THE WHOLE WORLD, Jesus is asking a pertinent question: "What is the profit"?.

So, Matthew 16:26 will read thus economically:

“Is there any PROFIT (GAIN) actually for a man, if he throws his whole soul (life) as the COST (CAPITAL, INVESTMENT) into a venture, and all the RETURNS, REVENUE or INCOME he gets is the whole world? What kind of backward business is this? Is that not a colossal loss?”

I'm sure nobody ever engages in any venture for the sake of loss. If there is any venture any man ever wants to engage in, it is solely to make some profit, and never primarily because the venture is looks nice. For instance, flowers are beautiful to behold and the fragrance is so charming, warm and inviting. If an horticulturist asks me if I want to enter into the flower business, and I say, "O yes, I love flowers, the smell is wonderful". And in introducing me into the business, he says I must bring $1000 as the cost price to purchase the flowers, and he goes on to say that the greatest and highest I can ever sell a $1000 worth of flowers is $600 because of the perishable nature of the business. I will become confused because, how can a business I plough in so much not even be able to give me back my capital cost in return let alone giving me some profits?, how could I throw $1000 in, and get a maximum of $600 income, meaning from the onset, the business is primarily one that I will definitely run at a loss of at least $400? I'm sure no matter my desperation, the beauty and the inviting nature of the flowers will never be strong enough to persuade me into falling headlong into such unreasonable business. This is because before any other consideration, I am thinking of what I will get out of the business as profit FIRST, all other reasons are simply secondary.

The only logical reason why a man will want to engage in any trade/business/venture is because he is sure, he will get some profit out of it. Even if a business is a smelling, nauseating one, whose cost price = $1000, and the revenue after sales (the selling price) is $1800, 80% profit is a very lucrative deal, many people may not mind engaging in such a business, because the profit they will get out of it far outweighs the stench they will endure.
What is the profit, if the revenue is the "whole world" put together, and the cost price is the soul?

Jesus is trying to paint something very clear here, he is trying to check and question the rational of man, and say, "are you thinking properly?, does a man engage in a business that evidently is going to run at a colossal loss? are you not thinking straight? don't you understand the worth of the soul of a man, don’t you understand the greatness, the bigness and mightiness of the soul in comparison to the ‘whole world’?". Jesus is trying to say that you will be very foolish to pour out your soul, to lose your great soul, to expend your soul, just because you want to gain the whole world, He says, that will be a great loss, and He is asking you a question, "what are you going to gain?, is there any gain in this kind of venture?"...

It appears to me that even the WHOLE WORLD put together, is too little in comparison to the soul of man, all the things that men call riches, wealth, affluence, big name, investments, and all the good names given to these things, all put together, are so inconsequential when juxtaposed with the soul. The investment that God put in man, which is the soul, is so enormous, even if all the greatness of the world put together can belong to a single man, Jesus reveals that the value of a man’s soul is worth by far much more than all these things of the world put together.

Jesus is saying to you that you will be a foolish man, if you will expend your life just to pursue all these things, He is revealing the futility of man's efforts to him. When a man labours from early in the morning till late in the night just to get a portion of the world of which no matter how he labours, he cannot get a tenth, a thousandth or even a millionth of the world's riches, but the man expends the whole of his life to secure this, he wakes early and sleeps late, and when some financial returns and ROI begins to turn in, with his bank account growing daily, even though he has not even got a minute fraction of the whole world, he begins to feel so happy and big. Jesus says you have spent, expended and lost a portion of your whole life to be able to get what you have now, how foolish you are to spend a whole life just for a meagre thing, how foolish for you to have spent SO MUCH just for SO LITTLE. Man sees the world as something very big, but Jesus says, if the world looks so big before you, then, how about the soul, the world's bigness cannot be compared with that of the soul, it’s like an ant before an elephant, the world is reduced to nothingness before the soul.

The investment that God has put in a man, called soul, the life of God, is so great, that man will be foolish to use up that investment for something so little as 'gaining the whole world'. The life of a man, does not consist (is not measured or determined) in the abundance of the things he has. All those things are too infinitesimal in comparison with the life he carries. Therefore, I am having an understanding that the life that was given to me is definitely for a purpose, and that purpose has nothing to do with the accumulation of worldly goods or worldly wealth. It is confusion and foolishness to SPEND my life to look for food, money, name and fame, and think I have spent it judiciously, oh no!, that will be a colossal waste, it’s like spending $1million to buy a single handkerchief. Even if I can accumulate everything in the whole wide world put together, and I become the only man that has everything including everybody in the whole world, it still tells me that all I think I have gained, is TOO LITTLE COMPARED WITH THE CAPACITY OF MY SOUL. I will be foolish to throw in my soul just to get anything the world can give, the colossal loss will be irreparable. My soul’s worth is far much more, it is for a divine purpose. What is it?


"...lose his life"

The life any man has on this side of the world, is like a raw material, it is full of viability and capacity to achieve much for God’s glory, it is like a super computer capable of crunching billions of jobs every second, BUT it is worthless until it is being put INTO THE ACTUAL USE THAT IT WAS MADE FOR.

A raw material life on earth is zero in heaven's sight, it is as the raw material is being put into production, and the desirable output/result is being achieved that heaven begins to record the REAL LIFE. A life capable of 100, but in a bid to make sure that he lives comfortably, has good health, make money, and is able to produce only 7 that heaven recognizes, while the remaining 93 has been spent to pursue mammon and a good 'life', heaven sees that life as only 7, though earth sees 100, the sophisticated man has 'saved' 93, and heaven says 'wasted', 'lost', 'irretrievable'...what a pity.

Putting your raw material life to pursue what your body kicks against and rejects in order to please God, to you, it's like losing that life, but heaven says whatever is lost, is what heaven counts in your favour eventually, and you find out eternally that that is the only thing you actually gained.


For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

Every venture a man engages in, the soul is been expended to carry out such venture. The soul is not just used to achieve tasks, it is also been expended, used up, poured out in order to gain anything. A pen is been USED to write, it is achieving a task - ‘writing’, but as the pen is been used, it is also been expended, used up, the ink is spent, and it is soon finished. So is the soul of a man, the soul of a man is actually a deposit, God can decide to deposit some 60, 70 or 80 years into a man. This soul is been used up for every task, and as each day passes, so passes the soul as well gradually, until all is spent. Therefore, whatever a soul gains in this world is actually not a gain / extra, it is rather an EXCHANGE for the precious soul, the soul is been used up in an exchange for what is being 'gained', and woe betides a man, who exchanges his soul for dung. No wonder Christ says there is nothing worthwhile enough that a man can exchange His soul for.


"...What is a man profited, if he ...gain..."

In living my life with a meaning, I must be asking some pertinent questions:

1. Am I spending my life in labouring for eternity?, Labouring for eternity may not necessarily mean labouring for the church. Many men are religious zealots today, but their passion is neither for souls nor for the Kingdom of God, but for their bellies and to make a name for self.

2. Have I lost my life into God.

3. What is the ETERNALITY of what I spend my life for? The things I do with my life, do they count beyond the four(4) walls of this world, or they will perish as the world perishes, and I will become empty afterwards? I need to check the everlastingness of what I pour my life on.

If all the labours of a man, if all that someone expends his life for, if all the gains and profit a man acquires with his soul are chaff that will easily burn in the fire of God's holy tests, if everything is a pile of dung, then, of what use is dung and chaff, but to be thrown into the garbage, all he laboured for, were actually wastes, losses, all he thought were gains, were actually losses.

The question of Jesus now is, "what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? The man has profited nothing, in actual fact, he has lost everything.