This is the man in whose honour the Cathedral Church of London, and many a parish church throughout the world, have been named ‘St Paul’.  It was his zeal and his holiness which changed the spirit of the Roman Empire.  The cost to himself he has told us – unnumbered perils and privations, humiliation and degradation – but over them all his fervent love for Our Lord triumphed gloriously.

But we notice that he claimed no credit for himself either for his change of heart or for his monumental achievements.  He gave the credit where (as he knew better than anyone else ever could) it was due – to the grace of God, to the working within him of God the Holy Spirit.

It was childishly simple to him that the source of all goodness is in God alone, not in human beings.  What goodness he himself had, he knew he drew from God, as a plant draws moisture from the ground and as we sing in the hymn:

“And every virtue we possess,
and every conquest won,
and every thought of holiness,
are his alone”. (1)

For St Paul this was not a theory to be discussed, it was an undeniable fact he had experienced.  His own life had taught him the truth that to be independent of God is automatically to be independent of goodness.  And though God’s generosity gives us more than we desire or deserve, nevertheless there must be a limit to that unless we make it our business to be in a condition to receive what he is ever ready to bestow.