The Measure of a Soul: Love Poured Out

By Jerry McCorkle

Viktor Frankl, who spent nearly three years in Nazi concentration camps during World War II, wrote in his book Man’s Search for Meaning about a simple, incredible human truth.

Even if everything is taken, one thing still remains: the freedom to choose how to respond.

He remembered men who, in the midst of starvation, gave away their last piece of bread. They were few—but they proved that even when the body is being destroyed, the soul can still grow.

Years later, David Brooks, reflecting on Frankl’s experience in The Second Mountain, put it this way:

“The body grows according to what it consumes, but the soul grows by the measure of love it pours out.”

That’s not just psychology. That’s deeply biblical.

In Acts of the Apostles 20:35, we’re reminded, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

That principle has shaped individuals—and, at times, even nations.

But it raises an uncomfortable question for us today. 

What happens when a people increasingly defined by blessing becomes a people primarily defined by consumption?

But if we begin to hold tightly to what we have;

…if giving becomes secondary to preserving; 

…we shouldn’t be surprised if something deeper begins to erode.

Not our wealth.
Not our strength.
But our soul.

This principle holds true at every level of life:

When we live to consume, something in us shrinks.
When we choose to give—even when it costs us—something in us comes alive.

Frankl saw it in the darkest place imaginable.

The question is…will we see it where we are?