1 Timothy 4:14 Neglect not the gift that is in you, which was given you by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery. If the supernatural gifts with which Timothy was endowed were in danger of suffering injury from the neglect of the zealous, ardent, devoted evangelist, how much greater is your danger of neglecting the gift that is in you, and of suffering injury from its neglect? I have seen the desolation of a negligent ministry, if you have not. By neglect his gift seems to have decayed and died out of him. He preaches, but not as he once preached. Let me not be misunderstood. I do not say that every unsuccessful minister has neglected the gift that is in him. I am very far from saying so. Some have small ministerial gifts, little preaching power. Paul, in his younger days, made full proof of his ministry. He neglected not the gift that was in him. What gift have you? What qualification for the ministry which all true ministers have? You have the one great gift of the Holy Ghost, a renewed heart. Is this your gift? Do not neglect it. Strive to attain more of this blessed, living experience of the great truths you have to preach. I once heard a good man and a good preacher well known and greatly honoured in this town, say, in the retrospect of a long and prosperous ministry, I have nothing to boast of, for my voice has done more for my success than my intellectual power." I admired the modesty of the preacher, who, though favoured by a musical voice, had no reason to speak disparagingly of his intellectual powers. But he was wise enough to form a right estimate of the adventitious gifts of which, without being vain, he knew how to make a good use. To be vain of such things would be indeed a little, pitiable vanity. Yet, like John Angell James, "Neglect not the gift that is in thee." "Neglect not the gift that is in thee." The words seem to say, Cultivate your own gifts; those which are natural to you. Do not be solicitous about gifts which God has not given you. (R. Halley, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery. |
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