Homiletic Monthly Romans 14:16 Let not then your good be evil spoken of: I. NOTHING IS MORE EASILY DESTROYED THAN A GOOD REPUTATION. You may be years, a life-time even, in building it up, and yet a moment, a single act, may suffice to destroy it. A breath of scandal may blast it, an indiscretion may tarnish it, a "dead fly" in the ointment may make it offensive. How sedulously should we guard it! II. NOTHING ON EARTH IS SO VALUABLE OR SO POTENT AS A GOOD NAME. Wealth beside it is dross. Office, station, fame, are nothing worth in comparison. Talent, learning, and gifts of oratory, pale and fade in the presence of it. 1. For our own sake we should sacredly guard it — for it is our crown jewel, the one potential element of usefulness we possess. 2. For society's sake we should do nothing, omit nothing, that will tend to obscure it. For Christ's sake and the Church's sake, we are bound to guard it as we would guard life itself: to wound it is to wound Christ in the house of His friends, and bring reproach upon His Church. Oh, it is these tarnished reputations, these soiled garments, these discredited names, in the household of faith, that so weaken the testimony of the Church and fill the mouths of scoffers and infidels. (Homiletic Monthly.) Parallel Verses KJV: Let not then your good be evil spoken of: |
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