Observation of Others
1 Timothy 4:15
Meditate on these things; give yourself wholly to them; that your profiting may appear to all.


That thy profiting may appear to all. The Christian teachings are not like Eleusinian Mysteries; they are revelations to be lived out in the broad daylight of history. A religion that ends in meditation makes the mystic a religion that confines itself to solitudes - makes the ascetic, who shuts himself out from the world.

I. THE PROFITING IS NOT TO BE A MATTER OF MERE FEELING; or, in other words, is no mere emotionalism that may coexist with lax character and feeble morality. Too often this has been the case, and the Church has been apt to palliate the sins of the fraudulent trader or the bankrupt trustee, if, though he has wronged others and brought whole families to beggary and ruin, he has still preserved his spiritual emotions, his seraphic rhapsodies of expression, and his fervent interest in missionary agencies.

II. THE PROFITING MUST APPEAR IN THE CHARACTER. It must come to the touchstone of action and character. It must energize the conscience, quicken the passive virtues of humility and submission, and brace the will for the stern obedience of the soldier and the faithful obligations of the steward. - W.M.S.



Parallel Verses
KJV: Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all.

WEB: Be diligent in these things. Give yourself wholly to them, that your progress may be revealed to all.




Ministers Wholly Given to Their Work
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