As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.–1 Peter 4:10
I don’t know who John Ellerton is, and I’m not going to do a Goggle search to find out. Nor do I know where or when I got this article. I simply found it in some notes I jotted down a good while ago. What I do know is that Mr. Ellerton knows something we all ought to know. Here it is:
GIVE yourselves anew to God and to God’s service, and He will give you the desire and the power to open your treasures; to give to Him, it may be wealth, it may be time, it may be personal service, it may be life itself. In His store there is a place for all, for the tears of the penitent, the barley loaves of the child, the two mites of the widow, the savings of the Philippians’ “deep poverty,” as well as for Mary’s ointment, for the land of Barnabas, for the gold and incense and myrrh of these Eastern sages. And if the vision of Christ be before his eyes, and the love of Christ be in his heart, the man of wealth will give his large offering, the man of learning his dear-bought knowledge, the man of business his hard-earned leisure, for the glory of God, for the benefit of his fellow-men, for the Church or for the poor; to feed the hungry, or to teach the ignorant, to help the struggling, or to guide the erring; and each gift will be welcomed by Him who gave Himself for us all, and who asks in return for ourselves as a living sacrifice to Him.
What he says is true. We all ought to give something and there is something for all to give. To put it bluntly, we all should give all, to Him who gave all for us. Is that not our “reasonable service”? (Romans 12:1).
