Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadWilliam Burkitt Notes and Observations - 1 Corinthians 9:2 - 9:2
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
As if he had said, "Whatever others do, you of all men should not question my apostleship, for you were converted by it. You confirm and ratify my ministry, that it is of God, and that God is in it of a truth: the conversion of sinners, and the building up of saints, is God's seal to our ministry."
Learn hence, That there is no such argument to prove a minister sent of Christ, as the success of his ministry in the conversion of souls unto God. This is God's seal to his office, that he is a minister called of God, and sent by God. Happy those ministers who can say unto their people, Ye are our work, and the seal of our apostleship are ye in the Lord.
Yet must it not be concluded from hence, that a person is not a true minister of Christ, because he cannot produce this seal: the good of our ministry is not always known to ourselves, much less published to the world; more good is done many times by the ministry of the word than the minister knows of; the seed sometimes lies long under the clods before it fructifies; what is sown in one minister's time, comes up in another's; so one soweth, and another reapeth, but both he that reapeth and he that soweth shall rejoice together. But where this seal can be produced, it is a certain sign that such a minister is sent from God, and that God is with him, and owns him; yet it must be added, that though the success of our ministry to others is a seal of our office, and assures us that we are true ministers, yet it is the efficacy of the word we preach, upon our own hearts and lives, that is the witness of our sanctification, and the seal of our salvation.
Lord, how sad will it be for any of us to have been instruments for the helping of others to heaven by the soundness of our doctrine, and go to hell ourselves for the badness of our example, and the wickedness of our lives?