"Where there are more Ministers in a Congregation than one, and they of different guifts, each may more especially apply himselfe to Doctrine or Exhortation, according to the guift wherein he most excelleth, and as they agree between themselves."
I have little to say after the recitation of this passage of pregnant and solemn counsel. That little shall be given to a supreme aspect of the whole subject; I mean, Spiritual Power in Preaching. Who that knows the Lord, and contemplates the preacher's work, does not long for Spiritual Power? By that longing he means no ambitious wish to be remarkable, nor any unwholesome craving to be a leader in scenes of religious excitement. He means the deep desire to be an effectual messenger of his Master; to be the living channel of the Holy Spirit's energy in His converting, sanctifying, strengthening, perfecting work. He knows that it is possible to be truly orthodox, and yet not to be this; to be eloquent, to be impressive, to be impassioned, and yet not to be this; to be unimpeachably truthful, reasonable, intellectually convincing, and yet all the while not to be this. How shall he be a vehicle of spiritual power?
The Scriptural answer is very simple, but it goes deep. If a man would have spiritual power with men, and prevail, he must be real with his Lord. What he says, he must first know, he must first live. As regards HIM who is at once his Master and his Gospel, he must indeed "_know_ whom he has believed," [2 Tim. i. 10.] and, in calm but entire simplicity, "_submit himself_ under His hands." Granted a true creed, and a humble faith in its Subject, he must, in quiet reality, "yield himself unto God," if he would be used by Him. Observe the Apostle's phrase; "Yield yourselves," [Greek: parastÍsate heautous]: not, "yield to God" (though that is implied), but, "yield _yourselves_, hand yourselves over, to God," as you would hand over a tool, a weapon [Rom. vi. 13.]. And another aspect of the same thing appears in the same Apostle's later words: "_If a man_ _purge himself_ of these, he _shall be a vessel_ unto honour, sanctified (to), and meet for, the Master's use," [Greek: hÍgiasmenon euchrÍston tÙ DespotÍ]. [2 Tim. ii. 21.]