Service a Gift
Numbers 18:7
Therefore you and your sons with you shall keep your priest's office for everything of the altar, and within the veil…


'... I have given your priest's office unto you as a service of gift.' -- NUM. xviii.7.

All Christians are priests -- to offer sacrifices, alms, especially prayers; to make God known to men.

I. Our priesthood is a gift of God's love.

We are apt to think of our duties as burdensome. They are an honour and a mark of God's grace.

1. They are His gift --

(a) The power to do. All capacities and possessions from Him.

(b) The wish to do. 'Worketh in you to will.'

(c) The right to do, through Christ.

2. They are a blessing.

(a) Note the good effects on ourselves -- the increase of fellowship with Him, the strengthening of all holy desires.

(b) The future benefits. Apply this to prayer and to effort on behalf of our fellow-men.

II. Our priesthood is to be done as a service -- under a sense of obligation to a master, with diligence (an [Greek: ergon], not a [Greek: parergon]).

III. Our priesthood is to be done as a gift to God -- to be done joyfully, giving ourselves back to Him: 'Yield yourselves unto God' -- 'your reasonable service.'

Then only do we really possess ourselves, and 'all things are ours, for we are Christ's, and Christ is God's.'


Parallel Verses
KJV: Therefore thou and thy sons with thee shall keep your priest's office for every thing of the altar, and within the vail; and ye shall serve: I have given your priest's office unto you as a service of gift: and the stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death.

WEB: You and your sons with you shall keep your priesthood for everything of the altar, and for that within the veil; and you shall serve: I give you the priesthood as a service of gift: and the stranger who comes near shall be put to death."




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