THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES - Chapter 20 - Verse 34

Verse 34. Yea, ye yourselves know. By your own acquaintance with my manner of life. In Corinth he had lived and laboured with Apollos, See Barnes "Ac 18:3"; and he refers elsewhere to the fact that he had supported himself, in part at least, by his own labour, 1 Co 4:12 1 Th 2:9; 2 Th 3:8. We may hence learn that it is no discredit to a minister to labour. Whatever it may be to a people who put him under a necessity to toil for his support, yet the example of Paul shows that a man should rejoice in the privilege of preaching the gospel, even if it is done while he is obliged to resort to labour for his daily bread. It is well when a minister of the gospel can make an appeal to his people like this of Paul, and say, "I have coveted no man's gold, or silver, or apparel." Every minister should so live that he can make this appeal to their own consciences of the sincerity and disinterestedness of his labours from the pulpit; or when called to separate from them as Paul did; or when on a dying bed. Every minister of the gospel, when he comes to lie down to die, will desire to be able to make this appeal, and to leave a solemn testimony there, that it was not for gold, or ease, or fame, that he toiled in the ministerial office. How much more influence can such a man have, than he who has been worldly-minded; who has sought to become rich; and the only memorials of whose life is, that he has sought "the fleece, not the flock," and that he has gained the property, not the souls of men. And every Christian, when he dies, should and will desire to leave a testimony as pure, that he has been disinterested, self-denying, and laborious in the cause of Jesus the Lord.

{d} "yourselves know" Ac 18:3; 1 Co 4:12; 1 Th 2:9; 2 Th 3:8