Wesley Corpus

Are you as watchful and zealous to gain souls, as those are to gain the gold that perisheth? Do you know by experi ence what that meaneth, “The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up?” Or are you one of those watchmen who do not watch at all, who neither know nor care when the sword cometh? of whom the Prophet saith, “They are dumb dogs that cannot bark, sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber?” Can it be supposed that such shepherds will “feed the flock?” will “give to every one his portion of meat in due season P” Will these “warn every man, and exhort every man, that they may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus?” Will they take care to “know all their flock by name, not forgetting the men-servants and women-servants?” Will they inquire into the state of every soul committed to their charge; and watch over each with all tenderness and longsuffering, “as they that must give account?” marking how they either fall or rise; how these wax “weary and faint in their mind; ” and those “grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ?” Who can do this, unless his whole heart be in the work; unless he desire nothing but to “spend and be spent for them; and count not his life dear unto himself, so he may present them blameless in the day of the Lord Jesus?” Can any shepherd do this, (and if he do not, he will never “give an account with joy,”) who imagines he has little more to do than to preach once or twice a week; that this is the main point, the chief part of the office, which he hath taken upon himself before God? What gross ignorance is this What a total mistake of the truth! What a miserable blunder touching the whole nature of his office It is, indeed, a very great thing to speak in the name of God; it might make him that is the stoutest of heart tremble, if he considered that every time he speaks to others, his own soul is at stake. But great, inexpressi bly great, as this is, it is perhaps the least part of our work.