Take heed to yourself

Till I come, give attention to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine. Do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you by prophecy with the laying on of the hands of the eldership. Meditate on these things; give yourself entirely to them, that your progress may be evident to all. Take heed to yourself and to the doctrine. Continue in them, for in doing this you will save both yourself and those who hear you. – 1 Timothy 4.13-16

We need to be careful in all of our service to others and for others that we forget the fact that we must also need to pay close attention to ourselves. We can’t possibly minister to others if we forget our own spiritual needs.

Study, Paul writes, to show yourself approved unto God. Give full attention to reading and exhorting and to doctrine. If my personal walk with God is weak I am useless or worse. If we become shipwreck the cause of Christ is going to be hurt.

I pay heed to my physical needs. I drink when I am thirsty and I eat when I am hungry. I walk everyday. I try to challenge myself mentally every day.

But it is at least an important that I look after myself spiritually. I must pray and read my Bible and meditate on scripture and make sure that I am in a constant process of taking heed to my own spiritual needs or I will be no good to anyone.

This isn’t just for preachers. All of us who want to live for God and be an influence and have a testimony before others must first be sure that we are ‘armoured up’ in the armour of God before we try to go to battle. God told the prophet Jeremiah the prophet to:

Study up
Get up
Speak up

And those are pretty good words for us.