Nehemiah 6:10-13 Afterward I came to the house of Shemaiah the son of Delaiah the son of Mehetabeel, who was shut up; and he said… When I lived in the country years ago, I remember one of our friends was a great smoker, and used to smoke morning, noon, and night, and his friends used to say it was a very bad practice, and inconvenient and expensive, and all those arguments with which we are familiar. He always used to smile one of those tranquil smiles which come from parties of that kind. That man could not give up his pipe, and declared that he could not, and that he would smoke till he died. One day there was a mouth trouble. He went to a distinguished physician, and he told him that he was afraid the excessive smoking was inducing cancer. That put his pipe out. It did; he dropped it that very day. It was marvellous; he had done with that. It is one thing when it touches your shillings; one thing when it is a question of convenience and inconvenience; it is another thing when it touches you. And I say to you, when the day of darkness, the day of temptation, when all the sorcery and besetment of evil is around you, don't say, "Iniquity will mar my health or cloud my reputation or shorten my days"; say with Nehemiah, "Should such a man as I do this evil" — such a man as I, with reason and conscience, the heir of the ages, the master of the planet, redeemed with the blood of the Son of God, called to a great destiny — should such a man as I do this mean thing, this base thing? Appeal in the sight of God to your own greatness, and He shall strengthen you in the day when the worst comes to the worst. (W. L. Watkinson.) Parallel Verses KJV: Afterward I came unto the house of Shemaiah the son of Delaiah the son of Mehetabeel, who was shut up; and he said, Let us meet together in the house of God, within the temple, and let us shut the doors of the temple: for they will come to slay thee; yea, in the night will they come to slay thee. |
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