Service Means Self-Sacrifice
Neh. 1:4
And it came to pass, when I heard these words, that I sat down and wept, and mourned certain days, and fasted, and prayed before the God of heaven,
Look at the man in our text.… He had the entree of a court, and the ear of a king. Brilliant prospects were opening up before him, but his brethren’s sufferings drew him, and with a noble resolution of self-sacrifice, he shut himself out from the former and went into the wilderness. He is one of the Scripture characters that never have had due honor—a hero, a saint, a martyr, a reformer. He did, though in a smaller sphere, the very same thing that the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews magnified with his splendid eloquence, in reference to the great Lawgiver, “And chose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God,” and to turn his back upon the dazzlements of a court, than to “enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season,” whilst his brethren were suffering.
Now, dear friends! the letter of the example may be put aside; the spirit of it must be observed. If Christians are to do the work that they can do, and that Christ has put them into this world that they may do, there must be self-sacrifice with it.… Of the principles in application to Christian service there is none more stringent than—“I will not offer unto my God burnt-offering of that which doth cost me nothing.”
Alexander Maclaren, Exposition of Holy Scripture