'Be not ashamed'.  'God hath not given us the spirit of cowardice'.

'Nevertheless I am not ashamed'.  These words from 2 Timothy suggest another

avenue along which the sacred trust may be attacked.  We are all 'keepers',

and have our own particular gardens 'to dress and to keep'.  Some good thing

has been entrusted to us that we are expected to keep, and not all the

refined opposition of 'science falsely so called', nor the more brutal

opposition of persecution must cause us to relinquish our post.  The title of

'keeper' is employed in Scripture to define the work of a shepherd, 'Abel was

a keeper of sheep'.  In this connection David stands out prominently as one

who was taken from the keeping of sheep to be ruler over the people of Israel

(2 Sam. 7:8).  What the keeping of sheep involved, let David tell us:

'Thy servant kept his father's sheep, and there came a lion, and a

bear, and took a lamb out of the flock: and I went out after him, and

smote him, and delivered it out of his mouth' (1 Sam. 17:34,35).

Young as he was, David had the true 'keeper' spirit, for we read that

when Jesse told him to go and visit his brethren at the battlefront, he did

not, with youthful forgetfulness, hurry off unmindful of his responsibility

as a shepherd, but 'rose up early in the morning, and left the sheep with a

keeper' (1 Sam. 17:20).  His eldest brother taunted him in vain when he said:

'With whom hast thou left those few sheep in the wilderness?' (1 Sam. 17:28).

This same spirit is manifested by David on his arrival at the battlefield.

He did not drop his baggage and run off to see what was going on, but first

'left his carriage in the hand of the keeper of the carriage' or, as

Rotherham renders the passage: 'Then David entrusted the provisions that were

upon him to the care of the keeper of the stores' (1 Sam. 17:22).

How many times have we left one part of service unprotected and

unprovided for because of the claims of another?  Yet true service is

watchful of all responsibilities.  The Lord Himself, as the good Shepherd,

entered into the 'keeper' spirit of His office, and could say:

'While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Thy Name: those

that Thou gavest Me I have kept, and none of them is lost ... keep them

from the evil' (John 17:12,15).

The reader will be aware of the many passages that enjoin the believer

to keep the Word of God, to keep the way, to keep the faith, to keep the

unity.  These should be found and added to the list, so that we may

appreciate in some degree of fulness the fact that one great symbol of

service is that of 'the keeper'.

There are some who appear to look upon Christian service as though it

were a matter of book knowledge and detailed examination of words, scarcely

to be described as a piece of work at all.  2 Timothy 2:15 opens with the

word 'study' (which actually means 'endeavour', and has nothing necessarily

to do with the 'studious') and goes on to speak of a 'workman'.  The same

chapter speaks of service under the robust figures of athlete, soldier and

farmer.  True Christian service is labour.  Let us see what Scripture says

under this head.  First, as to the different words so translated:

Usually translated 'work':

'I must work the works of Him that sent Me' (John 9:4).