Slowness of speech a drawback on ministerial fitness, but not a disqualification.
It is remarkable that both Moses, the great prophet of the First Covenant, and St. Paul, the "chosen vessel" for the publication of the Second Covenant, were ineffective as speakers; not perhaps both "in presence base," but certainly both "in speech contemptible" (2 Corinthians 10:1, 2 Corinthians 10:10). Speakers and preachers should lay the lesson to heart, and learn not to be overproud of the gift of eloquence. A good gift it is, no doubt—when sanctified, a great gift—which may redound to God's honour and glory, and for which they should be duly thankful, but not a necessary gift. The men of action, the men that have done the greatest things, and left their mark most enduringly upon the world, have seldom been "men of words." Luther indeed was mighty in speech, and John Knox, and Whitfield, and (though less so) John Wesley, but not our own Cranmer, nor Melancthon, nor Anselm, nor Bishop Cosin, nor John Keble. In the secular sphere of statesmanship and generalship the same principle holds even more decidedly. Demosthenes has to yield the palm to Alexander, Cicero to Caesar, Pym to Cromwell, the Abbe Sieyes to Napoleon. On the whole it must be said that those who are great in deed are rarely great in speech. And without eloquence a man may do God good service in every walk of life, even as a minister. The written sermon may go as straight to the heart of the audience as the spoken one. Ministerial effort in house-to-house visiting may do as much to convert a parish as any number of extempore sermons. Example of life preaches better than palaver. Let no one who feels within him the ministerial call, who longs to serve God by bringing his fellow-men to Christ, be deterred by the thought that he is "slow of speech and of a slow tongue." God, without making him eloquent, can "be with his mouth," give his words force, make them powerful to the conversion of souls. It has been said that there are many "dumb poets." So are there many "dumb preachers," whoso weak and hesitating words God blesses and renders effectual, so that in the end they have no cause to be ashamed, but may point to those whom they have brought to Christ, and exclaim with St. Paul, "Ye are our work, ye are our epistle, the seal of our apostleship are ye in the Lord" (1 Corinthians 9:1, 1 Corinthians 9:2; 2 Corinthians 3:2).
The sin of self-distrust, and its punishment.
Undoubtedly the general inclination of men is towards self-assertion and self-sufficiency, so that diffidence and distrust of self are commonly regarded as excellences. But there is a diffidence which is wrongful, a self-distrust which Scripture condemns. St. Paul calls it "a voluntary humility" ( ἐθελοταπεινοφροσύνη)—a humblemindedness, that is, which has its root in the will; a man not choosing to think that he is fit for high things, and determining to keep down his aims, aspirations, hopes, endeavours. The same apostle exhorts his converts "not to think of themselves more highly than they ought to think" (Romans 12:3), but at the same time, by implication, "not to think too humbly, for he tells them to think soberly, according as God has dealt to every one the measure of faith." We ought to take true views of ourselves, of our capacities, powers, faculties, even of the graces to which by God's mercy we have been able to attain; and not to deny them or depreciate them. If we do so we keep ourselves back from high things, and this is how God punishes us. Moses lost the gift of eloquence, which God would supernaturally have bestowed upon him (Exodus 4:12), and lost one-half of his leadership (Exodus 4:14 16), by his persistent diffidence and distrust. We prevent ourselves from attaining heights to which we might have attained, we keep ourselves down in this world and make our position low in the next, by similar folly. The youth who bore the banner with the word "excelsior" upon it, was wiser than most of us. If we would rise high we must aim high; if we would aim high we must not be too diffident of ourselves.