Chapter 1: IMPORTANCE OF A LIVING
MINISTRY
"How much more would a few good and fervent
men effect in the ministry than a multitude of lukewarm ones!" said Oecolampadius,
the Swiss Reformer -- a man who had been taught by experience, and who
has recorded that experience for the benefit of other churches and other
days.
The mere multiplying of men calling themselves
ministers of Christ will avail little. They may be but "cumberers of the
ground." They may be like Achan, troubling the camp; or perhaps Jonah,
raising the tempest. Even when sound in the faith, through unbelief, lukewarmness
and slothful formality, they may do irreparable injury to the cause of
Christ, freezing and withering up all spiritual life around them. The lukewarm
ministry of one who is theoretically orthodox is often more extensively
and fatally ruinous to souls than that of one grossly inconsistent or flagrantly
heretical. "What man on earth is so pernicious a drone as an idle minister?"
said Cecil. And Fletcher remarked well that "lukewarm pastors made careless
Christians." Can the multiplication of such ministers, to whatever amount,
be counted a blessing to a people?
When the church of Christ, in all her denominations,
returns to primitive example, and walking in apostolical footsteps seeks
to be conformed more closely to inspired models, allowing nothing that
pertains to earth to come between her and her living Head, then will she
give more careful heed to see that the men to whom she intrusts the care
of souls, however learned and able, should be yet more distinguished by
their spirituality, zeal, faith and love.
In comparing Baxter and Orton, the biographer
of the former remarks that "Baxter would have set the world on fire while
Orton was lighting a match." How true! Yet not true alone of Baxter or
of Orton. These two individuals are representatives of two classes in the
church of Christ in every age and of every denomination. The latter class
are far the more numerous: the Ortons you may count by hundreds, the Baxters
by tens; yet who would not prefer a solitary specimen of the one to a thousand
of the other?
Baxter's Burning Sincerity
"When he spoke of weighty soul concerns,"
says one of his contemporaries of Baxter, "you might find his very spirit
drenched therein." No wonder that he was blessed with such amazing
success! Men felt that in listening to him they were in contact with one
who was dealing with realities of infinite moment.
This is one of the secrets of ministerial
strength and ministerial success And who can say how much of the overflowing
infidelity of the present day is owing not only to the lack of spiritual
instructors-not merely to the existence of grossly unfaithful and inconsistent
ones-but to the coldness of many who are reputed sound and faithful.
Men can not but feel that if religion is worth anything., it is worth everything;
that if it calls for any measure of zeal and warmth, it will justify the
utmost degrees of these; and that there is no consistent medium between
reckless atheism and the intensest warmth of religious zeal. Men may dislike,
detest, scoff at, persecute the latter, yet their consciences are all the
while silently reminding them that if there be a God and a Saviour, a heaven
and a hell, anything short of such life and love is hypocrisy, dishonesty,
perjury!
And thus the lesson they learn from the
lifeless discourses of the class we are alluding to is, that since these
men do not believe the doctrines they are preaching there is no need of
their hearers believing them; if ministers only believe them because they
make their living by them, why should those who make nothing by them scruple
about denying them?
"Rash preaching," said Rowland Hill,
"disgusts; timid preaching leaves poor souls fast asleep; hold
preaching is the only preaching that is owned of God."
It is not merely unsoundness in faith,
nor negligence in duty, nor open inconsistency of life that mars the ministerial
work and ruins souls. A man may be free from all scandal either in creed
or conduct, and yet may be a most grievous obstruction in the way of all
spiritual good to his people. He may be a dry and empty cistern, notwithstanding
his orthodoxy. He may be freezing or blasting life at the very time he
is speaking of the way of life. He may be repelling men from the cross
even when he is in words proclaiming it. He may be standing between his
flock and the blessing even when he is, in outward form, lifting up his
hand to bless them. The same words that from warm lips would drop as the
rain, or distill as the dew, fall from his lips as the snow or hail, chilling
all spiritual warmth and blighting all spiritual life. How many souls have
been lost for want of earnestness, want of solemnity, want of love in the
preacher, even when the words uttered were precious and true
Our One Object: to Win Souls
We take for granted that the object of
the Christian ministry is to convert sinners and to edify the body of
Christ. No faithful minister can possibly rest short of this. Applause,
fame, popularity, honor, wealth-all these are vain. If souls are not won,
if saints are not matured, our ministry itself is vain.
The question, therefore, which each of
us has to answer to his own conscience is, "Has it been the end of my ministry,
has it been the desire of my heart to save the lost and guide the saved?
Is this my aim in every sermon I preach, in every visit I pay? Is
it under the influence of this feeling that I continually live and walk
and speak? Is it for this I pray and toil and fast and weep? Is it for
this I spend and am spent, counting it, next to the salvation of my own
soul, my chiefest joy to be the instrument of saving others? Is it for
this that I exist? To accomplish this would I gladly die? Have I seen the
pleasure of the Lord prospering in my hand? Have I seen souls converted
under my ministry? Have God's people found refreshment from my lips, and
gone upon their way rejoicing, or have I seen no fruit of my labors, and
yet content to remain unblest? Am I satisfied to preach, and yet not know
of one saving impression made, one sinner awakened ?''
Nothing short of positive success can satisfy
a true minister of Christ. His plans may proceed smoothly and his external
machinery may work steadily, but without actual fruit in the saving of
souls he counts all these as nothing. His feeling is: "My little children,
of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you" (Galatians
4:19). And it is this feeling which makes him successful..
"Ministers," said Owen, "are seldom honored
with success unless they are continually aiming at the conversion of sinners."
The resolution that in the strength and with the blessing of God he will
never rest without success, will insure it. It is the man who has made
up his mind to confront every difficulty, who has counted the cost and,
fixing his eye upon the prize, has determined to fight his way to it --
it is such a man that conquers.
The dull apathy of other days is gone.
Satan has taken the field actively, and it is best to meet him front to
front. Besides, men's consciences are really on edge. God seems extensively
striving with them, as before the flood. A breath of the Divine Spirit
has passed over the earth, and hence the momentous character of the time,
as well as the necessity for improving it so long as it lasts.
The one true goal or resting-place where
doubt and weariness, the stings of a pricking conscience, and the longings
of an unsatisfied soul would all be quieted, is Christ himself. Not
the church, but Christ. Not doctrine, but Christ. Not forms, but Christ.
Not ceremonies, but Christ; Christ the God-man, giving His life for ours;
sealing the everlasting covenant, and making peace for us through the blood
of His cross; Christ the divine storehouse of all light and truth, "In
whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Colossians
2:3); Christ the infinite vessel, filled with the Holy Spirit, the Enlightener,
the Teacher, the Quickener, the Comforter, so that ~'of his fulness
have all we received, and grace for grace" (John 1: 16). This, this
alone is the vexed soul's refuge, its rock to build on, its home to. abide
in till the great tempter be hound and every conflict ended in victory.
Meet "Opinion" With the Truth
Let us, then, meet this "earnestness" which
is now the boast, but may ere long be the bane, of the age, with that which
alone can bring down its feverish pulse, and soothe it into blessed calm,
the gospel of the grace of God. All other things are hut opiates, drugs,
quackeries; this is the divine medicine; this is the sole, the speedy,
the eternal cure. It is not by "opinion" that we are to meet "opinion ;
it is the Truth of God that we are to wield; and applying the edge
of the "sword of the Spirit" to the theories of man (which he proudly
calls his "opinions"), make him feel what a web of sophistry and folly
he has been weaving for his own entanglement and ruin.
It is not opinions that man needs: it is
Truth. It is not theology: it is God. It is not religion:
it is Christ. It is not literature and science; but the knowledge
of the free love of God in the gift of His only-begotten Son.
"I know not," says Richard Baxter, "what
others think, but for my own part I am ashamed of my stupidity, and wonder
at myself that I deal not with my own and others' souls as one that looks
for the great day of the Lord; and that I can have room for almost any
other thoughts and words; and that such astonishing matters do not wholly
absorb my mind. I marvel how I can preach of them slightly and coldly;
and how I can let men alone in their sins; and that I do not go to them,
and beseech them, for the Lord's sake, to repent, however they may take
it, and whatever pain and trouble it should cost me.
"I seldom come out of the pulpit but my
conscience smiteth me that I have been no more serious and fervent. It
accuseth me not so much for want of ornaments and elegancy, nor for letting
fall an unhandsome word; but it asketh me, 'How couldst thou speak of life
and death with such a heart? How couldst thou preach of heaven and hell
in such a careless, sleepy manner? Dost thou believe what thou sayest?
Art thou in earnest, or in jest? How canst thou tell people that sin is
such a thing, and that so much misery is upon them and before them, and
be no more affected with it? Shouldst thou not weep over such a people,
and should not thy tears interrupt thy words? Shouldst thou not cry aloud,
and show them their transgressions; and entreat and beseech them as for
life and death?'
"Truly this is the peal that conscience
doth ring in my ears, and yet my drowsy soul will not be awakened. Oh,
what a thing is an insensible, hardened heart O Lord, save us from the
plague of infidelity and hardheartedness ourselves, or else how shall we
be fit instruments of saving others from it? Oh, do that on our souls which
thou wouldst use us to do on the souls of others!"
Chapter 2: THE MINISTER'S TRUE LIFE AND WALKThe true minister must be a true
Christian. He must be called by God before he can call others to God.
The Apostle Paul thus states the matter: "God . . hath reconciled us
to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation"
(2 Corinthians 5:18). They were first reconciled, and then they had
given to them the ministry of reconciliation. Are we ministers reconciled?
It is but reasonable that a man who is to act as a spiritual guide to others
should himself know the way of salvation. It has been frequently said that
"the way to heaven is blocked up with dead professors"; but is it not true
also that the melancholy obstruction is not composed of members of
churches only? Let us take heed unto ourselves!
As the minister's life is in more than
one respect the life of a ministry, let us speak a few words on ministerial
holy living.
Let us seek the Lord early. "If
my heart be early seasoned with his presence, it will savof of him all
day after." Let us see God before man every day. "I ought to pray before
seeing any one. Often when I sleep long, or meet with others early, and
then have family prayer and breakfast and forenoon callers, it is eleven
or twelve o'clock before I begin secret prayer. This is a wretched system.
It is unscriptural. Christ rose before day, and went into a solitary place.
. . Family prayer loses much of power and sweetness, and I can do no good
to those who come to seek for me. The conscience feels guilty, the soul
unfed, the lamp not trimmed. Then, when secret prayer comes, the soul is
often out of tune. I feel it far better to begin with God, to see His face
first, to get my soul near Him before it is near another.
. . . It is best to have at least one hour
alone with God before engaging in anything else. At the same time,
I must be careful not to reckon communion with God by minutes or hours,
or by solitude." (McCheyne.)
Hear this true servant of Christ exhorting
a beloved brother:
"Take heed to thyself. Your own
soul is your first and greatest care. You know a sound body alone can work
with power, much more a healthy soul. Keep a clear conscience through
the blood of the Lamb. Keep up close communion with God. Study likeness
to Him in all things. Read the Bible for your own growth first, then for
your people."
"With him," says his biographer, "the commencement
of all labor invariably consisted in the preparation of his own soul. The
forerunner of each day's visitations was a calm season of private devotion
during morning hours. The walls of his chamber were witnesses of his prayerfulness
-- I believe of his tears as well as of his cries. The pleasant sound of
psalms often issued from his room at an early hour; then followed the reading
of the Word for his own sanctification: and few have so fully realized
the blessing of the first psalm." Would that it were so with us all! "Devotion,"
said Bishop Hall, "is the life of religion, the very soul of piety, the
highest employment of grace. It is much to be feared that "we are weak
in the pulpit because we are weak in the closet.
"Walking With God"
"To restore a commonplace truth," writes
Mr. Coleridge, 'to its first uncommon luster, you need only translate it
into action." Walking with God is a very commonplace truth. Translate
this truth into action -- how lustrous it becomes! The phrase, how hackneyed
! -- the thing, how rare! It is such a walk -- not an abstract ideal, but
a personality, a life which the reader is invited to contemplate. Oh, that
we would only set ourselves in right earnest to this rare work of translation!
It is said of the energetic, pious and
successful John Berridge that "communion with God was what he enforced
in the latter stages of his ministry. It was, indeed, his own meat and
drink, and the banquet from which he never appeared to rise." This shows
us the source of his great strength. If we were always sitting at this
banquet, then it might be recorded of us ere long, as of him, He was in
the first year visited by about a thousand persons under serious impressions."
Study the Speakers, Not the Sermons
To the men even more than to their
doctrine we would point the eye of the inquirer who asks, Whence came their
success? Why, may not the same success be ours? We may take the sermons
of Whitefield or Berridge or Edwards for our study or our pattern, but
it is the individuals themselves that we must mainly set before us; it
is with the spirit of the men, more than of their works, that we are to
be imbued, if we are emulous of a ministry as powerful, as victorious as
theirs. They were spiritual men, and walked with God. It is living fellowship
with a living Saviour which, transforming us into His image, fits us for
being able and successful ministers of the gospel.
Without this nothing else will avail. Neither
orthodoxy, nor learning, nor eloquence, nor power of argument, nor zeal,
nor fervor, will accomplish aught without this. It is this that gives power
to our words and persuasiveness to our arguments, making them either as
the balm of Gilead to the wounded spirit or as sharp arrows of the mighty
to the conscience of the stout-hearted rebel. From them that walk with
Him in holy, happy intercourse, a virtue seems to go forth, a blessed fragrance
seems to compass them whithersoever they go. Nearness to Him, intimacy
with Him, assimilation to His character -- these are the elements of a
ministry of power.
When we can tell our people, "We beheld
His glory, and therefore we speak of it; it is not from report we speak,
but we have seen the King in His beauty" -- how lofty the position
we occupy! Our power in drawing men to Christ springs chiefly from the
fulness of our personal joy in Him, and the nearness of our personal communion
with Him. The countenance that reflects most of Christ, and shines most
with His love and grace, is most fitted to attract the gaze of a careless,
giddy world, and win restless souls from the fascinations of creature-love
and creature-beauty. A ministry of power must be the fruit of a holy, peaceful,
loving intimacy with the Lord.
Faithfulness Essential to Success
"The law of truth was in his mouth,
and iniquity was nol found in his lips: he walked with me in peace and
equity, and did turn many away from iniquity" (Malachi 2:6). Let us
observe the connection here declared to subsist between faithfulness and
success in the work of the ministry; between a godly life and the "turning
away many from iniquity." The end for which we first took office, as we
declared at ordination, was the saving of souls; the end for which
we still live and labor is the same; the means to this end are a holy life
and a faithful fulfillment of our ministry.
The connection between these two things
is close and sure. We are entitled to calculate upon it. We are called
upon to pray and labor with the confident expectation of its being realized;
and where it is not, to examine ourselves with all diligence, lest the
cause of the failure be found in ourselves; in our want of faith, love,
prayer, zeal and warmth, spirituality and holiness of life; for it is by
these that the Holy Spirit is grieved away. Success is attainable; success
is desirable; success is promised by God; and nothing on earth can be more
bitter to the soul of a faithful minister than the want of it. To walk
with God, and to be faithful to our trust, is declared to be the certain
way of attaining it. Oh, how much depends on the holiness of our life,
the consistency of our character, the heavenliness of our walk and conversation!
Our position is such that we cannot remain
neutral. Our life cannot be one of harmless obscurity. We must either repel
or attract-save or ruin souls! How loud, then, the call, how strong the
motive, to spirituality of soul and circumspectness of life! How solemn
the warning against worldly-mindedness and vanity, against levity and frivolity,
against negligence, sloth and cold formality!
Of all men, a minister of Christ is especially
called to walk with God. Everything depends on this; his own peace and
joy, his own -future reward at the coming of the Lord. But especially does
God point to this as the true and sure way of securing the blessing. This
is the grand secret of ministerial success. One who walks with God reflects
the light of His countenance upon a benighted world; and the closer he
walks, the more of this light does he reflect. One who walks with God carries
in his very air and countenance a sweet serenity and holy joy that diffuses
tranquility around. One who walks with God receives and imparts life whithersoever
he goes; as it is written, out of him "shall flow rivers of living water"
(John 7:38). He is not merely the world's light but the world's fountain,
dispensing the water of life on every side and making the barren waste
to blossom as the rose. He waters the world's wilderness as he moves along
his peaceful course. His life is blessed; his example is blessed; his intercourse
is blessed; his words are blessed; his ministry is blessed! Souls are saved,
sinners are converted, and many are turned from their iniquity.
Chapter 3: PAST DEFECTS"O my God, I am ashamed and blush to
lift up my face to thee, my God . . . O our God, what shall we say after this?" -- EZRA 9:6,10.
To deliver sermons on each returning Lord's
Day, to administer the Lord's Supper statedly, to pay an occasional visit
to those who request it, to attend religious meetings -- this, we fear,
sums up the ministerial life of multitudes who are, by profession, overseers
of the flock of Christ. An incumbency of thirty, forty or fifty years often
yields no more than this. So many sermons, so many baptisms, so many sacraments,
so many visits, so many meetings of various kinds-these are all the pastoral
annals, the parish records, the ALL of a lifetime's ministry to many! Of souls that have been saved, such a record could make no mention.
Multitudes have perished under such a ministry;
the judgment only will disclose whether so much as one has been saved.
There might be learning, but there was no tongue of the learned to speak
a word in season to him that is weary." There might be wisdom, but it certainly
was not the wisdom that "winneth souls." There might even be the sound
of the gospel, but it seemed to contain no glad tidings at all; it was
not sounded forth from warm lips into startled ears as the message of eternal
life -- "the glorious gospel of the blessed God." Men lived, and it was
never asked of them by their minister whether they were born again! Men
sickened, sent for the minister and received a prayer upon their death-beds
as their passport into heaven. Men died, and were buried where all their
fathers had been laid; there was a prayer at their funeral and decent respects
to their remains; but their souls went up to the judgment seat unthought
of, uncared for; no man, not even the minister who had vowed to watch for
them, having said to them, Are you ready ? -- or warned them to flee from
the wrath to come.
Is not this description too true of many
a district and many a minister? We do not speak in anger; we do not speak
in scorn: we ask the question solemnly and earnestly. It needs an answer.
If ever there was a time when there should be "great searching of heart"
and frank acknowledgment of unfaithfulness, it is now when God is visiting
us -- visiting us both in judgment and mercy. We speak in brotherly kindness;
surely the answer should not be of wrath and bitterness. And if this description
be true, what sin must there be in ministers and people! How great must
be the spiritual desolation that prevails'! Surely there is something in
such a case grievously wrong; something which calls for solemn self-examination
in every minister; something which requires deep repentance.
The Tragedy of a Barren Ministry
Fields plowed and sown, yet yielding no
fruit! Machinery constantly in motion, yet all without one particle of
produce! Nets cast into the sea, and spread wide, yet no fishes inclosed!
All this for years -- for a lifetime! How strange! Yet it is true. There
is neither fancy nor exaggeration in the matter. Question some ministers,
and what other account can they give? They can tell you of sermons preached,
but of sermons blessed they can say nothing. They can speak
of discourses that were admired and praised, but of discourses that have
been made effectual by the Holy Spirit they can not speak. They can tell
you how many have been baptized, how many communicants admitted; but of
souls awakened, converted, ripening in grace, they can give no account.
They can enumerate the sacraments they have dispensed; but as to whether
any of them have been "times of refreshing" or times of awakening, they
can not say. They can tell you what and how many cases of discipline have
passed through their hands; but whether any of these have issued in godly
sorrow for sin, whether the professed penitents who were absolved by them
gave evidence of being "washed and sanctified and justified," they can
give no information; they never thought of such an issue!
They can tell what is the attendance at
Sunday school, and what are the abilities of the teacher; but how many
of these precious little ones whom they have vowed to feed are seeking
the Lord they know not; or whether their teacher be a man of prayer and
piety they can not say. They can tell you the population of their parish,
the number of their congregation, or the temporal condition of their flocks;
but as to their spiritual state, how many have been awakened from the sleep
of death, how many are followers of God as dear children, they can not
pretend to say. Perhaps they would deem it rashness and presumption, if
not fanaticism, to inquire. And yet they have sworn, before men and angels,
to watch for their souls as they that must give account! But oh,
of what use are sermons, sacraments, schools, if souls are left
to perish; if living religion be lost sight of; if the Holy Spirit be not
sought; if men are left to grow up and die unpitied, unprayed for, unwarned!
For God's Glory and Man's Good
It was not so in other days. Our fathers
really watched and preached for souls. They asked and they expected a blessing.
Nor were they denied it. They were blessed in turning many to righteousness.
Their lives record their successful labors. How refreshing the lives of
those who lived only for the glory of God and the good of souls. There
is something in their history that compels us to feel that they were ministers
of Christ-true watchmen.
How cheering to read of Baxter and his
labors at Kidderminster! How solemn to hear of Venn and his preaching,
in regard to which it is said that men "fell before him like slaked lime"!
And in the much-blest labors of that man of God, the apostolic Whitefield,
is there not much to humble us, as well as to stimulate? Of Tanner, who
was himself awakened under Whitefield, we read that he "seldom preached
one sermon in vain." Of Berridge and Hicks we are told that in their missionary
tours throughout England they were blessed in one year to awaken four thousand
souls. Oh, for these days again! Oh, for one day of Whitefield again!
Thus one has written: "The language we
have been accustomed to adopt is this; we must use the means, and leave
the event to God; we can do no more than employ the means; this is our
duty and having done this we must leave the rest to Him who is the disposer
of all things." Such language sounds well, for it seems to be an acknowledgment
of our own nothingness, and to savor of submission to God's sovereignty;
but it is only sound -- it has not really any substance in it, for though
there is truth stamped on the face of it, there is falsehood at the root of it. To talk of submission to God's sovereignty is one
thing, but really to submit to it is another and quite different thing.
Submission Involves Renunciation
"Really to submit to God's sovereign disposal
does always necessarily involve the deep renunciation of our own will in
the matter concerned, and such a renunciation of the will can never be
effected without a soul being brought through very severe and trying exercises
of an inward and most humbling nature. Therefore, whilst we are quietly
satisfied in using the means without obtaining the end, and this costs
us no such painful inward exercise and deep humbling as that alluded to,
if we think that we are leaving the affair to God's disposal, we deceive
ourselves, and the truth in this matter is not in us.
"No; really to give anything to God implies
that the wil4 which is emphatically the heart, has been set
on that thing; and if the heart has indeed been set on
the salvation of sinners as the end to be answered by the means we use,
we can not possibly give up that end without, as was before observed, the
heart being severely exercised and deeply pained by the renunciation of
the wilt involved in it. When, therefore, we can be quietly content to
use the means for saving souls without seeing them saved thereby, it is
because there is no renunciation of the will-that is, no real giving up
to God in the affair. The fact is, the will -- that is, the heart --
had never really been set upon this end; if it had, it could not possibly
give up such an end without being broken by the sacrifice.
"When we can thus be satisfied to use the
means without obtaining the end, and speak of it as though we were submitting
to the Lord's disposal, we use a truth to hide a falsehood, exactly in
the same way that those formalists in religion do, who continue in forms
and duties without going beyond them, though they know they will not save
them, and who, when they are warned of their danger and earnestly entreated
to seek the Lord with all the heart, reply by telling us they know they
must repent and believe but that they can not do either the one or the
other of themselves and that they must wait till God gives them grace to
do so. Now, this is a truth, absolutely considered; yet most of us can
see that they are using it as a falsehood to cover and excuse a great insincerity
of heart. We can readily perceive that if their hearts were really set
upon salvation, they could not rest satisfied without it. Their contentedness
is the result, not of heart-submission to God, but in reality of heart-indifference
to the salvation of their own souls.
Covering Falsehood With Truth
"Exactly so it is with us as ministers:
when we can rest satisfied with using the means for saving souls without
seeing them really saved, or we ourselves being broken-hearted by it, and
at the same time quietly talk of leaving the event to God's disposal, we
make use of a truth to cover and excuse a falsehood; for our ability to
leave the matter thus is not, as we imagine, the result of heart-submission
to God, but of heart-indifference to the salvation of the souls we deal
with. No, truly, if the heart is really set on such an end, it must gain
that end or break in losing it."
He that saved our souls has taught us to
weep over the unsaved. Lord, let that mind be in us that was in Thee! Give
us thy tears to weep; for, Lord, our hearts are hard toward our fellows.
We can see thousands perish around us, and our sleep never be disturbed;
no vision of their awful doom ever scaring us, no cry from their lost souls
ever turning our peace into bitterness.
Our families, our schools, our congregations,
not to speak of our cities at large, our land, our world, might well send
us daily to our knees; for the loss of even one soul is terrible
beyond conception. Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has entered the
heart of man, what a soul in hell must suffer forever. Lord, give us bowels
of mercies! "What a mystery! The soul and eternity of one man depends upon
the voice of another!" Chapter 4: MINISTERIAL CONFESSION"Remember there/ore from whence thou
art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto
thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except
thou repent." -- REVELATION 2:5.
In the year 1651 the Church of Scotland,
feeling in regard to her ministers "how deep their hand was in the transgression,
and that ministers had no small accession to the drawing on of the judgments
that were upon the land," drew up what they called a humble acknowledgment
of the sins of the ministry. This document is a striking and searching
one. It is perhaps one of the fullest, most faithful and most impartial
confessions of ministerial sin ever made. A few extracts from it will suitably
introduce this chapter on ministerial confession. It begins with confessing
sins before entrance on the ministry:
"Lightness and profanity in conversation,
unsuitable to that holy calling which they did intend, not thoroughly repented
of. Not studying to be in Christ before they be in the ministry;
nor to have the practical knowledge and experience of the mystery of the
gospel in themselves before they preach it to others. Neglecting to fit
themselves for the work of the ministry, in not improving prayer and fellowship
with God, opportunities of a lively ministry, and other means, and not
mourning for these neglects. Not studying self-denial, nor resolving to
take up the cross of Christ. Negligence to entertain a sight and sense
of sin and misery; not wrestling against corruption, nor studying mortification
and subduedness of spirit."
Of entrance on the ministry it thus speaks:
"Entering to the ministry without respect
to a commission from Jesus Christ, by which it hath come to pass that many
have run unsent. Entering to the ministry not from the love of Christ,
nor from a desire to honor God in gaining of souls, but for a name and
for a livelihood in the world notwithstanding a solemn declaration to the
contrary at admission."
Of the sins after entrance on the ministry,
it thus searchingly enumerates:
"Ignorance of God; want of nearness with
Him, and taking up little of God in reading, meditating and speaking of
Him. Exceeding great selfishness in all that we do; acting from ourselves,
for ourselves and to ourselves. Not caring how unfaithful and negligent
others were, so being it might contribute a testimony to our faithfulness
and diligence, but being rather content, if not rejoicing, at their faults.
Least delight in those things wherein lieth our nearest communion with
God; great inconstancy in our walk with God, and neglect of acknowledging
Him in all our ways. In going about duties, least careful of those things
which are most remote from the eyes of men. Seldom in secret prayer with
God, except to fit for public performance; and even that much neglected,
or gone about very superficially.
Glad to Find Excuses
"Glad to find excuses for the neglect of
duties. Neglecting the reading of Scriptures in secret, for edifying ourselves
as Christians; only reading them in so far as may fit us for our duty as
ministers, and oft-times neglecting that. Not given to reflect upon our
own ways, nor allowing conviction to have a thorough work upon us; deceiving
our-selves by resting upon absence from and abhorrence of evils from the
light of a natural conscience, and looking upon the same as an evidence
of a real change of state and nature. Evil guarding of and watching over
the heart, and carelessness in self-searching; which makes much unaquaintedness
with ourselves and estrangedness from God. Not guarding nor wrestling against
seen and known evils, especially our predominants. A facility to be drawn
away with the temptations of the time, and other particular temptations,
according to our inclinations and fellowship.
"Instability and wavering in the ways of
God, through the fears of persecutions, hazard, or loss of esteem; and
declining duties because of the fear of jealousies and reproaches. Not
esteeming the cross of Christ, and sufferings for His name, honorable,
but rather shifting sufferings, from self-love. Deadness of spirit, after
all the sore strokes of God upon the land. Little conscience made of secret
humiliation and fasting, by ourselves apart and in our families, that we
might mourn for our own and the land's guiltiness and great backslidings;
and little applying of public humiliation to our own hearts. Finding of
our own pleasure, when the Lord calls for our humiliation.
"Not laying to heart the sad and heavy
sufferings of the people of God abroad, and the not-thriving of the kingdom
of Jesus Christ and the power of godliness among them. Refined hypocrisy;
desiring to appear what, indeed, we are not. Studying more to learn the
language of God's people than their exercise. Artificial confessing of
sin, without repentance; professing to declare iniquity, and not resolving
to be sorry for sin. Confession in secret much slighted, even of those
things whereof we are convicted. No reformation, after solemn acknowledgments
and private vows; thinking ourselves exonerated after confession. Readier
to search out and censure faults in others than to see or deal with them
in ourselves. Accounting of our estate and way according to the estimation
that others have of us. Estimation of men, as they agree with or disagree
from us.
"Not fearing to meet with trials, but presuming,
in our own strength, to go through them unshaken. Not learning to fear,
by the falls of gracious men; nor mourning and praying for them. Not observing
particular deliverances and punishments; not improving of them, for the
honor of God, and the edification of ourselves and others. Little or no
mourning for the corruption of our nature, and less groaning under, and
longing to be delivered from, that body of death, the bitter root of all
our other evils.
"Fruitless conversing ordinarily with others,
for the worse rather than for the better. Foolish jesting away of time
with impertinent and useless discourse, very unbecoming the ministers of
the gospel. Spiritual purposes often dying in our hands when they are begun
by others. Carnal familiarity with natural, wicked and malignant men, whereby
they are hardened, the people of God stumbled, and we ourselves blunted.
Loving Pleasure More than God
"Slighting of fellowship with those by
whom we might profit. Desiring more to converse with those that might better
us by their talents than with such as might edify us by their graces. Not
studying opportunities of doing good to others. Shifting of prayer and
other duties, when called thereto -- choosing rather to omit the same than
that we should be put to them ourselves. Abusing of time in frequent recreation
and pastimes and loving our pleasures more than God . Taking little or
no time to Christian discourse with young men trained up for the ministry.
Common and ordinary discourse on the Lord's Day. Slighting Christian admonition
from any of our flocks or others, as being below us; and ashamed to take
light and warning from private Christians. Dislike of, or bitterness against,
such as deal freely with us by admonition or reproof, and not dealing faithfully
with others who would welcome it off our hands.
"Not praying for men of a contrary judgment,
but using reservedness and distance from them; being more ready to speak
of them than to them or to God for them. Not weighed
with the failings and miscarriages of others, but rather taking advantage
thereof for justifying ourselves. Talking of and sporting at the faults
of others, rather than compassionating of them. No due painstaking in religious
ordering of our families, nor studying to be patterns to other families
in the government of ours. Hasty anger and passion in our families and
conversation with others. Covetousness, worldly-mindedness, and an inordinate
desire after the things of this life, upon which followeth a neglect of
the duties of our calling, and our being taken up for the most part with
the things of the world. Want of hospitality and charity to the members
of Christ. Not cherishing godliness in the people; and some' being afraid
of it and hating the people of God for piety, and studying to bear down
and quench the work of the Spirit amongst them.
Trusting in Our Own Ability
"Not entertaining that edge of spirit in
ministerial duties which we found at the first entry to the ministry. Great
neglect of reading, and other preparation; or preparation merely literal
and bookish, making an idol of a book, which hindereth communion with God;
or presuming on bygone assistance, and praying little. Trusting to gifts,
talents, and pains taken for preparation, whereby God is provoked to blast
good matter, well ordered and worded. Careless in employing Christ, and
drawing virtue out of Him, for enabling us to preach in the Spirit and
in power. In praying for assistance we pray more for assistance to the
messenger than to the message which we carry, not caring what becomes of
the Word, if we be with some measure of assistance carried on in the duty.
The matter we bring forth is not seriously recommended to God by prayer,
to be quickened to His people. Neglect of prayer after the Word is preached.
"Neglect to warn, in preaching, of snares
and sins in public affairs by some; and too much, too frequent, and unnecessary
speaking by others of public business and transactions. Exceeding great
neglect and unskillfulness to set forth the excellences and usefulness
of (and the necessity of an interest in) Jesus Christ, and the new covenant,
which ought to be the great subject of a minister's study and preaching.
Speaking of Christ more by hearsay than from knowledge and experience,
or any real impression of Him upon the heart. The way of most ministers'
preaching too legal. Want of sobriety in preaching the gospel; not savoring
anything but what is new; so that the substantials of religion bear but
little bulk.
"Not preaching Christ in the simplicity
of the gospel, nor ourselves the people's servants, for Christ's sake.
Preaching of Christ, not that the people may know him, but that they may
think we know much of Him. Preaching about Christ's leaving of the world
without brokenness of heart, or stirring up of ourselves to take hold of
Him. Not preaching with bowels of compassion to them that are in hazard
to perish. Preaching against public sins, neither in such a way, nor for
such an end, as we ought-for the gaining of souls and drawing men out of
their sins; but rather because it is to our advantage to say something
of these evils.
Attitude Toward Our Opponents
"Bitterness, instead of zeal in speaking
against malignants, sectarians, and other scandalous persons; and unfaithfulness
therein. Not studying to know the particular condition of the souls of
the people, that we may speak to them accordingly; nor keeping a particular
record thereof, though convinced of the usefulness of this. Not carefully
choosing what may be most profitable and edifying; and want of wisdom in
application to the several conditions of souls; not so careful to bring
home the point by application as to find Out the doctrine, nor speaking
the same with that reverence which becomes His word and message.
"Choosing texts whereon we have something
to say, rather than those suited to the conditions of souls and times,
and frequent p reaching of the same things, that we may not be put to the
pains of new study. Such a way of reading, preaching and prayer as puts
us in these duties farther from God. Too soon satisfied in the discharge
of duties, and holding off challenges of conscience with excuses. Indulging
the body, and wasting much time idly. Too much eyeing our own credit and
applause; and being pleased with it when we get it, and unsatisfied when
it is wanting. Timorousness in delivering God's message; letting people
die in reigning sins without warning. Studying the discharge of duties
rather to free ourselves from censure than to approve ourselves to God.
"Not making all the counsel of God known
to His people; and particularly, not giving testimony in times of defection.
Not studying to profit by our own doctrine, nor the doctrine of others.
For most part, preaching as if we ourselves were not concerned in the message
which we carry to the people. Not rejoicing at the conversion of sinners,
but content with the unthriving of the Lord's work amongst His people,
as suiting best with our minds; fearing, if they should thrive better,
we should be more put to it, and less esteemed of by them -- many, in preaching
and practice, bearing down the power of godliness. We preach not as be
ore God, but as to men; as doth appear by the different pains in our preparation
to speak to our ordinary hearers and to others
to whom we would approve ourselves.
"Negligent, lazy, and partial visiting
of the sick. If they be poor we go once, and only when sent for; if they
be rich and of better note, we go oftener and unsent for. Not knowing how
to speak with the tongue of the learned a word in season to the weary.
"Lazy and negligent in catechising. Not
preparing our hearts before, nor wrestling with God for a blessing to it,
because of the ordinariness and apprehended easiness of it; whereby the
Lord's name is much taken in vain, and the people little profited. Looking
on that exercise as a work below us, and not condescending to study a right
and profitable way of instructing the Lord's people. Partial in catechising,
passing by those that are rich and of better quality, though many of such
stand ordinarily in great need of instruction. Not waiting upon and following
the ignorant but often passionately upbraiding them."
These are solemn confessions-the confessions
of men who knew the nature of that ministry on which they had entered,
and who were desirous of approving themselves to Him who had called them,
that they might give in their account with joy and not with grief.
Confessing our Shortcomings
Let us, as they did, deal honestly with
ourselves. Our confessions ought to be no less ample and searching.
1. We have been unfaithful. The
fear of man and the love of his applause have often made us afraid. We
have been unfaithful to our own souls, to our flocks, and to our brethren;
unfaithful in the pulpit, in visiting, in discipline, in the church. In
the discharge of every one of the duties of our stewardship there has been
grievous unfaithfulness. Instead of the special particularization of the
sin reproved, there has been the vague allusion. Instead of the bold reproof,
there has been the timid hint. Instead of the uncompromising condemnation,
there has been the feeble disapproval. Instead of the unswerving consistency
of a holy life whose uniform tenor should be a protest against the world
and a rebuke of sin, there has been such an amount of unfaithfulness in
our walk and conversation, in our daily deportment and intercourses with
others, that any degree of faithfulness we have been enabled to manifest
on the Lord's Day is almost neutralized by the want of circumspection which
our weekday life exhibits.
Archbishop Ussher's Example
Few men ever lived a life so busy and so
devoted to God as Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh. His learning, habits of
business, Station, friends, all contributed to keep his hands every moment
full; and then his was a soul that seemed continually to hear a voice saying:
"Redeem the time, for the days are evil." Early, too, did he begin, for
at ten years of age he was hopefully converted by a sermon preached on
Romans 12:1: "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God,
that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice." He was a painstaking,
laborious preacher of the Word for fifty-five years.
Yet hear him on his death-bed! How he clings
to Christ's righteousness alone, and sees in himself, even after such a
life, only sin and want. The last words he was heard to utter were about
one o'clock in the afternoon, and these words were uttered in a loud voice:
"But, Lord, in special forgive me my sins of omission." It was omissions,
says his biographer, he begged forgiveness of with his most fervent
last breath -- he who was never known to omit an hour, but who employed
the shred ends of his life for his great Lord and Master! The very day
he took his last sickness, he rose up from writing one of his great works
and went out to visit a sick woman, to whom he spoke so fitly and fully
that you would have taken him to have spoken of heaven before he came there.
Yet this man was oppressed with a sense of his omissions!
Reader, what think you of yourself -- your
undone duties, your unimproved hours, times of prayer omitted, your shrinking
from unpleasant work and putting it on others, your being content to sit
under your vine and fig tree without using all efforts for the souls of
others? "Lord, in special forgive me my sins of omission!"
Hear the confession of Edwards, in regard
both to personal and ministerial sins: "Often I have had very affecting
views of my own sinfulness and vileness; very frequently to such a degree
as to hold me in a kind of loud weeping, sometimes for a considerable time
together, so that I have often been forced to shut myself up. I have had
a vastly greater sense of my own wickedness, and the badness of my heart,
than ever I had be-fore my conversion. My wickedness, as I am in myself,
has long appeared to me perfectly ineffable, swallowing up all thought
and imagination. I know not how to express better what my sins appear to
me to be than by heaping infinite upon infinite, and multiplying infinite
by infinite. When I look into my heart and take a view of my wickedness,
it looks like an abyss infinitely deeper than hell. And yet it seems to
me that my conviction of sin is exceedingly small and faint: it is enough
to amaze me that I have no more sense of my sin. I have greatly longed
of late for a broken heart, and to lie low before God."
Worldliness Stunts the Conscience
2. We have been carnal and unspiritual.
The tone of our life has been low and earthly. Associating too much
and too intimately with the world, we have in a great measure become
accustomed to its ways. Hence our tastes
have been vitiated, our consciences blunted, and that sensitive tenderness
of feeling which, while it turns not back from suffering yet shrinks from
the remotest contact with sin, has worn off and given place to an amount
of callousness of which we once, in fresher days, believed ourselves incapable.
Perhaps we can call to mind a time when
our views and aims were fixed upon a standard of almost unearthly elevation,
and, contrasting these with our present state, we are startled at the painful
changes. And besides intimacy with the world, other causes have operated
in producing this deterioration in the spirituality of our minds. The study
of truth in its dogmatical more than in its devotional form has robbed
it of its freshness and power; daily, hourly occupation in the routine
of ministerial labor has engendered formality and coldness; continual employment
in the most solemn duties of our office, such as dealing with souls in
private about their immortal welfare, or guiding the meditations and devotions
of God's assembled people, or handling the sacramental symbols-this, gone
about often with so little prayer and mixed with so little faith, has tended
grievously to divest us of that profound reverence and godly fear which
ever ought to possess and pervade us. How truly, and with what emphasis,
we may say: "I am carnal, sold under sin" (Romans 7:14). The world
has not been crucified to us, nor we unto the world; the flesh, with its
members, has not been mortified. What a sad effect all this has bad, not
only upon our peace of soul, on our growth in grace, but upon the success
of our ministry!
3. We have been selfish. We have
shrunk from toil, difficulty and endurance, counting not only our lives
dear unto us, but even our temporal ease and comfort. We have sought to
please ourselves, instead of obeying Romans 15:2: "Let every one of
us please his neighbor for his good to edification." We have not borne
"one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ" (Galatians
6:2). We have been worldly and covetous. We have not presented ourselves
unto God as "living sacrifices," laying ourselves, our lives, our substance,
our time, our strength, our faculties -- our all -- upon His altar. We
seem altogether to have lost sight of this self-sacrificing principle on
which even as Christians, but much more as ministers, we are called upon
to act. We have had little idea of anything like sacrifice at all.
Up to the point where a sacrifice was demanded, we may have been willing
to go, but there we stood; counting it unnecessary, perhaps calling it
imprudent and unadvised, to proceed further. Yet ought not the life of
every Christian, especially of every minister, to be a life of self-sacrifice
and self-denial throughout, even as was the life of Him who "pleased not
himself"?
4. We have been slothful. We have
been sparing of our toil. We have not endured hardness as good soldiers
of Jesus Christ. Even when we have been instant in season, we have
not been so out of season; neither have we sought to gather up the
fragments of our time, that not a moment might be thrown idly or unprofitably
away. Precious hours and days have been wasted in sloth, in company, in
pleasure, in idle or desultory reading, that might have been devoted to
the closet, the study, the pulpit or the meeting! Indolence, self-indulgence,
fickleness, flesh-pleasing, have eaten like a canker into our ministry,
arresting the blessing and marring our success.
It can not be said of us, "For my name's
sake [thou] hast labored, and hast not fainted" (Revelation 2:3). Alas!
we have fainted, or at least grown "weary in well-doing." We have not made
conscience of our work. We have not dealt honestly with the church to which
we pledged the vows of ordination. We have dealt deceitfully with God,
whose servants we profess to be. We have manifested but little of the unwearied,
self-denying love with which, as shepherds, we ought to have watched over
the flocks committed to our care. We have fed ourselves, and not the flock.
5. We have been cold. Even when
diligent, how little warmth and glow! The whole soul is not poured into
the duty, and hence it wears too often the repulsive air of routine and
form. We do not speak and act like men in earnest. Our words are feeble,
even when sound and true; our looks are careless, even when our words are
weighty; and our tones betray the apathy which both words and looks disguise.
Love is wanting, deep love, love strong as death, love such as made Jeremiah
weep in secret places for the pride of Israel, and Paul speak "even weeping"
of the enemies of the cross of Christ. In preaching and visiting, in counseling
and reproving, what formality, what coldness, how little tenderness and
affection! "Oh that I was all heart," said Rowland Hill, "and soul, and
spirit, to tell the glorious gospel of Christ to perishing multitudes!"
Afraid to Tell the Whole Truth
6. We have been timid. Fear has
often led us to smooth down or generalize truths which if broadly stated
must have brought hatred and reproach upon us. We have thus often failed
to declare to our people the whole counsel of God. We have shrunk from
reproving, rebuking and exhorting with all long-suffering and doctrine.
We have feared to alienate friends, or to awaken the wrath of enemies.
Hence our preaching of the law has been feeble and straitened; and hence
our preaching of a free gospel has been yet more vague, uncertain and timorous.
We are greatly deficient in that majestic boldness and nobility of spirit
which peculiarly marked Luther, Calvin, Knox, and the mighty men of the
Reformation. Of Luther it was said, every word was a thunderbolt."
7. We have been wanting in solemnity.
In reading the lives of Howe or Baxter, of Brainerd or Edwards, we
are in company with men who in solemnity of deportment and gravity of demeanor
were truly of the apostolic school. We feel that these men must have carried
weight with them, both in their words and lives. We see also the contrast
between ourselves and them in respect of that deep solemnity of air and
tone which made men feel that they walked with God. How deeply ought we
to be abased at our levity, frivolity, flippancy, vain mirth, foolish talking
and jesting, by which grievous injury has been done to souls, the progress
of the saints retarded, and the world countenanced in its wretched vanities.
Preaching Self Instead of Christ
8. We have preached ourselves, not Christ.
We have sought applause, courted honor, been avaricious of fame and
jealous of our reputation. We have preached too often so as to exalt our-selves
instead of magnifying Christ, so as to draw men's eyes to ourselves instead
of fixing them on Him and His cross. Nay, and have we not often preached
Christ for the very purpose of getting honor to ourselves? Christ, in the
sufferings of His first coming and the glory of His second, has not been
the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, of all our sermons.
9. We have used words of man's wisdom.
We have forgotten Paul's resolution to avoid the enticing words of
man's wisdom, lest he should make the cross of Christ of none effect. We
have reversed his reasoning as well as his resolution, and acted as if
by well-studied, well-polished, well-reasoned discourses, we could so gild
and beautify the cross as to make it no longer repulsive, but irresistibly
attractive to the carnal eye! Hence we have often sent men home well satisfied
with themselves, convinced that they were religious because they were affected
by our eloquence, touched by our appeals or persuaded by our arguments.
In this way we have made the cross of Christ of none effect and sent souls
to hell with a lie in their right hand. Thus, by avoiding the offense of
the cross and the foolishness of preaching we have had to labor in vain,
and mourn over an unblest, unfruitful ministry.
10. We have not fully preached a free
gospel. We have been afraid of making it too free, lest men
should be led into licentiousness; as if it were possible to preach too
free a gospel, or as if its freeness could lead men into sin. It
is only a free gospel that can bring peace, and it is only a free gospel
that can make men holy. Luther's preaching was summed up in these two points
-- "that we are justified by faith alone, and that we must be assured that
we are justified"; and it was this that he urged his brother Brentius to
preach; and it was by such free, full, bold preaching of the glorious gospel,
untrammeled by works, merits, terms, conditions, and unclouded by the fancied
humility of doubts, fears, uncertainties, that such blessed success accompanied
his labors. Let us go and do likewise. Allied to this is the necessity
of insisting on the sinner's immediate turning to God, and demanding
in the Master's name the sinner's immediate surrender of heart to
Christ. Strange that sudden conversions should be so much disliked by some
ministers. They are the most scriptural of all conversions.
Too Little Emphasis on God's Word
11. We have not duly studied and honored
the Word of God. We have given a greater prominence to man's writings,
man's opinions, man's systems in our studies than to the WORD. We have
drunk more out of human cisterns than divine. We have held more communion
with man than God. Hence the mold and fashion of our spirits, our lives,
our words, have been derived more from man than God. We must study the
Bible more. We must steep our souls in it. We must not only lay it up within
us, but transfuse it through the whole texture of the soul.
12. We have not been men of prayer.
The spirit of prayer has slumbered amongst us. The closet has been
too little frequented and delighted in. We have allowed business, study
or active labor to interfere with our closet-hours. And the feverish atmosphere
in which both the church and nation are enveloped has found its way into
our closet, disturbing the sweet calm of its blessed solitude. Sleep, company,
idle visiting, foolish talking and jesting, idle reading, unprofitable
occupations, engross time that might have been redeemed for prayer.
Time for Everything but Prayer
Why is there so little anxiety to get time
to pray? Why is there so little forethought in the laying out of time and
employments so as to secure a large portion of each day for prayer? Why
is there so much speaking, yet so little prayer? Why is there so much running
to and fro, yet so little prayer? Why so much bustle and business, yet
so little prayer? Why so many meetings with our fellow-men, yet so few
meetings with God? Why so little being alone, so little thirsting of the
soul for the calm, sweet hours of unbroken solitude, when God and His child
hold fellowship together as if they could never part? It is the want of
these solitary hours that not only injures our own growth in grace but
makes us such unprofitable members of the church of Christ, and that renders
our lives useless. In order to grow in grace, we must be much alone.
It is not in society -- even Christian society -- that the soul grows
most rapidly and vigorously. In one single quiet hour of prayer
it will often make more progress than in days of company with others. It
is in the desert that the dew falls freshest and the air is purest. So
with the soul. It is when none but God is nigh; when His presence alone,
like the desert air in which there is mingled no noxious breath of man,
surrounds and pervades the soul; it is then that the eye gets the clearest,
simplest view of eternal certainties; it is then that the soul gathers
in wondrous refreshment and power and energy.
And so it is also in this way that we become
truly useful to others. It is when coming out fresh from communion with
God that we go forth to do His work successfully. It is in the closet that
we get our vessels so filled with blessing, that, when we come forth, we
can not contain it to ourselves but must, as by a blessed necessity, pour
it out whithersoever we go. We cannot say, as did Isaiah: "My Lord,
I stand continually upon the watchtower in the daytime, and I am set in
my ward whole nights" (Isaiah 21:8). Our life has not been a lying-in-wait
for the voice of God. "Speak, Lord; for thy servant heareth" (1
Samuel 3:9), has not been the attitude of our souls, the guiding principle
of our lives. Nearness to God, fellowship with God, waiting upon God, resting
in God, have been too little the characteristic either of our private or
our ministerial walk. Hence our example has been so powerless, our labors
so unsuccessful, our sermons so meagre, our whole ministry so fruitless
and feeble.
Seeking the Spirit's Strength
13. We have not honored the Spirit of
God. It may be that in words we have recognized His agency, but we
have not kept this continually before our eyes, and the eyes of the people.
We have not given Him the glory that is due unto His name. We have not
sought His teaching, His anointing-the "unction from the Holy One, [whereby]
ye know all things" (1 John 2:20). Neither in the study of the Word
nor the preaching of it to others have we duly acknowledged His office
as the Enlightener of the understanding, the Revealer of the truth, the
Testifier and Glorifier of Christ. We have grieved Him by the dishonor
done to His person as the third person of the glorious Trinity; and we
have grieved Him by the slight put upon His office as the Teacher, the
Convincer, the Comforter, the Sanctifier. Hence He has almost departed
from us, and left us to reap the fruit of our own perversity and unbelief.
Besides, we have grieved Him by our inconsistent walk, by our want of circumspection,
by our worldly-mindedness, by our unholiness, by our prayerlessness, by
our unfaithfulness, by our want of solemnity, by a life and conversation
so little in conformity with the character of a disciple or the office
of ambassador.
An old Scottish minister thus writes concerning
himself: "I find a want of the Spirit -- of the power and demonstration
of the Spirit -- in praying, speaking, and exhorting; that whereby men
are mainly convinced, and whereby they are a terror and a wonder unto others,
so as they stand in awe of them; that glory and majesty whereby respect
and reverence are procured; that whereby Christ's sermons were differenced
from those of the Scribes and Pharisees; which I judge to be the beams
of God's majesty and of the Spirit of holiness breaking out and shining
through His people. But my foul garments are on! Woe is me?. The crown
of glory and majesty is fallen off my head; my words are weak and carnal,
not mighty; whereby contempt is bred. No remedy for this but humility,
self-loathing and a striving to maintain fellowship with God."
Too Little Imitation of Christ
14. We have had little of the mind of
Christ. We have come far short of the example of the apostles, much
more of Christ; we are far behind the servants, much farther behind the
Master. We have had little of the grace, the compassion, the meekness,
the lowliness, the love of God's eternal Son. His weeping over Jerusalem
is a feeling in which we have but little heartfelt sympathy. His "seeking
of the lost" is little imitated by us. His unwearied 'teaching of the multitudes"
we shrink from as too much for flesh and blood. His days of fasting, His
nights of watchfulness and prayer, are not fully realized as models for
us to copy. His counting not His life dear unto Him that He might glorify
the Father and finish the work given Him to do, is but little remembered
by us as the principle on which we are to act. Yet surely we are to follow
His steps; the servant is to walk where his Master has led the way; the
under shepherd is to be what the Chief Shepherd was. We must not seek rest
or ease in a world where He whom we love had none. Chapter 5: REVIVAL IN THE MINISTRYIt is easier to speak or write about revival
than to set about it. There is so much rubbish to be swept out, so many
self-raised hindrances to be dealt with, so many old habits to be overcome,
so much sloth and easy-mindedness to be contended with, so much of ministerial
routine to be broken through, and so much crucifixion, both of self and
of the world, to be undergone. As (Christ said of the unclean spirit which
the disciples could not cast out, so we may say of these: "This kind goeth
not out but by prayer and fasting."
So thought a minister in the seventeenth
century; for, after lamenting the evils both of his life and his ministry,
he thus resolves to set about their renewal:
"(1) In imitation of Christ and His apostles,
and to get good done, I purpose to rise timely every morning.
"(2) To prepare as soon as I am up some
work to be done, and how and when to do it; to engage my heart to it; and
at even to call myself to account and to mourn over my failings.
"(3) To spend a sufficient portion of time
every day in prayer, reading, meditating, spiritual exercises: morning,
midday, evening, and ere I go to bed.
"(4) Once in the month, either the end
or middle of it, I keep a day of humiliation for the public condition,
for the Lord's people and their sad condition, for raising up the work
and people of God.
"(5)I spend, besides this, one day for
my own private condition, in fighting against spiritual evils and to get
my heart more holy, or to get some special exercise accomplished, once
in six months.
"(6) I spend once every week four hours
over and above my daily portion in private, for some special causes relating
either to myself or others.
"(7) To spend some time on Saturday, towards
night, for preparation for the Lord's Day.
"(8) To spend six or seven days together,
once a year, when most convenient, wholly and only on spiritual accounts.
Today's Need for Revival
Such was the way in which he set about
personal and ministerial revival. Let us take an example from him. If he
needed it much, we need it more.
In the fifth and sixth centuries, Gildas
and Salvian arose to alarm and arouse a careless church and a formal ministry.
In the sixteenth, such was the task which devolved on the Reformers. In
the seventeenth, Baxter, among others, took a prominent part in stimulating
the languid piety and dormant energies of his fellow ministers. In the
eighteenth, God raised up some choice and noble men to awaken the church
and lead the way to a higher and bolder career of ministerial duty. The
present century stands no less in need of some such stimulating influence.
We have experienced many symptoms of life, but still the mass is not quickened.
We require some new Baxter to arouse us by his voice and his example. It
is melancholy to see the amount of ministerial languor and inefficiency
that still overspreads our land. How long, 0 Lord, how long!
The infusion of new life into the ministry
ought to he the object of more direct and special effort, as well as
of more united and fervent prayer. The prayers of Christians ought to he
more largely directed to the students, the preachers, the ministers of
the Christian church. It is a living ministry that our country needs; and
without such a ministry it can not long expect to escape the judgments
of God. We need men that will spend and be spent -- that will labor
and pray -- that will watch and weep for souls.
How Myconius Learned His Lesson
In the life of Myconius, the friend of
Luther, as given by Meichior Adam, we have the following beautiful and
striking account of an event which proved the turning point in his history
and led him to devote his energies to the cause of Christ. The first night
that he entered the monastery, intending to become a monk, he dreamed;
and it seemed as if he was ranging a vast wilderness alone. Suddenly a
guide appeared and led him onwards to a most lovely vale, watered by a
pleasant stream of which he was not permitted to taste, and then to a marble
fountain of pure water. He tried to kneel and drink, when, lo! a crucified
Saviour stood forth to view, from whose wounds gushed the copious stream.
In a moment his guide flung him into the fountain. His mouth met the flowing
wounds and he drank most sweetly, never to thirst again!
No sooner was he refreshed himself than
he was led away by his guide to be taught what great things he was yet
to do for the crucified One whose precious wounds had poured the living
water into his soul. He came to a wide stretching plain covered with waving
grain. His guide ordered him to reap. He excused himself by saying that
he was wholly unskilled in such labor. "What you know not you shall learn,"
was the reply. They came nearer, and he saw a solitary reaper toiling at
the sickle with such prodigious effort as if he were determined to reap
the whole field himself. The guide ordered him to join this laborer, and
seizing a sickle, showed him how to proceed.
Again the guide led him to a hill. He surveyed
the vast plain beneath him, and, wondering, asked how long it would take
to reap such a field with so few laborers. "Before winter the last sickle
must be thrust in," replied his guide. "Proceed with all your might. The
Lord of the harvest will send more reapers soon." Wearied with his labor,
Myconius rested for a little. Again the crucified One was at his side,
wasted and marred in form. The guide laid his hand on Myconius, saying:
"You must be conformed to Him."
With these words the dreamer awoke. But
he awoke to a life of zeal and love. He found the Saviour for his own soul,
and he went forth to preach of Him to others. He took his place by the
side of that noble reaper, Martin Luther. He was stimulated by his example,
and toiled with him in the vast field till laborers arose on every side
and the harvest was reaped before the winter came. The lesson to us is,
thrust in your sickles. The fields are white, and they are wide in compass;
the laborers are few, but there are some devoted ones toiling there already.
In other years we have seen Whitefield and Hill putting forth their enormous
efforts, as if they would reap the whole field alone. Let us join ourselves
to such men, and the Lord of the harvest will not leave us to toil alone.
Reaping the Great Harvest
"When do you intend to stop?" was the question
once put by a friend to Rowland Hill. "Not till we have carried all before
us," was the prompt reply. Such is our answer too. The fields are vast,
the grain whitens, the harvest waves; and through grace we shall go forth
with our sickles, never to rest till we shall lie down where the Lamb himself
shall lead us, by the living fountains of waters, where God shall wipe
off the sweat of toil from our weary foreheads and dry up all the tears
of earth from our weeping eyes. Some of us are young and fresh; many days
may yet be, in the providence of God, before us. These must be days of
strenuous, ceaseless, persevering, and, if God bless us, successful toil.
We shall labor till we are worn out and laid to rest.
Vincent, the non-conformist minister, in
his small volume on the great plague and fire in London, entitled "God's
Terrible Voice in the City," gives a description of the manner in which
the faithful ministers who remained amid the danger discharged their solemn
duties to the dying inhabitants, and of the manner in which the terror-stricken
multitudes hung with breathless eagerness upon their lips, to drink in
salvation ere the dreaded pestilence had swept them away to the tomb. Churches
were flung open, but the pulpits were silent, for there was none to occupy
them; the hirelings had fled.
Preaching to Plague Victims
Then did God's faithful band of persecuted
ones come forth from their hiding-places to fill the forsaken pulpits.
Then did they stand up in the midst of the dying and the dead, to proclaim
eternal life to men who were expecting death before the morrow. They preached
in season and out of season. Week-day or Sunday was the same to them. The
hour might be canonical or uncanonical, it mattered not; they did not stand
upon nice points of ecclesiastical regularity or irregularity; they lifted
up their voices like trumpets, and spared not. Every sermon might be their
last. Graves were lying open around them; life seemed now not merely a
handbreadth but a hairbreadth; death was nearer now than ever; eternity
stood out in all its vast reality; souls were felt to be precious; opportunities
were no longer to be trifled away; every hour possessed a value beyond
the wealth of kingdoms; the world was now a passing, vanishing shadow,
and man's days on earth had been cut down from threescore years and ten
into the twinkling of an eye!
Oh, how they preached! No polished periods,
no learned arguments, no labored paragraphs, chilled their appeals or rendered
their discourses unintelligible. No fear of man, no love of popular applause,
no ever-scrupulous dread of strong expressions, no fear of excitement
or enthusiasm, prevented them from pouring out the whole fervor of
their hearts, that yearned with tenderness unutterable over dying souls.
"Old Time;" says Vincent, "seemed to stand
at the head of the pulpit with his great scythe, saying with a hoarse voice,
'Work while it is called to-day: at night I will mow thee down.' Grim Death
seemed to stand at the side of the pulpit, with its sharp arrow, saying,
'Do thou shoot God's arrows, and I will shoot mine.' The grave seemed to
lie open at the foot of the pulpit, with dust in her bosom, saying --
'Louden thy cry To God, To men, And now fulfill thy trust; Here thou must lie-- Mouth stopped Breath gone, And silent in the dust,'
"Ministers now had awakening calls to seriousness
and fervor in their ministerial work, to preach on the side and brink of
the pit into which thousands were tumbling. There was such a vast concourse
of people in the churches where these ministers were to be found that they
could not many times come near the pulpit doors for the press, but were
forced to climb over the pews to them; and such a face was seen in the
assemblies as seldom was seen before in London; such eager looks, such
open ears, such greedy attention, as if every word would be eaten which
dropped from the mouths of the ministers."
Should We Ever Be Less Earnest?
Thus did they preach and thus did they
hear in those days of terror and death. Men were in earnest then, both
in speaking and hearing. There was no coldness, no languor, no studied
oratory. Truly they preached as dying men to dying men. But the question
is, Should it ever be otherwise? Should there ever be less fervor
in preaching or less eagerness in hearing than there was then? True, life
was a little shorter then, but that was all. Death and its issues
are still the same. Eternity is still the same. The soul is still the same
Only one small element was thrown in then which does not always exist to
such an extent; namely, the increased shortness of life. But that was all
the difference.
Unbelief Weakens Our Testimony
Why then should our preaching be less fervent,
our appeals less affectionate, our importunity less urgent? We are a few
steps farther from the shore of eternity; that is all. Time may be a little
stronger than it was then, yet only a very little. Its everlasting issues
are still as momentous, as unchangeable. Surely it is our unbelief that
makes the difference! It is unbelief that makes ministers so cold in their
preaching, so slothful in visiting, and so remiss in all their sacred duties.
It is unbelief that chills the life and straitens the heart. It is unbelief
that makes ministers handle eternal realities with such irreverence. It
is unbelief that makes them ascend with so light a step "that awful place
the pulpit," to deal with immortal beings about heaven and hell.
Hear one of Richard Baxter's appeals: --
"I have been ready to wonder, when I have heard such weighty things delivered,
how people can forbear crying out in the congregation; much more how they
can rest till they have gone to their ministers and learned what they should
do. Oh, that heaven and hell should work no more upon men! Oh that everlastingness
should work no more! Oh, how can you forbear when you are alone to think
what it is to be everlastingly in joy or in torment! I wonder that such
thoughts do not break your sleep; and that they come not in your mind when
you are about your labor! I wonder how you can almost do anything else;
how you can have any quietness in your minds; how you can eat or drink
or rest till you have got some ground of everlasting consolations!
"Is that a man or a corpse that is not
affected with matters of this importance? that can be readier to sleep
than to tremble when he heareth how he must stand at the bar of God? Is
that a man or a clod of clay that can rise or lie down without being deeply
affected with his everlasting estate? that can follow his worldly business
but make nothing of the great business of salvation or damnation; and that,
when they know it is hard at hand? Truly, Sirs, when I think of the weight
of the matter, I wonder at the very best of God's saints upon earth, that
they are no better, and do no more in so weighty a case. I wonder at those
whom the world accounteth more holy than necessary, and scorns for making
too much ado, that they can put off Christ and their souls with so little;
that they pour not out their souls in every supplication; that they are
not more taken up with God; that their thoughts are not more serious in
preparation of their accounts. I wonder that they be not an hundred times
more strict in their lives, and more laborious and unwearied in striving
for the crown than they are.
"Ready to Tremble"
"And for myself, as I am ashamed of my
dull and careless heart, and of my slow and unprofitable course of life;
so, the Lord knows, I am ashamed of every sermon I preach; when I think
what I have been speaking of, and who sent me, and that men's salvation
or damnation is so much concerned in it, I am ready to tremble lest God
should judge me as a slighter of His truths and the souls of men, and lest
in the best sermon I should be guilty of their blood. Methinks we should
not speak a word to men in matters of such consequence without tears, or
the greatest earnestness that possibly we can; were not we too much guilty
of the sin which we reprove, it would be so."
We are not in earnest either in
preaching or in hearing. If we were, could we be so cold, so prayerless,
so inconsistent, so slothful, so worldly, so unlike men whose business
is all about eternity? We must be more in earnest if we would win souls.
We must be more in earnest if we would walk in the footsteps of our beloved
Lord, or if we would fulfill the vows that are upon us. We must be more
in earnest if we would be less than hypocrites. We must be more in earnest
if we would finish our course with joy, and obtain the crown at the Master's
coming. We must work while it is day; the night cometh when no man can
work.
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