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THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
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THE
CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
BT
LYliAN ABBOTT
It
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
(^fjt fHiiizt^t^z ptt^^y Cambndge
1905
COPYRIGHT 1905 BY LYMAN ABBOTT
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Published May iqos
To the Christian Ministers who are
attempting to impart that acquaint-
ance with God which is the secret
of life this volume is dedicated.
182155
.11.1 i-
OF THl
r
lUNIVERSiTY
PKEFACE
Ministers in their conventions often discuss the
question why people do not go to church. It would
be well if sometimes they would consider the ques-
tion, Why do any people ever go to church ? for the
phenomenon of church-going is a remarkable one.
In the fall of 1903 a careful census was taken
of the attendance upon church services in the Bor-
ough of Manhattan, in the city of New York. The
Borough was divided into four districts, and the
numbers in actual attendance upon the churches,
liberal and conservative, Protestant and Catholic,
were carefully counted. Fortunately the four Sun-
days devoted to this census were pleasant Simdays,
so that the conditions were favorable to a good
attendance. The census was taken with care and
the results tabulated. They showed that about one
half the adult population of the island of Man-
hattan were in the churches on those Sundays. No
estimate was made of the children in attendance
upon the Sunday-schools. In considering the sig-
nificance of this census, it must be remembered, on
the one hand, that every person in attendance upon
▼iii PREFACE
every service was counted, so tliat any person who
attended church twice on that day was counted as
two persons ; on the other hand, that those accus-
tomed to attend church who were absent on the
day the count was made, those who do business in
New York and live in the suburbs, and the Jews,
of whom there are six hundred thousand resident
in the island of Manhattan, were not included in
the census. Making due allowance for these facts,
it is probably fair to say that, approximately, haK
the population of the island, above school age, are
accustomed to take part in some form of religious
service every week. A little subsequently, a more
careful census of church attendance was made in
the city of London. A careful estimate of those
who attended two services was included in this
census. The result showed that, making allowance
for those too old, too young, too sick, and too busy,
— that is, in unavoidable occupations, — and not
counting twice those who attended twice, one third
of the population who can attend public worship
in London on Sunday do attend. These facts are
typical. In all ages of the world, among all races
of mankind, attendance upon some form of reli-
gious service is customary. It would be difficult
to mention any other custom so general.
PREFACE ix
What is the motive that brings so large a pro-
portion of the human race for a certain allotted
time every week into their varioas temples, syna-
gogues, and churches? The city of New York
maybe not inaptly termed the Corinth of America.
Both its virtues and its vices are those of a com-
mercial metropolis.. Its inhabitants through six
days in the week are eager in their pursuit of
wealth. They jostle one another in the cars and
upon the sidewalk; they travel wearisomely an
hour or two every day from their homes to their
places of business and back again; they work
often in dingy rooms and under disagreeable condi-
tions ; they sacrifice for this pursuit pleasure, edu-
cation, domestic affection, health, and life itself;
and yet once a week stores and offices are closed,
the process of money-getting halts, the throngs lay
aside for a day their commercial pursuits, and
something like one half of them assemble in their
churches. For what purpose? It is idle to say
that this is a fashion. How came the fashion to
be set? Or that it is a habit. What has caused
the habit ? They are not attracted by the music :
they can get better music in the concert-rooms ;
nor by the oratory : for few of the preachers are
orators; nor by the social advantages: for the
X PREFACE
city churcli is rarely a social club, and never a
successful one.
The object of this book is to furnish some answer
to this question ; to indicate to priests and preach-
ers what it is which induces half the population of
New York city to lay aside their commercial pur-
suits and gather in their churches every seventh
day ; to interpret to themselves the men and women
who form these congregations, and explain to them
what it is that they are often unconsciously seeking ;
and to indicate to those who rarely or never do go
to church the advantage which they might secure if
they were in this respect to conform to the custom,
not only of their fellow countrymen in America,
but of their fellow men throughout the world.
The Christian minister fulfills a fourfold func-
tion : he is pastor, administrator, priest, and prophet^
or preacher. As pastor, he is the personal friend
and counselor of his people ; as administrator, the
executive head of his church, which should be his
force as well as his field. These two aspects of his
work are not considered in this vd^umej it js de-_
-^ votedjexclusively to a^onsideration of the minister
as priest and prophet.
In the fall of 1903 I gave the Lyman Beecher
course of lectures before the Yale Theological Sem-
PREFACE xi
inary, at New Haven, and in March, 1904, the Earl
course of lectures before the Pacific Theological
Seminary, at Berkeley, Califomia. While this book
is not a reproduction of either course of lectures,
both of which were given extemporaneously, the
material of which those lectures was composed has
been freely used in, the composition of this volume,
as has also some other material contributed by me
at different times to periodical publications or used
in public and pubHshed addresses.
Lyman Abbott.
CORNWALL-ON-THE-HUDSON, N. Y.,
December, 1904.
CONTENTS
FA08
I. The Fundamental Faiths of the Ministry
Necessity of Fundamental Faiths 1
Keligion defined 3
What these Definitions imply 4
DifEerent Types of Religion 7
The Christian Religion defined 9
The Distinctive Feature of Christianity .... 10
The Hebrews' Golden Age 13
Christ's Definition of His Mission 14
The Message of the Apostles 17
Meaning of the Incarnation 19
The Post-Resurrection Life of Christ 20
Christianity a New Theology 22
Christianity a New Life 25
The Christian Ministry a Ministry of Christian Re-
demption 27
Doubts in Faith 28
Christianity answers the Question of Paganism . 31
The Secret of the Church's Power 32
11. The Function of the Ministry
Is there any Need of the Church ? 35
The Answer of the Irreligious 35
Of the Agnostic 36
Of the Skeptic 36
Of the Humanitarian 37
Of the Self-Satisfied 39
Of the Social Reformer 40
The Early Church as an Administrator of Charity 42
Other Organizations have taken its Place ... 44
xiv CONTENTS
The Inspirational rather than the Institutional
Church the Need of our Time 46
The Early Church as a Political Power .... 47
Three Stages in the Political Development of the
Church 48
The Political Function of the Modern Church . . 60
Difference between Minister and Political Re-
former 51
The Early Church as an Educator 54
Boman Catholic Testimony respecting Educational
Function of the Church 65
Public Schools Preferable to Church Schools . . 57
Defect in our Public Schools 58
Educational Function of Modern Church ... 60
The Fundamental Work of the Church . . . .61
The Message of the Church 62
Man's Desire for Peace 63
Man's Desire for Power 64
The Church's Ministry of Peace 67
The Church's Ministry of Power 68
This Twofold Ministry illustrated by the "High
Church Movement 70
By the Work of Dwight L. Moody .... 73
The Church must speak with Authority .... 74
III. The Authority of the Ministry
The Authority of the Hebrew Prophets .... 76
Not derived from the Bible 77
Nor from the Church 78
Nor from the Reason 78
Nor from Miracles 79
Nor from Fulfillment of Prophecy .... 79
Spiritual Authority defined by Canon Liddon . . 79
Analyzed by St. Paul 81
Analyzed by T. H. Huxley 83
The Response of the Soul to Ethical Principles . 84
To Spiritual Truths 85
CONTENTS XV
Blustrated by W. K. ClifPord 86
Illustrated by Herbert Spencer .... 87
Illustrated by Phillips Brooks 88
Illustrated by Charles Dickens .... 89
The Foundation of Religious Authority . . . 91
The Ecclesiastical Conception of the Authority
of the Church 92
The Spiritual Conception of the Authority of
the Church 93
The Ecclesiastical Conception of the Authority
of the Bible 96
The Spiritual Conception of the Authority of the
Bible 99
The Radical Difference between the Two Con-
ceptions 100
The Limits of Biblical Authority 102
The Authority of the Reason 103
Necessity for Clear Definition of the Nature and
Limits of Ministerial Authority 105
IV. The Individual Message of the Ministry
The Prophet defined 108
The Minister differs from the Journalist . . . 109
Preaching on Current Events 110
The Minister differs from the Author .... 112
Power of the Sermon is in Preacher's Personal-
ity 113
Attempt to preach Great Sermons a Weakness 114
The Minister differs from the Teacher . . . 114
In their Respective Objects 115
In the Secret of their Power 117
The Minister differs from the Moral Reformer 118
The Difference defined 119
Henry Ward Beecher on the Preacher as Moral
Reformer 120
The Minister differs from the Teacher of Theo-
logy 121
xvi CONTENTS
The Importance of Creeds 121
Theology is not Religion 122
Sermon not a Lecture on Theology 123
The Use and Abuse of Biblical Criticism in the
Pulpit 125
Dealing with Doubts 127
The Function of the Christian Ministry sum-
marized 129
V. The Social Message of the Ministry
The Kingdom of God 132
Three Ideas respecting the Kingdom of God . . 134
The Return to Christ's Teaching concerning the
Kingdom 136
Social Meaning of Theological Terms .... 137
Social Revelation 137
Social Redemption 141
Social Regeneration 143
Social Atonement 148
Social Sacrifice 153
Importance of Social Message in our Time . . 155
That Importance emphasized by our National
History 158
The Duty of the Christian Church concerning
Social Problems 159
Bible Instruction concerning the Laws of Social
Life 164
VI. The Minister as Priest
Priests and Prophets : Their DiflPerent Func-
tions 166
Importance of Devotional Meetings 169
Their Distinctive Character 170
The Lord's Supper : Its Threefold Character . 174
The Devotional Element in Church Services . . 176
The Devotional Reading of Scripture . . . .178
The Musical Service 179
CONTENTS xvu
Public Prayer 181
Preparation for Public Prayer 186
Relative Advantages of Liturgical and Non-Lit-
urgical Services 188
Testimony of Dr. Bainsford 190
Of Canon Liddon 190
Of Henry Ward Beechep 193
Intercessory Prayer 194
Vn. Qualifications for the Ministry
The Minister must possess Spiritual Life . . . 198
And Power to express it 201
Therefore a Definite Purpose 201
The Absorbing Passion of His Life 204
The Power of His Personality 205
Object more Important than Subject in Sermon 208
Mr. Gladstone's Testimony 208
Difference between Sermon and Essay . . . 210
Length of Sermon 213
Necessity for Careful Preparation 215
Mr. Gladstone's Method 216
Phillips Brooks's Method 217
Candor and Courage 219
Bespect for the Opinions of Others 220
Difdculties to be overcome 221
Hopefulness and Patience 223
Ministerial Studies : Human Nature .... 226
The Bible . 227
Acquaintance with God 228
Value of Meditation 229
Vin. Some Ministers op the Olden Time
The Hebrew Prophets 231
They claimed to speak for God 233
But do not claim Superiority to Others . . . 236
How their Visions came to them 237
Not Mere Messengers 240
xviii CONTENTS
Individuality of their Messages 242
The Source of their Power 243
Both Idealists and Practical Men 246
Dramatic Character of their teachings .... 248
Forthtellers and Foretellers 261
Hopefulness and Courage 251
Every True Minister a Successor of the Pro-
phets 262
IX. The Ministry of Jesus Christ : His Methods
The Testimony of Ernest Benan and Goldwin
Smith 254
The Interpretation of Jesus Christ necessarily
Inadequate 255
Christ's Power not Dependent on Dramatic Ef-
fects 257
Nor on Oratorical Splendor 258
Nor on Dialectical Skill 259
Christ's Teaching generally Conversational . . 260
Dealt with Great Problems 260
Was Systematic 262
Abounds in Seed Thoughts 266
Aphoristic Style 267
Christ's Industry 268
His Unconventional Methods 269
His Message Expression of His Life .... 270
Therefore exemplified by His Life 271
His Heroism 272
His Hours of Demotion 273
X. The Ministry of Jesus Christ : The Substance of
His Teaching
Early Formulation of Christ's Teaching . . . 275
His Teaching Vital and Practical 276
Sensuality of Roman Empire 277
First Century Reformers 278
Modern Parallels 279
CONTENTS xix
Christ's Use of the World 280
Christ's Indifference to the World 282
Things for Men, not Men for Things .... 284
Three Conceptions respecting our Relation to
the World 286
Fundamental Teaching of Hebrew Prophets Re-
specting Righteousness 288
Christ's Teaching respecting Righteousness . . 289
Christ's Example respecting Righteousness . . 291
Christ's Doctrine of Brotherhood 292
Standard of Honesty 293
Doctrine of Property 295
Doctrine of Service 297
Principle of Reform 298
His New Commandment 299
Different Conceptions concerning our Relations
to God 300
The Hebrew Conception 302
Jesus Christ's Acquaintance with the Father . . 303
His Teaching concerning our Acquaintance with
the Father 303
Hopefulness of Christ's Teaching 307
The Kingdom of Heaven has come 308
Obstacles to the Kingdom of God 310
Seeming Absence of God 313
Personal Immortality 315
The Necessary Endowment of a Christian Minis-
ter 316
THE CHEISTIAK MmiSTEY
CHAPTER I
THE FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY
Every vocation in life assumes as axiomatic cer-
tain fundamental principles on which that vocation
is founded. Any man who doubts those funda-
mental principles should not choose that vocation.
No one should enter the army if he entertains doubts
respecting the right of society to use force. He
cannot be enthusiastic as a soldier if the theory of
non-resistance, as it is expounded by George Fox
and Leo Tolstoy, has any place even in his sub-
consciousness. No man should enter the legal pro-
fession if he regards philosophical anarchism as
even a possible social hypothesis. He who is a dis-
ciple of Prince Kropotkin, or is inclined to be,
cannot be a good lawyer. Christian Scientists hold
either that the body and bodily ills have no real
existence, or that both are emanations of the mind,
and, as a consequence, that all so-called bodily ills
are to be cured merely by right thinking. No man to
whom this seems a possible hypothesis should enter
the medical profession. There are communists who
believe with Proudhon that the holding of private
2 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
property is wrong, that all property should be held
in common. One who shares this opinion, or even
regards it as worthy of serious consideration, ought
not to enter on a mercantile career, for the commer-
cial world is based on the assumption that the ac-
quisition of property is right, and that the ambition
to acquire property is a just and laudable ambition.
So there are certain principles or doctrines which
underlie the Christian ministry. They are its funda-
mentals, its axioms. They must be vital convictions
in the soul, or the man is unfit to be a minister ;
as unfit as a communist to be a railroad president,
or an anarchist to be district-attorney, or a Chris-
tian Scientist to be a medical practitioner, or a
non-resistant to be a soldier. The Christian minis-
ter purposes to dedicate his life to the ministry
of religion ; therefore he must not merely believe
in religion; that belief must be an unquestioned
conviction, as clear, as definite, as positive in his
experience as is belief in the reality of bodily ills
in the mind of a physician, or belief in the legiti-
mate use of force to resist wrongdoing in the mind
of a soldier. What, then, is religion ?
To enter at all adequately upon the religious his-
tory of the world for the purpose of determining by
a fresh investigation what is the nature of religion
as a vital force in human history would take me
too far from my immediate theme and require too
large a proportion of this volume; to enter on
this history but casually would be useless. Instead,
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 3
I accept two definitions which other investigators
have given to the world, and which seem to me,
after such study of comparative religions as has been
practicable for me, to be the best which the philo-
sophy of this subject affords. The first, by a divine
of the seventeenth century, is popular ; the second,
by Max Miiller, is philosophical ; the former lays
stress on religion diiefly as a motive power ; the
latter, chiefly as an intellectual apprehension ; the
former needs for exactness further defining ; the lat-
ter is possibly too definite to be entirely adequate.
He who wishes to inquire for himself what is rehgion
will find the material for such inquiry in the volume
from which the second of these two definitions is
taken.
Henry ScougaU defines religion as "the life of
God in the soul of man." ^ In this definition he
assumes that God is, and that he has such vital rela-
tions with man that the life of God may enter into
and affect the life of man. Max Miiller concludes
that " religion consists in the perception of the Infi-
nite under such manifestations as are able to influ-
ence the moral character of man." ^ In this definition
he also assumes that the Infinite is, and is an object
of perception by man, and that this perception by
man of the Infinite constitutes a motive power which
enters into his life and affects his moral character.
1 Henry Scougall : The Life of God in the Soul of Man, A. D.
1671.
2 Max Muller : Natural Beligion, p. 188.
4 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
In this volume I shall assume the correctness of
these two propositions. I shall recur to them again
and again by way of illustration, and for the pur-
pose of confirming certain conclusions to which
they necessarily lead every thoughtful man who ac-
cepts them; but I shall make no attempt to prove
their truth. I assume, as the postulates on which
this volume is founded, first, that God is an object
of perception ; that he can reveal himseK directly
and immediately to man; and that man has the
capacity to perceive him, either directly and imme-
diately, or indirectly and mediately through such
revelation ; and, secondly, that if God is thus per-
ceived the perception will affect for good or iU the
moral character of the man thus perceiving him,
the nature of that effect being primarily dependent
upon the clearness and the accuracy of man's per-
ception of the Infinite.
This definition of religion implies that the Infinite
is reaUy perceived, not merely imagined. If he is
not really perceived, there is no real religion ; there
is only a deception or an illusion. What is called
religion is of all vital phenomena the most wide-
spread and the most influential. Neither art, music,
literature, commerce, nor war has done so much to
determine the destiny of the nations as religion, be-
cause religion has itself determined their art and
their music, pervaded, if it has not created, their
literature, regulated their commerce by the obliga-
tory ideals which it has imposed on them, and some-
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 5
times incited them to war, sometimes mitigated it
or restrained them from it. I shall assume that this
phenomenon is not due to a deception or an illu-
sion, but is the result of a real, though always
partial, often obscure, and sometimes perverted per-
ception of the Infinite. I shall assume the reality
of religion.
This definition of religion implies more than a
perception of moral ideals, personified under the
general title of God. Perception of God means
more than a perception of the good ; faith in God
means more than belief in justice and mercy. It
means belief in a just and merciful Person. " Moral
Idealism," truly says James Martineau, " is not
Religion, unless the ideal is held to be Heal as well
as Divine J^ Religion is more than a perception
of an ideal moral principle which exists only in the
minds of those who perceive it ; it is the perceptioa
of a real moral principle superior to and independ-
ent of aU humanity, which, if it really exists at all,
must exist in some moral Being. Religion is more
and other than ethical culture. The minister of
religion must have more than a perception, however
vivid and controlling, of ethical principles. He
must have a perception of a Person who is controlled
by ethical principles and whose action manifests
them.
This definition of religion implies more than a
^ James Martineaa : " Ideal Substitutes for God," Essays, iv,
278.
6 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
belief in the reality and influence of what is called
religion in human life. To perceive in religion only
a phenomenon in human history is to perceive only
a phase, however important, of human experience ;
but religion involves a real perception of the Infi-
nite as the cause of religious experience. One may
believe in religious phenomena, without believing
that a real perception of the Infinite is the cause of
religious phenomena. Such a belief in the reality
of religious phenomena will suffice to make the be-
liever a teacher of comparative religions, but it will
not suffice to make him a minister to the religious
life. To be such a minister he must perceive the
Infinite manifesting himself in the rehgious life.
This definition of religion implies more than be-
lief in an hypothetical Creator conceived of as a
necessary supposition in order to account for the
creation, as a scientist conceives of ether as a neces-
sary supposition to account for the phenomena of
light. It implies more than a rational conclusion
that God exists ; it implies a perception of God as
a living Being recognized by the spirit of man.
Deism is not religion. The philosophical conclusion
that God exists is not sufficient to make a man
who has reached that conclusion a minister of reli-
gion. He must have a perception of the living
God, not merely a conception of a theoretical God.
Finally, this definition of religion implies more
than the perception of an Infinite and Eternal
Energy from which all things proceed. Awe in the
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 7
presence of mystery is not religion. Religion is such
a perception of God as affects the moral character
of man ; it must therefore be the perception of God
as a Personal Being, not as an impersonal Force.
By a Personal Being I mean a Being who thinks,
feels, and wills. Religion is a life in ourselves pro-
duced by our perception of Another under such
manifestations as influence our moral character, that
is, our thinking, our feeling, and our wills; but if
it is to influence our thinking, our feeling, and our
wills, it must be a perception of One who himself
thinks, feels, and wills. The minister of religion
must have, therefore, not merely an intellectual
apprehension of God ; he must have a moral per-
ception of God. He must so perceive him that by
that perception his own thinking, feeling, and wiU
are modified, clarified, purified, strengthened. There
must be in some true sense a reception as well as a
perception of God. Or, to recur to the other defi-
nition, he must have some measure of the life of God
in his own soul, if he is to minister to the life of
God in the souls of others.
Religion antedates rehgions and is the mother of
them all. Religions vary according as curiosity, or
fear, or hope, or conscience, or love predominates.
Religion is the perception of the Infinite under such
manifestations as are able to influence the moral
character of man. It may influence primarily to
seek for the truth about the Infinite : then it wiU
manifest itself in creeds and theologies. It may in-
8 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
fluence primarily to fear the wrath of the Infinite :
then it will issue in propitiations and atonements
and sacrifices to escape this wrath. It may influence
primarily to hope for reward from the Infinite :
then it wiU express itself in services and sacrifices
offered to the Infinite in hope of recompense here-
after. It may influence primarily the conscience
through a behef that the Infinite is a righteous law-
giver : then it will issue in a constant warfare to
compel the lower animal nature to obey the laws
and regulations which are believed to be the ex-
pressions of his holy will. It may influence pri-
marily through love of the Infinite as a Being of
illimitable love : then it will issue in loyal, filial,
reverential service of him and in gladness of fellow-
ship with him. The first religion will be scholastic,
the second sacrificial, the third and fourth legalistic
if not servile, the fifth spontaneous and gladsome.
Each of these phases of rehgion will have its excel-
lences and its defects : the first will be definite, but
dogmatic ; the second penitential, but superstitious ;
the third and fourth will be virile, but hard and
sometimes cruel; the fifth will be free and joy-
ous, but vague in thought, possibly sentimental if
not irreverent, and sometimes careless and lawless
in life. In fact, in all religions these different
elements are mingled though in different propor-
tions. There are defects in all religions, because
religion is a human experience ; there are excel-
lences in all religions, because in religion man is
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 9
seeking after excellence. Religions change with
times, circumstances, and temperaments, but religion
is universal. It would be easier to destroy the appe-
tites in man, and feed him by shoveling in carbon
as into a furnace ; or ambition, and consign him to
endless and nerveless content ; or love, and banish
him to the life of solitude in the wilderness, than to
destroy in him those desires and aspirations and
spiritual perceptions which make him kin to God,
and inspire in him the higher experiences of awe,
reverence, penitence, hope, and love.
But the Christian minister is more than a minis-
ter of religion; he is a miaister of the Christian
religion. If religion " consists in the perception of
the Infinite under such manifestations as are able
to influence the moral character of man," then the
Christian religion consists in a perception of the
Infinite so manifested in the life and character of
Jesus Christ that the manifestation is able to pro-
mote in man Christlikeness of life and character.
Then, also, if the minister of religion must have a
living perception of the Infinite under such manifes-
tations as are able to influence the moral character
of man, the Christian minister must so perceive the
Infinite as manifested in the hfe and character of
Jesus Christ, and must himseK possess such mea-
sure of Christlikeness, that he can promote in other
men a like perception and a like transformation of
character.
Religion involves the relation between God and
10 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
man. All such relations involve obligations on both
sides : by the inferior to the superior, but also by
the superior to the inferior. The child owes duties
to the parent, — the parent, also, duties to the child ;
the citizen, duties to the government, — the govern-
ment, also, duties to the citizen ; the pupil, duties
to the teacher, — the teacher, also, duties to the
pupil : no less is it true that man owes duties to God,
and God also owes duties to man. There is a mutu-
ality of obligation. God is under obhgation to man
as truly as man is under obligation to God. This
mutuality of obligation between God and man is
explicitly and reiteratedly affirmed both in the Old
Testament and the New Testament. It is expressed
by the word "covenant," for covenant involves
mutuality of obligation. There is, on the one hand,
the enforcement on man of his obligation toward
God ; there is, on the other hand, the recognition
on God's part of his obligation toward man.
AU religions recognize the obligations of man to-
ward God ; what is distinctive about the Christian
religion is that it recognizes the obligations of God
toward man. This is equally true of the Hebrew
religion ; but the Hebrew and the Christian religions
are not separate religions, but one. Christianity is
the Hebrew religion in flower ; the Hebrew religion
is Christianity in bud. When, therefore, I say that
what is distinctive about the Christian religion is
that it recognizes the obligations of God toward man,
I include in that statement the Hebrew with the
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 11
Christian religion. This mutuality of obligation is
the common characteristic of the one Hebrew-Chris-
tian religion.
The obligations of man toward God are expressed,
generically, by the term law ; specifically, by special
laws; as, the Ten Commandments, the Golden
Eule, the summary of the Jewish law as given by
Christ in the two great commandments, the precepts
which Christ has given (as in the Sermon on the
Mount), the moral maxims contained in the Book
of Proverbs, or those contained in the twelfth chap-
ter of Romans. These laws are the enunciation of
obligations which man owes to God and to his fel-
low man, because his feUow man is also a child of
God. And these obligations which man owes to God
are stated, substantially, by the Scriptures of the
Old and the New Testament as they are stated by
other religions ; more clearly, more simply, but in
their fundamental elements identical. And this is
because these laws of the Old and the New Testa-
ment are the embodiment of the law earlier written
in the consciences of men. The law, as it is enun-
ciated by the prophets and the apostles, is the in-
terpretation to man of the law as it is written in his
own conscience.
But while other religions recognize the obliga-
tions of man to God they do not recognize the
obligations of God to man. In the precepts of
Confucius, in the teachings of Siddhartha, in the
code of Hammurabi, the ethical principles embodied
12 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
in the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the
Mount may be found substantially stated ; but there
will not be found in these or in any other religious
writings, prior to or apart from the Hebrew and
Christian Scriptures, any recognition of the obliga-
tions of God to man, nor any clear and explicit
statement of what God will do in fulfilling his
covenant for man. Analogies with the Ten Com-
mandments can be found, but nothing analogous
to such promises as this in the prophecies of
Isaiah :
Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon
him while he is near : let the wicked forsake his way,
and the unrighteous man his thoughts : and let him re-
turn unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him;
and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.^
Nor anything analogous to this declaration of
Paul:
But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love
wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins,
hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are
saved ;) and hath raised us up together, and made us sit
together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus : that in the
ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his
grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.^
In these and kindred declarations of what God
has done for men and will do for men the Scriptures
of the Old Testament and the New Testament are
unique ; nothing comparable to them is to be found
1 Isaiah Iv, 6, 7. « Eph. ii, 4-6.
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 13
in the literature of other religions. In other words,
the law, or man's duty to God, is defined in analo-
gous terms in all religious literatures ; the Gospel,
or God's ministry to man, is peculiar to the Hebrew
and Christian religions.
It is not only distinctive, it is emphatic.
Throughout their history the Hebrew people were
taught by their religious teachers to look to the
future for their Golden Age. This Golden Age
they called " the theocracy," or " the kingdom of
God." Their prophets told them that the time would
come when the kingdom of God should be estab-
lished on the earth and the will of God done here
as it is done in heaven. This kingdom was por-
trayed in glowing colors. Education should be uni-
versal ; law should have its support in religion ;
war should cease, and the warring nations should
beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears
into pruning-hooks ; the blind should see, and the
lame should leap and walk ; the very wild beasts of
the forest should be transformed ; the wolf should
dwell with the lamb, and the leopard lie down with
the kid, and the sucking child play on the hole of
the asp, and the earth be full of the knowledge
of the Lord, as the waters cover the seas ; and there
should be new heavens and a new earth, and right-
eousness and praise should spring forth before
all the nations. This kingdom of God was to be
initiated by a Coming One, a Messenger of the
Most High, a Servant who should be the Messiah,
14 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
a world Deliverer. Sometimes the Nation is indi-
cated as this Servant of God ; sometimes a single
person seems to be foretold; sometimes he is por-
trayed as King, sometimes as Prophet, sometimes
as Crowned Sufferer.^ How these various pro-
phecies are to be reconciled, or whether they can
be reconciled, I do not stop here to discuss: I
think myself they are simply different phases of
the same gTcat truth. However this may be, it is
certain that from the opening chapter of Genesis
to the last chapter of Malachi, from the legend
which speaks of a time when the seed of the woman
shall bruise the serpent's head to the closing verse
of the Old Testament collection which foretells the
great and dreadful day of the Lord, the Old Testa-
ment writers agree in turning the faces of the peo-
ple toward the future, and fiUing their hearts with
a glad anticipation of a final world deliverance
from sin and sorrow, through Israel, and through
some servant of God who should embody aU that
was best and truest in Israel's message to the
world.
When Jesus Christ came, he began his message
with the declaration that the time for the fulfillment
of these prophecies had come.^ Going into the
synagogue at Nazareth, where he was brought up as
1 Deut. xviii, 15-19 ; Psalm Ixxii ; Isaiah ii, 3, 4, ix, 6, 7, xi, 1-9,
xxxiii, 6, XXXV, 6, xU, 8-13, xlii, 1-13, liii, 1-12, Ixi, 1-11, Ixv, 17 ;
Micah iv, 2, 3 ; Hab. ii, 14 ; Zech. ix, 9, 10.
2 Matt, iv, 17, X, 7 ; Mark i, 14.
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 15
a boy, he is asked to preach, and he opens the Book
of Isaiah and finds the place where it is written :
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he
hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor ;
he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach
deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,
to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.*
He then declares to the congregation that he has
himself come to fulfill this Scripture, and that its
fulfillment is to carry blessing not merely to the
people of Israel, but to the pagan world as well.
This declaration with which he begins his ministry
constitutes the theme of his life preaching. That
theme is the kingdom of God and himself as its
founder. Most of his instructions were conversa-
tional ; but he is reported as preaching five great
discourses, and this was the theme of the five. In
the first, at Nazareth, he proclaims himseK as the
One who was to fulfill the ancient prophecy, and
initiate the kingdom of God on the earth. In
the second, the Sermon on the Mount, preached
at the ordination of the Twelve to be his helpers,
he explains the nature and expounds the prin-
ciples of that kingdom. In the third discourse,
or series of discourses, the Parables by the sea-
shore, he traces prophetically the growth of that
kingdom. In the fourth, on the Bread of Life, he
reveals the secret of the power by which that king-
1 Luke iv, 18, 19; Isaiah M, 1, 2.
16 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
dom of God is to be established in this world : the
secret is acceptance of the Christ spirit, posses-
sion of the Christ life, loyalty to Christ. In the
fifth, the discourse on the last days, he foretells
the consummation of that kingdom, and the public
recognition of himself as the judge and lord of the
kingdom.^
Once he asks his disciples whom they think him
to be. When Peter replies by affirming their faith
that he is the promised Messiah, he approves the
declaration, and affirms that on this faith in him
as the world Deliverer, and on the power of that
faith to transform men as it will transform Peter
from a character as shifty as the waves of the sea
to one as firm as a rock foundation, he will build
his church. Again and again, in language which
would be supremely egotistical were it not divinely
true, he points to himself as the source of life in
all its various phases. " I have come," he says,
" that they might have life, and that they might
have it more abimdantly." And what he means by
life he makes clear by repeated and explicit invi-
tations, " Come unto me, all ye that labour and are
heavy laden, and I wiU give you rest." " Come ye
after me, and I will make you to become fishers of
men." " If any man thirst, let him come unto me,
and drink." "Whosoever drinketh of the water
that I shall give him shall never thirst." " My
peace I give unto you." " These things have I
1 Luke iv, 16-21 ; Matt, v, yi, vii, xiii ; John vi, 26-59,
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 17
spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you." ^
Rest, power, contentment, peace, joy, — these are
some of the elements in that life which he declares
that he has come to give to mankind.
His life draws to a close. Betrayed by one dis-
ciple, denied by a second, deserted by the others,
he is brought before the Jewish Supreme Court and
accused of blasphemy in declaring himself to be the
long-promised Messiah. In violation of the Jewish
law he is put upon the witness-stand, the oath is
administered to him, and he is asked directly the
question whether he is the Messiah or no. In full
consciousness of the fact that by his answer he seals
his own death warrant, he replies, " I am." ^ He
dies, and in his grave the hopes of his disciples are
buried. They return to their fishing. Then it be-
gins to be whispered about among them that the
Jesus whom they followed has risen from the dead.
With difficulty they are convinced of the fact, but
when they are convinced their despair is turned
into triumph. The fact that death had no dominion
over him convinces them that he was indeed the
One who was to bring deliverance to the world ; and
with this message they go forth to carry the hope of
deliverance to the nations. If the reader will turn
to the Book of Acts, and read the reports there
given of the Apostolic sermons, he will find that
1 Matt, xvi, 13-19 ; John x, 10 ; Matt, xi, 28 ; Mark i, 17 ; John
Tii, 37 ; John iv, 14 ; John xiv, 27 ; John xv, 11.
2 Mark xiv, 62.
18 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
they are all different forms of the same message.^
That message is not ethical, it is not a new philoso-
phy of life, nor a new interpretation of the character
of God, nor the elaboration of a new conception of
man's relation to God. The Apostles are witness-
bearers and what they bear witness to is this : The
world Deliverer has come, and we know that he
is the world Deliverer because he has triumphed
over the last enemy, Death, over whom no one before
ever won a victory. In that message Christianity
was bom, by that message Christianity has won its
victory in the world. Says Browning :
Does the precept run " Believe in good,
In justice, truth, now understood
For the first time ? " — or, * ' Believe in me,
Who lived and died, yet essentially
Am Lord of Life ? " Whoever can take
The same to his heart and for mere lovers sake
Conceive of the love, — that man obtains
A new truth ; no conviction gains
Of an old one only, made intense
By a fresh appeal to his faded sense.^
The reports of Christ's life and teachings afforded
by the Four Gospels answer Browning's question :
Jesus Christ was the theme of his own ministry.
The history of Christianity confirms Browning's
affirmation : it is the history of a new moral power
in the world derived from a new perception of the
Infinite, and a new effect produced thereby on the
moral character of man.
1 For examples : Acts ii, 22-36; iii, 12-26 ; iv, 8-12 ; v, 29-82.
* Robert Browning : Christmas Eve, xviL
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 19
It has often been said that Christianity is summed
up in the two commands, — " Thou shalt love the
Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, and with aU thy mind," and " Thou shalt love
thy neighbour as thyself." In fact, this is not Chris-
tianity at all ; this is Christ's summary of Judaism,
his summary of the law which defines man's obliga-
tion to God.i But this definition of man's obligation
to God is not distinctively Christian, it is hardly
even distinctively Jewish. Christianity is the state-
ment of what God has done and is doing for man ;
and what it affirms God has done and is doing for
man is this : God has come into life and fiUed
one human life fuU of himself that he may fill all
human lives full of himself, and in doing this he
has brought the world deliverance from its sins,
and transformed its sorrows into sources of a joy
deeper than any sorrowless joy.
Let us return to Max MiiUer's definition: re-
ligion is " the perception of the Infinite under
such manifestations as are able to influence the
moral character of man." Then the Christian re-
ligion is such a perception of the Infinite as mani-
fested in the life and character of Jesus Christ
that the perception is able to produce in man
Christlikeness of life and character.
I do not wonder that men disbelieve the Incar-
nation. I sometimes wonder whether any man
believes it, whether I really believe it myself.
1 Matt, xadi, 37-40.
20 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
What does it really mean? Nothing else than
this : that the " Infinite and Eternal Energy, from
which aU things proceed," ^ which creates, rules,
pervades the universe, energizing it alike on the
earth and on the remotest star ; that the " Power
not ourselves which makes for righteousness," ^ the
power in aU history, overruling all human wills,
and out of stubborn and stupid souls working out
a divine progress in events ; that this Energy, this
Power, has entered into one human life, filled it
full, and lived and loved and suffered and died
that we might know who and what he is, and how
he who is intangible, inaudible, invisible, is opera-
tive upon us. I believe this because I believe, with
Browning, that it is easier to think God has done
this than that man has imagined it.
But, if we are ministers of the Christian religion,
we perceive the Infinite not merely in the earthly
life of Jesus of Nazareth ; we perceive the Infinite in
his post-resurrection life and work. We believe and
^ " Amid all the mysteries which become the more mysterious
the more they are thought about, there will remain the one abso-
lute certainty, that he is ever in the presence of an Infinite and
Eternal Energy, from which all things proceed." — Herbert
Spencer: Religious Retrospect and Prospect, "Ecclesiastical In-
stitutions," p. 843.
2 " How are we to verify that there rules an enduring Power
not ourselves which makes for righteousness ? We may answer at
once : How ? Why, as you verify that fire bums, — by experi-
ence I It is so ; try it ! You can try it ; every case of conduct, of
that which is more than three fourths of your own life and of the
life of all mankind, will prove it to you." — Matthew Arnold :
Literature and Dogma, p. 267.
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 21
bear witness not merely that God was in Christ re-
conciling the world unto himself ; we believe and
bear witness that God is in this world of men here
and now. The incarnation was not ended at Calvary.
It is a perpetual fact. We believe that Christ is
risen from the dead. This is not merely a curious
fact in ancient history. What difference would it
make to us whether Jesus rose from the dead or not
if that were aU ? It is not practically important for
us to know whether the man borne to his burial,
and falling from his bier, rose from the dead when
he fell on Elisha's bones. It is not practically im-
portant for us to know whether Lazarus really rose
from the dead or not. The resurrection of Jesus
Christ is important, because to us it means that
this God who was manifest in the flesh, this image
of God, this Immanuel — God with us — is stiU
with us. He is not dead, he never died, he could
not die. This Christ, who lived eighteen centuries
ago in Nazareth and Capernaum, still lives ; there
is no death for him or for his followers ; he came
back to the world ; he is in the world ; he is as truly
in America as he was in Galilee, as present in the
Christian church as he was in the Jewish temple
and the Jewish synagogue ; and he is carrying on
through all these centuries the same work of for-
giving, healing, helping, inspiring love which he
carried on during the three short years of his re-
corded earthly life. The Christian religion is the
perception of the Infinite in the earthly life of
22 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
Jesus Christ ; it is also the perception of the Infi-
nite in the world history of Christianity. It is the
perception of God in the world reconciling the world
to himself, — forgiving its sins, assuaging its sor-
rows, and inspiring it with a new and divine life.
The Christian religion involves a new theology,
that is, a new conception of God. The earliest con-
ception of God is of one who is manifested in
power. This is a true conception, but it is a partial,
incomplete, imperfect, and so misleading concep-
tion. He is seen as the All-mighty One, but only
as the AU-mighty One. He is more. Says a He-
brew Psalmist : " Twice have I heard this ; that
power belongeth unto God. Also unto thee, O Lord,
belongeth mercy." ^ When the first message only
is heard, not also the second, when man sees the
Infinite only in the manifestation of extraordinary
power, and not also in the merciful instincts of his
own heart, the natural result is a religion of fear.
This religion Plutarch has graphically portrayed :
Of all fears none so dazes and confounds as superstition.
He fears not the sea that never goes to sea; nor a
battle that follows not the camp ; nor robbers that goes
not abroad ; nor malicious informers that is a poor man ;
nor emulation that leads a private life ; nor earthquakes
that dwells in Gaul ; nor thunderbolts that dwells in
Ethiopia : but he that dreads the divine powers dreads
everything, — the land, the sea, the air, the sky, the dark,
the light, a sound, a silence, a dream. ^
1 Psalm Ixii, 11, 12.
2 Plutarch's Morals, i, 169, Of Superstitioii.
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 23
To the pagan world dominated by this fear came
the Jewish religion, which in its earlier forms was
a conception of God as one manifested in the con-
science of mankind. Its message to the world was
that God is a righteous God who demands right-
eousness of his children and demands nothing else ;
that he wiU reward with peace and prosperity those
who obey his just laws, but also that he wiU recom-
pense with penalty, certain and terrible, those who
do not obey. " I call heaven and earth to record
this day against you," says the author of the Book
of Deuteronomy, " that I have set before you life
and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose
life, that both thou and thy seed may live." ^ This
conception of God as a righteous Person, who
" loves righteousness and expects man to conform
to his peremptory rules of law," ^ ^as a true con-
ception, but it was also partial, incomplete, im-
perfect, and so misleading. It was not a conception
which brought peace, for there was always possible
a fear that the soul had made a wrong choice, and
the more conscientious the individual the greater
was his apprehension. From both fears the later
Hebrew religion by its message, and Christianity
by its fulfillment of that message, brought deliver-
^ Dent. XXX, 19.
2 " The profound religions movement which took place in the
Kingdom of Israel in the ninth century b. c. resolved itself into
the assertion that Jehovah is a just God, who loves righteousness
and expects man to conform to his peremptory rules of law." —
Benan : History of the People of Israd, ii, 304.
24 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
ance. It perceived the Infinite not only as the Al-
mighty, not only as a righteous God who demands
righteousness of his children and demands nothing
else; it perceived God as a redeeming God, who
will help man to attain righteousness. The message
of Mosaism was summed up in the Ten Command-
ments : Reverence God, honor your parents, regard
the rights of your neighbor, and do this spontane-
ously from the heart, do not desire to do the re-
verse, and God will be your God, and you shall be
to him a nation of priests. The message of the
later Hebrew religion was summed up in the One
Hundred and Third Psalm :
Bless the Lord, O my soul,
And forget not all his benefits :
Who f orgiveth all thine iniquities ;
Who healeth all thy diseases ;
Who redeemeth thy life from destruction ;
Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies ;
Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things ;
So that thy youth is renewed like the eagle.^
This message, illustrated, emphasized, manifested,
fulfilled in the life of Christ and in the Christian
experience of his disciples, constitutes the message
of the Christian ministry to the world. It is the
message that God is such an one as Jesus Christ ;
that the Infinite is to be seen manifested in a finite
form in Jesus Christ; that he judges as Jesus
Christ judges, condemns as Jesus Christ condemns,
forgives as Jesus Christ forgives ; that he is a Healer
^ Psalm ciii, 2-5.
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 25
and Helper, a Saviour and Redeemer, a Friend of
the friendless, a Companion of men; that he is
ever doing in the world what Jesus Christ did in
Galilee ; that the Infinite is love, and that the life
and service and sufferings of Jesus Christ are the
interpreters of his love. To the pagan conception
of God as power, to the Jewish conception of God
as justice, — both of which were but partial and
imperfect, — Christianity adds the revelation of God
as mercy. Power is no longer feared when it is the
power of a Father, pledged to be used for the suc-
cor of his child. And this is the message of Chris-
tianity to the fearful : " My Father, which hath
given them unto me, is greater than all ; and no
one is able to snatch them out of the Father's
hand." ^ Justice is no longer feared when, at the
same moment and by the same act by which jus-
tice sets up a standard of character, it promises to
enable the feeblest to achieve the standard. And
this is the testimony of Christianity to the fearful :
" He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins,
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." ^
But the Christian religion is not merely a per-
ception of the Infinite in the life and character of
Jesus Christ, and in the post-resurrection history
of his work in the world, it is also a change in the
moral character of man produced by that percep-
tion. It is the transformation of character, indi-
vidual and social, which that perception has wrought
1 John X, 29. a 1 John i, 9.
26 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
in men. The perception of the Infinite as helping
mankind out of their ignorance and poverty and
misery and sinfulness has inspired in men to whom
that perception was given a like spirit of helpful-
ness. The life of Christ as a revelation of what
the Father is always doing in the world has inspired
men to identify themselves with him in this service
of love. For the standard of justice which Judaism
had given in the Golden Rule, — "all things what-
soever ye would that men should do to you, do
ye even so to them,"i Christ substituted a new
standard in the commandment, " That ye love one
another, as I have loved you." ^ Not equality of ser-
vice, but self-sacrificing service, is the ideal, and in
an increasing number of instances has become the
passion of the disciples of Jesus Christ. Inspired
by this spirit, Christianity became a great world
movement for the emancipation and elevation of
mankind. Christianity is the abolition of slavery,
the overthrow of despotism, the recognition of the
truth that all just governments are administered
for the benefit of the governed, the organization
of charity for the poor, the sick, the blind, the
establishment of educational systems intended for
and open to the masses, the diffusion of wealth
1 Matt, vii, 12. Christ does not give this as his rule of life, but
as his summary of the law and the prophets. The Golden Rule
is simply a rule of justice. What right have I to demand that
another should treat me better than I would treat him if our
positions and relations were reversed ?
a John XV, 12.
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 27
and comfort, better homes, better food, better
clothing, better sanitary conditions for all men.
Because Christianity is a new perception of what
Christlike work God is doing in the world, because
it is an inspiration to man to take part in this
work, it is a great- world movement. It is Christ's
sermon at Nazareth writ large in hmnan history ;
it is the story of One who for eighteen centuries
has been proclaiming glad tidings to the poor, heal-
ing the broken-hearted, delivering the captives,
bestowing sight on the blind, setting at liberty
those that are bruised. It is the One Hundred and
Third Psalm writ large in human experience ; the
history of a world that has been sinning and sick
and dying and humbling its head in dust and ashes,
and of a God who has been forgiving its iniqui-
ties and healing its diseases and saving it from self-
destruction and crowning it with loving-kindness
and with tender mercies.
The Christian minister is a minister of this
Christian redemption. It is true that in the life
and character of Jesus Christ he holds up a new
ideal and a new standard of life, and writes under-
neath it, " That ye love one another, as I have loved
you." It is true that, in the life and teachings of
Jesus Christ, he holds up a new conception of God
as the Father of whom every family in heaven and
on earth is named, and writes underneath it, " Say,
Our Father." But he does more than this. He is
the herald of a great Deliverer, and he brings the
28 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
message of a world deliverance. His message is
that the Messiah has come; that the world is a
saved world ; that sorrow is transformed, so that
even in their tears Christians may cry, " We glory
in tribulations also ; " ^ that sin is vanquished, so
that even while the battle is waged against it,
Christians may shout as they fight, " We are more
than conquerors through him that loved us." ^ He
is the messenger of glad tidings to the poor, of
healing to the broken-hearted, of deliverance to
the captives, of sight to the blind, of liberty to the
bruised ; he is the preacher of forgiveness to the sin-
ful, of health to the diseased and the dying, of
newness of life to those who have thrown their lives
away, of loving-kindness and tender mercies to those
for whom life seems to have no mercy, and hu-
manity no love.
If he is to do this, he must perceive the Infinite
as the Infinite is manifested in Jesus Christ, and
he must be able to open the eyes of men so that
they shall perceive the Infinite as the Infinite is
manifested in Jesus Christ, and he must so perceive
the Infinite in Jesus Christ, and so enable them to
perceive the Infinite in Jesus Christ, that Christ-
likeness of disposition and character shall be pro-
moted alike in himself and in them. I do not say that
a man may not at times have doubts respecting the
Christian religion, and still be an effective Chris-
tian minister. A soldier may at times wonder, Is
1 Rom. V, 3. ^ Rom. viii, 37.
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 29
war ever right ? or a doctor, Is it worth while to
administer drugs ? But underlying the soldier's pro-
fession is the strong confidence that it is right to use
force to put down force, and underlying the doctor's
profession is the strong conviction that there are
physical remedies for physical diseases. So, despite
the doubts that may sometimes surge in upon him,
underlying the work of the Christian minister must
be his fundamental faith, so wrought into his con-
sciousness that it is a part of his nature, not merely
that there are noble moral ideals, not merely that
there is a personal God, not merely that we owe to
him reverential and loving obedience, but that God
is in his world, ever doing what Jesus Christ is
portrayed as doing in his earthly life, — pardoning
iniquity, healing disease, redeeming life from de-
struction, and crowning man with loving-kindnesses
and with tender mercies.
It is because this is the message of the Christian
Church that the Church lays such stress upon its
faith in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The re-
surrection of Jesus Christ means to the Christian
believer that the Deliverer triumphed over death in
the very moment when death seemed to triumph
over him. It means that the earthly life of Jesus
of Nazareth is but the projection in visible form
upon the screen of human history of a spiritual
force more effective now than then just because it
is invisible, an influence working in and through
the spirits of men, and therefore limited by no con-
30 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
ditions of time or space. The resurrection of Jesus
Christ is not merely a miraculous evidence of his
Messiahship, it is not merely the historical basis
of Christianity as a world movement ; it is also
an historical witness to the spiritual vitality of a
Divine Redeemer whom death could not imprison.
This message of the Christian religion makes it
a missionary religion. The Christian missionary
does not go to pagan nations to teU them that their
religion is the product of priestcraft, or a delusion
of the devil; nor to abolish one form of worship
that he may substitute another ; nor as the enemy
of the spiritual faith, imperfect as it may be, of the
people to whom he ministers. He goes in the spirit
of Paul to Athens, — to say to the pagan world,
" Whom without understanding ye worship, him we
declare unto you ; " he goes to make clearer and
more intelligible the voice of their own conscience
as it is interpreted in their own ethical precepts ;
he goes to emphasize their own sense of sin and
their own need of pardon and help as these find
expression in their religious rituals ; and, above all,
he goes to answer the question which their religious
faith asks.
Professor William James, in his suggestive vol-
ume " The Varieties of Religious Experience," says,
" Is there, imder all the discrepancies of creeds, a
common nucleus to which they bear their testimony
unanimously?" and answers his question in the
affirmative thus :
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 31
The warring Gods and formulas of the various reli-
gions do indeed cancel each other, but there is a certain
uniform deliverance in which religions all appear to meet.
It consists of two parts :
1. An uneasiness ; and
2. Its solution.
1. The uneasiness, reduced to its simplest terms, is a
sense that there is something wrong about us as we nat-
urally stand.
2. The solution is that we are saved from the wrongs
ness by making proper connection with the higher
powers.^
This is as far as paganism carries its votaries.
The question which it leaves them asking, " How
shall we make proper connection with the higher
powers ? " Christianity answers by replying, " The
higher powers have already made that connection."
We have not to remove the past sins which sepa-
rate us from God, for he has already forgiven them ;
we are not to earn his favor by penances or services
of any description, — his favor is the free gift of his
love; we are not by self -absorption and interior
meditation to think ourselves into some mystical
acquaintance with him, — he has revealed himself to
us by coming into human life and interpreting him-
self to us in the terms of a human experience ; in
short, we are not to climb up to God, — he has
come down to us, and takes us into his strong arms
as a father takes his child : all that we need to do
is to accept the forgiveness that he freely offers,
1 William James : The Varieties of Religious Experience^ p. 508.
32 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
and live joyously the life with which he inspires
us.
This message of the Christian Church is the se-
cret of the power which the Evangelical churches
possess, and which no naturalistic philosophy or mere
ethical teaching can ever rival. It is our faith in
this message which makes us suspicious of aU philoso-
phies which seem to eliminate the supernatural from
the world. It is because this is our message that
we insist upon what are commonly called the great
cardinal doctrines of the Evangelical faith, such as
Inspiration, Incarnation, Atonement, and Regenera-
tion. This is not because we are enamored of a
particular system of theology; it is because our
message to the world is like that of Jacob to him-
self when he woke from his dream : " Surely the
Lord is in this place ; and I knew it not." I have
been often asked to define the difference between the
New Theology and Unitarianism. That difference is
difficult to define, because both the New Theology
and Unitarianism lay stress on life rather than on
doctrine. But I may indicate the two trends of opin-
ion, — one toward Divine inunanence, the other
toward naturalism, — without imdertaking to iden-
tify the first with the new orthodoxy, or the second
with Unitarianism, and 1 may do this by quoting the
words of James Martineau, who, though he always
disavowed the name Unitarian, was certainly no
Trinitarian, and in his philosophy belonged to the
liberal school of thought, though he was not always
FUNDAMENTAL FAITHS OF THE MINISTRY 33
ecclesiastically in sympathy with the Unitarian de-
nomination. His testimony is the more significant
because it was written toward the close of his life :
Your experience confirms my growing surprise, that
the mission which had been consigned to us by our his-
tory is likely to pass to the Congregationalists in Eng-
land and the Presbyterians in Scotland. Their escape
from the old orthodox scheme is by a better path than
ours. With us, insistence upon the simple Humanity of
Christ has come to mean the limitation of all Divine-
ness to the Father, leaving Man a mere item of crea-
turely existence under the laws of Natural Necessity.
With them the transfer of emphasis from the Atonement
to the Incarnation means the retention of a Divine es-
sence in Christ, as the Head and Type of Humanity in
its realized idea ; so that Man and Life are lifted into
kinship with God, instead of what had been God being
reduced to the scale of mere Nature. The union of the
two natures in Christ resolves itself into their union in
man, and links Heaven and Earth in relations of com-
mon spirituality. It is easy to see how the Divineness
of existence, instead of being driven off into the heights
beyond life, is thus brought down into the deeps within
it, and diffuses there a multitude of sanctities that would
else have been secularized. Hence, the feeling of rever-
ence, the habits of piety, the aspirations of faith, the
hopes of immortality, the devoutness of duty, which have
so much lost their hold on our people, remain real powers
among the liberalized orthodox, and enable them to
carry their appeal home to the hearts of men in a way
the secret of which has escaped from us. I hardly think
we shall recover it now. There is plenty of scope, how-
ever, for any young prophet who can bring into his mis-
34 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
sion the faith and fervour of more spiritual churches, in
combination with the rationality and veracity of ours.^
Whenever a minister forgets this splendid mes-
sage of pardon, peace, and power based on faith in
Jesus Christ as God manifest in the flesh, whenever
for this message he substitutes literary lectures,
critical essays, sociological disquisitions, theological
controversies, or even ethical interpretations of the
universal conscience, whenever, in other words, he
ceases to be a Christian preacher and becomes a
lyceum or seminary lecturer, he divests himself of
that which in all ages of the world has been the
power of the Christian ministry, and will be its
power so long as men have sins to be forgiven,
temptations to conquer, and sorrows to be assuaged.
1 James Dnuumond : The Life and Letters of James Martineau,
ii, 231.
CHAPTER II
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY
Is there any longer need for a Church and a min-
istry ? That men and women are putting this ques-
tion to themselves, and answering it either with a
doubtful affirmative or with a positive negative,
cannot be questioned by any student of modem
thought.
There are a few who agree, more or less defi-
nitely, with Strauss ^ that " instead of a prerogative
of human nature it [religion] appears as a weak-
ness which adhered to mankind during the period
of childhood, but which it must outgrow on at-
taining maturity." They rank religion with super-
stition, believe it to be the product of priestcraft, —
something which has been imposed upon the credu-
lity of mankind, — a weakness, not a strength ; a fee-
bleness, if not a folly, which belongs to the primitive
condition of mankind, and is to be discarded as man-
kind reaches its higher development. Such men
look with contempt upon the institutions of religion,
because they look with contempt upon religion it-
self.
Others believe that reverence and awe are neces-
1 David Friedrich Strauss : The Old Faith and the New, i, 158.
36 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
sary experiences of the human soul, but that they
are aroused by mystery, and dispelled by knowledge.
In their view all that concerns the Infinite and the
Eternal is involved in impenetrable mystery. God
is the Unknown and the Unknowable. Religion
cannot be defined in doctrine, nor taught in text-
books and sermons, nor embodied in institutions.
Such men discard religious teaching and religious
institutions, because they hold that the invisible lies
beyond the realm of apprehension. They think, if
they do not say, with Huxley, " truly on this topic
silence is golden; while speech reaches not even
the dignity of sounding brass or tinkling cymbal,
and is but the weary clatter of an endless logo-
machy." 1
To those who have clearly defined their views,
even to themselves, as thus anti-religious or imre-
ligious, must be added a larger number of men and
women whose education has taught them that the
intellectual forms in which religion has expressed
itself in the past are not consistent with truths
clearly revealed to us by modern investigation.
They can no longer believe in the infallibility of
the Bible, or in the historicity of miracles as mira-
cles are understood by them, or in the fall of
man and the entrance of imperfection and sin into
the world as a consequence of that faU, or even in
the personality of God, which they identify with the
anthropomorphic conceptions of Deity formed by
1 T. H. Huxley : Hume, p. 183.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 37
them in their childhood ; and as these intellectual
forms of religion are still in their minds identified
with the Church and its teachings, they either at-
tend the Church and listen to those teachings with
impatience or indifference, or discard both the
Church and the 'ministry altogether.
More than either, probably more than all these
classes combined, are those who discard the institu-
tions of religion, not because they discard religion,
but because they think that religion is so pervasive,
so universal, so fimdamental an instinct of human-
ity that institutions of religion are no longer needed.
Religion is a spirit, and aU the experiences of life
are engaged in promoting and developing it. Time
was, such men say to themselves, when religious
institutions were indispensable, and they are still
indispensable to certain classes in the community.
They are, therefore, to be respected, encouraged, per-
haps supported ; but the world is outgrowing them ;
other instrumentalities have come in to develop
the religious spirit and to make ecclesiastical or-
ganizations unnecessary. The apostle Peter cata-
logues the elements which go to make up a divinely
organized character: "Add to your faith virtue,
and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge temper-
ance, and to temperance patience, and to patience
godliness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and
to brotherly kindness love." ^ Various instrumen-
talities in society, say such non-churchgoers, are de-
1 2 Pet. i, 5-7.
38 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
veloping these virtues in man as well or better than
rituals and sermons. Athletics produce virtue, or
manliness. The requirements of business promote
temperance, because drinking men are no longer
wanted iu positions of trust. Daily life, by the bur-
dens which it lays upon us, develops patience as no
preacher can develop it. Social intercourse evokes
in us brotherly kindness. The home, the wife, the
children inspire in us love. There remain in the
apostle's catalogue faith and godliness. Concerning
these two qualities such skeptics are silent. Perhaps
in confidential conversation they will admit that the
old religion produced certain qualities of piety and
reverence which modem scientific thought, business
activity, and social affiliations do nothing to pro-
duce, but if so, they will regard the loss with mild
regret, as they regard the lost arts of a bygone
civilization ; possibly they may say with Frederic
Harrison and the Humanists, more probably they
will think without saying, that the new reverence
for Humanity must take the place of the old rever-
ence for God. Says the author of " Letters from a
Chinese Official : "
Humanity they [the Chinese] are taught as a being
spiritual and eternal manifesting itself in time in a series
of generations. This being is the mediator between
heaven and earth, between the ultimate ideal and the
existing fact. By labor incessant and devout to raise
earth to heaven, to realize in fact the good that exists as
yet only in idea — that is the end and purpose of human
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 39
life, and in fulfilling it we achieve and maintain our
unity, each with every other and all with the Divine.
Here surely is a faith not unworthy to be called a reli-
gion.^
If faith is looking upon the things that are un-
seen, this is not faith. If religion is a perception of
the Infinite, this is not religion. Looking at one's
self in the mirror and worshiping one's own image
is not reverence. Spelling humanity with a capital
H does not make it divine. But this reverence for
an idealized humanity is offered by a few and ac-
cepted by many as a substitute for that religion
which is the life of God in the soul of man.
Other men in the community, and these probably
a stiU greater number, regard religion as impor-
tant, and even the Church and the institutions of
religion as valuable, but not for themselves. "I
always thought," says Moses Pennel, " that my wife
must be one of the sort of women who pray."^
Moses Pennel is a type. Many men desire the in-
spirations and restraints of religion for others, but
do not desire those inspirations, still less those re-
straints, for themselves. They are glad to have
their children in the Sunday-school and their wives
in the church, but they do not go themselves ; they
say in moments of confidence. When we go to
church we get nothing from it, we do not hear as
good music as at the opera, and the minister tells
^ Letters from a Chinese Official, p. 52.
2 Harriet Beecher Sto\?e : Pearl of Orr^s Island, p. 321.
40 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
US nothing we did not know before ; we prefer
to remain at home and read.
To these classes must be added still another, and
a not inconsiderable one, of those who discard the
Church because it seems to them to discard religion.
Liberal leaders have told them that Christianity is a
life, not a doctrine, that the inspiration of this life
is to be found in Jesus Christ, and the ideal of this
life in his teachings and his character, and they
declare that they do not find this ideal presented or
this inspiration afforded by the Christian Church.
This class is thus described by the editor of " The
Hibbert Journal : "
The type of plain man we are considering wants a
more valid proof than has yet been offered that the
world is serious when it professes the Christianity which
is a life and not a creed. He doubts, moreover,
whether he could seriously and honestly make such a
profession himself. He is by all operative standards an
honorable man; he deals honestly in trade, is a good
husband and father, faithful to his friends (though per-
haps a little hard on his foes), public-spirited, patriotic,
munificent. But to pretend that the ethics of the Ser-
mon on the Mount are his, even in their spirit, would be
a flagrant falsehood. He admires the beauty, he may
even admit the philosophic truth of the principle which
bids him lose his life to save it; but he is an acting
member of a community whose industrial life is based
on the opposite principle of competition ! He knows
the danger of riches ; remembers the saying about lay-
ing up treasure on earth ; but willingly and eagerly takes
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 41
his part in an economic system which rests on the accu-
mulation of wealth. He is a firm supporter of the
criminal law ; holds that great armaments are necessary
to the life of nations ; takes pride in the majesty and
power of the British fleet; upholds the Government
when it shakes the mailed fist in the face of foreign
nations, — and he will not sully his conscience by pre-
tending that he who does these things is a believer, in
any sense whatever, in non-resistance to evil, in unlimited
forgiveness, or in the principle of turning the other
cheek. If these commandments are involved in the
Christianity which is a life, if obedience to them is re-
quired of the followers of Christ, then he is no Christian,
and will not pretend to be.^
Perhaps if, when he went to church, he heard the
Christian ideal simply and clearly defined, and the
violations of that ideal current in human society
candidly and courageously condemned, he might
continue to go, though he fell under that condem-
nation himself ; but he declines to go to a church
which substitutes a lower ideal, condones where it
should condemn, or offers acceptance of a creed,
long or short, simple or complex, or participation
in a ritual, liturgical or non-liturgical, for a sim-
ple and real acceptance of the precepts and prin-
ciples of Jesus Christ, and an honest endeavor
to apply them to the current problems of modern
life.
The view of these classes, more or less clearly
defined, more or less consciously entertained, that
1 The Hibbert Journal, January, 1904, pp. 254, 255.
42 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the institutions of religion are no longer necessary
for the promotion of the higher life, or that the in-
stitutions of religion as they exist in this country
to-day no longer do promote the higher life, seems
to receive some confirmation from the fact that
certain functions which the Church once performed
it no longer needs to perform, because other insti-
tutions have come in to take its place and to do its
work in these departments.
I. The Church was originally the administrator of
charity. When the Church was bom there were no
organized charities in the world. There are expres-
sions of charity in the ancient moralists, no doubt,
but charity, organically, wisely, systematically ad-
ministered, did not exist in pagan Rome, and
was not developed by pagan literature. Says Mr.
Lecky:
However fully they [the Stoics] might reconcile in
theory their principles with the widest and most active
benevolence, they could not wholly counteract the prac-
tical evil of a system which declared war against the
whole emotional side of our being, and reduced human
virtue to a kind of majestic egotism. . . . The frame-
work or theory of benevolence might be there, but the
animating spirit was absent. Men who taught that the
husband or father should look with perfect indifference
on the death of his wife or his child, and that the philo-
sopher, though he may shed tears of pretended sympathy
in order to console his suffering friend, must suffer no
real emotion to penetrate his heart, could never found a
true or lasting religion of benevolence. Men who refused
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 43
to recognize pain and sickness as evils were scarcely-
likely to be very eager to relieve them in others.*
When, therefore, the Christian churches came
into existence, they had not only to inspire the spirit
of benevolence, but they had also to organize the
activities of benevolence. There were no organiza-
tions into which they could put the expression of
the new life. There were no charitable organiza-
tions ; and the Church was not in touch with the
great political organizations and could not affect
them. If the work of benevolence was to be done
at all, it had to be done by the Church ; and the
Church, therefore, became an organized charitable
society. This work of charity done by the Church
became one of its most prominent pieces of work.
Says Edwin Hatch :
The teaching of the earliest Christian homily which
has come down to us [Clement on Romans xvi] elevates
almsgiving to the chief place in Christian practice:
" Fasting is better than prayer, almsgiving is better than
fasting : blessed is the man who is found perfect therein,
for almsgiving lightens the weight of sin." It was in this
point that the Christian communities were unlike the
other associations which surrounded them. Other asso-
ciations were charitable: but whereas in them charity
was an accident, in Christian associations it was of the
essence. They gave to the religious revival which almost
always accompanies a period of social strain the special
direction of philanthropy. They brought into the Euro-
* W. E. H. Lecky : History of European Morals, i, pp. 201,
t44 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRT
pean world that regard for the poor which had beeD for
centuries the burden of Jewish hymns.^
Out of these conditions grew the organization of
the early churches. They were almoners of charity
no less than preachers of religion. The spirit of
charity which they created they also organized ; the
gifts which they inspired they also distributed. That
spirit of humanity which leads the rich to provide
for the poor, and the competent to care for the
incompetent, — the deaf and blind and sick and
weak-minded, — existed only very feebly, and only
in exceptional individuals, outside of the Christian
Church ; and as this spirit of humanity was dis-
tinctively and almost exclusively a church as well
as a Christian virtue, its organic exercise was nat-
urally intrusted to church officers. Out of this
charitable work grew, as Dr. Hatch tells us, the
bishopric.
But in our time the conditions have entirely
changed, — changed because the Church has done
its fundamental work so thoroughly. The spirit of
humanity is still a Christian virtue ; but it is no
longer a distinctively church virtue. The Church
has so permeated Christendom with the spirit of
humanity that it no longer needs administer through
its own organism the spirit of charity which it has
inspired. The city, the state, the nation, have be-
come charitable organizjations. The system of penol-
1 Edwin Hatch : Organization of the Early Christian Churches^
pp. 35, 36. Gomp. A. P. Stanley : Christian Institutions^ pp. 210, 211.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 46
ogy has become a system of reform. Hospitals and
poorhouses and orphan asylums are founded, some
by the political organism, others by private enter-
prise. And it is a little difficult for the philosopher
to see why church charities should exist to any
great extent. Why should we have a Presbyterian
hospital and an Episcopal hospital ? Is there a Pres-
byterian method of setting a broken bone, or an
Episcopalian method of curing typhoid fever ? Nor
can it be said that church hospitals are doing any
better or any different work than the hospitals
which are inspired by the Christian Church, but not
directed by it.
It is not, then, the function of the Christian
minister, primarily, to be an almoner of public
charity, or to be an administrator of philanthropic
work. Whether it is best that a church should be
what men call an institutional church or not, will
depend altogether upon circumstances. If it is
situated in a community where that kind of work
is already adequately and sufficiently done, or in a
community where it can inspire men to do it by
other than distinctively church organizations, that
is the better way. It is better to inspire the Young
Men's Christian Association to carry on a gymna-
sium than for the Church to carry on a gymnasium.
It is better to inspire the city to maintain a hos-
pital than for the Church to maintain a hospital.
Nevertheless, there remains a very fundamental
charitable work for the Church to do. Much insist'
46 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
ence is put in our time upon organized charity, — and
not too much ; but it is quite possible to put all
the emphasis on the organization and none on the
charity. The primary function of the Church is to
inspire in men the spirit of love, not to organize,
direct, or administer that love when it has been
inspired. There are other organizations — national,
state, voluntary — to carry out the requirements of
that spirit whenever and wherever it exists. But
what institution, other than the Church, makes it
a direct, specific, and definite object to create, fos-
ter, and develop the spirit of charity? The cry.
More money for hospitals and less for churches,
is like the cry. More water for the reservoir and
less for the springs. For the greater proportion of
the money for all benevolent and educational in-
stitutions supported by private contributions comes
either directly from the churches, or indirectly from
them through men whose education has been re-
ceived in the churches and whose ideals have been
obtained there. The Church is to be measured, not
by the institutions it sustains, but by the inspiration
it imparts.
Even where the conditions of the community are
such as to require an institutional church, the more
institutional it is, the more necessary that it should
be made inspirational. These subsidiary institu-
tions, — the boys' club, the girls' club, the gym-
nasium, the kindergarten, — as carried on by a
church, are but the instruments by which the
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 47
Church is to serve men in the higher Hfe. The
clergyman who allows himself to forget his great
work, which is the promotion of the life of God
in the soul of man, in order that he may establish
a philanthropic institution or a gymnasium or a
kindergarten or a sewing-school, allows himself
to be diverted from the higher and nobler service
to one that is less important. It is a great mistake
if the modem minister substitutes the charitable
administration of a philanthropic machine for the
inspirational work of the pulpit, kindling in men
the flame of human love and of godly reverence. To
do this is to do exactly the reverse of that which
the Apostles counseled ; they said, " It is not reason
that we should leave the word of God, and serve
tables." ^ The word of God is the revealing of God
to men ; serving tables is philanthropic ministry to
the lesser, though more apparent, needs of men.
n. A second function which the Church exercised
in the olden time, and which it no longer has occa-
sion to exercise, was that of government. When the
Koman Empire feU into ruins, and the Imperial
autocracy was dissolved, little or nothing remained
of government for a time but the municipal system.
The members of the municipal governing bodies
became discouraged and apathetic, and the priests
and bishops, fuU of the new life, naturally and
rightfully offered themselves to do the work of
superintendence and administration for the muni-
^ 1 Acts vi, 2.
48 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
cipalities. They became the principal municipal
magistrates, because they were the men of force and
honor. " We should be wrong," says Guizot, " to
reproach them for this, to tax them with usurpa-
tion. It was all in the natural course of things ;
the clergy alone were morally strong and animated ;
they became everywhere powerful. Such is the law
of the universe." ^
As the result of this cooperation with the civil
authorities in the administration of the municipal-
ities, political power gradually passed over to the
bishops, and then finally to the Bishop of Rome,
and there ensued the next stage of political devel-
opment, in which the clergy cooperated with the
civilians in the administration of the State. They
divided the functions, the clergy taking the ecclesi-
astical side of life, the civilians the civil side of
life. Under this system the Church and the State
became one, as they had been one in the Hebrew
Commonwealth. The identification of the two in
one organism is thus described by Professor James
Bryce:
Thus the Holy Roman Church and the Holy Roman
Empire are one and the same thing, in two aspects ; and
Catholicism, the principle of the universal Christian soci-
ety, is also Romanism ; that is, rests upon Rome as the
origin and type of its universality ; manifesting itself in
a mystic dualism which corresponds to the two natures
of its Founder. As divine and eternal, its head is the
^ Guizot : History of Civilization in Eurcpe, i, 36.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 49
Pope, to whom souls have been entrusted; as human
and temporal, the Emperor, commissioned to rule men's
bodies and acts.
But this, which Mr. Bryce well calls " the one
perfect and self-consistent scheme of the union of
Church and State," proved to be impracticable ; in
fact, was attained only at a few points in the his-
tory of the Holy Roman Empire.
It was finally supplanted by another view of their
relation, which, professing to be a development of a
principle recognized as fundamental, the superior impor-
tance of the religious life, found increasing favor in the
eyes of fervent churchmen. Declaring the Pope sole
representative on earth of the Deity, it concluded that
from him, and not directly from God, must the Empire
be held, — held feudally, it was said by many, — and it
thereby thrust down the temporal power, to be the slave
instead of the sister of the spiritual. Nevertheless, the
Papacy in her meridian, and under the guidance of her
greatest minds, of Hildebrand, of Alexander, of Inno-
cent, not seeking to abolish or absorb the civil govern-
ment, required only its obedience, and exalted its dignity
against all save herself.^
Thus there were three stages in the development
of the political power of the Church : in the first,
the clergy went into politics because there was no
one else to administer public affairs ; in the second,
the clergy divided political functions with the lay-
men, they taking one part, the laymen the other ;
in the third and last, the clergy assumed the respon-
^ James Bryce : The Hdy Boman Empire, pp. 106-109.
50 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
sibility of telling the laymen what they ought to do,
and enforced their counsels by spiritual authority.
By common consent, in America, the first two of
these methods of clerical participation in politics
are abandoned. It is imiversally agreed that it is
not the function of clergymen, as clergymen, to
manage legislatures or municipal assemblies. If
Dr. Washington Gladden goes into the Common
Coimcil of Columbus, he is not there in his capacity
of clergyman. There is nothing in American poli-
tics which corresponds to the participation of the
Bishops of the Church of England in the English
government, through their seats iu the House of
Lords.
But there are those who think that the Christian
ministry ought to tell the people how to perform
their political duties. When those duties were per-
formed by the Emperor, it was the Pope's duty to
tell the Emperor how to perform them ; now that
they are performed by all the people, ought not
modern ministers to tell the people how to perform
them? In other words, ought not the minister to
preach politics ? This question cannot be answered
categorically. It cannot be answered unqualifiedly
in the negative, for all duties are proper themes for
the minister, and free citizenship imposes certain
duties on the citizen. It cannot be answered un-
qualifiedly in the affirmative, for in politics ques-
tions of ethics, questions of policy, and questions
concerning party leaders and party organizations are
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 51
so interwoven that it is often impossible to preach
on the current political questions without becom-
ing the advocate of one side of a question of politi-
cal expediency, if not the apologist or eulogist of a
party candidate or a party organization.
There are two things necessary to good govern-
ment in a free commonwealth : the first is a diffused
spirit of patriotism, justice, and good-will ; the
second is the organization of this spirit of patriot-
ism, justice, and good-wiU in laws and political
institutions. It is the function of the lawyer, the
statesman, the political reformer, to formulate the
spirit of patriotism, justice, and good-will in laws
and institutions ; it is the function of the minister
to develop the spirit of patriotism, justice, and good-
will that it may be in the community to be formu-
lated. It is the function of the minister to inculcate
by every means in his power the fundamental prin-
ciple that the Indian in this country is to be treated
with justice, that he is not to be robbed and kept
in ignorance and denied libei'ty ; but the questions,
How shall we frame our laws for this purpose?
ShaU the Indian be under the War Department or
under the Interior Department ? ShaU the reserva-
tion be broken up, and in what way? do not
belong to him, as minister, to solve.
In the nature of the case, the statesman must be
an opportunist if he is to succeed ; that is, he must
consider the immediate effect of the present action.
But we need other men in the community than op-
62 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
portunists. We need men with a long look ahead ;
men who are not considering what will be the im-
mediate effect ; men who consider what wiU be the
ultimate effect of human action on the kingdom of
God. Such is the minister. He is or should be an
idealist. When an idealist goes into politics and
undertakes to carry out his ideals in political action,
he fails ; when an opportunist goes into the pulpit
and undertakes to measure human policies by imme-
diate results, he fails. So long as Savonarola pro-
claimed the great fundamental principles of truth
and righteousness and justice, he was a great power
in Italy ; when he undertook to become a political
leader and frame the policies for the State, he lost
his power.
The function of the minister is not to teU men
how they ought to vote in the immediate issue before
the community. His function is to inspire in his
congregation the faith that God is in his world
working out his kingdom, and the purpose to work
with him to that end. It is to lift men above the
issues of the hour to the eternal issues ; above the
party conflicts of the hour to the eternal conflict
between truth and error, light and darkness, hu-
manity and injustice, selfishness and generosity,
good and evil, in which all temporary conflicts are
but episodes. It is to cause them to consider the
effect of their action, not upon their own personal
interests, nor upon those of their party, but upon
the kingdom of God. If the minister, strong in
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 63
that perception of God whicli constitutes the essence
of religion, perceives him in public affairs, and causes
his congregation to look there for him also, he may
contribute nothing directly to the solution of tariff,
or currency, or colonial questions, on which the
nation is to vote ; but he will do what is far more
important, — he will promote that spirit of divine
justice which clarifies the mind from the disturbing
influences of pride and passion, and that long look
ahead which is the best guide for the action of
each day. If, on the contrary, the minister fails to
do this, no one else will or can fulfill this function ;
it will remain unfulfilled.
If, then, I could reach my brethren in the ministry
with my pen, my message to them would be this :
Deal with aU the public issues of your time, but deal
with them exclusively in their relation to the king-
dom of God. As a citizen, you may be a Repub-
lican or a Democrat, a Populist or a Prohibitionist,
but in your pulpit be neither. Do not undertake
to use your ministerial influence to promote the
success of special candidates or parties or political
policies. It is not certain that you are infallible ;
it is very certain that your congregation will not
believe that you are. You and I are men of like
passions as other men. In the midst of a heated
political campaign we ourselves get the heats of the
campaign burning like a fever in our veins. During
the Bryan campaign the ministers who preached on
the political issue in the East assured us that the
64 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
gold standard was the only honest money, and the
ministers who preached in Colorado were equally
certain that free silver was the only honest money.
Remember, too, that there are men who are shrewder
than you are, who wiU be very glad to get your
influence to promote the result of the election of
to-day, but who care nothing for the relation of that
vote or of your influence to the kingdom of God in
the world. Do not work for parties, nor for can-
didates, nor for immediate results ; do not be an
opportunist. Carry your idealism into all your
teaching concerning political questions. Work for
the triumph of the kingdom of God, not for the
triumph of a political party. Do not imagine that
the triumph of the kingdom of God is identical with
or even dependent upon the trimnph of a political
party. Remember that there are honest men in all
parties and dishonest men in all, and seek not to
promote victory for the party of your choice, but
to promote whatsoever things are true, whatsoever
things are just, whatsoever things are honest, what-
soever things are pure, in men of all parties and in
men of none.
III. A third function which the Church formerly
exercised, and which is now better exercised by
other instrumentalities, is that of secular education.
In the first century the only schools for the
common people were those connected with the Jew-
ish synagogues. Neither Rome nor Greece made
any provision for the education of the common
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 65
people. Christianity inherited from Judaism, with
its free spirit and its free political institutions, its
educational system. The Church established, with
charities for the poor, schools for the ignorant, and
for a long time these parish schools furnished the
only provision of any kind for the education of the
children of the poor. Out of these parish schools
grew institutions of higher learning, mainly devoted,
however, to preparation of an elect few for the cler-
ical profession. Protestants ought always to hold
in grateful remembrance the monasteries, not only
because in their libraries they preserved the manu-
scripts which have brought down to our time the
best thoughts of the ancients, whether pagan or
Christian, secular or religious, but also because they
handed over to the Christian community from the
Hebrew community the provision which the latter
had made for popular education. But, on the other
hand, Koman Catholics ought not to forget that this
educational work of the Church was carried on, not
because the Church believed this to be her prime
function, but because it was absolutely necessary
work, and there was no other organization willing
or able to undertake it. It is not the primary func-
tion of the Church to furnish secular instruction.
Says the Kev. Thomas Bouquillon, Professor of
Moral Theology at the Catholic University of
America, Washington, D. C. :
The Church has received from her Divine Founder
the mission to teach the supernatural truths. . . . But
66 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the Church has not received the mission to make known
the human sciences, she has not been established for the
progress of nations in the arts and sciences, no more
than to render them powerful and wealthy. . . . Her
duty of teaching human sciences is only indirect — a
work of charity or of necessity : of charity when they
are not sufficiently taught by others who have that duty ;
of necessity when they are badly taught, that is, taught
in a sense opposed to supernatural truth and morality.
This is why the missionary, setting foot in a savage land,
though he begins with the preaching of the Gospel, very
soon establishes schools. . . . There are men who seem
to assert that the Church has received the mission to
teach human as well as divine science. They give to the
words of Christ, Euntes docete (go and teach), an indefi-
nite interpretation. But such an interpretation is evi-
dently false.*
I do not affirm that this is the authoritative posi-
tion of the Roman Catholic Church on this subject.
Probably many Roman Catholic authorities would
dissent from it. Certainly the doctrine that fur-
nishing education is the primary function of the
State is still hotly denied by ecclesiastics, both Pro-
testant and Roman Catholic, in Europe. The reli-
gious war now raging in France is the result of an
endeavor by the State to take the work of teaching
out of the hands of the Church into its own hands.
The recent Educational Bill in England is the re-
1 Thomas Bouquillon: Education: To Whom Does it Belong?
See also two other pamphlets by the same author and with same
title : (1) A Bejoinder to the Civiltd, Cattolica; (2) A Rejoinder to
Critics*
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 57
suit of an endeavor by the Church to recover the
supervision and control of the educational work of
that country, partially taken out of its control and
lodged in that of the state authorities by a previous
administration.
But for America we may consider this question
decided. The great body of the people, Protestant
and Roman Catholic, agree in their support of the
public school ; and this means that they agree in
their belief that education for the common people
is to be furnished by the State, not by the Church ;
that in its control and administration it is to be
civil, not ecclesiastical. There will probably always
be private schools and church schools in America,
but they will be the exception. The education of
American boys and girls in the industries, the arts,
and the sciences wiU be mainly furnished, not in
parochial but in public schools, not under the con-
trol of the clergy, but under the control of the State.
It is true that there are still flourishing denomina-
tional colleges. But in most Protestant communions
these are denominational in name rather than in
reality, in the control to which they are intrusted,
rather than in any doctrine which they teach or
even any influence which they exert.
But although in America the Church has rele-
gated to the State the work of educating the youth
in the arts and sciences, it does not follow that the
Church has no longer any educational function.
Says Professor Huxley :
68 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
Education is the instraction of the intellect in the laws
of Nature, — under which name I include not merely
things and their forces, but men and their ways ; and
the fashioning of the affections and of the will into an
earnest and loving desire to move in harmony with those
laws. For me, education means neither more nor less
than this. Anything which professes to call itself educa-
tion must be tried by this standard, and if it fails to
stand the test, I will not call it education, whatever may
be the force of authority, or of numbers, upon the other
side.^
The State is, in the main, admirably giving in-
struction of the intellect in the laws of Nature;
but she is doing little or nothing directly to fashion
the affections and the will into an earnest and
loving desire to move in harmony with those laws.
And that this fashioning of the affections and the
wiU is quite as essential as the instruction of the
intellect we are beginning in America to discover.
Man is not governed by his reason ; he is guided
by his reason, but he is governed by his emotive
powers, by his affections and his will, by his
appetites, his passions, his love of acquisition, his
love of approbation, his self-esteem, or by his rev-
erence, his conscience, his hope, his love. A man
whose intellect is well instructed, but whose affec-
tions are ill trained, is more poorly educated than
one whose affections are weU trained and whose
intellect is ill instructed; as an ocean steamer is
a more helpless object if it is without an engine
1 T. H. Huxley : Science and Education, p. 83.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 69
tlian if it is without a rudder. We have yet to
learn how in this country to organize and carry on
a system of education which wiU fulfill the defini-
tion of Professor Huxley : which will fashion the
affections and the will, as well as instruct the in-
tellect.
This is not to be done by dividing education into
two departments, and intrusting the instruction of
the intellect to the State and the fashioning of the
affections to the Church ; nor is it to be done by
estabhshing a state church in order to give in the
state schools instruction in the doctrines of the
Church. A Roman Catholic bishop of this country
has in a pregnant paragraph intimated the way in
which it must be done. Says the Right Rev. John
J. Keane, D. D. :
A school is not made a Christian school by taking up
a good deal of time in doctrinal instruction or in devo-
tional exercises, which would otherwise be spent in ac-
quiring secular knowledge. Some time, indeed, must be
given to these, and it ought to be, and can be, made the
most instructive and beneficial part of the school hours ;
but that time need not be, and should not be, so long
as to be wearisome to the pupils or damaging to other
studies. "What, above all, make it a Christian school are
the moral atmosphere, the general tone, the surround-
ing objects, the character of the teachers, the constant
endeavor, the loving tact, the gentle skill, by which the
light and the spirit of Christianity — its lessons for the
head, for the heart, for the whole character — are made
to pervade and animate the whole school-life of the
60 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
child ; just as the good parent desires that they should
animate his whole future life in all his manifold duties
and relations as man and as citizen. This is the kind of
a school which a parent, anxious as in duty bound to
give his child as thorough Christian training as possible,
will naturally choose.^
As it is not the primary function of the Church
to administer charities, but it is its primary func-
tion to inspire in the conmiunity the spirit of
charity ; as it is not the primary function of the
Church to govern, nor to teU either emperors, aris-
tocracies, or democracies how to govern, but it is
its primary function to inspire in the rulers of the
land the spirit of justice out of which all righteous
policies proceed ; so it is not the primary function
of the Church to administer systems of education ;
but it is the primary function of the Church to in-
spire in the community such a desire to fashion the
affections and the will in conformity to the laws
of life, that the public school shall fulfill the end of
education as defined by Professor Huxley ; that is,
shall fashion the affections and the will, as well as
instruct the intellect, and shall be a Christian school
as defined by Bishop Keane ; that is. Christian in
its moral atmosphere, in its general tone, and in the
character of its teachers. Nor can it be doubted
that it is a greater work to inspire the community
with the spirit of charity than to administer partic-
ular charities ; to inspire all parties with the spirit
1 The Rt. Rev. John J. Keane : Denominational Schools, p. 9.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 61
of justice thao to counsel particular policies, or
contribute to the victory of any party ; to inspire
the school system with Christlikeness of disposition
than to teach the pupils in a parochial school the
tenets and ritual of a denomination. This work
the Church can do' only by being true to its specific
work, — that of ministering to the Christian life of
the community.
Let us recur to our definition of the Christian
religion: The Christian religion consists in such
a perception of the Infinite, as manifested in the
life and character of Jesus Christ, that the percep-
tion is able to promote in man Christlikeness of
character. Then a Christian church is a body of
men and women who possess in some degree such a
perception of the Infinite in Jesus Christ and some
Christlikeness of character, and who have united for
the purpose of imparting to others that perception,
and developing in others that character. Catholics
— whether Roman, Greek, or Anglican — believe
that the Church was organized by Jesus Christ him-
seK, and that loyalty to him requires his disciples
to unite with that historic organization; Protest-
ants believe that any men and women possessing
this vision of God, and animated by this purpose
to impart it and its fruits to others, have a right to
constitute themselves a church of Christ for that
purpose. But both Catholics and Protestants agree
that a church, if it be a church of Christ, must
be animated by the spirit of faith, hope, and
62 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
charity ; faith, that is, the perception of the Infinite
in Christ ; hope, that is, the aspiration for Christ-
likeness which that perception inspires ; love, that
is, a desire to impart both the perception and the
resultant life to the world.
The message of the Christian Church is very-
simple and very profound. It is not a series of
disjointed messages, though many counsels of per-
fection grow out of it. It cannot be adequately
formulated in a creed, though it involves a new
and inspiring conception of hfe. It cannot be
stated in words, because life always transcends
definition ; and yet a few simple words may sufiice
to suggest it. It is that God is not the Unknown
and the Unknowable ; that though he transcends
aU our definitions, yet he is a self-revealing God ;
that he manifests himseK in nature, in the world's
history, in hmnan experience, and preeminently in
the person and character of Jesus Christ; that
through Jesus Christ the manifestations of God in
nature, in history, and in human experience are
interpreted, and, so to speak, vocalized; that in
knowing God, in acquaintance with him, in parti-
cipation in his life, is the secret of life, the fruits
of which are love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentle-
ness, goodness, fidelity, meekness, self-control ; that
love, not any ordered selfishness, is the true social
bond ; that loyalty to God's law, not any divine
right of kings or of democracies, is the foundation
of just government; that character building, not
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 63
any mere intellectual instruction, is the only ade-
quate education ; and, finally, that the secret of all
social well-being is the individual life, the secret
of all individual life is acquaintance with God, and
the supreme source of acquaintance with God is
Jesus Christ.
In giving this message the Church of Christ is
more than an instrument of social reform. It is
a minister to life. And in its ministry to life it
responds to the two deepest and most universal
desires of mankind ; the desire for peace and the
desire for power.
Every healthful man sometimes looks back regret-
fully upon his past. He is conscious of blunders in
judgment, of aberrations of wiU, of deliberate acts
of wrong-doing which have brought injury upon him-
self and upon others. He wishes that he could live
again his life, or some particular crisis in his life.
His experience answers more or less consciously
to the expression in the General Confession in the
Book of Common Prayer : " We have done the
things which we ought not to have done, and we have
left undone the things which we ought to have done,"
even if his self-dissatisfaction does not lead him to
add, " and there is no health in us." ^ Sometimes
this is a keen sense of shame for some specific deed
done or duty neglected; sometimes it is a vague
feeling of self-condemnation, without clearly defined
1 The Book of Common Prayer : The Order for Daily Morning^
and for Daily Evening Prayer.
04 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
specific cause ; sometimes it is a passing shadow,
evanescent and uninfluential ; sometimes it is a
morbid self-condemnation, depressing the spirits
and tending toward despair. But he who has never
felt this sense of remorse in some one of its various
forms is singularly lacking, either in his memory, his
ideals, or his power of sitting in judgment upon his
own conduct and character. It is doubtful whether
any desire which the human soul ever possessed is
keener or more overmastering than the desire which
sometimes possesses it, in certain phases of experi-
ence, to be rid of its ineradicable past, and to be per-
mitted to begin life anew,unclogged and unburdened.
The other spiritual hunger of the soul relates to
the future. The soul is conscious of undeveloped
possibilities in itself ; it is spurred on to it knows
not what future by unsatisfied aspirations. It longs
to do and to be more, and rather to be than to do.
It has in the sphere of moral experience aspirations
which may be compared to those which have sum-
moned the greatest musicians and the greatest artists
to their careers. This sense of unsatisfied aspiration
differs from the sense of remorse in that it relates
to the future, not to the past ; the one is a con-
sciousness of wrong committed or duty left undone,
the other of life incomplete. The cry of the soul in
the one experience is that of Paul : " Who shall de-
liver me from the body of this death ? " ^ The cry of
the other is that of Tennyson :
> Bom. vii, 2i.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 65
And ah for a man to arise in me,
That the man I am may cease to be ! ^
The one is a craving for peace, the other for achieve-
ment. The one belongs to a nature which dwells in
the past, the other to a nature which lives in the
future. Not only are different temperaments dif-
ferently affected, the one being more conscious of
regret, the other of unsatisfied aspiration ; but the
same person sometimes experiences the one, some-
times the other. One age of the world is more prone
to the former, another age to the latter. In our
time there is comparatively little experience of re-
gret for the past. There is, to use the phrase cur-
rent in theological circles, very little " conviction of
sin." The age has its face set toward the future.
Its ideals lie before it, not behind. It is eager, ex-
pectant, hopeful, aspiring. It takes no time to look
back, not even time enough to learn the lessons
which the past can teach. But it is full of eager
expectations for a nobler civilization, a better distri-
bution of wealth, more harmonious relations between
employer and employed, juster government, better
social and industrial conditions, a nearer approxi-
mation to brotherhood. In the Middle Ages, hu-
manity was burdened by the consciousness of past
wrong-doing, and it sought relief from its burden
by seclusion from the world in monastic retreats.
In the present age, humanity is feverish with un-
satisfied aspirations, and is driven by its fever into
1 Tennyson : Maud, X, vi.
66 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the world, there to engage in ceaseless and exces-
sive activities. Like a mettlesome steed cruelly
roweled with spurs, yet held in by a curb bit, is
the present age, spurred on by aspiration to even
greater achievements, yet held back by prudential
self-interest from the great endeavor and the greater
seK-sacrifices without which the noblest achieve-
ments are always impossible.
It is because the Christian religion professes to
be able to satisfy these two passionate desires of
the human soul — the desire for peace and the de-
sire for achievement — that it possesses the attrac-
tion which the failures and the folly of its adherents
may diminish, but cannot destroy.
Christianity is more than a system of ethics —
though it has revolutionized ethics ; more than a
method of worship — though it has furnished a new
inspiration to worship and given it a new character ;
more than a philosophy of life — though it has
given to life a new interpretation. It is a new life
founded on a historic fact ; take that fact away and
it is difficult to see how the life could survive. The
belief of the universal Christian Church in that
fact is expressed with incomparable simplicity in
the words of one of the more ancient Christian
creeds : " I believe ... in one Lord Jesus Christ.
. . . Who for us men, and for our salvation came
down from heaven." ^ What is the relation of this
Lord Jesus Christ to the Eternal Father from whom
1 The Nicene Creed.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 67
he came, and how he accomplishes our salvation,
are questions to which Christian philosophers give
different answers. But aU Christian believers accept
the historic fact that there is one Lord Jesus
Christ, and that he came down from heaven for us
men and our salvation. In its possession of this
faith and its interest in this fact lies the secret of
the power of the Christian Church. Rob it of this
faith, take from it this fact, and its peculiar power
would be gone ; it would only be a teacher of ethics,
or a school of philosophy, or a conductor of reli-
gious mysteries in an unintelligible worship of an
unknown God. For in its possession of this fact
lies its power to take from men the two burdens
which so sorely oppress them, — that of remorse for
a wrongful past, that of unsatisfied aspiration in
the present and for the future.
Empowered by this fact, the Church declares to
men burdened that their sins are forgiven them.
This is not a philosophical statement founded on a
general faith that God is good and therefore will
forgive sins ; still less is it the enunciation of a
general belief that he is merciful and therefore will
not be very exacting of his children, but will let
them off from deserved punishment if they appeal
to him with adequate signs of repentance, in pen-
ances or otherwise. It is the statement of the his-
toric fact that God forgave men their sins before
they repented; that he bears no ill-will and no
wrath against them ; that he only desires for them
68 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
that they shall be good men and true ; and that, to
accomplish this, his good-will toward them, Jesus
Christ has come forth from his Father and our
Father into the world. Empowered by this fact,
the Church acts as the official and authoritative
promulgator of a divine forgiveness, an authoritative
and historically reinforced interpreter of the divine
disposition ; empowered by this fact, the Christian
teacher repeats of himself what Jesus Christ said of
himself : " The Son of man hath power on earth to
forgive sins." ^ He reiterates Christ's message and
with the same authority : " Go in peace and sin no
more." ^ He re-declares, not as a theory, but as an
historically established fact : " Almighty God, the
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, . . . hath given
power, and commandment, to his ministers, to de-
clare and pronounce to his people, being penitent,
the absolution and remission of their sins. He
pardoneth and absolveth all those who truly repent,
and unfeignedly believe his holy Gospel." ^
While the Church thus with authority unloosens
the burden of the past from those on whom a re-
morseful memory has bound that past, it also inspires
with a hope for the future which turns the anxious
and sometimes despairing aspirations into eager and
gladly expectant ones. For it tells the story of a
Man who in himself fulfilled the spiritual desires
1 Mark ii, 10. * Luke vii, 48-50 ; John viii, 11.
* The Book of Common Prayer : The Order for Daily Morning
and for Daily Evening Prayer.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 69
which are in aU noble men, and then, departing,
left as his legacy the command, which is also a
promise : " Follow me." It answers the question,
What is human nature ? by pointing to the charac-
ter of Jesus of Nazareth, with the assurance. What
he was every man can become. It answers the ques-
tion. Is life worth living ? by pointing to that life
and declaring that, as he laid down his life for us,
so can we lay down our lives for one another. It
presents to humanity not an ideal merely, but a
realized ideal, and in this realization of the highest
ideal of character gives assurance that our aspira-
tions are not doomed to disappointment, unless we
ourselves so doom them. That they are intended
by our Father to be realized, and that we can real-
ize them, is historically attested by the life of him
who was the Son of man, and who, experiencing
our battles, has pointed out to us the possibility of
victory and the way to achieve it.
This is the secret of the power of the Church:
not the excellence of its ethical instruction, not the
wisdom of its religious philosophy, not the aesthetic
beauty of its buildings or its services, and certainly
not the oratory of its preachers : but this, that it
is charged with a double message to men burdened
by a sense of wrong-doing in the past and tor-
mented by unfulfilled aspirations for the future ; a
message to the first. Thy sins are forgiven thee ; ^
a message to the second, You can do aU things
1 Luke V, 20.
70 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
through him that strengtheneth you.^ Poorly as
the Church understands its mission, poorly as it
delivers its message, it nevertheless has this as its
mission, this as its message. And when it fulfills
the one and delivers the other with the power that
comes from the conscious possession of divine au-
thority, men gather to its services to receive its
gift. This is not the only message of Christianity :
it teaches a purer ethics, it proffers a more sacred
consolation, it incites to a more joyous and inspir-
ing worship than any other religion ; but no other
religion has attempted to proclaim with authority
pardon for the past, or to give, as from God him-
self, power for the future.
Of the principles which I am here trying to
interpret, two illustrations are afforded in the very
recent life of the Church, — illustrations which are
aU the more significant because they come from
quarters so dissimilar theologically and ecclesiasti-
cally that to many persons they seem to have no-
thing in common. The first illustration is afforded
by the High Church movement in England; the
second by the life and work of Dwight L. Moody.
It can hardly be necessary to say that I have
no ecclesiastical or theological sympathy with the
High Church movement. I do not believe that
Jesus Christ organized a church, or appointed
bishops, or gave directly or by remote implication
any special authority to the bishops thereafter to
1 Phil, iv, 13.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 71
be appointed in the Church, or conferred special
grace, or intended that special grace should be
conferred, by the sacraments of Baptism and the
Lord's Supper, or made either of them means of
conveying supernatural grace, except in so far as
they became the expressions of a mood or spirit of
mind receptive of grace. I do not believe in the
perpetuity of a priesthood, or an altar, or the kind
of sacrificial system which a priesthood and an
altar seem to typify. And yet it is impossible for
any student of current events to doubt that the
High Church party in the Anglican Church is
reaUy exerting a notable spiritual influence in Eng-
land ; that it is attracting in many cases large con-
gregations to before sparsely attended churches;
that it is felt as a power in many hearts and
homes. To think that this is because Protestant
England is going back to its old-time allegiance to
the Pope of Rome, or because a generation which
has departed in its social standards from the severer
simplicity of Puritan England wants elaborate ritu-
alism in its churches, or because it is easier to con-
duct an orderly ritual than to preach a tolerable
sermon, and easier to go through the first without
attention than to give attention to the second, is
to misread the signs of the times, and, in judging
a movement, to estimate it by the mere incidents
which happen to accompany it and not by the
essential spirit which characterizes it. The dis-
tinctive characteristic of the High Church party
72 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
is its sacerdotal spirit ; ^ its exaltation of the priest-
hood and the altar ; its conversion of the memorial
supper into a bloodless sacrifice of the mass ; and
its use of priesthood, altar, and mass to emphasize
the right of the priest to declare authoritatively
the absolution and remission of sins. It is because
the High Church priesthood assume power on earth
to forgive sins, and so to relieve men and women
of the first of the two burdens of which I have
spoken, that it has its power over the hearts of its
adherents. It is for this reason, also, that its power
is mainly seen among women. Women's morbid
consciences make them susceptible to painful and
sometimes needless regrets, and a church which
offers to remove this burden of the past appeals to
them more than it does to men, who are more
inclined to let the dead bury their dead, and ask
for a religion which wiU help them to a better
future. High Church theology has no special effi-
cacy in equipping the soul for the future, and it
has, therefore, no special attraction for virile men.
But so long as men and women feel the burden of
the irreparable past, so long they wiU come to that
church, and only to that church, which declares
with authority that the past is forgiven ; and they
wiU not always be critical in inquiring whether all
^ It has also been characterized by notable missionary and phi-
lanthropic activity. But this is not distinctive of the High Church
party ; it belongs to the age, and is seen in every denomination
within the Church and in some organizations wholly nnecclesias-
tioal.
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 73
the grounds on which that authority is claimed can
stand historical investigation.
At the other extreme, ecclesiastically, are the
evangelists of our time, chief among them all, and
type of them all, the late Dwight L. Moody. If I
speak of him peculiarly, it is because he affords so
striking an illustration of the principle which I wish
to elucidate. Mr. Moody belonged to a denomination
which discards all notion of the priesthood, whose
ministry are only laymen performing a special func-
tion in a church without orders. In this church he
never had such ordination as is generally required
of those who desire to exercise ministerial func-
tions. His services were accompanied neither by
Baptism nor by the Lord's Supper. He believed
that the latter was a memorial service, not a blood-
less sacrifice ; that any Christian, whether lay or
clerical, was equally a priest ; to him the Church
was a meeting-house and the altar a communion
table or table of meeting ; and most of his services
were held in unconsecrated halls. But never did
a High Church priest of the Anglican Church be-
lieve more profoundly that to him had been given
authority to promise the absolution and remission
of sins, than did Mr. Moody believe that he pos-
sessed such authority. Rarely, if ever, did priest,
Anglican or Catholic, hear more vital confessions
or pronounce absolution with greater assurance.
The High Churchman thinks that he derives such
power through a long ecclesiastical line ; Mr. Moody
74 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
believed that he derived it through the declarations
of the Bible ; but both in the last analysis obtained
it by their faith in " one Lord Jesus Christ, . . .
Who for us men, and for our salvation came down
from heaven." The one no less than the other
spoke, or claimed to speak, by authority ; both de-
rived their authority from the same great historic
fact ; and the attractive power which drew unnum-
bered thousands to the preaching of Mr. Moody
was in its essence the same as that which draws
unnumbered thousands to the Altar and the Eucha-
rist.
This is the function of the Christian ministry :
not to administer charity, but to inspire in the com-
munity the spirit of charity ; not to counsel wise
political policies, but to inspire in government the
spirit of justice ; not to instruct the intellect, but
to fashion the affections and the wiU ; and this it
is to do by imparting to men peace from the burden
of the past and power for the duties of the present
and the future. If the Christian ministry is to do
this work it must be itself inspired by such a per-
ception of the Infinite in the life, character, and
post-resurrection work of Jesus Christ as is able to
promote in men Christlikeness of character. If this
perception is wanting in the ministry, the ministry
will be without power. If we of the so-caUed lib-
eral faith hope to retain in these more liberal days
the attractive power of the Church, we can do it
only by holding fast to the great historic facts of
THE FUNCTION OF THE MINISTRY 75
the birth, life, passion, and death of Jesus Christ
essentially as they are narrated in the Four Gospels,
and to the great spiritual fact that in the God whom
Christ has revealed to us there is abundant for-
giveness for all the past, and abundant life for all
the future. And this we must declare, not as a the-
ological opinion, to be defended by philosophical
arguments as a rational hypothesis, but as an as-
sured fact, historically certified by the life and death
of Jesus Christ, and confirmed out of the mouth of
many witnesses by the experience of Christ's disci-
ples and followers in all churches and in every age.
If we fail to do this, men will desert our ministry
for Eomanism, Anglicanism, and Evangelism, or, in
despair of spiritual life in any quarter, will desert
aU that ministers to the higher life, and live a
whoUy material life, alternating between restless,
unsatisfied desire and stolid seK-content. And the
fault and the folly will be ours more even than
theirs.
If the Church is to give this message of peace
and power it must give it with authority. Whence
does it derive this authority ? and how is this author-
ity attested ?
CHAPTER III
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY
The writers of the Bible speak witli authority.
When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, it was
not to say to the Children of Israel on the plain, I
advise you not to steal, not to kiU, not to commit
adultery ; you will be a great deal happier if you
do not do these things ; the experience of the world
indicates that this is disadvantageous. He says,
Thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not kiU, thou shalt
not commit adultery. He speaks with authority.
When Isaiah speaks to the Children of Israel, in a
later age, he does not say, I think you are mistaken
in putting such stress on forms and ceremonies ; it
is far more important to keep the heart clean than
it is to offer sacrifices ; the experience of the world
indicates this ; and there are other good reasons for
thinking so. He says, in the name of God, and
speaking as for him: " To what purpose is the multi-
tude of your sacrifices unto me ? . . . Wash you,
make you clean ; put away the evil of your doings
from before mine eyes ; cease to do evil ; learn to do
well." ^ These prophets spoke in the name of God.
Their customary phrase was, " Thus saith the Lord."
1 Isaiah i. 11, 16, 17.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 77
They spoke with authority. When Christ comes
and a great audience gathers to hear that ordination
sermon which we call the Sermon on the Mount,
he does not argue, he simply affirms ; and when he
has finished, the ^people say. This man speaks with
authority, and not as the Scribes. He promises to
his apostles similar authority. He says, " Ye shall
receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come
upon you." When Paul writes his Epistles, it is
stiU with power. The Gospel, he says, is "the
power of God unto salvation." ^ From the Exodus
to the close of the canon the Bible speaks with au-
thority.
Where did these men get their authority?
What was the secret of it ? What was its nature ?
They certainly did not get it from the Bible,
because the Bible is composed of what they said ;
it is the product of their utterances. The Bible
gets its authority from the prophets and the apos-
tles ; the prophets and the apostles do not get their
authority from the Bible.
They did not get it from the Church. Moses
spoke before any church was organized. The later
prophets stood in no relation to the Church ; they
did not belong to the hierarchy. The priests were
in a succession, but the prophets were not. In the
later times, Christ and the apostles did not get
their authority from the Church. Christ did not ;
1 Matt, vii, 29 ; Acts i, 4, 5, 8 (cf . Luke xxiv, 49) ; Rom. i, 16
(cf. 1 Cop. i, 18).
78 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the Church excommunicated him ; the major part
of his life the Church was fighting him. Paul did
not; the Christian Church was divided on the
question whether he was an apostle or not, and the
Jewish Church turned him out of the synagogue.
The sacred writers did not get their authority
from reason. Their affirmations were not deduc-
tions ; their revealings were not conclusions of ar-
guments. The Hebrews were not philosophers.
They did not argue. Jesus Christ rarely argued.
His most emphatic declarations were not syllogistic
in form and cannot be put in syllogistic form. His
great sermons — the Sermon at Nazareth, the
Sermon on the Mount, the Sermon on the Bread
of Life — are not logical. Paul argued ; but only
for the purpose of making the people accept the
conclusions which he had reached by a different
process. Sometimes his arguments are formal, not
real ; sometimes the processes are illogical ; some-
times the premises would be doubted or denied by
most modern readers ; generally his most authori-
tative declarations are not preceded by any argu-
ments, as : " We know that the whole creation
groaneth and travaileth in pain together until
now ; " or " We know that aU things work together
for good to them that love God." ^ Where does he
get his authority for such a statement ? How did
he know ? How can he know ?
These writers did not get their authority from
1 Rom. viii, 22, 28.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 79
miracles. Granting that all the so-caUed miracles
in the Bible were performed exactly as narrated,
stiU it remains true that the great majority of the
Bible teachers performed no miracles. Most of the
prophets performed none. Of those Biblical teach-
ers who did perform miracles, the great majority
made their utterances independent of any miracles.
They did not get their authority from the ful-
fillment of prophecy, for the prophecy was not ful-
filled for years, in some cases not for centuries,
after the prediction. Events occurring from two to
four centuries after the death of the prophet could
not have given the prophet his authority during his
lifetime. Their authority did not come from pro-
phecy, nor from miracles, nor from argument, nor
from the Church, nor from the Bible ; and yet they
spoke with authority.
The character of this authority has been de-
scribed by Canon Liddon in an eloquent passage :
Wherein did this power which the Apostles were to
receive consist? Creating political ascendancy, yet ut-
terly distinct from it ; fertilizing intellectual power, yet
differing in its essence from the activity of mere vigorous
unsanctified intellect ; working miracles, (it may be) gifted
to work physical wonders, yet certainly in itself more per-
suasive than the miracle it was empowered to produce ;
intimately allied with, and the natural accompaniment of
distinct ministerial faculties, yet not necessarily so, —
what is this higher, this highest power, this gift of gifts,
this transforming influence, which was to countersign as
if from heaven what had previously been given by the
80 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
Incarnate Lord on earth, and was to form out of un-
lettered and irresolute peasants the evangelists of the
world ? My brethren, it was spiritual, it was personal,
it was niioral power. And spiritual power may be felt
rather than described or analyzed. It resides in or it
permeates a man's whole circle of activities ; it cannot
be localized, it cannot be identified exclusively with one
of them. It is felt in solemn statements of doctrine, and
also in the informal utterances of casual intercourse ; it
is felt in actions no less than in language, in trivial acts
no less than in heroic resignation ; it is traced perchance
in the very expression of the countenance, yet the coun-
tenance is too coarse an organ to do it justice ; it just
asserts its presence, but its presence is too volatile, too
immaterial, to admit of being seized, and measured, and
brought by art or by language fairly within the compass
of our comprehension. It is an unearthly beauty, whose
native home is in a higher world, yet which tarries
among men from age to age, since the time when the
Son of God left us His example and gave us His Spirit.
It is nothing else than His spiritual presence, mantling
upon His servants ; they live in Him ; they lose in Him
something of their proper personality ; yet they are ab-
sorbed into, they are transfigured by, a Life altogether
higher than their own : His voice blends with theirs. His
£ye seems to lighten theirs with its sweetness and its
penetration ; His hand gives gentleness and decision to
their acts ; His Heart communicates a ray of its Divine
charity to their life of narrow and more stagnant affec-
tion ; His Soul commingles with theirs, and their life
of thought, and feeling, and resolve is irradiated and
braced by His.^
1 H. P. Liddon : Clerical Life and Work, pp. 159-161.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 81
Eloquent as this description is, it yet leaves some-
thing to be desired. Can we by analysis approxi-
mate an understanding of the secret of this power ?
Can we state it in psychological terms ? Two writ-
ers have done this : one an ancient, the other a
modem author; one theological, the other anti-
theological ; the one called himseH an Apostle, the
other called himself an Agnostic.
The Apostle Paul in his Epistle to the Corinthi-
ans thus describes this authority :
And my speech and my preaching was not with en-
ticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of
the spirit and of power.
His power was a demonstration of the spirit.
What does that mean ? A little later in this Epistle
he teUs us what it means :
But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things
which God hath prepared for them that love him. But
God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit : for the
spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the
spirit of man which is in him ? even so the things of
God knoweth no man, but the spirit of God.^ Now we
have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit
which is of God ; that we might know the things that
are freely given to us of God. Which things also we
speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth,
but which the Holy Ghost teacheth ; comparing spiritual
things with spiritual. But the natural man receiveth not
^ That is, as in the next sentence, " the spirit which is of Qod."
82 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the things of the spirit of God : for they are foolishness
unto him : neither can he know them, because they are
spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth
all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.^
Every man has a body, a physical organism. He
has a social and intellectual character that is some-
what aMn to that of the animal. And he also
possesses a spiritual nature, — a faith, a hope, a
love, — that transcends the animal nature, the social
nature, the physical nature. This spiritual nature
in man searches the deep things of God. It is all
the time groping; it is all the time looking for
something the eye does not see and even the im-
agination has not conceived. It feels, it realizes, it
knows, because it is spirit ; knows something that
transcends the senses, something that argument can-
not bring, something that logic cannot demonstrate.
Every man has this spirit in him. If we so speak
that we evoke that spiritual response in the men
who listen to us, our words are with authority, be-
cause they themselves see also that it is true. "We
are ourselves revelators. We draw aside the veil
that hangs over men's souls, and then they see and
know : not because the Church has told them, not
because the Bible has told them, not because mira-
cles have attested it, not because fulfilled prophecy
has proved it, not because reason has reached it,
but because they see it.
Such is Paul's explanation of the secret of his
1 lCor.ii,4,9-15.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 83
power. His preaching was powerful because it was
in " demonstration of the spirit ; " not " proof by
syllogistic deduction of a conclusion from known
premises," ^ but proof by the revelation to the
spirit in man '^hich is able to perceive spiritual
truth upon the bare presentation of it.
In very different language, but to the same effect,
is Professor Huxley's explanation of the source of
our knowledge of ethical truth, and so the secret
of power in the ethical teacher :
Some there are who cannot feel the difference be-
tween the " Sonata Appassionata " and " Cherry Ripe "
or between a grave-stone-cutter's art and the Apollo
Belvedere ; but the canons of art are none the less ac-
knowledged. "While some there may be, who, devoid of
sympathy, are incapable of a sense of duty ; but neither
does their existence affect the foundations of morality.
Such pathological deviations from true manhood are
merely the halt, the lame, and the blind of the world of
consciousness ; and the anatomist of the mind leaves them
aside, as the anatomist of the body would ignore abnor-
mal specimens. And as there are Pascals and Mozarts,
Newtons and Raffaeles, in whom the innate faculty for
science or art seems to need but a touch to spring into
full vigor, and through whom the human race obtains
new possibilities of knowledge and new conceptions of
beauty: so there have been men of moral genius, to
whom we owe ideals of duty and visions of moral perfec-
tion, which ordinary mankind could never have attained :
though, happily for them, they can feel the beauty of a
* Aristotle : quoted in Liddell & Scott's Greek-Englisb Lexi-
con under &p<J5€t|tf.
84 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
vision which lay beyond the reach of their dull ima^na-
tions, and count life well spent in shaping some faint
image of it in the actual world.*
An analysis of the closing sentence of this para-
graph shows two statements in it, each of which
throws some light on the authority of the Biblical
writers. The first statement is that the men of
moral genius have possessed not merely ideals of
duty, but also visions of perfection ; that is, they
have not merely imagined an ideal which we might
seek to realize, but they have seen an existing
standard of perfection to which we may endeavor
to conform our character. The second statement is
that to these ideals of duty and visions of perfec-
tion ordinary mankind could never have attained,
except through the disclosure of them by the men
of moral genius ; in other words, we need not wait
for an original ideal or vision, but may well accept
both at second hand from another, and count that
life well spent which shapes some image of it in
the actual world.
This is the authority which underlies all effective
ethical teaching. Goodness is a kind of beauty;
and the prophet is one who sees this beauty him-
self and is able to make others see it. This is the
authority which underlies the Ten Commandments
and the Sermon on the Mount. When Moses says
to Israel, Thou shalt not kiU, thou shalt not steal,
thou shalt not commit adultery, their own con-
1 T. H. Huxley : Hume, pp. 239, 240.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 85
sciences respond, This is right. When Jesus
Christ says, Do not indulge in lustful thoughts, love
your enemies, do good to them that despitefully
use you, he speaks with authority, because there is
in men the capacity to see the truth and beauty of
these utterances. There is no need of argument.
The congregation say to themselves. That is true.
The authority lies in the preacher, because it lies
in the heart of the hearer. It lies in the preacher,
because he is able to evoke in the heart of the
hearer the same voice that has spoken within his
own heart.
But the soul of man has need of something more
than ethical principles to guide his conduct. Man
needs God, as the body needs water. Man can see
and know God as one with whom he can have spir-
itual communion, as he can know the spirit of a
friend. The preacher speaks of God with authority
when he realizes this need of man, and when he is
able so to present God that his presentation satis-
fies that need. That there is such a need, sometimes
underlying consciousness, sometimes acutely felt in
consciousness, sometimes openly expressed in sor-
rowful words, is abundantly testified to by literature.
One of the most ancient expressions of the soul's
need for God is found in that splendid " epic of the
inner life," the Book of Job :
Oh that I knew where I might find him,
That I might come even to his seat !
I would order my cause before him,
And fill my mouth with arguments.
86 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
I would know the words which he would answer me,
And understand what he would say unto me.
Would he contend with me in the greatness of his power ?
Nay ; but he would give heed unto me.
There the upright might reason with him ;
So should I be delivered for ever from my judge.
Behold, I go forward, but he is not there ;
And backward, but I cannot perceive him ;
On the left hand, where he doth work, but I cannot behold him :
He hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him.^
Not less pathetic is the testimony of a modern
agnostic, Professor W. K. Clifford, to the same
truth:
It cannot be doubted that theistic belief is a comfort
and a solace to those who hold it, and that the loss of it
is a very painful loss. It cannot be doubted, at least, by
many of us in this generation, who either profess it now,
or received it in our childhood and have parted from it
since with such surging trouble as only cradle-faiths can
cause. We have seen the spring sun shine out of an
empty heaven, to light up a soulless earth ; we have felt
with utter loneliness that the Great Companion is dead.
Our children, it may be hoped, will know that sorrow
only by the reflex light of a wondering compassion.^
Professor Clifford is mistaken. As long as man
is man and God is God, so long wiU man not be con-
tent to see " the spring sun shine out of an empty
heaven, to light up a souUess earth ; " so long he
will cry out, sometimes in articulate outcries, some-
times in inarticulate and half-conscious moanings,
like a child in his sleep reaching for his mother,
1 Job xxiii, 3-9.
2 W. K. Clifford : Lectures and Essays, p. 389.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 87
Oh that I knew where I might find him, that I
might come even to his seat ! This is the reason
men aUow one day in the week the wheels of the
factory to stop, the store to be closed, the plough
to stand unused in the furrow, even the courts to
halt in the administration of justice, that those who
are busy for six days accumulating material wealth,
or serving their feUow men on the earthly and
material side, may take one day for seeking a
knowledge of him to whom they are always coming,
and yet who must ever remain in some sense the
Unknown. Surely it is significant that Herbert
Spencer, who is preeminently known as the apostle
of agnosticism, — the doctrine that the Infinite
and the Eternal is and ever must be the Unknown,
— surely it is significant that his last word to the
world, in the closing paragraphs of his autobiogra-
phy, is a testimony born of his own experience that
the longing to know the Unknown is irrepressible :
Behind these mysteries lies the all-embracing mystery
— whence this universal transformation which has gone on
unceasingly throughout a past eternity and will go on un-
ceasingly throughout a future eternity ? And along with
this arises the paralyzing thought — what if, of all that
is thus incomprehensible to us, there exists no compre-
hension anywhere ? No wonder that men take refuge in
authoritative dogma ! . . . Thus religious creeds, which
in one way or other occupy the sphere that rational in-
terpretation seeks to occupy and fails, and fails the more
the more it seeks, I have come to regard with a sym-
pathy based on community of need : feeling that dissent
88 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
from them results from inability to accept the solutions
offered, joined with the wish that solutions could be
found.^
No philosophical solution ever did, ever will, or
ever can satisfy this need. The need is not intel-
lectual, but spiritual. It is not need of a solution,
it is need of a God. It is not the desire of a phi-
losopher to solve an enigma, it is the desire of a
child to find his Father. If the preacher can bring
to his congregation nothing better than a solution
of the enigma, nothing better, that is, than a the-
ology, the people wiU go away unsatisfied. If he
has in himseK some experience of God, however
superficial, fragmentary, and imperfect, and if he
has the power to evoke in his congregation an ex-
perience of God, though it be as superficial, as frag-
mentary, and as imperfect as his own, they will come
again. It is neither the "authoritative dogma"
nor the " rational interpretation " which the souls
of men hunger for ; it is the Living Person ; and
it is for the minister to answer this need by
evoking in the soid a consciousness of the Living
Person.
Helen Keller, deaf, dumb, blind, shut out from
the world of sense, from the world of beauty, and
to a large extent from the world of men, seeks to
know God, and writes to PhiUips Brooks, " I wish
you would tell me something about God ; " and thus
he answers her :
1 Herbert Spencer : An Autobiography, ii, 548, 549.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 89
Let me tell you how it seems to me that we come to
know about our heavenly Father. It is from the power
of love in our own hearts. Love is at the source of every-
thing. Whatever has not the power of loving must have
a very dreary life indeed. . . . And so God who is the
greatest and happiest of all beings is the most loving too.
All the love that is in our hearts comes from him, as aU
the light which is in the flower comes from the sun. And
the more we love, the more near we are to God and his
love.*
He proves nothing, cites no authority of Church
or Scripture; simply bids her look into her own
heart, and in its testimony find the revelation for
which she longs.
Charles Dickens was not a theologian ; he was not
pietistic ; he was a dramatist ; he saw clearly, and de-
scribed effectively, the common experiences of com-
mon men. He dealt chiefly with plain, unlettered,
uncultivated people. In " Bleak House " he por-
trays Allan Woodcourt standing by the form of
poor Jo, a heathen who had been living in the heart
of London, — and there is no pagan land more pagan
than some parts of our great cities, — as the breath
is departing from the body of the poor boy, who has
never known anything of religion or of God or of
Christ. Allan says :
" Jo, my poor fellow ! "
" I hear you, sir, in the dark ; but I 'm a-gropin',
argropin', — let me catch hold of your hand."
" Jo, can you say what I say ? "
1 Helen Keller : The Story of My Life, p. 187.
90 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
" I *11 say any think as you say, sir ; for I knows it 's
good."
" Our Father."
" Our father ! — yes, that 's wery good, sir."
** Which art in heaven."
" Art in heaven. Is the light a-comin', sir ? "
" It is close at hand. Hallowed be thy name."
" Hallowed be — thy " —
The light is come upon the dark benighted way.
Dead!!
That is preaching. If the minister can say " Our
Father " so that the men and women in his congre-
gation will also say "Our Father, yes! that is very
good," this is enough. He will not need to go to
bishops or archbishops for authority; he will not
need to quote texts for authority ; the authority is
in the hearts that are before him. If the minister
cannot evoke this response from the hearts of his
congregation, no authority of gowns and crosses, of
ordinations and laying on of hands, of books and
writers, ancient or modern, inspired or uninspired,
will suffice to make him a preacher. The authority
of the preacher lies in his power to make other men
see the God whom he has himself first seen.
And if he is able to make them see the God whom
he has himself first seen, a God whose forgiving love
and inspiring power are manifested in Jesus Christ
and in the history of Christianity, he will, in im-
parting to them this vision, impart also that for-
giveness for the past and that inspiration for the
^ Charles Dickens : Bleak House, chap, xlvii.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 91
future, that peace and that power, which are the
deepest needs of the human soul, and are at times
its most intense desire. If he can first awaken that
dormant desire and make it dominant, and then if
he can satisfy it,,by leading the soul to him who
alone can satisfy it, no other evidence of his author-
ity need be offered, for no other will be demanded.
If he cannot do this, ecclesiastical indorsements will
be cited by him in vain ; for none such wiU be suf-
ficient.
Is there, then, no authority in the Church, and
none in the Bible? Are there no standards of
truth and duty? Is that for each man the truth
which he thinks to be true, and that for each man
right which he thinks to be righteousness? Are
truth and duty subjective terms merely, — truth
only the opinion of the individual, duty only the
impulse of the individual ? No ; this would be an
intolerable conclusion : truth and duty are realities ;
opinions and impulses are only the method by which
those realities are interpreted to us. There is an
authority apart from the judgment and conscience
of the individual man, — a real authority ; and it is
to be found both in the Church and in the Bible.
And it is of the utmost importance that the modem
religious teacher should understand the nature and
source of this authority. The authority both of the
organization and of the Book lies in the fact that
both appeal to the spiritual nature of man, give
expression to the half-conscious spiritual life of
02 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
man, and by their message respond to the imper-
fectly realized spiritual wants of man. When the
authority of either the Church or the Bible is re-
garded as though it were something apart from the
authority of God, speaking to and in the spirit of
man, when the attempt is made by the authority of
either the Church or the Bible to repress the ques-
tioning of the human spirit, to impair its life, and
to impose obligations upon it against which its con-
science and its judgment rebel, there can be but
one result, — a weakening of aU religious authority,
if not an open rebellion against it. Certain it is
that the religious teacher must understand clearly
the two antagonistic conceptions respecting the
authority of the Church, and the two antagonistic
conceptions of the authority of the Bible, and must
choose between them.
The Eoman Catholic theologians define with
great clearness, and accept with entire consistency,
what may be called the ecclesiastical conception of
Church authority. This conception is thus defined
in the " Faith of Catholics : "
The way or means by which to arrive at the know-
ledge of divine truths is attention and submission to the
voice of the Pastors of the Church : a Church estabHshed
by Christ for the instruction of all ; spread for that end
through all nations ; visibly continued in the succession of
Pastors and people through all ages. Whence the marks
of this Church are, Unity, Visibility, Indefectibility, Suc-
cession from the Apostles, Universality, and Sanctity.^
1 The Faith of Catholics, Prop. VI, i, 9.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 93
All churches which regard a visible, historical or-
ganization as the basis and source of authority in
religion, whether Greek, Eoman, or Anglican,
belong in the same category. For convenience'
sake, this theory may be termed the Catholic
theory. It is accepted by all loyal communicants
in the Greek and Roman Catholic communions,
and by a considerable number of the clergy in the
Protestant Episcopal Church.
The other conception of the authority of the
Church regards the Church as the whole body of
those in aU ages in whom has been developed the
power of so perceiving the Infinite as that their
moral nature is changed by the perception; who
are inspired by the spirit of faith, hope, and love ;
who possess in their own souls that life of God in
the soul of man which constitutes the essence of
religion. The Church thus defined is the Repub-
lic of God ; it is the temple in which he dwells ;
it is the body of Christ, the historic continuation
of the Incarnation. Its unity is not in creed, or
ritual, or sacrament, or orders and organization,
but in spiritual life. The authority of the Church
as interpreted by this conception is the authority
derived from the testimony of the concurring ex-
perience of unnumbered thousands. It is the author-
ity of the individual consciousness, multiplied by
innumerable witnesses. It furnishes a standard of
faith, exactly as the testimony of many witnesses
furnishes a standard of observation. If a thousand
d4 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
men have seen the same phenomenon, and a hun-
dred who were in the same place at the same time
did not observe it, we accept the affirmative testi-
mony of the thousand and disregard the negative
testimony of the hundred. We accept the testi-
mony of the Church of God, bearing witness to its
experience of Divine life in the souls of men, and
do not count the testimony of those who have no
such experience. Such negative experience is of no
weight whatever in counteracting this affirmative
testimony to a real life. And we use without hesi-
tation that which is concurrent in the consciousness
of many witnesses to correct that which is idiosyn-
cratic in the experience of a single individual.
This conception of the basis of authority is dis-
avowed by practically aU Greek and Roman Cath-
olic theologians ; unfortunately, it has been but
dimly held and inconsistently inculcated by most
Protestant theologians. But as the one theory may
be entitled Catholic, so the other may be entitled
Protestant. It is impossible to combine the two.
" In vain," says Auguste Sabatier, " wiU eminent
men in both camps, with the most generous and
conciliatory intentions, arise and endeavor to find
some middle ground, and effect a pacific reunion of
the two halves of Christendom. AU compromises,
aU diplomatic negotiations, will fail, because each
of the two principles can only subsist by the nega-
tion of the other." ^ He truly adds, that in actual
1 Auguste Sabatier : Outlines of a Philosophy of Bdigion, p. 211.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 95
life " this opposition is attenuated by the fact that
in all Catholicism there is a latent Protestantism,
and in all Protestantism a latent Catholicism."
But the Koman Catholic Church is quite right
in refusing to tolerate in its hierarchy this latent
Protestantism; and Protestantism will never be-
come the spiritual power it ought to be until it
frees its clergy from this latent Catholicism. In
vain does an unhistorical hierarchy endeavor to
attach authority to the creeds of the Church while
it disavows the Roman Catholic definition of the
Church. Those Protestants who endeavor to invest
the creeds of the past with authority really revert,
however unintentionally and unconsciously, to the
Catholic affirmation that the " means by which to
arrive at the knowledge of the divine truths is
attention and submission to the voice of the Pastors
of the Church." They affirm what Zwingli denies,
" that the meaning of the celestial Word depends
upon the judgment of men ; " and they deny what
Zwingli affirms, that " faith does not depend upon
the discussions of men, but has its seat, and rests
itself invincibly in the soul. It is an experience
which every one may have." ^
But though the authority of the Protestant min-
ister is not derived from the Church, it is enforced
and strengthened by the Church. His authority
rests, primarily, on his own spiritual consciousness,
and on his ability to evoke some answering testi-
^ Quoted by Auguste Sabatier: Eeligions of Authority, p. 163.
96 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
mony in the dormant spiritual consciousness of his
congregations, but it is confirmed by the testimony
of a great body of men and women in common with
whom he has that spiritual consciousness. When
he bears his testimony to the laws of righteousness,
to the forgiveness of sins through Jesus Christ
our Lord, to the pardon and peace which that for-
giveness of sins has brought, and to the presence
of God in human life, enabKng the weakest of his
children to say, I can do all things through him
that strengtheneth me, he bears testimony not only
to his own experience, but to that experience con-
firmed by ten thousand times ten thousand wit-
nesses. He does not stand alone ; imnumbered are
the voices which reinforce his message with a loud
Amen. The glorious company of the Apostles, the
goodly fellowship of the Prophets, the noble army
of Martyrs, the holy Church throughout all the
world, unite with him in acknowledging the Father
of an infinite Majesty, his adorable, true, and only
Son, and the Holy Ghost, the Comforter. He speaks
for the Church universal. He is and ought to feel
himself to be the voice of an innumerable silent
host, and he speaks, or ought to speak, with the
authority of their spiritual experiences interpreted
through his utterance.
The Keformers for the authority of the Church
substituted the authority of the Bible. It is not
necessary for my purpose here to trace the history
of the conflict in the Protestant churches between
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 97
the two conceptions of authority, — that of spiritual
experience in the individual soul, and that of a
written record of a revelation external to man, —
for both conceptions have found their place in Pro-
testant theology. 'But despite the persistence of the
spiritual conception, affirmed by Zwingli, and by
Luther in his earlier writings, reasserted by the
more spiritually-minded of the English Puritans,
reappearing in the doctrine of the Inner Light
affirmed by the Friends, and again reasserting itself
in what in our time is called the New Theology,
it may, nevertheless, be said, in general terms, to
quote again the words of Sabatier, that " the Catho-
lic system finds divine infallibility in an admirably
organized social institution, with its supreme head,
the Pope ; the Protestant system finds infallibility
in a book." ^ It would be easy to find extreme il-
lustrations of this doctrine of the infallibility of
the book. Avoiding these, I quote, as interpreta-
tive of eighteenth-century New England Puritan-
ism, from one of the more liberal of the Evangelical
Congregational divines, Lyman Beecher. In his
lectures on " Political Atheism " he declares " the
impotency of reason and the light of nature to
meet the exigencies of man, in time or eternity ; "
affirms that " the Bible, in its adaptation to our
necessities, meets all our exigencies, personal,
social, and civil, in a manner more rational and
benignant than any other system that claims a
1 Auguate Sabatier : Rdigiona of AtUhority, p. 186.
98 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
parentage from God ; " declares that " we must
have the broad seal of Heaven, which none can
coimterfeit, set upon it [the Bible], or we cannot
give it credence ; " and affirms that this seal con-
sists " in the miracles and prophecies connected
with that book." These he thus defines :
A miracle is such a control, or suspension, of the laws
of nature, as none but God, who made the world, can
accomplish ; and in such relation to a revelation as give
it the Divine attestation. Prophecy is a declaration of
future events which no finite could foresee or conjec-
ture, any more than it could work miracles.^
This theory has been held and taught by Pro-
testant theologians in different forms : sometimes,
that the Bible was dictated by the Spirit of God
to the writers, as amanuenses, and that every word
and letter is divine and authoritative ; sometimes,
that this divine authority inheres only in the origi-
nal manuscripts, and that the errors in our English
Bible are due to imperfections in preservation,
transmission, and translation ; sometimes, that in-
spiration did not preserve the writers from scien-
tific error, and that the writings are infallible and
inerrant only in the moral and religious realm;
sometimes, that this inerrancy and authority can
be predicated only of parts of the Bible, as, of the
New Testament, or, of the teachings of Jesus
Christ. But, in whatever form, and with whatever
limitations, this doctrine of the Bible has been in-
1 Lyman Beecher : Works^ vol. i, Lecture IX, pp. 203-206.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 99
culcated, underlying it has always been the same
substantial conception, — that man can have no im-
mediate and direct knowledge of God or of divine
truth, that for this knowledge he is dependent upon
an external revelation furnished through a book,
and that the evidence that this book does furnish a
trustworthy revelation is afforded by external evi-
dences, such as miracles and prophecy.
It is not necessary to trace here the historical
process by which this conception of Biblical author-
ity has been gradually undermined. The contrast
between the conception of the Bible entertained by
the liberal orthodoxy of New England in the first
half of the nineteenth century, and that entertained
by the same school in the latter half of the nine-
teenth century, will be apparent to the reader by
comparing Part I of " The Self -Revelation of God,"
by Dr. Samuel Harris, Professor of Systematic
Theology in Yale University, with Dr. Lyman
Beeeher's two lectures, on "The Necessity of a
Revelation from God to Man," and on " The Bible
a Revelation from God to Man."
Two disconnected paragraphs from Dr. Harris's
work must suffice here :
If God reveals himself it must be through the medium
of the finite and to finite beings. The revelation must
be commensurate with the medium through which it is
made and with the development of the minds to whom it
is made. Hence both the revelation itself and man's
apprehension of the God revealed must be progressive,
100 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
and, at any point of time, incomplete. Hence, while it
is the true God who reveals himself, man's apprehension
of God at different stages of his own development may-
be not only incomplete, but marred by gross misconcep-
tions.
God's revelation does not consist of inditing the Bible
and giving it to men to convert them to the life of faith
and love. He reveals himself in the grand courses of
his own action in the creation, preservation and progres-
sive evolution of the universe, in providential and moral
government, and in redemption. . . . What God reveals
is himself as distinguished from a religion. He reveals
himself in the experience of the person as the quickener
of his faith and love, as the being with whom he com-
munes in worship, who is with him as a present helper
in the work, and the burdens, the joys, and the sorrows
of his life. This communion with God is religion, but it
is so because God has revealed himself, and not a religion ;
and the man has found God in his revelation of himself,
and so has found access to him in communion.^
The difference between these two conceptions of
the Bible is radical. The first regards the Bible as
a book indited by God, and containing infallible
information concerning religion which man could
obtain in no other way; the second regards the
Bible as a book expressing the experiences which
devout men have had of God in their own souls,
and have uttered in their own language, each one
according to his own temperament. The statesman
saw God in human conscience, and interpreted him
1 Samuel Harris : The Self -Revelation of God, pp. 8, 58.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 101
as the authority for all just law, human and divine.
The historian saw God working out divine ends
through all the tangled course of human history,
and interpreted that history as a process of human
development divinely guided and controlled to a
divine result. The poet saw God in nature and in
human experience, and wrote his poem, whether it
were an epic, like the Book of Job, or lyrics, hke
those contained in the Hebrew Psalter, to interpret
his vision of God, and inspire others with a like
vision. The philosopher, whether ethical or theo-
logical, saw a moral order in the universe, and God
inspiring that order, and making it conqueror over
the chaos which sin had introduced into the world,
and he wrote to give, through philosophy, an inter-
pretation of his vision of an immanent God and his
hope of the final achievement of God's kingdom
on the earth. This literature has an authority, but
it is spiritual, not external. The evidence which
substantiates that authority is spiritual, not ex-
ternal. "We do not believe in the Bible because we
believe in miracles ; it would be more true to say
that we believe in miracles because we believe in
the Bible. It is the character of the Bible, and
its spiritual efficacy and value, not extraordinary
events occurring eighteen centuries ago, which give
to the Bible its authority. Says Samuel Taylor
Coleridge :
In the Bible there is more that finds me than I have
experienced in all other books put together ; the words
102 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
of the Bible find me at greater depths of my being ; and
whatever finds me brings with it an irresistible evidence
of its having proceeded from the Holy Spirit.^
We believe that it is inspired because we find it
inspiring. Our experience confirms its revelation.
We read the Twenty-third Psalm, and looking back
along our pathway, our experience of life replies,
God is also our Shepherd. We read the eighth
chapter of Romans, and recalling our song in the
night of our sorrow, our souls reply. Neither shall
death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor
powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor
height, nor depth, nor any other creature be able to
separate us from the love of God which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord. The Bible is an authority because
in the Bible God finds us and we find God. When
the Bible contradicts our spiritual consciousness, we
refuse to accept its dicta, — as when it seems to
attach the divine approval to the wholesale slaughter
of the Canaanites. When it contradicts our reason,
we seek to find some other interpretation, — as
when it seems to say that the sun stood still in or-
der to prolong miraculously a day of battle, or that
a big fish swallowed a prophet in order, on the one
hand, to preserve him from drowning, and, on the
other hand, to compel him to take up a mission
which he had refused. The minister in our time
may profitably use the Bible as an authority, but
he can use it as an authority only as he uses it to
^ S. T. Coleridge : Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit, Letter H.
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 103
interpret to men their own spiritual experience,
to confirm that spiritual experience, or to reveal to
them truths of life to which their own spiritual
experience responds with instinctive approbation.
Even its distinctively historical revelations find
their substantiation in the answer of the individual
soul. The evidence for the Divinity of Jesus Christ
is the character of Christ himself ; it is the fact that
when we look upon this character thus portrayed,
this life thus lived, we say. This character, this life,
presents a divine ideal ; this character is worthy of
our highest reverence, this life, of our sincerest imi-
tation.
There is also an authority in the reason. But the
authority of the preacher does not depend upon his
logical powers. The reason is rather a critical than
a creative faculty. The scientific method can at
best only deduce hypotheses respecting the invisible
world from observations of visible phenomena. The
relation of the logical faculty to the religious life
is well defined by Paul, in a verse which is often
regarded as though it were nothing but a combina-
tion of four separated aphorisms, but which is really
the Pauline philosophy of life condensed into four
pregnant sentences : " Quench not the Spirit ; de-
spise not prophesyings ; prove all things ; hold fast
that which is good." ^ Every man has a spiritual
nature ; he is able to look upon the things that
are unseen and are eternal : let him not quench it.
1 1 Thess. V, 19-21.
104 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
There are prophets, " men of moral genius to whom
we owe ideals of duty and visions of moral perfec-
tion which ordinary mankind could never have at-
tained : " do not despise them. For knowledge of
the outer world, study the works of the great sci-
entists, the men of observation ; for knowledge of
the inner world, study the works of the poets and
prophets, the men of insight. But take no man's
testimony, be he scientist or prophet, with unques-
tioning credence. It may fairly be doubted whether
the credulity which sometimes passes for faith has
not inflicted on the world more injury than the skep-
ticism which often passes for irreligion. The alleged
revelations of a Joe Smith or a Mrs. Eddy, accepted
by too confiding natures, have probably done more
to hinder or to divert the moral progress of the race
than the respectful agnosticism of Herbert Spencer
or even the scoffing agnosticism of Robert Ingersoll.
And this leads us to the true test by which all visions
of poets and prophets are to be tried. Says Jonathan
Edwards : " The degree in which our experience
is productive of practice shows the degree in which
our experience is spiritual and divine." Says St.
Teresa : " A genuine, heavenly vision yields to her
[the soul] a harvest of ineffable spiritual riches,
and an admirable renewal of bodily strength." Says
William James : " TTie way in which it works
on the whole is Dr. Maudsley's final test of a
belief. This is our own empiricist criterion ; and
this criterion the stoutest insisters on supernatural
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 105
origin have also been forced to use in the end." ^
These authors do but repeat, in another form, the
Pauline test: Hold fast that which is good. The
visions which stand the test of experience are visions
whose guidance we are to accept. The function of
the logical faculty is less the discovery of truth than
protection from falsehood. And this, which is
Paul's declaration, is the affirmation also of modern
philosophy : " The greatest and perhaps sole use of
philosophy is after aU merely negative, and instead
of discovering truth has only the modest merit of
preventing error." ^
The Christian minister must speak with power op
he speaks in vain. He must overcome the currents
which sweep men backward and downward toward
the animal condition from which they are gradually
emerging, — appetite, sensuality, avarice, lust of
power, love of applause, seK-conceit, seK-wiU. This
he cannot do with pleasant literary essays, pious or
pungent phrase-making, theological philosophizing,
or the exhibition of beliefs, once living, now dead,
and preserved like mummies in the tombs of the
past. He must speak with authority. That author-
ity must be either in some external standard or in
spiritual experiences which he has evoked in the
souls of those to whom he is speaking. If he wishes
^ William James : The Varieties of Religious Experience, pp. 19-
21, where these quotations from Edwards and St. Teresa may be
found.
2 This saying is attributed to Immannel Kant, though I have
not been able to verify the quotation.
106 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
to depend on an external authority, the Boman
Catholic, or the Greek Catholic, or the Anglican
Catholic Church is a better external authority than
a book, because it is more vital and more flexible.
It is able to adjust its teachings to the differing
needs of different generations. He who has no
spiritual authority in himself, and therefore can
awaken no spiritual authority in his hearers, should
either abandon the Christian ministry or seek to
f ulfiU it in some branch of the Catholic Church. If,
on the other hand, he depends for his authority on
his spiritual experience and on his power to evoke
spiritual experience in the men and women before
him, then he belongs in some branch of the Protest-
ant Church.
The fundamental question is easily stated : Is the
minister's authority without or within ? Have we
preachers to go to a vicegerent and representative
of God, or have we to go to God himself, sitting at
our side, walking in our path, manifesting himself
in our experience ? If the latter, we may enforce
the authority with which we speak by the concur-
rent testimony of the living Church, and by the
revelatory experiences recorded in the Scriptures
of the Old and New Testaments, and we may use
the scientific method to test those experiences, fear-
lessly asking. Do they work well? and fearlessly
and impartially recording the answer of history to
that question. But the real secret of our authority
must lie in our own consciousness of sin forgiven
THE AUTHORITY OF THE MINISTRY 107
and life imparted by an ever-present God, and in
our power to reproduce in other souls the life wliich
God has produced in our own.
Before passing to consider what are the qualifica-
tions necessary to enable the modern minister to
give with authority that message of peace and power
which it is his peculiar and distinctive function to
give to the world, I wish to consider more fully the
distinctive character of that message.
CHAPTER IV
THE INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY
Tedb prophet, says Ewald, is one who "has seen
or heard something which does not concern himself,
or not himself alone, which will not let him rest,
for which he must work by his words. . . . He
has exactly the feeling of having received a special
trust, a mission, an errand from his God, distinctly
to declare, in spite of all hindrances, at the right
place the higher voice which he cannot any longer
hide and suppress within him. He acts and speaks
not of his own accord ; a higher One impels him, to
resist whom is sin ; it is his God, who is also the
God of those to whom he must speak. And those to
whom he speaks often come by his proclamation to
feel their God as alive within them ; they hear what
they sought for but did not find ; they surmise and
recognize in him who declares to them what they
had long sought, the preacher and interpreter of his
own and their God, the mediator between them and
God."^ It is this divine impulse supplying the
motive, this divine theme furnishing the message,
and this divine object to bring men to feel their
God as alive within them, which distinguishes the
1 G. H. A. von Ewald : Prophets of the Old Testament, i, 7.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 109
Christian minister from men of other professions,
which in some respects closely resemble his own.
He is both like and unlike the journalist, the author,
the teacher, and the moral reformer. A comparison
of the Christian fiiinistry with these analogous pro-
fessions will help to make clear his specific func-
tion.
I. The office of the journalist is twofold : to re-
port the history of the day, and to interpret its
meaning. In the first work, that of reporter, the
modem American press exhibits great enterprise,
though not always great discrimination ; in the
second work, that of interpreter, it is not always
equally successful. Its interpretations are affected
by the demands of its subscribers, by the interests
of its advertisers, by the relation of events to its
favored political or ecclesiastical organization ; and
when it escapes all these belittling, if not malign
influences, it is still apt to consider the immediate,
not the ultimate, the provincial, not the world-wide,
effect of the event whose significance it endeavors
to explain.
The minister is not a reporter of events. He may
on occasion make himself one by a first-hand study
of some public incident on which he wishes to speak.
He may go to the coal-fields of Pennsylvania during
a great coal strike, or to Colorado during a time of
mob law, and return to give his congregation the
results of his investigations. It is always doubtful,
however, whether he can investigate as well as the
110 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
trained reporter, or secure as accurate and trust-
worthy results as he might secure by a careful col-
lection and comparison of different newspaper
reports. On the other hand, the work of interpre-
tation is sometimes the minister's ; all the more so,
because this function is so often ignored, refused,
or iU performed by the journalist. He may take
a current event for his text, as Christ on one occa-
sion took the massacre of the Galileans and the
disaster at the tower of Siloam for a text.i The
application of eternal principles to current prob-
lems may often be his duty, as it was the duty,
courageously fulfilled, by the Hebrew prophets.
In this work of interpreting public events there
are three principles by which the minister should
be guided.
He should beware of preaching to the newspa-
pers ; beware of selecting a topic because the gen-
eral public is interested in it and he shares the
general interest. The sermon is a message to the
congregation that listens to the preacher, and to
none other. If, as the minister thinks of that con-
gregation, of the men immersed in the temptations
of business life, of wives and mothers wearied with
household cares, or alternately dazzled and satiated
with society charms, of the young men and maidens
with their eager hopes, their perilous surroundings,
their vibrant life, the theme which it appears to
him will help them most in the experiences of the
^ Luke xiii, 1-5.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 111
coming week is the coal strike in Pennsylvania or
the mob law in Colorado, he may make that his
theme. But he should select it solely because it is
what his congregation needs, not because it is what
the daily press are talking about.
If he selects such a theme, he should speak of
the duties of his own congregation. He should not
chide the violence of workingmen in preaching to a
congregation of employers, or the greed of capitalists
in preaching to a congregation of workingmen, or
the superstition and ignorance of negroes in preach-
ing to Anglo-Saxons, or the cruelty of an Anglo-
Saxon mob in preaching to a congregation of negroes.
If every white preacher would preach to inspire
white men to take up the white men's burden, and
every negro preacher to inspire negro men to bear
bravely their black men's burden, and every preacher
to employers would speak of the duties of employers
to the employed, and every preacher to workingmen
of the duties of workingmen to their employers, the
race problem and the labor problem would be much
nearer their solution than they are to-day. Class
preaching can have but one effect, — to intensify
class prejudice and widen the gulf between the
classes ; and class preaching, by which I mean
preaching to one class on the sins and the duties
of another class, is unfortunately very common in
America.
In preaching on current events the minister
should interpret those events in the light of eternal
112 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
principles. He should measure them by their rela-
tion, not to a party, nor to a church, but to the
kingdom of God. He should tell us whether they
are promoting or hindering that righteousness and
peace and joy which constitute the kingdom of
God. He should give to his congregation the light
which is thrown upon such events by the Beatitudes
and the Golden Eule. He should get for himself,
and give to his congregation, the long look, should
treat current events in the spirit in which the He-
brew prophets treated them, should judge them not
by twentieth-century standards, but by the standards
of the Last Great Day. These three principles are
all illustrated by Christ's method ; thus, on the oc-
casion to which I have alluded above,^ he preached
to his immediate auditors, he turned their thoughts
from the calamity which had befallen others to the
sins which they themselves had perpetrated, and he
brought to bear on those sins the light of the last
judgment.
II. Literature, " in its more restricted sense," is
defined by the Century Dictionary as " the class of
writings in which expression and form in connection
with ideas of permanent or universal interest are
characteristic or essential features." The sermon,
then, is literature, and the preacher an author ; for
the sermon is a writing or speech " in which expres-
sion and form in connection with ideas of permanent
and universal interest are characteristic and essen-
^ See ante, p. 110.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 113
tial features." And yet tlie difference between the
work of the preacher and the work of the author,
whether poet, dramatist, novelist, historian, bio-
grapher, or essayist, is fundamental. The emphasis
of the author is on the form and expression, of the
preacher on the ideas of permanent and universal
interest ; the object of the author is to interest, of
the preacher to convince and comfort ; the author
seeks to interpret life, the preacher to impart life ;
if the poem, the novel, the biography, the history,
or even the essay is didactic, it is defective ; if the
sermon is not didactic, it is no true sermon. We ask
concerning the book, Is it artistic ? The sermon is
sometimes the more effective for being inartistic.
In brief, the author is an artist ; the test of his book,
poem, or story is its artistic quality. The preacher
is not an artist ; the test of his sermon is its life-
giving power. A sermon is not an oration. If there
can be anything more foolish than for a congrega-
tion to imagine that one man can give fifty-two ora-
tions a year, it is for that man himself to imagine
that he can do so. The great orators of history,
Demosthenes, Cicero, Burke, Chatham, Webster,
Calhoun, Sumner, have given possibly a score of
orations in a lifetime. It would be preposterous to
expect from a minister two score of orations and
more a year.
The power of a sermon is interpreted in that
Roman Catholic title for the priest, — Father. The
father gathers his children about him in the gloam-
114 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
ing and talks to them ; teUs them a story, gives them
counsel. It is not an artistic story ; it is not very
eloquent counsel. If it were taken down by a short-
hand writer and printed in a book, it would not be
read by a great number of readers. But the chil-
dren want it, and they would rather have the coimsel
that father gives than any other counsel from any
other man. Its power is due to the personal relation.
The power of the sermon must be the power of a
personal relation ; the counsel of a personal friend
to personal friends ; the revelation of God by a soul
full of his Spirit to a congregation who need him.
Preachers should be afraid of great sermons ; their
congregations are. The minister may, perhaps,
preach one occasionally by accident, but it always
ought to be an accident. The value of the sermon
lies in its power to impart life to the congregation.
If the congregation go away admiring the sermon,
the minister has failed ; if they go away forgetting
the sermon, but carrying with them an impulse to
a new life, coming they know not whence or how,
he has succeeded. If, when he has preached his
sermon, some one comes up after the service and
says, " That was a great sermon you gave us this
morning," let the preacher go home for an hour of
humiliation, fasting, and prayer; but if he says,
" Thank you ! you helped me this morning," let
the preacher go home to give God thanks.
m. The preacher is a teacher, but more than a
teacher. The two professions are alike in that they
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 115
both aim at the development of character through
the ministry of truth. And yet they differ, both in
the immediate object of their respective vocations
and in the ultimate source of their power. They both
address themselves to the wiQ ; but the one reaches
it indirectly through the intellectual powers, the
other directly through the motive powers.
It is the function of the teacher to gather out of
the reservoired experience of the past what it has for
us and give it to the oncoming generation. We
wonder sometimes that the world does not grow wise
more rapidly. Six thousand years, and so little
progress! Not six thousand years; the world of
men is only about forty or fifty years old, sixty at
the utmost ; for the world of men is no older than
a generation. The babes come into the infant school
knowing no more than their fathers knew, and, when
they have learned what this life has to teach them,
they go out into whatever school there lies beyond,
we know not. It is the function of the teacher to
take the reservoired experience of the past and give
as much of it as is possible to the children as they
come upon the stage. In this educational process,
control, discipline, training, are necessary, but they
are incidental and subsidiary. As the process of
education goes on, this disciplinary work lessens,
and finally disappears in the university, where there
is practically no discipline, and the pupils are left
to self-government. The education itself also tends
to affect the character in the springs of action.
116 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
Thus mathematics perfectly taught tends to develop
exactitude of character, and literature breadth of
human sympathy. But this tendency again is in-
cidental and subsidiary. The object of the teacher
is to give his pupils the benefit of the world's ex-
perience, and he largely leaves that experience to
convey its own lessons. The best teachers moralize
but little.
The preacher, on the other hand, appeals not
to the experience of mankind, but to the intuitions
of the individual soul ; he does not seek to inform
a pupil as to the experiences of others, he endeav-
ors to awaken in the heart of his hearer a new
experience. His object is to bring the individual
soul into communion with the living God, and so
inspire in him a life of loyalty to God, and to do
this by inspiring in the individual such a perception
of the Infinite, manifested in Jesus Christ, as will
awaken in him the desire, and form within him the
purpose, to lead a Christlike life and attain a Christ-
like character. Let us recur to Professor Huxley's
definition of education : " Education is the instruc-
tion of intellect in the laws of nature . . . and the
fashioning of the affections and the will into an
earnest and loving desire to be in harmony with
those laws." ^ It is the primary work of the teacher
to instruct the intellect, the primary work of the
ministry to fashion the affections and the will:
the first furnishes information, the second power ;
^ See ante, p. 58.
OF THE
x
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 117
the first develops the observing and reasoning facul-
ties, the second the motives ; the first trains the
pilot, the second educates the engineer. No doubt
the teacher promotes morality, and the preacher in-
telligence ; but intelligence is the professed aim of
the teacher, and morality the professed aim of the
preacher ; the specific work of the teacher is train-
ing, of the preacher inspiration.
But even more than the difference in the respec-
tive aims of the teacher and the preacher is the
difference in the secret of their power. The teacher
draws upon the outward and visible experience of
mankind, the preacher appeals to the inner and the
spiritual life of men ; the power of the one is learn-
ing, of the other piety ; the one imparts what he
has acquired from the experience of others, the
other transmits what he has received from his God.
No one can be a good teacher without scholarship,
because it is the function of the teacher to impart
to others what scholarship has imparted to him ;
but there have been many efficient teachers not
remarkable for their godliness. . No one can be a
good preacher without godliness, because it is the
function of the preacher to give men acquaintance
with God ; but there have been many effective
preachers who were not scholars. Says Herbert
Spencer :
Unlike the ordinary consciousness, the religious con-
sciousness is concerned with that which lies beyond the
sphere of sense. A brute thinks only of the things which
118 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
can be seen, heard, tested, etc., and the like is true of
the untaught child, the deaf-mute, and the lowest sav-
age. But the developing man has thoughts about exist-
ences which he regards as usually intangible, inaudible,
invisible ; and yet which he regards as operative upon
him.^
The teacher deals primarily with the ordinary con-
sciousness, and his power depends upon his accurate
knowledge of what lies within the sphere of sense ;
the preacher deals with that which lies beyond the
ordinary consciousness, and his power depends on
his ability to make real to men and operative upon
them a spiritual world which is intangible, inaudi-
ble, and invisible. The teacher draws his lessons
from what has been, the preacher awakens a hope of
what yet may be ; the teacher conveys a knowledge
of the actual, the preacher inspires a conception of
the possible ; the teacher enforces wisdom by les-
sons drawn from the history of past experience, the
preacher presents a realized ideal of life in a Divine
Person who teaches us the principles of life, and
reveals to us the spirit of life, and so shows us what
we may ourselves become.^
IV. The minister is a moral reformer, but he is
more than a moral reformer, and he makes a mis-
^ Herbert Spencer : Religious Retrospect and Prospect, *' Eccle-
siastical Institutions," p. 827.
^ See this distinction between secular teaching and the work
of the preacher stated with characteristic clearness and beauty
by James Martineau, in " Factors of Spiritual Growth in Modem
Society," Essays, iv, 75-91.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 119
take if he substitutes leading a moral reform for
preaching the gospel.
Out of personal sins grow social abuses ; out of
self-indulgent appetite, the saloon ; out of ambition,
political despotism ; out of covetousness, industrial
oppression. The reformer attacks the social abuse,
— the saloon, the political despotism, the industrial
oppression. The minister may or may not join with
him in this attack. Whether he does or not will
depend partly upon his temperament, partly upon
the nature of the institutions of his country, partly
upon the conditions of the time in which he lives.
But whatever his temperament, whatever the insti-
tutions or the conditions of his time, if he is a true
preacher he is not content merely to attack the
social abuses which have grown out of personal sin.
He will seek to extirpate the appetite, not merely
to overthrow the saloon ; to inspire ambition with
the spirit of service, not merely to destroy the mon-
archy, the machine, or the boss ; to mak6 acquisi-
tiveness subservient to benevolence, not merely to
substitute free labor for slavery, or a socialistic or-
der for unregulated competition. For he sees that
unregulated appetite is responsible for the dyspep-
tic as well as for the drunkard, that ignoble am-
bition substitutes the irresponsible boss for the
absolute czar, and greed of wealth inflicts parallel
if not equal cruelties on the slaves of America, the
serfs in Russia, and the factory hands in England.
If the minister attacks injurious social or politi-
120 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
cal forces, as slavery in industry or monarcliy in
government, it is because these forms violate the
laws of God, thwart the free development of the in-
dividual, and prevent the consummation of the king-
dom of God. To the moral reformer reform is an
end, to the preacher it is only a means. His object
is always the life of God in the soul of man, and
so the kingdom of God in the social order.^ His
inspiration is always the love of God, and of men
as the children of God, and a hope in him as the
Kedeemer of the world.
Henry Ward Beecher was, partly owing to his
temperament, partly to his Puritan education, and
partly to the times in which he lived, preeminently
a moral reformer. But no one has stated more
clearly than he this principle, that to the preacher
moral reform ought always to be a means, not an
end, the end being the kingdom of God, and that
to him the inspiration ought to be not merely
humanity, but love for and loyalty to Jesus Christ.
Our highest and strongest reason for seeking justice
among men is not the benefit to men themselves, exceed-
ingly strong as that motive is and ought to be. We do
not join the movement party of our times simply be-
cause we are inspired by an inward and constitutional
benevolence. We are conscious of both these motives
and of many other collateral ones ; but we are earnestly
conscious of another feeling stronger than either, that
lives unimpaired when these faint, yea, that gives vigor
^ See ante, chap, ii, pp. 47-54.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 121
and persistence to these feelings when they are discour-
aged; and that is a strong, personal, enthusiastic love
for Jesus Christ I regard the movement of the world
toward justice and rectitude to be of His inspiration.
I believe my own aspirations, having a base in my nat-
ural faculties, to be influenced and directed by Christ's
spirit. The mingled affection and adoration which I
feel for Him is the strongest feeling that I know.
Whether I will or not, whether it be a phantasy or a
sober sentiment, the fact is the same nevertheless, that
that which will give pleasure to Christ's heart and bring
to my consciousness a smile of gladness on His face in
behalf of my endeavor, is incalculably more to me than
any other motive. I would work for the slave for his
own sake, but I am sure that I would work ten times as
earnestly for the slave for Christ's sake.^
V. But the minister is not only more than a
journalist, an author, a secular teacher, or a moral
reformer ; he is also more than a teacher of theology.
Theology is not religion. EeHgion is the life of
God in the soul of man ; theology is what philo-
sophers have thought about that life.
The scorn for creeds is a thoughtless scorn. He
who says, I do not believe in creeds, expresses a
creed by that saying. " I do not believe in creeds "
is his creed. Whoever thinks on any subject to a
purpose and with a result has a creed, for the result
is his creed. If he thinks on politics and is a free-
trader, free-trade is his creed ; if on sociology and
^ Henry Ward Beecher : Quoted in Biography by Mrs. Beecher
et al., p. 269 ; in Biography by Lyman Abbott, pp. 193, 194.
122 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
is an individualist, individualism is his creed ; if he
thinks to any purpose on religion, the result of that
thinking is his creed, " Religion is a weakness which
a man must outgrow on attaining maturity " is the
creed of David Friedrich Strauss.^ This is as truly
a creed as is the Westminster Confession of Faith
or the Thirty-nine Articles.
But though creeds are important and are a ne-
cessary result of serious thinking, they are not life.
Theology is important, but it is not religion. Astro-
nomy is what men think about stars, but astronomy
is not stars ; botany is what men think about flowers,
but botany is not flowers ; so theology is what men
think about the life of God in the soul of man, but
theology is not the life of God in the soul of man,
and it cannot take the place of that life.
Men come to church for religion: that is, for
life. To be more specific, they come for the fruit
of the Spirit : for love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, serviceableness, fidelity, meekness, self-
control. When they get only theology, that is,
only what philosophers have thought about this
fruit of the Spirit, and the cause which produces
it, and the methods of its development, and the
consequences of lacking it, they go away dissatisfied.
To-morrow morning the reader will go down to
breakfast and will expect his roUs and coffee; if
instead of rolls and coffee his wife should read him
a lecture on hygiene, he would go away dissatisfied ;
1 See ante, p. 35.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 123
and if that should happen often, he would go some-
where else for breakfast. It is quite important that
the housewife should understand the principles of
hygiene in order that she may know how to prepare
breakfast ; but what we want is breakfast, not a
lecture on hygiene. So what men and women go to
church for is religion, not a lecture about religion ;
and when they go to church and get, not religion,
but a philosophy about religion, they stop going.
It is not strange.
Next Sunday morning a man comes to church.
He is dissatisfied with himself. He has wasted his
time ; he has been mean in business ; he has been
cross with his wife ; he has been tyrannical with
his children ; he is half conscious of it, and is dis-
contented with himself. Perhaps his feelings are
deeper. Perhaps he looks back on a life that has
been thrown away; perhaps he has deep within
himself the feeling that he dares not meet his God,
and dares not face the future, and, so feeling, goes
to church. The preacher announces his text and
proceeds to give him a lecture on the atonement.
He explains to him that there is a theory of the
atonement that Christ died to satisfy the wrath of
God ; a theory that Christ died to satisfy the law
of God; a theory that Christ died in order to pro-
duce a certain impression on the human mind ; a
theory that Christ died in order to impart the life
of God to man ; and then, at the end, the preacher,
in order to make it soimd like a sermon, closes with
124 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the exhortation, "Accept Christ and be saved;"
and the man goes away unsatisfied. He goes to an-
other church, and another preacher takes the same
text and preaches also on the atonement. But he
has before him this aching, hungering, needy heart,
and he says to his congregation :
" When you hear these words, ' Prepare to meet
your God,' are you afraid to meet him ? I teU you
that Christ has died, and whatever wrath there is
in God against sin is met and answered, and God's
love is offered to you. Do you say, ' God may for-
give me, but I cannot forgive myself ; his law rises
up against me ; and my own conscience condemns
me ? ' I tell you that his law is satisfied, and his
Son, your Saviour, has come to bring you peace.
Do you say, 'I do not repent; I cannot repent;
nothing that I have done to another or to myself
moves me ? ' I teU you Christ died for you. I put
before you his bleeding hands and feet and pierced
heart that you may know what God's love is, that
God's love may move you. Do you say, ' I cannot
arise ; I cannot feel ; I am dead ? ' I tell you that
the crucified Christ stands at the door of the grave
and says, ' Lazarus, come forth ! ' I teU you that
God loves us and raises us up even when we are
dead in trespasses and sins. Arise, begin a new life,
for you are a new man if you choose to be a new
man." One has delivered a lecture, the other has
preached a sermon. One has given his congrega-
tion theology, the other has given them religion.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 125
Or perhaps it is a mother who has come to
the church. She has had a hard week and is tired
out. The children have been cross, the husband
has been impatient, or indifferent and unloving;
the cook has left without notice ; everything has
gone wrong. The wearied wife thinks it is hardly
worth while trying to live any longer. She ques-
tions whether she will go to church, whether she
would not better stay at home and read a book.
But habit is strong upon her, and she goes. The
minister takes for his text, " Comfort ye, comfort
ye, my people, saith your God." ^ " Now," she
says, " I am going to get a sermon of comfort."
The minister proceeds to give her a lecture on the
Higher Criticism. He says : " It used to be thought
that there was but one Isaiah ; but there are two
Isaiahs — at least two, perhaps a score, and I am
going to prove it to you." And then he puts on his
boxing-gloves and begins to attack the old tradi-
tions. There are always a few people in every con-
gregation who admire the courage of such a man,
though it really does not require much courage to
conduct a boxing-match with a stuffed dummy.
Others — a few — wonder at the learning, saying,
" What a scholarly minister we have got ! " But
the poor mother goes back to her home and says
(that is, she would say it if she dared, even to her-
self), " I really would have done better had I stayed
at home and read a good story." And so far as
^ Isaiah xl, 1.
126 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the sermon is concerned she is right ; she would
have done better.
On the other hand, another minister, who be-
lieves that there are two Isaiahs, preaches on this
same text. He says nothing about two Isaiahs, but
he uses his conviction that the second Isaiah lived
toward the close of the exile. He says :
"This people Israel had sinned against God;
their life had gone awry; they had been carried
away from their homes; they had spent seventy
years in exile ; they were discouraged ; they be-
lieved God had deserted them, that he had for-
gotten them, that he cared no more for them. Then
came this message to the prophet, ' Comfort ye,
comfort ye my people, saith your God; ye have
received double for all your sins.* Even the prophet
could not believe the words, and he said, ' What
kind of a message can I bring to thy people ? They
are but grass. They are perishing.' And the an-
swer came back to him, ' Though they are but grass
and perish, the word of God endureth for ever.
Take comfort and be strong.' " ^ Then, with this
mother in his mind, and with similar weary, worn,
discouraged hearts in his mind, the minister says :
" You think there is no God. Have you more reason
to think that there is no God than had Judea in
exile ? You are discouraged. Have you more reason
to be discouraged than they had ? You have sinned
and think that you are suffering the punishment
1 Isaiah zl, 1 ff .
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 127
for your sins, and tliat there is no help for you.
Have you more reason to think that there is no
help for you than they had ? Have you sinned more
than Judah had sinned? To you, in your loneli-
ness, your discouragement, your remorse, the mes-
sage of the Gospel is, 'Comfort ye, comfort ye
my people, saith your God.' " And the minister
brings comfort to this mother, and sends her back
with new hope in her heart, and she will come next
Sunday. The one preacher has lectured on the
Higher Criticism, the other has used it.
What I have said here respecting the difference
between religion and theology, and the demand of
congregations for religion rather than for the-
ology, I said some years ago in an address delivered
to a ministerial gathering in New England. The
address was published in " The Outlook," and it
brought to me from a correspondent the following
letter :
I should like to ask one question : Do you not think
that with the burdened man and the grieving woman
there comes also to church the person whose difficulties
are intellectual, who doubts, to whom the old orthodoxy
has almost closed the way of faith, and who needs, who
hungers for, an exposition of truth almost theological ?
I can conceive such a one enlightened, brought to the
Cross indeed, by a discussion of the theories of the
Atonement in which difficulties and misconceptions were
removed. Of course, what such a person needs is the
fact of an atonement rather than the theory explaining
it ; but to explode some of the theories might open the
128 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
way to the fact, the reality. Your own preaching, it seems
to me, has been peculiarly to the class who have been
led to a larger religion through a simpler and truer
theology.!
The answer to this letter is twofold. First, the
minister may sometimes be simply a teacher. He
may give lectures in place of sermons. He may tell
his congregation in a series of lectures what is the
New Theology, or what is the New Criticism, or
what is the New Sociology. This is often an ad-
vantageous thing to do ; but he should understand
clearly the difference between teaching and preach-
ing, between a lecture and a sermon. It is also true
that it is one function of the preacher, in and through
his sermon, to correct misapprehensions and remove
intellectual difficulties ; but he should never forget
that his object in preaching should be to remove
those intellectual difficulties which prevent the de-
velopment of the spiritual life, and because they
prevent the development of the spiritual life ; that
his aim must always be, not the elucidation of the-
ology, but the impartation of life. The world is
not saved by theology, either old or new ; it is saved
by the life of God imparted to the soul of man.
There is, as Martineau has said, plenty of scope for
the young prophet who will bring into his mission
the rationality and veracity of modem thought,
provided it is accompanied with the faith and fer-
vor which accompanied the ancient thought. But
1 The Outlook, December 9, 1899.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 129
rationality and veracity of modem thought are
powerless to do the work of the ministry unless
they are vitalized by and made a vehicle for a
simple faith and fi sincere fervor.
To sum this chapter up in a paragraph : The
minister is sometimes an interpreter of current
events, but he is more than a journalist ; his sermons
should be literature, but he is more than an author ;
he is an instructor in truth, but he is more than a
teacher ; he seeks the regeneration of society, but
he is more than a moral reformer ; he is a teacher
of the truth about God, but he is more than a
teacher of theology. He is a minister of religion,
that is, of the life of God in the soul of man. The
spiritual hunger of humanity is well expressed in
the words of the General Confession : " We have
left undone those things which we ought to have
done; and we have done those things which we
ought not to have done ; and there is no health in
us. But Thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us, mis-
erable offenders. Spare Thou those, O God, who
confess their faults. Restore Thou those who are
penitent ; according to Thy promises declared unto
mankind, in Christ Jesus our Lord. And grant,
O most merciful Father, for His sake, that we may
hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life, to
the glory of Thy holy name." ^
The message of the Christian minister is the
answer of the Gospel to this " cry of the human."
1 Book of Common Prayer.
130 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
It is the message of Jesus Christ to the woman that
was a sinner, " Thy sins are forgiven ; " it is the
message of Jesus Christ to the fishermen, " Follow
me ; " it is the message of Jesus Christ to his dis-
ciples bereft of his presence for a second time by
the Ascension, " Ye shall receive power after that
the Holy Spirit is come upon you." It is the three-
fold message of pardon for the past, guidance for
the future, and power to achieve. The mission of
the Christian minister is interpreted for him by his
Master*s commission, " Go ye, therefore, and make
disciples of all nations, baptizing them into the name
of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost,
teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I
have commanded you." ^ He is to bring men into
living connection with the living God ; he is to in-
spire them with the purpose to possess the spirit
and f oUow the example of Jesus Christ ; he is to
teach them what following Christ in this twentieth
century involves. The mission of the minister is
interpreted for him by the words of the Apostle
Paul : " And he gave some as apostles, and some
as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as
pastors and teachers, for the perfecting of the holy
in the work of service to the building up of the
body of Christ, until we all come unto the unity of
the faith and of the perfect knowledge of the Son
of God unto a perfect manhood, unto the measure
of the stature of the fulness of Christ."
1 Matt, xacviii, 19, 20. « Eph. iv, 11-13.
INDIVIDUAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 131
His work is first to bring individuals into Christ-
likeness of character by imparting to them new-
ness of life. It is also to transform, through the
unity of faith, a heterogeneous society into a king-
dom of Christ. It is both individual and social.
The consideration of this social function of the
Christian minister, and what it demands of him in
our time, is the subject of our next chapter.
CHAPTER V
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY
The theme of Christ's preaching was the king-
dom of heaven or the kingdom of God. Matthew
sums up the first preaching in this sentence : " From
that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent :
for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Luke tells
us that he defined thus his mission : " I must preach
the kingdom of God to other cities also : for there-
fore am I sent." When the disciples were ready
for their mission, this was the message which he
gave to them : " As ye go preach, saying. The king-
dom of heaven is at hand." His disciples were told
to pray, " Thy kingdom come, thy wiU be done, in
earth as it is in heaven." ^ A comparison of the
Scripture texts, especially those uttered by Jesus
Christ concerning this kingdom of God or of
heaven, makes clear certain of its characteristics.
This kingdom of God is at hand. It is one which
the poor in spirit, the humble, the children easily
enter. It is one which is open to the pagan nations.
They wiU come from afar to enter it, while some of
the children of Abraham will be shut out. It is a
kingdom which it is difficult for the rich to enter,
1 Matt, iv, 17; Luke iv, 43; Matt, x, 7, vi, 10.
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 133
and impossible for the self-satisfied and the seK-
righteous to enter. It is growing up on the earth ;
it is like a seed planted and growing secretly, men
know not how. It grows from little beginnings to
a great consummation. It grows under difficulty,
and its growth depends upon circumstances. Some-
times it grows rapidly, sometimes slowly ; sometimes
it grows a little while, and then fails and falls back
again. Other things grow as well as the kingdom
of God, evil as weU as good, tares as weU as wheat.
It is like a feast ; the rich, the noble, the aristo-
cratic, the educated, the cultivated are invited, and
they make excuses ; one is too much occupied with
his business, another with his property, another with
domestic affairs ; then the highways and hedges are
searched for the poor, the lame, the halt. But to
all the message is the same. The table is set ; all
things are ready. Come! The kingdom is here;
you have not to wait.i
And yet, though it grows up here, and is here,
and the message given to the disciples is to tell men
that it is here, men cannot see it. They cannot say
of it : " Lo here, or lo there ! " It is invisible. In
order to see it a man must be bom from above.
Men cannot see it unless a new power of vision is
given to them. It is not ostensible ; it is not pal-
pable. It is earthly, because it is on the earth, and
1 Matt, iv, 17, V, 3, xviii, 4 ; Luke xiii, 28, 29 ; Matt, xix, 24,
amii, 13; Mark iv, 26, 27 ; Matt, xiii, 31, 32, 3-9, 24-30, 47-50;
Luke xiv, 13-24; Mark ix, 1.
134 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
yet it is celestial, because it is spiritual. It is human,
because it is made up of men ; it is divine, because
it is the kingdom of God. And when the consum-
mation of human history is accomplished, the con-
summation will be written in this sentence : " The
kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms
of our Lord, and of his Christ." The kingdoms of
this world — still world kingdoms, the politics still
human politics, the rule stiU human rule, and yet
transformed so that the kingdoms of this world
themselves are the kingdoms of our Lord and of
his Christ. But we are not to wait until the drama
is over ; we are not to wait for the kingdom of God
to be seen in the celestial city ; the new Jerusalem
is now coming down out of heaven to be among
men. We are to pray, " Thy kingdom come, thy
will be done, in earth as it is in heaven." The
ideal is celestial, the realization earthly; the sub-
ject, men ; the centre and source and power, divine.^
There have been in the post-apostolic Church
three conceptions respecting this kingdom of God
and its coming on the earth. There has been, first,
the notion that it would come with some great cata-
clysm, some great spiritual and supernatural revo-
lution. So the Jews expected a kingdom that should
come with blare of trumpets and waving of flags.
So, apparently, the primitive Church expected it,
thinking that the risen Christ would come back in
coronation glory to establish it. As Christ did not
1 Luke xTii, 21 ; John iii, 3 ; Rey. xi, 15, xxi, 2 ; Matt, vi, 10.
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 135
come in coronation glory to establisli the kingdom,
there arose the conception that the kingdom of God
was the Church, and the Church the kingdom ; the
King was absent;, but he had appointed a vicar to
take his place, and this vicar of God, this Pope of
Rome, stood in the lieu of God, and this Church
ruled over by him was the kingdom of God, and
men that were baptized entered into that kingdom
through their baptism. Men could then point at
the cathedral and at the mass and at the priest-
hood, and say : " Lo here, lo there ; behold the king-
dom of God ! " The Church and the kingdom of
God were identified. As the Church disappointed
men, there arose a third conception, that the king-
dom was not to come on earth at aU. It was celes-
tial, not terrestrial, and the earth was only a place
of trial by which men worthy of the kingdom were
selected, or a place of preparation by which men
worthy of the kingdom were prepared for it. Men
still continued to pray, " Thy kingdom come, thy
wiU be done, in earth as it is in heaven ; " but they
no longer had the faith that it would or could come
on earth. They still read such declarations as, " This
is the victory that overcometh the world, even our
faith," 1 and such interpretations of that declaration
as the prophecy, " The kingdoms of this world are
become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ,"
but they no longer believed these prophecies. They
regarded faith as an experience by which they could
* 1 John V, 4.
136 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
escape from the world, not as a power by which they
could conquer it ; and the future as having in it the
destruction of the kingdoms of this world, not their
transformation into a kingdom of God in which his
will would be done as it is in heaven.
In our time we are returning to the apostolic
conception of the kingdom of God, — that it is to
come by the spirit of Christ gradually pervading the
kingdoms of this world, and so gradually transform-
ing them. This was Christ's conception : the king-
dom is like leaven entering and pervading the whole
lump. It was Paul's conception : the kingdom of
God is righteousness and peace and joy in holiness
of spirit. It was John's conception : he saw " the
new Jerusalem coming down from God out of
heaven " to be " the tabernacle of God among
men." ^ The minister, if he foUows his Master,
accepts his Master's commission, and endeavors to
carry on toward its completion his Master's mis-
sion, is not merely to be a preacher of glad tidings
to individuals. He is not merely to be an evan-
gelist to solitary pilgrims, bidding them flee from
the City of Destruction. He is to be the herald of
a new social order ; he is to aim at nothing less
than making a celestial city out of the City of De-
struction ; he is to be the inbringer and the up-
builder of a new earth wherein dwells righteousness.
The message of the ministry, as it is interpreted
by the Evangelical faith, has foimd expression in
1 Rev. xxi, 3.
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 137
five pregnant words : revelation, redemption, regen-
eration, atonement, and sacrifice. These five words
have their personal meaning as applied to the indi-
vidual. On that meaning in the past, perhaps not
too great, but certainly too exclusive stress has
been laid. For they aU have a corporate or social
meaning, and this corporate or social meaning the
minister must grasp if he would fulfill the mission
which he has accepted, and for the fulfillment of
which no age has ever offered such opportunities
as the present.
I. Revelation is a personal word; a revelation
of God through individual men to individual men ;
the unveiling of God through Moses and David
and Isaiah and Paul to the individual reader of
the Bible, and to each individual according to his
spiritual capacity. But this is not all, it is not even
chiefly what revelation means.
Says the late Dr. Samuel Harris of Yale Theo-
logical Seminary : " The Bible is not a collection
of truths formulated in propositions, which God
from time to time whispered in the ear to be com-
municated to the world as the unchanging formulas
of thought and life for all time." Revelation is
" God's majestic march through history, redeeming
man from sin." ^ " Arise, shine," cries Isaiah to
Israel ; " for thy light is come, and the glory of the
Lord is risen upon thee." ^ Israel itself is to be a
1 Samuel Harris : The Sdf-Bevelation of God, xxx, 468, 459.
2 Isaiah Ix, 1.
138 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
revelation to the world ; because in Israel God is to
dwell, therefore through Israel God is to be re-
vealed. The Bible is what it has weU been called,
*' the message of Israel." Our prejudice against the
Jewish people is as unnatural as it is unchristian ;
for they held that religion which we revere, while
yet it was a bud, before it had blossomed out into
Christianity. To them we are indebted for the faith
that there is one God ; that he is a righteous God
and demands righteousness from his children, and
demands nothing else ; and that he will help them
to attain righteousness if they wiU accept his help.
Out from the Jewish nation shines this first begin-
ning of the light that is to illuminate all the nations
of the earth. But God has not stopped his majestic
march. He did not cease to walk in human history
when the canon was closed. He has been majesti-
cally marching through all the centuries. It is not
to Israel only that he has said, " Arise, shine ; " he
no less emphatically says it to America. And it is no
less the duty of the modern prophet to interpret
this message to the thought and to the conscience
of the American people. The function of the
Christian ministry is not merely to make individ-
uals luminous by inspiring in them the life of Christ ;
it is not merely to make the Church luminous by
gathering into it the Christian light-bearers ; it is
to make the nation a light-bearer to all the nations
of the world.
Our history gives us some illustration of this
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 139
truth, because it records some fulfillment of this
duty by the nation. We have opened the gates
which Isaiah said should not be closed. We have
called the uttermost parts of the earth to share
with us in our inheritance, and they have come to
us, — all races, all classes, all conditions, — and we
have borne, by our treatment of the foreigner on
this shore, a witness to the brotherhood of man
such as no nation ever before has borne in the
history of mankind. Slavery was fastened upon us.
It grew with our growth, and strengthened with
our strength ; but when at last it threatened the
life of the nation, the nation armed itseK, not simply
for union, — though it took much money and much
blood to learn the lesson God had to teach us, —
but for liberty as well ; and when the four years of
agony were over, we had borne a witness to brother-
hood in tones which had echoed around the globe.
Our foreign policy also affords an illustration of the
way in which a nation may be made a revelation
of God, a light to lighten the Gentiles. When the
Boxer movement took possession of the Chinese
people, as of old the demon took possession of the
unhappy boy and cast him into the fire and into
the waters to destroy him, America was the one
nation that insisted upon recognizing the reality of
the Chinese nationality and appealing to the con-
science of the Chinese people ; the one nation whose
guns were not trained against that Chinese fort,
and whose soldiers, when the ministers had been
140 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
released, took no share in the looting, plundering,
and devastating expeditions that were miscalled
punitive. The Chinese received from the fires that
Eussia and Germany and France lighted a revela-
tion concerning so-called Christianity which it will
take centuries to erase from their minds. They
have received from our flag a revelation of Chris-
tianity of which, on the whole, we need not be
ashamed.
But the end has not been reached. So long as
in our country there remain prejudices to separate
Jew and Christian, Roman Catholic and Protestant,
foreigner and native American, African and Anglo-
Saxon, so long there will remain need of prophets
to teach that One is our Father which is in heaven,
and that we are aU brethren. So long as there are
selfish men eager to appropriate the wealth of the
subject peoples who have fallen into our keeping,
and indifferent men, desirous to leave them to
themselves, either because they are unwilling to
endure what taking up the white man*s burden
imposes on the nation, or because they distrust the
capacity of the nation to enter on new and untried
duties toward an undeveloped people, so long will
there be need of Christian prophets to bear witness
to the nation that we are debtor to the poor and
ignorant of all lands, and especially of those to
whom God's providence has appointed us as guar-
dians, that by our justice, our loyalty to liberty,
our faith in God and in man as God's child, we
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 141
may develop a human brotherhood in Porto Rico,
Hawaii, and the Philippines. The nation itself is
to be a revelation of Christianity to other peoples
and it is the function of the Christian ministry to
lay that duty on the American people, to inspire
them with courage to undertake it, and to indicate
the principles by which they are to be guided in so
great an undertaking.
II. Redemption has a personal meaning. It is
the saving of the individual life from self-destruc-
tion by sin. But redemption is more than personal ;
it is organic, it is corporate. Christ is the Lamb
of God that taketh away the sin of the world, not
some sins from some men in the world. God is
majestically marching through history, redeeming
not elect individuals merely, but redeeming the
world. Christ does not come as an angel or mes-
senger might come to the imprisoned French in the
Conciergerie in the time of the Revolution, to call
out one or another from the fateful guillotine ; he
comes to destroy the guillotine, and establish law
and order and peace where before was anarchy and
ruin.
History is the interpreter of God's redeeming
work, and what does history tell us ? When Paul
wrote to the Romans, " I am not ashamed of the
glad tidings of Christ, for it is the power of God
unto salvation," ^ government was an absolute des-
potism ; labor was wholly servile ; the family was
1 Rom. i, 16.
']
142 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
a commercial partnership wliicli might be dissolved
by either husband or wife at any time ; there were
no schools for the education of the people; and
the pagan religion did not even pretend to try to
make men better, — it devoted itself to appeasing
the wrath of angry gods or bribing the favor of
corruptible ones. For nineteen centuries Christ has
been majestically marching through the world, and
wherever he has gone, governments have ceased to
be the Old World despotisms they once were ; the
shackles have dropped from the wrists of the slave ;
the commercial conception of marriage has disap-
peared, though relics of the ancient paganism from
which the world is emerging still appear in too
many of our States ; the public school for the edu-
cation of the people has been first planted by the
Church and then taken up and carried on by the
State ; and religion has become an instrument for
the making of men, and its ministers and priests
are endeavoring to bring to the people a message
that will make them happier, wiser, better, more
worthy to be called Christ's men.
We are not as a Christian Church simply to
redeem individuals; we are to carry on the work
which Christ has been carrying on through the
centuries, — a work of world redemption. In the
old slave days single slaves occasionally broke
away from slavery, crossed the Oliio River, and
were aided by some Abolitionist to escape to
Canada; and occasionally some preacher of right-
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 143
eousness gathered money from his congregation to
purchase a single slave girl and set her free. But
when the fuUness of time came, Abraham Lincoln
signed the proclamation which said to every slave
in America, " You are free," and changed the labor
condition of one half the nation. Christ has come
into the world not merely to aid escaping fugitives
here and there ; he has come to say to aU mankind,
" You are free ; " and the work of the Church is
to secure and complete that emancipation here and
now, on this globe.
III. Regeneration is individual. Each individ-
ual soul must be born into the spiritual life as each
individual soul must be bom into the earthly life.
But regeneration is more than individual ; it is
corporate, it is social. The community, in its indus-
try, its government, its social order, is to be born
from above.
Socialism and Christianity are alike in that both \
of them seek a new social order .^ They are unlike ^
in the method by which they propose to secure the
new social order. Socialism attributes what is evil '
in men to the evil system, and proposes to change
the system that it may change the spirit. Chris-
tianity attributes what is evil in the system to the
evil spirit in men, and proposes to change the spirit
that it may change the system.
Let me illustrate. Our present industrial system
^ I use the somewhat vague word socialism here in its more re-
stricted meaning, as equivalent to State Socialism.
144 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
may be briefly described thus : The farmer gathers
the raw material from the earth ; the manufacturer
converts it into objects which are useful to human
life, — the grain into flour, the wool into clothing ;
the railroad man takes this material, which is of no
use where it is, and carries it across the continent
to those regions where it is needed, from the over-
fed West to the underfed cities of the Atlantic
border ; the middleman takes what is transported
and carries it to our houses ; the banker regulates
the money through which all this mysterious and
intricate system of interchange is carried on ; the
lawyer determines for us what are the principles of
justice by which we are to be governed in our deal-
ings one with another in this intricate system ; the
doctor cures us when we are sick, or, if we are wise
and he is wise also, keeps us from getting sick ; the
teacher gathers out from all the experience of the
past that which shall launch us into life with some-
thing of the wisdom acquired by our forefathers ;
and the preacher seeks to give the life and love of
God to men to inspire them in all their labor.
Socialism proposes to change this system. It
proposes that the community shall constitute one
great corporation, in which every individual shall
be a stockholder, that in the constitution of the
corporation aU the stockholders shall have equal
authority, that the corporation shall own all the
tools and implements of industry, including the
land and all instruments of transportation, and
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 145
that it shall assign to every man his task according
to his ability, and to every man his reward accord-
ing to his need. Christianity proposes to change the
spirit and motives of the men who are carrying it
on. The message of Christianity might be epito-
mized somewhat as follows : Permit this industrial
system to go on upon the principle that every man
is to get what he can and keep what he gets ; let
competition be the law of industry ; let tlie farmer
say, " I will see how much I can get for my grain,"
and the manufacturer say, " I will see how much
I can get for my manufacturing," and the railroad
man say, " I will see what the transportation will
bear," and the middleman say, " I wiU take all the
transporter leaves before I hand anything over to
the private individual," and the doctor say, " I will
get all out of the sick man that he thinks his life
is worth," and the lawyer say, " I will not leave
this estate until I have got the most of it into my
pocket," and the teachers combine to make the
school subservient to their interests, and the preacher
seek the parish that will give him the largest salary
and the least work, — and the results will be oppres-
sion of the poor, degradation of the rich, misery of
all. And if this spirit of selfishness is left dominant
in men, no change in the system will be of any great
benefit. To take the control of all the industries
from private enterprise and give them all to the
State will only be to substitute political autocracy
for industrial autocracy ; it wiU abolish Mr. Car-
146 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
negie and enthrone Mr. Croker. But, on the con-
trary, we may safely leave the industrial system
unchanged if we can put a new spirit into it. Let
the farmer say : " Thank God, I live in a time
when seven men can feed a thousand, and I will see
how many hungry mouths I can supply." Let the
manufacturer say : " I am a worker together with
God, for I also am a creator ; I am building for
the world." Let the railroad man say : " If it were
not for me the East would be famine-stricken ; I will
make haste in transporting food that I may feed
the hungry." Let the middleman say : " What can
I do for my companions? " Let the employer say :
" What are the largest wages I can pay my work-
ingmen and live?" Let the workingman say:
" What is the best service I can render and stiU
maintain life at its full flood tide ? " Let the lawyer
say : " I am a minister of justice, and God is just."
Let the doctor say : " I am following the footsteps
of Christ, who healed the sick." Let the minister
say : " I do not ask for an easy pulpit, or a rich
parish ; put me where I can bring life to the hearts
of men." Then all the industrial system will be a
part of the kingdom of God, and whatever changes
in the organism are necessary will f oUow as of course
and without revolution.
The Christian minister need not — I have indi-
cated this before — be a sociologist. He need not
be an expert on the subject of business methods.
And if he is not an expert he had better not
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 147
attempt to discuss those methods in detail before a
congregation which has in it a considerable number
of experts. He need not be able to draw a clear
line of demarkation between legitimate and ille-
gitimate competition, to teU when speculation ceases
to be speculation and becomes gambling, to know
himself or to teach others what are the legitimate
rules of a labor union, or what the propriety of
an employers' association, or what wages the em-
ployer should pay, or what hours the employee
should be willing to labor. The more he knows
on these subjects the better, provided he does not
think a little knowledge is equivalent to full know-
ledge, or forget that sometimes a little knowledge
is a dangerous thing. But there are certain funda-
mental principles of social order which Christ has
inculcated, and which the Christian minister ought
to understand, and he ought to know how to apply
them to the social problems of his own time and his
own community. They are such as the dignity of
labor : " My father worketh hitherto and I work ; "
the measure of greatness : " Whosoever will be chief
among you let him be your servant ; " the stand-
ard of values : " Is not the life more than meat
and the body than raiment ; " the method of set-
tling controversies : " If thy brother shall trespass
against thee, go and tell him his fault between
thee and him alone ; if he shall hear thee, then thou
hast gained thy brother; but if he will not hear
thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in
148 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the mouth of two or three witnesses every word
may be established : " that is, first conciliation, then
arbitration. 1 For the office of the Christian minister
is not merely or even mainly to save from a general
wreck a few elect individuals, transformed by the
renewing of their spirit into fitness for a celestial
state ; it is to do his part in preparing, by the re-
newing of its spirit, a kingdom of industry on the
earth, that shall be a kingdom of mutuality of ser-
vice, of the ministry of things to life, and of peace
and good-will.
IV. Atonement is individual and personal. Each
soul must be brought into harmony with God. But
atonement is more than individual and personal;
it is organic, it is corporate. In that unity of the
individual soul with God is the secret of the unity
of the human race in itself.
" God was in Christ," says Paul, " reconciling
the world unto himself," ^ — not merely individuals
in the world ; and because he was reconciling the
world unto himself, he was reconciling all parts
of the world to one another. The secret of social
imity is the recognition of God's fatherhood, and
of Christ's redeeming work in the world.
There is a brotherhood which depends upon
agreement in opinion. The Republicans are bro-
thers, because they agree upon one platform ; the
Congregationalists, the Presbyterians, the Episco-
1 Matt, vi, 25, xviii, 16, 16, xx, 27, John v, 17.
2 2 Cor. V, 19.
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 149
palians are each a brotherhood, because the mem-
bers of these denominations hold each to the same
creed. But the brotherhood that Christ spoke of
was broader than an intellectual brotherhood, for
he told men that the Good Samaritan, who was a
heretic, was more brother to the man who fell
among thieves than the priest and Levite, who were
orthodox. There is a brotherhood that depends
on social congeniality. The man whose tempera-
ment agrees with my temperament, the man who
thinks not only as I think, but feels as I feel,
whose tastes and inclinations are like mine, is re-
cognized as my brother. But the brotherhood of
Christ was broader than that. The Pharisees would
never have found fault with Christ if he had simply
preached to the publicans and sinners ; but he sat
down and ate with them ; he treated them as bro-
thers, and that the Pharisees could not understand.
There is a brotherhood of race. In vain do poli-
ticians and journals cry out against it. Still, it re-
mains true that Englishmen will recognize in us,
and we should recognize in Englishmen, kin across
the sea, because we have one blood pulsating in
our veins. But the brotherhood of Christ was
broader than the brotherhood of blood relation-
ship. In his first sermon he was mobbed because
he told the Jews that the Syro-Phoenician woman
and the Syrian man were children of the same
God and their own kin.i Christ has told us what
1 Luke iv, 25-27.
150 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
is the secret of the unity of the human race ; it is
that we are all the offspring of God.
Be not ye called Rabbi : for one is your teacher, and
all ye are brethren. And call no man your father on
the earth : for one is your Father, which is in heaven.
Neither be ye called masters : for one is your master,
even the Christ.^
In this country we have seen the peril of two
great chasms that seem to be growing, one between
the black race and the white race in the South, the
other between the laborer and the capitalist in the
North, — the race rift and the class rift. How shall
we close these rifts ? How shall we prevent the
evils that will come from them? We have tried
the experiment of universal suffrage. We have
said that we would give the ballot to all men, —
black and white, foreigner and native American,
— and then we shall have a brotherhood. We gave
them the same political power, but this did not give
us brotherhood. We tried a similar method of deal-
ing with the class division. We have said : Let every
man work where he will, for what wages he can
get, and let every capitalist employ whom he wUl,
for as low wages as he can pay, and we shall have
brotherhood. What has happened ? The capitalists
have organized, and the trade unions have organ-
ized for greater success in their conflicts with each
other, untn the peril of industrial war is so great
that both sides are appalled at the possible danger,
1 Matt, xxiii, 8-10.
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 151
and are trying to see if they can adjust their
antagonisms through some courts of arbitration.
There is no unity for the human race outside of
these two faiths, — faith in God as the Father
of humanity, and faith in redemption as the end of
human history. It is the business of the Christian
Church to bridge the chasm between black and
white, between native American and foreigner,
between labor and capital, not by a new form or
method of social, political, or industrial organiza-
tion, but by infusing into the hearts of men this
twofold faith, — faith in the fatherhood of God,
and faith in the redeeming work to be carried on
by his children on the earth.
" Our Father " — who may say that ? Whoever
needs a father ; whoever has sorrows that are call-
ing for comfort or sins that call for pardon. And
whoever, having sorrows that need comfort, or sins
that need pardon, or ignorance that needs illumi-
nation, or weakness that needs strengthening,
kneels and says, " Our Father," is a brother to
me, though he may kneel to a crucifix, though he
may acknowledge a false creed, though he may use
poor words, though he may not understand the God
he addresses, and though he may call him by the
wrong name. We are of one Father ; therefore we
are brethren.
And we are here for one work in the world ; we
are here to build up the kingdom of God, not
merely to save men from the kingdom of the devil
152 . THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
and to prepare them for tlie kingdom of God in a
future life. If that were all, then laymen could
employ ministers to do this work, and they could
go on with their secular affairs. But that is not
what we are here for. "We are here to build the
kingdom of God. Ministers can sketch on paper
the outline of the edifice, but the laymen build it.
Ministers often fail to realize this. It is easier to
draw a picture of a house than to build it with
brick and stone and mortar. With a composing-
stick in hand and the type before you, you can
pick out the single letters and speU the word
" brotherhood," and print it and send it out into
the world. It is only a moment's work. But it is
a very difficult task for the head of a factory, with a
Pole, an Irishman, an African, an Hungarian, and
a Russian Jew before him as movable type, to spell
out a living " brotherhood." Yet that is what the
laymen have to do, — out of these very elements
to make a human brotherhood that is itself the
kingdom of God on the earth; and they cannot
do it save as we in the Christian ministry make
the men before us realize that they are in the
world not to build railroads or factories or steam-
ship lines, but, through factories and railroads and
steamship lines, to redeem the world here and now,
and make a human brotherhood out of these het-
erogeneous social elements. The unity of the race
or the nation can come only from unity in funda-
mental faith, — the recognition of " Our Father,"
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 153
— and unity in motive, — the recognition that our
work in the world is the world's redemption. The
men of the South must realize that their work is
to educate and elevate the African race ; the edu-
cated and employing class in the North must real-
ize that their work is to educate and elevate the
uneducated foreigners. Only in this realization can
there be a true at-one-ment, — a unity of men with
one another, because a unity of men with Christ in
his work.
V. Sacrifice is personal. Christ suffered and died
once for all, for the sins of the whole world. But
sacrifice is also generic and corporate and continu-
ous. I will not enter here into the debated ques-
tion whether we are to say that Christ died on our
behalf, or that Christ died in our stead ; but his
death is idle for us unless we die with him, and his
crucifixion is ineffective for us unless we also are
crucified with him. This truth is written throughout
the Gospels ; it is written throughout the Pauline
writings. The Koman Catholics are right in their
statement that the sacrifice is a continuous sacri-
fice; they are wrong in thinking that this con-
tinuous sacrifice is or can be offered by means of
consecrated bread and wine upon the altar. It is a
sacrifice in the home, in the store, in the shop, —
a sacrifice day by day, by every man for his fellow
men.
There are two conceptions of life. One is that
we are in the world to produce a type of humanity.
154 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
Hence struggle for existence and survival of the
fittest. Therefore let the strong man keep his
strength, and the wealthy man his wealth, and the
great man his greatness ; the quicker the weak and
the poor die, the quicker the end will be reached
and the type will be attained. The other concep-
tion is that God in this world is working out, not
a type of man, — he has given us the type in Jesus
Christ, — but a race of men that are to conform
to that type ; and the only way the race can be
wrought out in human history is by the strong bear-
ing the burdens of the weak, and the wise bearing
the burdens of the ignorant, and the rich bear-
ing the burdens of the poor.
The first conception does not even give us a
type. Who reverences the self-seeking politician
or merchant or doctor or minister ? We have to
hide our self-seeking if we want to be honored.
On the other hand, how can life make a brave man
if he does not face danger, or a patient man if he
does not bear burdens ? How can life make a true
man if he does not suffer for the sake of his brother
man ? Only as this Anglo-Saxon people are willing
to put themselves imderneath the African race and
lift it up, and underneath the Pole and the Hun-
garian, and the Italian and the Russian, and lift
them up ; only as they are willing to lay down their
lives that other men may walk up the incline to
a higher life, will or can the world be saved.
The Christian minister has then a social no less
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 155
than a personal message. His aim is not merely the
salvation of souls, it is the salvation of society. His
theme is the kingdom of (Jod as it was the theme
of his Master. And in some sense this social mes-
sage is peculiarly required in our age and our coun-
try. If this social gospel is not his preeminent
theme above all other themes, this age is preemi-
nent above aU other ages in its call for this message.
Into the United States God has poured a vast
heterogeneous population. The picture which John
painted in the Apocalypse may be seen here, with a
difference ; men gathered out of all nations and
kindreds and peoples and tongues, but not before
the throne of God, nor praising him. Every phase
of indiAddual character is here represented ; every
race, every nationality, every language, every form of
religion. Here are the Irishman, the Englishman,
the Frenchman, the Swede, the Norwegian, the Ger-
man, the Hungarian, the Pole, the Italian, the
Spaniard, the Portuguese. Here are the Celt, the
Anglo-Saxon, the African, the Malay. Here is
the negro, with his emotional religion ; the Koman
Catholic, with his ceremonial religion ; the Puritan,
with his intellectual religion, and the unbelieving
German, with his no religion at aU. Hither they
have come trooping, sometimes beckoned by us,
sometimes thrust upon us, sometimes invading us ;
but welcome or unwelcome, still they come. To
America the language of the ancient Hebrew pro-
phet may be almost literally applied :
156 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
The sons of strangers shall build up thy walls,
And their kings shall minister unto thee ;
Thy gates also shall be open continually ;
They shall not be shut day nor night ;
That men may bring unto thee the forces of the Gentiles,
And that their kings may be brought.^
This heterogeneous people occupy a land which
embraces every variety of climate from northern
Europe to middle Asia, and every variety of wealth
from the wheatfields of Russia to the gold mines
of Australia. Its fertile soil gives every variety of
production, from the pine-trees of Maine to the
orange groves of Florida. It has for agriculture
vast prairies of exhaustless wealth ; for mines,
mountains rich in coal, iron, copper, silver, gold ;
for mills, swift running rivers ; for carriage, slow
and deep ones ; and for commerce, a harbor-indented
coast-line lying open to two oceans and inviting the
commerce of both hemispheres. I do not dwell upon
the magnificence of this endowment, — that is a
familiar aspect, — but upon its diversity. The na-
tion which occupies such a land must be diverse in
industry as it is heterogeneous in population. The
simplicity of social and industrial organization has
long since passed away. There are few richer men
in the world than in America, and none who have
amassed such wealth in so short a time ; there are
no poorer men in the world, and nowhere men
^ Isaiah Ix, 10, 11. The whole chapter applies in a remarkable
manner to the present condition of the United States.
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 157
whose poverty is so embittered by disappointed
hopes and shattered ambitions. In the Old World
men are born to poverty, and accept their predes-
tined lot with contentment, if not with cheerfulness.
In America the ambitious youth sees a possible
preferment in the future; counts every advance
only a step toward further advancement, and attri-
butes every failure to injustice or ill luck. Society,
thus made up of heterogeneous population, sub-
jected to the educational influence of widely differ-
ing religions, engaged in industries whose interests
often seem to conflict, if they actually do not, and
separated into classes by continually shifting par-
tition walls, is kept in perpetual ferment by the
nature of its educational, political, and social insti-
tutions. The boys of the rich and the poor sit by
each other's side in the same schoolroom ; their
fathers brush against each other in the same con-
veyance. The hod-carrier and the millionaire hang
by the same strap, and sway against each other in
the same street-car. Every election brings rich and
poor, cultivated and ignorant, into line to deposit
ballots of equal weight in the same ballot box, and
make it the interest of each to win the suffrage
of the other for his candidate and his party. The
caldron, political, social, and industrial, is always
boiling; the bottom thrown to the top, the top
sinking in turn to the bottom. The canal-boat
driver becomes President; the deck-hand a rail-
road magnate. The son of the President mingles
158 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
with the masses of the people in the battle for po-
sition and preferment, and the son of yesterday's
millionaire is to-morrow earning his daily bread by
the sweat of his brow. In the Old World men Hve
like monks in a monastery ; each class, if not each
individual, has its own cell. Here all walls are
down, and all classes live in common. All this is
familiar; it is enough here to sketch it in the bar-
est outlines ; for my only purpose in recalling it is
to ask the reader to consider what is its moral
meaning. It can have but one. Into this continent
God has thrown this heterogeneous people, in this
effervescent and seething mass, that in the struggle
they may learn the laws of social life. African,
Malay, Anglo-Saxon, and Celt, ignorant and culti-
vated, rich and poor, — he flings us together under
institutions which inextricably intermix us, that
he may teach us by experience the meaning of the
brotherhood of man.
Our national history confirms this interpretation
— if any confirmation were needed. The questions
of our national history have all been social, not the-
ological. We can hardly conceive that battles were
fought, as bitter as our civil war, over the question
whether God should be defined as existing in one
Person or in three; whether the Son should be
defined as proceeding from the Father or created
by him ; whether he should be described as of the
same substance or only as of like substance. We
can hardly conceive that Europe was plunged into
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 159
fierce wars by the question whether righteousness
was imputed or imparted. But these were the real
questions of the past ; if they seem insignificant to
us now, it is only, because we do not look beneath
the form to the substance of the issues involved, —
issues as sublime as ever demanded the supremest
consideration and the most devoted zeal of men.
For these questions men once willingly died; for
them they now unwillingly keep awake for half
an hour of a Sunday afternoon. The questions for
which we have fought, and are willing to fight again
if need be, are questions of a different sort. Slavery,
temperance, labor and capital, the tariff, public edu-
cation : these present the questions of our national
life, and they are all aspects and phases of one
question, — What are the divine laws of social life ?
Are there any principles of government, known or
discoverable, which wiU enable men who differ in
origin, in condition, in race, and in religious belief,
to live harmoniously together in one commonwealth,
— that is, in one social and political organization,
so fashioned and carried on as to promote their
common welfare ?
This question the clergy and the Church must
help to answer. It is emphatically a religious ques-
tion.i If the Church does not interest itseK in what
concerns humanity, it cannot hope that humanity
wiU interest itself in what concerns the Church.
^ " Every political question is rapidly becoming a social ques-
tion, and every social question a religious question." — Mazzini.
160 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
Why, indeed, should it ? If the Church shelters it-
self under the plea that religion is a matter between
the individual soul and God, it adopts a very much
narrower definition of religion than that of the
Bible. The Hebrew prophet who asked, "What
doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly,
and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy
God ? " 1 had a conception of religion two parts of
which have to do with our relations to our fellow
men, and one part to our relations with God.
Christ's summary of the law and the prophets puts
as much emphasis on the brotherhood of man as
on the fatherhood of God. Indeed, it could not be
otherwise. A religion which did not teach us how
to hve on earth would have small claims upon our
respect when it claimed to teach us how to prepare
for heaven. A captain who does not know how to
manage a ship at sea cannot be trusted to bring
her into port. A teacher who cannot teU his boys
how to get along with one another in school is not
the man to prepare them to get along with one
another as men in manhood.
To whom else shall the people look for instruc-
tion in the moral principles of a true social order
if not to the ministry ? Shall they look to the poli-
ticians ? Their function in a democracy is not to in-
culcate, still less to discover, great principles. They
are executive officers, not teachers. They are ap-
pointed to formulate in law and so make effective
^ Micah vi, 8.
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 161
the principles which, under the instruction of others,
the people have adopted. This is what more or
less effectively they are doing ; and this is what they
ought to do. The" politician is not a motive power ;
he is a belting, and connects the motive power with
the machinery. He gets things done when the peo-
ple have determined what they want done. The
bankers and financiers deliberate and discuss, and
when the popular determination as to the currency
is reached as the result of this discussion. Congress
incorporates it in a law. The politicians wiU never
determine what is the best legal method of dealing
with the liquor traffic. When the people have deter-
mined, the politicians may be trusted to carry that
determination into effect. The people cannot learn
the moral laws of the social order from the politi-
cians ; the politicians must learn them from the
people. The master does not take orders from his
servant ; the servant takes them from his master.
Shall we then look to the editors for moral instruc-
tion in sociology ? The editors ought to be public
teachers, but with few exceptions they have abdi-
cated. The secular press is devoted to secular news-
gathering and to party service ; the religious press
to ecclesiastical news-gathering and denominational
service. There are some notable exceptions, but
they only prove the rule. Not long since I heard
one of the editors of one of the wealthiest and most
successful, though not most influential, of American
journals say in a public debate that the daily paper
162 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
was organized to make money, and that was what
it ought to be organized for. So long as this is
deemed true by the editors, the newspaper cannot
be a teacher. The world has never paid for leader-
ship until the leader was dead. Such a press can
only crystallize the public sentiment which others
have created, and so make efficacious a feeling
which otherwise would effervesce in emotion. This
it does, and for this service we are duly grateful.
But it cannot — at least it generally does not — do
the work of an investigator. It does not discover
laws of life. It does not create ; it only represents.
It is a reservoir, without which the miU could not
be driven ; but the reservoir must itself be fed by
the springs among the hiUs.
The real formers of public opinion are the teach-
ers and the preachers, the schools and the churches.
The teachers are necessarily empirical ; they deduce
the laws of life from a study of past experience.
The preachers ought to be prophets. Their sympa-
thy with all classes of men, their common contact
with rich and poor, their opportunities for reflection
and meditation, and their supposed consecration to
a work whoUy unselfish and disinterested, ought to
combine with their piety to give them that insight
into life which has always been characteristic of a
prophetic order. I do not mean to demand of the
ministry the impossible; but if this is not their
function, it would be difficult to say what function
they have. They cannot formulate public opinion
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 163
in laws as well as the politicians ; they cannot re-
present that public opinion as well as the journal-
ists ; they cannot extract the truth from a scientific
study of life as well as the teacher and the scholar.
But so far as natural selection, aided by special
studies and a generally quiet life, can equip any
class of men for a prophetic function, and so fit
them to discern the great moral laws of the social
order, the ministry are so equipped. If they wiU
leave the professional teachers to expound the secu-
lar, that is, the empirical side of social science, the
newspapers to reflect such conclusions as are reached
respecting social science, and the politicians to em-
body those opinions and principles in law, and wiU
devote themselves to the spiritual study of the Book
and of life, they can be leaders of the leaders. They
can lay the foundations on which other men shall
rear the superstructure. They speak, or can speak,
to all classes in the community, for they belong to
none. They address audiences of personal friends,
whom they have counseled and aided in the hours
when friendship is the most fuU of sweet signifi-
cance. They speak to these friends at a time when
baser passions are aUayed and loyal sentiments are
awakened. The very smallness of their auditory as
compared with that of the journalist adds force to
their counsels and affords protection from misappre-
hension.
The pulpit for to-day, then, must be competent
to give instruction in the moral laws which govern
164 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
social and industrial life, — the organized life of
humanity. The age requires this instruction; the
people desire it ; the ministers should give it. If
the minister will go to his Book for this purpose, he
will find it quite as rich in sociological as in the-
ological instniction ; quite as fertile in its sugges-
tions respecting the duty of man to man as in its
suggestions respecting the nature and government
of God. He will find his New Testament teUing
him that in Christ's kingdom the strong are to serve
the weak ; the rich, the poor ; — that is, the factory
owner is to serve his hands, the railroad prince, his
trainmen ; that controversies are to be settled not
by wage of battle or its modern equivalent, strikes
and lockouts, but by mutual concessions and ulti-
mate appeal to an impartial tribunal, — in other
words, by conciliation and arbitration; that the
State is not a " social compact," nor government
a " necessary evil ; " that the one is a divinely con-
stituted organism, and the other a necessary condi-
tion of its existence ; that the judicial function does
not belong to humanity, and therefore the judicial
system wiU never become truly Christian till it
ceases to be an effort to administer justice and be-
comes an effort to administer mercy ; that the bro-
therhood of man is an integral part of Christianity
no less than the Fatherhood of God, and that to
deny the one is no less infidel than to deny the
other. In short, while he will find in the Book
which he is appointed to interpret no light upon
THE SOCIAL MESSAGE OF THE MINISTRY 165
scientific details of poKtical or industrial organiza-
tion, he will find the great moral laws of the social
order, if not clearly revealed, at least definitely indi-
cated, and in them abundant material for sermons
which will be interesting because giving instruc-
tion which is both imperatively needed and eagerly
desired. Sir Henry Maine ^ has shown very clearly
that democracy is not yet " triumphant democracy; "
it is stiU an experiment. The American Revolution
determined our right to try it on this continent
without fear of foreign intervention; a civil war
determined our right to try it without fear of do-
mestic disruption. We have still to work the prob-
lem out. Whether a people diverse in race, religion,
and industry can live happily and prosperously to-
gether, with no other law than the invisible law of
right and wrong and with no other authority than
the unarmed authority of conscience, is the question
which America has to solve for the world. No one
class in the community has a more potent influence
in determining what shall be its answer to that ques-
tion than the American clergy.
1 Henry Sumner Maine: Pofpular Government, Essay H, on
" The Nature of Democracy."
CHAPTER VI
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST
The duties of religious ministry in Old Testament
time were discharged by two classes of ministers,
— priests and prophets. The priest conducted public
worship, the prophet furnished religious instruction :
rarely was the same man both priest and prophet.
It is true that the priest sometimes furnished reli-
gious instruction, and the prophets sometimes accom-
panied their prophesyings with music, which may
have been a kind of public worship ; but, speaking
broadly, the conducting of public worship was
carried on by the priests, and religious instruction
and inspiration were furnished by the prophets.
The object of religious worship is the expression
of an existing religious life ; the object of religious
instruction is the impartation of such life. In our
time these two functions are generally united in one
service. By the expression of religious life we help
to promote it ; in promoting religious life we neces-
sarily give expression to it. But they may be, and
in point of fact they often are, differentiated.
Sometimes public worship is without any public
instruction. In most of the cathedrals of Spain,
and in many of those in Italy, there are small
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 167
facilities for public instruction. There is no pul-
pit ; there are no seats for a congregation ; and in
point of fact in many of the larger churches in
those countries no public instruction is given except
during the Lenten season. Thus there is religious
worship without any instruction. On the other hand,
there may be religious instruction without any wor-
ship. There is no indication that there was any
public worship connected with the Sermon on the
Mount ; it is certain that there was no public wor-
ship in connection with Paul's sermon at Athens.
There is held every winter in New York, in Cooper
Union, on Sunday evenings, a series of public reli-
gious addresses. Jew and Christian, Protestant and
Roman Catholic, Churchman and Anarchist, com-
bine to fill Cooper Union Hall fairly fuU ; and under
these circumstances those who arrange for these
meetings think it not wise to have any religious
services. There is no reading of the Scriptures, no
prayer, no singing of hymns ; there is simply a
religious lecture. And the heterogeneous congrega-
tion of non-church-goers assembled and the attention
they give to the more serious discourses justify the
method pursued.
There is no essential reason why any minister
might not in his church maintain this distinction,
and have sometimes a service without any instruc-
tion, and sometimes instruction without any service.
Whether this would be wise or not would depend
upon the condition of the homes in the village or
168 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
town where the church is situated. Ordinarily the
instruction and the worship are better commingled ;
each is better for being connected with the other;
the service is more real and rational if connected
with instruction ; the instruction is more spiritual
and vital if connected with some public worship.
But there is no essential impropriety in having either
without the other.
It is true the best expression of our religious life
is in our conduct, in what we do, not in what we
say. It is also true that the expression of our re-
ligious life which is personal and individual is more
important than that which is public and common.
" When thou prayest," says Christ, " enter into thy
closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to
thy Father which is in secret ; and thy Father, which
seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly." ^ But
those of us who have a common religious life, — a
reverence for God, a hope in God, a responsiveness
toward God, a comfort in God, a love for God,
will inevitably desire to come together and find
some common expression for these common experi-
ences. This is public worship. The most impor-
tant way in which a boy can express his love for
his father is by obedience to his commands. If he
does not show it in that way, aU the other ways are
of little value. The most sacred hour of the week
for him is the hour when he sits down alone with
his father or his mother, and these two talk together
1 Matt, vi, 6.
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 169
confidentially with no one to hear, and speak almost
in whispers, as though they would not even allow
their own ears to hear their own words. But still
the home would be very imperfect were there not
some hours in which the whole family gather to-
gether and interchange their thought and their
feeling, so that their lives flow in one commingled
stream. What these hours of human fellowship in
the family are to the home life, the hours of worship
are to the church life. They are of vital importance.
The minister makes a very great mistake, in my
judgment a fatal mistake, if he thinks his chief
function is to be a preacher of sermons. Certainly
not less important is his function to inspire, direct,
and conduct the worship of a worshiping people.
To do this he has in all Protestant churches three in-
strumentalities, — the distinctively devotional meet-
ing, the Lord's Supper, and the public worship in
the regular Sunday service.
I. Every church ought to have some meeting or
meetings primarily if not exclusively for the ex-
pression of its devotional life. They may be litur-
gical or non-liturgical or a combination of the lit-
urgical and non-liturgical; they may be intermingled
with instruction or exhortation or both, or they may
be exclusively devotional; what is essential is that
their primary object should be, not a teaching of
truth, not an appeal to the emotions or the will, but
an expression of the already existing life of peni-
tence and consecration and praise. And if the
170 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
meeting is devoted to that object, and that object
exclusively, it wiU necessarily be attractive only to
those who possess or desire to possess such spiritual
life, and to share the expression of it with others.
In other words, only those will be attracted to the
purely devotional meeting who are both social and
spiritual, or perhaps I should say who are socially
spiritual.
The descendants of the Puritans have made a
great mistake in measuring devotional meetings by
quantity, not by quality. I confess to that mistake
myself. In my earlier ministry I measured the
spirituality of my church by the size of the prayer-
meeting. If I went back into the ministry, I should
not apply that measure. I should not try to make
the prayer-meeting large, and should not be dis-
couraged because it was small ; I should not urge
the people to attend it from sense of duty, nor try
to draw them to it by purely social attractions. I
should wish to get together on certain occasions
those members of the church who had a spiritual
life to which they wished to give expression in
common with other members of the church, and
only those. If there were three, I would begin with
three ; if thirty, I should be glad of the thirty. If
twenty more should come in who had no spiritual
life, who did not care for the prayer-meeting, and
to whom the prayer-meeting meant nothing, I should
wish them to stay away. I should not wish a for-
eign element in a meeting the object of which is
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 171
not to impart religious life to others but to express
religious life by a common devotion.
A man may be a very good man, lie may be a
profoundly religious man, and not be interested in
a purely devotional meeting. His religious life may
find its expression in his daily acts and in private
devotions. The devotional meeting of the church
may be liturgical, and the liturgy may fail to afford
the expression which fits his temperament ; or it
may be non-liturgical, and his critical temper may
make it impossible for him to preserve a devotional
spirit in spite of the infelicities of expression in
the extemporaneous prayers. No man has any right
to set up his own method of expression of spiritual
life as a standard and then measure all men by that
standard. Neither the Roman Catholic nor the
Episcopal Church has what is ordinarily designated
by the term prayer-meeting. Yet both have devel-
oped high types of devotional life. Nor is it true
that the prayer-meeting is the thermometer of the
Church, if by that phrase is meant that the spirit-
ual life of the Church is to be measured by the
size of the prayer-meeting. The true measure of
the Church is the efficiency of its active service.
Christ has given to his disciples the true measuring
rod : " By their fruits ye shall know them." ^
The difference between the meeting for spiritual
expression and the meeting for public instruction is
very clearly indicated by certain contrasts in the
1 Matt, vu, 20.
172 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
New Testament. The Sermon on the Mount was
delivered to a great concourse. It is an address for
the impartation of religious instruction. The con-
versation of Christ, in the fourteenth, fifteenth, and
sixteenth chapters of John, was an expression of
spiritual life to those who were already in sympathy
with the Master. All others were excluded : Christ
did not begin that conversation with them until the
traitor had gone out. Even more striking is the
contrast between what we call the Lord's Prayer
and the prayer which Christ offered just before his
Passion, as it is reported in the seventeenth chapter
of John. The Lord's Prayer expresses the common
wishes of unspiritual humanity, — for daily bread,
forgiveness of sin, guidance, deliverance from temp-
tation. But when Christ comes to offer prayer in
the innermost circle of his own disciples, he says no-
thing about daily bread, — he assumes his Father's
care for his own ; he says nothing about forgive-
ness of sins, — he assumes that these men have been
forgiven ; he does not ask that they shall not be led
into temptation. The only petition that is in the
Lord's Prayer in Matthew and also in the Lord's
prayer in the seventeenth chapter of John, is the
prayer for deliverance from evil. " I pray not that
thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that
thou shouldest keep them from the Evil One."
And then follows prayer for fellowship with the
Father and fellowship with Jesus Christ his Son,
which will make them one with God as the Father
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 173
and the Son are one with each other. One is a
prayer of Christ and for those who are already in
fellowship with him ; the other voices the common
aspirations of universal humanity.
Public worship may, and in some sense does,
both express and develop the dormant reverence
in the community, so that the life of men who never
attend worship is modified in its spiritual quality
from the mere fact that they dwell in a community
where worshipers dwell and public worship is car-
ried on. Thus the atmosphere of a college where
a wholly voluntary chapel service is maintained,
which is attended by only a minority of the stu-
dents, is different from one which is without any
devotional exercises of any description. It is also
true that public worship often enkindles spiritual
life in those who chance to attend it, without pre-
viously sharing in that life. For both reasons
weekly meetings wholly devotional in their char-
acter may be advantageously maintained, to which
the undevotional may be not only welcomed but
invited or even urged. It is also true that weekly
meetings may well be held in the church for other
than purely devotional purposes. The pastor may
maintain a weekly lecture, or a weekly Bible class,
or a meeting to arouse missionary enthusiasm, or
one for purely social fellowship ; or he may com-
bine two or more of these objects in one meeting,
and that meeting may be held on the same evening
with a purely devotional meeting, either preceding
174 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
or following it. But he makes a mistake if lie al-
lows any meeting to take the place of one purely
devotional in its character ; or if he attempts by
extraneous attractions to draw the unspiritual into
the devotional meeting, or by appeals to a sense
of duty to coerce them into it. " Where two or
three are gathered together in my name, there am
I in the midst of them," says Christ. ^ A fourth
who has not come in Christ's name does not add
to but detracts from the spiritual value of such a
gathering.
II. The Lord's Supper is a memorial service.
" This do in remembrance of me," ^ is a request
rather than a command. Christ wished to be re-
membered. One thing and only one does he ask us
to do for himself ; he says. Do not forget me. And
that you do not forget me, now and again meet to-
gether and take this bread and this wine in memory
of me. The one thing that we can do for Christ
that is not for the service of some one else is our
participation in the Lord's Supper.
But the Lord's Supper is something more than
a memorial. It is an occasion wherein we may
especially feel, if we will, the companionship of our
Lord. He who believes that the benefit of Christ's
presence is purely through a spiritual inspiration,
not through any material or mechanical medium,
cannot accept the doctrine of transubstantiation,
that is, the doctrine that at the moment of con-
1 Matt, xviii, 20. ^ Luke xxii, 19.
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 175
secration the bread and wine are changed into the
" body, blood, soul, and divinity of our Lord." He
who believes that Christ is really present whenever
two or three ar^ gathered together in his name,
cannot believe that he is any more reaUy present
in the Lord's Supper than in any other truly devo-
tional meeting. But we may well believe that the
Lord's Supper affords an occasion wherein those
who participate in it may especially realize, if they
win, the companionship of their Lord. For this
sacred half hour, not merely our pleasures and
cares and customary vocations are removed from
our thoughts, but also our daily duties and respon-
sibilities. Our whole attention is concentrated on
companionship with our Master and our Friend.
We come to this service in a receptive mood of
mind. Our thoughts are directed not to what we
should do, or what we should think, or what we
are, they are not even directed to what we need ; they
are directed away from ourselves altogether to An-
other. The service is one of self-f orgetf ulness because
it is a service of love-remembrance. The meal is itself
a symbol of the fellowship which it both expresses
and cultivates. We do not know a family until we
have taken a meal with them ; but when we have
sat down to the same table with them, in eating
together we come into their family life. The Lord's
Supper we eat with him, and so enter into fellow-
ship with him. This makes it a Lord's Supper. It
is therefore a Eucharist, a thanksgiving. We ought
176 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
not to meet for tlie Lord's Supper with streaming
eyes and heavy hearts, but with thankfulness and
gladness in him. This should be a feast, not a
funeral. And it is a Communion, in which we are
brought close to one another because we are brought
close to him, and the ecclesiastical and theological
and philosophical and temperamental differences
for a little time disappear.
For the same reason that our devotional meetings
should be so arranged that they may be the gather-
ing only of those who are devout of spirit, the
Lord's Supper should be frequently, if not gener-
ally, so arranged as to be a private meeting of loyal
disciples, as the first Lord's Supper was. This
may be done by an early communion, as in the
Episcopal Church, or by a special celebration in
the afternoon, which was the custom in the New
England churches in my boyhood. If it comes at
the close of the morning service, it should be sepa-
rated from that service, and there should be an
opportunity left for those to withdraw who are not
intending to partake of the communion, that it may
be a real communion of those who are already at-
tached to Christ and desire personal, spiritual, and
intimate fellowship with him. It is hardly wise to
put our Sermon on the Mount and our fourteenth,
fifteenth, and sixteenth chapters of John within
the same hour ; if we do, we should certainly leave
a little interim between them.
III. The third instrumentality for the expression
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 177
of devotional life in tlie churcli is the public wor-
ship as a part of the regular Sunday service.
If the Roman Catholics and the Episcopalians
have made relatively too much of the service and
too little of the sermon, the Puritans and their
descendants have made too much of the sermon and
too little of the service. In my boyhood days this
used to be called " preliminary exercises," and still
is sometimes so called, as though it were a kind of
grace before meat — short grace, long meat; for
we come to the table, not for the grace, but for the
food.
The evils of this relegation of the worship to
a secondary place are many and great. The min-
ister gives it scant attention, devotes the week to
his sermon, selects his Scripture reading and his
hymns after he comes into the pulpit, and offers
prayers which fail to hold the thought of the people
because the minister has put no thought upon them
beforehand. The choir leader catches the spirit of
the minister, and treats the music as a kind of
sacred concert — not always very sacred — which
precedes the sermon, as the music of the orchestra
precedes the play, or as an aesthetic device to get
the people to church, as though to get a careless
people inside a sacred edifice were the end and aim
of a religious service. The people catch the spirit
of minister and choir, and think they are in abun-
dant time if they are in their places before the ser-
mon, or take a back seat and slip out as soon as
178 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the music which has attracted them is over. And,
deeper than all, minister, choir master, and people
are trained to think of the worship of Almighty God
as a mere incidental frame-work to a literary com-
position, a portico to the sermon, which is the real
temple, with a consequent worship of the preacher
in lieu of the worship of God, and the expectation
of entertainment from choir and preacher alike, in
lieu of serious thought, glad praise, solemn peni-
tence, and renewed consecration. Nor shall we
banish this fundamental irreverence from our Puri-
tan churches, until we reahze the truth that public
worship is at least as important as public instruc-
tion, and ought to be as highly esteemed, and de-
serves and requires as sincere and serious consid-
eration.
Three elements enter into this public worship ;
the reading of Scripture, the singing of hymns, the
prayer.
The reading of Scripture may be for devotional
purposes or for instructional purposes; that is,
it may be to teach the people something, or
to express their devotional life. And these two are
quite distinct, and must be kept distinct in mind,
though the two may be intermingled in actual prac-
tice. The advantage of the responsive reading of
the Psalms is that no one can think it is for in-
structional purposes ; it carries with it necessarily
the idea that it is devotional, not educational. But
if the minister would read the Scripture so as tP
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 179
make it an instrument for the expression of devo-
tion, the Scripture must first enter into his own
soul. " The words that I speak unto you," says
Christ, " they are spirit and they are life." ^ The
words of Scripture wiU not be spirit, and they will
not be life to the congregation, unless they have
entered into the spirit and life of the reader. He
must know not only how to read so that his congre-
gation can hear, but he must laiow how to read so
that his congregation wiU feel. I am not urging
elocutionary reading, stiU less dramatic reading,
least of aU, theatric reading ; I am urging spiritual
reading.
The musical service ought to be distinctly an
expression of spiritual life. It is not always ; we
might say, it often is not. We ministers find fault
with our choirs, that they are ill-behaved during
the sermon ; the choirs would often have a right
to find fault with the ministers, that they are ill-
behaved during the singing. We take the time of
song to look over our congregation and see who are
present ; to consider whether the house is too warm
or too cold and caU the sexton to set it right ; to
examine our notices and consider how we can most
effectively announce some important meeting; or
to look over the notes of the sermon and refresh
our memories ; in brief, to do anything but join in
the praise of God. I am not indulging in whole-
sale denunciations of ministers; I am confessing
1 John vi, 63.
180 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
faults not uncommon in all non-liturgical pulpits.
I was present once at an ordination in the West
where a home missionaiy, possessed perhaps of more
frankness than prudence, after a long sermon and
a long charge to the congregation, gave out a hymn
in this way : " In order to relieve the tedium of these
exercises we will sing the fifty-fifth hymn, — and
also to the praise and glory of Almighty God." It
was rather too candid and naive a confession of what
is really often in the minds of non-liturgical minis-
ters. Frequently the minister selects a hymn with-
out reading it, thinks it too long, and directs the
omission of a verse quite regardless of the muti-
lating effect. Years ago I heard a minister an-
nounce a hymn in that way, directing us in singing
to omit the second verse ; what we sang was this :
When thou, my righteous Judge, shalt come
To take thy ransomed people home,
Shall I among them stand ?
O Lord, forhid it by thy grace.
I once attended a meeting of the Young Men's
Christian Association in one of our colleges, where
a young man selected for us to sing a baptismal
hymn in which we represented ourselves as bring-
ing our children to Christ to dedicate them to him,
and I suppose I was the only married man in the
room.
Some instruction in hymnology and in sacred
music ought to be given and some study of both
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST . 181
required in aU theological seminaries. It is not
necessary that every minister should be a musician,
but it is very desirable that he should at least have
enough knowledge of music to understand its adap-
tability to the conditions of the service he is con-
ducting. For an evangelistic service carried on
in a hall crowded with tramps and lodging-house
men, the Moody and Sankey hymns are admir-
able. They are adapted to the needs of the kind of
people that are there gathered. But when I go to
a college Young Men's Christian Association, and
" Safe in the arms of Jesus " or " Hallelujah, 't i»
done," is given out to be sung, I know that the
cultivated, educated young men of the coUege are
certain to be repelled by any such form of expres-
sion of religious life, and I am not surprised that
sometimes the men whom the service is intended
to attract remain outside until the singing is over.
The minister ought to know something about hymns ;
he ought to know something about music ; and he
ought to have sympathy with his choir leader. We
shall yet come in the Church of Christ to the con-
clusion that no man can be allowed to lead the wor-
ship of God through the medium of music who is
not himself devout. It is as incongruous that an
undevout choir-master should lead the worship of
God as that an undevout minister should lead it.
And yet in many of our city churches the only ques-
tion asked respecting singer or organist is. Can she
sing? Can he play? As a consequence we do not get
182 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
music that is a vehicle for the carriage of a spiritual
life. How can we, when there is no spiritual life in
the singer to be conveyed ? We get perhaps a good
essay at one end of the church, and a musical per-
formance at the other. That is not worship ; and
it is not religion. " Thou shalt not take the name
of the Lord thy God in vain." ^ I sometimes think
that there is no place where that command is more
violated than in some Christian churches.
The minister is also to conduct the worship of
the congregation by public prayer. In this service
he is preeminently their priest. Some of us have
been inclined to maintain that there is no Christian
priesthood ; that the priesthood has forever passed
away. Certain of the priestly offices have passed
away. The old sacrificial system has gone. There
is no more in our temples the lowing of cattle,
the bleating of lambs, no more the drawn knife,
the rivers of blood, no more sacrificial altars. The
priest is no longer an offerer of sacrifice. It is true
that the whole Roman Catholic Church, and a few
even in the Protestant Church, believe that the
sacrifice is a perpetual sacrifice, and must be offered
Sabbath after Sabbath. I do not need to discuss
the question here. I shall assume that there is no
longer need of a sacrifice to be offered, or a priest
to offer it. But both the priestly office and the
prophetic office remain. What are they ? I call a
priest one whose function it is to interpret man to
1 Exodus XX, 7.
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 183
God ; I caU a prophet one whose function it is to in-
terpret God to man : these two functions constitute
the function of the Christian ministry, and they are
needed to-day as much as ever they were needed.
To interpret man to God — is this needed ? Has
not the veil of the temple been rent ? May not any
one enter into the Holy of Holies ? Is there needed
any mediator between the individual soul and God ?
Is it not the fundamental doctrine of our religion
that every soul can go direct to God, and no man
need ask for the intervention of a sacred order?
Yes, this is all true. And yet we men and women
do need some one to interpret us to God, because
we need some one to interpret us to ourselves. Let
me try and make this clear.
What does a painter do ? He sees beauty where
you and I would fail to see it ; then he puts the
interpretation of that beauty upon the canvas, and
by his painting he not only interprets nature to us,
but he interprets us to ourselves. He gives us new
eyes ; he gives us a new sense, a new perception of
beauty. We are educated, because that which was
deep down in us is uncovered, revealed, opened out
to us, and we see through his eyes, because he with
his brush has spoken to us. We are all musicians.
You cannot play a note ; you cannot make a chord ;
you know nothing whatever about the laws of har-
mony. Nevertheless, you are a musician. If you
were not, you would care nothing for the singing
of the birds, nothing for the dance music, nothing
184 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
for the churclL choral — and we all like one or the
other. You are a musician though you cannot com-
pose music. The musician who creates music by
his fingers or by his voice, interprets the music to
you, and interprets you to yourself, — evokes the
music in you, makes you hear who before could not
hear, makes you realize what before you could not
realize. What we cannot hear the musician hears,
though there is no music played, and transcribes on
the piano what he has heard with the invisible ear.
You and I lack the invisible ear ; but the man who
plays on the piano and the woman who sings, create,
the one with her voice, the other with the instru-
ment, the hearing ear, and we are interpreted to
ourselves, and find that we are musicians though we
did not know it. So we are all poets, though most
of us have the sense not to try to write rhymes.
There is poetry in all men, and we take our Words-
worth, our Tennyson, our Browning, our Dante, our
village poet it may be, and there is something in that
poetry which appeals to us, evokes something we
were not conscious of. Deep down below our visible
self there is a hidden seK, and the poet brings that
out, and when he speaks, we say, " Yes, I see the
beauty which I saw not before."
So we men and women, weary and worn or
glad and joyous, come to our church on Sunday
morning, and we do not know ourselves. This man
has sinned, has thrown away his opportunities, has
violated the law of love, has been selfish with his
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 185
employers, been unfaithful in his work, been cross
with his wife, been unjust with his children, and
he does not know it. He has what he calls " the
blues." It is a little, secret, uninterpreted, unin-
telligible remorse, and he brings it with him to
church. By his side there sits a mother. God has
reached down out of heaven the arms of his love,
and has taken the child from her to himself ; she
always thought she believed in immortality, and
now for a little time she hardly knows whether her
babe is living or dead. In the next pew is a young
bride, fuU of all the joy of love, glad, joyous,
thankful, and yet she does not know that she is
thankful. What this sinner with his heart bur-
dened by unconscious remorse, what this mother
shadowed by a half-scepticism, what this bride full
of a glad, uninterpreted joyousness desires, is some
one in this pulpit to interpret themselves to them-
selves, and so interpret them to their God. What
they want is some man who shall so say, " We have
erred and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep," ^
that this man haK-conscious of his guilt shall say
to himself, " That is it ; I have so erred ; " who
shaU so say, " I am the resurrection and the life," 2
that this woman who cannot see the truth for her
tears shall wipe them away and say, " He is ; "
shall so say, " We give thanks to thee, thou Giver
of every good and perfect gift," that this half-
grateful bride shall say, " My love, he gave it to
^ The Book of Common Prayer. 2 John xi, 25.
186 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
me." The minister ought to be an artist, a musician,
a poet, that is, a priest. He ought to know how to
interpret the unutterable experiences of men, first
to themselves, and then, through that expression
and interpretation, to God. This not because God
is afar off, that only a few holy men can approach
him ; but because men, busy with the toil and care
of life, have not time to think, or suppose that
they have not time, and perhaps have not unaided
the ability, to think themselves out, to enter into
their own nature, to interpret that which is deepest
and best in them. They need an interpreter. The
Church ought to be a place where we come to lay
all our burdens, whether of sorrow, of sin, of duty,
or of joy, at the feet of our Lord. We want some
man to lead us to him and speak for us, and so
teach us to speak for ourselves.
If the minister is to fulfill this function of priest,
if he is to interpret the people to God, first of all he
must imderstand what is in the people. It is said
of Christ that he knew what was in men. Every
minister ought to know what is in men. We need
to know our congregation better than they know
themselves. We need to know those hidden expe-
riences which they conceal from one another, and
which they conceal from themselves. We must be
able to see the soul through the eye, the trembling
of the voice, the very silence ; we ought to be able
to penetrate their mask — not in order curiously to
discern the secrets of men, but to help their needs,
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 187
on the assumption that men do not know their own
deepest selves, and require some one to interpret
themselves to themselves, and so to interpret them
to their God.
But it is not enough for the minister to under-
stand these deep experiences ; he must learn how
to carry them to God. How? By reading devo-
tional literature ? By reading prayers ? By writing
prayers ? That has only to do with the mere mecha-
nism, that is the mere supplementary work. No
minister ever leads a congregation in public devo-
tion who is not accustomed to go to God in private
prayer with that congregation in his heart. When
he knows what his people are, when he knows who
they are, when he knows what secret life they hide
in this masquerade that we call life, when he has
been accustomed daily on his knees in his closet
to carry their sorrows and burdens to his Father, —
then when he comes into the church he will find
the way easy, and they wiU find the way easy.
Sometimes we come to church and our minister
addresses to us an eloquent oration which he calls
a prayer ; sometimes he gives us a lecture on the-
ology which he calls a prayer ; sometimes he nar-
rates the gossip of the village, which he calls a
prayer; sometimes he gives instructions to the
Almighty which he calls a prayer ; and when he
goes stumbling through a wood that he has never
walked in before, the trees not even blazed, nor the
imderbrush taken away, we refuse to follow him^
188 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
and our thoughts go everywhither. But when he
comes on Sunday bearing our burdens on his heart,
because he has borne them all the week ; when he
comes ready to carry them to the Father now, be-
cause he has carried them to the Father all the
week ; when he comes walking on the highway his
faith has made plain and simple for him, he has
made the pathway for us, and we follow where he
leads, though we can scarcely creep.
It does not come within the province of this
volume to discuss the relative advantages of litur-
gical and non-liturgical services. I have never
been able to see why the two forms of service
should be regarded as mutually exclusive. Why
should not the liturgical churches encourage the
use of extemporaneous prayers without discontinu-
ing the use of a noble liturgy ? Why should not
the non-liturgical churches encourage the use of a
liturgy without abandoning the advantage afforded
by extemporaneous prayers? That there are ad-
vantages in both the liturgical and the non-liturgical
service appears to the unprejudiced inquirer beyond
reasonable question. There are certain spiritual
experiences which are constantly repeated and which
may therefore well find their expression in forms
constantly used. Such are the experiences of re-
pentance and gratitude expressed in the General
Confession and General Thanksgiving of the Book
of Common Prayer, and the desires in which every
congregation may well be expected to unite in
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 189
every Sunday service for tlie Nation and the
Church. There is a distinct advantage in a common
phraseology for the expression of these common
experiences. The congregation can audibly unite
in them. Even if they do not do so, they are not
curious to see what new phraseology the minister
will employ to express the life which he expressed
in a different form last Sunday. The minister is
not brought under pressure to vary the form for
the expression of the same life. Awkwardness and
infelicities of expression are avoided. Forgetfulness
never intervenes to omit from the service those
elements of spiritual experience which ought to find
utterance on every occasion of public worship. The
imagination is appealed to by the fact that on the
same day other worshiping assemblies in this and
other lands are speaking to the Father of the same
experience and in the same words. This unity of
expression both emphasizes and promotes that
imity of life which is the root out of which alone
true church unity can grow. And the fact that
the same life has found the same expression
through many centuries of Christian experience
preserves an historic unity because it affords a
living demonstration that the life of God in the
soul of man is essentially the same despite all
changes of theological and ecclesiastical organiza-
tion. Finally, a catholic Church (and every Chris-
tian Church should seek to be a catholic Church)
ought to aim to provide in its service for men of
190 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
every temperament ; and in our Puritan congrega-
tions there are apparently an increasing number
who share the opinion which Dr. Rainsford has so
well expressed in his autobiography :
I cannot conceive of any man, whose religious life
is earnest, who does not find himself more comforted
and uplifted by the use of written prayers, especially
when he has a collection of the best prayers of the ages.
Personally I find more rest to the soul and more ease
of worship in following along lines which we know per-
fectly well and which help me to express what I feel.
To the educated spiritual consciousness I do not believe
there is any special appeal in variety of extemporaneous
prayers. If all men prayed always as some men pray
sometimes, then we might do away with the Liturgy ;
but they do not.^
On the other hand there are great advantages in
extemporaneous prayer. There frequently occur in
the parish experiences for which no liturgy can
possibly afford adequate expression and which in a
Church shut up to a liturgy remain unexpressed.
This truth is recognized by some of the wisest and
most devoted adherents of a liturgical service. Says
Cannon Liddon :
Although as a general rule it is wise in praying with
the sick and poor to use only the Church's words, there
are occasions when extempore prayer becomes a matter of
necessity. It is impossible, or almost so, that the research
of the parish priest should have been able to anticipate
every variety of mental and moral weakness by his selec-
1 William S. Rainsford : A Preacher's Story of His Work, p. 146.
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 191
tions from the copious stores of antiquity ; and the risk
of using general language when there is need of pointed
applicability to ar particular case is very great. A soul
must be led to God, not under cover of a general for-
mula, but, as she is, in His Presence.^
It is not only with the sick and poor that extem-
pore prayer becomes a necessity. The devout min-
ister who is accustomed to study, not merely the
social and ethical conditions of his parish, but its
spiritual life, and to carry the needs of that life to
God in petition, or the amplitude of that life to
God in thanksgiving, to whom, in short, interces-
sory prayer is the continuous experience of his life,
will find every week some phases of life in his con-
gregation, not purely individualistic, but typical
and measurably common, to which he will wish to
give expression in the Sunday service, and for
which no research can find expression in " the
stores of antiquity." If by the rule of his Church
or by his own habit, he is denied the opportunity
to give expression in extemporaneous prayer to
such experiences, not only is his own life denied
its best development, but his congregation also
loses that inspiration which freedom and genuine-
ness of expression always affords. In such cases
even the liturgy itself is in danger of becoming
lifeless. The danger of exclusive use of forms in
public devotion is a resultant tendency to for-
malism. Says Henry Ward Beecher, " The man
1 H. P. Liddon: Clerical Life and Work, p. 36.
192 THE CHKISTIAN MINISTRY
that merely comes to administer ordinances on
Sundays or Saints' Days, who goes through a regu-
lar routine, is nothing but an engineer who runs a
machine." ^ That he is in danger of becoming such
an engineer the history of the Christian Church
abundantly demonstrates. The remedy for this
peril would be found in the habitual use of extem-
poraneous and spontaneous prayer to supplement
the more obvious and generic expressions of spirit-
ual life furnished by the historical liturgy.
And this suggests the second advantage in the
use of extemporaneous prayer, an advantage inti-
mated by Dr. Eainsford in one sentence in the
paragraph quoted above: "If all men prayed al-
ways as some men pray sometimes." The Church
ought to furnish opportunity for the some men to
pray as they can sometimes. It ought to do more ;
it ought to develop in its ministry this power of
spontaneous prayer. It is impossible to doubt that
the Church and the worshiping congregation has
suffered a real loss, not only in its expression of
life but in life itseK, because such men as Dr.
Rainsford and Phillips Brooks have been trained
not to lead their great congregations through the
medium of their own spontaneous expression of
their own distinctive yet thoroughly human and
catholic spiritual experience. The extemporaneous
expression of that experience would itself have in-
spired a like experience in the hearts of others. If
^ Henry Ward Beecher : Lectures on Preaching, i, 16,
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 193
all public prayer had been limited to those fur-
nished by the Church, we should have no such book
of devotions s^ the " Prayers of the Ages ; " we
should not have the prayer of Paul for his friends
and companions given in the third chapter of
Ephesians, nor the intercessory prayer of Jesus
Christ given in the seventeenth chapter of John,
nor, indeed, the prayers in the Book of Common
Prayer ; for these, like all true liturgies, grew out
of original acts of free, spontaneous devotion. What
the Church and the ministry loses of deep spiritual
experience may be best illustrated by a single
quotation expressive of the experience of one min-
ister, whose spiritual power in public prayer was
no less than his more widely advertised power in
public speech. Says Henry Ward Beecher :
I can bear this witness, that never in the study, in
the most absorbed moments; never on the street, in
those chance inspirations that everybody is subject to,
when I am Uf ted up highest ; never in any company,
where friends are the sweetest and dearest, — never in
any circumstances in life is there anything that is to me
so touching as when I stand, in ordinary good health,
before my great congregation to pray for them. Hun-
dreds and hundreds of times, as I rose to pray and
glanced at the congregation, I could not keep back the
tears. There came to my mind such a sense of their
wants, there were so many hidden sorrows, there were
80 many weights and burdens, there were so many
doubts, there were so many states of weakness, there
were so many dangers, so many perils, there were such
194 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
histories, — not world histories, but eternal world his-
tories, — I had such a sense of compassion for them,
my soul so longed for them, that it seemed to me as if I
could scarcely open my mouth to speak for them. And
when I take my people and carry them before God to
plead for them^ I never plead for myself as I do for
them, — I never could. Indeed, I sometimes, as I have
said, hardly feel as if I had anything to ask ; but oh,
when I know what is going on in the heart of my peo-
ple, and I am permitted to stand to lead them, to in-
spire their thought and feeling, and go into the presence
of God, there is no time that Jesus is so crowned with
glory as then ! There is no time that I ever get so far
into heaven. I can see my mother there ; I see again
my little children ; I walk again, arm in arm with those
who have been my companions and co-workers. I for-
get the body, I live in the spirit ; and it seems as if God
permitted me to lay my hand on the very Tree of Life,
and to shake down from it both leaves and fruit for the
healing of my people ! ^
That every minister can attain such an experi-
ence as that here described is not to be expected ;
but every minister may have something analogous
to it. And to me it is hardly conceivable that the
exclusive use of a liturgy should produce such an
experience, and as Canon Liddon has said, in the
article quoted above, no liturgy can give adequate
expression to it.
Whether the minister uses a liturgy or extempore
prayer or both, he must be a priest, that is, he must
1 Hexiry Ward Beecher : Lectures on Preaching, ii, 46, 47.
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 195
by prayer interpret the experiences of Lis congre-
gation both to themselves and to God. And to do
this he must understand the experiences of his con-
gregation by sharing those experiences with them.
Without this participation in their spiritual life he
can be no true priest ; he is at best only a " pray-
ing machine." He may think he uses extempore
prayers and yet repeat well-worn phrases Sunday
after Sunday, using devotional forms which have
all the disadvantages and none of the advantages
of an historic liturgy. He may every Sunday vio-
late the injunction of Jesus Christ, " Use not vain
repetitions, as the heathen do." ^ In that case his
careless prayers wiU be a weariness to his congre-
gation and an offense to God. Or he may study
through the week the spiritual life of his commu-
nity, he may habitually carry those experiences to
God in intercessory prayer for his people, his expe-
rience throughout the week may repeat that of the
Apostle Paul, " Without ceasing I make mention
of you always in my prayers ; " ^ in which case his
public prayers will be true prayers, not iU-disguised
addresses to his congregation; and the congrega-
tion will forget to be critical of the form of peti-
tions when those petitions reveal to themselves the
unknown deeps of their own nature. No less he
may be a mechanical administrator of a liturgy, —
1 Matt, vi, 7.
2 Rom. i, 9; comp. Eph. i, 16j 1 Thess. i, 2; 2 Tim. i, 3;
Phile. 4.
196 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
" nothing but an engineer who runs a machine ; "
he may read prayers emptied of all devotion, —
prayers, not prayer, hurrying through them as
though the sooner ended the better the service. Or
he may pour into that confession of sin, that prayer
of thanksgiving, that longing for national weKare
and for the unity of the Church, a heart surcharged
with all the spiritual desires of the ages. And as
he prays, he may realize that a congregation greater
than any man can number are joining with him in
these expressions of penitence and gratitude and
spiritual desire, and that he is walking with them
on a great highway weU trodden by the feet of the
centuries.
The minister, whether offering extemporaneous
prayer or using a familiar liturgy, has no higher
function than this : to interpret our souls to our-
selves and so express to God, for us and with us,
our unexpressed spiritual experiences. Jacob, afraid
of his brother's just wrath, fled away from the
scene of his sin, and laid himself down to sleep
with his head pillowed on the stones, careless of
his cheated father, his wronged brother, his lonely
mother, his offended God ; and as he slept he
dreamed ; and in his dreams " behold, a ladder set
up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven :
and behold, the angels of God ascending and de-
scending on it." And when he waked, of his pillow-
stones he made an altar, saying, " Surely the Lord
is in this place, and I knew it not." ^ Out of our
1 Gen. xxviii, 10-22.
THE MINISTER AS PRIEST 197
petty lives, our short-lived triumplis, our discour-
aging defeats, our embittered enmities, and our
disappointiQg fiHendships, out of our sins and our
sorrows, forgetful of ourselves and of our God, and
in spiritual unconsciousness of what we have done,
and who we are and what our needs, we come to
the House of God ; and we want our minister to
put that ladder of prayer before us that we may
see it and may see the God-inspired prayers as-
cending and the God-given answers descending;
and when at last the strains of the organ die away
and we go back to our busy lives, the words upon
our lips shall be, not, " What an eloquent preacher
we heard to-day ! " but, " God is in this world, and
though I knew it not I know it now, for God's
voice, speaking in the heart of the great congrega-
tion and in my own heart, has been interpreted to
me by his priest."
CHAPTER VII
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRX
Religion is the life of God in the soul of man,
and the function of the minister is to impart this
life to the individual and to disseminate this life
through the community. He cannot impart this
life to the individual nor disseminate it through the
community unless he possesses it himself. It is dif-
ficult, perhaps impossible, to define this life of God
in the soul of man. But Paul has described its fruits.
" The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suf-
fering, gentleness, serviceableness, fidelity, meekness,
seK-control." 1 The minister cannot impart these
virtues to others unless he possesses them himself ;
and his power to impart them wiU be in the ratio
in which he does possess them. He must have that
companionship with the Father which is the essence^
of faith, that glad expectation for the race, through
the redeeming love of God in Jesus Christ, which
is the essence of hope, and that good-wiU toward aU
men of every condition and character, which is the
essence of love, or he cannot bring other men into
the realization of this hope through this companion-
ship with the Father. He need not necessarily have
1 Gal. V, 22, 23.
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 199
an emotional nature, though restrained and regu-
lated emotion will add to his power ; he need not ;
necessarily possess spiritual vision, though imagina-
tion inspired by devotion and guided by reason will
add to his power ; but he must have this life of God
in his own soul or he cannot give this life to the
souls of others.
It is in vain for him to attempt to deceive him-
seK by sedulously cultivating the impression that
he can borrow his power from the Bible or the
Church without possessing himself that life which
has made the Bible and the Church powerful. He
cannot even interpret the Bible without some pos-
session of that experience which the Bible portrays.
One cannot teach geography to a class of children
if he does not know what the sea or the mountain
is. Words are but symbols : he must know what
these symbols stand for or he cannot impart the
knowledge to the pupil. So he must know what the
words in the Bible stand for. He cannot interpret
such a promise as this, " Who forgiveth all thine
iniquities, who healeth aU thy diseases, who redeem-
eth thy life from destruction, who crowneth thee
with loving-kindness and tender mercies," ^ unless
he knows what it is to have iniquity forgiven, dis-
ease healed, life redeemed, the coronation of God's
loving-kindness and tender mercies. Without this
knowledge of the inward experience, his repetition
of the words is but the preaching of a phonograph
^ Psalm ciii; 3, 4.
200 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
or a parrot. He cannot interpret the Cliurcli unless
he has that spiritual experience which has bound
the Church together and, despite its various forms
and creeds, has made it truly one. The minister is
not a voice crying in the wilderness, — he is one of
a great body of men and women who through the
ages in increasing numbers have been bearing wit-
ness to the Living Christ redeeming the world ; he is
one of a great spiritual apostolical succession, the
succession of those on whom Christ has breathed,
to whom he has imparted his spirit, and on
whom he has laid his commission. But he cannot
witness for them unless he shares their experience.
No theological education, no laying on of hands,
will suffice to make the minister an interpreter of
the Church unless he is made one in the body of
Christ by that Christian experience which makes
the Church one. He cannot, for example, give that
Gospel message of the Church, " He pardoneth and
absolveth all those who truly repent and unfeign-
edly believe his holy Gospel," ^ unless he knows
what it is truly to repent, what it is unfeignedly to
believe the Gospel, and what it is to feel the burden
of sin lifted from his shoulders and himself set
free. Spiritual experience must be a reality to the
minister if he would interpret truly either the Bible
or the Church ; and his real power wiU be in the
ratio of the reality and simplicity of this spiritual
experience. This is what Paul means by the de-
* The Book of Common Prayer.
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 201
claration, " Let us prophesy according to the pro-
portion of faith ; " this is what Christ means by the
promise, "Ye shall receive power after that the
Holy Ghost is come upon you." ^
But possessing this spiritual power is not alone /
enough : the minister must be able to impart it. v
He cannot impart it if he does not possess it, but
he may possess it and yet be unable to impart it.
His constitution and temperament may be such
that he can impart it only incidentally, by his life
and example; he may be without power to give
direct verbal effective expression to it : then he does
not belong in the ministry. Piety or godliness is
essential to success in the Christian ministry, but
piety or godliness is not sufficient for the Christian
ministry without other qualifications. Is it possible
to analyze this ability to impart life, to see what
are the elements of which this ability is composed ?
I think it transcends complete analysis. There is
something mystical in what we call sometimes per-
sonality, sometimes magnetism. It is in no small
measure a gift, gained, acquired, or bestowed we
know not how. But it is possible for one to culti-
' vate the gift that is in him ; and to do this he must
at least endeavor to see what is the nature of this
gift, what are its constituent elements, and how it
can be cultivated.
Essential to this capacity to impart spiritual life
is a clearly marked, well defined, eagerly earnest de-
^ Rom. xii, 6 ; Acts i, 8. See chap. i.
202 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
sire to impart it. For success in the Christian min-
istry the minister must be inspired by an ambition
to make men sharers of his life, to bring men into
fellowship with God through Jesus Christ, to take
a direct personal share in the great historic move-
ment for the world's redemption, to transform so-
ciety by the impartation of the Christ spirit into
the Kingdom of God. The minister must be a
messenger ; he must be an apostle ; he must have an
experience which enables him at least to understand
the saying of Malachi, that the priest " is the mes-
senger of the Lord of Hosts," an experience which
will give him something of the certitude of Paul,
" called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the
will of God." ^ It is this experience of a commission
received to be fulfilled, of a message received to be
delivered, of a life received to be imparted, which
distinguishes the preacher from the mere teacher.^
No man can go to a theological seminary and
get from that seminary a theological system, or an
understanding of the Bible in its literary and ethi-
cal and theological aspects, and then go out and
impart to men what the seminary has imparted to
him, and expect success. He cannot purchase from '
the seminary, as from a jobbing-house, the goods
which afterwards he will deliver to his congregation
as a retailer. This is, indeed, in a measure true of
all education. We call a doctor, not to tell us what
1 Mai. ii, 7; 1 Cor. i, 1 ; Rom. i, 1.
2 See chap, iv, pp. 114-118.
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 203
he has learned of anatomy, but to set the broken,
bone ; the lawyer, not to teU us what he has learned
concerning contracts, but to draw for us a contract
which will stand the test of time. So we go to the
minister, not to learn what he knows about the
Bible, or what he knows about theology, but to
receive from him a ministry of life, a healing for a
broken heai-t, or a bond of union with our fellow
men which will stand the test of life's temptations.
This impulse or purpose in the minister must be an
interior impulse. It may be awakened by influence
from without, but no influence from without can
take its place. For this reason I am more than
doubtful about the wisdom of addresses to young
men in coUege urging upon them the duty of enter- j
ing the ministry, or influences by father and mother ;
to send them into the ministerial profession. I would
rather put obstacles in their way than clear the way
of obstacles. I would rather repeat to them Christ's
warning to his disciples : " The servant is not greater
than his Lord. If they have persecuted me, they will
also persecute you." I would rather bid them ponder
the question which Christ put to James and John :
" Are ye able to drink of the cup that I shall drink
of, and to be baptized with the baptism that I am
baptized with ? " ^ I am inclined to say, even at the
hazard of being misunderstood, that no man should
go into the ministry if he can satisfy his own con-
science and his own heart in any other vocation.
1 John XV, 20 ; Matt, x, 24, 25 ; xx, 22.
204 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
This object, to give to the world the message
which has been given to him, to impart to the
world the life which has been imparted to him, if
it be real and vital, not fictitious and assumed, wiU
affect all his life. He will be a minister of the
life of God, a messenger preparing the way of the
Lord, an apostle by the wiU of God wherever he
goes. He will not put on the ministerial character
with his robe or his frock coat when he goes into
the pulpit and lay it off when he comes out. He
wiU be possessed by a divine enthusiasm, which will
color all his thinking, inspire all his action, and di-
rect and determine all his life. As executive head
of a working church, he will direct its activities, not
for the purpose of building up a great organization,
but for the purpose of building up the Kingdom of
God ; as pastor, he will not be a merely social caUer
and talker of small talk, he will carry the spirit of
faith and hope and love with him into every home
he enters, the benediction of his presence will mean
immeasurably more than the formal benediction
which he pronounces at the close of the church ser-
vice, and his preaching wiU derive its power from
this identification of his official message with his
daily life, and the witness of his daily life to the
tnith and reality of his message. Says the Rev.
J. E. C. WeUdon :
In sermons personality is everything. It is not so
much what the preacher says as what he is that makes
his sermon. Personality, it is true, may affect preach-
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 205
ing in more ways than one. A village priest, let me
suppose, has lived many years among his people; his
home is theirs, his interests are theirs ; he has baptized
the children of the village and seen them grow up, he
has married them, and some of them he has laid in the
grave ; there is not a family whose history he does not
know, there is not a cottage within whose walls he is
not a welcome and frequent visitor ; he has shared his
people's hopes and fears, their joys and sorrows ; he has
been the recipient of their confidences, he is their neigh-
bor, their adviser, their friend ; he has exemplified in
his rectory or vicarage what Coleridge calls "the one
idyll of English life." How is it possible that they
should distinguish his sermon from his life ? It comes
to them fraught with a thousand memories of kindness
and sympathy and help in hours of need. Such a man's
life is his sermon ; his sermon is his Hf e. When he en-
ters the pulpit the congregation who listen to him care
not to ask if he is eloquent or forcible in his preaching.
It is enough that he is their well-known, long-tried pastor,
and his sermons are stamped with the indelible impression
of his ministry. Because this is so, it would undoubtedly
prove a loss to take away the right of preaching from
the parochial clergy and confine it to certain preaching
orders. Whether these clergy preach well or ill, nobody
can preach to their congregations so well as they.^
Let me not be misunderstood. I am not urging
that the minister should never forget that he is a
minister ; I would rather say that he should never
remember that he is one. Self-consciousness is
^ J. E. C. Welldon : Nineteenth Century and After. Reprinted
in The Living Age, Oct. 29, 1904.
206 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
perilous to success in any profession ; nowhere is it
y^ so perilous to success as in the ministerial profes-
sion. The bane of the pulpit is professionalism, —
not hypocrisy, not deliberate false pretense, but the
saying of a thing because it ought to be said, not
because the heart prompts the speaker to say it.
The minister should never be professional, — neither
in the pulpit nor out of it. But he should not be a
minister at all unless his whole nature, his execu-
tive ability, his social sympathies, his intellectual
processes, his aesthetic tastes, his imagination, his
ambition, his affections, are all pervaded by the
spirit which rejoices in the fellowship of the Great
Companion, made companionable to him through
Jesus Christ, and by an overmastering desire to
impart this companionship, and the life which it
brings, to his fellow men.
This passion to impart to the men about him the
life of God will make him a living man among liv-
ing men. It will make him share the spirit, sym-
pathize with the thinking, talk the language of the
twentieth century. He may hold to the old the-
ology or to a new theology, but whatever instru-
ment he uses, he will use it for the purpose of
bringing the truth of God into the life of his own
time, and he wiU speak to his own age and genera-
tion. He will understand the problems of his own
time, spiritual, ethical, social, political, and will
deal with them ; not becausjB they are problems, but
because they are part of the life of living men and
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 207
women. In this respect he wiU follow the example
which is set for him by the biblical writers. The
Bible is a book' for all time, because every writer
in it wrote for his own time, — Moses for a people
just emancipated from slavery, Isaiah for a people
threatened with dire punishment for aggravated
sins, Ezekiel for a people in captivity, Paul for a
people that were passing out of Hebrew into Greek
life. Every one of its writers ministered to his own
age, and therefore to aU ages.
This passion for men wiU also make the minister
a minister to his own congregation. He wiU study
their wants and seek to understand their lives, that
he may minister to them. If he is preaching to a
commercial congregation, ignorant of and indiffer-
ent to the intellectual perplexities of the scholastic
community, he will not preach on Herbert Spencer
and Evolution ; he will not give to Corinth the ser-
mon which last year he preached at Athens. If he
is preaching to a radical congregation, whose whole
idea of religion is summed up in the Golden Rule,
he will study how he can effect in them a simple,
unaffected, and sincere piety. If he is preaching to
a devout congregation, whose religion has chiefly
consisted in prayer and praise, and who have never
brought their religious reverence to bear on the
common affairs of life, he will study how he can
make them see that to obey is better than sacri-
fice, that to do the will of Christ in daily life is
better than to say to him, " Lord, Lord."
208 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
This enthusiasm of humanity, while giving pur-
pose and direction to the whole life, wiU give dis-
tinctive character to each sermon. The first con-
dition of an effective sermon is a definite object.
Mark the difference between subject and object.
In preparing a sermon the minister should define
his object in his own mind before he select either
his subject or his text. What do I want to accom-
plish this Simday morning, in this congregation,
with this discourse ? This is the first question for
the preacher to ask himself. When a lawyer goes
before a jury, it is not in order to give them a lec-
ture on justice, but to win from them a verdict for
his client. When a public speaker goes before an
audience in a political campaign, it is not to instruct
them upon the general question of the tariff, — it
is to get votes for the Eepublican or the Demo-
cratic candidate. The minister should learn a les-
son from the lawyer and the political speaker. He
should regard his congregation as a jury whose
verdict he seeks to secure, as citizens whose vote
he is determined to obtain. Psychologically speak-
ing, he should address himself to the will, as the
citadel of the character, and count no sermon a
success which does not at least aim to achieve
either some new resolution or some strengthening
of a good resolution already formed. Mr. Glad-
stone has put this principle very clearly in a con-
trast which he draws between English and Italian
preaching :
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 209
The fundamental distinction between English and
Italian preaching is, I think, this : The mind of the Eng-
lish preacher, or reader of sermons, however impressive,
is fixed mainly upon his composition, that of the Italian
on his hearers. The Italian is a man applying himself
by his rational and persuasive organs to men, in order to
move them ; the former is a man applying himself, with
his best ability in many cases, to a fixed form of matter,
in order to make it move those whom he addresses. The
action in the one case is warm, living, direct, immediate,
from heart to heart ; in the other it is transfused through
a medium comparatively torpid. The first is surely far
superior to the second in truth and reality. The preacher
bears an awful message. Such messengers, if sent with
authority, are too much identified with, and possessed
by, that which they carry, to view it objectively during
its delivery, — it absorbs their very being and all its
energies ; they are their message, and they see nothing
extrinsic to themselves except those to whoSe hearts they
desire to bring it. In truth, what we want is the follow-
ing of nature, and her genial development.^
It is this definiteness of object which distinguishes
the sermon from the essay, and which makes some
pulpit addresses which would be interesting essays,
hopelessly ineffective as sermons. Some years ago I
heard a sermon on Methuselah. The preacher ex-
plained to us that Methuselah lived for 969 years,
and then he proceeded to tell us how much Methu-
selah would have seen if he had come to the end of
his life the year in which the preacher was preaching
his sermon. With this as his thread, the preacher
1 Quoted by John Morley, Life of Gladstone, i, 174.
210 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
gave us a pictorial history of the English people
from about the time of Alfred the Great to the
present day. As an essay it might have been charm-
ing, but cui bono f It did nothing to help the men
and women before him to live better lives. As a
sermon it was worthless. A friend some years ago
attending service with her brother, who was in a
large boarding-school, had her attention called by
him to the congregation to which the minister was
preaching. There were fifty or sixty boys from ten
to fifteen years of age, the rest of the congregation
was made up of fathers, mothers, grandfathers, and
grandmothers ; and the minister was preaching —
on how to select a wife. The subject had probably
been suggested to him either by some book which he
had read or some experience which he was approach-
ing ; but it did not concern his congregation. The
sermon was an aimless sermon; and an aimless
sermon is always a useless sermon.
This is the fatal defect with what I may call
pretty sermons, sermons which are literary essays,
sermons which are the product of the minister's
consciousness that he has to preach next Sunday
and therefore must "get up a sermon." Under
this pressure, he takes from the Bible as his text,
"His righteousness is like the great mountains."
Then he takes down Michelet and reads for an hour
on the mountains. Next he gets out his cyclopedia
of illustrations, to find some bits of classic prose,
or fine poetry, about the mountains. Then he begins
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 211
to write his sermon. The mountains are strong:
God's righteousness is strong. The mountains are
high : God's righteousness is exalted above the plane
of ordinary human righteousness. The mountains
are white and pure ; God's righteousness is always
pure and unsullied. The mountains supply the
valleys with water : God's righteousness is a feed-
ing, watering, life-giving righteousness. Under each
head of this discourse he works in a bit of poetry
from his dictionary of poetical quotations ; and his
sermon is done. It is a pretty bit of literature,
but it is preached with a fictitious earnestness and
listened to with a languid interest. This is one way
to make a sermon. His neighbor sees in imagina-
tion his congregation before him. He has entered
into their life, he realizes their temptations, he sees
that their great need is a new inspiration to right-
eousness, righteousness like that of God, — strong,
high, pure, life-giving. Their life depends upon
their possession of this righteousness — Hfe here,
life hereafter. What can he do to impart something
of this life-giving righteousness to them? This is
the problem which confronts him and with which
he wrestles ; and if he goes to Michelet, or to his
dictionary of poetical quotations, or to his Bible,
it is not for a subject, it is for the material which
wiU enable him better to confer on a people whom
he loves the power which they need.
If the sermon has this fundamental quality, if it
is bom of an intense faith in the truth of God, and
212 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
an intense sympathy for men who need that truth
as an equipment for their own life, it will have two
other qualities, — life and brevity. A sermon should
never be a lake, it should be a river ; it should have
movement; a terminus a quo^ and a terminus ad
queni. If the minister in preparing his sermon has a
definite object in view, all his thinking will naturally
concentrate itself on the accomplishment of that
object, and the sermon will move with increasing
power toward the ultimate, and by the preacher
before-perceived, result. This quality of life, or
movement, is more than mere logical continuity. In
a chain, each link depends upon and is fastened
into the preceding link, but the last link does not
differ in size from those which preceded it ; but
each contributing stream adds to the volume and
force of the river. The sermon should be a river,
not a chain. It should be so constructed that every
new thought should not only conduct to the ultimate
conclusion, but should reinforce the considerations
previously educed : for the object of the sermon is
not merely to convince the understanding, it is to
transform life ; and its value depends, therefore, not
merely upon its logical completeness, but upon its
reinforcing power. The object of the sermon on
sin is not to convince the congregation of the generic
fact of human sinfulness, — it is to lead each man
in the congregation to cry out, " God be merciful
to me a sinner I " The sermon on the forgiving love
of God has for its object, not merely to convince
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 213
the congregation that God does forgive sin, but
to lead each burdened soul in the congregation to
come to God for forgiveness ; and the whole sermon
from its opening text to its last sentence should be
shaped and fashioned for this purpose. The perora-
tion, so called, should be the natural consummation
of a discourse which in every paragraph grows
wider and deeper and more forceful to the end.
And this quality of vitality imparted by definite-
ness of spiritual purpose will prevent the preacher
from imposing on the patience of his hearers. How
long should a sermon be ? This is like asking how
large should a gateway be. The size demanded of
the gateway depends on the size of the load to be
carried through ; the length of the sermon depends
on the largeness of the idea of which it is a vehicle.
People do not object to long sermons, they object
to lengthy sermons. If what the minister wants to
say can be said in three minutes, the sermon is too
long if it takes four minutes. If the minister is
full of a theme which for its adequate presentation
would require an hour, the sermon seems short if
it occupies forty-five minutes. There is, however,
an important fact which the modern minister should
realize, but does not always, — the change which has
been produced within the last twenty-five years by
the telegraph and the newspaper. Men think much
more quickly than they used to think. Contracts
which they would take hours to talk over, they now
complete, save for the legal phrasing, in five min-
214 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
utes. They read the daily newspaper by the head-
lines, or, glancing the eye down the column of the
editorial, extract its significance by a kind of instan-
taneous intellectual process. Accustomed to this
rapidity of mental action through the week, they
go to church, and are wearied by hearing a minis-
ter hold a single thought before them, possibly a
rather commonplace thought, for fifteen or twenty
minutes, or even half an hour, while he is hoping
to keep their attention upon it by the beauty with
which he attires it, or even insisting that it is the
duty of the hearer to continue to listen after he
has learned all that the minister has to say. To an
alert mind nothing is more wearisome than to stand
at the end of a lane and wait for the speaker to
come at a leisurely pace to the same terminus.
The editor is under pressure to condense: he is
constantly attempting to put the substance of a
volume in a page, the substance of a page in a
column, the substance of a column in a paragraph,
and the substance of a paragraph in two lines ; the
minister, on the other hand, is often imder tempta-
tion to dilute and expand : he has a single thought,
and his question is, how can he so present this
thought as to keep the interest of the congregation
for twenty minutes or half an hour upon it ? There
is but one radical remedy for lengthy sermons : it is
for the minister, first, to be possessed of the truth,
and of the desire to impart it to his congregation
because they need it, and, secondly, remorselessly
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 215
to fix as Ms limit less time than he thinks is
adequate for the due presentation of his subject.
There is a special temptation to ministers to
over-elaborate the peroration and the introduction.
A friend of mine tells me that he once heard a
famous preacher say as he drew towards the close
of his discourse, " One word more." My friend
looked at his watch ; the preacher had been speak-
ing thirty minutes, and he took thirty-five minutes
for the " one word more." In my judgment, the
time for exhortation has passed away, — the whole
sermon should be suffused with a genuine feeling ;
it may be inflamed with a genuine passion ; if it is
not, no endeavor to correct the defect by emotional
appeals at the end wiU. be other than worse than
useless. As to introductions, generally the less in-
troduction the better. The whole service of prayer
and praise and Scripture reading has been intro-
duction ; that is, it has been preparing the mind
and heart of the congregation for the message of the
preacher. He who strikes the heart of his subject
in the first sentence is the one most likely to secure
an attentive listening at the outset of his discourse.
It does not come within the province of this
volume to enter in any detail upon the question of
the structure of sermons. For this the ministerial
reader must be referred to the books on sacred
rhetoric, of which there is an abundance ; but it is
legitimate to say that devotion to the truth and
sympathy with men furnish no excuse for slovenly
216 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
intellectual processes and no substitute for thor-
ough intellectual preparation. Whether the sermon
is written and committed, written and read, or not
written at all, it ought to be carefuUy conceived
and thoroughly prepared. Whenever we are able
to get back of the finished oration to the processes
of preparation, we always find that the latter have
involved painstaking study. The apparently easy
speaker is uniformly a hard thinker. Spontaneity
in utterance is the product of industry in prepara-
tion. Mr. Gladstone was endowed by nature with
all the equipment necessary for successful oratory,
"a voice of singular fullness, depth, and variety
of tone ; a falcon eye with strange imperious flash ;
features mobile, expressive, and with lively play;
a great actor's command of gesture, bold, sweeping,
natural, unforced, without exaggeration or a trace
of melodrama ; . . . the gift and the glory of
words " — but to these he " superadded ungrudging
labor." Here are his counsels to a correspondent,
evidently bom of his own experience :
1. Study plainness of language, always preferring
the simpler word. 2. Shortness of sentences. 3. Dis-
tinctness of articulation. 4. Test and question your own
arguments beforehand, not waiting for critic or opponent.
5. Seek a thorough digestion of, and familiarity with,
your subject, and rely mainly on these to prompt the
proper words. 6. Remember that if you are to sway an
audience you must, besides thinking out your matter,
watch them all along. (March 20, 1875.) ^
* John Morley: Life of Gladstone, i, 191, 192.
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 217
If ever the term " full man " could be applied
to any preacher, it could be applied to PhiUips
Brooks. His sermon seemed to be — and was —
the spontaneous expression of a superabundant
life ; wealth of vocabulary, of illustration, of expo-
sition were the instruments, and spiritual enthu-
siasm was the secret of his marvelous power.
But Dr. Allen, in the account of Phillips Brooks's
method of preparation, has made it very clear
that the great preacher did not trust to these
native gifts alone, — he directed all the forces of
his nature with careful guidance to a purposed
end.
He took half a sheet of sermon paper, folding it
once, thus making four small pages, some seven inches
by less than five in their dimensions, which he was to
fill. He invariably filled them out to the last remaining
space on the last page, as though only in this way could
he be sure that he had sufficient material for his sermon.
Each plan contained, when it was finished, a dozen or
more detached paragraphs, each of which contained a
distinct idea, and was to become, when expanded, a par-
agraph in the finished sermon, placing over against each
the number of pages it would occupy when it had been
amplified. Then he added the numbers together. Thirty
pages was the limit of the written sermon. If these
numbers of assigned pages fell short of thirty, he re-
viewed his plan to see where he might expand, or where
to reduce if he had too many.^
1 Condensed from Dr. A. V. G. Allen*s account in The
Life and Letters of Phillips Brooks^ and quoted on page 718 of
The Oatlooh for March 10, 1901.
218 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
More important than the quality of the sermon
is the quality of the preacher, for the sermon is an
expression of the life of the preacher, and therefore
the value of the sermon depends upon the quality
of the preacher's life. There is a legend that a
famous preacher, having been unable to make his
preparations for a certain Sunday, asked the Devil
to provide a preacher for him. The Devil replied,
" I will preach myself," and he went into the pul-
pit and preached a vigorous and eloquent sermon
against the Devil and all his works. When he came
down, his ecclesiastical ally said to him, " I should
have thought you would have been afraid to preach
that sermon, lest it should destroy your influence."
" No," replied the Devil, " it will have no effect,
because I did not believe a word of it myself."
Like many another ecclesiastical legend, this is a
parabolic expression of a divine truth. The power
of the sermon depends primarily on the reality of
the minister's conviction. It is not enough that he
preach the truth, he must preach self-realized truth.
He should never be an echo of another man's
faith. If he has no experience of sin, he should not
preach on sin ; if no experience of God's love, he
should not preach on God's love. If all ministers
limited their preaching by their own experience,
the sermons would be shorter and there would be
fewer of them, but they would make up in effec-
tiveness what they lacked in number and in length.
It is for this reason that I object to creed subscrip-
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 219
tion, — not because I object to the creed, but I
object to any system which puts a preacher under
the temptation to become the advocate of another
man's faith, not the interpreter and expounder of
his own.
For this reason candor seems to me to be essen-
tial to the preacher. There are certain virtues which
may be called professional virtues. No man can be
an efficient soldier without courage; though he
may be efficient as a soldier without honesty. No
man can be an efficient merchant without honesty ;
though he may be efficient as a merchant without
courage. Candor is the professional virtue of the
minister. He cannot be truly successful without it.
He must have convictions and the courage of his
convictions. Those cynics are mistaken who im-
agine that the preacher is popular who panders to
popular prejudice. The answer to their cynicism
is to be found in the history of the American pulpit.
From Jonathan Edwards to the present day, and in
all the denominations alike, the great preachers
have been heroic preachers. Not to go beyond the
circle of our own time, Finney, Channing, the
Beechers, father and son, Bushnell, Phillips Brooks,
— no one ever questioned the courage of these
men, no one ever doubted their candor, and crowds
thronged to listen to them. The American people
like a brave man, a man of strong convictions and
the courage of them.
With this candor and courage must go another
220 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
quality which does not always accompany thenij re-
spect for one's fellow men. " Thou shalt love thy
neighbor as thyself " involves more than a spirit of
mutual good-will, it involves also a spirit of mutual
respect. The preacher must understand, and he
must have intellectual respect for, opinions which
he believes to be thoroughly erroneous. It may
be laid down as an axiom that you can never per-
suade another man to your point of view until
you appreciate his point of view. You can never
get another to take your position until you have
in imagination taken his position. If a Protestant
would persuade a Roman Catholic, he must first
sympathetically imderstand the Roman Catholic
doctrines of Papal Infallibility, the Adoration of the
Virgin, Transubstantiation, and the Real Presence.
If an orthodox believer would convince an Evolu-
tionist of the truth of the doctrine of the Fall, he
must first imderstand what Evolution means, and
what are the grounds on which the scientist accepts
it. If the preacher would impart spiritual vision to
men and women in his congregation who are with-
out it, he must first enter sympathetically into their
conditions of life, understand what the counting-
room is, and what its temptations and its struggles,
and what the life of modern society and its illusions
and snares. If he would persuade the employer to
some different attitude towards the trade-union, he
must first see the trade-union with the employer's
eyes, and comprehend the friction which naturally
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 221
if not inevitably arises in our time between the or-
ganizatiqns of labor and of capital. This is what
Paul did. "Unfo the Jews I became as a Jew,
that I might gain the Jews ; to them that are under
the law, as under the law, that I might gain them
that are under the law ; to them that are with-
out law, as without law, so that I might gain them
that are without law. To the weak became I as
weak, that I might gain the weak : I am made all
things to all men, that I might by all means save
some."^ This is what Christ did when he came
to earth and entered, not merely into our physical
conditions but into our spiritual experiences, and
was tempted in all points like as we are, that he
might become our Redeemer. The preacher must
by imagination enter into the life of the people if
he would impart to the people the life that is in
Christ his Master. The preacher must understand
us if he desires us to understand him.
There are three difficulties which tend to prevent
the minister from entering thus sympathetically into
the life of those whom he is addressing. He must
be an educated man ; and education develops cul-
ture, taste, and the critical spirit, and these tend to
separate him from those who are without education,
cultivation, and taste. Ignorance and boorishness
build up a waU upon the one side, cultivation and
taste upon the other. The preacher must be able to
sympathize with the ignorant and the boorish, not-
1 1 Cor. ix, 20-22.
222 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
withstanding Ms cultivation and his taste. His in-
terest in people is therapeutic ; he studies them as a
physician studies his patients, that he may cure
them. This is necessary, and yet this habit of study-
ing men as specimens, so to speak, as set apart from
him and objects of his ministry, easily tends to de-
velop in him the spirit of self-conceit ; and rehgious
self-conceit is a form of Pharisaism. Thus, unless
in all his study of mankind he is able to preserve
the spirit of respect for mankind, the more he
studies, the less competent does he become to do his
Master's work among men. Finally, since vices and
intellectual errors arouse his conscience, his indig-
nation is stirred against them. The age of physi-
cal persecution has passed, but the spirit which led
men in the Middle Ages to punish heresy with fire
and sword still exists. If he has that tolerance of
error which is bom of indifference to it, he has not
the earnestness which enables him to combat it.
If he has that indignation against error which ac-
companies the spirit of religious or intellectual seK-
conceit, he has not that human touch which enables
him to get entrance to the minds of the men whom
he wishes to convince and convert. Thus his edu-
cation, his professional interest, and his conscience
combine to separate him from men, and will sepa-
rate him from them, unless he sedulously cultivates
that spiritual imagination which enables him sym-
pathetically to understand aU sorts and conditions
of men, and that respect for humanity which enables
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 223
Mm to secure their sympathetic hearing for his
message.
Another quality essential to the preacher, espe-
cially in our time, is a spirit of divine hopefulness.
The pessimist has no place in the American pulpit.
The preacher should be a leader among men. If
he is to be a leader, he must set before himself an
ideal, and he must have in himself some expecta-
tion that that ideal can be attained. I do not mean
that he is to look only on the bright side of things.
He is to have the courage to see things as they are,
but he must have faith in a God who is in the
world making things better, and, born of this faith,
an incorrigible expectation that they will be better,
and an invincible determination to do something to
make them better. He must believe that out of
every day wiU walk a better to-morrow ; he must
believe, not with Browning, that " God 's in his
heaven, all *s right with the world," ^ but that God
is in his world, and therefore all will yet be well
with it. " "We are saved by hope." ^ He who has
no vision to see a better future, and no expectation
inspiring him to its attainment, does not belong in
the Christian ministry.
With this spirit of candor, courage, considera-
tion, and hopefulness should go patience. " So is
the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed
into the ground; and should sleep, and rise night
^ Robert Browning : Pippa Passes.
2 Rom. viii, 24.
224 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
and day, and tlie seed should spring up and grow, lie
knoweth not how." ^ The kingdom of God, then, is
a growth ; and growth requires time, and time de-
mands patience. " Be patient therefore, brethren,
unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husband-
man waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and
hath long patience for it, until he receive the early
and latter rain." ^ The impatience of preachers is
one cause of the constant changes in the ministry and
the consequent short and inefficacious pastorates.
A young man once called upon me to ask my help
in finding a new pastorate. To my question why he
had left his last one, he replied, " The town of
was nearer hell on earth than any place I ever saw."
" And what," said I, " is a minister for, except to
change a place that is like heU on earth to one as
near as possible to a heaven on earth ? " He could
give me no answer. Here was lamentable lack both
of courage and of patience. When I went into the
ministry my father gave me this counsel : " It is a
principle in mechanics that if an object is at one
point, and you wish to carry it to another point, you
must carry it through all the intermediate points.
That is equally true in morals. If your congrega-
tion is at one point, and you wish to take them to
another point, do not try to carry them across ; carry
them one point at a time." This is the principle of
patience concretely applied ; it will prevent the pro-
gressive preacher from breaking his connections with
1 Mark iv, 26, 27. ^ jamea v, 7.
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 225
his congregation in a too great eagerness to advance
them. If a conservative preacher finds himself the
pastor of a progressive church, or a progressive
preacher finds himself the pastor of a conservative
church, he should not seek a change. Let him stay
where he is and attempt, one step at a time, to con-
vert them to his better way of thinking. It is a
mistake to suppose that honesty requires any min-
ister to avow all his beliefs at once, regardless of
the effect of his avowal on his auditors.^ It is a still
greater mistake to suppose that he must proclaim
his dissent from his church and then depart from
it. No modern preacher, however radical, differs
more fundamentally from his church than did Jesus
from the Judaism of his time, or Paul from the
synagogues, or Luther from the Roman Catholic
Church. But Christ remained in the Jewish Church
until it excommunicated him, and Paul preached in
the synagogues until he was driven out, and Luther
remained a Roman Catholic until the Roman Catho-
lic Church disowned him. These are good examples
for dissidents to follow in our time. If aU radical
preachers go into radical congregations and preach
radicalism, and aU conservative preachers go into
conservative congregations and preach conservatism,
the divisions in the Church of Christ are made
deeper and wider, and progress in the Church of
Christ becomes impossible. Candor, courage, con-
1 " I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear
them now. — John xvi, 12."
226 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
sideration, hopefulness, and patience constitute per-
haps a not too common combination of qualities; but
they are essential to the highest and more enduring
efficiency in the Christian ministry.
What courses of study shall a minister pursue to
develop the qualifications and increase the equip-
ment for his work ? Assuming that he has gradu-
ated from a theological seminary, has acquired there
New Testament Greek, some knowledge of the He-
brew, such an acquaintance with historical theology
as will prevent him from mistaking old errors in a
new dress for new discoveries, such a knowledge of
the ecclesiastical machinery of his own church as
will enable him to work understandingly and loyally
in it, and such acquaintance with the English lan-
guage as wiU make him reasonably successful if not
a master in the use of it, what are the lifelong
courses of study which he must pursue ? They all
seem to me to be reducible to three branches.
^^^^^ He must study human nature. The best literary
material for such study is furnished by the great
novelists, poets, and dramatists. They are the in-
terpreters of life ; and life in its essential elements
is the same in aU ages, under all conditions, and in
all civilizations. But he should not merely read the
great novelists, poets, and dramatists for entertain-
ment ; he should study them for the purpose of as-
certaining what are the motives which actuate men,
what the life which hides behind the masks they
wear, what the real personality hidden beneath the
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 227
conventional incognito. He must familiarize himself
also with the conditions of modern life and of
modern thought. He must know both the intpUec-
tual and the industrial life of his age, for it is to
that life he is to apply the principles and precepts
of Jesus Christ, it is of that life he is appointed to
be a leader, it is that life which he has to guide
toward the Kingdom of God. And he must study-
human nature sympathetically in the individual
members of his parish. He must be a man among
men^ and must cultivate in himself the receptive
habit of mind, the habit of listening and consider-
ing the views and sentiments of others. He must
receive impressions from his people through the
week, that he may impart impressions to them on
Sunday.
He must study the Bible ; because in no other
literature will he find such an interpretation of the
higher spiritual experiences of men, such an exposi-
tion of the divine remedies for the sins and sorrow
which afflict mankind. He should remember, too,
that there is a great difference between studying the
Bible and studying the commentaries on the Bible,
He who can get back to the Bible itself, who can
apprehend the social and ethical principles which
underlie the Old Testament jurisprudence, and
which are expounded and applied to their own times
by the Hebrew prophets, who can understand the
great principles of individual life which find ex-
pression in the precepts of Jesus Christ, and inter-
228 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
pretation in the philosophy of Paul and of John,
and then can apply those moral and spiritual and
those social and individual principles to the pro-
blems of our own time, will always be an original
preacher.
But more important than his study either of hu-
man nature or of the Bible is his cultivation of ac-
quaintance with God. He must learn to look, in the
events occurring in his own generation, for the God
who is as truly in the history of America to-day as
he was in the history of Palestine in the olden times.
Christ denounced the Pharisees because they could
not discern the signs of the times. The prophet of
to-day must perceive what God is doing in the world
to-day if he would cooperate with God. But it is
not only or chiefly in events that he is to seek for
the Great Companion, — he must seek for him in
the quiet of his own soul. Some one has well said
that studying is searching for new truth, meditating
is dwelling with familiar truth. The minister must
find time not only to study but to meditate, not only
to do and to think, but also to listen. To the lover
of literature the most fruitful hours are not those
spent with his books of reference about him, digging
for knowledge as for a hid treasure ; they are those
spent in the quiet of the library, or the greater quiet
of the forest, in the summer time, with Browning
or Shakespeare or Carlyle or Tennyson or Whittier
in hand. We read for ten or fifteen minutes, then
the book drops into our lap, and we begin to think
QUALIFICATIONS FOR THE MINISTRY 229
the author's thoughts, to dream his dream, to see
his visions. These hours in which we simply listen
to what the men of genius have to say, — are they
not the most fruitful hours of our life ? The most
sacred hours with nature are not those in which with
spade or hoe we are digging, the better to cultivate
fruits or flowers, nor those in which with hammer
we break the rocks, or with magnifying glass we
examine the flowers, to learn the secrets which nature
has written in her book. Some day in June we lie
down on the grass and simply take what nature has
to give us. The squirrel runs up the tree and looks
at us ; the robin hops along, peeps at us, utters a
little note, picks up his breakfast, and flies away
again ; the cricket shows himself in the grass close
by, and chirps a cheerful note to us. We are not
studying, we are scarcely thinking, we are simply
listening. And we are learning more from nature
then than when we are striving to wrest her secrets
from her.
As we listen to what great men have to say to
us, and to what nature has to say to us, so may
we listen in silence and solitude to what God has
to say to us. Savonarola is reported to have said,
" We are too busy praying ever to listen to God."
There is danger in our time that we of the Chris-
tian ministry, in this strenuous and eager life, shall
be so busy working for God that we reserve little
time to pray to him and no time to listen to him.
The best hours, the most fruitful hours, the hours
230 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
fullest of inspiration for future service are those
in wliicli our only utterance is, " Speak, Lord ; thy
servant is listening," and the only message we re-
ceive is, " Be stiU, and know that I am God." ^ The
busier the minister is, the more exacting his parish,
the more multifarious his duties, the more import-
ant is it that he keep sacred from every interrup-
tion, every call, whether of pleasure or of duty, this
quiet hour.
1 1 Sam. iii, 9 ; Psalm xlvi, 10.
CHAPTER Vin
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME
The system of priests and sacrifices Israel had in
common with other and pagan religions, but the
order of the prophets was unique. They belonged
to no ecclesiastical order, they received no ordina-
tion, they had no ecclesiastical authority. It is true
that in other religions there have been seers and
soothsayers who possessed characteristics and made
claims somewhat resembling those of the Hebrew
prophets, but the contrasts are far greater than the
parallels. Nor is it necessary to go into those con-
trasts in any detail. It must suffice to say that
there is not to be found anywhere in human history
any such body of religious writers and teachers,
bound together only by a common faith, believing
themselves to have a message from the Eternal, and
bringing that message to bear upon the practical
affairs of life — any order parallel to that of the
prophets.
Moses was the first of them. Peter, James, John,
and Paul were the last of them. Moses is called
a prophet, although he is more generally known
as the great lawgiver. The New Testament pro-
phets have another name, — they are called apostles
232 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
rather than prophets ; yet they have the essential
spiritual characteristics which belong to the order
with which spiritually they are connected, and with
which, I think, we modern ministers should also
be spiritually connected, if we are to hope to have
power in our ministry. How important was this
unecclesiastical order of the prophets is indicated
by the fact that something like a quarter of the
whole literature of the ancient Hebrews, as it is
contained in the Old Testament, is composed of
the prophetic writings of these ministers of the
olden times. It is of these prophets, their spirit,
their messages, their methods, I speak in this chap-
ter. For they are models whom we are to study,
though not slavishly to imitate. It may be said of
them, as Paul and Barnabas said of themselves,
" We also are men of like passions with you," and
what Paul said of himself, " We know in part, and
we prophesy in part." ^ We have been too prone to
set these messengers of Jehovah apart by them-
selves, as though God no longer spoke to man as he
spoke to them, as though either God had grown
dumb or men deaf, as though inspiration were a
lost grace, and receiving it and speaking because of
it were a lost art. But if they were not men, pos-
sessing ordinary human attributes, and speaking and
acting under the recognized laws of human nature,
it would be idle and indeed impossible to study
them. It is only as we can share their experiences
^ Acts xiv, 15 ; 1 Cor. xiii, 9.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 233
that it is possible for us to understand them, and
it is only that we may both understand and share
their experiences that we profitably study them.
Only as the preacher shares the experiences and
characteristics of the prophets can he be truly suc-
cessful in his ministry. It is to a study of these
characteristics I ask the reader to accompany me in
this chapter.
In the first place, these prophets claimed to be
representatives of God. Their very name indicates
this claim. " Prophet " is a speaker for another.
Says Ewald, —
Confining ourselves for the present to the Hebrew
language, its name for a prophet denotes originally a
loud, clear speaker, yet always one who declares the
mind and words of another who does not himself speak ;
just as a dumb or retired person must have a speaker to
speak for him and declare his thoughts, so must God,
who is dumb with respect to the mass of men, have his
messenger or speaker ; and hence the word in its sacred
sense denotes him who speaks not of himself, but as com-
missioned by his God.^
This is the first and the most essential charac-
teristic of the Hebrew prophet. He is a speaker
for another, and that other the invisible, inaudible
God. He is an interpreter of God to men. He is
called, therefore, a man of God, or a man of the
1 G. H. A. von Ewald : Commentary on the. Prophets of the Old
Testament, vol. i, p. 8. Compare A. P. Stanley : History of the
Jewish Church, Lecture XIX, vol. i, pp. 367-369 ; G. A. Smith :
The Booh of the Twelve Prophets, vol. i, p. 12.
234 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
Spirit, or an interpreter. He is said to be full of
the Spirit. He speaks with this authority, implicit
or explicit. Sometimes he dramatically speaks in
the name of God : as though God were speaking,
he speaks. Thus Paul says : " We are ambassadors
for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us :
we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to
God." Thus Micaiah says : " As the Lord liveth,
what my God saith, that will I speak." i Thus a
very common introduction to a prophecy is the
phrase " Thus saith the Lord." The prophet cus-
tomarily claims to have been called to his mission
by God. He describes, or others describe for him,
this call from God, which is sometimes attended by
dramatic incidents, as Moses called at the burning
bush, Isaiah in the Temple, Ezekiel in the desert.
Where there is no such dramatic incident accom-
panying and attesting the call, or where it is rele-
gated to a secondary place, the call is not less clear
in the consciousness of the prophet. Thus Jeremiah
is called in his childhood and Amos while he is
following the flocks as a herdsman.^
It is this speaking for God which distinguishes
the true prophet from the false prophet. The true
prophet is not distinguished by the fact that all his
predictions come true ; they do not aU of them come
1 Deut. xxxiii, 1 ; Judg. xiii, 6 ; Hos. ix, 7, R. V. ; Num. xi,
26 ; xxvii, 1, 8 ; Is. Ixi, 1, xliii, 27, R. V. ; Job xxxiii, 23 ; Dan. v,
16 ; 2 Cor. v, 20 ; 1 Kings xxii, 14.
2 Ex. iii, 1-18 ; Is. ri ; Ezek. i, ii, iii, 10-14 ; Jer. i, 4-7 ; Amos
vii, 14, 15.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 235
true, — he is sometimes mistaken. He is not distin-
guished from the, false prophet merely by a higher
ethical standard, though his ethical standard is
higher. The true prophet speaks as a representa-
tive of God; the false prophet as an interpreter
and representative of men. The false prophet
studies the popular currents, watches to see what
people think, asks what they want to hear, and gives
them the message they desire. So he cries. Peace !
Peace ! when there is no peace.^ So, in the time
when the nation is threatened and the people want
a counsel, he brings them the counsel which they
want, or think they want.^ The false prophet has —
to use the American phrase — his ear to the ground ;
he watches the currents of public sentiment, as a
politician does, or as an editor does, or as I fear
some ministers do. This is the false prophet, the
man who is an interpreter of popular sentiment.
The true prophet has his ear toward God ; he is lis-
tening for the voice of God ; he brings the word of
God to mankind ; he is impelled to give his mes-
sage, whether men will hear or whether they will
forbear. He is the messenger of a great, an infinite,
a Divine King, Lord, Father.^
It is this claim on the prophet's part to speak for
God, and in the name of God, that distinguishes
him from the wise men, and so distinguishes the
books of prophecy from the books of " Proverbs "
1 Jer. vi, 13, 14. « For example, 1 Kings xxii, 1-23.
8 Ezek. ii, 5, 7, iii, 11.
236 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
or " Ecclesiastes.*' The prophet does not grope his
way after truth ; he does not argue ; he does not
present hypotheses and reasons deduced from ex-
perience for them. The prophet is not a philoso-
pher. He, therefore, has no system to propound.
We can deduce theological systems from the pro-
phets, but we cannot find a system of theology in the
prophets ; so we can buUd a house out of the trees
of the forest, but the trees of the forest do not con-
stitute a house. The prophet is a witness. He tes-
tifies to the things that he has heard and seen. I
believed, therefore have I spoken, — this is his mes-
sage.^ He is a man of visions, and he reports the
visions. He is preeminently a witness-bearer.
And yet he does not claim superiority to the men
about him. He does not claim to be their master
or their lord, or to have access to sources of know-
ledge which they do not possess, or to be their
spiritual superior, to belong to a spiritual aristo-
cracy. He believes that God is a Universal Pres-
ence ; that he is in all nature, in all history, in all
human experience. The prophets do not think that
they are inspired more than other men are inspired ;
only that they have heard the voice, have obeyed
the vision, have understood the message. The com-
monest operations of the human mind they attrib-
ute to the direct influence of the Spirit of God.
This truth is strikingly illustrated in " The Plough-
man's Ode : "
1 Psalm cxvi, 10 ; 2 Cor. iv, 13.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 237
Listen, and hear ye my voice,
Attend, and hear ye my speech.
Is the ploughman never done with his ploughing",
With the opening and harrowing of ground ?
Does he not, when its surface is leveled.
Scatter fennel, and sow cummin broadcast^
And duly set wheat there and barley,
And for its border plant spelt ?
It is Jahveh who has taught these right courses,
It is his Grod who has trained him.
We do not thresh fennel with sledges,
Nor are cart-wheels rolled over cummin,
But fennel is threshed with a staff.
And cummin is threshed with a rod.
Do we ever crush bread-corn to pieces ?
Nay, the threshing goes not on forever.
But when over it cart-wheels are driven.
Or sledges, our care is never to crush it.
This also from Jahveh proceeds :
Wonderful counsel, great wisdom has He.^
In their view everything proceeds from Jehovah.
There is no difference between the natural and the
supernatural: all the natural is supernatural; all
the supernatural is natural. This inspiration which
is universal, the prophet recognizes as possible to
the men about him. He speaks that he may give
them the hearing ear and the seeing eye ; that he
may lead them to hear the voices that he has heard,
to see something of the vision that he has seen.
This vision does not always come to him, it is
not always presented, suddenly and unexpectedly.
Sometimes it is, sometimes not. For the prophet
has not laid aside his personality in taking on this
1 Isaiah xxix, 23-29, Cheyne's translation.
238 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
influence of God ; after the inspiration lie is no less
the person that he was before. He is still the same
man, with the same temperament, the same quali-
ties, the same characteristics. These prophets do
not believe that a man should be an empty and
broken vessel in order to be meet for the Master's
use ; they believe that he should be a strong, vigor-
ous, manly man to be meet for the Master's use.
When Ezekiel sees the vision in the desert and
throws himself prostrate on the ground, the voice
that comes to him says, " Son of man, stand upon
thy feet, and I will speak unto thee." ^ It is to men
standing on their feet, all their senses alert, all their
powers active, that God speaks. These prophets are
not passive recipients and parrot-like repeaters.
The message given to them becomes a part of
their own faith, inspires their personality, and trans-
forms them and makes them what they are. So it
comes to them according to their temperament.
Sometimes it flashes upon them in a vision, as it
flashes upon Isaiah in the Temple. Sometimes they
long for it and wait for it as a man coming across
the sea watches on the watch tower for an expected
haven. Sometimes they pray for it with unutterable
longings and it comes in answer to their prayer.
Sometimes they have to fight for it, and it is the
product only of a hard life battle. So Habakkuk
fought for the vision that came to him : " O Lord,
how long shall I cry and thou wilt not hear I I cry
1 Ezek. ii, 1.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 239
out unto thee of violence, and thou wilt not save ! "
This is the beginning of his experience ; listen to
the end :
Althongh the fig tree shall not blossom,
Neither shall fruit be in the vines ;
The labor of the olive shall fail,
And the fields shall yield no meat ;
The flock shall be cut off from the fold.
And there shall be no herd in the stalls :
Yet I will rejoice in the Lord,
I will joy in the God of my salvation.^
His faith is not a ripe fruit that has dropped into
his open palm from the bough of a tree : he has
had to plough, to harrow, and to dig for it as men
dig for a hid treasure ; he has had to battle in order
that he might win it. Paul has to fight the good
fight of faith that he may receive faith's coronation :
" Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principali-
ties, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to
come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created
thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of
God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Cannot
we see how life and death and principalities and
powers and things present and things to come have
been attempting to separate him from God ; how he
has had to fight for his faith before he could call
himself " more than conqueror " ? ^ This faith was
not received in the silence of the mind, in the
quietude of a retreat; it was won through battle
and in the midst of a strenuous, energetic life. The
1 Hab. i, 2, iii, 17, 18. « 2 Tim. iv, 7 ; Rom. vifi, 37-39.
240 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
story of Hosea affords a striking illustration of one
of the ways in which these prophets learned the
truth they were to teach to others. His wife was
unfaithful to him. But he loved her and would not
put her away from him. Then she grew weary of
him; perhaps of his very pity and love, and de-
serted him for some unknown lover who could sat-
isfy her greed for gold and her ignoble ambition.
Deserted by this lover, she sank lower and lower,
until at last she sold herself to a life of public har-
lotry. So Hosea at last found her, a helpless slave,
bought her, though she had fallen so low that he
paid for her less than he would have paid for one
of the poorer and cheaper slaves, and took her back,
never more to be his wife, but was evermore her
guardian and protector. And from his own heart's
sore trial, and from his own patient love toward an
apostate wife, he learned the lesson of God's love
which forms the burden of his prophecy: God is
the faithful lover ; Israel is the unfaithful wife ;
sin is against love, not merely against law ; but love
is infinite and eternal and cannot be destroyed.^
These prophets are not mere messengers. They
are not like a telegraph boy who takes a sealed let-
ter from the office and carries it to some one and
does not know what it contains. They are not like
phonographs to whom the message is communicated
and by whom the message is repeated. Their mes-
sages are not dictated to them ; they are not merely
1 Hosea i-iii.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 241
amanuenses who write down what is dictated. The
message enters into them, transforms their nature,
makes them what they are. So they are holy men,
spiritual men, godly men, with the message wrought
into their own consciousness and coming forth from
their own consciousness. It becomes part of their
nature. The word is in their hearts as a burning
fire shut up in their bones. They cannot keep it
to themselves ; it must find expression. " Woe is
me if I preach not the Gospel! " cries Paul. " The
Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy ? "
cries Amos.^ They must speak. Their message,
just because it has become a part of their very
nature, it is impossible for them to retain.
Hence when this message is given forth, it is
transformed by their personality. How much of
what Isaiah said was Isaiah, and how much was the
Spirit of God, no man can tell. How much of
the sermon which the preacher wiU write for next
Sunday is born of his own thinking, how much did
he get out of his theological studies, how much
came of his reading of Carlyle or Calvin, Emerson
or Edwards ? Who can answer this question ? He
has been reading all these years, listening to mes-
sages, studying carefully ; the results of his study
and thinking have entered into his character, and
have been made a part of himseK ; and then they
come forth suffused with his own personality.
Consequently these messages of the ancient pro-
^ Jer. XX, 9 ; 1 Cor. ix, 16 ; Amos iii, 8.
242 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
phets are human messages. Into the message of each
the life of the messenger enters. The message trans-
forms the character of the messenger, but the char-
acter of the messenger no less gives color and
character to the message. Each prophet speaks
according to the spirit and temper of his own
nature. Paul uses the same word to express the
spirit of holiness within a man and the Holy Spirit
operating on a man. Oftentimes we cannot tell
which he means. Sometimes I do not think he
knows himself, the two are so interwoven in his
experience. This Holy Spirit operating within has
so changed the spirit within, and this spirit so
derives its life from the Spirit without him, that
he cannot distinguish one from the other, and uses
the same word to mean either, or both in their com-
mingled action.
Hence the messages of these prophets are indi-
vidual messages. Amos, the Carlyle of Hebrew
literature, is an interpreter of the divine con-
science ; Hosea, a poet of infinite tenderness, is an
interpreter of the divine mercy ; Isaiah, the states-
man-prophet of his people, is largely a preacher of
political righteousness ; Micah, the prophet of the
poor, is the socialistic voice of his age ; Habakkuk
is the prophet of victorious faith conquering a native
pessimistic skepticism; Jeremiah is the first indi-
vidualist among the Hebrew prophets, a Protestant
ages before Protestantism ; Ezekiel is the voice of
the Hebrew liturgists or churchmen ; the Great
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 243
Unknown, the prophet whose writings appear in
the latter part of the book of Isaiah, is the most
catholic of all this ancient ministry, a fountain and
inspiration to largeness of faith and hope for all
the ages. Thus in these messengers of the Lord
is every type of temperament, and therefore every
type of message : justice and mercy, individualism
and socialism, ecclesiasticism and Protestantism,
pessimism and optimism. These men do not all
have the same message ; they do not all repeat the
same story; they are not mere echoes of a voice.
The life has entered into them, commingling with
their life, and comes forth tinged by their pervad-
ing experiences. They are transformed by the mes-
sage, and the message is also transformed by them.
These men, thus speaking forth from God, get
the power of their message from the fact that they
are interpreting God, — not echoing the public sen-
timent of their time, but receiving, understanding,
appreciating, and repeating the message that all
men might receive from God if they would but use
their ears to hear. Some men have power over an
audience by reason of their innate character, their
mere force of will. They master other men by
the power of their personality. This is not the case
with the prophets ; at least they declare that it is
not. When Moses is asked to go on his mission, he
protests that he is not the one to go. " I am slow
of speech and of a slow tongue," he says. When
Isaiah is called upon to go on his mission, he re-
244 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
plies, " I am a man of miclean lips." He does not
think himself the one to regenerate the people.
When Jeremiah is called, he pleads his youth and
inexperience as a reason why he should not go. " I
cannot speak," he says, " for I am a child." When
Paul is called as a missionary to the Gentiles, he
argues that he is better fitted to be an apostle to
the Jews because they know how intense a Jew he
has been.i These are not men with a transcendent,
innate, self-conscious power which carries them
forth against all obstacles and enables them to
overcome all difficulties. That is not the secret
of their power.
Some men borrow their power from their audi-
ences. The power of an orator, wrote Mr. Glad-
stone, " is an influence principally received from
his audience (so to speak) in vapor, which he pours
back upon them in a flood." ^ That is, no doubt,
the secret of a great deal of real, genuine pulpit and
platform oratory. But these prophets spoke to inat-
tentive audiences, indifferent audiences, hostile audi-
ences. Their audiences did not give them in vapor
what they gave back in a flood. Ezekiel compares
the people to whom he is to speak to a vallej^ of dry
bones. Isaiah declares of the people of his day that
their hearts are fat and their ears are heavy and
their eyes are shut, lest they should see with their
eyes and hear with their ears and understand with
1 Exodus iv, 10 ; Isaiah vi, 5 ; Jer. i, 6 ; Acts xxii, 17-21.
2 Quoted by John Morley : lAft of Gladstone^ i, 191.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 245
their heart.^ The power of these prophets was not
in their own innate sense of power; it was not
borrowed from the people to whom they spoke and
reflected back to them again ; it was in their con-
sciousness of th& presence in them of the living
God, speaking in them, giving them their message,
transforming their nature, imparting to them their
life, sending them on their errand.
Intuitionalists and idealists as they were, yet
they were practical men. They were idealists and
intuitionalists in obtaining their message, they were
practical men in giving it. This differentiates them
from the poet. The poet sees his vision, and then
he expresses himself because he wishes to express
himself. It is a pleasure for him to do so. As one
sits down at the organ and plays upon it because
it expresses music, though there be no one in the
room, so the poet plays upon the instrument of his
imagination and gives forth the utterances, whether
men will read his poetry or whether they will not.
The men to whom this poem will come are not in
his mind at all ; it is the vision which is in his mind.
This is not so with the prophets. They are eager to
give their vision to their f eUow men. AU their pro-
phecies have a definite spiritual purpose, and if we
study the history of the time, we can see what that
purpose is. They come to convince men of their
sins or to inspire men with hope, to cast men from
their pride or to lift them up from their despair ;
1 Ezek. xxxvii, 1-11 ; Isaiah vi, 9, 10.
246 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
but they come always with some message of healing,
of help, of medicine. It is a message from God,
but it is no less a message to men. It is this which
gives their messages such practicality. They do not
deal with sin op with righteousness in the abstract,
but with the actual sins and the actual virtues of
the men of their time.
It is sometimes said that conviction of sin is no
longer experienced as it was experienced in the
days of our fathers. But I wonder whether our
conviction of sin to-day is not a much better con-
viction of sin than that in the beginning of the nine-
teenth century. I am inclined to think that it is.
Our fathers had a conviction of sin : we have a
conviction of sins ; and it is better to have a con-
viction of sins than a conviction of sin. Notwith-
standing their conviction of sin, drunkenness, or
at least drinking to excess, was not unconunon at
church ordinations. Notwithstanding their convic-
tion of sin, they left slavery undisturbed. Our
conviction of sin may not be so profound, but we
have abolished slavery, we have driven the saloon
out of the church, and perhaps by and by we shall
drive it out of the highways. Our religion may be
less spiritual, but it is more practical than the re-
ligion of our fathers. In this respect it is more like
the religion of the prophets. One quotation may
serve to illustrate the practicality of their teaching :
Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and Thou seest not ? morti-
fied ourselves, and Thou markest it not ?
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 247
Surely, on your fast-day ye pursue your business, and all money
lent on pledge ye exact ?
Surely, it is for strife and contention ye fast, and to smite with the
fist the poor ;
Such fasting as yours to-day will not make your voice heard on
high.
Can such be the fast that I choose, a day when a man mortifies
himself ?
To droop one's head like a bulrush, and to make sackcloth and
ashes one's couch —
Wilt thou call this a fast, and a day acceptable to Jahveh ?
Is not this the fast that I choose, says Jahveh ?
To loose the fetters of injustice, to untie the bands of violence,
To set at liberty those who are crushed, to burst every yoke
asunder.
Is it not to break thy bread to the hungry, and to bring the home-
less into thy house ;
When thou seest the naked to cover him, and to hide not thyself
from thy own flesh ?
Then will thy light break forth as the dawn, thy wounds will be
quickly healed over.
Thy righteousness will go before thee, and Jahveh's glory will be
thy reward.^
The writings of the prophets abound in such
practical expositions of religious duty. The sins
which they most condemn are sins of inhumanity to
man. Rarely if ever do they condemn absence from
church, failure in sacrifice, disregard of ordinances,
or even lack of prayer. What they condemn is in-
justice and impurity and cruelty. Rarely if ever do
they send men to the temple or to the sacrifice for
forgiveness. " Wash you, make you clean : put
away the evil of your doings from before mine
eyes ; cease to do evil ; learn to do well. . . . Come
^ Isaiah Iviii, 3-8 : Gheyne's translation.
248 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord :
though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white
as snow ; " this is the burden of their message.^
White because of temple and sacrifice and priestly
ceremonial ? No. Because of ceasing from iniquity,
or as another prophet expresses it, breaking off
sins by righteousness.^ The preaching of the pro-
phets is spiritual because the message is derived
from God, not from man. It is practical because it
is applied to the daily affairs of daily life.
For the same reason it is dramatic. These pro-
phets are not separated from humanity because they
live with God ; on the contrary, the more they live
with God the more they are identified with human-
ity ; the more they enter into the secret places of
the Most High, the more they enter into the com-
mon experiences of their fellow men. Hence they
are able to interpret human experience. And this
interplay of the human experience and the divine
response — and again the divine message and the
human response — makes the prophetic writings
dramatic. A very familiar passage in Micah may
serve to illustrate this dramatic element and at the
same time its peculiar character. It is a trialogue
between the Prophet, Jehovah, and the People :
The Prophet. Hear ye now what the Lord saith:
Arise, contend thou before the mountains, and let the
hills hear thy voice. Hear, O ye mountains, the Lord's
controversy, and ye enduring foundations of the earth i
I Isaiah i, 16-18. « Daniel iv, 27.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 249
for the Lord hath a controversy with his people, and he
will plead with Israel.
Jehovah. O my people, what have I done unto thee ?
and wherein have I wearied thee ? testify against me. For
I brought thee up qut of the land of Egypt, and redeemed
thee out of the house of bondage ; and I sent before thee
Moses, Aaron, and Miriam. O my people, remember now
what Balak king of Moab consulted, and what Balaam
the son of Beor answered him ; remember from Shittim
unto Gilgal, that ye may know the righteous acts of the
Lord.
The People. Wherewith shall I come before the Lord,
and bow myself before the high God ? shall I come be-
fore him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or
with ten thousands of rivers of oil ? shall I give my first-
born for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the
sin of my soul ?
The Prophet. He hath shewed thee, O man, what is
good ; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to
do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with
thy God. 1
Not less strikingly dramatic is the opening of
the prophecy of the " Second Isaiah," the " Great
Unknown," — a dialogue between the Divine Voice
commanding the Prophet, and the Prophet asking
for his message and expostulating with the com-
mand, and finally receiving the word which he is
to proclaim.
The Voice. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith
your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry
1 Micah vi, 1-8.
260 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her in-
iquity is pardoned ; that she hath received of the Lord's
hand double for all her sins. The voice of one that
crieth, Prepare ye in the wilderness the way of the Lord,
make straight in the desert a high way for our God.
Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and
hUl shall be made low : and the crooked shall be made
straight, and the rough places plain : and the glory of
the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it to-
gether : for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. The
voice of one saying, Cry.
The Prophet. What shall I cry ? All flesh is grass,
and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the
field : the grass withereth, the flower fadeth ; because
the breath of the Lord bloweth upon it: surely the
people is grass.
The Voice. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth :
but the word of our God shall stand for ever.^
This prophet has felt the burden of his time, its
sin, its penalty ; and he has seen the transitoriness
of Israel, — its glory passing away, its city in ruins,
its temple abandoned. But he has seen more. He
has seen the manifestation of God in the captivity
of Israel, that is, in the punishment of the Nation
for its sins and in the redemption which he sees
approaching, that is, in the divine pardon of a re-
deemed people; and behind this transitoriness of
the Nation's glory, and behind the penalty and the
pardon, and in -both penalty and pardon, he sees
the Eternal working out his plans for the redemp-
tion of the race through Israel.
• 1 Isaiah xl, 1-8.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 251
The Hebrew prophets saw beneath the surface,
and therefore they saw beyond the day. They
foretold the future because they perceived truly the
present. They understood the real meaning of events,
therefore they comprehended the trend of events.
They saw that God is in human history working
out the redemption of the world ; and this vision
of God in his world gave them a foresight as to the
outcome of God's work in the final issue of human
history. This insight gave them foresight and made
them foretellers. They were foretellers because they
were forthtellers. Because they spake as interpre-
ters of an inward vision they turned their faces and
the faces of their people toward the future.
And as this spirit gave them foresight, so it gave
them hopefulness ; because it was the foresight of
men who believed that the moral forces are greater
than aU other forces, that God is more than aU they
that are leagued against God. They were hopeful
for their Nation, for they could not believe that the
Nation would abandon Jehovah ; and when finally
they were forced to the conclusion that the Nation
had abandoned Jehovah, they were hopeful for a
new Nation which God would raise up and through
which he would save the world. Even in their hours
of darkest pessimism they were optimists ; even at
the time when they beheld the ruin of the destroyed
Nation they still hoped for the redemption of man-
kind.
And this foresight and this hopefulness gave them
262 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
courage. Jeremiah, standing for God and God's
truth, as he sees it, facing the charge that he has
turned traitor to his country and is a friend of the
Chaldeans, because he sees the victory of the Chal-
deans, let down into the dungeon and lying there
in the mire, and stiU maintaining his courage and
his faith in God ; Paul rescued from the mob on
the floor of the temple, lifted up, bleeding, dust-
stained, scarred, and standing there and turning to
the officer to ask, " May I not speak to this mob ? "
and on those temple stairs repeating the message of
a redeemed world through Jesus Christ our Lord,i
— where shall we find in human history more splen-
did illustrations of magnificent courage than in
these prophets of the Old Testament and the New
Testament ?
No man belongs in the Christian pulpit unless
he is the successor of the Prophets and the Apos-
tles, in a succession not given by the laying on of
hands, not ecclesiastical or organic, a succession
spiritual, a succession of inheritance of the spirit.
If a man is to do his work as a Christian minister,
he must be a man of God as the old prophets were
men of God ; he must interpret him, not reflect the
sentiments of his community ; he must receive into
himself the message which God gives him and make
it a part of his life ; he must make that conscious-
ness of his message the secret and source of his
power, and give it forth with the spiritual vitality
1 Jer. xxxii, 2-5 ; xxxiii, 1-3 ; Acts xxii, 30-39.
SOME MINISTERS OF THE OLDEN TIME 253
which comes only from an experience of God's love,
in faith and hope ; he must make it a practical
message, dealing with the actual scenes, the actual
struggles, the actual life of the people of this twen-
tieth century ; aud he must have the foresight that
comes from insight ; he must dare march forward ;
he must be a leader in that great movement the
end of which is the kingdom of God, the power of
which is the power of God, and the ministers to
which must be ministers of God.
CHAPTER IX
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST: HIS
METHODS
In this and the succeeding chapter I purpose to
consider what light the example and teachings of
Jesus Christ throw upon the subject which the
reader has been invited to examine with me in this
volume, namely, the true methods of the Christian
ministry and the secret of its power. Even those
who do not accept Jesus Christ as a Master whose
example and instruction possess a divine authority,
may yet well think him the greatest religious teacher
the world has ever seen, and his methods and spirit
therefore worthy of the most thorough and reverent
study. He " has founded absolute religion," Ernest
Kenan says. " The genius of nineteen coming cen-
turies," Goldwin Smith calls him.^ In this chapter
I ask the reader to consider the methods, in the
next chapter the substance of the teaching of this
founder of absolute religion, this genius of nineteen
coming centuries.
^ "Pure Christianity still presents itself, after eighteen cen-
turies, in the character of a universal and eternal religion. . . .
The foundation of true religion is verily his (Christ's) work. . . .
All that may be attempted outside this grand and noble Christian
tradition will be sterile. . . . Jesus, on the other hand, has founded
THE MINISTRY OF JEStJS CHRIST 255
In entering upon this theme three cautions are
necessary.
1. No man can fully understand or adequately
interpret Jesus Christ ; certainly I do not assume
so to do. To me he is the supreme revelation in the
terms of a human experience of the Infinite and the
Eternal, the inspirer and the ideal for all men and
for all ages ; for the first century and the twentieth
century, for men and for women, for the Occi-
dental and for the Oriental, for the prince and
for the peasant, for the philosopher and for the
unlearned, for the aged and for the schoolboy, for
the poet and for the man of affairs, for the mer-
chant, the mechanic, the farmer, the soldier, the
lawyer, the statesman, — in short, for men of every
temperament, every vocation, and every type of
character. Of course he who believes this cannot
believe himself capable of furnishing an adequate
interpretation of Jesus Christ. All that he can hope
or even desire to do is to give one man's view of
Christ. Even that view it would be impossible for
me adequately to present within the limits of these
two chapters. For half a century I have been try-
absolute reli^on." — Renan: The Life of Jesus, pp. 410, 411.
" The Founder of Christendom, having no home of his own
wherein to lay his head, goes to find shelter for the night beneath
some disciple's lonely roof. Little did the owner of that roof
dream that it was receiving as a guest the genius of nineteen
coming centuries; perhaps of the whole future of humanity,
unless the Spiritual as well as the Supernatural is doomed, and
science is henceforth to reign alone." — Gbldwin Smith: The
Founder of Christendom, p. 44.
266 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
ing to apply the precepts of Christ to the various
problems of life, individual and social, and to learn
myself, and teach others, how the spirit of Christ
carried into life will make it harmonious, hopeful,
joyous, divine. I should be sorry to think that I
could put into a few pages the entire product of
fifty years of serious thinking.
2. It must be remembered, also, that we have no
biography of Jesus Christ ; we have only memora-
bilia. They do not afford a continuous history of
his life, nor represent any attempt to trace out the
development of his doctrine, or his own intellectual
or spiritual growth. Of the thirty-three years of
his life we have, excepting for the account of his
birth and one incident in his boyhood, only the
record of three years, and this record only in
fragmentary reports. In the study of these reports
there is constant danger, on the one hand, of draw-
ing too large deductions from slight premises, of
reading into Christ's life and teachings our own
prejudices and making him sponsor for our own
thoughts; on the other hand, danger of passing
carelessly by incidents and sayings which have in
them matter worthy of our careful attention. To
preserve the golden mean between these two dan-
gers is difficult, perhaps impossible.
3. We have also to bear in mind that not even
the example and teaching of Jesus Christ are to be
blindly followed. Jesus Christ did not teach in
order that he might serve as a substitute for think-
THE MINISTRY' OF JESUS CHRIST 257
ing, but that he might inspire us to think. We
need not take the Lord's Supper in an upper
chamber because he took it in an upper chamber,
or reclining because he reclined, or think that we
may not be married because he was unmarried, or
that our ministry must be an itinerant ministry
because he was not settled over a parish. We
follow a great leader, not by thinking his thoughts
over again, or doing again the deeds he did, —
we follow him by carrying into our own age the
spirit which he carried into his, and applying to our
own circumstances the principles which he applied
to the circumstances of his life. To understand
Christ's principles, to appreciate Christ's spirit, and
then to apply those principles and exemplify that
spirit in our own life — this is to follow Christ.
With these preliminary cautions borne in mind, I
ask the reader to consider with me in this and the
succeeding chapter what were the methods of Christ
as a preacher, what was the secret of his power,
and what was the substance of his teaching, hoping
that the hints given in these chapters may incite
the reader to make a life study of the Four Gos-
pels for himself, in an endeavor to secure more
satisfactory answers to these questions.
Certain negative conclusions respecting Christ's
method seem very evident.
He did not depend for his power on dramatic
effects. He did not act upon the counsel of De-
mosthenes, who declared that action was the first.
268 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the second, and the third condition of oratory.
He did not seek to win the attention of the people
by any form of dramatic art or artifice. John B.
Gough portrayed in action and in dialect every
character he described, and acted upon the plat-
form every incident he narrated. Henry Ward
Beecher, with unconscious skiU, imitated every act
which he used in illustration. We can be quite
sure that this was not Christ's method, because he
habitually taught sitting down. He went into the
synagogue at Nazareth to preach, the eyes of all
them that were in the synagogue were fastened on
him, and he " sat down " to preach to them. He
went into the mountain, the multitudes followed
him to listen to his inaugural sermon, and " when
he was set " he opened his mouth and taught them.
He came into the temple, all the people came unto
him, "and he sat down and taught them." The
people pressed upon him at the lake of Gennesaret,
and he entered into a boat, and thrust it out a little
from the land, and " sat down and taught the people
out of the boat." ^
Nor did he move them by the oratorical splen-
dor of his addresses. These addresses had none of
the literary characteristics of great orations. They
were not musical ; there are no cadences in them.
They were not made splendid by beautiful orna-
mentation; they are without rich coloring. They
were without striking introductions to attract at-
* Luke iv, 20 ; Matt, v, 1 ; John viii, 2 ; Luke v, 3.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 269
tention, and without eloquent peroration to win
applause; indeed, one can hardly think of them
as having ever been received with applause. With
very few exceptions they were not aflame with pas-
sion. They were simple in style as in substance,
spontaneous, unartificial, practical and instructional
rather than imaginative and emotional. No school-
boy wishing to find a fit piece of literature for a
declamation would think of looking among Christ's
discourses for a suitable oration for oratorical dis-
play. Christ's discourses are not declamatory, they
are not oratorical, they neither surge with passion
nor scintillate with antithesis nor sparkle with wit
and humor. No teacher of rhetoric would go to
them except for examples of lucidity and sim-
plicity. They are simple, conversational, almost
colloquial.
Nor was the power of Jesus Christ, primarily,
intellectual. The interest which he aroused was not
dependent on skillful analysis and dialectical skill.
He did not play before men a game of chess, setting
thought against thought with check and counter-
check, while men looked on to see how the game
would end. There is very little of the kind of
intellectual interest in reading the discourses of
Jesus Christ which the scholar finds in reading the
dialogues of Plato. A profound philosophy of life
underlies his teaching, but his teaching is not the
exhibition or unfolding of a system of philosophy.
There is little in common in the method of the
260 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
teaching between Jesus Christ and Hegel or Kant
or Calvin or Edwards.^
Most of his teaching was conversational ; some
scholars think it was all conversational. Probably
it was largely fragmentary ; certainly it comes to
us in fragmentary reports. It is mainly coUoquial
— talk with men, rather than addresses to men.
Christ receives their inquiries and gives his reply,
or seeks their responses to his own inquiries. It is
often dialogue in fact, when it is not so in form, —
an interchange of thought with thought, of life
with life. On even the most conservative interpre-
tation of the Gospels, there are not more than &ve
discourses that can properly be called sermons, of
which we have any report in the Gospels. These
are the sermon at Nazareth, the Sermon on the
Mount, the parables at the seashore, the sermon on
the Bread of Life, and the Discourse on the Last
Day .2 The parables by the seashore I believe to
have been given on different occasions, though at
the same period of his ministry ; the other sermons
above referred to I believe to be real discourses,
not merely collections of apothegmatic sayings ; but
upon this point scholars are not agreed.
And yet, while he taught in conversational
forms, and in apparently fragmentary utterances,
he dealt with the greatest problems of human life.
^ But see further on this aspect of his teaching, post, pp. 262-264.
2 Luke iv, 16-32 ; Matt v, vi, vii; Luke vi, 17-49; John vi,
25-71 ; Matt. xxiv.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 261
The questions which he discussed are such as these :
What is the object of life ? That question he
answers in the sermon at Nazareth. We are here
to serve one another, to lift men up, to comfort, to
console, to illumine, to instruct, to redeem ; not to
be ministered unto, but to minister. What is the
secret of happiness ? That question he answers in
the Sermon on the Mount. Character is the secret
of happiness. Blessed are the poor in spirit, the
meek, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peace-
makers. Not what we have but what we are deter-
mines our happiness. What is the secret of char-
acter ? How shall I possess a holiness (or whole-
ness or healthf ulness) that will make me blessed ?
That question he answers in the sermon on the
bread of life. The secret is communion with God,
fellowship with him, feeding upon him, making him
the substance of our life, the nourishment of our
soul. What is the destiny of man, the issue of life,
the outcome of this great drama of history of which
we are a part ? That he answers in his Discourse
on the Last Day. It is the revelation of God, such
a revelation that the deaf will hear, the blind wiU
see, the dull will recognize.
Or turn from these discourses to his conversa-
tions. These also are on great themes. Nicodemus
comes to him by night. " Rabbi," he says, " we
know that thou art a teacher come from God : for
no man can do these miracles that thou doest,
except God be with him." Christ instantly turns
26SS: THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
the conversation into a new channel. It is not, he
teUs him, a right opinion about miracles, nor a
right opinion about myself that you need ; you need
a new life coming down from above. He talks
with the woman at the well, and from a simple re-
quest for a drink of water turns the conversation
into one of the prof oundest discourses respecting
the nature and source of spiritual life.^ Or, from
the conversations, turn to his parables. They are
never mere dramatic pictures to catch the attention
and arouse the interest for the moment ; they are
interpretations of great spiritual truths. In the
parables of the Good Samaritan and Dives and
Lazarus, he exhibits the true test of character ; in
the parable of the Prodigal Son he exhibits the
difference between the holiness that forgives sin
and the holiness that only hates and resents it ; in
the parable of the publican and the Pharisee, the
difference between the holiness that is satisfied
with past achievement and that which aspires to a
worthier future.^
Though in form fragmentary, in fact Christ's
teaching was systematic. It may be true that
" Jesus, so far as we can conclude from our sources,
has never aimed in any single discourse or any
group of connected discourses at laying down his
doctrine in systematic form ; '* ^ certainly his teach-
1 John iii, 1-12, iv, 1-30.
2 Luke X, 25-37, xvi, 19-31, xv, 11-32, xviu, 10-14.
8 Wendt: The Teaching of Jesus, p. 107.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 263
ing is in its form the farthest possible removed
from the systematic theology of a Calvin, an Ed-
wards, a Park, or a Hodge; but underlying his
teaching is a system. He does not formulate it,
but it exists. He presents no isolated truths, half
thought out ; eveiy truth which he presents runs
its roots down and finds connection with every
other truth. For nineteen centuries his disciples
have been studying his teachings ; they have gotten
some doctrines out of his teachings which are not
there, and they have, doubtless, failed to get some
doctrines out of his teachings which are there ;
but, despite their conflicting prepossessions and
temperaments, they have agreed in finding certain
great fimdamental truths in his ministry. Roman
Catholic and Protestant, Calvinist and Arminian,
Episcopalian and Congregationalist, orthodox and
heterodox, bitterly as they have fought one another
on certain questions of doctrine, heartily agree with
one another in certain fundamental faiths. They
could not have thus agreed in discovering a sys^
tem underlying the teachings of Jesus Christ if
no system was there. Imperfectly understood by
his disciples, imperfectly reported by them, con-
stantly misinterpreted since, used by combatants
as an arsenal for weapons of offense or defense,
sharply criticised by skeptics of every type in all
ages of the world, the teaching of Jesus Christ is
more universally honored, more profoundly rever-
enced, and on the whole more loyally followed than
264 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
ever before in the world's history. This could not
be if it had not unity. Teaching which is but a
series of disjecta memhra could possess no such
immortality.
But it was not the object of Jesus Christ to ex-
hibit or maintain a system. He did not teach for
the purpose of inculcating a philosophy ; it was not
his aim to found a school of thought. Still less did
he seek to give specific rules for the regulation of
conduct ; it was not his aim to found a school of
ethics. Both truth and rules of conduct were in-
strumental ; the end of all his teaching was the pro-
duction of character. Thus, his preaching was not
in form philosophical or ethical ; it was vital, and
aimed at changing the sources of life, that is, at
changing the character, not merely at the forma-
tion of opinions or the regulation of conduct. He
therefore never measured men by their ecclesiastical
practices, their intellectual opinions, or their emo-
tional states. He never asked them whether they
went to church, or what they believed, or how they
felt. He never portrayed men as good because of
their ecclesiastical practices or the orthodoxy of
their opinions or the excitation of their emotions.
He never portrayed them as bad because they did
not conform to ecclesiastical rules or orthodox stand-
ards, or did not possess prescribed emotions. His
measurements of men were always real, practical,
vital ; character was the end of his teaching, con-
duct was his measure of character.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 265
His preaching, therefore, is concrete. His illus-
trations are never mere ornaments, introduced to
relieve a wearied audience or lighten the strain
upon their attention ; they are concrete expressions
of vital truth ; and the only truths with which he
concerns himself' are those capable of concrete inter-
pretation. An abstract truth which exists only in
the realm of pure intellect has apparently for Jesus
Christ no interest ; it certainly has no place in his
teaching. The only Christianity which Jesus Christ
inculcated was applied Christianity.
Seeking thus to change the sources of character,
he seeks to make men think for themselves, answer
their own questions, or ask questions of themselves
which they had not thought to ask before. A lawyer
asks him, "Who is my neighbor?" Christ tells
him the story of the good Samaritan, and then
returns his question to him, " Which now of these
three, thinkest thou, was neighbor unto him that
fell among thieves?" He tells the story of two
sons, one of whom promised to work in his father's
vineyard but did no work, the other of whom re-
fused to work in his father's vineyard and repented
and went to work, and then puts to his auditors the
question, " Whether of them twain did the wiU of
his father?" A young man comes running in his
eagerness, kneels to him reverently, and in words
acknowledging his authority says, " Good Master,
what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" Christ
throws him back upon himself: What do you
266 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
mean by "good Master"? Why do you call me
good ? and the young man is silent ; he has used the
phrase without significance. ^ This method is charac-
teristic with Christ. He seeks by concrete statement,
by parabolic illustration, by searching question, to
get behind the intellectual conception, behind the
ethical rule, behind the ecclesiastical formulary,
into the very springs and sources of man's being.
This combination of profundity of thought and
concreteness of statement gives his sayings a hid-
den meaning. His thoughts are seed thoughts. His
teaching abounds in epigrams. Whole systems of
truth lie concealed in them. " I say unto you, Love
your enemies " has in it the secret of the Christian
system of penology. The function of society is not
to punish but to redeem the enemies of society.
" Say, Our Father " has in it a complete system
of theology. What true fatherhood means to us
on earth interprets the relationship of God to hu-
manity. " Take my yoke upon you " contains the
whole secret of human development. Yoke yourself
to God and your work is easy. This is the secret
of civilization, — that we have learned how in the
natural realm to avail ourselves of the divine forces
in nature and work cooperatively with them. This
is the secret of Christian development, which we
shall have acquired when we have learned how to
enter into spiritual companionship with God and
work in the spiritual realm cooperatively with him.
^ Luke z, 36 ; Matt zzi, 31, zriii, 17.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 267
This compacting of fundamental principles of
life into brief and pregnant aphorisms gives great
crispness of style to the teachings of Jesus. "With
what measure ye mete it shall be measured unto
you." " Many that are first shall be last, and the
last first." " Many are called but few are chosen."
" The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for
the Sabbath." "He that is greatest among you
shall be your servant." " It is more blessed to give
than to receive." The teachings of Jesus abound
with aphorisms of this description.^ They consti-
tute more than a characteristic of style, they are
evidences of profoundness of thought and careful-
ness of preparation. Such coin as these are not
minted without study of form as well as of sub-
stance, of expression as well as of truth. It is
for the preacher to ponder these aphoristic sen-
tences, meditate upon them, search for the truth
which is contained in them, study the life that is
about him, and by this combined study learn how
to apply the truths concealed in these aphorisms to
the circumstances and conditions of modern life.
There are also certain elements in Christ's life
which bear directly on his teaching, and which, in
any consideration of him as a teacher, must be
taken account of.
First is his industry. Judged simply as other
^ Matt, vii, 2, xix, 80, xx, 16, xxiii, 11 ; Mark ii, 27 ; Acts xx,
35. Wendt, in The Teaching of Jesus, gives three pages of say-
ings of this description, vol. i, pp. 139-142.
268 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
men are judged, it is safe to say that no man in
the history of the human race has accomplished any-
thing commensurable with what Jesus Christ accom-
plished in the three years into which his life ministry
was condensed. But his habits of industry antedated
his public ministry. He began life working as a
carpenter at his father's bench. His appreciation
of nature, his familiarity with the Bible, and his
profound knowledge of life, all indicate a thought-
ful boyhood. In the beginning of his ministry he
gathered workingmen about him, and from them
chose his apostles. An itinerant ministry was his,
and his journeys were all performed on foot ; he
walked hundreds of miles in the course of his life.
Mark has given us the story of one of his days.^
It was a typical day ; multiplied, it affords a picture
of his busy life. It is said of him at one period of
his ministry that he had not time so much as to
eat.2 ^j^^ Ijjg work was of a kind that exhausts
men; and it exhausted him. Virtue went out of
him, it is said.^ He was so worn by the calls upon
his sympathies that bystanders looking on him said
to one another. We see now what the prophet meant
when he said of the Messiah, " Himself took our
infirmities, and bare our sicknesses." * These evi-
dences of his industry lie on the surface of his life.
But as the greater part of an iceberg lies below the
1 Mark i, 21-45.
2 Mark vi, 31, iii, 20; Matt, viii, 20.
« Luke vi, 19, viii, 46 ; Mark v, 30.
* Matt, viii, 17.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 269
water line, so the greater part and the best part of
a teacher's industry lies out of the world's sight.
Christ could not have taught the truths he taught
without much time given to meditating ; he could not
have been the master of the Hebrew literature, not
of its words only, but of its inner spiritual meaning,
without much study of that literature ; and he could
not have thrown out those aphoristic sentences that
sparkle like diamonds, those perfectly wrought par-
ables, profound in the truth they reveal, perfect
in the lucidity and simplicity of the form in which
it is revealed, without much study expended both
upon the substance and the expression.
As a teacher he was free, unconstrained, uncon-
ventional. He neither resented the conventions of
his time nor submitted to them. He used them when
they were useful ; he disregarded them when they
interfered with his work. He preached in the syn-
agogues as long as the synagogues would permit him
to do so. The fact that his teaching was revolu-
tionary of the religious opinions of the rulers of
the synagogues did not deter him from using their
pulpits so long as their pulpits were open to him.
When the rulers thought to prevent his preaching
by prohibiting him the only recognized religious
gathering-place of the time, he found other places
in which to preach. A house, a field, a shore, a hill-
side served as a synagogue; a seat, a stone, the
prow of a boat, served as a pulpit. And he never
waited for a congregation. Sometimes he talked to a
270 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
single woman coming to the well to draw water;
sometimes to a houseful, while others crowded about
the doors and the windows ; sometimes to a group of
fishermen casually on the shore of the lake ; some-
times to the crowds passing and repassing in the
outer court of the Temple at Jerusalem; some-
times to thousands who had flocked from the vil-
lages to hear him on some plain among the hills
of Galilee. Any soul served as a congregation,
any spot as a church, any opportunity as a sacred
occasion.^
The reason for this it is easy to see : he had a mis-
sion to fulfiU, a message to deliver. After a day
of ministry his friends find him in his retreat, and
desire to bring him back to enjoy the sweets of
popularity. He refuses. " Let us go into the next
towns," he says, " that I may preach there also, for
therefore came I forth." His message was the
expression of his own life, and its expression was
necessary to him. He foresees what it will cost, not
to him only, but to his friends and to the world,
and he shrinks from these consequences, yet he
cannot, will not draw back. " I am come to send
fire on the earth, " he says : " and what will I if
it be already kindled? I have a baptism to be
baptized with ; and how am I straitened till it be
accomplished ! " The message has been given to him
by his Father, and he cannot be still. " The words
that I speak unto you," he says, " I speak not of
1 John iv, 6, 7 ; Mark ii, 1, 2 ; Luke v, 1-3, xx. 1; Matt, vi, 1.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 271
myself : but the Father that dweUeth in me, he doeth
the works." The mission is one which has been
laid upon him ; and he cannot lay it down until he
can say to his Father, " I have finished the work
which thou gavest me to do." ^
Because his ^message was the expression of his
life it was emphasized by his life. His actions in-
terpreted his words. " I am," he said, " the way,
the truth, and the life." ^ He bade his disciples take
no thought for the morrow. He took none. When
the multitude was hungry, he asked what provisions
the little band had provided for their own use, as
one who had given himself no concern before upon
the subject, then gave it aU away to the throng
who attended his ministry, in seeming oblivion of
his own needs, in real trust in the Father who cares
for the fowls of the air and the lilies of the field.
He bade his disciples love their enemies and pray
for those who despitefully used them. His enemies
he loved. His last words to the disciple who be-
trayed him were pathetic words of friendly reproach,
— a final effort to save the traitor from his self-
destruction, and not in vain, since they awakened
a remorse that we may at least hope was the begin-
ning of a true repentance.^ Among his last words
was a prayer for the forgiveness of those who crucified
1 Mark i, 38 ; Luke xii, 49, 50 ; John sdv, 10, xvii, 4.
2 John xiv, 6.
8 Mai-k vi, 34-41 ; Matt, v, 44, vi, 25-31 ; Luke xxii, 48, xxiii,
34.
272 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
him. Thus Christ lived as he preached, because
he preached what he was, — no reporter of other
men's thoughts, no repeater of other men's faiths
was he, but the exponent of his own innermost,
sacred, divine life.
This inner life of his, compelHng his lips to utter
and his hands to do, inspired a courage which halted
at no danger and hesitated at no obstacle. I send
you forth, he said to his apostles, as sheep in the
midst of wolves ; be wise ; be harmless, but fear
not. Going himself as a sheep in the midst of
wolves, neither courting danger nor avoiding it, he
never feared. In vain his mother and his brethren
endeavored to dissuade him from the seemingly un-
equal contest into which he had entered with the
ruling powers of his time. In vain his disciples
warned him of the danger of his death and besought
him to avoid it. History affords no more dramatic
illustration of heroism than is afforded by his going
up to Jerusalem to his passion, with the shame and
spitting, the betrayal, the mock trial, the angry
mob, the crucifixion all before him ; and there in
the Temple courts challenging the Scribes and
Pharisees with an invective against their false re-
ligious pretense covering evil hearts and evil deeds,
as a whited sepulchre covers " dead men's bones
and all uncleanness." Yet parallel to it is that
other scarcely less dramatic incident in the begin-
ning of his life, when he turned the applause of his
Nazarene congregation into murderous hate by his
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 273
rebuke of tlie national sin of provincial pride and
narrowness.^
Of the essential spirit of his ministry — its spirit
of self-control surpassing all asceticism, its spirit of
conscience surpassing all Puritanism, its spirit of
piety surpassing' all mysticism, its spirit of hope-
fulness surpassing all optimism — I shall speak in
the next chapter. Yet the most important charac-
teristic in the method of his ministry would be
ignored if I were to pass by in silence his habit of
retreating from time to time, not only from the
crowd but from his nearest and most intimate
friends, to be alone with himseK and his God.
" When thou prayest," he said to his disciples,
" enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy
door, pray to thy Father which is in secret." His
closet was sometimes the wild eastern shore of the
Sea of Galilee, sometimes a recess high up among the
hills, sometimes a garden in the environs of Jeru-
salem.2 Eager as he was to help men, thronged
as he was by men eager for his help, with a work
too large to be accomplished in a lifetime, and a
life too short for anything but the merest begin-
ning of that work, yet he never was so busy that
he could not get away from men for hours whose
occupation is hidden from our vision, and can be
interpreted only by our experience. How intimate
1 Matt. X, 16 ; Mark iii, 21, 31^5, viii, 31-33, x, 32 ; John xi, 16 ;
Matt, xxiii, 13-39 ; Luke iv, 16-32.
2 Matt, vi, 6 ; Luke v, 16, vi, 12 ; Mark i, 35, xiv, 32-35.
274 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
was his companionship with his Father in those
hours, how far back into the ages which preceded
his birth that companionship may have reached, it
is not for us to know. But this we may surely
know, — that we who are trying to do Christ's work
in Christ's way, whose aspiration it is to emulate
his industry, his freedom, his spontaneity, his real-
ity, his courage, his self-control, his conscientious-
ness, his piety, and his hopefulness, must have our
hours of solitude that are also hours of most inti-
mate companionship, our hours of silence and repose,
given not to study, not even to petition, but to that
conmiunion which can neither be analyzed nor de-
scribed, hours when perhaps our only prayer is,
Speak, Lord, for thy servant is listening, and per-
haps the only answer we hear is, Be still and know
that I am God.
CHAPTER X
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST : THE SUB-
STANCE OF HIS TEACHING
There have been many attempts to formulate the
teaching of Jesus Christ. Of these the earliest is
that contained in the Epistle to Titus : " The grace
of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to
all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and
worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously,
and godly, in this present world ; looking for that
blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great
God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." ^ This sum-
mary of Christ's teaching may certainly be taken
as an indication of the opinions respecting that
teaching entertained by the Apostolic Church, and
it is clear from this summary that the Early Church
thought of Christ as a systematic teacher, or, at
least, as a teacher of truths which could be sys-
tematized, and which, being systematized, proved
to be comprehensive and complete, covering all the
categories of human experience. For man stands in
four relations in his life involving ethical obligation,
and only in four. First, in a relation to a material
universe, and to his body, which is a part of that
1 Titus ii, 11-13.
276 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
material universe, through which he comes in con-
tact with the world outside. Second, in a relation
to his fellow men, that is, to human society. Third,
in a relation to God. Fourth, in a relation to the
future. These four include all the possible catego-
ries of experience : relation to the material world,
relation to his fellow men, relation to God, and
relation to the future. We stand, it is true, in a
certain relation to the past ; but we cannot change
it, and therefore it is not a relation which affects
our duty. What the Epistle to Titus declares is
that Jesus Christ has taught how we should live in
these four relations. He has taught us what are
our ethical relations to the physical world, to our
fellow men, to God, and to the future.
It is also clear that in the Apostolic age the
teaching of Jesus Christ was regarded as vital and
practical rather than as philosophical and theologi-
cal. He taught the practical art of living rather
than any abstract theory of life. If one had asked
the primitive Church, in the second century, what
Jesus came to teach, he would probably have been
answered in the words of the Apostles' Creed. He
would have been told that the essence of Christian-
ity lies in certain historic facts. If one had asked a
couple of centuries later what was the epitome of
Christ's teaching, the answer would have been in
the words of the Nicene Creed, that Jesus Christ is
" God of God, Light of Light, very God of very
God, begotten, not made, being of one substance
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 277
with the Father," in other words, that the essence
of Christianity consists in certain beliefs respecting
the relationship which Jesus Christ bears to the
Eternal and the Infinite. If one had asked the
Christians of the sixteenth century, whether Pro-
testant or Roman 'Catholic, they would have pre-
sented in reply certain theories of the universe as
constituting the essence of Christianity. We find
them to-day embodied in the Creed of Pius IV,
in the Westminster Confession of Faith, or in the
Thirty-nine Articles. But in this earliest summary
of Christ's instruction he is represented as teach-
ing, not what we should think, but how we should
live. There is nothing in this epitome concerning
theological or other opinions. It concerns itself
wholly with life. Jesus Christ has come to teach
us that we should live soberly, righteously, godly,
and hopefully in this present world.
I. What does Jesus Christ mean by soberly ?
In the first century the condition of the world
was that of gross animalism. Wealth was concen-
trated in the hands of a very few. At least half the
world were slaves, and of the other haK the great
majority lived in abject poverty. At the same time
a few lived in the possession of wealth so great that
they knew not what to do with it. The result was a
state of dissipation and degradation ahnost incred-
ible in our times. The world was ransacked for
materials to add to the gratification of the body.
From two hundred thousand dollars to four hundred
278 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
thousand doUars were sometimes spent on a single
banquet. It is said of one man that he spent four
millions of doUars in luxurious eating and drinking,
and then committed suicide because he had only
four hundred thousand dollars between himself and
starvation. The feasts lasted for days, often for a
week. Sometimes a governor was appointed, who
required men to drink their due quota of wine.
The grossness of indulgence in animal passion was
such that it is impossible to describe it in explicit
terms in such a volume as this.
Such a state of affairs called for reform, and
there were those who proposed reform. There grew
up sects which declared that all aniaial pleasure
was shameful, degrading, sinful. In Kome were
the Stoics, who claimed that pleasure was always
degrading. In Palestine were the Pharisees and the
Essenes, who, in different forms, made the same
claim. The Pharisees were the Puritans of the first
century. They were the separatists. They lived in
the world, mixed with the world, made money, went
to feasts, had fine houses, wore fine clothes ; but
they held that religion was apart from this life.
When they feasted, they were not religious ; to be
religious they fasted. They were not religious when
they lived in fine clothes ; to be religious they took
off their fine clothes and put on sackcloth and ashes.
Religion consisted in separating themselves from
the enjoyments in which for most of the time they
indulged. The Essenes were more consistent, if
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 279
less practical. They separated themselves from the
world ; lived away from the towns where the temp-
tations were great ; gathered in little villages or in
settlements in the desert ; forbade, it is said, though
this is doubtful, all use of meat and of wine ; cer-
tainly forbade aU ^marriage. They cut themselves
off from everything in life from which it was pos-
sible to cut themselves off, and still maintain an
existence.
This, broadly speaking, was the condition of the
world when Jesus came into it, — on the one hand,
men giving themselves up to imbridled lust and
appetite, without restraint of any kind ; on the
other hand, men saying, All indulgence in pleasure
is irreligious, and to be religious we will take cer-
tain times for denial of the body, or, more consist-
ently, saying, We will deny the body entirely as
far as we can do so and still keep soul and body
together.
It would not be difficult to find in our own time
parallels to both these classes. On the one hand,
there are men and women — a few, though not so
many now as there were in the Middle Ages —
who hold that the highest religion requires that we
should separate ourselves from the world altogether ;
there are many more who hold that religion consists
in cutting off certain things which they characterize
as worldly. It is irreligious to play cards, but not
to play dominoes ; to play billiards, but not to play
croquet ; to go to the theatre, but not to witness
280 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
tableaux. A line is drawn ; all on one side of the
line is wrong, all on the other side of ^the line is
right. There is more than one man who eats poor
pastry and drinks strong coffee until his flesh is
as flabby as the one and his skin as yeUow as the
other, and yet thinks that he is a temperance man
because he does not drink beer. Such men conceive
that religion requires us to put certain things in
packages and write " prohibited " on them, and
certain other things in packages and write "per-
mitted " on them.
Jesus Christ did not accept any such notion.
He came into the world, and in the world lived as
a man among men. He was no ascetic. His first
miracle was making wine at a wedding, simply to
add to the festivities of that joyous occasion. He
continued throughout his life in the same spirit.
The sect of Essenes, who separated themselves from
the world, he did not join. John the Baptist, as a
protest against the sensuality of his time, went into
the wilderness and lived there on locusts and wild
honey. Jesus pursued the opposite course. John,
he said, came neither eating nor drinking ; the Son
of man came eating and drinking. It is not re-
corded that in the history of his life he ever de-
clined an invitation to a feast. Sometimes it was
given to him by the rich, sometimes by the poor,
sometimes by a Pharisee, sometimes by a publican ;
but whoever gave it, he went. He accepted the
common pleasures of life, and was not prevented
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 281
from so doing by the fear that his example would
be misinterpreted. It was misinterpreted : because
he came eating and drinking, men said of him that
he was a wine-bibber and a glutton ; they lied, but
stiU he went on eating and drinking as before.^
And what he ^did he advised others to do.
Again and again he portrayed a great feast to il-
lustrate the kingdom of God. He never spoke of
dancing with displeasure, and more than once with
apparent commendation. He spoke of the sports
and games of the children in the market-place with
apparent approbation. He told the story of a boy
who had wandered off into a far country, and come
back after his experience with the harlots, footsore,
ragged, unkempt, poverty-stricken, and when his
father received him it was to music and dancing
and a feast. Paul, in one of his letters, tells us in
a phrase which has been often misquoted and mis-
interpreted what he thinks the spirit and teaching
of Christ embody on this subject. "Wherefore,"
Paul says, " if ye be dead with Christ from the
rudiments of the world, why, as though living in
the world, are ye subject to ordinances, [such as]
Touch not ; taste not ; handle not ; which all are to
perish with the using ; after the commandments and
doctrines of men ? " " Touch not, taste not, handle
not " ! How often that has been quoted as though
that were the law laid down by Christianity ! Paul
1 John ii, 1-11 ; Matt, xi, 18, 19 ; Luke vii, 36, », 37, xiv, 1,
xix, 2-5 ; Matt, ix, 10, xxvi, 6, 7.
282 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
quotes it from pagan literature, and says to Chris-
tians: You are free from that law if you are a
follower of Christ. You are to touch, you are to
taste, you are to handle ; the world is yours. That
is the first teaching of Christ.^
But while Christ was not prevented from taking
the innocent pleasures of the world even by the
misrepresentation and abuse which resulted from
it, his happiness did not depend on what we call
pleasure, — on fine clothes, fine houses, fine food, or
anything that ministers merely to the body. He
took these things if they came ; he left them alone
if they did not come ; but he did not care. A man
said to him once, I will follow thee whithersoever
thou goest ; he said. Will you ? Foxes have holes,
birds of the air have nests ; I have not where to
lay my head. He went to aU sorts of feasts pro-
vided for him, but the food that he provided for
himself was apparently of the simplest kind. One
incident tells us what it was. A great crowd lis-
tened aU day long; they were hungry; Christ wished
to feed them. He turns to his disciples : What pro-
vision have we ? Five crackers and two little fishes
— like our sardines — the humblest food of the
peasants. This was his food. He lived a poor man,
and poverty did not trouble him. He depended on
the charity of men for his livelihood while he taught
them, and he told his disciples to do the same.
When he sent them forth, he said. Take no money
1 Matt, xi, 16, 17; Luke xv, 26 ; CoL ii, 20-23.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 283
in your purse ; depend on what men will give to you.
Once he came out from Jerusalem and stopped at
the house of a friend. There were two sisters. One
of them was interested in his teaching, and sat at
his feet, listening to him ; the other bustled about
the house to get a great supper for him. When the
busy sister called on him to send her sister to help
her he refused. He preferred the listening pupil to
the too busy housekeeper. He would rather teach
than eat. He and his disciples had no servant.
Once when they came in from a long walk, tired,
footsore, with soiled feet, — they wore no shoes and
stockings in those days, and therefore men washed
their feet as we wash oui- hands before meals, — and
there was no one to do this for them, he poured the
water into the basin and washed their feet himseK.^
He was no Stoic, but he was no epicure; he was no
Pharisee, but he was no Sadducee; he was no Puri-
tan, but he was no Cavalier. He did not depend for
his happiness on the things the world gives, and he
told his disciples not to depend on them. Happiness,
he said to them, is a disposition, not a condition.
Men are happy according to what they are, not ac-
cording to what they have. Blessedness depends
on character, not on possession ; on what you are,
not on what you have ; on how you live, not on
where you live. The true man is independent of
his possessions. This was his teaching, and it was
1 Matt, viii, 20, xiv, 16, 17; Luke x, 4-11, 38-40; John xiii,
1-5.
284 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
taught by him in his life as well as by his words.
He lived it as well as taught it. Sobriety with him
did not mean cutting off certain things and allowing
himself certain other things; it meant counting all
things as his if he chose to use them, and yet not
depending for his pleasure on them.
For sobriety involved, in the second place, the
fundamental principle that things are for men, not
men for things. This principle had been announced
by an unknown Hebrew prophet in that wonderful
poem which describes the creation of the world.
" So God created man in his own image, in the
image of God created he him; male and female
created he them. And God blessed them, and God
said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and re-
plenish the earth, and subdue it : and have domin-
ion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the
air, and over every living thing that moveth upon
the earth." ^ All things are made for man, — all
material things, aU animal things, — made that they
may be the servitors of man, that they may make
him happier and wiser and better. All animals are
his servants, and the animal nature that is a part of
him is no less his servant. The animal in the man
is made to serve that which is higher than the ani-
mal in the man, as aU external things are made to
serve him. This was a fimdamental principle both
in the teaching and in the living of Jesus. All
material things outside and all material things
1 Gen. i, 27, 28.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 285
within the man himself are made for the inteUect-
ual, the moral, the spiritual, the immaterial. The
lower must serve the higher.
When he saw a man who did not imderstand
this principle, and who thought there was joy in
the simple possession of things, he called him — for
sometimes he spoke in very plain language — a fool.
He told the story of a man who, having filled his
bams to bursting, said. What shall I do? I have
no more barns to dispose of my goods. I wiU build
greater bams, and put my harvests in the greater
barns, and I will say to myself, Eat, drink, and be
merry. And then Jesus said, God called to him. Thou
fool, this night thy life shaU be required of thee. A
man who cannot think of anything better to do with
things than to fill his house with them, and then
build another house and fiU that with them, and
then a third house and fiU that with them, Jesus
calls a fool. And there are a great many such fools
in America. He put this truth again explicitly
in a question which it will be well for Americans
to ponder : " What is a man profited, if he shaU
gain the whole world, and lose his own life ? " ^ The
world is made for life, and if a man exchanges his
life for the world, what does he gain ? Yet there
is many a man who does exactly this. He can pur-
chase pictures in France or Germany or England,
and pay what prices he will, but he has no eyes for
^ Luke xii, 16-21 ; Matt, zyi, 26. This is the meaning of the
Greek word " soul."
286 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
art. He can buy libraries, and with them make
beautiful wall-paper for his rooms, but the only-
books he cares for are the ledger and the day-book.
He has money which will enable him to put all the
luxuries of aU the markets on his table, and a diges-
tion which forbids him to eat any of them. He has
lost his life in gaining things. In our American
world are many such men.
In contrast with such living, common now, almost
universal then, Jesus said. Things are for men, not
men for things. His first affirmation is. Your hap-
piness does not depend upon what you have, but
upon what you are ; his second, Things are for you,
not you for things. To live soberly according to
the example and teaching of Jesus Christ is to live
under the guidance and inspiration of these two
simple and fundamental principles. It is not to put
certain things on one side and say, I will not take
those, and certain things on the other side and say,
I will take those, — it is to say, I will take every-
thing that will help me to be a better man, and
nothing that will not help me to be a better man.
There are three conceptions possible respecting
our relation to the material world. First : that we
should give ourselves up to the enjoyment of it : let
us eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow we die.
Rome did that, and Eome died ; and the land that
had given a Cicero, a Caesar, a Tacitus, a Sallust,
a Virgil, lay for centuries dead, kiUed by its own
self-indulgence. The second is, to shut one's self off
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 287
from the world, and shut off all those things in the
world that bring what we caU pleasure. The Puri-
tans tried this plan. They broke the glass windows
in the cathedrals, destroyed the statues, tore down
the pictures from the waUs, prohibited the novel,
shut the door of the theatre. But aU that they abol-
ished came back again : the stained-glass windows
are in Puritan churches ; the statues are restored
to the niches ; the pictures are on the walls ; the
theatre doors are wide open ; the novel is here to
stay. The third method is the method of consecra-
tion. It is the method of one who says. Whatever
I can use to make myseK, my family, my world
wiser, better, happier, I will enjoy ; and what I
cannot so use I will prohibit to myself. This was
the method which Christ urged alike by his precept
and example. Soberly, as interpreted by Christ,
means the free use of aU things in the service and
for the upbuilding of the spirit. It is interpreted
by Paul in his declaration to the Corinthians, " All
things are yours; whether Paul, or Apollos, or
Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things
present, or things to come ; aU are yours ; and ye
are Christ's ; and Christ is God's." ^ All teachers,
all material things, aU activities, present and fu-
ture, all belong to us, to use as Christ used them,
in loyalty to God and in the service of our fellow
men.
II. What does Jesus Christ mean by righteously ?
1 1 Cor. iii, 21-23.
288 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
What did he teach concerning the right relation of
man to his fellow men ?
In interpreting the teaching of Jesus Christ we
ought not to forget, as we are too apt to do, that he
was a Jew and primarily a teacher to Jews, and that
he assumed as the basis of his teaching the funda-
mental faiths held and inculcated by the Hebrew
prophets. And fundamental to their teaching was
the doctrine that God is a righteous God ; that he
demands righteousness of his children, and demands
nothing else ; that the one thing that arouses his
anger is man's inhumanity to man; that the one
way to please him is for man to serve his f eUow man.
It is true that there had grown up in Judaism an
elaborate sacrificial system, a great temple, and a
great priesthood ; but this sacrificial system, with
its priesthood and its temple, was not essential to the
Hebrew religion. That it was not is evident from
two facts : first, that, as modern scholars have abun-
dantly shown, this system did not exist in anything
like the form in which we now find it in the Old
Testament until the fifth or sixth century before
Christ ; second, that with the destruction of Jeru-
salem, seventy years after the birth of Christ, the
temple, the sacrificial system, and the priesthood
disappeared. No Jew now offers sacrifices, no Jew
now recognizes a priesthood, and yet the religion
of the Hebrew people remains to-day fundamentally
what it was fifteen hundred years before Christ.
Jesus Christ has himseK given a summary of the
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 289
Hebrew religion, as it is to be found in the writings
of its great law-giver and the subsequent prophets :
" Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
This is the first and great commandment. And the
second is like untait. Thou shalt love thy neighbour
as thyself." ^ AU the law and all the prophets are
the development and application of these two prin-
ciples, or this twofold spirit.
In thus summarizing the Hebrew law and prophets
Jesus summarized his own reply to the question,
What is righteousness ? In his first sermon at Naz-
areth, in defining his mission in the terms of an
ancient Hebrew prophet, he significantly ignored
all ecclesiastical requirements, and summed up the
object of his mission in terms of helpfulness to
suffering humanity. His mission, he said, was
to bring glad tidings to the poor, healing to the
broken-hearted, deliverance to the captives, sight
to the blind, liberty to the bruised. When John
the Baptist sent two of his disciples to ask if Jesus
was the Messiah, this work of help and healing
was the only evidence of his Messiahship which
he offered : " Tell John," he said, " what things ye
have seen and heard ; how that the blind see, the
lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear,
the dead are raised, to the poor the glad tidings are
preached." ^
Christ's whole ministry is in harmony with this
1 Matt, xxii, 35-40. ^ Luke ir, 16-19, vii, 19-23.
290 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
teaching. In his parables he portrayed, as his ideals
of the religion which he taught, not characters fa-
mous for devoutness or theological lore or mystical
faith, — he portrayed men who, living common lives,
lived them on the plane of a high and noble morality.
The farmer who was diligently sowing seed; the
father who received back into his arms the wayward
son ; the man who, having found the pearl of great
price, did not put it in his pocket, but looked for
the owner and sold all that he had in order that
he might buy it honestly ; the steward who admin-
istered a great estate fairly for his lord, and was
ready to return a good account of it when the time
of administration had passed, — such were the men
Christ held up before his disciples as his conception
of religious men. To illustrate this principle he
told a story which has often been misunderstood
because the emphasis of it has been disregarded.
He assumed the common belief of his time in a
future hell and a future heaven. According to that
belief, to hell the heathen and the heretics and the
publicans and sinners were sent. Christ told the
story of two men, one of whom fared sumptuously
every day and was clothed in purple and fine linen,
and, so far as the account went, did no harm to any
one — simply did no good, leaving the poor man to
suffer at his door, while the dogs licked his sores.
And Christ said that this is the kind of man who
is to go to hell, the man who leaves suffering and
trouble and sorrow unrelieved in the world when he
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 291
has power to relieve it. Once, and only once, be
drew a picture of the judgment. God, he said, wdll
set men on his right hand and on his left, as the
sheep and the goats might be divided by a shepherd,
and he will say to those on the one hand, " Come,
ye blessed of my' Father, inherit the kingdom pre-
pared for you from the foundation of the world,"
and to those on the other, " Depart from me, ye
cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil
and his angels." And when they ask why, he wiU
reply. You shall go into everlasting punishment
because you did not feed the hungry, you did not
clothe the naked, you did not visit the sick and the
imprisoned ; and. You shall go into everlasting life
because you did feed the hungry and clothe the
naked, and visit the sick and the imprisoned.^
This, Christ's teaching, was emphasized by his ex-
ample. He was not a priest. He went to the Temple
and the Temple feasts, but apparently because the
people crowded there and thus afforded him an oppor-
tunity for teaching. He never, so far as we have any
account, sacrificed for himseK. Again and again he
told men their sins were forgiven them, and never
told them to offer a sacrifice for their sins. Once,
indeed, he sent a leper to the Temple, but it was
because the priest was the health officer of that
time, and the leper must have a clean biU of health
from the priest before he could go back into society.
1 Matt, xiii, 3-9, 45, 46, xxv, 14-46 ; Luke x, 30-37, xv, 11-
32, xvi, 19-31.
292 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
The life of Jesus Christ was not spent in ceremo-
nial observance ; it was spent in going about doing
good. He gave himseH to his fellow men. He
fed the hungry, comforted the sorrowing, helped
the discouraged, instructed the ignorant. Never,
within the limits of the human strength which was
given to him, did he refuse aid to those who came
to him for aid. No barrier could separate him from
his fellow men. It was deemed in that time irre-
ligious to teach pagans. He taught pagans as well
as Jews. It was considered indecorous to preach
religion to women ; he never hesitated to preach to
women. No moral degradation was sufficient to
separate man or woman from his sympathy. The
woman that was a sinner, the woman that to-day
scarce any man is wiUing to recognize as a hopeful
object of redemption, to her he brought the words
of hope ; to her he said, "Thy sins are forgiven:
go in peace." ^
In these teachings of Christ concerning man's re-
lation to his fellow men, there are five great laws
of life which he inculcated. Let us look at them
separately.2
First was the principle of human brotherhood :
" All ye are brethren," and " One is your Father
which is in heaven." That motto which has come
into our American industrial life might well be
1 Matt, ix, 9-13 ; Luke vii, 86-50 ; Jolin viii, 2-11.
^ These laws of the Christian life I have treated more fully in
Christianity and Social Problems.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 293
founded on his teaching, for it expresses his spirit,
"An injury to one is an injury to all." But he
taught it with a far wider application than is com-
mon in our time. The injury to one laborer is an
injury to other laborers ; but it is also an injury to
the capitalist. The injury to one capitalist is an in-
jury to other capitalists ; it is also an injury to the
laborer. Whatever builds up the interest of the one
class builds up the interest of the other ; whatever
injures the interest of the one injures the interest
of the other. We are one great corporate body, one
universal brotherhood. And the basis for this doc-
trine is a religious basis. It is easy to understand
why I am brother to the man whom I meet in
daily social intercourse, to the man who worships
in the same church with me, to the American born
on the same soil and having the same blood in his
veins ; but why am I brother to the man in a
whoUy different social circle, to the Jew, the pagan,
the unbeliever, to the stranger and foreigner, to
those men who are outside my life and never come
in touch with me ? Why ? Because we are children
of one Father which is in heaven. The fatherhood
of God — without that there is no brotherhood of
man ; and without the brotherhood of man there is
no fatherhood of God. The two go together ; the
one cannot be separated from the other.
The second great law that Jesus enunciated was
the Golden Rule of honesty ; and he enunciated it
in these words : " All things whatsoever ye would
294 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
that men should do to you, do ye even so to them." i
That is not, as it is sometimes called, a law of love ;
it is a law of justice. Who am I that I should
demand of my neighbor what I would not give
to him if we were to change places ? Equity de-
mands that anything which I ask of him I should
be ready to give to him, and anything which I
should be willing to ask of him if we changed
places, he has a right to ask of me. This is not
charity, this is justice. It is expressed in the famil-
iar motto. Put yourseK in his place. It is a very-
simple principle, and it is very easy of application.
What are the duties of the preacher and pastor ?
What he would wish of his pastor if he were a lay-
man in the pew. What are the duties of the doc-
tor ? What he would desire if he were the patient
and the doctor came to see him. What does the
lawyer owe to the client ? What he would desire
of his lawyer if he were the client. What are the
duties of the workingman ? What, if he were the
employer, he would ask of his workingman. What
are the duties of the capitalist ? What he would
expect the capitalist to do for him if he were a
laboring man. What does the mistress owe the
cook in her kitchen ? They are sisters, one in the
kitchen, one in the parlor: let each put herself in
the other's place and then ask and answer the
question. This is Christ's law of honesty : What-
ever you would demand of another, that you owe to
1 Matt, vii, 12.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 295
him. It is a ploughshare that runs deep, and were
it to run through American society it would be found
in many respects revolutionary ; but no man can
question its inherent and absolute justice.
The third law of righteousness which Christ
propounded is that property is a trust. There is
a familiar motto, What is mine is my own. That
Jesus Christ emphatically denied. All wealth is
really common wealth. Every man is contributing
to his neighbor, whether he wiU or whether he wiU
not. How many men contributed to make the break-
fast we ate this morning! Our coffee came from
Mexico, our sugar from Louisiana, our milk from
Orange County, our beefsteak from Chicago, and
our wheat bread from Minneapolis. How many
contributed to make the clothes we wear! How
many men are dead who contributed to make this
contribution possible ! How many lives have been
sunk in making the great flour mill in Minneapolis !
How many lives in making the loom that wove our
garments! Can we pay the dead? Can we pay
even the living? Every man is debtor to every
other man. As well might one spring that has con-
tributed to the Croton reservoir claim its own sep-
arate drops of water, and say. These are mine, as
for any man to say, What has come into my pos-
session even by my industry I have made myself.
No man ever made his wealth ; be it little or much,
the whole world has contributed to make it.
Communism affirms that inasmuch as all prop-
296 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
erty is made in common, all property should be
administered in common. Christ drew no such de-
duction ; neither did he condemn it. He said no-
thing against men's administering their property in
common, he said nothing in favor of it ; he simply
said that all property is a trust, and whatever man
has, be it little or be it much, he holds it in trust
for his fellow men.^ It is said of a great railroad
magnate that he is worth a hundred million dollars
or more. What does that mean ? It simply means
that he is the administrator of an enormous trust.
His wealth is not, and cannot be, expended on him-
self. He cannot wear more clothes at a time than
his poor neighbor, nor eat more food without injur-
ing his digestion, nor live at any one time in more
houses. He has some advantages. If he is sick, he
can call in what medical attendance he likes ; and
yet the poorest man may get the best medical at-
tendance in our great hospitals. He can have what
books he wishes to read ; and yet we are coming to
the time when the great public libraries will give
the best books to all men. He owns a great rail-
road, that is, he operates a great highway ; and if
he is a man of honesty, he operates it for the
benefit of the people. Our food, our clothes, our
provisions, the products of our labor, come and go
on this great highway which he owns and operates.
It is a trust in his hands to administer for the
benefit of the American people. That which eight-
1 Matt. XXV, 14-30; Luke xix, 11-27.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 297
een centuries ago was the declaration of Jesus
Christ is to-day the declaration of our own courts
of justice. It is not only Christianity, it is law to-
day ; for the courts declare that the ^eat highway
belongs to the people, and that the man who seems
to own it is but a trustee and must administer it
under their control and according to their direc-
tion.
The fourth law of righteousness which Christ
enimciated was : He that would be greatest among
you, let him be servant of all. The greatness of
a man is measured by the greatness of the service
he renders. Are we put into this world to see how
much we can get out of it, or to see how much we
can put into it? The issue is perfectly simple, and
yet it is one of those alphabetic issues that, because
it is so simple, men constantly forget. No man is
worthy to be called a man who is not ambitious so
to live that the world wiU be left richer and better
and happier and wiser because he has Hved in it. No
man is worthy to be called a man who is, as a rule,
idle ; there is work that he can do. If he walks
the streets with ragged shoes and ragged clothes,
he is a tramp ; if he travels the continent in Pull-
man cars and does nothing for the world he lives
in, he is the worse tramp of the two, because with
less excuse for his idleness. The unprofitable ser-
vant Christ condemned because he was unprofit-
able. A man or a nation is like a fruit tree ; if
it bears no fruit for the benefit of others, " cut it
298 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
down ; why cumbereth it the ground ? " The only-
excuse for leaving it is the hope that it may justify
itself by becoming useful.^ This world is not a
grab-bag in which we are aU to put our hands,
some to draw a prize and some a blank. It is a
great confederacy in which every man is appointed
to render some service to his fellow man.
The fifth law of righteousness which Christ enun-
ciated was the law which his greatest follower epito-
mized in the sentence, " Overcome evil with good.'*
Christianity is medicinal. Christianity offers to
help men to be better men ; and Christ has told
us how we are to accomplish that for our fellow
men. " Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou
shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But
I say unto you. Love your enemies, bless them that
curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray
for them which despitefully use you, and persecute
you ; that ye may be the children of your Father
which is in heaven." ^ Not by wrath, not primarily
nor chiefly by pain and penalty, but by love and
service and seK-sacrifice, is the world to be made
right. The penologists are beginning themselves to
accept this principle, and to recognize that we need
in our country, not a system of justice which will
give to eveiy offense its proper proportion of suffer-
ing, but a system of mercy which wiU give to every
man who has been thrust into wrong-doing by cir-
cumstances, or who has walked into wrong-doing
1 Luke xiii, 6-9. « Matt, v, 43-45.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 299
with open eyes and willing feet, an inspiration to
return to virtue.
These are the five great laws which Christ enun-
ciated as laws of social righteousness : First, the
law of hunxan brotherhood, — we are all one organic
whole ; second, tfie law of human justice, — put
yourself in his place and do to your neighbor as
you would have him do to you ; third, the law of
possession — count all property a trust to be ad-
ministered for the world ; fourth, the law of activity
— aU life is a service, and he is the greatest man
who renders the greatest service ; and, fifthly, the
law of healing — love, not wrath.
As Jesus Christ was about to die, he called the
twelve disciples about him and said to them, " A
new commandment I give unto you, That ye love
one another; as I have loved you, that ye also
love one another." ^ His life gave to love a new
significance. Not that self-sacrifice had never been
known before, but never on such a scale and with
such an inspiration. He did not merely love his
neighbor as he loved himself ; he loved men and
gave himself for them. As he marched to death
women followed after him weeping tears of pity,
and he turned toward them with the word, " Weep
not for me ; weep for yourselves." The soldiers
laid him on the cross and drove the nails through
his quivering hands and feet. He cried for mercy,
not for himself, but for the men who were nailing
^ John xiii, 34.
300 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
him to the cross. As he hung there, the hot sun
beatmg upon his head, the pestering gnats sting-
ing his unprotected face, his head throbbing with
unutterable anguish, he saw before him his mother
and his beloved disciple ; and in that hour, when
he might well have looked to them for strength,
he thought alone of them and their future loneli-
ness, and when he could no longer speak a com-
pleted sentence, in broken accents he commended
them each to the other's care : " Mother — - look —
thy son ! Son — look — thy mother I " And so he
died. And from that figure comes down through
the ages this word, that every man might well honor
and revere : As I have loved you, that so also ye
love one another. This was the consummation of
Christ's law of righteousness.
III. What did Jesus Christ mean by godly?
What did he teach, what by his life did he ex-
emplify concerning the relation between God and
man ? We are ever in the presence of an Infinite
and Eternal Energy from which all things proceed.
What, if anything, can we know of this Infinite
and Eternal Energy? What are or may be our
conscious relations to it ? To these questions there
are four answers which have been given by serious
thinkers, and more or less widely accepted by large
bodies of men.
First is the answer of agnosticism, the answer
of those who reply, We can know nothing about
this Infinite and Eternal Energy, except that it
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 301
exists, and that it transcends our knowledge. This
answer underlies Confucianism. It is the basis of
the religious philosophy of the Chinese, and of what
is known in this country by the general name of
the School for Ethical Culture. It may be epito-
mized in a sentence thus : We are and always must
be ignorant concerning the character of God ; there-
fore we would best cease trying to know him or
worship him or obey him, and give ourselves to the
service of our fellow men whom we can know.^
The second answer is that of ancient paganism. It
is, that we can know this Infinite and Eternal En-
ergy as a great and awful power, — moving towards
unknown ends, to which it is conducting all things
as irresistibly as the glacier, — and as impassible.
It is the affirmation that there is a great power in
the universe, but a power without what we are ac-
customed to regard as moral principles, and certainly
without moral sympathies. A religion founded on this
conception wiU be, as it always has been, a religion
of fear. Plutarch has graphically portrayed it :
Of all fears none so dazes and confounds as that of
superstition. He fears not the sea that never goes to sea ;
nor a battle, that follows not the camp ; nor robbers,
that stirs not abroad ; nor malicious reformers, that is a
poor man ; nor emulation, that leads a private life ; nor
earthquakes, that dwells in Gaul ; nor thunderbolts, that
dwells in Ethiopia ; but he that dreads divine powers
^ For a full exposition of this doctrine see John Cotter Morison ;
The Service of Man,
302 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
dreads everything, — the land, the sea, the air, the sky,
the dark, the light, the sound, a silence, a dream.^
The third conception of this Infinite and Eternal
Energy is that it is a Person, who stands related to
the human race somewhat as a king stands related
to his subjects. He is an awful Person, an inex-
orable Person, perhaps a terrible Person, but he is
a just Person. He has made certain laws; they
are like edicts issued by a king. We must under-
stand them and obey them or suffer the conse-
quences. In this conception of religion conscience
comes to reinforce fear, and fear to reinforce con-
science. This was the earlier Jewish conception, —
God a Lawgiver ; the moral laws edicts or statutes
issued from God ; men his subjects, who must under-
stand his laws and obey them. But in this concep-
tion, God appears to stand apart from the world that
he has made, as the mechanic stands apart from the
engine which he has made ; and apart from the hu-
man race which he governs, as the king stands apart
from the people whom he governs. He resides in
the palace ; they reside in their peasant homes.
The fourth answer to our question is that God
is the friend of humanity. This was the concep-
tion of the later Hebraism. It believed that God
was a righteous Person, a King, but it believed that
he was much more than a king. John Cotter Mori-
son has thus, in a sentence, characterized this later
Hebrew faith ;
1 Plutarch's Morals, i, 169, 170.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 303
The Jew was, therefore, on a footing of familiarity
and intimacy, so to speak, with his God, to which the
metaphysical Greek, with his wide discourse of reason,
never attained. To the Jew, God is the great com-
panion, the profound and loving yet terrible friend of
his inmost soul, with whom he holds communion in the
sanctuary of Ms heart, to whom he turns, or should turn,
in every hour of adversity or happiness.^
Put side by side these four conceptions of the
Infinite and Eternal Energy. First : We can know
nothing about this Energy : let us leave it alone
and go on our way. Second : This Energy is
awful, terrible, a power to be dreaded : let us ap-
pease its wrath by sacrifice and win its favor by
gifts. Third : This Energy is that of a just and
righteous Person, but an inexorable Lawgiver ; we
must conform to his laws or suffer the penalty.
Fourth : He is a sympathetic Person, friendly,
companionable, helpful ; if we lay hold upon him
rightly, he will lay hold upon us and we can count
upon his assistance. These are the four great con-
ceptions of the Infinite and Eternal Energy. What
was the teaching of Jesus Christ ?
He was not an agnostic. He claimed a personal
acquaintance with God. He said of himself, " As
the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Fa-
ther." He did not look back across the centuries to
find what Moses or David or Isaiah told him. He
knew the Father ; had personal acquaintance with
1 John Cotter Morison : The Service ofMan^ p. 181.
304 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
him ; the relationship between him and the Father
was that of intimate, confidential friendship. He
conversed with the Father. He was accustomed to
go into the mountain-top and spend long nights in
talking with this Father. He heard what the Father
had to say, and he told his disciples that the mes-
sages which he brought to them he received from
the Father. He had no fear of this Father, with
whom he lived in these intimate and close relation-
ships. He never calls him the Great King, or the
Holy One of Israel, or the just and righteous God,
or the Infinite and Eternal Energy, or the Al-
mighty Power : he calls him Father. I think only
once in the Gospels does he address him as God,
and that is when he dies upon the cross, and even
then the personal relation is manifested in the cry,
" My God ! my God ! " Jesus Christ beheved that
he knew the Father, that he lived intimately with
the Father, that he had friendship with the Father,
that he talked to the Father, that the Father talked
to him. He said in one of his recorded prayers,
" I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I
knew that thou hearest me always." ^ He would no
more have discussed the question whether God hears
prayer than we would discuss the question whether
we can talk with our friends. He was as sure of
personal converse with the Father as we are sure
of personal converse and communion with our
earthly companions.
1 John zi, 41, 42.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 305
And this Father was not to him some One apart
from him, some One who issued laws which he
must obey if he would escape the penalty of disobe-
dience. The will of his Father was the very suste-
nance of his life. 'He wished to do what his Father
wished him to do. It was so from very childhood.
In the one incident that we have recorded about
him as a boy, he wondered that his father and mo-
ther should have looked anywhere else for him in
the Holy City, with its architectural splendor, its
shops, its processions, its crowds of people, its varied
magnificence, except in the one university of the
city, trying to find out his Father's wiU. This at
the beginning of his life. And at its close almost
his last prayer was. Thy wiU, not mine, be done.^ A
husband and wife grow up together in loving friend-
ship. As the years go by, the color of their
eyes and the very form of their features seem to
change. They grow more and more into even the
physical likeness of each other. They come into
such closeness of relationship that the wife does
not need to hear what the husband has to say, nor
the husband what the wife has to say, but each, by
a kind of telegraphy, perceives the wish and will
of the other, through an all-mastering love. These
two are one. So Christ was one with the Father,
thinking the Father's thoughts, living the Father's
life, loving the Father, talking with the Father.
Was this to be exceptional? On the contrary,
^ John iv, 34 ; Luke ii, 49 ; Matt, zzvi, 42.
306 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
what he claimed for himself he taught his disciples
to expect for themselves. He did not undertake to
tell us about God ; he undertook to introduce us
to God. A little babe does not know anything
about the mother, but she knows the mother. I
may not know anything about God, but according to
Jesus Christ, I can know God. For Jesus Christ
taught that God, who is his Father, is also our Fa-
ther. When his disciples asked him. How shall we
come to God? he replied in substance. Tell him
the things you want. You are hungry, ask him for
bread ; in perplexity, ask him to guide you ; in
temptation, ask him to make you strong, that you
may put the temptation under foot ; you have
fallen, ask him to lift you up and put you on your
feet again. He will listen to you, for he cares for
you. Not even a sparrow falls to the ground and he
does not know it ; and you are worth a great deal
more to him than sparrows. Ask your father-heart :
Will you not give good gifts to your children ? and
do you not think that He will give good gifts to
you ? Do not be afraid of him ; he is not one to be
afraid of. Have you done wrong ? Still do not be
afraid of him. Have you sinned against him? Still
do not be afraid of him. Have you sinned against
him times and ways without number, so that you are
no more worthy to be called his son ? Still do not be
afraid of him. To illustrate this truth Christ told the
story of a boy who sinned, deliberately sinned, ran
away from his father, spent his substance in riotous
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 307
living and with harlots, and never thought to turn
back to his home again until he was sick, hungry,
friendless, and famished ; and when he returned,
the father uttered no word of reproach, no word of
condemnation, but welcomed him, saying, I have
been waiting for you ; here is the robe, the ring,
the thanksgiving dinner. This was Christ's inter-
pretation of our relation to the Infinite and the
Eternal Energy from which all things proceed :
that we may be one with this Father ; that we may
have our will attuned in accord with the Father's
wiU ; that we may live in fellowship and compan-
ionship with him ; that the Father offers to pour
his life into our lives that we may live. And his
last prayer for his disciples was " That they all
may be one ; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in
thee, that they also may be one in us." This is the
summary of Christ's teaching concerning God : The
Infinite and Eternal Energy from which all things
proceed is a loving Person, a Father who cares for
his children ; we can know him ; we can talk with
him ; we can get answers from him ; we can come
into fellowship with him ; we can live in the kind
of unity with him that a husband lives with a wife,
or a friend with a friend.
lY. Jesus Christ's teaching respecting the future
is expressed by the phrase, " Looking for the blessed
hope and appearing of the glory of our great God
and Saviour Jesus Christ." ^ This glory of our God
1 So in the Revised Version.
308 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
and Saviour Jesus Christ is the consummation of
Ms kingdom on the earth, a kingdom which Paul
has defined as " righteousness and peace and joy in
the Holy Ghost." i
It would be difficult to find a more hopeful
teacher in history than Jesus of Nazareth. The
times were indeed dark ; moral life seemed to have
died out of the human heart ; there were no philoso-
phers in Greece, only sophists, no prophets in Pales-
tine, only scribes, no justice in Kome, only despotic
power. In that day, to that people, the message of
Jesus was, " The kingdom of heaven is at hand."
More audacious optimism the world has never seen.
And a large part of his teaching was concerned
with what he called, and what his people had called
before him, the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of
heaven.
The phrase " kingdom of heaven " has sometimes
misled men. They have imagined heaven as a celes-
tial sphere apart from the earth, and the kingdom
of heaven as a kingdom in that celestial sphere.
But the kingdom of heaven is not a kingdom in
heaven, — it is a kingdom which is to come, on earth
as it is in heaven. We speak of the " American
idea.*' Whether we meet it in France or Germany
or Italy or England, still, if it is the spirit of Ameri-
canism, we call it the American idea. We speak of
the " Republic of letters,'* meaning by it that com-
mon life which is derived from a common experi-
1 Rom. xiv, 17.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 309
ence and a common enjoyment of literature. So the
Master spoke of the kingdom of heaven, not as
something that was to take place in heaven, but as
something that was to take place on the earth,
which was interpreted by the imagination which
men have of heaven, and deriving its power and its
spirit from heaven. What is the kingdom of the
sun ? It is here on earth, and is in everything that
lives and moves. It sings in the bird, and waits in
the egg not yet hatched ; it is in the fragrant blos-
som and in the bud unopened ; it is in the blades
of grass upspringing, and in the germinant seeds
just breaking through their shell in the darkness of
the earth. So is the kingdom of heaven already
here, — here, as the day is here when the sun begins
to rise ; here, as the summer is here when spring
begins to come ; here, as manhood is here when the
babe lies in the cradle, for the man begins when he
is born. The kingdom of God begins when it is
first upon the earth, and it is first on the earth
when the spirit of righteousness and justice and
love and peace is in the hearts of men and is work-
ing its way into the institutions of men. So Christ
said. The kingdom of God is among you. Look for
it in the mother's love, in the hero's sacrifice, in the
patriot's devotion ; look for it in the honest laborer,
the faithful servant, the loyal friend. It is here;
it is now.
And yet it is only here in the beginning. For
Jesus further taught, respecting this social order,
310 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
that it must come by a gradual process of growth.
The kingdom of heaven, he said, is like a seed
planted in the ground, which groweth secretly, no
man knows how : first the blade, then the ear, then
the full com in the ear. Out of the previous con-
dition will grow the following condition ; out of the
poorer will grow the better ; out of the cold earth
wiU grow the fruit for the food of men. Christ was
an evolutionist long before the word evolution was
known. He never defined evolution ; but he declared
that the spiritual laws of the universe are the same
as the physical laws of the universe ; that as the
plant grows gradually from the lower to the higher,
from the simpler to the more complex, so must the
kingdom of God grow. Little by little, according
to him, the world was to grow better ; by no sudden,
no revolutionary, no cataclysmic force. Those of us
who have believed in the Master sometimes grow
weary of waiting, and wonder if the dawn wiU ever
come ; but we ought not to be surprised at the delay.
He gave us fair warning. Again and again he told
his disciples that the process would be a long and
slow one.
But not only is this kingdom of God coming
gradually ; it has to fight its way. When love
comes into the world, will not every man wel-
come love? Will not all men throw open their
doors and say. Come into our homes? Will not
industry open its doors and say, Come into our
factories ? Will not every heart say, Come in and
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 311
rule in me ? Alas, no ! Love finds wrong, and fights
against wrong, and wrong arms itself to kill love.
Love sets itseK in battle array against what men
call vested rights, but which should be called vested
wrongs, and vested wrongs arm themselves to cru-
cify love. It was so then ; it always has been so.
And Christ foretold it. Do not expect, he says,
that you will be better treated than I have been.
They have called me Beelzebub ; they will call you
Beelzebub. They have persecuted me ; they wiU
persecute you. They have reviled and maligned
me ; they will revile and malign you. Woe unto
you when aU men speak well of you. If that time
comes, be sure you are not doing a good work in
the world.
He told us that the kingdom of God would have
to battle against the inertia and the laziness of
men, against the dull content that says. What was
good enough for our grandfathers is good enough
for us ; against the spirit that says, What has been
must be. The kingdom of God, he said, is like a
little leaven — the ancient yeast — that is put into
a lump of dough. It takes time for it to pervade
the lump of dough ; time for it to change the char-
acter of the lump of dough ; and it can do it only
by fermentation and agitation. So Christ himself
had to battle against this inertia in his own dis-
ciples. They did not imderstand him. He looked
upon them sometimes with pathetic sadness, say-
ing. Shall the Son of man find faith on the earth
312 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
when he returns ? How long have I been with you,
and you have not understood me I It has been well
said, when he talked in parables they thought he
was talking literally ; when he talked literally they
thought he was talking in parables. He had to
work his way into the hearts of men through par-
ables despite them. Having ears, he said, they hear
not ; and eyes, they see not ; and hearts, they cannot
understand. It was so then ; it is so now ; it wlQ be
so tUl the end is achieved. Truth makes its way
against the inertia of mankind.
But not only that, it makes its way also against
open opposition. Christ compared the kingdom of
heaven to wheat sown in the field ; and when men
went out to cultivate the wheat, they found tares
growing by the side of the wheat. They said. Shall
we not puU up the tares ? No, replied the house-
holder ; if you do, you wiU uproot good wheat ; let
them both grow together, the good and the evil.
That is a part of the history of the kingdom of
God; both grow together, the evil with the good.
Increased civilization brings increased temptations,
and increased temptations bring increased vices.
Man never experienced delirium tremens until
some one invented distilled liquors. There could
not be forgery until men learned how to write ; nor
murder by poisoning until men learned chemistry ;
nor embezzlement until there was a credit system.
Evil grows with the good, and evil fights the good,
in the individual, in the community.
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 313
One other thing which Jesus Christ taught,
and which often men have failed to note, is that
God seemingly leaves men to fight the battle for
themselves. The Master said in one of his parables
that the kingdom, of heaven is like a nobleman
going away into a far country, and leaving his
estate in the charge of his stewards. He has gone :
I want instructions how to pursue my work, but
there is no telegraph wire. I want to be told what I
shall do, but there is no mail. I want authority.
He says : You have it in yourself. I put this estate
in your hands : make the best you can out of it.
That is Christ's own figure of the kingdom of
God.
Sometimes this seems to us hard : sometimes we
wish that he would come and by some sudden and
wonderful revelation of power transform society,
put an end to the injustice and wrong of life, and
put righteousness and good-will in their place ; or
at least, that he would teU us exactly what to do
and how to do it. But this he does not do ; and the
Master has told us that this he will not do. He
throws the responsibility of life upon us, and leaves
us to fight the battle out and reach the result by
our own strong effort. Strange! and yet we are
learning that this is the only way. We are learning
in our colleges and higher institutions of learning
to throw the responsibility on the coUege boys, who
used to be watched, with tutors and guardians and
monitors, to see that they did their work aright.
314 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
We are learning, in politics, to trust the govern-
ment to the people, and not to a few men watching
over the people, ruling the people, or acting for the
people. Does Christ not say that he is with us
always, even unto the end of the world? Surely.
Are we to come back to that notion of an absentee
God from which Christianity has led us out into
the freedom of fellowship with the living God?
Surely not. But he is not a father confessor to
whom we go with our hard problems and come
away with solutions ready made. His presence is
not to solve our problems for us, but to inspire us
to solve our own ; not to bear our burdens for us,
but to strengthen us with patience that we may
bear our own ; not to take our temptations from us,
but to fiU us with a courage to be ourselves con-
querors and more than conquerors through him that
loved us. He holds himself apparently apart. No
eye sees him ; no ear hears his voice ; no telegram
from him brings instructions ; no letter brings us
word what we are to do. We blunder on, but by
the blundering we learn wisdom; by failures we
hew our own way to success ; by our mistakes, our
errors, yes, even by our very sins, we grow in char-
acter — and character is everything.
This, then, is what Christ said about the future :
There is a new regime yet to come. It has begun
already. Time will be required to work it out. It
will have to be worked out by yourselves, against
your own inertia, against your own blunders, against
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 315
opposition of others, against the opposition that wiU
spring up in yourself.
Did he say nothing of personal inunortality ? Yes !
but much less than men have sometimes imagined.
He spoke not as a higher animal to higher animals,
but as a Son of God to sons of God. He told his
disciples once that "he that liveth and belie veth in me
shall never die." There is no dying, only transition,
a passing through the curtain to the other realm that
is close at hand. He told his disciples that this world
is not the only dwelling-place in the universe ; in it
are many dweUing-places, and there wiU be a place
for us beyond.i When sometimes the worker grows
weary and the soldier faint-hearted, or his little life
comes toward its end, and he looks back and sees
how little he has done or can do for others about
him, and then looks forward to see into what kind
of life his children are launched and in what kind
of conflict they are to take part — then, in that hour,
he may take comfort from the reflection that, hav-
ing done his little here, the end is not, but there
is another life out of which he can still put forth
influences for the redemption and the upbuilding of
humanity. And when the grave covers all that he
can see of the one he loved and lived with here on
earth, he then can take hope from the faith that it
covers only what he saw, and that that which he
reaUy loved and which was invisible, — the love, the
faith, the patience, the long-suffering, the gentle-
1 John xi, 23-26, xiv, 1-3.
316 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY
ness, the courage, — these invisible things that
made her what she was, these death cannot touch.
" We know in part and we prophesy in part '*
and " we see through a glass darkly." No one dis-
ciple can do more than give a partial interpretation
of a teaching so fundamental in its principles, and
capable of such an infinite variety of applications,
that nineteen centuries of study have not yet ex-
hausted it; and no disciple can portray more than
one aspect of a character so infinite in its per-
fections that after nineteen centuries of spiritual
growth it stiU remains the unapproached ideal foraU
humanity. This chapter is not and does not pretend
to be a complete answer to the question, What is
Christianity ? But this I believe may be safely said :
No man is a Christian minister, whatever his eccle-
siastical ordination, and however sound his theo-
logical orthodoxy, unless he possesses the spirit of
sobriety, which puts the inner life above outward
possessions, and measures all things by their spirit-
ual values ; unless he possesses the spirit of right-
eousness, which counts life an opportunity for ser-
vice, and no life weU spent which is not spent for
others; unless he possesses the spirit of godliness,
which knows the living God as a Companion, a
Friend, a Helper and Saviour ; unless he possesses
the spirit of hopefulness for himself and for his
fellow men, which enkindles for them and in them
an exhaustless and expectant aspiration. And he
THE MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST 317
is a Christian minister, whatever his church and
whatever his philosophy, if he possesses this spirit
and gives himself to the endeavor to impart it to his
fellow men. For Christianity is such a perception
of the Infinite manifested in Jesus Christ as tends
to produce Christlikeness of character, and a Chris-
tian minister is one who, inspired by that percep-
tion, imparts that Christlikeness of life to those to
whom he ministers.
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