Preacher

The Power of a Definite Purpose. — No man becomes eminent in any pursuit unless he gives himself up to it with all the powers and passions of his nature — body and soul. Michael Angelo had never been so great a painter if his love of art had not become so enthusiastic that he frequently did not take off his garments to sleep by the week together; nor had Handel ever been such a great musician if his ardor for sounds celestial had not led him to use the keys of his harpsichord till, by constant fingering, they became the shape of spoons. A man must have one pursuit, and consecrate all his powers to one pur pose, if he would excel or rise to eminence among his fellows.

Meditation. — Meditation is to the soul what oil was to the body of the wrestlers. When those old athletes went out to wrestle, they always took care before they went to oil themselves well — to make their joints supple and fit for labor. Now, meditation makes the soul supple — makes it so that it can use things when they come into the mind. Who are the men that can go into a controversy and get the mastery? Why, the men who meditate when they are alone. Who are the men that can preach? Not those who gad about and never commune with their own hearts alone; but those who think earnestly, as well when no one is near them as when there is a crowd around them. Who are the authors who write your books, and keep up the constant supply of literature? They are meditative men. They keep their bones supple and their limbs fit for exercise by continually bathing themselves in the oil of meditation. How important, therefore, is meditation as a mental exercise, to have our minds in constant readiness for any service.

Saved by a Stray Sermon. — Many a sailor boy has been wild, reckless, Godless, Christless, and at last has got into a foreign hospital. Ah, if his mother knew that he was down with the yellow fever, how sad her mind would be, for she would conclude that her dear son will die away at Havana, or somewhere, and never come home again. But it is just in that hospital that God means to meet with him. A sailor writes to me something like that. He says, “My mother asked me to read a chapter every day, but I never did. I got into the hospital at Havana, and, when I lay there, there was a man near to me who was dying, and he died one night; but before he died he said to me, ‘Mate, could you come here? I want to speak to you. I have got something that is very precious to me here. I was a wild fellow, but reading this packet of sermons has brought me to the Savior, and I am dying with a good hope through grace. Now, when I am dead and gone, will you take these sermons and read them, and may God bless them to you. And will you write a letter to the man that preached and printed those sermons, to tell him that God blessed them to my conversion and that I hope he will bless them to yourself f ‘” It was a packet of my sermons and God did bless them to that young man who, I have no doubt what ever, went to that hospital because there a man who had been brought to Christ would hand to him the words which God had blessed to himself and would bless to his friend. You do not know, dear mother, you do not know. The worst thing that can happen to a young man in this world is sometimes he best thing that can happen to him.

The True Preacher. — In the old romance, they tell us that at a gate of a certain noble hall there hung a horn, and none could blow that horn but the true heir to the castle and its wide domains. Many tried it. They could make sweet music on other instruments; they could wake the echoes by other bugles; but that horn was mute, let them blow as they might. At last, the true heir came, and when he set his lips to the horn, shrill was the sound and indisputable his claim. He who can preach Christ is the true minister. Let him preach anything else in the world, he has not proved his calling; but if he shall preach Jesus and the resurrection, he is in the apostolical succession. If Christ crucified be the great delight of his soul, the very marrow of his teaching, the fatness of his ministry, he has proved his calling as an ambassador of Christ.

Magnifying the Ministry. — We find the most eminent of God’s servants frequently magnifying their office as preachers of the gospel. Whitfield was wont to call his pulpit his throne; and when he stood upon some rising knoll to preach to the thousands gathered in the open air, he was more happy than if he had assumed the imperial purple, for he ruled the hearts of men more gloriously than doth a king. When Dr. Carey was laboring in India, and his son Felix had accepted the office of ambassador to the king of Burmah, Carey said, “Felix has drivelled into an ambassador” — as tho he looked upon the highest earthly office as an utter degradation if for it the minister of the gospel forsook his lofty vocation. Paul blesses God that this great grace was given to him, that he might preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; he looked upon it not as toil, but as a grace.

Christ in the Sermon, — A young man had been preaching in the presence of a venerable divine, and after he had done he went to the old minister, and said, “What do you think of my sermon?” “A very poor sermon, in deed,” said he. “A poor sermon?” said the young man, “it took me a long time to study it.” “Ay, no doubt of it.” “Why, did you not think my explanation of the text a very good one?” “Oh, yes,” said the old preacher, “very good, indeed.” “Well, then, why do you say it is a poor sermon? Didn’t you think the metaphors were appropriate, and the arguments conclusive?” “Yes, they were very good as far as that goes, but still it was a very poor sermon.” “Will you tell me why you think it a poor sermon?” “Because,” said he, “there was no Christ in it.” “Well,” said the young man, “Christ was not in the text; we are not to be preaching Christ always, we must preach what is in the text.” So the old man said, “don’t you know, young man, that from every town, and every village, and every little hamlet in England, wherever it may be, there is a road to London 1” “Yes,” said the young man. “Ah!” said the old divine, “and so from every text of Scripture, there is a road to the metropolis of the Scriptures, that is, Christ. And, my dear brother, your business is, when you get to a text, to say, ‘Now what is the road to Christ?* and then preach a sermon, running along the road towards the great metropolis — Christ. And,” said he, “I have never yet found a text that had not got a road to Christ in it, and if ever I do find one that has not got a road to Christ in it, I will make one; I will go over hedge and ditch but I would get at my Master, for the sermon cannot do any good unless there is a savor of Christ in it.” Lying on the Promises. —

None but Jesus! None but Jesus
Can do helpless sinners good!”

It is simple reliance on him which saves. The negro said, “Massa, I fall flat on de promise;” so if you fall flat on the promise of Jesus, you shall not find him fail you; he will bind up your heart, and make an end to the days of your mourning.

Sermons Born of Feeling. — It is a long time since I have made a good speech at a public meeting; but I do remember doing it once. I stepped out, as one of the speakers was delivering a very, very pretty oration, and I went into a neighboring house to speak with a woman who wished to join the church. It was not in London. When I stepped into the house, there was the husband beastly drunk; he had got his wife up in a corner, and was with all his might trying to bruise her face, and tear her arms with his nails, till the blood flowed from her arms and face. Two or three rushed in, and dragged him away. She said she had endeavored with all her meekness to persuade him to allow her to go to the house of God that night; and the only reason why he ill-treated her was, because he said she would always be going to that place of worship. And when I had seen this sight, and looked on the poor woman, with tears in her eyes, I went into the place, and spoke like a man who had got his face and heart, and whole body, full of fire. I could not help it: I was all on flame against the sin of drunkenness, and sought with all my might to urge the members of the church to do all they could to scatter the light of the Gospel into a neighborhod which was so dark and black and filthy and abandoned. And I think it would do all of us good, when we preach, if we were sometimes to be dragged through some of the worst parts of London, to let us see the wickedness of it.

Keep the Light Burning. — Truly, the minister of Christ will feel like the old keeper of Eddystone lighthouse; life was failing fast, but summoning all his strength, he crept round once more to trim the lights before he died. 0 may the Holy Spirit enable us to keep the beacon-fire blazing, to warn you of the rocks, shoals, and quicksands, which surround you. and may we ever guide you to Jesus.

A Preacher Converted. — You remember Rowland’s HilPs Story in “The Village Dialogues,” about Mr. Merriman. Mr. Merriman was a sad scapegrace of a preacher; he was to be seen at every fair and revel, and used seldom to be found in his pulpit when he should have been; but when he was converted, he began to preach with tears running down his face — and how the church began to be crowded! The squire would not go and hear any of that stuff, and locked up his pew; and Mr. Merriman had a little ladder made outside the door, as he did not wish to break the door open; and the people used to sit on the steps, up one side and down the other, so that it made twice as much room for the people who chose to come as there was before.

A Child’s Religion. — A dear little girl, some five or six years old, a true lover of Jesus, requested of her mother that she might join the church. The mother told her she was too young. The poor little thing was grieved exceedingly; and after awhile the mother, who saw that piety was in her heart, spoke to the minister on the subject. The minister talked to the child, and said to the mother, “I am thoroughly convinced of her piety, but I cannot take her into the church, she is too young.” When the child heard that, a strange gloom passed over her face; and the next morning when her mother went to her little bed she lay with a pearly tear or two on each eye, dead for very grief; her heart was broken, because she could not follow her Savior, and do as he had bidden her. I would not have murdered that child for a world! Take care how you treat young piety. Be tender of it. Be lieve that children can be saved as much as yourselves. When you see the young heart brought to the Savior, don’t stand by and speak harshly, mistrusting eveiything. It is better sometimes to be deceived than to be the means of ruining one. God send to his people a more firm belief that little buds of grace are worthy of all care.

Sad Results of Careless Conduct. — There was a young minister once preaching very earnestly in a certain chapel, and he had to walk some four or five miles to his home along a country road after service. A young man, who had been deeply impressed under the sermon, requested the privilege of walking with the minister, with an earnest hope that he might get an opportunity of telling out his feelings to him, and obtaining some word of guidance or comfort. Instead of that, the young minister all the way along told the most singular tales to those who were with him, causing loud roars of laughter, and even relating tales which bordered upon the indecorous. He stopped at a certain house, and this young man with him, and the whole evening was spent in frivolity and foolish talking. Some years after, when the minister had grown old, he was sent for to the bedside of a dying man. He hastened thither with a heart desirous to do good. He was requested to sit down at the bedside; and the dying man, looking at him, and regarding him most closely, said to him, “Do you remember preaching in such and such a village on such an occasion?” “I do,” said the minister. “I was one of your hearers,” said the man, “and I was deeply impressed by the sermon.” “Thank God for that,” said the minister. “Stop!” said the man, “don’t thank God till you have heard the whole story; you will have reason to alter your tone before I have done.” The minister changed countenance, but he little guessed what would be the full extent of that mail’s testimony. Said he, “Sir, do you remember, after you had finished that earnest sermon, I with some others walked home with you? I was sincerely desirous of being led in the right path that night; but I heard you speak in such a strain of levity, and with so much coarseness, too, that I went outside the house, while you were sitting down to your evening meal; I stamped my foot upon the ground; I said that you were a liar, that Christianity was a falsehood; that if you could pretend to be so in earnest about it in the pulpit, and then come down and talk like that, the whole thing must be a sham; and I have been an infidel,” said he, “a confirmed infidel, from that day to this. But I am not an infidel at this moment; I know better; I am dying, and I am about to be damned; and at the bar of God I will lay my damnation to your charge; my blood is on your head;” — and with a dreadful shriek, and one demoniacal glance at the trembling minister, he shut his eyes and died.

A Sermon That Went to the Mark. — - 1 have heard of a woman, who, when she was asked what she remembered of the minister’s sermon, said, “I don’t recollect any thing of it. It was about short weights and bad measures, and I didn’t recollect anything but to go home and burn the bushel.”

Hiding Behind Christ. — I recollect a story told by William Dawson, whom our Wesleyan friends used to call Billy Dawson, one of the best preachers that ever entered a pulpit. He once gave out as his text, “Through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins.” When he had given out his text he dropped down to the bottom of the pulpit, so that nothing could be seen of him, only there was a voice heard saying, “Not the man in the pulpit, he is out of sight, but the Man in the Book. The Man described in the Book is the Man through whom is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins.”

Too Much Red Tape. — Mr. Rowland Hill was said to have ridden on the back of all order and decorum. “No,” he said, “I cannot ride on the back of two horses, but I have two horses to my carriage, and I have called one of them ‘Order, and the other ‘Decorum, to make the report come as nearly right as possible.” Order and Decorum were never put to a better use than when they drew Mr. Rowland Hill from town to town preaching the gospel; and I, for one, am glad that he never took those horses into the pulpit. He was just as disorderly and indecorous as a Christian man ought to be — that is to say, he was perfectly natural, and spoke the truth from his heart, and men that heard it felt the power of it; and so he became a blessing to this part of London, and indeed, to the whole world. Shake yourself up a little, my brother. If you are too precise may the Lord set you on fire, and consume your bonds of red tape! If you have become so improperly proper that you cau not commit a proper impropriety, then pray God to help you to be less proper, for there are many who will never be saved by your instrumentality while you study propriety.

A Word in Season. — A smith was blowing his bellows one day, when the saintly McCheyne stepped into the smithy for shelter from a shower of rain. As the smith was blowing the coals and they were at a great heat, he simply said to him, “What does that fire make you think of f” He never waited for an answer, but went his way. It made the smith think of the wrath to come, and it made him flee from it too. We cannot tell what may be, in the gracious providence of God, the means of bringing you to decision. He that used an angel’s hand with Lot, can use a well-timed observation with you. Therefore, I urge all Christian people that they use every opportunity, and study to season their conversation with grace. Sow beside all waters, for you know which may prosper, this or that.

A Dumb Dog. — I have heard of a minister who preached for several years before he was converted, and when converted he became a very earnest preacher of the gospel; but one day as he rode along the street he was observed to stop and cane a dog which was lying in front of a door. When they said to him, “Mr. McPhayle, why did you beat the dog?” he said, “He was so exactly like myself, lying in the sun sleeping — a dumb dog that didn’t bark — that I could not but give him a touch of the rod; tho I meant it all the while for myself.”

Fishing but Never Catching. — If a minister can be content to go on preaching without converts or baptisms, the Lord have mercy upon his miserable soul! Can he be a minister of Christ who does not win souls? A man might as well be a huntsman and never take any prey, a fisherman and always come home with empty nets, a husbandman and never reap a harvest! I wonder at some people’s complacency. When God never blesses them they never fail to bless themselves. “Divine sovereignty withholds the increase,” they say. But it really is their idleness that tends to poverty. The promise of God is to the diligent, not the indolent. Let Paul plant, and let Apollos water, God will give the increase. It may not come to-day, nor to-morrow, nor the next day, but come it must. The word cannot return unto God void.

A Faithful Messenger. — Do you send a servant to the door of a neighbor with a message? If the person at the door should be angry, the servant would say, “It is of no use being angry with me; you must be angry with my master, for I have given you the message just as he gave it to me.” And if they should be angry with him, he would say, “I would much rather that the stranger at the door should be angiy with me for telling the message than that my master should be angry with me for keeping it back, for to my master I stand or fall.” I think the minister of God, if he has preached faithfully, may say, “Well, I have delivered only what my Master told me; if you are angry with me you must remember that you ought to be angry with my Master, for it was my Master’s message, and it is better for you to be angry with me than for my Master to be angry with me.”

The Preacher God’s Messenger to the Conscience. — I am afraid, there are some ministers who hardly think that the gospel is intended to come personally home to the people. They talk, as I read of one the other day, who said, that when he preached to sinners he did not like to look the congregation in the face, for fear they should think he meant to be personal, so he looked up at the ventilator, because there was no fear then of any individual catching his eye. Oh! that fear of man has been the ruin of many ministers. They never dared to preach right at the people. We have heard of sermons being preached before this and that honorable company; but preaching sermons before people is not God’s way; we must preach sermons at the people, directly to them,- to show that it is not the waving of a sword in the air like a juggler’s sport, but it is the getting the sword right into the conscience and the heart. This, I take it, is the true mission of every minister of Christ. It is said of Whitfcfield, that if you were the farthest away from him in a throng, where you could but hear the sound of his voice, you felt persuaded that he meant to speak to you; and of Rowland Hill it is said, that if you got into Surrey Chapel you could not hide in a corner there; tho you should manage to get into a back seat, or were squeezed tight into the windows, you would still feel persuaded that Mr. Hill was addressing you, and that he had singled you out for his expostulations. Surely this is the perfection of preaching.