Sermons in Shoes

“As ye go, preach!” — Matthew x, 7.

This was the brief but conipreliensive commission given by our Lord to His twelve disciples. In these words is contained thendivine call to the gospel ministry. At first, and during the earthly life-time of their Master this ministry was confined to the sheep of the house of Israel”; but after His ascension to heaven, their field was as wide as the world. They, and many of the converts whom they made, went everywhere preaching the Word! The Master does not seem to have ordained any of them to a superior rank over their associates; no one of them was created an Archbishop; much less was any of them a Pope. Neither at the outset did they stop to organize themselves into Conferences or Councifs into Synods or General Assemblies. Their prekching also would appear to have been of the most simple and elementary character. It was certainly not after the style of our modern elaborate discourses or before congregations assembled in stately sanctuaries with all the modern appliances of public worship. Each man spoke the word which the Holy Spirit gave to him. Peter talks to Cornelius, and his assembled kinsfolk, until the Spirit descends upon them, and they are converted and baptized. Paul preaches to the PhiJippian jailer and condenses the core of the gospel into a single sentence. Philip overtakes a titled foreigner in his chariot by the roadside, and a “Bible reading” is extemporized on the spot. That was preaching — truth-teacliiiig — in its most elementary form. Aquila and Priscilla become expounders of the new gospel, with the gifted Apollos for their pupil. Down at Joppa industrious Dorcas takes to preaching also, but woman-like she emx)loys her needle as her instrument; and her actions speak londer than words. And so the hive is all busy. Everyone who has a message delivers it; everyone who can heal a sick man or mend a crippled limb performs the miracle of love; everyone who has a lamp lets it shine. Their Lord and Master is glorified by their” bearing much fruit.”

Those men and women introduced into this world a new style of life. Such characters as Peter and John and Paul, as Stephen and Barnabas and Dorcas and Onesiphorus, the world had not seen before. Such sermons in shoes — going about doing good — had not been treading the thoroughfares of sinful humanity.

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The word came with power, because these men and women were themselves a power; they reflected Jesus Christ in their beautiful humility, their unselfish benevolence, and their strenuous philanthropy. This was probably one great secret of their success.

That band of devoted imitators of Christ Jesus exerted an influence “on which our modern churches look back with a sort of admiring despair ’ ‘; they were inspired with a spiritual might before which hoary systems of error tottered to the ground. It may be that their style of preaching was more simple and direct than ours; it may be that the gospel came with a freshness and novelty wdiich it no longer possesses; the s]3oken word was attended with miracles visible to the eye; but all these causes do not sufficiently account for the marvels and the majesty of apostolic power. One great reason for their success was that their character and conduct were so irresistibly eloquent; their actions spoke louder than their words. Peoi:)le discovered that, though Jesus of Nazareth had departed, His likeness had been left behind Him; the Christ was yet alive in the lives of His followers. The people saw that Christian love was more than a new doctrine; it was a practical principle working out in deeds of brotherly kindness, while it shared its loaf with the needy, brought healing to the sick, and light to the benighted. They saw that the divine sympathy of Jesus was living still in His disciples when they grasped the hands of poor outcasts and still ‘’ate with publican and sinner. “They beheld the divine magnanimity of Jesus reproduced in his followers, who endured persecution without flinching, and returned hard blows with gentle words of love. Ah, there was a force in the silent preaching of such Christ-like lives which struck the world with wondering awe! Scoffers might ridicule the fishermen’s discourses; rabbis might jeer at the doctrines of the atonement and the resurrection; but they could not gainsay the beauty of the apostles’ conduct, or deny the positive good that these ‘’heretics” were achieving everyday. When the Master gave His great commission, “as ye go, preach,” He meant by it — as ye go, shine; as ye go, testify of Me; as ye go, heal the sick body and the sick soul; as ye go, bear fruit, and live out the gospel intrusted to you! It was the sermons of heroic and holy living that shook the world, and have come down ringing and resounding through the centuries. And the preaching which this sinning and sobbing old world of ours needs to-day is of the same character. The only way in which we can hoye to reproduce, in any good degree, the glory of that apostolic era is by the same living manifestation of Jesus Christ. The

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best sermon that you and I can furnish is: Christ Imetli in me.

Observe that I include you my brethren and sisters, as co-preachers of our beloved Master. To you in these pews comes the command, as directly as to me in this pulpit, “Go ye and I)reach! “Do you suppose that all the setting forth of Jesus Christ in this broad land is to be done by the sixty or seventy thousand persons who are officially ordained to the gospel ministry What are our barley loaves for the supply of fifty millions of hungry souls? And what are our few hours of public discourse — chiefly upon a single day — in comparison with the combined eloquence of millions of Christian voices and Christian lives on every day of the round year? Be assured that the commission to preach Jesus Christ is not restricted to any limited monopoly of men or of measures. It comes to every child of converting grace with the gift of that grace. No sooner does our Lord, by His Spirit, make you Christians than He bids you become soul-winners also. ‘’ Let him that heareth say come!”

There are many ways of preaching Christianity without choosing a text, or standing in a pulpit. William Wilberforce proclaimed the gospel of breaking fetters on the floor of the British Parliament, even though he never had a prelate’s ordaining hand laid on his honored head. George H. Stuart was an apostle of the cross when he organized his “Christian Commission,” to furnish its spiritual “rations” to our brave boys in bhie during the Civil War. Elizabeth Fry preached Christ to brazen women in the corridor of Newgate prison; and in our time Lady Henry Somerset proves the patent of her true nobility by unselfish labors among the slums of London. Sometimes the Master ordains His workmen to a special mission: as when Father Mathew wrought for the reformation of Irish drunkards, and William Logan for the rescue of fallen women in Glasgow Street, or Anthony Comstock for the cleansing of our land from a filth fouler than any “Augean stables.” Christ scatters his commissions very widely. Harlan Page distributing tracts through a city workshop; Ralph Wells gathering his mission class from the attics or the cellars; the sweet “Dairyman’s Daughter” murmuring the name of Jesus with her faint, dying voice, and Lord Shaftesbury addressing the thieves and the tramps of London, were each and all most surely the ordained missionaries of their Master. There have been but few more faithful ministers than Thomas Halyburton, and some of his most impressive discourses were pronounced n])on a dying bed. “This is the best pulpit,” said he, “that ever I was in; I am laid on this bed for this very end, that I may commend my

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Lord.” What a host of colleagues I have had in this beloved congregation daring the past thirty years — some of whom have preached most impressively to me in their sick chambers, and many more are gospeling the children every Sabbath in yonder hall. My brilliant brother, Doctor Hitchcock, has said, “1 confess that I do not see how Christianity is ever to carry the day unless the great bulk of our church membership becomes also a ministry. Is it i)ossible for mij man to be a true Christian himself and yet be doing nothing to make other men Christians too? Who, if he could, would like to be plodding heavenward in a path only wide enough for one?”

The number of those who possess the peculiar qualilications for the pulpit are comparatively few; and probably a majority of all (he Christians in our land, old and young, might not be able to deliver very edifying addresses in a prayer meeting. But every true follower of Jesus can be a witness for Him; and there is many a Christian life that is quite as eloquent as any discourse ever delivered by a Chrysostom or a Chalmers. By xureness, by long-suffering, by truthfulness, by love unfeigned, and by a holy conversation, the humblest of Christ’s discijdes may become His ambassador. ^’I canna answer many questions aboot Jesus,” said the humble Scotchwonum to her pastor, “but I could dee for Him.” It is the faith that cannot only live for Christ, but is ready to die for Him, that carries with it an irresistible power.

Actions speak louder than words, because they commonly cost more; Ave usually test the utterances of the lips by the conduct of the life. The words of promise spoken at the marriage altar are weighed in the scales of wedlock; they may prove to be solid gold, or they may be lighter than a feather. We test the solemn confessions and covenants made by many of you before this pulpit by the lives you are now leading before the world. Our Master’s own challenge is, “by their fruits ye shall know them.” The religious truth contained in a book, or in a creed, or in a discourse, is only a theory. That same truth, if wrought out into noble deeds and godly character, becomes certified by experiment. Men once disputed what Robert Fulton affirmed in regard to the propulsion of vessels by steam; but no one now disputes a Cunarder. Scoffers derided Morse and Field as sanguine visionaries; no man laughs now at the sub-ocean cable. Christianity, attested by its fruits, is unanswerable. If it purifies the human heart, if it elevates the affections, if it conquers sinful lusts, and subdues evil passions, if it prompts to generous sympathies and noble deeds, if it sweetens the home and cleanses society, if it lifts fallen humanity up toward God, and if it makes its possessors the better, stronger, purer, and holier, then doth it vindicate its divine origin and establish its divine authority. Such a religion no scoffer can laugh down, and no i)hilosoplier can silence. The divine author of Christianity demanded this crucial test for His gospel, and sent forth His disciples with the commission, ‘’As ye go, preach! “and this commission was qualified with the solemn j)roviso,” Herein is my Father in heaven glorified, that ye hear much fruit.’ The great object for which Jesus Christ came into this world, and for which His gospel is ireached, is to form godly character. Christlieb was right when he said that the “living Christian is the world’s Bible”; and there are millions in our land who seldom look at any other. We, whose business it is to ireach Christianity, must also remember that i:>eople look at us when outside of our pul]3its to discover exactly what we mean when we are in our pulpits. If our conduct before the community contradicts the utterances on God’s day in God’s house, then the most eloquent tongue becomes a tinkling cymbal. A certain parishioner once remarked,” My pastor’ s discourses are not brilliant, but his daily life is a sermon all the week.” Paul stood behind all his inspired writings; the ‘’living epistle” moves us as deeply as any words he ever sent to Rome or to Corinth. More than one-half of the power of many successful ministers lias lain in their personality. Not long ago the city of Edinburgh, through its official magistracy and multitudes of its citizens, honored the obsequies of the late Principal Cairns. Of all the thousands of mourners who thronged the streets with uncovered heads, but a small proportion had ever heard him preach or had ever read any of his works. Their homage was paid to the grand old man who had moved before them for many a year illustrating, in his own useful life, the things that are true, and the tilings that are just and lovely and of good report. A similar homage had been i)aid a few diiys before, and on a grander scale, to the world-known pastor of the Metroi3olitan Tabernacle. Popular as his x)reacliing and his books had been, yet behind all his throngs of admiring auditors, and behind his Pastor’s College, and all his many institutions of charity, was Spurgeon, t7ie man of God. It was Spurgeon, the fearless, the faithful, the holy-hearted man, to whom lu’inces and archbishops sent messages of sympathy during his longsickness, and to whom honest, loving tributes were paid in

Jewish synagogues and Quaker meeting houses and lofty Episcopal cathedrals. Such scoffers as Ingersoll cannot verify their taunt that “Christianity is dying out,” when London and Edinburgh throng their thoroughfares with extraordinary testimonials of re-

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spect for two humble-minded evangelical ministers of the Lord Jesus Christ.

In these days the malaria of infidelity is in the air. It threatens our colleges and poisons no little of our current literature. Skepticism is not to be vanquished by volumes of Apologetics. It arrogantly claims that the Csesar of science is on its side, and to Csesar it shall go. True science judges causes by results. No candid scientist can legitimately deny that if Christianity makes people better, purer and holier, and elevates man God-ward, then it vindicates its value and attests its divine origin. No lie is of the truth. No falsehood of an imloster makes men upright. The tree must be jadged by its fruits; a bad tree cannot produce good fruits; no thorn-bush can yield Hamburg grapes. All ‘the skeptics on the globe cannot refute the unanswerable argument of a consistent, cheerful, courageous Christian life.

This fact lays upon us who profess and call ourselves Christians, a most tremendous responsibility. The question is sometimes asked ‘’ why are not more souls converted under the public preaching of the Word? “To this question it is not a sufficient answer to say that” Grod purposes to save only a portion of the human race.” God purposes to save everyone who believes on the Lord Jesus Christ and follows Him. Nor is it a sufficient reply to affirm that all men are naturally ^’ dead in trespasses and sin,” and can only be made alive by the regenerating Holy Spirit. Let us not throw the blame of men’s impenitence on a just and loving God. I very much fear that the blame rests nearer home; and that one great reason why there are not more converts to Christianity is that there is so much preaching against it by those who ought to be j)reacliiiig for it. Every unworthy act of a professing Christian is a sermon against our Master and His gospel. Satan’s most successful preachers are inconsistent j)rofessors. The bad sermons during the week are often an overmatch for the best sermons on the Sabbath. Oh, my dear brethren, do you sujpose that if you and I practised more faithfully the instructions of this holy Word, we would not be able to win more souls to Jesus %

As every one of you is a preacher, and every life is a sermon, let me inquire of you: what sort of a sermon are you preaching? Do you find your texts in the shop or in the stock market, and preach that the chief end of life is to make money? Then you are making more converts to Mammon than to Christ. Do some of you preach that self-indulgence is the “one thing needful?” Then you will draw more to the iDleasure party and the playhouse than you will to the prayer meeting. It boots but little that the Eighth Commandment is taught from this pulpit if any of you are guilty of sharp practices in your business, or refuse to give every man his due. What is done by God’s professing people outside of the sanctuary carries more weight than anything said within the sanctuary — even though Paul himself stood in the pulpit. And if the great apostle had not lived out what he taught, he could not have won a single convert to the Gospel.

My brethren, as ye go, preach! But take heed how and what ye preach. The recording angel is taking notes; and the “book shall be opened.” When the Master gave the commission to His witness-bearers, He said to them — learn of Me! — follow Me! let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in Heaven! To-day this world’s sorest need is for more Christ-like men and women. The sermons it needs are sermons in sJioes. The preaching that alone can save it is the preaching of a living Christ illustrated by the holy lives of His followers. A church that does not tread in the footsteps of its Master will never convert a sinful world to God. But a church of consecrated disciples, whose hearts have been cleansed by the frequent baptisms of the Spirit, and whose lives have been made beautiful by inward conflicts and secret prayer, such a church is the embodiment of a living Jesus in this sin-cursed world. Their voice is a trumpet. Their example is a light. Their l,”O SERMONS IN SHOES.

influence is a salt. Their i)ower is a power to wake the dead; for theii’ master promiseth ‘’lo! / am with you always!” To be such preachers you and I require the ordination and the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Let us humbly and devoutly seek it!