MISTAKES ABOUT CHURCH DOCTRINE.

While on the subject of Church Doctrine, I may go a little further, and remind you how very likely you are to discover in your rounds many mistakes about both the doctrine and the government of the Church of England. I have had considerable experience of such questions in the way of private pastoral ministry; I have found pious dissenters, or church-people whom they had influenced, fully persuaded that the Church of England teaches unconditional regeneration in the hour of Baptism, that she teaches at least a near approach to Transubstantiation, that she entrusts to her priests the power of conferring or withholding the divine forgiveness, and that, officially and in set terms, she "unchurches" all communities not episcopally organized.[22] It is well to be quite sure that these beliefs about the Church are mistakes, provably such, in the light of the Prayer Book and Articles, and of history. It has been my happiness to bring some such questioners as I have described to "sincere and conscientious communion with" the Church of England, in a loyalty which leaves ample room for loving sympathy with all true Christians. And the chief means has been the production of proof that the Church herself, as distinguished from particular teachers and leaders in the Church, does not teach the tenets alleged.

[22] As regards the Scottish and Continental Protestant Churches it is not too much to say that, with the very rarest exceptions, English Church writers of all schools regarded them as "Sister Churches of the Reformation"—till about 1830.

DEFECTIVE VIEWS OF SIN.

But to come back to matters more primary than even these; I must remind my younger Brother that there is, all around him, in the average circles of even church-going people, a sorrowfully faint insight into the sinfulness of SIN; into the terrible realities of its guilt before God (a point too often absent from even earnest modern teaching), and of its power; yes, and into its true nature, as it comes out, not in outbursts of word or deed, or in practices which public opinion condemns, but in imagination, in desire, in tone. It may surprise us (when we think how very elementary are the spiritual principles involved), but I fear it is a fact, that sin is regarded by vast numbers of church-people (I am not thinking at all of "the lapsed masses" now) as a matter of little importance if it does not come out in some very positive form. Multitudes among us are quite insensible to the spiritual penetration of the law of God, and have never given a thought to the question of a heart-surrender to His will in everything, and the sin of merely withholding that surrender.

Then, to take another primary subject of a different class; there is a wide and general ignorance of the great lines of Christian Evidence, and a large open door accordingly for the active attacks of shallow, or subtle, unbelief. Few have ever been taught in any definite way the supreme significance in this respect of the fact of the Lord's Resurrection, and its mighty walls of proof; and the reasons for our belief that the Bible is indeed not of man but of God; the witness of history to prophecy; and so on.

LET US DROP SEEDS OF TEACHING.

I owe an almost apology for this long talk about subjects of doctrine, and practice, and evidence. But I have kept all along the purpose of this chapter in view. I wish to remind my Brethren how very much they may do, in the course of visitation, to drop seeds of fact, of truth, of principle, in careful, thoughtful words, the product of private reading and reflection, called out by some natural occasion. Undoubtedly, the subjects I have outlined are themes for the pulpit, and for the Bible class, as well as for the visit. But my feeling is that the visit gives opportunities quite of its own for didactic work. We ought to be "natural" everywhere; but we are sometimes suspected, or imagined, to be less so in public than in private; and besides, in private we give and take; we are open to question and answer; and this may give quite special advantage to the word spoken, quietly and pleasantly, but pointedly, in the pastoral interview.

"PURCHASE THE OPPORTUNITY."

"The priest's lips should keep knowledge." [Mal. ii. 7.] The Clergyman should be ready everywhere to be the teacher on the great subjects which he is supposed to make his own. He will never intrude instruction, or parade it; but he will everywhere be on the watch for the occasion for it, [Greek: exagorazomenos ton kairon], "purchasing the opportunity," [Eph. v. 10.] at the cost of care.

VISITATION OF THE SICK.

And here I may come again to that important branch of visitation, the visitation of the sick. The Church, as we well know, provides a Form of Visitation; most helpful and suggestive in its principles and outline for all. But it is, as you are aware, imposed by the Canon (lxvii.) only on such Clergymen (very scarce personages) as have no licence to preach. As a fact, we Presbyters are left to our own discretion in this sacred part of our work; and that discretion we should seek prayerfully to cultivate. How different are the circumstances in each one of an average series of sick-visits! As I write the words, such a series from my own past days rises up before me; and I transcribe a few recollections from the book of memory.

A SERIES OF VISITS.

W.S. is a retired tradesman, a thoughtful and rather reticent man; brought up a Socinian, and professedly such still. I am trying to lay siege to him, not without merciful tokens of hope from the Lord. And the simple plan is, not to open the controversy between Socinus and Scripture, but to arrange that each visit shall have its short Scripture reading, its friendly talk, and its prayer, all bearing mainly on the deadliness of sin and the wonder and glory of salvation. I happen to know that the married daughter of W.S., a very intelligent woman, was brought from heresy to a divine Saviour's feet by means of a sermon, not on Christ's Godhead, but on the sinfulness of sin.

T.H. is a sturdy old blacksmith, old enough to have been bred in the infidel school of Carlile (quite another person than Carlyle), and steeped in old-fashioned Chartism. He always has the newspaper on his now helpless knees, never the Bible; but he almost always has some Bible difficulty ready for me. It is pleasant to be able this afternoon to show him, holding the page up before his eyes, that his last stumbling-block is one of his own (or his friends') bold invention. He meets civility always civilly, and never resents a natural transition from the last bit of politics to the Gospel. But it is a hard, sad case. The Lord only knows how the apparently motionless conscience fares.

T.G. is a fine, manly artizan, a coach-painter, scarcely yet in middle life; lately the somewhat bitter and very self-satisfied critic of his good and devoted wife's simple faith. I have had rather discouraging talks with T.G. before to-day; but now he is very ill, and a few Sunday afternoons ago he sent across the road for the Curate, who to his own solemn joy found him broken down in unmistakable conviction of sin, asking what he must do to be saved. It is a blessed thing to visit him now, for already the rays of the eternal sun are shining between the clouds of a deeply genuine repentance; and the visitor's task is plain,—

"To teach him all the mercy, while he shows him all the sin."

Soon it will be my happiness, I hope, to administer to him, as a penitent believer, with his now happy wife and a faithful friend, the precious Communion; and I look forward to see him depart in due time in the peace of God, to be with Christ, for whom already he has learnt to testify.

Then comes another visit, to one of our "bettermost" neighbours; this door bears, or ought to bear, the proverbial brass knocker. But be the door what it may be, there is great need and great mercy inside it. The dear man, W.T., lately in active professional life in the home civil-service, is sinking under the most agonizing of human maladies, and it is very near the close; this is the second visit to-day, in his urgent need. But, blessed be God, grace, once absent, has found its way through the terrible obstacle of pain, and his scarcely articulate utterance—intelligible to his visitor only because now so familiar—speaks of the joy and rest of the Lord Jesus Christ, and of the sufferer's longing for the salvation of another soul, a soul very dear to him.[23]

[23] Wonderful to say (it is to me very wonderful), I have known more than one bright conversion take place amidst the untold pangs of such an illness.

Such visits tell upon the heart, and upon the head, and perhaps the round among the suffering has been long enough to-day. To-morrow we will try to get a quiet half-hour with W.R., a shopkeeper, sinking in consumption; a man of no common natural refinement and thoughtfulness, but long troubled with that sort of scepticism which is generated (who knows in how many cases?) by the mysteries, not of God's revelation, but of His providence. For him, too, the visitor's business is to lay a gentle siege, "here a little, and there a little," trying never to lose patience with objections and difficulties, but rather to sympathize with them as to their pains, and then to suggest the answer in Jesus Christ. And oh joy, the Lord is finding the way in, through His Word, and the clouds are passing away from the man's mind, and soul, and forehead, as he is getting to "know WHOM he believes."[24]

[24] I possess a beautiful little Bible given me by dear W.R., who has now been many years with Christ. Such a gift is a very sacred treasure to a Pastor.

Then we can walk round the corner—how the beloved streets and lanes rise up in memory before me as I write!—to see J.F., a young printer, dying in the brightest joy and peace, won from carelessness to a solid faith by the work and witness of earnest dissenting Christians, but glad and thankful to receive the Communion of the Lord from his dear Vicar, or his Vicar's son. And then five minutes' walk takes us to a tiny alley in the denser part of the widespread parish, where a poor life-long cripple, W.G., lies day and year upon his little bed—little, because though the head is full-sized, and the brain within it is an adult brain, the body has never grown since childhood. Here is a case for steady sympathy, and also for gentle and steady aiming at instruction as well as comfort. And then, not far off, we will take the privilege of a quiet visit to an aged Christian woman, J.N. In long past years loving saints found her pining in extreme poverty, and sunk in a dull, despairing indifference. Now it is a great spiritual help to sit in her little attic beside her, and draw her on to speak (she is no loquacious person by nature, and needs drawing on) about the needs of the soul, and the glorious fulness of the Son of God. She is no common Christian; not only in life but in thought this appears. At the time of her conversion, she could not read a letter. Since then, she has repeatedly read with great spiritual insight and enjoyment Archbishop Leighton's Commentary on St Peter. Here is a room in which the visitor learns quite as much as he teaches. And so he does in a still smaller and much darker room, three minutes' distant from J.N.'s. There lies blind R.W., in his strong days the head-servant of an old farmer of our village, and to all appearance as little capable of spiritual interests as the animals he fed. But on his sick-bed, the comfortless couch of many declining years, a loving visitor, a devoted lady-worker, has found him out, and the Lord has found him out through her. He never knew A from B in his life, and never will. But do you want proof of the power of grace to quicken mind, as well as to convert soul? Come with me up the stairs into dear old R.W.'s darksome room, and in the course of our talk you shall hear his quavering voice saying things, quite humbly and naturally, about the glory of his Saviour, and the way of salvation, and the joy and peace of his heart in God, which are not only loving ascriptions but clear and sound divinity. It is good to be with him.

I have spoken mainly, though not only, of cases of warm interest and encouragement. Of course there are sorrowful and heart-trying visits to the sick. One such, to poor old T.H., I have described. And we might see the much older A.C., a woman of near ninety years, who seems impenetrable to the true light, though grateful and kindly towards the visitor; and B.F., older still, ninety-six, so vain of her age that it is difficult to get her off the beloved theme; and J.G., a steady, self-righteous man; and C.W., clever, and disposed to scoff; and T.B., known to be leading a very evil life, civil, but immovable.

RESOLVE TO BE A VISITOR.

The work is very various, very interesting, and full of the call for "long patience," while full, too, of blessed encouragements and surprises. But "the time would fail me." Ah, let me not close without saying to my younger Brother how deeply humbling to me are the memories of those pastoral days, and humbling above all as I look back and wish now, in vain for ever, that I had visited more, among both the sick and the whole. "Enter not into judgment with Thy servant, O Lord"; "To Thee only it appertaineth to forgive sins."

My dear younger Brother, resolve that by the grace of God you will be a visitor, whatever else you are, or are not. And be a visitor who respects his neighbours, who feels with them, whose heart lives with them, and who on the other hand watches over his call to instruct them, to clear up and deepen their thoughts of self, and God, and life, and death, and salvation, and duty, and eternity.

A CONVERSION AT EIGHTY-SIX.

"Go, labour on; spend and be spent." There is a sure reward, seen or not seen as yet; and often the most unlikely quarter shall prove the quarter of blessing, and the last shall be first. One recollection, drawn out of my earliest childhood, shall close this wandering talk. It is of dear old Mrs E., then aged quite eighty-six. She must have been born under the rule of King George the Second. A farmer's widow, she had been absolutely and perfectly respectable all her life, and was entirely satisfied with her state and her prospects for the next world. My dear Father, and his devoted Curate of those days, the Rev. W.D., not seldom saw her, but without leaving any apparent impression on her conscience. At last that conscience woke. The Curate read a chapter, in her hearing, to her pious invalid daughter, who had sought her mother's conversion for years in prayer, and had lived true Christianity all the while in her mother's home. And on a sudden, something in that chapter (it was the third of Romans) said to the old lady, "You have lived eighty years in the world, and never done a single thing for the love of God." The conviction was tremendous in its depth and quality, and it lasted long. But a very bright light followed, and shone with holy fulness through what proved to be several remaining years of beautiful old age. She rejoiced in her adorable Saviour with joy unspeakable, a joy meanwhile perfectly sober and full of the good fruits of loving righteousness. She died at last, singing, or rather musically murmuring, Rock of Ages.[25] And my recollection, across seven-and-forty years, is of that dear old lady of the past, sitting upright in her parlour, as my Mother led me in to see her, and wearing a look upon her face which I can only now describe as a remembered ray of light.

[25] My dear Father, many years ago, published a full narrative of Mrs E.'s last days, in a little volume of pastoral recollections, Pardon and Peace.

"I love, I love my Master; I will not go out free; For He is my Redeemer, He paid the price for me.

"I would not leave His service, It is so sweet and blest, And in the weariest moments He gives the truest rest."

MISS F.R. HAVERGAL.



CHAPTER IX.

THE CLERGYMAN AND THE PRAYER BOOK.

_Dear pages of ancestral prayer, Illumined all with Scripture gold, In you we seem the faith to share Of saints and seers of old.

Whene'er in worship's blissful hour The Pastor lends your heart a voice, Let his own spirit feel your power, And answer, and rejoice._

In the present chapter I deal a little with the spirit and work of the Clergyman in his ministration of the ordered Services of the Church, reserving the work of the Pulpit for later treatment.

THE PRAYER BOOK NOT PERFECT BUT INESTIMABLE.

Let me begin by a brief reminder of the greatness of the spiritual treasure which we possess in the Book by which we minister. How shall I speak of it as I would? "The Prayer Book isn't inspired, I know," said an old coast-guardsman some years ago to a friend of mine, "but, sure and certain, 'tis as bad as inspired!" "I find the Liturgy," said another veteran, Charles Simeon, "as superior to all modern compositions as the work of a philosopher on any deep subject is to that of a schoolboy who understands scarcely anything about it." "All that the Church of England needs to make her the glory of all Churches," said Simeon's friend, the late Rev. William Marsh, "is the spirit of her own services."

I am not so blind as to maintain that our Book is ideally perfect, and that its every sentence is infallible. It is not quite literally "as bad as inspired." After using it in ministration for nearly five-and-twenty years I own to the wish that here and there the wording, or the arrangement, or the rubrical direction, had been otherwise in some detail, perhaps in some important detail. I do certainly wish very earnestly indeed that the Revisers of 1661-2 had expressed themselves more happily in that Rubric about "Ornaments" which within recent years has proved—little as they expected it, or intended it, to do so—such a fertile field of discord. But for all this, my five-and-twenty years' ministerial use of the Prayer Book has only deepened my sense of its inestimable general value and greatness.

If a temperate and equitable revision were possible at the present time I should welcome the prospect on most accounts. But it seems to me plain that it is not at present possible. And meanwhile I thank God from my inmost heart for the actual Prayer Book as a whole.

Let me point out a very few of the claims of the Book on our love and gratitude; and now specially in view of what we may sometimes hear said about it by Christians not of our own Church.

i. Observe its profound and searching spirituality. It is quite true that in a certain sense the Book takes all who use it for granted; it assumes them to be worshippers in spirit and in truth; it does not pray for them, or lead them in public worship to pray for themselves, as for those who do not know and love God, who have not come to Christ. But then what form of public, common prayer can well do this? And meantime the Book does, especially in the service of the Communion, and particularly in that too often omitted part of it, the "longer Exhortation," beginning Dearly beloved in the Lord, throw the worshipper back upon himself for self-examination. This is just the method of St Paul in his addresses to the Christian community. He writes to all as "saints," "faithful," "elect," "sanctified." What does he mean? Does he mean that those glorious terms are satisfied by the fact that all have been baptized, or even that all are communicants at the sacred Table? Not at all. He takes all for granted as being what they profess to be, when he greets the community. [Rom. viii. 9; 1 Cor. xvi. 22; 2 Cor. xiii. 5; Gal. v. 6.] But he says also, "If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His"; "If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema"; "Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not that Jesus Christ is in you—except ye be [Greek: adokimoi], counterfeits?" "In Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by love." Such sentences throw a flood of holy and searching light on the sense in which St Paul "took them all for granted." And the Prayer Book is in true harmony with both parts of the Apostle's method.

WHAT IT TAKES FOR GRANTED IN THE WORSHIPPER.

And then, think what the Book does thus searchingly and helpfully "take for granted." It assumes a deep sense of sin, such a sense as is indeed "grievous unto us." It takes for granted our deep desire both for pardon and for spiritual victory. It assumes our desire to be "kept this day without sin"; to "follow the only God with pure hearts and minds"; to "be continually given to all good works"; to "be enabled by the Lord to live according to His will"; to have "all our doings ordered by His governance"; to have "such love to Him poured into our hearts that we may love Him above all things." It assumes our desire to "read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest all the Holy Scriptures." It assumes our readiness to "suffer on earth for the testimony of the truth, looking up steadfastly to heaven, and by faith beholding the glory that shall be revealed." It assumes our adoring devotion to our Lord Jesus Christ, and that we present "ourselves, our souls and bodies, a reasonable, holy, and living sacrifice," to our God.

I heard a few years ago of a remarkable case of secession from the Church of England. A thoughtful and conscientious man left us because, as he said, he could no longer seem to concur in such words of intense spiritual reality and surrender while he did not fully mean them. On his principles, I fear there ought to be a large exodus from our Church. But that is not the fault of the Church, or of the Church's Book. It is the fault of the worshippers, and it is a solemn call to us not so much to criticize the Liturgy as to "examine ourselves."

THE PRAYER BOOK AS A WEAPON.

In this connexion I am reminded of a characteristic saying of an honoured friend of mine, now at rest with the Lord after a long and faithful ministry. He was one of those men who instinctively speak strongly, perhaps sometimes roughly; but such roughness is often useful. "The Prayer Book," said he, "is always handy to throw at people's heads"; figuratively, of course, not literally. He slung it out in vigorous quotations from his pulpit, point blank at the unreality, and formalism, and pharisaism, and love of this present evil world, which too often underlies the most precise "churchmanship" and the most punctual church-going.

My old friend's strong word may carry a suggestion to some of my younger Brethren; though I would advise their deferring a projectile use of the Book till they are seniors in the Church. But the youngest Minister of Christ, in all loving modesty, may reach many a conscience (beginning with his own) by well-timed words from the Prayer Book, showing what the Book takes for granted in the worshipper.

SCRIPTURALITY OF THE BOOK.

ii. Next I point to the abundant and loyal Scripturality of the Prayer Book. I venture to say that no Service Book in the world is quite like ours in this. This characteristic lies on the surface; in the wealth of Scripture poured out in every service before the people; Psalms, Lessons, Canticles, Epistle, Gospel, Introductory Sentences, Decalogue, Comfortable Words. At the Font, in the Marriage Ordinance, at the Grave, it is still the same; Scripture, in our mother tongue, full and free, runs everywhere. And below the surface it is the same. Take almost any set of responses, or any single prayer, and see the strong warp of the Bible in it all.

*"THE PREFACE" ON THE BIBLE.

And then go for a moment from the Services to the Preface of the Book, and see what the Fathers of our English Liturgy thought and intended about the place of the Holy Scriptures in worship. I hope my Brethren have all read that "Preface" with care; I mean, of course, the whole length of introductory matter which precedes the Tables of Lessons; nothing of it later than 1662, most of it (indeed all but the first section, written by Sanderson) dating in substance from 1549.[26] I hope it has all been read by you; but I am not quite certain of it, so little attention is at present called to those important and authoritative statements of principle. But however well you may already know them, they will repay another reading; and so you will be reminded again that the really first thought in the minds of the men who gave us our Prayer Book in English was to let "the Word of God have free course and be glorified" in all the worship of the people. [2 Thess. iii. 1.] Those men were learned in the past, and they reverenced history and continuity. But they reverenced still more the heavenly Word, and where they found the ample reading and hearing of it impeded by even immemorial usage, the usage had to give way, without reserve, to the Bible.

[26] I do not forget that some modifications in detail, as to the Lectionary, are quite recent.

Yes, the Prayer Book is, whatever else it is, searchingly, overflowingly Scriptural; full of the Bible, full of Christ. Let us drink its principles and its manner in, that they may come out in our life and our preaching.

And now for a few simple practical suggestions on our ministerial use of the Book.

USE THE BOOK WITH DILIGENCE.

i. First, I would entreat my younger Brother to resolve in the Lord's name that his own use of the Prayer Book in his ministration be to him a thing of sacred importance and personal reality. We need to form such a resolve deliberately, and to watch and pray over it. Do we not know what strong temptations lie in the other direction? We have to use these forms over and over again; before many years are over perhaps we could "take" a whole service, except the appointed Scriptures, without looking at the book: is it not too easy under such conditions to read as those who read not, and to pray as those who pray not? And all too often the Clergyman, younger or older, allows himself almost consciously, almost on principle, to form an inadequate estimate of his Prayer-Book work. Perhaps he regards the prayers as in such a sense "the voice of the Church" that he is willing to be little more than a machine through which the Church offers them. Or perhaps on the other hand he lets himself forget their immense importance, under a strong, and just, sense of the sacred importance of the Sermon. He is alive and awake in the pulpit, and seeks his Lord's presence there, and realizes it as sought; but in the desk—he goes by himself, and much of his precious time there is spent in thought which wanders to the ends of the earth while his voice does its decent but somnambulatory part alone.

*USE IT WITH LIVING REALITY.

I can only appeal with all my heart to my younger Brother not to let it be thus with him. And the only effective recipe against the trouble is faith, exercised in prayer and watching, with a full recollection of the urgent importance of the matter. For indeed it is all-important that the servant of God should be "given wholly to" his work, at the reading desk, at the lectern, at the Table, at the Font.

PRAY THE PRAYERS.

It is easy to say, as it is often said, that we "must not preach the prayers," must not obtrude our personality in leading the devotions of the congregation; that our part is to be regular and audible, and otherwise to "efface ourselves." Most certainly we ought not to preach the prayers, in public any more than in private. But then, we ought to pray them. Most certainly we ought not to obtrude our personality upon the thought of the worshippers. But then, we ought to serve them with our personality, and we can best do this, surely, by a spirit and a manner which is unmistakably that of the fellow-worshipper, who feels himself to be in the presence of the King, and knows that the petitions and the promises are for him at least a holy reality. I am perfectly well aware that it is not easy to steer between a more or less mechanical manner and a demonstrative one, and that perhaps of two evils the former is the less. But I am sure it is possible to steer the right line, by using sanctified common-sense, and asking for a little candid counsel from those who hear us, and above all by being what we seek to seem—true worshippers, spiritually awake and humbly reverent.

As long as man is man, so long will the law of sympathy hold good. And by that law it is certain that the way to promote, so far as we can, a spirit and tone of true worship in our people is to possess—and to show—that spirit ourselves, as we lead, and also join, their worship. Never declaim the prayers, but always pray them, from the soul and with the voice.

"GIVE ATTENDANCE TO THE READING" OF THE LESSONS.

ii. I spoke just now of what we should do at the lectern. Let me earnestly press upon my Brethren the great duty of rightly reading the Lessons. Do you want to carry out the will and purpose of the Church of England? As we have seen, that purpose is above everything to glorify the Word of God. See then that the Lesson, as read by you, is as audible, as intelligible, as impressive as you can make it. Take care beforehand that you understand its points, its arguments, its emphasis. Take counsel with yourself, and perhaps with others, about ways and means for bringing these things out in your public reading. Remember that for very many of your people (I fear I am right in saying so) the Church Lessons are the most solid pieces of Scripture they ever hear, or ever read. Many years ago it was not uncommonly said that in "these days of universal reading" we might perhaps abbreviate our Church Lessons. But since that time it has been more fully and sadly realized, by very many of us at least, that universal reading does not mean universal Bible reading by any means, but much rather universal newspaper and novel reading. The heavenly Book is terribly unfamiliar to multitudes of churchgoers, as you will find, if you ask, when you go about your parish; of this we have already thought. Therefore, make all you can of the reading of the Lessons in public worship. [Greek: Proseche te anagnosei], says the Apostle to Timothy, "Give attention to the reading" [1 Tim. iv. 13.]; does he not mean, be diligent in reading the Scripture to the people? The precept is as much as ever in point in our day.

OPPORTUNITIES OFFERED BY THE OCCASIONAL SERVICES.

iii. As regards the occasional services, Public and Private Baptism, Marriage, Burial, I would earnestly counsel my Brother to put personality into his reading in them all, in the moderate sense indicated above. The fact that such occasions are necessarily more or less special in their interest for some at least of those present should never be forgotten; bring the power of a sympathetic interest and earnestness to bear upon it. In administering Public Baptism I have often realized this to a very peculiar degree. Who can feel the least fondness for little children, and have the slightest insight into a parent's heart, and not do so? Our service is undoubtedly long; very long indeed when accompanied by a chorus of perhaps several little crying voices. But let the servant of God "be in it," and he will find himself much more touched than troubled by the babies' lamentations as he speaks to the sponsors about the young helpless souls, and turns to the Lord of all grace to dedicate them to Him and to invoke His blessing on them for time and eternity, and then applies the watery Seal of all the promises to their small foreheads. I have always found it very hard to get through that service with a perfectly steady voice; and after all, why should we be so careful to do so?

Private Baptism is indeed a special occasion. There are reasons, no doubt, why it must not be too readily administered; in some parishes parents, for one reason or another, too often try to secure "a christening" in private, on insufficient grounds, with no intention of a public dedication afterwards. But when the case is clear, and you are at the little suffering one's side, perhaps with a distressed mother close beside it and you, see to it that you so minister the rite, so read the few precious words, as both to sympathize and to teach. Let me add that Private Baptism often brings the Clergyman into a house where religion is utterly neglected; and the opportunity may be a priceless one, if the power of love and spiritual reality is with you in the work.

And when you officiate at a Wedding, different as the conditions are from those just remembered, still do not forget that for at least some there present the hour is a deeply moving one. And is not the Marriage Service a noble one to read, to interpret, with its peculiar mingling of immemorial and archaic simplicity with a searching depth of scriptural exhortation, and a bright wealth of divine benedictions? Throw the power of a true man's solemnized sympathy into your reading of that service.

PROBLEMS CONNECTED WITH THE USE OF THE BURIAL SERVICE.

Of the ritual of the Grave I hardly need to speak. I know only too well that there are funerals and funerals. There are occasions of unrelieved sadness. There are occasions when the Minister's heart is chilled by a manifest and utter indifference. But the saddest, dreariest of burials is an opportunity for the Lord. Whether or no you see your way to give an address, let it be seen that you are dealing with God in the prayers, and read the Lessons "as one that pleadeth with men."

A brief word in passing on the problem raised by some of the phrases of our Burial Service. Let me call attention to the studied generality of the words, In sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life. Before 1662 this ran "in sure ... hope of resurrection, etc.," which, as you will observe, expressly applied the "hope" to that case of burial; the change was evidently made on purpose to relieve conscience in the matter. Then remember that the whole service is constructed, like all our services, for the member of the Christian community taken on his profession; and that assumption, unless flagrant facts withstand it, is to be made, in public ordinance, as much at the grave as elsewhere. And do not forget that hope, be it ever so "trembling," is never forbidden at a grave-side. I am no advocate of what is called "the larger hope"; I dare not be. But I am deeply convinced that mercies of the Lord, in cases quite beyond our possible knowledge, are experienced in the very act of departure.

"Betwixt the stirrup and the ground Mercy I sought, mercy I found."

That instance has many parallels; and God only knows their limits. Never should we say, whatever we may awfully fear, that such and such a soul is to our knowledge lost.

As regards the practical management of extreme cases, the young Clergyman will of course act altogether under his Incumbent. And the young Incumbent will remember that he can have recourse to his Bishop for counsel.

THE HOLY COMMUNION.

iv. Let me say one special word on our administration of the precious ritual of the Table of the Lord. I am not attempting here any discussion of its doctrinal aspects in detail. For myself, as I have said elsewhere, I make no secret of long-settled "Evangelical" convictions. I regard the Holy Eucharist as above all things else the Lord's way of sealing to His true Israel the unutterable benefits of the New and Everlasting Covenant, rather than an occasion on which He infuses into them His glorified Manhood. His sacred Body and Blood are, for me, the Body and the Blood as they were, once for all, at Calvary, and as they are not therefore literally now; and my participation in them is accordingly my participation in the virtues of the Atoning Sacrifice, there once and for ever wrought and offered. But this is by the way. I speak now of our spirit and manner in the administration, in respect of some principles which are little if at all affected, it seems to me, by even grave differences of doctrinal theory. Alas, at the present day it is too often the case that the communicant is fairly bewildered by the varieties of Communion ritual, or by the complications of it. Ought this to be so, on any theory of the Eucharist? Did I for one believe our adorable and beloved LORD to be locally present (I use the words not technically but practically) on the Holy Table as nowhere else here on earth, I think that all my instinct would go towards a reverence whose depth was manifested not by an elaborate ceremonial but by the most solemn possible simplicity of act. A ritual whose details must be matter of careful practice, and which suggests almost the need of a Spanish master-of-the-ceremonies—ought that to be the natural effect of an, as it were, invisible Presence?

SIMPLICITY AND REVERENCE.

But probably I write for readers whose inclinations or risks lie little in that direction. And for them I say, let your administration of the blessed Communion always combine a manifest reverence and a restful simplicity. The Lord is there, the Master of His own Table, the Prince of His own Covenant, ready to give His people His royal Seal by your hands. And His people are there, to have their sacred interview with Him. Do not obstruct their view, their colloquy; humbly aid it. Be their servant, as in HIS presence; obtrude yourself as little as you possibly can.

ADDRESSES ON THE PRAYER BOOK.

As I draw the chapter to a close, I make one practical recommendation to my younger Brethren. It is, to do what they can to interest their people in the Prayer Book, and to promote its intelligent use, by taking what opportunities they can to talk to them about it. Many a private occasion for this will no doubt present itself. But if now and then a simple lecture on the history of the Prayer Book can be given, and if possible well illustrated, it will be very useful; and so will be a series of week-night devotional addresses on the teaching of the Prayer Book. And let not the need of plain matter-of-fact explanation of obsolete terms and technical phrases be forgotten on such occasions. Of course the Curate will carefully consult his Incumbent on the whole matter. But few of my elder Brethren will not feel with me that such "talks upon the Prayer Book," carefully considered and conducted, whether by Incumbent or by Curate, may be of the greatest use, under our Master's blessing.

"MORE CEREMONIAL, LESS WORSHIP."

One last word, and I have done with these suggestions. An English Bishop once told me that he had lately met a gentleman who, after ten years' residence abroad, returned to England, and to his place as a worshipper in our Churches. "Do you remark particularly any change or advance in what you see there?" "I observe on the one hand much more ceremonial, on the other hand, apparently, much less worship. Fewer kneel, fewer respond, fewer around me seem devoutly attentive." Less worship! Is it so indeed? Let the very opposite be the case, so far as our influence and teaching can have effect, with our fathers' Prayer Book in our hands, and in our hearts.

"_Lo, God is here; Him day and night Th' united quires of angels sing; To Him, enthron'd above all height, Heaven's hosts their noblest praises bring; Disdain not, Lord, our meaner song, Who praise Thee with a stammering tongue.

"Being of beings, may our praise Thy courts with grateful fragrance fill; Still may we stand before Thy face, Still hear and do Thy sovereign will; To Thee may all our thoughts arise, Ceaseless, accepted sacrifice._"

J. WESLEY, from TERSTEEGEN



CHAPTER X.

PREACHING (i.).

Earthen vessels, frail and slight, Yet the golden Lamp we bear; Master, break us, that the light So may fire the murky air; Skill and wisdom none we claim, Only seek to lift Thy Name.

I have on purpose reserved the subject of Preaching for our closing pages. Preaching is, from many points of view, the goal and summing up of all other parts and works of the Ministry. What we have said already about the Clergyman's life and labour, in secret, in society, in the parish; what we have said about his study and use of the Book of Common Prayer; all, so far as it has been true, ought to contribute its suggestions as we approach this great theme.

THE PULPIT THE CENTRAL POINT.

For, indeed, "the Pulpit" (I use the word in its widest application, wide enough to cover the mission-room desk, or the preaching place in the open air) is no mere isolated item in the midst of other matters which call for a Clergyman's attention. If the man is working, and ordering his work, aright, the Pulpit will not be a something which has to be taken by the way, a link in a long chain in which committees, clubs, and social gatherings, and the like, are other and co-ordinate links. It will be a sacred central point, the living heart of the busy life, to which everything will bear relation. To the Pulpit everything will somehow converge, and from the Pulpit everything will be influenced. As the Pastor moves about amongst his people, he will be gathering incessantly, from all parochial places and seasons, material which will tell upon his sermons; he will be getting to know his people's minds and lives with an intimacy which will give his preaching to them a point which otherwise it could not have. And when he stands in the Pulpit, this continually accumulating knowledge will come out, not indeed in the way of diluting or distorting his Gospel, but so as to give its eternal and holy message a point and closeness of application which will ensure its "coming home," as God gives the blessing.

TEMPTATIONS TO FORGET THIS.

It needs thought and care to keep the parish and the sermon thus en rapport. But such thought and care is infinitely well worth taking. The Clergyman who longs to be useful for his Lord in the highest degree he can be, cannot possibly think lightly of his sermons. Yet he may be tempted, half unconsciously, to treat them too lightly in practices, particularly if he is beset with a consciousness that he is not "a born preacher," or if he stands in the opposite danger of having a "fatal" facility of speech. Let the Clergyman only remember that his sermon, his public delivery of instruction, of exhortation, in the Lord's name, is not to be an exhibition of his own powers of thought or utterance, but a faithful message-bearing to his own flock, in the light of what he knows of Christ and the Word on the one side, and of the needs of the flock on the other, and he will find a most useful encouragement, or a most useful corrective, as the need may be. "O my Lord, I am not eloquent," [Exod. iv. 10.] will be no disheartening thought, as he carries to the pulpit the ever-growing weight of pastoral experience, all giving point and freshness to the unalterable message. And the secret temptation to think the sermon a light thing because mere words come easy, will be powerfully counteracted in the other case not only by contact with the realities of life in the daily work, but by remembering that the sermon will have to do with not an abstract audience but these particular souls and lives thus laid on the man's conscience and affections.

THE PASTOR PREACHES TO THOSE PARTICULAR HEARERS.

Let me repeat it as earnestly as I can. The sermon, if it is to be what it should be, should be affected at every point by the facts of the preacher's own inner life, and by those of his intercourse with his people. Those facts must, of course, be thoughtfully weighed and handled. The tact which is so important in a Pastor, and which is best learned and developed in the school of Christ's love, will see instinctively how to apply in preaching the experience gained in prayer, in conversation, in every branch of ministering life. We shall remember that indefinite harm, not good, may be done when a man, particularly a young man, unwisely preaches what may fairly seem to be personalities; I have known some sad instances in point here. But taking that for granted, assuming the good sense and sympathy of the preacher, I am quite sure that the most eloquent sermon, adapted to any audience, is far less likely to be blessed and used by our Lord than the sermon which is penetrated with the Pastor's personal intimacy with that particular audience, and which goes therefore straight from him to them.

It has been well said that preaching may be described as "truth through personality"; not merely the presentation somehow of so many facts and thoughts, but the presentation of them through the medium of a living man, who brings into the pulpit his heart, his character, his experience, and so gives out his message. We may add to this suggestive dictum that the true pastoral sermon is also "truth to personalities"; the living man's delivery of the message to living men and women whose life, more or less, he knows. And so it presupposes some real amount of pastoral intercourse, intelligently brought to bear on pulpit work.

PREPARE SERMON IN THE PARISH.

I linger a little over these thoughts, though they are little more than introductory. For experience tells me how easily, in these days, the Clergyman is tempted to dislocate his "parish work" from his sermons, to the great loss of one or both parts of his duty. And if once he begins to think of his sermons as a thing really apart, which must be got through somehow, but rather as a mere duty than as a vital ministerial function, the results will be sad for the sermons. So I lay stress on the thought that the sermon-preparation ought to go on not only in the study, over the Word, but in the parish, over the hearers of it. The more constantly this is recollected, and put in practice, the less fear will there be that the sermon will be a weariness either to people or to preacher.

"LABOUR IN THE WORD."

But let me, however, entreat my younger Brother, by any and every means, to watch and pray against a slack or low view of his function as a preacher. From very many quarters at the present day we are invited to slight our sermon-labour. Sometimes it is "work," organization, committees, which is set against the sermon; sometimes it is the reading-desk and the Communion Table—the liturgical functions of the Ministry. Let pastoral activities and holy rites alike have ample place in our thoughts and work; but for Christ's sake, my Brother in the ministry of the Word and Sacraments, do not forget the Word. A Christian Church where preaching sinks to a low ebb, where the labour of public teaching and exhortation is neglected, in favour either of machinery or ritual, cannot possibly—I dare to say it deliberately—be in a truly healthy state now, and most assuredly is not laying up health and strength for years to come. For the very life of our flocks, and of our Church, and for the dear glory of our Master, let us "labour in the Word and teaching." [1 Tim. v. 17.]

"LITHO SERMONS."

Is it necessary, in the case of any reader of these pages, that I should not only appeal thus in general, but add one special entreaty—always to preach your own sermons? Probably it is not necessary; but it may be "safe" [Phil. iii. 2.] nevertheless. Not long ago I was distressed to read, in the advertisement columns of an excellent Church newspaper, a conspicuous announcement of a series of "litho sermons," that is, I suppose, sermons so printed as to look like manuscript. If such literature has a sale, it is a miserable fact. Can these discourses possibly be either written by a "man of the Spirit," or used by such a man? I say, No. The production of them (in order to be lithographed), and the use of them in their "litho" state, are untruthful acts, untruthful in the very sanctuary of truth. The Lord pardon—and the Lord forbid!

Better the most stammering and incoherent utterances of a man who loves the Lord, and the Word, and the flock, and who in Christ's Name does his best, than the unhallowed, and usually, I think, vapid glibness of such acted as well as spoken falsehoods.[27] And surely, the more the Clergyman keeps his pulpit and his parish in living relation, the less will he be tempted, be it ever so remotely, by any exigencies, to dream of expedients such as these.

[27] I am far from saying that the preacher should never get help from other men's sermons. This may be done honestly and usefully, in many ways. But to let another man's sermon pass as one's own is a sin.

"DR SOUTH IN THE AFTERNOON."

Quite conceivably, there may be rare occasions when another man's sermon may be rightly used by you. But then, of course, you will do it honestly and above-board, telling your people whose it is. In Addison's Sir Roger de Coverley there is a pleasant scene, where the venerable Knight asks the Parson who the preacher for next Sunday is to be. "The Bishop of St Asaph in the morning," replies the good man, "and Dr South in the afternoon."[28] That is, he was about to read, openly and honestly, a sermon of Beveridge's, and then a sermon of South's; neither, certainly, in lithograph. I do not say he did the best for his people in so doing; most certainly he could not "speak home" to the details of their village life, and its temptations, if he spoke only in the phrase of the two classical pulpit-masters. That rapport of parish and pulpit of which I have spoken could not have been much felt, at least on that coming Sunday. But the good Parson was honest, however. The practice of which I speak is not honest.

[28] "He then shewed us his list of preachers for the whole year, where I saw with a great deal of pleasure Archbishop Tillotson, Bishop Sanderson, Dr Barrow, Dr Calamy, with several living authors." (Spectator, No. 106, July 2nd, 1711.) Calamy by the way was a Presbyterian, made one of the King's chaplains at the Restoration.

WE MUST PREACH ATTRACTIVELY.

Let me come now to a closer view of the preacher's work, and I will be as practical as possible. I have besought my Brother to let nothing tempt him to push his preaching into a neglectful corner. Let me now beseech him to remember that he must not only be a diligent preacher, but do his very best to commend his preaching to his people,—to be, in a right sense, attractive.

I deliberately say, attractive. That word, of course, suggests some very undesirable applications. It is only too possible to aim at attractiveness by bad methods. We may tone down the Gospel-message, leaving out unpopular and man-humbling truths, and try to "attract" people so. We may strive to "attract" them to hear us by doubtful external accessories (of very different kinds), which, after all, will rather attract attention—for a season—to themselves, than to the message, and the Lord. But none the less it is every Clergyman's plain duty to make his preaching, so far as he can, lawfully attractive. It is his duty to see that he preaches Christ Crucified; and "the offence of the Cross" [Gal. v. 11.] will always occur, sooner or later, in such preaching; but it is his duty to see that there is no other "offence" in it, so far as he can help it. If he so speaks of sin, and righteousness, and judgment, that the unregenerate heart does not like it, though the preacher has spoken wisely and in love, that is not the preacher's fault. If he has so magnified Christ, and the glory and fulness of His salvation, that it sounds like exaggeration to the unspiritual hearer, though the words have been said in all reverent reality, that is not the preacher's fault. But it is his fault if he has repelled his hearers from his message by what is not the message, but his own setting of it; his spirit, manner, his delivery, his neglect of some plain precautions against prejudice and weariness. Of a few such precautions I come now to speak; and first, of what I may call the most external amongst them.

NEEDFUL AND NEEDLESS OFFENCES.

Beginning, then, with physical precautions against needless "offences," [Greek: skandala], in our preaching I say first, let us do our best to be audible.

AUDIBILITY: MEANS TO IT.

The word sounds almost amusingly commonplace. But it must be said. Many more of us Clergymen than know it, or think about it, are not audible. The lack of training for the bodily work of the pulpit, in our Church, is serious; far more is done in this way among our Nonconformist brethren.[29] And accordingly there are numbers of young English Clergymen who read and speak without a thought of methodical audibility. They do not articulate distinctly. They do not remember that the pace and force of utterance, fit for a private room, are quite unfit for a large building. They do not know, perhaps, how extremely important is the articulation of consonants, and of final syllables of words, and of closing words in a sentence. They do not know that a certain equability (not monotony) of voice is necessary, if the utterance is to "carry" to the end of a long church, or a church of many pillars.

[29] Let me cordially commend the Rev. J.P. Sandlands' book, The Voice and Public Speaking. Mr Sandlands has done, and is doing, admirable work as an oral teacher of clerical elocution, in the intervals of his parochial labours.

PLEASANT AUDIBILITY.

Or again, they do not know, or do not remember, that audibility is not secured by mere loudness and bigness of voice, nor again by raising the voice to a high pitch. "People tell you to speak up," said that excellent elocutionist, Mr Simeon; "but I say, speak down," down as regards the musical scale. Again, the larger the building the more accentuated must be the articulation, and the more limited the variation of pitch; but too often this is not thought of by the preacher.

Further, it has to be remembered, but it is frequently forgotten, that the audibility we should aim at is a pleasant and attractive audibility. It is a great thing to be easily heard; which of us does not know the combined physical and mental labour of listening to a sermon, or a speech, which only reaches us indistinctly? But it is a greater thing to be pleasantly heard; heard so that the listener finds nothing to tire and repel in the utterance. Here, of course, different voices give very different advantages; but there are some common secrets, so to speak, which all—who will make a sacred business of it—may profitably and effectively use. Above all, there is the secret of quiet naturalness; the watchful avoidance (do not forget this) of tricks and mannerisms in delivery;[30] the watchful cultivation of the sort of utterance which we should use in an earnest conversation on grave subjects, with only such differences as are suggested by the size of the place in which we speak. Of some other "common secrets" I shall speak when I come to the question of style and phrase.

[30] I have known a sermon which in matter and style were really excellent made, to some hearers at least, almost unendurable by the accident that the preacher had got the habit of (needlessly) clearing his throat at the end of almost every sentence.

FIND A CANDID FRIEND.

How shall we best work upon such hints? Very largely, by the use of the plainest common-sense and every-day observation on our own part. But largely also by trying to find some friend, equally kind and candid, who will help us "to hear ourselves as others hear us." For myself, after twenty-five years, I welcome more and more gratefully every such criticism as the occasion presents itself. Let the Curate ask his Vicar to tell him without mercy if his utterance, his articulation, is clear; if his manner is natural; if his preaching is or is not easy to listen to in these respects. And let friend ask friend; let pastor ask parishioner; let husband ask wife!

GOOD ENGLISH.

There are other directions in which we must cultivate attractiveness. There is English style. Here, again, gifts differ widely in detail, yet there are common secrets open to common use. It is open to every one to avoid, on the one hand, an ambitious, long-worded style; on the other, a style which many young men of our time are in more danger of patronizing—the slovenly, shapeless style, in which the Queen's English is very "freely handled," and into which the broken English of an ever-growing slang not seldom makes its way. These defects have only to be recognized, surely, to be avoided, by keeping our eyes open as we read and our ears as we hear, and by remembering that the sacred message of the King, while it is too great to be tricked out with false rhetoric, is also too great to be slighted, not to say insulted, by a really careless phraseology.

A GOOD STYLE IS A PRACTICAL POWER.

Pains will be needed, of course, as we pursue the object of a good style. We must watch and think. We must read and observe good models, the written words of men who have proved themselves powerful preachers to the people, and indeed of men generally who are known masters of English. We shall have, again, to consult candid friends. But my point is, that all this is abundantly worth our while. A neat, straight, well-worded sentence is not a mere literary luxury. It is a practical power. It is far easier to listen to than a careless, formless sentence is, and it is far easier to remember. The truth which it conveys is much more likely, therefore, to find its way securely into the mind, and to lie there ready for the vivifying touch of the Spirit of God.

I emphasize this matter of style, for in many quarters it is much neglected, and some of my younger Brethren do, if I mistake not, entertain the thought that the simplicity of the Gospel is best set forth, and God most honoured, where plans and methods of language are neglected. To speak about "a good style" to those who think so, may seem perhaps little else than a recommendation to bid for human applause in the line of literature. But my intention is far enough from this. Mere literary ambition, the quest of the glory of self in this as in every other line, is a forbidden thing to the true bondservant of the Lord. But it is by no means forbidden him, for his Lord's sake, to aim at clearness, point, force of expression, that the message may be the better taken in. God is as little glorified by a bad style as by a bad voice, or bad handwriting, or bad reasoning. And by a good style I mean not a style polished and elaborated to please fastidious tastes (the best taste, by the way, is best pleased with correct simplicity), but a style which shall be both pure and plain in word and phrase, "understandable of the people" yet such as not to vex those who care for their native tongue, and just enough formed and pointed to make attention pleasant to the ear. For average audiences, I know no style more perfectly answering my idea than that of Mr Spurgeon,[31] in his printed sermons of recent years. And I happen to know that Mr Spurgeon has always taken great and systematic pains with his English.

[31] Since these words were written this great Christian and preacher has passed away to his Master's presence.

FRENCH HEARERS OF ENGLISH.

Some preachers need much more than others a hint to keep their sentences straight, and to avoid the tangle of parentheses, long or short. Here, again, Mr Spurgeon gives me an admirable illustration. His sentences, never thin or weak in matter, are always straight. If any of my younger Brethren are tempted, as I confess I am, in the digressive direction, I would recommend them (if they usually preach without writing) to write a sermon now and then, and rigorously to exclude, or re-write, all sentences which transgress. It occurred to me recently, when acting as a summer chaplain in Switzerland, to find the benefit of a different corrective. On one particular Sunday I had among my hearers in the morning a French Presbyterian, in the afternoon a French Roman Catholic, each understanding a little English; and in each case I had special reasons for hope and longing that the sermon might bring some spiritual help. Instinctively, I avoided every expression which could in the least complicate my English and thus obscure the message to my foreign friends. And so thankful was I for the pruning of periods that resulted, that I am much disposed, in all future preaching, to put mentally before me those same two hearers.

"WRITTEN OR EXTEMPORE?"

On that great question, Shall I preach from writing, or not? I say very little. Speaking quite generally, and thinking now only of the regular church congregation, not of the mission-room or open air, I would advise my younger Brethren to write for some while, but usually with an ultimate view to speech without writing. No hard rule can be laid down. One man is so gifted that from the first he can express himself correctly and well without any manuscript before him. Another finds, all his life through, that he speaks best, and his people listen best, when he reads (vividly and naturally) from his prayerfully-prepared manuscript. But on the whole, I repeat it, writing is the best discipline for a man in his early days of Ministry, while beyond doubt the freely-spoken sermon, like the freely-spoken speech, (carefully enough prepared as to matter and order,) is usually best to listen to, and therefore should be the preacher's goal. Some men write their sermons and then learn them by heart for delivery. For myself, I own this would be a severe ordeal to nerve; and in very few cases, if I am right, does it produce a perfectly natural effect. Not long ago, if not now, it was a frequent custom in Scotland; and one amusing story comes to my mind. A good minister, known to a near relative of mine, always thus "mandated" his sermon, and punctually delivered it word for word. One day a tremendous hailstorm assailed the church windows, and not only did his parishioners fail to hear him, but literally he lost the sound of his own voice. Yet he dared not stop, lest memory should play him false; and when the storm ceased, "I found myself," he said, "with some surprise, in a quite distant part of the sermon."

ORDER AND DIVISION.

Another important aid to attractiveness is order and division, simply and sensibly managed. Nothing is much more repellent, at least to modern hearers, than an excess of arrangement; headings and subdivisions overdone. But nothing is more helpful to attention than a simple, natural, luminous division, present in the preacher's mind, announced to the audience, and faithfully carried out. Remember this, among many other things, in the choosing of the text; ceteris paribus, that text is best which best lends itself to natural division.

PAINS AND FAITH.

There are many other points, more or less of the exterior kind, so to speak, which concern the attractiveness of our preaching. There is the question of length, which can only be settled by careful and prayerful consideration of special circumstances, with recollection of the general principles that the morning sermon should be short compared with that of the evening, and that he who would reach the hearts of the poor must not give them "sermonettes," but sermons. There is the question of action, a large subject. All that I can say is, that some action is almost always a help to attention, but that it proves the very opposite as soon as it seems uneasy, or a mannerism.

I have yet to deal with some thoughts about the preacher's message, and the inmost secrets of his power. Meanwhile, may our Lord and Master enable us so to "labour in the Word" that we shall think no means too humble which will really help us to make His message plain, and no dependence on Him too absolute for the longed-for spiritual results.

"Would I describe a preacher, such as Paul, Were he on earth, would hear, approve, and own, Paul should himself direct me. I would trace His master-strokes, and draw from his design. I would express him simple, grave, sincere, In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain, And plain in manner; decent, solemn, chaste, And natural in gesture; much impress'd Himself, as conscious of his awful charge, And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds May feel it too; affectionate in look, And tender in address, as well becomes A messenger of grace to guilty men."

COWPER.



CHAPTER XI.

PREACHING (ii.).

For Thy sake, beloved Lord, I will labour in Thy Word; On the knees, in patient prayer; At the desk, with studious care; In the pulpit, seeking still There to utter all Thy will.

I pursue the subject of attractive preaching, taking still the word attractive in its worthiest sense, and again laying stress on the necessity of attractiveness of the right sort. We have looked a little already at some of the external requisites to this end; now let us approach some which have to do with matter more than manner.

CONSIDERATENESS.

On the way, I pause to say a word in general on one of the reasons why we should do our best to speak so that our hearers shall care to hear. The supreme reason is manifest; it is the glory of our Master and the good of souls. For His sake, and for the flock's sake, we long and must strive to speak so as to draw their attention to His message and to Himself. But subordinate to this great motive, and in fullest harmony with it, there is another; and this is a motive which, once clearly apprehended, will affect not our preaching only, but all parts of our ministry—our conduct of public worship, our pastoral visitation, our whole intercourse with our neighbours. I mean, the simple motive of a loyal and faithful considerateness for others, as we are on the one hand Christian men and English gentlemen, and on the other hand servants, not masters, of the Church and parish. Possibly this aspect of the Pastor's public and official ministry may not have presented itself distinctively as yet to my younger Brother; but it cannot be recognized and acted upon too early. Some things in our clerical position and functions tend in their own nature to make us forget it, if we are not definitely awake to it beforehand. In some respects the Clergyman, even the youngest Curate, has dangerous opportunities for in considerate public action. Take the management of divine Service in illustration. In his manner of reading, his tone, his pace, the Clergyman may allow himself, only too easily, to think of himself alone. In the reading-desk, or at the Table of the Lord, he may consult only his own likes and dislikes in attitude, gesture, and air. But if so, he is greatly failing in the homely duty of loyal considerateness. What will be most for the happiness and edification of the congregation? What will least disturb and most assist true devotion? How shall the Minister best secure that the worshippers shall remember the Master and not be uncomfortably conscious of the servant? The answers to such questions will of course vary considerably under varying conditions; but it is the principle of the questions which I press home. Our office, and the common consent and usage of the Christian people, give us a position of independence in such matters which has its advantages, but also its very great risks; and it is for us accordingly to handle that independence with the utmost possible considerateness.

This thought was much upon my own mind lately during the interesting experiences of a Continental summer chaplaincy, to which I referred in the last chapter. As usual in a health resort abroad, the English residents represented many different shades of Church opinion and practice. By the convictions of many long years, I am an Evangelical Churchman, in the well-understood sense of the term; and of those convictions I am not at all ashamed. My manner of conducting public worship, especially in the Communion Office, would probably make it plain at once to most worshippers where I stand as a Churchman. But that does not mean, I trust, that I am to allow myself to be inconsiderate of the feelings of others in the matter; and on the occasions referred to it was my earnest and anxious aim to remember this with regard to worshippers, and particularly communicants, whose beliefs, or however whose sympathies, were what is called "higher" than my own. On their account I sought to make it plain that no rubrical direction was neglectfully treated by me, and that reverence of manner and action was a sacred thing in my eyes—a reverence not elaborated, but attentive. I hope I should have been reverently careful whatever the composition of the congregation was; but under the circumstances the duty of this obvious sort of ministerial considerateness was laid on my heart with special weight. That duty bears in many directions. It is, I venture to say, inconsiderate, on the one hand, when the Clergyman conducts the services of the Church with a disturbing artificiality of performance. It is inconsiderate, on the other hand, when he conducts them with any, even the least, real slovenliness and inattention.

TEMPTATIONS TO FORGET IT.

But if all this is true of the desk and of the blessed Table, it is true also, and in a high degree, of the pulpit. Singularly independent, up to a certain point, is the position of the preacher. He chooses his own text; he assigns himself (at least in theory) his own length of discourse; he is entitled, under the aegis of the law of the land, to speak on to the end without interruption; he is bound, within the limits of a sanctified common-sense, to speak with the authority of his commission. Here are powerful temptations to an inconsiderate man, perhaps especially to an inconsiderate young man, to show much inconsideration. And therefore, here is a pre-eminent occasion for the true Pastor, who thinks, prays, loves, and is humble, to practise the beautiful opposite. Shall you and I seek grace to do so?

RESPECT ELDER HEARERS.

Put yourself often, my dear Brother, while I do the same, into the position—which we once occupied always, and often do still—of the hearer. You, the Curate, or the young Incumbent, have recently come into the parish, and you are full of a young man's energy and enterprize, and a little infected perhaps with a common and natural belief of your time of life, but a belief not quite true to facts, that the world is made for young men. And among your hearers, week by week, as you preach from that pulpit, sit men and women who were working, and thinking, and perhaps believing, literally long before you were born. Put yourself in their place. Into many of their experiences, and their sympathies born of experience, you cannot possibly enter personally. You cannot feel personally how this or that innovation of language or manner, this or that too crude statement of your message, this or that baldly new and perhaps by no means true theory, aired as if it were all obvious and of course, must look and sound to them. You cannot feel it all; but you can think about it. Perhaps these are educated and refined people, and accustomed all their lives to value clear thought and pure diction, in any case accustomed to carefulness in the matter and manner of the sermon. You cannot enter into all their mental habits in your own mental workings; but you can take account of them, and in a loyal and thoughtful considerateness you can remember them in practice, and honestly aim so to prepare and to preach as to conciliate the thoughtful and the elders.

Such considerateness will not mean the stifling of prayerful conviction, or the failure to be faithful as the messenger of the Lord. But it will mean a severity upon yourself as regards the tone and spirit of your thoughts, and also as the manner of your utterance. You will take pains, even at a heavy cost to self (and such costs are always gains in the end), so to minister as to attract the attention of the flock, not to yourself, but to your blessed Master and His Word; preaching "not yourself, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and yourself their servant for Jesus' sake." [2 Cor. iv. 5.]

With this aim of Attractiveness, then, in our minds, and with this motive of Considerateness beside it, let us come to some thoughts in detail about the matter of preaching.

And here first I must bring in another word to meet the word "attractive." That word is "faithful."

WRONG KINDS OF ATTRACTIVENESS.

As a matter of most obvious fact (we noticed it in the previous chapter), there is a false and useless attractiveness, as well as a true. There is the poor and miserable attractiveness—it draws a certain class of modern hearers—of mere brevity; the "ten-minute sermon." There are no doubt exceptional occasions when ten minutes, or even five, may be the right limit to our utterance; but there is something wrong with both sermon and audience if in the regular ministration of God's holy Word the preacher must at once begin to stop. There is again the specious and spurious attractiveness of excitement and froth of manner, or of a merely emotional appeal to perhaps not the deepest emotions, an attraction which has little in it of that divine magnet which draws the will and lifts the soul in regenerate faith and surrender. There is the attraction, tempting, but futile for the true purposes of the pulpit, of the sermon which is after all only a lecture, or a leading article; full of the topics of the day, of the hour; full perhaps of some celebrated name just immortalized by death[32]; but not full of the eternal message for which the pulpit exists. Most certainly there is no divine rule which excludes from the sermon all allusions to politics, to society, to science, to great men; but there is a divine rule, running through the whole precept and example of the New Testament, which keeps such things always subordinate to the supreme work of preaching Jesus Christ.

[32] "I went longing to hear about Christ, and it was only Newman from beginning to end." This was the actual lament of an anxious soul, one Sunday in 1890.

FAITHFULNESS.

Across all our thoughts how to secure attractiveness, as a co-ordinate line which fixes attention to the true point, runs the word "Faithfulness." The preacher is to be attractive while faithful, faithful while attractive. And he is to be attractive not for the sake of so being, but in order that he may win an entrance for the words of faithfulness, to his Master's praise.

WE ARE MESSENGERS.

Yes, this is what we are to be as preachers. We are to seek "mercy of the Lord to be faithful." [1 Cor. vii. 25.] We are not popular leaders, looking for a cry, or passing one on. We are not speculative thinkers, feeling out a philosophy, communicating our guesses at truth to a company of friends who happen to be interested in the investigation. We are "messengers, watchmen, and stewards of the Lord." We are in commissioned charge of a divine, authentic, and unalterable message. We are the expounders of a "Word which liveth and abideth for ever," [1 Pet. i. 23.] a Word which man is always trying to judge and to disparage, but which will judge man at the last day. [Joh. xii. 48.] We are the bondservants of an absolute Master, who is at once our Sender and our Message, and who overhears our every word in its delivery.

It is a grave mistake, as we saw in our last chapter, to think that faithfulness means a repellent utterance of "the faithful Word." [Tit. i. 9.] But it is at least an equal mistake to think that attractiveness means a modification of that Word, which to the end of our world's day will still be a "folly" and a "stumbling-block," [1 Cor. i. 23.] in some respects, to the unconverted soul, and will always have its searching point and edge for the converted soul also.

But this consideration here is only by the way. I return from it to the matter of a right and faithful attractiveness and some of its higher conditions.

SECRETS FOR TRUE ATTRACTIVENESS.

"Preach the Gospel—earnestly, interestingly, fully." Such, I believe, is the prescription given, by the great preacher whom I cited in the last chapter, to the Pastor who would fill his church, and keep it full. In the first instance, no doubt, Mr Spurgeon gives it as a prescription to the Nonconformist Pastor; but it is quite as much to the purpose for the Conformist, so far as he is a Minister of the Word.[33] What I have to say in these present pages shall run on the lines of that sentence of good counsel.

[33] And let it never be forgotten that this is his primary function in the mind of the Church of England. See the Priest's Ordination, particularly its Exhortations, its Commission, and its final Collect.

"PREACH THE GOSPEL."

i. "Preach the Gospel," that is to say Jesus Christ, in His Person, His Work, His Offices, His Teaching, all applied to the souls and lives of men. Would you truly and permanently attract, with an attraction which God will bless? Let that be your first condition. I do not dilate upon it here, but with all the earnestness possible I lay it upon my younger Brother's heart as we pass on. Preach the Gospel, that is to say the Lord, in all He is for man as man is a sinner, a mortal, a mourner, a worker. Do not let Christ be one subject among others. As little can the sun be one among the planets. He is the Subject; all others get their reality and importance for us preachers by their relation to Him. In particular I venture to say, do not let occasional, temporal, local topics, even very important ones, dislodge Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ of the whole Bible, from His royal place in your preaching; and do not forget continually (though not monotonously) to keep to the front the fact that He is the sinner's Saviour. More will be said later about that point of view, but I state it at once. Speak indeed of Christ as Exemplar, Ideal, Friend, Man of Men; but do not let your brethren forget that, "first of all, Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures," [1 Cor. xv. 3.] and that His primary practical relation to us is always that of Saviour to sinner. That truth is not altogether in fashion now. But it is eternal; it is deep as the human soul, and as the Law of God, and as such it is a mighty condition to attractiveness, wisely and truly handled. It corresponds to the inmost facts of the hearers' being, whether they are aware of it yet or not; and is there not here the most powerful of magnets, at least in posse?

"PREACH IT EARNESTLY."

ii. "Preach the Gospel earnestly." This does not mean necessarily with vehemence, or even with fervour, of manner. Some men's delivery is fervent, or even vehement, in the most natural way possible; and let such men preach so, if they will do it thoughtfully and to the purpose. But the slightest artificial cultivation of such qualities, or of the semblance of them, is a great practical mistake. And earnestness is at once a wider and a simpler matter all the while. The man who preaches earnestly is the man who is altogether in earnest, and speaks out his conviction and his purpose.

*PREACH IT AS A WITNESS.

He is the man who has the Lord's message deep in his own soul, and is conscious of its vast importance for the souls of others. He is the man who does not merely discuss, or explain, or even expound, however soundly and luminously, but whose words—well chosen, well weighed, well ordered—are also the living words of one who "testifieth that he hath seen." [Joh. iii. 11.] Yes, the essence of the right sort of earnestness is the witness-character of the preacher. What is a witness? One who has personal knowledge of the matter of his words [2 Tim. i. 12.]—"I know whom I have believed." Is there not a great need at this time, in our dear Church, of more such witness-preaching? I do not mean preaching that advertises the preacher as a remarkable Christian, certainly not preaching that puts for one moment our "testimony" on a level with the infallible Word once written. But I do mean the preaching which, by one of the surest laws of our nature, attracts attention to that Word in a living way by the preacher's manifest confession that its message is a mighty reality and certainty to himself.

Some years ago I heard an account of the peculiarly impressive preaching of a young Mission-clergyman. It was described to me as remarkable not for energy of manner, or warmth of diction, but for the impression left on all hearers that the truths handled by the man were for himself absolute and present facts. He stated them with a directness and quietness which was emphatically matter-of-fact. This sort of preaching is earnest indeed.

"PREACH IT INTERESTINGLY."

iii. "Preach the Gospel interestingly." How shall we secure this? Some recipes for interest are familiar. There is the method of illustration; there is the method of anecdote: both excellent, and almost indispensable. Only, they are methods which have their risks, and must be used with care. Illustrations are apt to overwhelm the thing illustrated, the moment much detail is allowed; and they are apt to go on three feet, or even upon one, instead of upon four; and they may be drawn from quarters too remote to strike the hearers with effect. Anecdotes have the same risks; and, besides, they need, if they are to be used aright, to be carefully sifted and verified. I say this not to disparage what in some preachers' hands is a most powerful and also a most delicate weapon; yet the caution is certainly needed, especially by younger men.

INTEREST OF EXPLANATION.

But the surest secrets of interesting preaching lie deeper than anecdote and illustration. One of them, a very simple one to state, is clearness of thought, and of the expression and explanation of thought. I entreat my Brother to be an explanatory preacher, by which I mean, not that he should treat his brethren as if they were his children (unless indeed it is a children's sermon), but that he should handle familiar religious terms with the resolve to make them live and speak to the ordinary hearer. Nothing is more opiate-like than a sentence which is unreal to the hearer because it is mere phraseology. Nothing can be made more interesting than familiar phraseology (supposing it to be true and important) so treated as to speak its meaning out fresh and living in modern ears.

INTEREST OF EXPOSITION.

Another deep and unfailing secret of interest, so that it be used intelligently and prayerfully, is close akin to this last. It lies in the right sort of expository preaching. I have in my mind such exposition as will be found in Dr Vaughan's sermons on the Philippian Epistle. The charm and power of those sermons lie, I know, very much in the extraordinary excellence, the curiosa simplicitas, of their literary style, so unpretentious and so masterly. But it lies also in the fact that the preacher takes us over a familiar Scripture passage, verse by verse, phrase by phrase, and translates it into the dialect of present circumstances. Let me heartily commend this sort of preaching from my own parochial experience in past days. In a congregation consisting chiefly of the poor, I found that the most intelligent and sustained interest was excited by a series of Sunday evening sermons on a selected chapter or paragraph, in which the aim was first to paraphrase the sacred phrases, as it were, into modern shapes, and then at the close to enforce some main message of the portion. The method is as old as the Homilies of Chrysostom, and older.