THE MINISTERIAL ASSOCATION, pp. 275-284.
• "But Rather That Ye May Prophesy" by C. H. Winders, pp. 275-279.
• "A Sacred Calling" by Allen R. Moore, pp. 280-282.
• "Concerning the Ministerial Association" by L. C. Howe, pp. 282-284.

      There has probably never been a time in the history of the church when it was more anxious to see itself, not simply as others see it, but as it is, than at the present. See its own weaknesses, faults and failures. Self-criticism is a note frequently heard in pulpit, convention and religious press. Some of the things said, for example, are, that "we are not reaching the masses." "We are losing the workingman." The church is becoming a club for the well-to-do. Then, too, we are told that many fields where once the church worked almost alone are being occupied by other agencies. Such, for example, as the fields of education and charity. In both of these, it is believed by many, the State can do, and even now is doing, more thoroughly scientific and efficient work than the church can possibly do.

      But it is also said that the church is not only no longer leading in the great reform movements of society, but that it is not keeping abreast of these movements, and that it does not seek to adjust itself to new conditions and new needs which are constantly arising. But even this is not all. We are told that the power, influence and charm of the ministry is broken. That it no longer offers the opportunity for usefulness that it once offered, and therefore no longer appeals to minds of the first order, and that much of the work of the ministry is being taken up and absorbed by other callings.

      1. A distinguished minister and educator and author, to whose Lyman Beecher lectures of last year I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness, says: "Outside the pulpit, preaching is to-day more widespread, more vigorous, more effective and more in demand than at any time during the last hundred years. The preacher is not always an official. He is a college professor, a political leader, a judge of the Supreme Court, a diplomat, or the Governor of a State." And thus it would appear that the very work to which the minister is called, is passing out of his hands.

      These observations come chiefly from within the church, and even from the ministry itself. These are words of friends, not foes. It is fine to see the ministry and the church become their own most severe critics. It shows a vitality and an ideal that will preclude a spirit of indifference that might bring death.

      But may not these observations and criticisms be founded, in part at least, upon a superficial view of the mission of the church and of the work of the ministry? What is the supreme work of the minister, and by what standard must his success be determined?

      The statement is not only so obviously true, but so very commonplace, that I hesitate to make it, and yet, as ministers of the gospel of Christ, we need to remind ourselves of the fact that we are not mere entertainers, and we need also to remind our congregations of this fact.

      Whose heart is not stirred by the sight of a great audience waiting to hear the preaching of the gospel? And for no other purpose will people assemble, time [275] after time, in such large numbers, and any success that may follow an effort to reach the masses in any other way, will only be temporary. The field of entertainment is too well worked for the minister to hope for any very large and permanent success here. And yet the temptation is one against which we need to continually guard ourselves. We are in danger of making bigness the only standard of success. How large are my congregations? My Sunday-schools? My membership? How many additions can I report for the last protracted meeting or the last year's work? These are questions we ask ourselves because we know others are asking them concerning us and our work. Our standard of greatness is not very far removed from that of the boy who asked "How big was Alexander, pa, that people called him great?" The

C. H. WINDERS.

measuring-line of success, to use the words of Dr. Jewett, "is too often a horizontal and not a vertical one." Our motto is forward, not upward. Jehovah seeth not as man seeth, but the minister of the gospel should seek to see as Jehovah seeth. Measured by the horizontal standard, the prophets, both of the old and the new dispensations, failed. Measured by the vertical standard, their success was abundant.

      2. The minister of the gospel is not merely a reformer, nor is he chiefly that. The failure to see this is the basis of much criticism lodged against the church and the ministry at the present time.

      Men are ever ready to condemn the church because it does not espouse their particular scheme looking toward social, political, moral or religious reform. "Bid my brother divide the inheritance with me," men are everywhere saying. And the church is right when it answers with Jesus: "Who made me a judge or a divider over you? Take heed, and beware of all covetousness, for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth." "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If any man will open unto me, I will come in unto him." Standing without, Jesus is only a reformer; the wisest and best the world has ever seen, but only a reformer. But when the door is opened and He is permitted to enter and is given possession of that heart and life, He is vastly more than a reformer--He is the Saviour and sovereign of the soul. The church need not go off after strange gods in order to accomplish the work of moral leadership and inspiration to larger life. Its work is vastly more important than any particular reform, and its success in no way depends upon the scheme or plan of any man, or group of men, but rests in the power and wisdom of God.

      3. Once more: The minister is not primarily a priest. The priest is a mediator between man and God. He is to approach God in behalf of man. The priestly functions are in a sense perpetual and must be performed by the minister. And to plead the cause of the lowest and most needy is indeed a noble thing.

      But he who, with his people--all his people in his mind and on his heart--can say, "Our Father," can never feel that the chief duties of the minister are those of the priest.

      It is not, then, the supreme duty of the minister to present man to God, but to present God to man. To make God real to man. To help man to know God, to trust God, to love God, to obey God; and that is the work of a prophet. To quote Lyman Abbott at this point: "The need of a prophet grows not out of the inaccessibility of God, but out of the imperfections of men." We need a prophet, not because God is dumb, but because man is deaf.

      It is the business of the prophet, then, to speak for God, and speak to men. To interpret to man the thought, spirit and will of God. Much as the poet, the artist and the musician are prophets of the beautiful and the true in literature, in art and in music, interpreting these to man and calling out from man's nature a response to these, the minister of the gospel is a prophet of God to man's religious nature and need; interpreting God to man, and calling out a [276] response from man's nature to God's revelation, which is a revelation not alone of God to man, but of man to himself. What a glorious work this is! To awaken a God consciousness where it is not; to bring God back into the life from which, at least, the consciousness of his presence has faded; to make him real to the soul to whom he has been unreal; to bring him close to the one to whom he has been far away; to teach one to say with meaning, "Our Father who art in heaven," who hitherto had only been able to say, "Thou great and holy One who inhabitest eternity," and to make him also see that with Fatherhood goes brotherhood; to displace doubt with faith, despair with hope and cynicism with love.

      That is the work of the prophet. And that is the mission of the gospel minister. Can anything be more inspiring and more fascinating than that?

      The minister who can not make a message like that entertaining, who can not tell this story so that it interests and grips and holds his people, can hardly hope to succeed as a prophet. But such a mission is fundamental and comprehensive. Professor Harnack says of Martin Luther: "He did not care about bettering the world or the state or science for themselves alone. Yet right here," Mr. Harnack adds, "is revealed the truth of the saying, 'Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.' In that Luther thought out the gospel in all its parts, proclaimed and applied it, all else fell into his lap; in that he liberated religion from mixture with that which is foreign to it, he also liberated the natural life and the natural order of things." And so the prophet becomes a reformer by virtue of his being a prophet. For in proportion as he interprets God to man he interprets man to himself; in proportion as he helps man to get right with God he helps him to get right with man--both himself and his fellow-man.

      But the minister is also a priest. For no man can interpret God to man who does not know man as well as God, know his burdens and sorrows and sins, and who does not bear them daily upon his heart and in his prayers to almighty God. Who is more needed at this time, when every few days some one appears with a new social cure-all, upon which they have pasted heaven's label, asking that the church and the ministry give it their endorsement and become its special advocates? This day when the church is suffering from the materialism, not of science or philosophy, so much as the materialism of things, until even spiritual activity and spiritual progress are determined by material standards; and the prophet of God is measured by the size and cost of the building in which he delivers his message, the crowds that gather to hear him, the salary he receives. Who is more needed just now than some one who will emphasize the value of the spiritual and eternal? who will put fresh meaning into the old message that "life is more than meat and the body more than raiment," and that "man shall not live by bread alone"? Who more needed than the prophet of God who can help men to see God and know God, and from this lofty summit "see life steadily and see it whole"?

      That is our mission, my brother ministers, and no greater or more inspiring one was ever committed to angels or men. It was a saying of Thomas Goodwin that "God had only one Son and he made him a minister." Does the contemplation of the greatness of this work stir in you no holy emotions? Then I pity you. For no one can prophesy with power whose message does not stir his own soul. Are young men turning away from that high calling for professional and business careers? Then it must be they have never seen how vital and fundamental to all progress is the preaching of the gospel. It must be they have never seen the matchless opportunities which the ministry offers, both for a life of usefulness and also of self-realization. And may it not be that we, under whose ministry these young men sit, fail to so preach and so live as to commend this work to those seeking the largest and richest fields in which to invest their lives?

      Have we seen clearly and held steadily to our work as prophets of God? Or have we sought to satisfy the deep needs of the human soul by preaching to them something other than the gospel of the [277] grace of God? Have we sought to be an example in word, in manner of life, in love, in faith, in purity? We need frequently to read Paul's instruction to Timothy: "Give heed to reading, to exhortation, to teaching." "Neglect not the gift that is in thee; be diligent in these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy progress may be manifest unto all."

      Thy progress. If the preacher is making no progress in his own religious life; if God is not growing more real, the Christian life more precious, the service of God more delightful, he may be sure that his people are making little or no progress in these respects.

      But there should be intellectual progress also, and there must be, if there be true spiritual progress. Nothing is more essential to a minister's success than that he be a student, that he maintain a spirit of open-mindedness, of hospitality to new truth.

      There is an increasing demand for better equipped ministers, and by this is usually meant ministers of more scholarship. This is important, but it is even more important that a man be a student than that he be a scholar.

      In the discussion of the problem of the country church, the student preacher is usually made responsible for many of its infirmities. And for some of them, he is, no doubt, in a measure responsible. It is to be regretted that he must often preach for less than the church is able to pay, both because it works an injury to the church and is an injustice to him. But the college student preaches and works with the conviction and enthusiasm begotten of new truth, new and growing experience, which give his message power and make him attractive to the church. And this can not be said of every minister who has left college, for, unfortunately, not every minister is a student. Two classes of ministers must sooner or later meet with very meager success, if not complete failure. The one who feels that a thorough college training can have little value in his work, must either soon discover that he has gone to war without first counting the cost, and set about diligently to make amends for this neglect, or he must inevitably fail.

      The other is the man who feels that a college degree is the only thing that has any value, and who seems never able to learn that "the mill is not turned by the water that is past."

      As ministers of the gospel, we should constantly advocate a more thorough and careful preparation for this great work.

      In the church of Christ we can not prescribe any educational standard for admission to the ministry, and it is well that we can not, for in that case many faithful and efficient men would be debarred. We can never cease to thank God for the many Spirit-filled men, greatly blessed of him in the work of soul-saving, who, if required to meet almost any educational requirement which the church would have been satisfied to fix, should have been forever shut out from this sacred service. But even these would doubtless have been more efficient if they had received the advantages of a college education.

      "To the inefficiency of the ministry, coupled with the burden of sectarianism, the most common form of devotion to specifics the world has ever known, and the methods of the uneducated man in every profession," says President Pritchett, "is due the decline and decay of many Protestant churches. For in Protestant churches we well know how the quality of the work depends upon the efficiency of the minister."

      It ill becomes the minister of the gospel to bewail the meanness and niggardliness of his people. They are what he, and they who preceded him, have made them. Their missionary enthusiasm, their breadth of vision and depth of spiritual life, their unity of purpose and kindly and brotherly spirit, are indications of the intelligence, industry and unselfishness of their ministers.

      But the question of an inefficient ministry directly connects itself with the question of compensation. And this is not a mere bread and butter problem of the ministry; it is a question involving his freedom, his dignity and his power. The preacher's efficiency sustains a very close relation to the character of his financial support. An ill-trained ministry means the lowering of the compensation to the basis of the inefficient man, and this means to make [278] the efficient man less efficient, and the church consequently suffers.

      May I quote a paragraph from a recent article by Dr. Aked, of the Fifth Avenue Baptist Church in New York City, who can scarcely be accused of speaking with reference to his own need, but who speaks for thousands of needy and underpaid men in the ministry:

      "The nearest, most important single reform to be attempted by the religious people of this country, is to double the salary of every preacher upon the continent. The churches get just as good preaching as they are entitled to for the money they pay. They are served better than they deserve. Yet we of the pulpit are not big enough for the mighty tasks which lie before us. The readjustment of the machinery of the churches to the work of the world in the new day and in the coming day is a giant's task. And we are not giants; the church will not pay for giants. The church needs statesmen, thinkers, prophets, men with piercing insight and foresight, men who know what Israel ought to do. The railroads will pay for such men."

      But the question of thorough preparation and increasing efficiency is connected with the question of ministerial supply, also. It has been observed that a disproportionately large number of tragedies, due to moral delinquency, occur when the victim is between the ages of forty and forty-five. Homes are broken up, suicides are committed, men trusted with large business interests suddenly show themselves unworthy of confidence. What is the explanation? Is it not this? They began life with too little capital, intellectual, moral and religious, and they have been kept too busy, or, it may be, have been disinclined to increase that capital. The supply is exhausted and failure follows. A disproportionately large loss to our ministerial ranks because of those who leave the ministry between the ages of forty and forty-five. This loss is due partly, no doubt, to the fact that the salary is found inadequate to meet the increasing needs of the family. But may it not also be due to the fact that the work was begun with too little intellectual moral and religious capital, and that capital has, for some reason, not been increased, and they find their work growing more and more difficult and less and less interesting, until they are driven, either under the compulsion of duty or of necessity, to their task. I do not wonder that a business career appeals to a man like that, and that he soon concludes that he can serve the Lord just as acceptably in some other capacity.

      The minister's experience should be just the reverse of this. His path, like that of the righteous, should "shine brighter and brighter unto the perfect day." And this will be his experience, if he merit the epitaph of John Richard Green--"He died learning."

      The National Ministerial Association, the youngest of our national organizations, will be of value, then, as it helps to hold us all to higher ideals, intellectual, ethical and religious.

      As it may help to give us all such large views of our mission that we dare not trifle with our duties; that we dare not waste our time; that we dare not stop short of giving the best we have to the highest work God ever committed to man.

      The Ministerial Association should be able to do something also toward securing for the minister a compensation sufficient, not simply to provide shelter and food and clothing for himself and family, but sufficient to provide himself with books, magazines and means of travel, and whatever else may be necessary for his own improvement, and even for a rainy day.

      The Ministerial Association should also see that very soon a sufficient fund is provided for the National Ministerial Relief Board, and enable it to supply the real need of every aged, infirm or unfortunate minister of the gospel.

      The Ministerial Association should be helpful, not only in winning to this great work young men of ability and consecration, but also in holding them to their college or university work until thoroughly prepared.

      With these things accomplished, we shall find the ministry of the church of Christ not only greatly increased in numbers, but, what is even more important, increased in efficiency and power, and many problems which now vex our souls will then be easily solved.

[CCR 275-279]