THE RECTIFICATION.

Sermons and Notes of Sermons.

ABLE MINISTERS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.

(2. COR. iii. 6.)

SUBSTANCE OF A SERMON PREACHED BY REV. HELY SMITH, RECTOR OF TANSLEY, AT SCARTHIN CHURCH, TUESDAY, 21ST OCTOBER, 1873, ON THE OCCASION OF THE MATLOCK BATH CLERICAL MEETING.

I HAVE chosen these words as my text this evening, considering them suitable to an occasion like the present, when ministers of the Gospel have been meeting together to study and pray over the Word of God; thus manifesting a desire to become able ministers of the New Testament. As, however, almost all my clerical hearers have had more experience in the ministry than myself, I feel there will be a difficulty in giving free expression to my opinions without apparently presuming to teach. I must, however, disclaim all such pretension and crave indulgence while I endeavour to speak of what seem to be certain important truths suggested by the text. In doing so I propose to consider:

I. What is the principal office of ministers of the New Testament. II. How we may hope to perform our office efficiently.

III. That we are ministers emphatically of the New Testament in contradistinction to the Old.

I. What is the principal office of ministers of the New Testament. Four chief duties may be mentioned: Visiting the sick, and our flock generally, conducting the public services, administering the Sacraments, and preaching. That these are the principal duties attached to our position will, I believe, be allowed by all; but is it not a fact that in the present day there is a tendency to depreciate, almost to ignore, the ordinance of preaching? By an increasing section, both of ministers and people, the conducting the services, and the administering the Sacraments, especially the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, are considered as almost engrossing the ministerial functions. By others the energetic working of a parish-systematic house to house visitation-is considered the great essential; hence the questions of the day are: How is the service conducted in such and such a church? How often do they have "celebrations?" Is the parish well worked? It is seldom asked, Is the pure Word of God preached there? The sermon is considered, and often spoken of, as quite a secondary consideration.

I desire to bring these modern opinions to the test of Scripture, and to see whether we there find any warrant for depreciating the office of the preacher. The officiating and pastoral duties are undoubtedly important and necessary; but the question is whether they are not unduly magnified until they have assumed a disproportionate importance.

Throughout the Word of God the ordinance of preaching is conspicuously exalted. Honourable mention is made of Noah, because he was a "preacher of righteousness." How much more do we read of prophets than we do of priests in Old Testament history? How much more conspicuous is Moses, the prophet, than Aaron, the priest? Samuel was both prophet and priest; but it is as the prophet of the Lord that he arrests our attention. When Solomon had learnt to condemn all his other glories as vanities, he continued to glory in the title of "the

preacher," "and sought to find out acceptable words." How large a portion of the Old Testament Scriptures is occupied with the utterances of the prophets. But, if the ordinance of preaching is exalted in the Old Testament, much more is it magnified in the New. Here we find that we have entered especially on the dispensation of preaching. The forerunner of the Messiah was eminently a preacher: "In those days came John the Baptist preaching in the wilderness. All four evangelists record this fact, and dwell on it as one of great importance. His preaching might, indeed, serve as a model for all Gospel ministers, for the burden of it was, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." Then, when we turn to the history of our blessed Lord, we find that, immediately after He had been especially set apart for His work by baptism, and His fitness for His office tested, and manifested by the temptation, the first act of His public ministry was to teach in the synagogues; indeed, it was one proof of His being the Messiah that He preached the Gospel to the poor; and, throughout the whole three years of His public course, what is the history of His life? It is summed up in these words: “And Jesus went about all the cities and villages teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the Gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and disease among the people."

Even this healing sickness was principally for the purpose of confirming the truth of His preaching. This we gather from John x. 37, 38:If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not; but if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works." Even after His resurrection, Christ continued to preach, "and, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself." Such was Christ's example, and His precept confirmed it. What were His last injunctions to His Apostles? Were they not that "they should go and preach the Gospel to every creature?" And, although it may be objected, that in this case the ordinance of baptism was coupled with that of preaching, and therefore is made of equal importance, it may be replied, that in the two Gospels, Matthew and Mark, in which the two ordinances are thus coupled, the preaching is put before the baptizing. Mark, moreover, seemed to consider the command to preach as the most important of the two, for, in recording the obedience of the apostles to their Master's farewell words, he makes no mention of their baptizing; but concludes his Gospel by telling us, "And they went forth and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs following." St. Luke says nothing about the command to baptize, though he does allude to the command to preach. Lastly, John, who records Christ's parting command, "Feed my sheep," records no instructions at all with regard to baptism. Thus it is evident that of the two parting commands of Christ the one which left the most impression on the minds of the evangelists was the one to preach the Gospel. This certainly was the impression left on the minds of the Apostles themselves. The Acts of Apostles are the acts of preachers. Immediately on the outpouring of the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost, the first impulse of the eleven was to proclaim the Gospel, and in almost every chapter throughout the book there is mention made of the Apostles' preaching: "They went everywhere preaching the Word," alleging as their reason that Jesus, after He rose from the dead, "commanded them to preach to the people." And the closing verses of the book tell us how "Paul dwelt in his own hired house, preaching the kingdom of God, and

teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus." In the Epistles we find it taken for granted that preaching was the especial duty of early ministers. How St. Paul insists on it. Take for example the first and second chapters of his first Epistle to the Corinthians. Notice, also, his injunction to Timothy: "Take heed to thyself and to thy doctrine, for in so doing thou shalt both save thyself and them that HEAR thee." From this word "hear we gather what was Timothy's chief duty in St. Paul's estimation. In the Revelation the heads of the seven churches are called "angels," that is, messengers; and, being God's messengers, necessarily preachers. Thus, throughout the Scriptures, in the Old Testament as well as New, but pre-eminently in the New, is the ordinance of preaching exalted.

It is, doubtless, remarkable that God should have chosen an instrumentality which involves the employment of sinful, ignorant, and weak mortals for the spread of His truth. He had plenty of other means at His disposal. He might have used angels as His heralds. He might have spoken from heaven, and converted men instantaneously by power accompanying the word, as He did once in the case of Saul. He might have converted men simply by the inspiration of His Holy Spirit operating directly on the heart, without any other instrumentality; or, lastly, He might have chosen that the reading of His revealed Word should be the great lever for the conversion of men; for we know that the "Scriptures are able to make wise unto salvation." But He did not see fit to make use of any of these means. As a general rule, it is indeed thought by many that the Bible, without note or comment, is the most powerful of preachers. But this does not seem to be so much God's appointed instrument of conversion as the ordinance of preaching. It would seem as though the inspired Word were such concentrated essence of truth that it requires to be diluted with human weakness before it can be received by the generality of men; and that, therefore, "it pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe." But, nevertheless, in order that "the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us, we have this treasure in earthen vessels."

With such overwhelming weight of Scripture evidence in favour of the paramount importance of preaching, especially under the present dispensation, how strange it is that so many persons are found who do all they can to disparage it, and to subordinate it entirely to the manner of conducting the services, or the frequency of administering the sacrament. This is the more remarkable because our Church (thoroughly Scriptural in her teaching) on all occasions gives precedence to the office of preaching. Thus, in her articles, she describes the Church as a "congregation of faithful men, in which the pure Word of God is preached, and the sacraments duly administered." Then, at our ordination, the bishop said to each of us, "Take thou authority to preach the Word of God, and to minister the holy sacraments." Again, preaching is put before ministering the sacraments. Thus there is no warrant, either from Scripture or the Church of England, for despising this ordinance, but every reason for pronouncing it to be the most important part of the duties of a minister of the New Testament.

If this be indeed the case, how weighty becomes the question which I proposed for our second consideration, namely, How we may hope to become able ministers of the New Testament-how we can best qualify ourselves for this honourable and important office-for we are none other

than God's messengers. Hence, we do indeed, as St. Paul expresses it, "magnify our office;" but we do not thereby magnify ourselves, for we are only led to contrast our feebleness with the responsibility of the task, and to ask, with the Apostle, "Who is sufficient for these things?" and to answer with him, "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves, but our sufficiency is of God." There is only one way in which we can expect to be equal to our task-the Holy Spirit must teach us; we must seek to speak by inspiration. Why should such a view be ridiculed as visionary and presumptuous ? "Holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost ;" and is it enthusiasm or presumption to imagine that we, who are living under the especial dispensation of the Spirit, may look for the same help? We are distinctly told, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God," and that God will "give His Holy Spirit to them that ask Him." And, in proportion as these prayers are answered, we are enabled to speak by inspiration; and I think we may be sure of this, that it is only our inspired words that are ever followed by a blessing. In the liturgy and collects we also pray for divine teaching. Our prayers would be a mockery if we did not believe there was any probability of their being answered. It appears to me, therefore, that while no preacher should neglect study, especially the study of the Scriptures, yet that they should never attempt to preach without asking God to take their thoughts and lips into His keeping, teaching them both what to say and what not to say; and surely we may expect our request answered when the very object of our asking is that we may deliver God's own message faithfully. It has been well said, that, if the preacher has God for his audience, the Holy Spirit for his Techer, and Christ for his subject, he cannot go far wrong. And here I would say, how very essential it is to preach, as it were, for God to listen to, rather than for the sake of gaining the approbation of man. We know that when an inspector of schools is examining pupil teachers he makes them take a class, while he stands by and listens. On such occasions, the pupil teachers will do their utmost to teach their class well; but they will not be anxious to know what the children of the class think of their mode of teaching—their anxiety will be to please the inspector-it is his approbation they care about; and this will make them take the greatest pains in teaching the children. This is exactly how it ought to be with us ministers; our effort should be to please God rather than our class-our congregation. In proportion as this principle is acted upon, the anxiety to obtain a reputation from men, as eloquent, powerful, or able preachers, would be lessened, and yet we should, undoubtedly, be more useful to men, and probably more eloquent, powerful, and able. Our question before entering the pulpit should be, "What will God think of my sermon ?" after leaving the pulpit, "What has God thought of it?" Very hard lessons these to learn, but very essential, if we really desire to be able ministers of the New Testament.

(To be concluded next month.)

RESULT OF THE FALL.-Were thorns for earth, and sin for man? Christ took both, that He might bring us a new creation, a new earth, and a new Man to reign on it.-J. Miley.

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