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 Leonard, Adna Wright, 1874 
 Evangelism in the remaking 
 
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BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
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 Evangelism in the 
 Remaking of the 
 
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 ( OCT 18 19 
 
 By ^: '\~^-i^:>;i4LS^^^ 
 
 ADNA WRIGHT LEONARD ^^^--1-illiL — :::- 
 
 Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 
 THE METHODIST BOOK CONCERN 
 NEW YORK CINCINNATI 
 
Copyright, 1919, by 
 ADNA WEIGHT LEONARD 
 
To My Devoted Wife 
 MARY L. DAY 
 
 WHOSE SYMPATHETIC INTEREST AND HELPFUL 
 
 COUNSEL HAVE ENCOURAGED ME IN 
 
 THIS UNDERTAKING 
 
• CONTENTS 
 
 Cbiapteb Paqb 
 
 Foreword 9 
 
 I. The Preacher and Evangelism. 13 
 
 II. Evangelism and Young People. 43 
 
 III. Evangelism in Church Music. . . 69 
 
 IV. Evangelism in Social Service. . 101 
 
 V. Evangelism in the Sunday Night 
 
 Service 135 
 
 VI. Safeguards op Evangelism 163 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 In the early part of 1918 I was re- 
 quested by Dean E. A. Healy, of the 
 University of Southern California, to 
 deliver some time during the year 1919 
 a series of lectm^es before the students 
 of the Maclay College of Theology. 
 He suggested that the lectures deal 
 with some of the outstanding problems 
 of evangeUsm from the viewpoint of 
 the pastor. Upon the successful com- 
 pletion of the one-million-dollar cam- 
 paign for endowment and equipment, 
 in the spring of 1918, the Board of 
 Trustees of the University, on the 
 motion of President G. F. Bovard, 
 estabhshed The New Era Lectureship, 
 and requested that these lectures be 
 given as the first series of the new foun- 
 dation. The lectures were, therefore, 
 dehvered before the students of the 
 University of Southern CaUfornia, in- 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 eluding those of the Maclay College of 
 Theology, February 24-28, 1919. 
 
 In the preparation of the lectures 
 I have read with great appreciation and 
 profit much of the literature on evan- 
 gehsm, regardless of denominational 
 emphasis and viewpoint, and have en- 
 deavored to discover what are the 
 fundamental problems of evangelism. 
 I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness 
 to all those great souls who, realizing 
 how absolutely important it is that the 
 church shall be definitely evangelistic, 
 have endeavored by lectures and ad- 
 dresses to acquaint Christian ministers 
 with the perils that threaten the church 
 at this point. In their emphasis on 
 social service large numbers of preach- 
 ers have lost the evangelistic note, 
 while all too often those who place 
 emphasis on evangehsm seem to be 
 utterly oblivious of the importance of 
 social service. I have especially empha- 
 sized the doctrine of the deity of Jesus 
 Christ as fundamental to evangelism. 
 10 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 For years large numbers of pastors of 
 the evangelical churches have lost the 
 positive note in their preaching. One 
 of the major reasons for this is that 
 many have been influenced by German 
 rationalism, and have come to question 
 the divinity of our Lord. The result 
 is the Christ of the Scriptures — ^the his- 
 torical divine Christ — is given scant 
 place in their preaching. 
 
 The lectures do not deal specially 
 with plans for evangelistic work, but 
 rather with that which is of greater im- 
 portance — the stating of those princi- 
 ples that are fundamental to all evan- 
 gelism. I am conscious of the fact that 
 these lectures come far short of being 
 a satisfactory statement of this most im- 
 portant subject, but they represent an 
 earnest endeavor to face what seem, in 
 my opinion, to be the most pressing 
 problems of evangelism from the 
 preacher's standpoint. 
 
 It is impossible for me to express in 
 words my high appreciation of the 
 11 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 honor conferred upon me by the trustees 
 of the University of Southern Cahfor- 
 nia in asking me to give the first series 
 of the New Era Lectureship. If as a 
 result of this effort there should come 
 to anyone a clearer vision of the perils 
 of the hour, so far as evangelism is 
 concerned, and if it should be in the 
 least degree the cause of having the 
 church face more seriously and cour- 
 ageously the vital questions that are 
 here discussed, the effort will not have 
 been in vain. 
 
 A. W. L. 
 
 12 
 
THE PREACHER AND EVAN- 
 GELISM 
 
THE PREACHER AND EVAN- 
 GELISM 
 
 The true minister of the gospel 
 realizes that his supreme business is to 
 bring men and women to a saving 
 knowledge of Jesus Christ. He feels 
 the upward thrust of that inner power 
 which will not let him rest unless he 
 sees men and women accepting Jesus 
 Christ as their personal Saviour from 
 sin. With him it is not a matter of 
 choosing a profession. Reahzing that 
 he has been chosen, his heart cries out 
 to God constantly that he may be 
 spared from becoming a professional 
 minister. 
 
 Unfortunately, the demands made 
 upon the modern preacher tend to pro- 
 fessionahze his ministry. He feels al- 
 most irresistibly the pressure of insti- 
 15 
 
V 
 
 EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 tutionalism. He discovers sooner or 
 later that he is embroiled in multitudi- 
 nous activities which draw his energy 
 and thought from that which is of 
 supreme importance. 
 
 Some time ago an article appeared 
 in the Atlantic Monthly, by Mr. Ed- 
 ward Lewis, entitled "The Professional 
 ^' Ministry." As the church faces the 
 period of reconstruction that is already 
 at hand, this article might be reread by 
 Christian people with great profit. The 
 article is negative in that the writer 
 contents himself with pointing out that 
 something is radically wrong with the 
 present-day ministry. He observes 
 that modern preaching has lost its pro- 
 phetic character. He is of the opinion 
 that the church is a diminishing and 
 decaying institution from which power 
 and authority in the world are swiftly 
 passing. He says there is some "quality 
 of spirit" lacking and that church life 
 is being smothered with duties which do 
 not necessarily require any special 
 16 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 quality of religious conscience or high 
 spiritual endowment. He tells us that 
 the church is more concerned with or- 
 ganization than with Hfe, that we are 
 laying emphasis on money instead of 
 upon the spirit which furnishes in love 
 the means by which the work of the 
 church is maintained. He enumerates 
 in the following words the multitudi- 
 nous activities of the average minister: 
 "He must keep the people together, 
 shepherd the flock, and originate new 
 plans which will be hkely to attract 
 others from outside; he must visit the 
 homes of his people and make himself 
 pleasant; bring around the disaffected, 
 stimulate the slack; stimulate the staff 
 by his example; attend upon the sick; 
 comfort the dying; preside over all 
 kinds of gatherings, from a prayer 
 meeting to a pipe parliament; be able 
 to speak out offhand on almost every 
 subject under the sun; take several 
 kinds of classes; initiate good works; 
 run this and that from a concert to a 
 17 
 
 ^llfe^ 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 creche; represent his congregation in 
 denominational assemblies. He must 
 be a preacher, a pastor, the secretary of 
 a company, the managing director of 
 a thriving business and (as often as 
 not) his own commercial traveler to 
 boot. In addition to this, he must keep 
 up a style consistent with his position 
 and suffer all the social entanglements 
 connected therewith, whether he Hkes it 
 or not. He must also be a credit to his 
 church in local public affairs." 
 
 In the concluding portion of the ar- 
 ticle, the author expresses his belief that 
 the decline in the church's influence will 
 continue as long as she kills her 
 prophets by making them subservient 
 to organization. 
 
 More recently an article appeared in 
 the Literary Digest entitled "The La- 
 borer is Worthy of His Hire." For 
 months after this article was pubhshed 
 it was the topic of conversation in 
 church circles everywhere. So timely 
 and of such constructive value was it 
 18 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 that it later appeared in practically 
 every leading publication of the Prot- 
 estant churches of America. It is a 
 powerful and convincing appeal, on the 
 ground of fair play, to increase the 
 salaries of preachers. 
 
 After speaking of the increased cost 
 of living and of the fact that wage- 
 earners in every department of the na- 
 tion's work have been demanding more 
 income, and that their demands have 
 been recognized as just and necessary, 
 the writer says : 
 
 "Your pastor is not a cheap man nor 
 an unskilled laborer. He has brought 
 long, careful training to his task. He 
 was chosen with scrutinizing care as to 
 his quahfications and he is being meas- 
 ured to-day by high and exacting re- 
 quirements in the performance of his 
 work. . . . 
 
 "Set down on paper some of the 
 qualities and duties you demand of 
 your pastor, and then judge their 
 value. 
 
 19 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 "He must be a man among men, a 
 man of force, tact, and agreeable per- 
 sonality, a good mixer, a man of knowl- 
 edge, wisdom, and authority, whose 
 presence commands respect and whose 
 word carries conviction. He must be 
 ♦able to influence men and women, win 
 their confidence, kindle their enthusi- 
 asm, direct their energies, and organize 
 their working powers. He must be full 
 of sympathy, ready with consolation, 
 a strength in weakness, a bright light 
 in times of darkness, and a never-fail- 
 ing source of inspiration to the souls 
 of his people. You expect all this of 
 him. 
 
 Your pastor, also, must be the suc- 
 cessful head and center of your organ- 
 ized church activities, business, social, 
 and spiritual. On occasion, or as a 
 regular part of his task, he must be an 
 expert money-raiser. You engage him 
 as your chief and leader, the general 
 manager of your church, if not its 
 actual creator or saviour from its diffi- 
 20 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 culties. You put upon him a burden 
 and a responsibility you would never 
 dream of intrusting to any cheap man 
 in business." 
 
 The preacher is keenly conscious of 
 all this. The demands of the people 
 and the inadequate support he receives 
 make it exceedingly difficult for him to 
 properly emphasize the evangehstic side 
 of his ministry. The average pastor 
 knows all too well that when the income 
 of the church begins to fall away, 
 whispers soon arise as to whether he "is 
 quite the right man" or, perhaps, that 
 "he has finished his work among us." 
 With anguish of soul he observes that 
 at the official board meeting finance 
 occupies the major portion of the time. 
 Seldom, if ever, is there any opportu- 
 nity in the board meeting to discuss and 
 pray over the spiritual problems of the 
 church. From day to day the faithful 
 pastor endeavors to meet the multi- 
 tudinous social demands that are made 
 upon him. Right bravely he responds 
 21 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 to the numerous calls for speeches, lec- 
 tures, and addresses. He regards it as 
 a compliment to be asked to do such 
 things, and, furthermore, he knows that 
 his church members will consider him 
 to be popular or unpopular in propor- 
 tion to the number of local outside en- 
 gagements he is able to fill and whether 
 or not the community can say of him 
 that he is a "good mixer." 
 
 Any man thus driven through the 
 week, and living under the constancy 
 of such pressure, may enter the pulpit 
 on Sunday, and he may talk, expound, 
 explain, theologize, and argue, but 
 rarely, if ever, will he really preach. It 
 is practically an impossibility for him to 
 do so. 
 
 The supreme mission of the preacher 
 is to persuade men and women to ac- 
 cept Jesus Christ as their personal 
 Saviour, and to build up believers in 
 the most holy faith. How can he do 
 this effectively if his time and strength 
 are spent in "running" the church 
 22 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 machinery, inventing plans for the rais- 
 ing of funds, and in meeting social en- 
 gagements? Shall the minister, then, 
 withdraw from the life of the day? Is 
 he no longer to live among folks and 
 brush shoulders with his fellow men? 
 Is he not to take a hand in helping to 
 solve the social problems and in bring- 
 ing about great moral reforms? Is the 
 modern preacher in the reconstruction 
 period to become a recluse, a hermit? 
 By no means! He must be a man 
 among men. His presence and influ- 
 ence must be felt wherever there is hu- 
 man need. He must do his part in help- 
 ing to solve the problem of human liv- 
 ing together, which is the social prob- 
 lem. These he must do, but not to the 
 neglect of the spiritual needs of him- 
 self and his people. It is at this point 
 that large numbers of preachers are 
 faiUng to-day. They give their time 
 and effort to social and reform matters 
 to the exclusion and neglect of the 
 spiritual needs of their people. The 
 23 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 note of personal appeal is very largely 
 absent from their preaching. 
 
 Some years ago I asked Gipsy Smith 
 what in his mind was the greatest de- 
 fect in the preaching of American min- 
 isters, and he answered immediately, 
 "The American preachers have lost 
 their power of appeal." 
 
 The question before us is, therefore. 
 Can the modern preacher, in view of 
 the many demands of a social and finan- 
 cial nature that are made on him by the 
 church and society, be successful in 
 carrying out an evangehstic program 
 for his church? 
 
 There can be but one answer, and 
 that is. The pastor must have an evan- 
 gelistic program at whatever cost. He 
 must hold himself and his church to that 
 and adjust other matters accordingly. 
 
 The preacher who is really fired with 
 a holy passion for the salvation of men 
 and women from sin will not be blind 
 to nor will he ignore the great social 
 and reform movements of the com- 
 24 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 munity where he lives. There may be 
 weeks and even months when he will 
 feel justified in giving most, if not all, 
 of his time to the advancement of some 
 special reform or social movement. 
 When that is done and he has given to 
 the special cause all the time and effort 
 that may reasonably be expected of 
 him, he should not forget his evan- 
 gelistic mission. This is not a plea for 
 any special kind or type of evangelistic 
 effort. It is not a plea for what is 
 known as the **revival service," al- 
 though it is my firm conviction — and 
 an experience of many years in the pas- 
 torate bears out the statement — that 
 any pastor may have a "revival" in his 
 church when both himself and the peo- 
 ple are willing to pay the price. But 
 call it by whatever name you please, 
 "Revival," "Lenten Services," "Special 
 Meetings," "Meetings for the Deepen- 
 ing of the Spiritual Life," etc., the 
 name is of little consequence. The im- 
 portant thing is whether the preacher 
 25 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 knows what it means to be possessed by 
 the sacrificial spirit of the Master. It 
 is so easy for the preacher to become 
 callous, so easy for him to become pro- 
 fessional. The ideal toward which the 
 preacher should bend the entire ener- 
 gies of his soul is that of bringing his 
 own church to a standard of continuous 
 evangelism with himself as the evan- 
 gehst. Let no one deceive himself by 
 thinking that this can be accomplished 
 merely by organization and newspaper 
 publicity. Organization is important, 
 and a certain amount of newspaper 
 publicity and other advertising may be 
 perfectly legitimate, possibly essential; 
 but to place too much reliance on these 
 things is utterly wrong. The preacher 
 deals with spiritual forces and he who 
 would carry out a program of continu- 
 ous evangelism in his church will sooner 
 or later discover that he has set himself 
 to one of the biggest tasks that possibly 
 can engage his mind and heart. 
 
 Reference already has been made to 
 26 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 some of the difficulties in the way of a 
 modern preacher doing the very work 
 he has been called to do. There are 
 other hindrances to evangelism, as 
 every pastor knows. I refer to the 
 widespread materialistic spirit, the 
 critical temper, and the very marked 
 social unrest. A great wave of prac- 
 tical materiaUsm has swept over our age 
 like a giant tidal wave. By this is not 
 meant a philosophic materialism, but 
 the materialism that expresses itself in 
 the form of commercialism and the 
 mere love of pleasure. As a result of 
 the critical temper of the age, old 
 creeds have been dissolved in many 
 minds and a vital faith has not yet 
 taken definite and positive form. In 
 addition to all this, the social unrest that 
 is literally shaking the world, and the 
 spirit of organized labor that is not 
 only indifferent to the church but fre- 
 quently hostile to it, present problems 
 to the modern preacher of which the 
 fathers had no conception. 
 27 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Notwithstanding these things, evan- 
 gelism is possible, yea, it is absolutely- 
 essential, if the church is to measure up 
 to that which God requires of her. 
 Paul said, "I can do all things through 
 Christ which strengtheneth me." 
 
 Concerning this statement by the 
 apostle to the Gentiles, who knew the 
 meaning of preaching the gospel under 
 very adverse circumstances, J. H. 
 Jowett has said: "The strength was 
 transmitted to him. There was a great 
 power house, and the energy was con- 
 veyed to him as a humble receiver. But 
 it was more than a transmission. *Him 
 strengthening me.' At either end there 
 is a person, and a power passes from 
 one to the other. It is not that at one 
 end there is a great historic hero, a 
 supreme example in a great gallery of 
 heroes, and at the other end a living, 
 contemporary with searching and im- 
 mediate need. No, at either end there 
 is a living soul, and the apostle Paul is 
 dealing with a living conmiunicative 
 28 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 energizing Christ. Paul drew his sap, 
 his spiritual force, the power which 
 made him effective, out of a hving fel- 
 lowship with the living Christ of God." 
 If the modern preacher is to be in 
 the best sense of the term an evangehst 
 among the people whom he serves, he 
 must know Jesus Christ to be his per- 
 sonal Saviour from sin. His faith in 
 him as Saviour must be absolute. Not 
 the Christ that some are to-day pro- 
 claiming, but the Christ of the Scrip- 
 tures, the Christ of prophecy, the Christ 
 of the cross, "the only begotten of the 
 Father, full of grace and truth." The 
 preacher who doubts the deityship of 
 Jesus Christ may preach scholarly ser- 
 mons, may be a very eloquent and 
 learned man, may be in close touch with 
 all the social movements of the day, but 
 he will never be a soul-winner. In the 
 very nature of the case he cannot be. 
 What the world needs most to-day is 
 a fresh emphasis upon the fact of the 
 divinity of Jesus Christ. No other gos- 
 29 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 pel will meet the demands of the recon- 
 struction period. The storm center is 
 Jesus Christ. The words of Dale writ- 
 ten years ago have not lost their mean- 
 ing in this new day. "The storm has 
 moved round the whole horizon, but it 
 is rapidly concentrating its strength and 
 fury above one sacred Head. This, 
 this is the real issue of the fight — Is 
 Christendom to believe in Christ any 
 longer or no? It is a battle in which 
 everything is to be lost or won. It is 
 not a theory of ecclesiastical polity 
 which is in danger, it is not a theological 
 system, it is not a creed, it is not the 
 Old Testament or the New, but the 
 claim of Christ himself to be the Son 
 of God and the Saviour of mankind. 
 This is surely enough to stir the church 
 to vehement enthusiasm and to inspire 
 it with its old heroic energy. It is a 
 controversy, not for theologians merely, 
 but for every man who has seen the face 
 of Christ, and can bear personal testi- 
 mony of his power and glory." 
 30 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 That is the secret, for only the 
 preacher who "can bear personal testi- 
 mony of His power and glory" can ex- 
 pect to bring about a spiritual crisis in 
 other men's lives whereby they shall 
 come to know him also as Lord and 
 personal Saviour. The work of Cal- 
 vary must be proclaimed by those who 
 from personal experience can say, "I 
 know whom I have beheved." 
 
 In all of this we are assured that the 
 Holy Spirit will take the things of 
 Christ and make them real not only to 
 us as preachers, but also to those for 
 whose salvation we labor. But it is 
 everlastingly true that unless the 
 preacher is himself living the absolutely 
 surrendered life, he can never become 
 the apostle of surrender to others. 
 
 The preacher must know his Bible, 
 Paul wrote to Timothy, "All scripture 
 is given by inspiration of God, and is 
 profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for 
 correction, for instruction in righteous- 
 ness: that the man of God may be per- 
 31 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 feet" (English Revised Version, "fur- 
 nished completely unto every good 
 work"). The preacher who does not 
 know his Bible cannot be "furnished 
 completely." There are large numbers 
 of ministers of the gospel whose knowl- 
 edge of the Word of God is compara- 
 tively meager. They fail to make the 
 Bible first in their studies, and their 
 sermons show it. How can the preacher 
 comply with the admonition of the 
 Master to Peter, "Feed my sheep," 
 unless he himself feeds in green pas- 
 tures and beside still waters? Some 
 men are clever and have a reputation 
 for making striking statements. They 
 are very well versed in the poets and are 
 "up to date" so far as current litera- 
 ture is concerned. They crowd their 
 churches by announcing sensational and 
 sometimes irreverent themes. As a 
 rule, their day is a short one, for they 
 soon "wear out." The people need the 
 gospel of comfort, of sympathy, and of 
 love. 
 
 32 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 People need to be aroused concern- 
 ing the fact of sin, and the Christ of 
 God must be presented to them in love. 
 They must be led to see that he is their 
 hope and their salvation. In order to 
 do this the minister must know his 
 Bible. Whatever may be our theory 
 of inspiration, God has appointed the 
 Bible as the one book a man must know 
 if he is to be a successful winner of 
 souls. The centuries of the Christian 
 Church furnish ample proof of the cor- 
 rectness of this statement. Those who 
 have moved men mightily by their 
 preaching have been without exception 
 men whose hves were hterally saturated 
 with the Word of God. He who would 
 bring men and women to saving faith 
 in Jesus Christ must be able to use the 
 Bible as a skilled workman uses his 
 tools. Jesus said, "The seed is the 
 word of God"; and Peter said, "Hav- 
 ing been begotten again, not of cor- 
 ruptible seed, but of incorruptible, 
 through the Word of God, which liveth 
 33 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 and abideth." In James we read: "Of 
 his own will begat he us with the word 
 of truth, that we should be a kind of 
 firstfruits of his creatures." Again in 
 Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians the 
 same truth is declared: "In whom ye 
 also trusted, after that ye heard the 
 word of truth, the gospel of your salva- 
 tion." 
 
 These are only a few of the many 
 passages of Scripture which declare 
 that it is the word received into the 
 heart — that is, the word believed — 
 through which the spiritual change we 
 call conversion is brought about. We 
 cannot sufficiently exalt the hfe-giving 
 power of the word. 
 
 That which rescued the church from 
 the negations of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury was not philosophy or learning, 
 but, rather, the tides of spiritual re- 
 vival that swept over Britain and other 
 lands, as a result of the Wesleyan re- 
 vival. The preaching of that move- 
 ment was eminently biblical. The Bible 
 34 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 was the one authority for the preach- 
 er's message, and in the wake of that 
 God-inspired movement a new hfe was 
 breathed into society and a new day 
 dawned upon the world. Evangehsm 
 won the victory over indifference and 
 unbeHef, and it is to evangehsm we 
 must look for still greater victories in 
 the days that lie just ahead. 
 
 The preacher must he a man of 
 prayer. This is his strong fortress. By 
 it he can break down the materialistic 
 spirit, overcome the prevailing critical 
 temper, and lead his people into the 
 most definite kind of sacrificial service. 
 Prayer is the secret of the expanding 
 life. The more prayerful the preacher 
 is, the more powerful he will be in his 
 preaching and the more effective he will 
 be in personal work. His whole life 
 must be a prayer, and if it is not, his 
 preaching will reveal the fact. With- 
 out exception the successful soul-winner 
 is a man of prayer. He knows what it 
 means to agonize for the conversion of 
 35 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 definite men and women. Jesus 
 "offered up prayers and supplications 
 with strong crying and tears," and 
 Paul said, "I would have you know 
 how greatly I agonize for you." The 
 Saviour prayed "with strong crying 
 and tears," and Paul, the apostle, 
 "agonized" in intercession. "True in- 
 tercession," says Jowett, "is a sacrifice, 
 a bleeding sacrifice, a perpetuation of 
 Calvary, a 'filling up' of the sufferings 
 of Christ." 
 
 Charles G. Finney knew the mean- 
 ing and importance of intercessory 
 prayer, for he is said to have asked his 
 host on one occasion to permit him to 
 sleep in the barn rather than in a com- 
 fortable bed. The request being 
 granted, he was seen to climb up into 
 the haymow, where he spent the night 
 in prayer for the blessing of God upon 
 the services he was to begin the next 
 day. 
 
 When Dwight L. Moody was con- 
 ducting those great meetings in the 
 36 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 Hippodrome in New York, he could 
 scarcely wait until the service was dis- 
 missed because of his eagerness to pray 
 with individuals in the inquiry room. 
 
 That great soul-winner George 
 Macgregor stated that there was prob- 
 ably not an hour of any day the last 
 years of his life when a passion for souls 
 did not present itself consciously and 
 consumingly to his heart. 
 
 When we think of these prayer-war- 
 riors, and how intercessory prayer 
 bulked so large in their lives, we dis- 
 cover the more readily the weakness of 
 our efforts to bring men and women to 
 a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. 
 Do we really know what it means to 
 "agonize" as did the apostle Paul for 
 the salvation of men? If we know noth- 
 ing of this experience, neither shall we 
 know the joy of soul-winning. 
 
 As the church faces the conditions of 
 this new day, what is to be the outstand- 
 ing characteristic of her message? If 
 she is true, her message will be, "For 
 37 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 God so loved the world, that he gave his 
 only begotten Son, that whosoever be- 
 lieveth in him should not perish, but 
 have everlasting life," and her ministers 
 will be flaming heralds of the divine 
 truth. 
 
 The following letter was received by 
 Bishop W. F. McDowell from a friend 
 serving as a chaplain somewhere in 
 France, and states at once the problem 
 and the task before us in the new day 
 of reconstruction: 
 
 "My fourteen-year-old son in select- 
 ing a Christmas gift for me chose your 
 Yale Lectures. The very virtue of 
 them makes them painful reading here 
 where almost every sight and sound 
 bears witness to the bitter estrange- 
 ment of man from man. 
 
 "But even more terrible than this 
 estrangement is the fact that it hardly 
 enters into the minds of the millions of 
 soldiers here high and low that the root 
 of it all lies in man's estrangement from 
 God. And the matter looks worse still 
 38 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 when we ask why they do not think of 
 this. It is the whole business of the 
 church to bring men to see the import- 
 ance of reconcihation with God. Why 
 has the church not done it? 
 
 "The equipment with which the 
 church fits men out is being put to the 
 test here in France. I have had con- 
 tact with a good many trained under 
 highly favorable circumstances in our 
 Protestant churches. I would not say 
 that their lives are not profoundly in- 
 fluenced by their training, but if recon- 
 ciliation with God as a conscious ex- 
 perience is to be accepted as the test 
 of that training, it has proved very de- 
 ficient. What strikes one is the serious 
 lack of any clear and definite religious 
 conceptions in the minds of these young 
 men that are powerful enough to create 
 any sense of loyalty to Christ and the 
 church or to produce any adequate ap- 
 preciation of the importance of these 
 things. 
 
 "Why has the church failed in this? 
 39 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 How is the failure to be corrected? 
 Our pastors are busy with frantic 
 efforts to get people in the church, 
 whether they are well trained or not, 
 in order to satisfy the demands which 
 laymen make for a showing. The 
 churches are busy with raising great 
 funds for endowments, the Young 
 Men's Christian Association, the Red 
 Cross, and other objects, and danger- 
 ously honoring rich people as a part of 
 the process. We are busy with pro- 
 grams, but down at the root of it all 
 we are not making reconciliation with 
 God a real thing to the children in our 
 Sunday schools and the congregations 
 in our churches. A harking back to 
 the methods of the past will not do. 
 What are we to do? It is absolutely 
 necessary that the German ambitions 
 be curbed at whatever cost. But that 
 will not bring peace. Only reconcilia- 
 tion with God will do that. Only the 
 church has the power to mediate that 
 reconciliation. Will it ?" 
 40 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 May God help the ministry so to 
 present Christ to men that they will be 
 reconciled with God. This is the mis- 
 sion of the church. This is the preach- 
 er's high calling in Christ Jesus. 
 
 41 
 
II 
 
 EVANGELISM AND YOUNG 
 PEOPLE 
 
II 
 
 EVANGELISM AND YOUNG 
 PEOPLE 
 
 It has been said that youth is "a 
 wide, deep river, dividing childhood 
 from manhood; a river which, Hke the 
 river of death, must be crossed without 
 bridge or boat ; through which each soul 
 must go; into whose turbid waters the 
 child must descend alone, knowing well 
 that beneath their flood his childhood 
 will be buried to rise no more ; a stream 
 both broad and turbulent, not to be 
 crossed in a day or a year ; whose buoy- 
 ant waters will indeed bear him up, 
 but not without his efforts; whose cur- 
 rents will land him somewhere on the 
 other shore, but, O, so far down stream, 
 on the dusty plains of sordid, sinful 
 manhood, far out of sight of those green 
 45 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 hills of childhood that were so near to 
 heaven." 
 
 This figure pictures to us that period 
 of our own lives when we were between 
 child and man. It was the period of 
 restlessness and uncertainty. Nothing 
 seemed to be fixed and stable. If our 
 little craft was fastened to a mooring 
 one day, it was caught by unexpected 
 and irresistible currents the next and 
 we were carried far downstream. We 
 comprehended so little and yet we lived 
 in a state of constant expectancy. We 
 had our times of exhilaration and also 
 those of humiliation and disappoint- 
 ment. We reahzed that we were caught 
 in the great rush of life, eager to sup- 
 port ourselves and to be free from 
 others' control, having visions of the 
 long road that stretched out before us, 
 although having no idea of what was at 
 the other end. 
 
 Youth is an unexplored continent 
 and few there be who can penetrate its 
 jungles, follow its trails, and discover 
 46 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 its secrets. We have come that way 
 ourselves, and yet how easily we forget 
 and how stupid we are. We all love 
 children, but do we all love youth? 
 This question can be answered more 
 affirmatively to-day than ever before, 
 for the church is beginning to know 
 youth better than in former years, and 
 to know youth is to love youth with a 
 full heart. Earnest souls are studying 
 the mind and spirit of youth to-day with 
 a sympathy and zeal that are worthy of 
 the highest commendation. The rise 
 of young people's organizations within 
 the church is bringing about a better 
 understanding of the special problems 
 and essential needs of the young peo- 
 ple who are passing through the forma- 
 tive period of adolescence. 
 
 Youth is the character-forming 
 period of hfe, and the character-form- 
 ing processes go hand in hand with the 
 transformation of the body of the child 
 into that of a man. It requires not less 
 than ten or twelve years for the physical 
 47 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 processes to be completed, and while 
 those processes are going on, the mind 
 and spirit are being most powerfully- 
 affected. This development with girls 
 is generally more rapid than with boys. 
 This is the period when there is a 
 noticeable independence of thought, a 
 disposition to be a;rgumentative, and 
 when there is an emotional awakening. 
 In his book on Educational Evan- 
 gelism, Charles E. McKinley says: "In 
 the transformation of the child into the 
 man there are three things to be done. 
 We observe, accordingly, three acts in 
 the drama of youth. They correspond 
 also in a general way with the three 
 periods of adolescence. The dramatic 
 action of the first period centers in the 
 youth's achievement of his personal 
 freedom; in the second, in his discovery 
 of life ; in the third, in his incorporation, 
 as a distinct individual, into the social 
 body. The first step to a sympathetic 
 understanding of youth is an intelli- 
 gent acquaintance with the necessary 
 48 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 dramatic action within the spirit by 
 which these successive objects are at- 
 tained." 
 
 What are the circumstances and 
 methods through which and by which 
 we are to arrive at the place of a sym- 
 pathetic and inteUigent understanding 
 of youth? It will be readily admitted 
 that the great problem is to bring the 
 independent self-assertive will of youth 
 to the place where it will be reconciled 
 to the divine will. As the prodigal 
 came to it by way of reconciliation with 
 his father, so must youth by way of 
 reconciliation with the heavenly Father. 
 
 The Catholic Church beheves that 
 this is accomplished by the Spirit at the 
 time of baptism, administered by the 
 priest. This church teaches that there 
 is a sacramental grace bestowed in this 
 rite, which when performed results in 
 the regeneration of the individual. The 
 reformed churches radically modified 
 this view by placing the emphasis not so 
 much upon the sacramental rite as upon 
 49 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 the truth contained in the creed and 
 catechism. Among Protestants this 
 emphasis became general, and it was 
 taught that the regeneration of the soul 
 was brought about by the acceptance 
 of the truth contained in the great series 
 of confessions and catechisms. 
 
 The eighteenth century witnessed a 
 radical departure from either of the 
 above named points of emphasis. It 
 was brought about by what is known as 
 the Wesleyan revival. This movement 
 placed supreme emphasis upon the 
 office and work of the Holy Spirit, in 
 convincing men of sin and in making 
 real to them the things of Christ. 
 Under this teaching men came to see 
 that regeneration involved a complete 
 change. It involved a change of one's 
 sentiments, tastes, and desires. Old 
 things passed away and all things be- 
 came new. Under that teaching the 
 affections and emotions were stirred, 
 the awfulness of sin was revealed, and 
 the deityship of Jesus Christ and his 
 50 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 saving grace were magnified. This 
 teaching marked the greatest revival 
 period in history. 
 
 Of late years increasing emphasis has 
 been placed by many upon what has 
 come to be known as educational evan- 
 gelism. Horace Bushnell, in his book 
 on Christian Nurture, struck the key- 
 note of this latest movement in evan- 
 gelism. The chief point of emphasis 
 in this movement may be expressed in 
 these words — "Growth, not conver- 
 sion." In other words, according to 
 this theory, men are to become Chris- 
 tian by a process of growth rather than 
 by the Holy Spirit moving upon their 
 minds and hearts and leading them to 
 repentance. Vast numbers of people 
 have been misled by this attractive but 
 nevertheless dangerous teaching. Of 
 course no one will depreciate the value 
 of hereditary influences, environment, 
 ideals, atmosphere, spirit, etc., but we 
 miss that which is the most vital thing, 
 when we say that these are sufficient. 
 51 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Christian character does not neces- 
 sarily follow being born in a Christian 
 home. We all know those who were 
 born of Christian parents but whose 
 lives are anything but Christian. They 
 had all the advantages of heredity, cul- 
 ture, and environment, and yet they are 
 far removed in life and practice from 
 the ideals of the Christian home in which 
 they were born and reared. 
 
 So far as I have been able to discover, 
 the theory of educational evangelism 
 makes no provision for the work of the 
 Holy Spirit in conversion. The glar- 
 ing defect in all such teaching is that 
 there is no place for a spiritual crisis. 
 This I hold to be absolutely essential 
 and positively biblical. It does not 
 matter how favorable may have been 
 the accident of birth, nor how morally 
 clean and pure the life has been, every 
 one must come to the place where he 
 consciously and purposely turns away 
 from the sin and evil of the world and 
 accepts Jesus Christ as his personal 
 52 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 Saviour. Modern Sunday school liter- 
 ature is frequently lame at this point. 
 Too much of it lacks the positive note 
 in matters relating to the supernatural. 
 "Educational evangelism" is stressed 
 again and again at the expense of defi- 
 nite and positive conversion. 
 
 In working among young people, the 
 goal of all our efforts should be that of 
 bringing about a spiritual crisis in their 
 lives that will result in their acceptance 
 of Jesus Christ as a personal Saviour. 
 Everything is tested right here — faith, 
 knowledge of the Bible, tact, temper, 
 policy, plans, all that we are comes 
 under the acid test at this point. Who 
 has not longed to be able to bring young 
 people to an immediate acceptance of 
 Christ? Preachers, Sunday school 
 teachers, Epworth Leaguers, and 
 Christian workers in general have ear- 
 nestly prayed that they be given that 
 power by which they could become suc- 
 cessful in persuading others to sur- 
 render their Hves to Christ. This leads 
 53 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 to the question, what are the prime 
 requisites for successful evangelistic 
 work among young people? 
 
 First of all, the man who would seek 
 to save others must know Christ to be 
 his personal Saviour. In this matter 
 there must be no sham. There is no 
 class of persons anywhere in the world 
 that more quickly detects the false note 
 than young people. If it is in the ser- 
 mon, they will find it out. If it is in 
 the life of the Sunday school teacher, 
 they are not slow in discovering it. If 
 a man's life does not support his pro- 
 fession, then any attempts he may make 
 to win them to Christ will fail. When 
 young people find out that the person 
 who is interesting himself in their spirit- 
 ual welfare is living a consistent Chris- 
 tian life they will usually give him a 
 listening ear. Absolute sincerity and 
 an absence of all that savors of arti- 
 ficiality is the demand made upon 
 Christians by the youth of to-day. 
 
 In the second place. Christian 
 54 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 workers must gain the confidence of 
 those whom they would win for Christ. 
 This is not always an easy thing to do. 
 God has blessed some with a personality 
 that is unusually attractive. It is not 
 so difficult for them to get close to 
 young people. They are eagerly 
 sought by the young, and are not in 
 conversation very long with them be- 
 fore they have secured their confidence 
 to an unusual degree. This confiden- 
 tial relation once established sweeps 
 out of the way many obstacles that 
 would bulk large under other con- 
 ditions. Young people know who are 
 really their friends. Their difficulties, 
 temptations, and sorrows are very real 
 to them, and when they find some one 
 who sympathizes with them, some one 
 who really knows, they will take the 
 short cut in order to unburden their 
 hearts to one who is a friend. Not all 
 will be equally successful, but it is the 
 sacred duty of every follower of Christ 
 to leave nothing undone in the develop- 
 55 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 merit of his own personality so that 
 young people will be attracted to Christ 
 through him. Then when we have done 
 all that we can do, God will do what 
 we cannot do, and we will stand amazed 
 at the results of our own efforts. 
 
 The Sunday school and the Epworth 
 League offer unparalleled opportuni- 
 ties for reaching the young life of the 
 church. These are practically the only 
 organizations within the church that 
 can carry out a plan of continuous 
 evangelism. Be it said to the credit of 
 both of these organizations that they 
 are doing a greater evangelistic work 
 to-day than ever before in their history. 
 When a pastor I planned with the Sun- 
 day School Board of my church for 
 Decision Day months in advance. This 
 involved many conferences with the 
 officers, teachers, and parents, but when 
 Decision Day came, the appeal was fol- 
 lowed by a rich harvest chiefly of young 
 people, who were at once assigned to 
 preparatory classes under the direction 
 56 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 of the pastor. The Epworth League, 
 never stronger or more efficient than it 
 is to-day, is doing a work among the 
 young people of Methodism that 
 augurs great things for the future of 
 the church. Dr. Charles E. Guthrie, 
 general secretary of the Epworth 
 League of the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church, has well said: "The universal 
 feature of young life is not study, al- 
 though for many reasons we could wish 
 it were; nor is worship, important as 
 that must be admitted to be. The uni- 
 versal feature of young hfe is comrade- 
 ship. This has been recognized and 
 made fundamental in the young peo- 
 ple's movement known as the Epworth 
 League — so that the movement which 
 has had such phenomenal development 
 for a generation is nothing more than 
 the strategy of the church capitalizing 
 the comradeship of youth for the serv- 
 ice of Christ." 
 
 This is what the Epworth League 
 institutes of the Methodist Episcopal 
 57 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Church are doing for the youth of 
 Methodism. To these institutes come 
 young people paying their own ex- 
 penses and entering enthusiastically 
 upon a week of intensive training for 
 better service and for leadership in the 
 local chapters and home churches. 
 During the institute week these young 
 people not only face but diligently 
 study "the whole program, for the 
 whole church, for the whole world." 
 Under the inspiration of the fine Chris- 
 tian comradeship of the institutes large 
 numbers of the most promising youth 
 of Methodism find Christ as a personal 
 Saviour and discover that God has a 
 special work for them to do. 
 
 The third requisite is to ''follow up" 
 faithfully the work that has been be- 
 gun. In this respect the church has 
 too often failed. We have all known 
 of great revivals of religion that gave 
 promise of great things for the King- 
 dom. But six months after the revival 
 was over there was very little to show 
 58 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 for it. The work accomplished was 
 thorough enough, but there was no fol- 
 low-up plan. No business house would 
 be guilty of such neglect in the care of 
 new customers. With what painstak- 
 ing care the new prospects are followed 
 up! What interest is manifested and 
 what courtesy is extended to those 
 whom it is hoped will become regular 
 patrons ! It is even more essential that 
 new converts shall be followed up and 
 encouraged and advised. The Epworth 
 League for years was weak at this 
 point. Large numbers of life decisions 
 and conversions were reported each 
 year by those having in charge the in- 
 stitutes, but the church had compara- 
 tively little to show for it. All this is 
 being changed now, for the League is 
 developing a life-service department 
 with carefully trained young people as 
 life-service secretaries, whose whole 
 time is being given in the interest of 
 those who have heard the call of God 
 to some special form of Christian serv- 
 59 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 ice. Follow-up work that is carefully 
 planned and patiently pursued will 
 bring a rich reward. Our failure to fol- 
 low up some preliminary endeavor may 
 mean complete failure so far as some 
 soul is concerned. A young man who 
 attended the church I served as pas- 
 tor was a university student who stood 
 well among his fellows. Soon after 
 making his acquaintance I had the good 
 fortune of gaining his friendship. 
 When I first met him he said with con- 
 siderable assurance, "I tried out reli- 
 gion once and don't think there is much 
 in it." To become a lawyer was the 
 goal of his ambitions. I made up my 
 mind I would win him for Christ if such 
 a thing were possible. For two years 
 I lost no opportunity of showing a per- 
 sonal interest in him. I literally laid 
 siege to that young man's life, and to 
 my great joy he came forward at the 
 close of a preaching service one Sunday 
 morning and said in a calm but definite 
 fashion: "I have made the decision to- 
 60 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 day. I am ready to unite with the 
 Church." The two years of quest for 
 the salvation of that young man were 
 worth while, and though he did not be- 
 come a lawyer, he did go into journal- 
 ism, and the last I heard of him he was 
 the assistant editor of a daily paper in 
 one of the greatest cities of this coun- 
 try. It pays to "follow up" and it pays 
 to hold on. 
 
 In addition to following up prelimi- 
 nary endeavor, every effort should be 
 made to tie up the new convert to some 
 kind of Christian service. After im- 
 pression must come expression. This 
 is not always an easy task, but until 
 young Christians are related in some 
 vital way to the activities of the church 
 or to some kind of Christian service, 
 we cannot avoid the conviction they are 
 in grave danger of losing their hold on 
 the Christian life altogether. 
 
 In deahng with young people and 
 their rehgious life it is neither right nor 
 fair that the same type of religious ex- 
 61 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 perience shall be expected of them that 
 is to be found in persons of mature 
 life and experience. If it takes ten 
 years for nature to transform the body 
 of a boy into that of a man, we should 
 be very patient with the seemingly slow 
 progress of our young people in moral 
 and spiritual development. This does 
 not mean, however, that the religious 
 experiences of youth are not as clear 
 and distinct as are those of later life. 
 They are undoubtedly just as clear and 
 just as real, but they are the experiences 
 of youth and not those of old age. 
 Many young people in their late teens 
 have become discouraged in their reli- 
 gious life because some well-meaning 
 but unwise grown-up has criticized them 
 unkindly and demanded an expression 
 of their sincerity which was utterly un- 
 reasonable from the standpoint of 
 youth. Nothing is more easily marred 
 than young life, and every one who 
 seeks to win young people to Christ 
 should bear this fact constantly in mind. 
 62 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 To be successful here requires all the 
 graces of Christian character. 
 
 Thus far in the discussion there has 
 been no mention of the place of the 
 Bible in the work of evangelization 
 among young people. It need scarcely 
 be said that the personal worker must 
 know his Bible. He cannot know it 
 too well, and he cannot read it too often. 
 Its soul-saving truths must become a 
 part of himself and, like an expert 
 workman who is thoroughly familiar 
 with his tools, he must be able to place 
 his hand upon those portions of the 
 Scripture that will serve his immediate 
 need. The use of the Bible should not 
 have the appearance of professionalism. 
 Some schools of evangelism urge an im- 
 mediate use of the printed page in deal- 
 ing with all classes of persons. The 
 Bible is produced at once, a portion of 
 Scripture selected and the finger is 
 placed upon it, with the request that 
 the person read it for himself. The 
 wisdom of this method is very doubtful, 
 63 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 and unless great discrimination is used 
 it may do more harm than good. As 
 a rule, the person who is not yet a con- 
 fessed follower of Christ is not very 
 much interested in what the Bible says, 
 and at the start his attitude may be 
 utterly disinterested, or even antago- 
 nistic. Of course there will be excep- 
 tions, but the first thing to do is to 
 find a meeting ground of common in- 
 terest and from that point lead the un- 
 believer on to the place where he accepts 
 Christ as Saviour. The approach must 
 be free from any preacher tone and it 
 must be in the language and accent of 
 the present day. The work is not com- 
 pleted, however, until the newly con- 
 fessed follower of Christ discovers that 
 the Bible is the inspired Word of God, 
 the Book of Life, the guide to the way 
 of truth. It then becomes the duty of 
 the Christian worker, and it is also the 
 duty of the church, to so interpret the 
 Scripture as the Book of Life that 
 young people will realize that it is of 
 64 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 vital importance that their lives be 
 linked up with its teachings and pre- 
 cepts. 
 
 The youth time of life is at once the 
 most fascinating and dangerous. If 
 our young people slip out of their teens 
 into manhood and womanhood without 
 having acknowledged Christ as their 
 Saviour, the task of ever winning them 
 to the Christian life is increased four- 
 fold. 
 
 It was in my late teens that I experi- 
 enced conversion. My mother was an 
 invalid during the last nineteen or 
 twenty years of her life, and during all 
 that time scarcely knew what it was to 
 draw a breath without a pain. I had 
 formed the friendship of two or three 
 boys who were reckless in their eager- 
 ness to have a "good time." We had 
 agreed to attend an amusement park 
 which was nothing but a German beer 
 garden. While on the way I was seized 
 with a conviction that if I carried out 
 the plan it might mean my ruin. Sud- 
 65 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 denly and quite abruptly I excused my- 
 self from my friends and remarked that 
 instead of going with them I had de- 
 cided to go to church. They thought 
 I was perpetrating a joke, but for me 
 it was serious business. I went at once 
 to the church our family attended, the 
 Sumner Avenue Church, Brooklyn, 
 New York. ' A series of revival meet- 
 ings were in progress, and one of my 
 sisters was at the piano and another was 
 in the choir. The pastor was conduct- 
 ing the meeting, and when the invita- 
 tion was extended for all who desired 
 to find Christ to come forward and 
 kneel at the altar of prayer, I came 
 forward at once. It was there I had a 
 bitter experience due to the well-mean- 
 ing but misdirected efforts of the pas- 
 tor, who kneeled at my side and calhng 
 me by my given name, said: "What are 
 you here for? Your parents and your 
 family are Christian people. Why 
 have you come here? What do you 
 want?" It both discouraged and 
 66 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 angered me. He should have known 
 that my young heart was breaking. I 
 rephed, "Please leave me alone." But 
 no relief came, and I went home, said 
 nothing to my mother of what had taken 
 place, and retired for the night. When 
 my mother learned that I had been to 
 the altar she was too wise to force any 
 conversation regarding the matter, but 
 as she told me afterward, she was in 
 constant prayer all that night and the 
 next day. The next night I again went 
 to the altar, but again found no relief. 
 I said to mother that night, "Well, it's 
 no use. I am going to give it up," and 
 she replied, "My dear boy, hold on." 
 The third night I went to the altar and 
 still no relief came. I hastened home 
 from the church, fully intending to put 
 forth no more effort. Mother was wait- 
 ing for my return. It was always her 
 custom to remain awake until she knew 
 I was home, but on this occasion she 
 was sitting in her old armchair. Poor 
 soul, she was such a sufferer! Rheu- 
 67 
 
EVANGELISM 
 
 matism had played havoc with her 
 body. Her Hmbs and feet and hands 
 were so swollen and distorted. She 
 said as I entered her room, "Well, how 
 did you get along?" I replied there 
 was no use trying and that I would 
 have to give it up. "No," she said, 
 "don't give up. Let's pray about it." 
 She had been so long an invalid that I 
 could not recall the last time I had 
 seen her kneel in prayer. But on this 
 occasion she did kneel, and with her 
 hand upon my head as I kneeled at 
 her side, she prayed as only mother 
 could pray. It was then that I found 
 the Lord. My heart melted, and I 
 realized that God, for Christ's sake, had 
 forgiven my sins. The fact of my con- 
 version I have never doubted from that 
 time to this. That was the most critical 
 period of my life and but for that ex- 
 perience I might have lost the way. 
 
 May the Church of Christ not fail in 
 her ministry to the youth of this new 
 dayl 
 
 68 
 
Ill 
 
 EVANGELISM IN CHURCH 
 MUSIC 
 
Ill 
 
 EVANGELISM IN CHURCH 
 MUSIC 
 
 The purpose of this lecture is not to 
 trace the history of the development 
 of sacred music from the Hebrew 
 temple with its choir and its psalms, 
 from the synagogues and the early 
 Christian fraternities, with their cantil- 
 lation and choral antiphony, down to 
 the generally accepted customs of 
 modern Christianity, but is, rather, to 
 call attention to the character and pur- 
 pose of sacred music in modern Chris- 
 tian worship. 
 
 There have been two widely differ- 
 ent conceptions of sacred music as 
 represented by the Roman Catholic 
 and Protestant churches. In the 
 former the church decides what belongs 
 71 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 to the essence of divine worship. Ac- 
 cording to this conception, church music 
 is liturgical song as appointed by the 
 church and such artistic song as has 
 been carefully examined and admitted 
 for use in divine worship. This was 
 expressed very definitely by the decree 
 of the Congregation of Rites of April 
 23 and 26, 1883. According to this 
 decree, "only that form of Gregorian 
 song was to be regarded as authentic 
 and regular, which in virtue of the pro- 
 visions of the Council of Trent has been 
 approved and confirmed by His Holi- 
 ness Pope Leo XIII, as hkewise by the 
 Congregation of Sacred Rites, con- 
 formably to the edition prepared at 
 Regensburg, as the one used by the 
 Roman Church." 
 
 This decree, however, was reversed 
 by Pius X shortly after his accession 
 to the papal throne. He threw the 
 weight of his authority in favor of the 
 school of Solesmes, with the result that 
 the monopoly of the Regensburg edi- 
 72 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 tors came suddenly to an end. The 
 latter decree did not exclude modern 
 music from use in church services, but 
 the restrictions and limitations placed 
 upon it required that it be religious and 
 ecclesiastical in character. 
 
 According to the Protestant concep- 
 tion, sacred music is one of the essen- 
 tials to divine service. It aids in the 
 proclamation of the gospel, creates an 
 atmosphere of worship, fosters prayer, 
 and expresses emotions that strive in 
 vain for words. Evangehcal worship 
 is essentially a congregational act, and 
 implies that the congregation shall take 
 part in the same. 
 
 All great revivals of religion have 
 resulted in an outbreak of joy which 
 could only be expressed in song. This 
 was true of the revival under Francis 
 of Assisi. His followers were called 
 "Joculatores Domini," that is, "God's 
 jongleurs." They went up and down 
 the valleys of Italy singing their songs, 
 the most famous of which was the song 
 73 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 written by Francis himself entitled 
 "Canticle of the Sun." This song was 
 declared by Renan to be "the most 
 perfect utterance of modern rehgious 
 sentiment and showing how closely the 
 heart of Francis was wedded to nature 
 and to God." 
 
 The Reformation gave to hymn-sing- 
 ing an impetus that continues to this 
 day. The revival under Luther was 
 characterized by an outburst of song. 
 Because of the reformation of public 
 worship there was a demand on the part 
 of the people for a simpler form in 
 which they might engage. 
 
 Concerning the translations of hymns 
 and chants which Luther made, as well 
 as the hymns he himself composed, the 
 Rev. James Burns has well said: 
 "These hymns bear the same popular 
 note as his translations of Scripture. 
 They are full of evangehcal faith, full 
 of fervor, and couched in language 
 which goes straight to the heart of the 
 people. His great hymn 'Ein' feste 
 74 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 Burg ist unser Gott,' with its inspiring 
 tune, also written by himself, Heine has 
 called *The Marseillaise of the Refor- 
 mation.' It at once caught the popu- 
 lar ear, and sweeping over Germany, 
 was sung by tens of thousands whose 
 hearts had been Hberated by the evan- 
 gelical message, and who found in this 
 noble hymn an outlet for their joy. His 
 other hymn also, 'Nun freut euch lieben 
 Christen gemein,' which expresses his 
 own Christian experience, and gives ex- 
 pression also to the joyous hberty which 
 the message of the gospel brings, be- 
 came immensely popular. 'Through 
 this one hymn of Luther's,' says Hes- 
 shusius, 'many hundreds of Christians 
 have been brought to the true faith, who 
 before could not endure the name of 
 Luther.' These hymns undoubtedly 
 did much to awaken in dormant hearts 
 a new desire for spiritual things; they 
 created new emotions; they brought 
 into common life an intimate acquaint- 
 ance with some of the most tender and 
 75 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 affecting thoughts of God; they 
 brought rehgion down to hve with peo- 
 ple in their common tasks, to cheer them 
 in their hours of drudgery, console them 
 in their hours of loss, and to their 
 troubled and burdened hearts gave 
 solace and ease. Instead of being re- 
 garded as something distant and mys- 
 terious, religion became to tens of thou- 
 sands something intimate and precious ; 
 Christ had come down from the clouds 
 in which he had been hidden, and now 
 tabernacled amongst them." 
 
 The Wesleyan revival turned loose 
 vast spiritual energies, and wherever 
 John and Charles Wesley and White- 
 field went the common people heard 
 them gladly. This movement also gave 
 great impetus to hymn-singing. John 
 Wesley was for days seeking for peace 
 and assurance. He says he was fol- 
 lowing the instructions given him by 
 Peter Bohler, a man who had come 
 under the influence of Count Zinzen- 
 dorf, and who was then giving ad- 
 76 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 dresses in London to small companies 
 of men and women. 
 
 As told by Wesley, the instructions 
 which Bohler gave were that he could 
 find peace by (1) "absolutely renounc- 
 ing all dependence, in whole or in part, 
 upon my own works of righteousness, 
 on which I had really grounded my 
 hope of salvation, though I knew it not, 
 from my youth up; (2) by adding to 
 the constant use of all the other means 
 of grace continued prayer for this very 
 thing; justifying, saving faith; a fuller 
 rehance on the blood of Christ shed for 
 me; a trust in him as my sole justifica- 
 tion, sanctification, and redemption." 
 Despite all these efforts he says he still 
 remained in a state of "strange indiflPer- 
 ence, dullness, and coldness, and a con- 
 stant sense of failure." But that great 
 day, May 24, 1738, finally came for 
 him, when at five o'clock in the morn- 
 ing he opened his Bible and read, 
 "There are given unto us exceeding 
 great and precious promises that we 
 77 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 should be partakers of the divine na- 
 ture." A little later he again opened 
 his Bible and read, "Thou art not far 
 from the kingdom of God." All that 
 day he seemed to live in a state of great 
 expectation and toward evening he 
 says, "I went very unwillingly to the 
 Society in Aldersgate Street, where 
 one was reading Luther's preface to 
 the Epistle to the Romans. About a 
 quarter before nine while he was de- 
 scribing the change wrought by God in 
 the heart through faith in Christ, I felt 
 my heart strangely warmed. I felt I 
 did trust Christ, Christ alone, for sal- 
 vation; and an assurance was given me 
 that he had taken away my sins, even 
 mine, and saved me from the law of sin 
 and death. I began to pray with all 
 my might for those who had in a more 
 special manner despitefuUy used me 
 and persecuted me. I then testified 
 openly to all there what I now first felt 
 in my heart." But he then goes on to 
 say: "It was not long before the enemy 
 78 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 suggested, *This cannot be faith; for 
 where is thy joy?' Then was I taught 
 that peace and victory over sin are 
 essential to faith in the Captain of our 
 salvation; but that, as to the transports 
 of joy that usually attend the begin- 
 ning of it, especially in those who 
 have mourned deeply, God sometimes 
 giveth, sometimes withholdeth, them 
 according to the counsels of his own 
 will." 
 
 Wesley and his friends then hastened 
 to carry the glad tidings to his brother 
 Charles, who was at that time ill in bed. 
 Charles says: ^Toward ten my brother 
 was brought in triumph by a troop of 
 our friends and declared, *I believe.' 
 We sang a hymn with great joy and 
 parted in prayer." 
 
 The hymn which in all probability 
 was sung was the one composed by 
 Charles Wesley at the time of his own 
 conversion and was in reality the first 
 hymn of the new movement. 
 
 The hymn that struck the keynote of 
 79 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 the Wesleyan Revival was written by 
 Charles Wesley, and is said to have been 
 sung by Jesse Lee under the Old Elm 
 on Boston Common in 1790 when he 
 came to New England for the purpose 
 of introducing Methodism: 
 
 "Come, sinners, to the Gospel feast, 
 Let every soul be Jesus' guest: 
 Ye need not one be left behind. 
 For God hath bidden all mankind." 
 
 Charles Wesley has undoubtedly made 
 a richer contribution to the hymnology 
 of the Christian Church than any other 
 hymn- writer. Up to the time of his 
 conversion he wrote very few hymns, 
 but after that great event he gave ex- 
 pression to his new-found joy by writ- 
 ing hymns. His biographers say that 
 he wrote not less than six thousand five 
 hundred hymns that express in a very 
 remarkable manner not only his ear- 
 nestness and zeal, but also his intense 
 love for Christ his Saviour. One sixth 
 of all the hymns of the Methodist 
 80 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 Hymnal were written by this great 
 hymn-writer, while there are very few, 
 if any, of the hymnals or song books 
 used by other denominations that do not 
 include in their list one or more of his 
 hymns. 
 
 More attention should be given to 
 the use of great hymns in public wor- 
 ship. Unquestionably they are among 
 the most powerful agencies at our com- 
 mand for the development of the reU- 
 gious sentiment of our people. The 
 best of them, from the standpoint of 
 theology, poetry, form, and imagery, 
 are exquisitely beautiful and help to 
 bring certain phases of the truth to the 
 hearts of the people in a way in which 
 nothing else can. The great hymns of 
 the church have been born out of some 
 of the richest spiritual experiences of 
 the race. They reveal qualities of reli- 
 gious fervor that can be explained on 
 no other ground than that of divine in- 
 spiration. 
 
 In the Psalter published by Dr. Isaac 
 81 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Watts, probably the greatest hymn 
 was: 
 
 "O, God, our help In ages past. 
 Our hope for years to come, 
 Our shelter from the stormy blast, 
 And our eternal home !" 
 
 The world will not quickly forget or 
 fail to use his inspiring hymn, "Joy to 
 the world I the Lord is come." It would 
 be of great benefit to Christian people 
 if in these days of strife and disorder, 
 when the nations of the world are strug- 
 gling for a readjustment and feeling 
 their way toward a new appraisement 
 of himian values, the last verse of this 
 great hymn could be sung frequently: 
 
 "He rules the world with truth and grace 
 And makes the nations prove 
 The glories of his righteousness, 
 And wonders of his love." 
 
 But of aU the hymns written by Dr. 
 Watts, the one that is cherished most 
 dearly by Christian people everywhere 
 
 is: 
 
 82 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 "When I survey the wondrous cross 
 
 On which the Prince of Glory died, 
 My richest gain I count but loss, 
 And pour contempt on all my pride." 
 
 The hymns of Philip Doddridge have 
 a permanent place in the religious ex- 
 periences of Christian people. His 
 hymns exalt the joy and privilege of 
 service : 
 
 "My gracious Lord, I own thy right 
 To every service I can pay, 
 And call it my supreme delight 
 To hear thy dictates, and obey. 
 
 "What is my being but for thee, 
 
 Its sure support, its noblest end? 
 'Tis my delight thy face to see, 
 
 And serve the cause of such a Friend. 
 
 "His work my hoary age shall bless. 
 When youthful vigor is no more; 
 And my last hour of life confess 
 His dying love, his saving power." 
 
 He did not shrink from the work 
 and service which he believed God 
 wanted him to do. It was his highest 
 
 83 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 joy to serve, and service for him was 
 no hardship. 
 
 "How gentle God's commands ! 
 How kind his precepts are 1 
 Come, cast your burdens on the Lord, 
 And trust his constant care. 
 
 "His goodness stands approved, 
 Unchanged from day to day. 
 I'll drop my burden at his feet. 
 And bear a song away." 
 
 John Newton has enriched the world 
 by his hymns. He had rather a check- 
 ered career. His mother was a de- 
 vout Christian whose one great de- 
 sire was that her boy might become a 
 minister. But she died when John was 
 a mere child, and at eleven he went to 
 sea. He became wild and reckless and 
 ultimately plunged into infidehty. 
 When about eighteen a press-gang 
 seized him and placed him on the Har- 
 wich man-of-war. He became midship- 
 man, but deserted the ship one night 
 while she lay in Plymouth Harbor. He 
 84 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 was caught and treated with such 
 severity that he was glad to be ex- 
 changed to a merchantman. The years 
 that followed were years of dissipation. 
 The vessel visited Africa, and while 
 there he left it and hired himself out 
 to a slave-trader. During all his wild 
 career he never lost his craving for edu- 
 cation. On a voyage back to England 
 he began to read Thomas a Kempis. 
 The thought came to him, "What if 
 these things should be true?" That 
 very night there was a fearful storm 
 and the lives of all on board were im- 
 periled. Newton was profoundly con- 
 victed of sin. He says, "I began to 
 pray. I could not utter the prayer of 
 faith. I could not draw near to a recon- 
 ciled God and call him Father. My 
 prayer was hke the cry of the raven, 
 which yet the Lord does not disdain to 
 hear." He studied the New Testament 
 and was particularly impressed with the 
 parable of the prodigal son. When 
 he arrived at England he was a changed 
 85 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 man. Later he became a minister in 
 the Estabhshed Church. After a lapse 
 of thirty years the prayer of his mother 
 was answered. No wonder then that 
 grace became his favorite theme. 
 He thus describes his conversion: 
 
 "In evil long I took delight, 
 Unawed by shame or fear, 
 Till a new object struck my sight 
 And stopped my wild career. 
 
 "I saw One hanging on a tree, 
 In agonies and blood. 
 Who fixed his languid eyes on me, 
 As near his cross I stood. 
 
 "Thus, while his death my sin displays 
 In all its blackest hue. 
 Such is the mystery of grace, 
 It seals my pardon, too." 
 
 When we think of the sinful life he had 
 lived, of the depths to which he had 
 sunk, and then of his wonderful con- 
 version, we are inspired though not sur- 
 prised to hear him sing: 
 86 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 "Amazing grace ! How sweet the sound, 
 That saved a wretch like, me ! 
 I once was lost, but now am found, 
 Was blind, but now I see. 
 
 " 'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, 
 And grace my fears relieved; 
 How precious did that grace appear 
 The hour I first believed! 
 
 "Through many dangers, toils, and snares 
 I have already come ; 
 'Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far, 
 And grace will lead me home." 
 
 The hymns just referred to illustrate 
 the fact that the great hymns of the 
 church root back into some of the rich- 
 est experiences of which we have any 
 knowledge. 
 
 For many years the kingdom of God 
 has suffered violence at the hands of 
 mercenary people who have flooded the 
 market with cheap and unworthy so- 
 called "gospel hymns." Christian peo- 
 ple should be brought back to an ap- 
 preciation of those hymns that have in 
 them real merit. Many preachers have 
 87 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 allowed themselves to be imposed upon 
 by cheap evangelists, who invariably 
 force upon them and their believing 
 people their own songbooks. It would 
 not be fair to say that none of the 
 modern gospel songbooks are of any 
 real value. Nevertheless, it is a fact 
 that the songbooks of most evangelists 
 are short-lived and that many of the 
 songs used in some evangelistic cam- 
 paigns are a travesty on religion. The 
 mercenary motives of evangelists are to 
 be seen in the refusal of so many to con- 
 duct revival meetings unless they can 
 have the privilege of selling their own 
 books. The income from this source 
 alone frequently is more than the church 
 pays the evangelist for his services. 
 
 It is a great mistake for preachers 
 to think revival meetings, prayer meet- 
 ings, and Sunday night services cannot 
 be successfully conducted unless popu- 
 lar gospel songs are used. For many 
 years, I used nothing but the hymnal 
 in all the services of the church. A 
 88 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 study of the hymns and the circum- 
 stances under which they were written 
 was not only an inspiration to myself, 
 but I soon found that the people be- 
 came more interested when they knew 
 their history, and soon they preferred 
 them to the cheap modern gospel songs. 
 Of course people will not take an in- 
 terest in the use of the great hymns if 
 the preacher is not interested. Not 
 enough time and thought are expended 
 by preachers upon their plan of action 
 in the use of hymns. Their selections 
 are made at random and not infre- 
 quently there occur long awkward 
 pauses in services while the leader is 
 endeavoring to find "some familiar 
 hymn." This should not be. The 
 hymns should always be selected before 
 the service begins and with the great- 
 est care. In the less formal meetings, 
 such as the Sunday night service, the 
 midweek prayer service, and the revival 
 meeting, a brief reference to the author 
 of the hymn and some telling incident 
 89 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 in connection with its origin and use 
 will cause the people to sing with new 
 spirit and meaning. In the last church 
 I served as pastor it was my privilege 
 to conduct a series of revival services 
 that resulted in the conversion of many- 
 people. The Church Hymnal was 
 used exclusively. One feature of each 
 service, which I shall always believe had 
 much to do with the gracious results, 
 was the use of Charles Wesley's great 
 hymn written, it is supposed, at the time 
 of his conversion. Undoubtedly, it is 
 a description of his own experience : 
 
 "And can it be that I should gain 
 
 An interest in the Saviour's blood? 
 
 Died he for me, who caused his pain? 
 For me, who him to death pursued? 
 
 Amazing love ! how can it be 
 
 That thou, my Lord, shouldst die for me? 
 
 " 'Tis mystery all ! the Immortal dies ! 
 Who can explore his strange design? 
 In vain the first-born seraph tries 
 To sound the depths of love divine ; 
 90 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 'Tis mercy all ! let earth adore : 
 Let angel minds inquire no more. 
 
 "He left his Father's throne above, 
 
 So free, so infinite his grace ! 
 Emptied himself of all but love. 
 
 And bled for Adam's helpless race ; 
 'Tis mercy all, immense and free. 
 For, O, my God, it found out me ! 
 
 "Long my imprisoned spirit lay. 
 
 Fast bound in sin and nature's night; 
 Thine eye diffused a quickening ray, 
 
 I woke, the dungeon flamed with light: 
 My chains fell off, my heart was free, 
 I rose, went forth, and followed thee. 
 
 "No condemnation now I dread, 
 Jesus, with all in him, is mine; 
 Alive in him, my living Head, 
 
 And clothed in righteousness divine, 
 Bold I approach the eternal throne. 
 And claim the crown, through Christ, my 
 ojni." 
 
 This great hymn, in some respects 
 Charles Wesley's greatest hymn, was 
 used throughout the entire series of 
 91 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 special meetings, immediately before 
 the sermon. It became a great favorite 
 with the people and is remembered by 
 them to this day. 
 
 As a rule, the most effective hymns 
 that can be used when the appeal to the 
 unsaved is being made are those having 
 choruses that are calculated to stir the 
 emotions and bring the undecided to 
 immediate decision. Some hymns have 
 been honored of God in this respect and 
 have become interwoven in the experi- 
 ences of vast numbers of people. Who 
 is there whose heart is not stirred pro- 
 foundly when he hears a congregation 
 of earnest devoted Christian people 
 sing — 
 
 "Come every soul by sin oppressed, 
 There's mercy with the Lord" — 
 
 "Only trust him, only trust him. 
 Only trust him now: 
 He will save you, he will save you, 
 He will save you now." 
 
 "Pass me not, O gentle Saviour," 
 92 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 with its wonderful chorus — 
 
 "Saviour, Saviour, hear my humble cry, 
 While on others thou art calhng, 
 Do not pass me by." 
 
 Or, yet again — 
 
 "I am coming to the cross, 
 I am poor, and weak and blind, 
 
 with its chorus — 
 
 "I am trusting, Lord, in thee, 
 Blest Lamb of Calvary ; 
 Humbly at thy cross I bow, 
 Save me, Jesus, save me now." 
 
 The contrast between such hymns as 
 these and many of the modern so-called 
 revival hymns is very great. 
 
 The choir and the organist occupy 
 positions of great importance and can 
 aid the pastor in his work or be the 
 cause of much anguish and sorrow. Too 
 much emphasis cannot be placed upon 
 the importance of the organist being 
 a Chi^istian man or woman. The same 
 is true of the choir leader and of mem- 
 93 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 bers of the choir. That it is nothing 
 short of mockery to have persons in 
 these important positions who are not 
 Christians is too obvious to require 
 argument or exposition. All the music 
 of the church should be under the con- 
 trol of the pastor. I know this is a 
 delicate question, and that the music 
 department of the church is often 
 spoken of as the war department, but 
 it is nevertheless true that the person 
 upon whom rests the responsibility for 
 the success of all the services of the 
 church should not be hampered in his 
 work. Authority must reside in some 
 one, and that some one should be the 
 pastor. Having said this, there must 
 not be left unsaid this other statement, 
 namely, that the greatest sympathy 
 should exist between the pastor and the 
 organist, or choir leader and the singers 
 of the choir. In many churches the 
 function of the choir should be empha- 
 sized more than it is. In fulfilling its 
 mission the choir renders a service of 
 94 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 the greatest importance. One of the 
 glaring defects, however, in the service 
 rendered by most choirs is the expres- 
 sionless and careless manner in which 
 they sing the hymns. No less attention 
 should be given to the rendering of 
 anthems and the great musical pro- 
 ductions of the masters, but more at- 
 tention should be paid to the singing of 
 hymns. It is frequently the case that 
 choirs will spend almost an entire eve- 
 ning in rehearsing an anthem that is to 
 be rendered the following Sunday, but 
 will not sing more than one stanza of 
 the hymns that have been chosen by the 
 pastor and which bear directly upon 
 the message he is to give the people. 
 This is a grave mistake. Every hymn 
 has a message and it is the high duty 
 and privilege of those who lead the con- 
 gregation in holy song to so interpret 
 the hymns so that the people will catch 
 their message. By his own understand- 
 ing and appreciation of hymns the pas- 
 tor will be careful to select those that 
 95 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 will make a real contribution to wor- 
 ship of the hour. 
 
 Sometimes pastors suffer from what 
 may be called choir-tyranny. Leaders 
 of choirs now and then arrogate to 
 themselves rights and privileges which 
 do not belong to them. By their un- 
 friendly attitude toward the pastor they 
 prejudice the members of the choir 
 against him. Soon there is a manifest 
 spirit of unwillingness to cooperate 
 with the pastor in his plans, and the 
 result is very far-reaching. Like the 
 minister, the choir is to lead the congre- 
 gation in worship, and exists for that 
 one purpose. When there is lack of 
 harmony between the pastor and the 
 choir, neither can render the most effi- 
 cient service and the possibilities of 
 evangelism are greatly diminished, if 
 not rendered impossible. No people in 
 the world are more susceptible to kind- 
 liness and respectful consideration, to 
 an intelligent, judicious, and sympa- 
 thetic policy than are church organists, 
 96 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 choir leaders, and singers. Where these 
 are Christian people and there exists 
 a spirit of sympathy and cooperation 
 between them and the pastor there are 
 possibilities for evangelism beyond our 
 power to reckon. Such a combination 
 makes possible an appeal to the un- 
 saved through song that is well-nigh 
 irresistible. 
 
 The great hymns of the church not 
 only make their appeal to the uncon- 
 verted. We all cherish certain hymns 
 because they remind us of some tender 
 experience relating to our lives or to 
 those whom we "have loved long since 
 and lost awhile." They come to us in 
 the great crises of life. They brighten 
 our hope, strengthen our faith, and 
 soothe the hurt of a broken heart. 
 
 My own dear mother as she lay upon 
 her dying bed, after many years of the 
 severest suffering and invalidhood, fell 
 injo a very sound sleep. It was only a 
 night or two before her outgoing. My 
 father was kee-ping his faithful vigil, 
 97 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 when suddenly he heard a familiar voice 
 singing, 
 
 "O Thou, in whose presence my soul takes 
 delight. 
 On whom in affliction I call, 
 My comfort by day, and my song in the 
 night. 
 My hope, my salvation, my all !" 
 
 It was my mother's voice singing in a 
 marvelously clear tone the hymn that 
 had been a favorite with her all her life. 
 Though asleep she sang every verse 
 clear through to the end. Other mem- 
 bers of the family were awakened by it 
 and listened in breathless silence, for it 
 was like the song of an angel. She did 
 not waken for some time after she had 
 ceased singing, and when told of what 
 had taken place she was not surprised, 
 for the hymns of the church had been 
 such a comfort to her throughout her 
 entire life. 
 
 It brought to mind the words of 
 David, 'T call to remembrance my song 
 98 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 in the night." I would not part with 
 the memory I cherish of that hymn for 
 the wealth of the world. Some things 
 are more precious than gold. 
 
 The more general use of the great 
 hymns would enrich the life of the 
 church and train the present generation 
 to an appreciation of that kind of 
 sacred song which has been the glory of 
 the church throughout all her history. 
 
 99 
 
IV 
 
 EVANGELISM IN SOCIAL 
 SERVICE 
 
IV 
 
 EVANGELISM IN SOCIAL 
 SERVICE 
 
 The Old Testament is pervaded with 
 a vivid sense of the nation as a living 
 being. Israel is addressed in a most 
 personal manner and is invited, warned, 
 punished, and rewarded by Jehovah. 
 The Jew regarded his nation as chosen 
 of God, called out of Egypt, led 
 through the devious wilderness wander- 
 ings, and the heir of all the promises. 
 It is from the Hebrews that we have 
 received our ethical and religious con- 
 ceptions, and these were based upon the 
 family. God was thought of as a 
 Father, men as his children, and the 
 natural result was an organized social 
 hfe, the nation being its highest ex- 
 pression. 
 
 Social service, as the term is under- 
 103 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 stood to-day, is scarcely to be found in 
 the Old Testament. There was social 
 unrest. Law and prophecy burned 
 with a demand for social justice. There 
 were laws dealing with practically every 
 human relationship, and for centuries 
 the prophets of Israel thundered 
 against all manner of social wrongs. 
 More than one prophet's voice cried out 
 against that form of religious worship 
 that divorced itself from human or 
 social service. 
 
 Elijah, Isaiah, and other prophets 
 blazed with indignation at national and 
 social wrongs, and resented, at the risk 
 of their own lives, the despotic methods 
 of the rulers of their day. *'Woe unto 
 them," thundered Isaiah, "that decree 
 unrighteous decrees, and that write 
 grievousness which they have pre- 
 scribed; to turn aside the needy from 
 judgment, and to take away the right 
 from the poor of my people, that 
 widows may be their prey, and that they 
 may rob the fatherless!" The prophets 
 104 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 insisted that individual and national 
 life must be built upon righteousness. 
 They declared this to be the unalterable 
 demand of the one true God, and that 
 he would be satisfied with nothing else. 
 They held up to scorn the idea that the 
 nation could obtain divine pardon by 
 a multiplication of sacrifices. 
 
 The words of Isaiah which are so 
 frequently used by those preaching re- 
 vival sermons, "Though your sins be 
 as scarlet, they shall be as white as 
 snow; though they be red hke crimson, 
 they shall be as wool," have no refer- 
 ence whatever to personal pardon, but, 
 rather, to the abolition of social wrongs. 
 The prophet is saying that only as a 
 nation seeks the overthrow of social in- 
 justice and oppression can it gain the 
 favor of God. 
 
 In the Old Testament this salvation 
 of the individual is bound up with the 
 moral character and destiny of his na- 
 tion. Professor Walter Rauschen- 
 busch says: "The religious ideal of 
 105 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Israel was the theocracy. But the 
 theocracy meant the complete penetra- 
 tion of the national life by religious 
 morality. It meant politics in the name 
 of God. That line by which we have 
 tacitly separated the domain of public 
 affairs and the domain of Christian life 
 was unknown to them. The prophets 
 were not religious individualists. Dur- 
 ing the classical times of prophetism 
 they always dealt with Israel and Judah 
 as organic totalities. They conceived 
 of their people as a gigantic personality 
 which sinned as one and ought to repent 
 as one. When they speak of their na- 
 tion as a virgin, as a city, as a vine, they 
 are attempting by these figures of 
 speech to express this organic and cor- 
 porate social life. In this respect 
 they anticipated a modern conception 
 which now underlies our scientific com- 
 prehension of social development and 
 on which modern historical studies are 
 based. ... It was only when the na- 
 tional hfe of Israel was crushed by for- 
 106 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 eign invaders that the prophets began 
 to address themselves to the individual 
 life and lost the large horizon of public 
 life." 
 
 The keynote of the messages of the 
 prophets finds expression in the words 
 of Hosea which Jesus himself fre- 
 quently quoted — *'For I desired mercy, 
 and not sacrifice ; and the knowledge of 
 God more than burnt offerings." 
 
 Isaiah expresses the same thought 
 when he says: "Bring no more vain 
 oblations; incense is an abomination 
 unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, 
 the calling of assemblies, I cannot away 
 with; it is iniquity, even the solemn 
 meeting. Your new moons and your 
 appointed feasts my soul hateth: they 
 are a trouble unto me; I am weary to 
 bear them. . . . Wash you, make you 
 clean ; put away the evil of your doings 
 from before mine eyes, cease to do evil ; 
 learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve 
 the oppressed, judge the fatherless, 
 plead for the widow." 
 107 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 The prophets struck at the very heart 
 of wrong and injustice, threw them- 
 selves against the mockeries of mere 
 rituahstic observance, and strenuously 
 opposed the fallacy that religion and 
 ethics can be separated. 
 
 Although social service was prac- 
 tically unknown in the Old Testament, 
 the social ideal was not wanting. 
 
 Jesus said, "Think not that I am 
 come to destroy the law, or the proph- 
 ets: I am not come to destroy, but to 
 fulfill." In Jesus Christ, we find not 
 only the fulfillment of the predictions 
 of the prophets but in Him there is the 
 fullest and most perfect realization of 
 their teaching. 
 
 "In the harmony of the two revela- 
 tions," says Professor A. F. Kirk- 
 patrick, "we shall hear the voice of God 
 speaking to men, not the voices of men 
 striving to express their aspirations 
 after God. The prophecies are not hu- 
 man ideals, but divine ideas." 
 
 Not merely prophecy, but Old Testa- 
 108 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 ment law as well, throbs and beats with 
 a demand for social justice. If Jesus 
 "came not to destroy but to fulfill," it 
 is unthinkable that he could have no 
 social ideal. What, then, was the social 
 ideal of Jesus? 
 
 At the very outset it should be 
 affirmed that Jesus Christ was in the 
 most profound sense of the term the 
 climax of God's revelation to this world. 
 His supreme purpose was to reveal the 
 Fatherhood of God and to lead men 
 back to a glad submission to his will, 
 and to inspire them with a holy desire 
 for sacrificial service as the master 
 motive of their lives. He was not 
 merely a teacher or a prophet. He was 
 not a social reformer. We find the 
 ideal of Jesus in the ultimate aim of 
 his life. It is absolutely unfair to take 
 here and there a quotation from the 
 sayings of our Lord and by that means 
 prove that he is above and beyond all 
 things a social reformer. Should any 
 future historian write a biography of 
 109 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 President Woodrow Wilson and at- 
 tempt to defend the proposition that he 
 was above all things else a war Presi- 
 dent, he would be guilty of an inex- 
 cusable misrepresentation of the man. 
 That he has had a large and worthy 
 part in the war of nations, will of 
 course be admitted, and the statement 
 defended, but who will be so bold as 
 to declare that he was first and fore- 
 most a war President? Future gen- 
 erations will think of him as the man 
 who would "make the world safe for 
 democracy," who would "make the 
 world a safe place to live in," who 
 would lead the great American repub- 
 lic to marshal its resources of men and 
 money, in order that Prussian militar- 
 ism might be smitten dead and orga- 
 nized cruelty overthrown and forever 
 destroyed. But they will also think of 
 him as the peace President, whose chief 
 aim and ambition found expression in 
 an all-consuming desire for world peace. 
 He who exalts the social ministry of 
 110 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 Jesus at the expense of his Messianic 
 mission hurls insult into the face of a 
 righteous and loving God, who sent 
 ("his only begotten Son" into this sin- 
 stricken and lust-smitten world "to seek 
 and to save the lost." 
 
 This statement is made mindful of 
 the fact that a very large proportion of 
 the teachings of Jesus deal with human 
 relationships. He himself had per- 
 sonal and intimate contact with the life 
 of his time. He did not withdraw him- 
 self from the world. He mingled with 
 men so freely that his enemies called 
 him "a gluttonous man and a wine-bib- 
 ber." There were two outstanding 
 words he frequently employed in giv- 
 ing his message. One was "Come" and 
 the other was "Go." No one ever 
 sought to know him as Lord and Mas- 
 ter who did not go from his presence 
 fired with a holy desire to make others 
 acquainted with him. He mingled 
 among men and sent out his disciples 
 to do the same thing. As a proof of 
 111 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 the fact that he did not shrink from 
 coming in contact with people, it should 
 be remembered that twenty-six of the 
 recorded miracles of Christ were mir- 
 acles of the healing of the body, while 
 two others supplied bodily food. He 
 was present at the wedding feast in 
 Cana of Galilee and he dined in the 
 home of the Pharisee. 
 
 The social ideal of Jesus is to be 
 found in His doctrine of the kingdom 
 of God, or the kingdom of heaven. He 
 left to the world no definition of what 
 he meant by the phrase. In the very 
 beginning of his ministry Jesus de- 
 clared that the kingdom of God was at 
 hand. This was the message that was 
 upon the lips of his disciples. He in- 
 structed them in every city to make the 
 same declaration concerning the King- 
 dom. In his parables, he expounded 
 the Kingdom and made plain the rela- 
 tion of men to it. His own personal 
 relation to it is that of Founder. It 
 is his kingdom as well as the Father's 
 112 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 and he is Lord and King over it. "The 
 Son of man shall send forth his angels, 
 and they shall gather out of his king- 
 dom all things that offend, and them 
 that do iniquity." Not only is he Lord 
 of the Kingdom, but he is also the vital 
 germ of it. "It is through vital rela- 
 tion to him, as the synoptics and still 
 more clearly the fourth Gospel empha- 
 size — ^through reception of his Person 
 and message, through faith in him, sur- 
 render to him, submission to his rule, 
 keeping his commandments, which is 
 synonymous with doing the will of the 
 Father through union with him as the 
 branches and the vine — ^that the King- 
 dom is constituted." The Kingdom as 
 taught by Jesus is a spiritual kingdom. 
 It is a principle working from within 
 outward for the renewal and trans- 
 formation of every department of our 
 earthly life. The kingdom of God may 
 be said to be the rule and reign of God's 
 law and love in the hearts of men. 
 "The kingdom of God cometh not with 
 113 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 observation: neither shall they say, Lo 
 here ! or, lo there I for, behold, the king- 
 dom of God is within you." The mes- 
 sage of the Master was, therefore, not 
 political, not economic, but spiritual. 
 Wherever the kingdom of God is estab- 
 lished in the hearts of men there is at 
 once a new social order. 
 
 Furthermore, his message was per- 
 sonal. It had in it all the elements that 
 make for a new social order, but his 
 gospel was primarily an individual gos- 
 pel. He desired to plant within men's 
 hearts his message, knowing fuU well 
 that if it became operative it would 
 issue in a social order that would make 
 "all things new." Most of his teaching 
 had direct bearing upon the Hfe of the 
 individual. This is especially true of 
 his parables and miracles. A study of 
 his conversations with individuals re- 
 veals the same principle that lies at the 
 very heart of his message. The cry of 
 his heart was "Repent!" His one de- 
 sire was that men should come back to 
 114 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 God. It was not enough that they 
 should have better clothing, better 
 homes, higher wages — in a word, that 
 the physical conditions of their lives be 
 improved. These were of great import- 
 ance. There was something, however, 
 more fundamental in his message than 
 any or all of these things, and that was 
 that men everywhere should experience 
 a change of mind and heart toward 
 God. He said, "But seek ye first the 
 kingdom of God, and his righteousness ; 
 and all these things shall be added unto 
 you." The Pharisees endeavored to 
 trap him and to side-track him. They 
 said, "Is it lawful to give tribute unto 
 Cgesar or not? But Jesus perceived 
 their wickedness and said. Why tempt 
 ye me, ye hypocrites? Show me the 
 tribute money. And they brought unto 
 him a penny. And he said unto them. 
 Whose is this image and superscription? 
 They said unto him, Csesar's. Then 
 saith he unto them. Render, therefore, 
 unto Caesar the things which are 
 115 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Caesar's; and unto God the things that 
 are God's." 
 
 But the Pharisees were not satisfied 
 with this, and later in the day sent a 
 lawyer who was intent on silencing 
 Jesus as Jesus had silenced the Sad- 
 ducees. His question was, "Master, 
 which is the great commandment in the 
 law? Jesus said unto him. Thou shalt 
 love the Lord thy God with all thy 
 heart, and with all thy soul, and with 
 all thy mind. This is the first and great 
 commandment. And the second is hke 
 unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor 
 as thyself. On these two command- 
 ments hang all the law and the 
 prophets." 
 
 These two great laws are so related 
 that the one is the logical outcome of 
 the other. He who loves God with all 
 his heart and with all his mind, will love 
 his neighbor as himself. And whenever 
 these two great laws operate in the 
 minds and hearts of men you have the 
 kingdom of God, and not until then can 
 116 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 the petition in the model prayer, "Thy 
 will be done in earth, as it is in heaven," 
 be fully reahzed. Therefore, while 
 Christ's message throbs and beats with 
 social impulse, it is primarily spiritual. 
 
 As a result of the teachings of Jesus, 
 pulsating with the social passion as they 
 do, the early Christian Church soon 
 gave heed to the social needs of the 
 people. Bunson says: "These Chris- 
 tians belonged to no nation and to no 
 state, but their fatherland in heaven was 
 to them a reality, and the love of the 
 brethren, in truth and not in words, 
 made the Christian congregation the 
 foreshadowing of a Christian common- 
 wealth and model for all ages to come." 
 
 In his History of the Christian 
 Church, Hurst says: "One of the first 
 evidences of this fraternal sense is to 
 be found in the help which was extended 
 to the needy. The poor in Jerusalem, 
 for whom Paul collected contributions 
 from the Greek Christians in Asia 
 Minor, were only the first to receive the 
 117 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 benefit of this early tender sympathy 
 of the strong for the weak. Benefi- 
 cence became the law, and not the im- 
 pulse of a generous hour, which entered 
 into the whole life of the early church. 
 No needy society was forgotten in its 
 silent sorrow whether of mere poverty 
 or unsparing persecution." In this 
 they formed a striking contrast to the 
 pagans about them. During a pesti- 
 lence in North Africa, in the reign of 
 Gallus, the Christians at Carthage dis- 
 tinguished themselves by their brotherly 
 kindness and by their sacrificial service 
 in the interests of others. The pagans 
 deserted their sick and dying and re- 
 fused to touch the bodies of the dead. 
 Soon the streets were covered with 
 bodies of victims of the scourge. In 
 many instances avarice overcame their 
 fear of death and the bodies of the dead 
 were stripped of clothing and valuables. 
 Cyprian in exhorting his church to look 
 upon the desolating scourge as a trial 
 of their faith said, "How necessary it 
 118 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 is, my dear brethren, that this pestilence 
 which appears among us, bringing with 
 it death and destruction, should try- 
 men's souls — should show whether the 
 healthy will take care of the sick; 
 whether relations have a tender regard 
 for each other; whether masters will 
 take home their sick servants." He 
 was not satisfied, however, with a mere 
 statement, but went a step further, 
 called his church together and addressed 
 them in the following words : "If we do 
 good only to our own, we do no more 
 than the pubHcans and heathens. But 
 if we are the children of God, who 
 makes his sun rise and sends his rain on 
 the just and on the unjust, who scat- 
 ters his gifts and blessings not barely 
 on his own, but even on those whose 
 thoughts are far from him, we must 
 show it by our actions, striving to be 
 perfect, even as our Father in heaven 
 is perfect, blessing those that curse us, 
 and doing good to them that despite- 
 fuUy use us." As a result of his ap- 
 119 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 peal to the church the members im- 
 mediately divided the work among 
 themselves. The rich gave of their sub- 
 stance, the poor contributed their labor ; 
 and in a short time, the bodies which 
 filled the streets were buried and the 
 city delivered from the danger of a uni- 
 versal infection. 
 
 One of the most concise, as well as 
 one of the most complete, statements 
 of the effect of the teachings of Jesus 
 upon the social order is that given by 
 Schaff : "Under the inspiring influence 
 of Christ's teaching and example, the 
 Christian Church asserted the individ- 
 ual rights of man ; recognized the divine 
 image in every rational being; taught 
 the common creation, and the common 
 redemption, and the destination of all 
 for inmiortality and glory; raised the 
 humble and lowly; comforted the 
 prisoner and captive, the stranger and 
 exile; proclaimed chastity, as a funda- 
 mental virtue, elevated woman to a 
 dignity and equality with man; upheld 
 120 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 the sanctity of the marriage tie; laid 
 the foundations of the Christian family 
 and home; moderated the evils and un- 
 dermined the foundations of slavery; 
 opposed polygamy and concubinage; 
 denounced the exposure of children as 
 murder; made relentless war on the 
 bloody games of the arena and circus, 
 on the shocking indecencies of the 
 theater, and on cruelty, oppression, and 
 vice; infused into a heartless and love- 
 less world the spirit of love and brother- 
 hood; transformed sinners into saints, 
 frail women into heroines, and lit up 
 the darkness of the tomb by the bright 
 ray of unending bhss of heaven." 
 
 The teachings of Jesus have hterally 
 saturated literature, created new social 
 ideals, influenced the education of 
 statesmen and public leaders, and have 
 dominated the social conscience 
 throughout the world. The Christian 
 Church has passed through many crises. 
 She was compelled to determine what 
 her attitude should be toward the 
 121 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Roman empire and the Greek philoso- 
 phy. In the Middle Ages she had to 
 face the question of her relation to those 
 processes which were bringing to exist- 
 ence a new Europe. During the 
 Renaissance she was confronted by the 
 problem of the new learning. In the 
 Reformation she struggled with the 
 question of her relation to the new in- 
 dividualism in religion and politics, and 
 in the period of revolutions, wrestled 
 with the theories of natural rights and 
 vested privileges. These were all great 
 crises, but none were more vital to the 
 well-being of the world than that 
 through which she is now passing. The 
 past twenty-five years have witnessed 
 an earnest effort on the part of the 
 church to recover the social impulse of 
 her earliest days. Prior to this time she 
 was in grave danger of losing her social 
 vision. With changing social condi- 
 tions, the church too frequently with- 
 drew from the field and sought "a more 
 favorable location." Instead of placing 
 122 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 herself in a position whereby she could 
 understand and sympathize with the 
 masses, again and again the church 
 moved away, leaving the community 
 and its far-reaching interests to the 
 mercy of street preachers and agitators, 
 whose ideals were in direct antagonism 
 to those for which the church stands. 
 
 The policy of moving the church 
 away from the densely populated por- 
 tions of the great cities, which, con- 
 sciously or unconsciously, the church 
 seems to have adopted, undoubtedly ac- 
 counts, in part at least, for the appall- 
 ing fact that out of the one hundred 
 million who compose the population of 
 the United States of America, no less 
 than sixty million report themselves as 
 having no connection whatever with any 
 church, either Protestant or Roman 
 Catholic. 
 
 For a quarter of a century, however, 
 
 the church has been making a noble 
 
 effort to live up to her earliest social 
 
 ideals, adapted, of course, to the needs 
 
 123 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 of the living present. It may safely be 
 said that the dominant activity of 
 modern Christianity is social. This is 
 particularly true of Protestantism in 
 Great Britain and America. 
 
 The social ministry of the church is 
 a gracious one. Schools, hospitals, and 
 homes for the aged have been erected 
 and endowed. Nurses have been trained 
 and have gone into the homes of the 
 poor, ministering gladly and without 
 charge in the name of the Lord Christ. 
 The blind have been taught to read and 
 the deaf to speak. Waifs of the city 
 streets have been gathered into homes 
 and provided with all the blessings of 
 the more favored classes. The church 
 has led in campaigns against the liquor 
 traffic and has conducted moral reform 
 movements that have put red-hght dis- 
 tricts out of business and reduced the 
 possibility of graft in public officials to 
 a minimum. It has organized social 
 settlements and other philanthropic in- 
 stitutions of various kinds. To mention 
 124 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 all the activities in which the church is 
 engaged in carrying on her social min- 
 istry would require time and space to 
 no purpose. 
 
 The Church of God must not be 
 satisfied with alleviating physical suf- 
 fering and in temporarily supplying 
 the needs of the poor. Never before 
 has she made as earnest an eifort to 
 discover the causes of misery, and suf- 
 fering, and social discontent as she is 
 making to-day. It is from this sympa- 
 thetic standpoint that she is approach- 
 ing the labor question. 
 
 The present-day church without 
 some kind of a social program is a back 
 nimiber. Most ministers reahze, or are 
 coming to realize, that unless the church 
 has some kind of a social program it 
 will make but scant impression upon 
 the community, and its influence will be 
 more or less a negligible quantity. 
 
 In their eagerness to develop a social 
 ministry for the church, large numbers 
 of persons have unfortunately become 
 125 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 extremists. They have conceived of 
 the social movement as it is related to 
 Christianity in a secular rather than in 
 a spiritual sense. Their plans for social 
 betterment are an end in themselves 
 rather than a means to an end. The 
 passion for the spiritual regeneration 
 of men and women is noticeably absent. 
 The personal note of appeal for men 
 and women to surrender their lives to 
 Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour is 
 never heard. I have listened eagerly 
 and sympathetically to noted lecturers, 
 who are known as social-service experts. 
 They have shown a sympathetic grasp 
 of their subject and have explained in 
 very clear terms what they believe to 
 be the cause of social discontent, but 
 they have said nothing about the per- 
 sonal, divine Christ and his power to 
 transform the lives of men. It is at this 
 most vital point that they have failed. 
 In like manner attempts have been 
 made to carry on church work purely 
 from the standpoint of social service. 
 126 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 In order to secure the attendance of 
 large numbers of people methods have 
 been adopted that have been anything 
 but creditable to the Church of God. 
 The passion has not been for souls, but 
 for crowds. The entertainment fea- 
 ture not infrequently becomes so promi- 
 nent that the church itself is trans- 
 formed into an ecclesiastical vaudeville 
 and the preaching of the gospel rele- 
 gated to a place of secondary import- 
 ance. Says Shailer Mathews: To 
 make a church a religionless mixture of 
 civil-service reform, debating societies, 
 gymnasiums, suppers, concerts, stere- 
 opticon lectures, good advice, refined 
 negro ministrel shows, and dramatic 
 entertainments is to bring it into com- 
 petition with the variety theater, and 
 when the masses have to choose between 
 that sort of church and its rival, if they 
 have any sense left within their per- 
 plexed heads, they will choose the 
 variety theater. That at least is per- 
 forming its proper social function." 
 127 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 What this old world needs most is 
 a fresh realization of the fact that Jesus 
 Christ is the divine Saviour from sin. 
 Much is being said about the period of 
 reconstruction. Some statesmen, pub- 
 licists, and theologians are having much 
 to say about the new religion that is to 
 be after the war. That there will be 
 new conditions, no informed person can 
 doubt. The world will never be what it 
 was prior to the year 1914. In a very 
 real sense of the term "old things have 
 passed away." The world has become 
 a brotherhood. Race prejudice, though 
 by no means dead, is being greatly 
 modified. A common peril and a com- 
 mon pm-pose to be delivered from the 
 common peril have brought many na- 
 tions together in the bond of a common 
 brotherhood. But the prophets of a 
 new religion will find that the days of 
 peace will hold no new religion, but 
 that they will contain a purified Chris- 
 tianity. Already it has been clearly re- 
 vealed that the soldier on the battle- 
 128 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 field wants to know more about God. 
 He is not concerned about ecclesiastical 
 strife and denominational differences 
 and time-worn platitudes. The hunger 
 of his soul is expressed in the words of 
 the dying soldier in the trench, who, a 
 few seconds before he breathed his last, 
 turned to a comrade and said, "What 
 can you tell me about God, quick?" 
 
 "A student of world problems re- 
 cently visited the battlefront in France 
 and returned to say to his countrymen: 
 'Here in France among the soldiers a 
 new and elemental conception of reli- 
 gion has developed. It has little creed, 
 and certainly no sectarianism; ecclesi- 
 astics back home might be startled into 
 something like awakeness could they 
 but reahze how little the things that 
 bulk so large in their life mean to the 
 soldier. These soldiers care nothing for 
 the differences that divide Episcopa- 
 lians and Methodists and Presbyterians 
 and Baptists. They are interested in 
 God, and whether or not he answers 
 129 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 prayers, and the relation between him 
 and the great considerations of right- 
 eousness for which the Allies stand. As 
 for the shop talk of the churches, over 
 here they confess that they never were 
 in the habit of paying any attention to 
 that.' 
 
 "Three words characterize the reli- 
 gion of the American soldier: sim- 
 plicity, brotherhood, and service. Faith 
 is stripped to the buff in the trenches. 
 Nobody cares for any elaborate expres- 
 sion of belief. These men believe they 
 are doing their bit for God when they 
 help break the grip of the Hun upon 
 the earth. They are convinced that the 
 essential righteousness of our cause 
 makes it God's cause. If we have much 
 at stake in this war, God has more. 
 Therefore, they are serving him when 
 they go ahead in uncomplaining loyalty 
 to do their part in winning the war. 
 Fidelity to the task is the first expres- 
 sion of worship." 
 
 The nations of the world are giving 
 130 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 to religion a larger place than they did 
 before the outbreak of the war. That 
 is especially true of America, Great 
 Britain, and France. 
 
 These days of the reconstruction 
 offer the church her greatest opportu- 
 nity. In order to fulfill her mission she 
 must have with the social vision and 
 program that spiritual appeal which 
 will present the living Christ as Lord 
 and Master. 
 
 Preachers and churches must be 
 ready for the millions of soldiers who 
 will return to peaceful pursuits when 
 peace is actually established. They will 
 return with their new experiences and 
 broadened and deepened conceptions of 
 religion and brotherhood; of God the 
 Father and of Jesus Christ his Son; of 
 society, the church, and the nation. 
 When that time comes the preacher of 
 the gospel must be ready. His message 
 must be real. He must speak from ex- 
 perience — ^the experience of the new 
 birth. He must absolutely believe that 
 131 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Jesus Christ is the Saviour of men be- 
 cause He is his Saviour, and his whole 
 life must give evidence of a great heart- 
 ache that will not cease until he sees 
 men and women accepting Him as 
 "Lord to the Glory of God the Father." 
 The period of reconstruction is here, 
 and the age demands the practical ap- 
 plication of the social gospel to the 
 needs of the time. But human nature 
 is the same the world over and it will 
 never outgrow its need of Jesus Christ 
 the divine Son of God, the personal 
 Saviour of men. Changing social con- 
 ditions may cut new channels. The pos- 
 sibilities for serving humanity will be 
 greatly enlarged. But no program, 
 social or educational, can ever lessen 
 the importance or do away with the 
 need for God to perform his transform- 
 ing work in the hearts of men. 
 Heredity, social environment, and edu- 
 cation are of exceeding great import- 
 ance, but that which is of still greater 
 importance, yea, that which is of su- 
 132 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 premely great importance is that men 
 everywhere shall know Jesus Christ as 
 a personal Saviour. 
 
 God demands of his church in this 
 new day an apostolic faith and a holy 
 passion to see men saved from sin. 
 
 May the whole church gird herself 
 for the new and glorious task! 
 
 133 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE SUN- 
 DAY NIGHT SERVICE 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE SUN- 
 DAY NIGHT SERVICE 
 
 The Sunday night service is becom- 
 ing increasingly a problem. With 
 many pastors the question is not what 
 kind of service shall be held, but 
 whether there shall be held any service 
 whatever. 
 
 Large numbers of churches have 
 utterly abandoned this very important 
 service, or have merged it into the 
 young people's vesper service. Of the 
 many reasons assigned, the following 
 are most frequently heard: It is impos- 
 sible in these days for a minister to pre- 
 pare for the same congregation two 
 sermons a week, that will command the 
 attention and respect of intelligent and 
 well-informed people; the second 
 preaching service taxes unduly the 
 strength of those who, for one reason 
 137 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 or another, feel obligated to attend the 
 morning service and also the Sunday 
 school; the social Hfe is such that large 
 numbers of church members devote 
 Sunday afternoon and evening to visit- 
 ing, and believe that is sufficient excuse 
 for not attending the evening preach- 
 ing service; many people live at such 
 great distances from the church where 
 they have their membership that they 
 cannot afford the expense of two trips 
 for the family; a majority of church 
 members do not want a second preach- 
 ing service and will not support it. 
 
 In addition to the reasons above 
 stated, it must be remembered that the 
 homes of many church members are 
 well supplied with the best current lit- 
 erature, both secular and religious, and 
 that Sunday evening affords an excel- 
 lent opportunity for reading and con- 
 versation. It also affords an opportu- 
 nity to rest before entering upon a 
 strenuous and nerve-racking week of 
 business that is just ahead. 
 138 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 These are not imaginary, but real 
 difficulties, as every pastor well knows. 
 The question of first importance is. 
 Does the Sunday night preaching serv- 
 ice meet a real need in the lives of any 
 considerable number of people? 
 
 An experience of a considerable num- 
 ber of years in the pastorate, a close 
 study of the subject, and an opportu- 
 nity for wide observation leads me to 
 say that there is a crying need for the 
 Sunday night service. 
 
 During one of my pastorates there 
 was a gentleman who attended the Sun- 
 day night service regularly, but was 
 seldom, if ever, present in any morning 
 service. One day in conversation with 
 him I said: "I see you regularly in the 
 evening service, but never in the morn- 
 ing. Is it impossible for you to be pres- 
 ent at the Sunday morning service?" 
 
 He replied, "I am, unless ill, always 
 
 present at the evening service, but I am 
 
 never present in the morning." He 
 
 then proceeded to state his reasons. He 
 
 139 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 is unable to close his place of business 
 before eleven o'clock on Saturday- 
 night, and often it is eleven-thirty or 
 twelve o'clock before the last customer 
 leaves. The store must then be put to 
 rights and everything made ready for 
 business Monday morning. It is, con- 
 sequently, very late when he reaches his 
 home. Tired, and well-nigh exhausted, 
 he retires feeling that he is justified in 
 sleeping until a late hour Sunday morn- 
 ing. This is not an extreme case. It 
 can be duphcated in the membership of 
 many other churches, especially those 
 of the cities. Many mothers and house- 
 wives offer just as reasonable excuses 
 for not attending the morning service, 
 and wage-earning women excuse them- 
 selves from church attendance Sunday 
 mornings for reasons equally as valid. 
 Furthermore, in every community there 
 are large numbers of persons unat- 
 tached to any church, and if they attend 
 church service at all, it is usually in the 
 evening. If it were not for the eve- 
 140 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 ning service, many young people in- 
 stead of being found in the church 
 would be in the theater, the "movie," 
 or in some other place of amusement. 
 
 The mere recital of these facts is 
 ample support of the statement that 
 there is a real need for the Sunday night 
 service/ 
 
 There is another outstanding reason 
 for the maintenance of the Sunday 
 evening service. It affords the best 
 opportunity of the week for the minis- 
 ter to reach the nonchurchgoing and 
 unconverted people of the community. 
 
 Every minister who preaches to even 
 fairly large Sunday evening congrega- 
 tions is heard by more unconverted peo- 
 ple in one such service than in several 
 Sunday morning services. It is the 
 preacher's greatest opportunity of the 
 week. It should be a fitting climax of 
 all that has preceded. It is the time 
 when the preacher should go a-fishing. 
 
 The morning service is the preacher's 
 
 ^ See Methodist Review. 
 
 141 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 opportunity to instruct and teach his 
 people in the things of God. In a word, 
 to build up believers in the most holy 
 faith, to comfort them in the gospel, and 
 to send them back to their homes 
 "rooted and grounded in love." It 
 should be a stately service, but not lack- 
 ing in sympathy and power. The eve- 
 ning service should be less formal than 
 that of the morning and should be brief, 
 bright, and brotherly. 
 
 Undoubtedly the question that is 
 upon the lips of many preachers when 
 the importance of the Sunday evening 
 service is urged is. How can a hearing 
 on Sunday night be secured? 
 
 Here is the crux of the whole ques- 
 tion. Many preachers are too quick in 
 beating a retreat. In many instances 
 the surrender is made before the battle 
 is on. Too many throw up their hands 
 and say, "It is simply impossible to 
 maintain an evening service. The peo- 
 ple do not want, will not support it, 
 and that ends it." We should not lose 
 142 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 sight of the truth that nothing is im- 
 possible until it is too hard for God to 
 do. 
 
 One thing is certain, and that is, if 
 the Sunday night service is to be a suc- 
 cess, it will require work — hard work. 
 It matters not who the minister is, or 
 what kind of church he is serving, 
 whether it be the rural church, the 
 church in a small town or village, the 
 small church in a large city, or the great 
 church in the heart of the metropolis, 
 he will discover, if he has not already 
 done so, that in these days it is no small 
 task to maintain for any great length 
 of time a sustained interest in the eve- 
 ning service. Sometimes it is said that 
 it does not matter who is the pastor of 
 such and such a church, the congrega- 
 tions are always large. In the words 
 of the lamented Professor S. F. Up- 
 ham, "I deny the allegation and defy 
 the allegator." 
 
 He who succeeds will do so at the 
 cost of hard, patient, and persistent 
 143 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 work. It will be at the expense of 
 brain sweat and heart agony. What 
 
 ^^^*- "Be strong! 
 
 We are not here to play, to dream, to drift, 
 We have hard work to do, and loads to lift. 
 Shun not the struggle, face it, 'tis God's 
 gift."^ 
 
 Four things suggest themselves as a 
 possible solution of this problem. It 
 must be admitted that even these may 
 exist under certain conditions, and still 
 the Sunday night service not be what 
 we could desire. However, where the 
 Sunday night service is successful, these 
 four elements will not be lacking. 
 
 First. The minister must believe in 
 the importance of the service. He can- 
 not afford to regard it as of secondary 
 importance to the morning service. If 
 he does not believe in its importance, 
 the sermon will show it. The people 
 will be quick to detect the pastor's in- 
 differen ce, and the more thoughtful of 
 
 1 From Thoughts for Every-Day Living, copjo-ight, 
 1901, by Charles Scribner's Sons. By permission of 
 the publishers. 
 
 144 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 his congregation will observe that the 
 sermon lacks thoroughness of prepara- 
 tion and earnestness in dehvery. As a 
 result the indifference of the people will 
 be manifold more pronounced than the 
 preacher's, and ere long large numbers 
 of church members, even those who are 
 30 situated as to be able to attend the 
 evening service as well as the morning, 
 will be conspicuous for their absence. 
 As a rule, in church work people do not 
 give much thought or attention to the 
 things in which the pastor does not 
 profoundly beheve. Many an evening 
 preaching service has struggled for 
 existence or died out entirely because 
 the pastor failed to impress the people 
 that he believed profoundly in its im- 
 portance. The pastor is the key to the 
 situation, and no church can hope for 
 a large and enthusiastic evening service 
 unless he heartily believes in it. Once 
 convinced that the evening service is of 
 vital importance and that it offers a 
 great evangeHstic opportunity, the 
 145 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 pastor will take new interest in the 
 preparation of his sermons. His en- 
 thusiasm will inspire the people, and 
 ;soon the service will attract those who 
 had lost all interest in it or who had 
 given it no thought whatsoever. 
 
 Thus convinced of its importance, 
 the pastor will plan to give the people 
 something to which they may look for- 
 ward. To that end the preacher must 
 choose his subjects and select his themes 
 with greatest care. They should be 
 biblical of course, but they should also 
 reveal the preacher's knowledge of and 
 interest in the things uppermost in the 
 minds of the people. Not infrequently 
 do we see in the church notices which 
 appear in the daily press subjects that 
 cause disgust. Many times the subjects 
 announced are an embarrassment to the 
 supporting members of the church 
 rather than an inspiration. In their 
 efforts to avoid the commonplace in the 
 selection of subjects some preachers go 
 too far the other way. The result is 
 146 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 many of the more devout church mem- 
 bers are grieved, while even the uncon- 
 verted and vi^orldly turn away with a 
 sneer. The subject of the sermon must 
 show strength, must be dignified, and 
 must relate practically to the life of to- 
 day. 
 
 It is a good thing to announce the 
 subject of a sermon at least a week in 
 advance. Some preachers do not ap- 
 prove of this method, and never an- 
 nounce any subject. They believe the 
 people should be trained to attend 
 church for worship, and not simply to 
 listen to a sermon. There is much that 
 can be said in favor of this. We are, 
 however, hving in days of tremendous 
 stir. Few preachers can command at- 
 tention to any great extent simply by 
 announcing that there will be preach- 
 ing services at a certain hour. In order 
 to have a hearing on Sunday night, the 
 preacher should command the attention 
 of people by the very subjects he 
 chooses. 
 
 147 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 One of the most successful methods 
 for maintaining constant and increas- 
 ing interest in this service is for the pas- 
 tor to dehver from two to three series 
 of sermons throughout the year. At 
 other times he may speak on the sub- 
 jects of compelling public interest to 
 the community or nation. Special men- 
 tion should be made of such sermons 
 or series of sermons, from one to two 
 weeks in advance, and whenever pos- 
 sible some line of thought should be 
 suggested from the pulpit which will be 
 given special emphasis in a single ser- 
 mon, or series of sermons. This will 
 usually command the attention of the 
 people, will give them something to 
 which they may look forward. A wise 
 use of printer's ink may be a great fac- 
 tor in helping to maintain the Sunday 
 night service. There is much money 
 wasted, however, in the efforts men 
 make to advertise. A little of the right 
 kind of publicity goes a long ways. A 
 small fortune may be spent in the 
 148 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 wrong kind of advertising, and it will 
 avail nothing. 
 
 Whatever the plan adopted in order 
 to bring the work of the church to the 
 attention of the community, all such 
 efforts will be futile unless the minister 
 believes tremendously in the importance 
 of the Sunday night service. 
 
 Second, The preacher must beheve 
 the gospel he preaches. Professor 
 Shailer Mathews raised the question, 
 "How shall we preach this gospel of 
 the risen Christ?'* and answers it as fol- 
 lows: "Above all else, positively; with 
 a contagious conviction. A man will 
 neither fear nor love a God under in- 
 vestigation. With the passion of a 
 moral physician who knows that sin is 
 a deadly curse — ^not a term of the 
 schoolman. And, up to the utmost limit 
 of our convictions, with an emphasis 
 upon both its experimental and its his- 
 torical elements." It would be difficult 
 to improve upon this answer. How- 
 ever, unless the minister has an un- 
 149 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 wavering belief in the gospel he 
 preaches, it will be impossible for him 
 to meet the requirements of the answer. 
 A firm belief is of supreme importance. 
 He who gives his people to understand 
 that the Bible is merely a collection of 
 folklore, myths, and legends need not 
 look for a large measure of success in 
 the Christian ministry. 
 
 Attacks upon the doctrine of the 
 Virgin birth and the resurrection of our 
 Lord are being renewed to-day in the 
 light of modern science. Instead of 
 being uncompromising defenders of the 
 faith, and saying with the apostle Paul, 
 "I am set for the defense of the gos- 
 pel," there are those who deny the 
 bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, and 
 with Professor Lake regard as myths, 
 pure and simple, the accounts contained 
 in the Gospels of the resurrection of 
 Christ's body from the grave. In the 
 same manner do they regard the Virgin 
 birth of our Lord. 
 
 One of the most prominent questions 
 150 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 before the church to-day, according to 
 Professor James Orr, is the admissi- 
 bility of the supernatural in the form 
 of miracle. This question, from the 
 standpoint of modern scientific thought, 
 is worrying many Christian ministers. 
 It has so shaken the faith of some 
 that their preaching is anything but 
 positive. 
 
 Then there are those who are placing 
 unnecessarily, in some instances, ex- 
 treme emphasis upon "the psychology 
 of conversion." There are those who 
 are filling "the minds of the uncon- 
 verted with the notion that at any time 
 they may proceed along lines of psy- 
 chology or New Thought to all that is 
 necessary." They hasten to know what 
 some professor of physical or mental 
 science has to say about conversion and 
 religious experience and then thrust his 
 views upon congregations that are 
 hungry for the gospel. The preaching 
 of such men lacks the essential, positive 
 note, and raises in the minds of the 
 151 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 hearers the question, What is the 
 preacher's attitude toward the Bible as 
 the Word of God? Does he really be- 
 lieve the gospel of Jesus Christ? It 
 has been well said that "modern theo- 
 logians who sneer at the old religion, 
 and substitute for the old gospel a sys- 
 tem of comfortable ethical self -culture, 
 are emptying churches to-day." Such 
 preachers can never have a large hear- 
 ing in the Christian Church, and they 
 are usually the first to give up the Sun- 
 day night service. He who would main- 
 tain constant interest in the Sunday 
 night service must preach the Word 
 of God with positiveness and, to use 
 again the words of Professor Mathews, 
 "with the passion of a moral physician 
 who knows that sin is a deadly curse 
 — not a term of the schoolman." He 
 must beheve the gospel he preaches and 
 preach the gospel he believes. People 
 will desire to hear such a man. 
 
 Third, The Sunday night service 
 must be preeminently evangelistic. It 
 152 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 should be the climax of the week's work. 
 All the services of the week should lead 
 up to it. There should be in it at all 
 times the spirit of invitation. The 
 stranger should not only be informed 
 that he is welcome, but he should very 
 plainly and cordially be given to un- 
 derstand that his presence is earnestly 
 desired. The reason evangehsm in the 
 Sunday night service is not more suc- 
 cessful is because too frequently the in- 
 vitation to accept Christ as a personal 
 Saviour from sin is not given with a 
 moral urgency that carries with it con- 
 viction. If the preacher enters the pul- 
 pit more concerned about his own repu- 
 tation than for the salvation of men, 
 his message will lack both power and 
 appeal. People will come to hear the 
 man who preaches the gospel without 
 frills. The average person who attends 
 the Sunday night service does not care 
 to hear a discourse on John Ruskin, nor 
 an essay on Dante. It is not for the 
 purpose of being entertained or amused 
 153 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 that he has found his way to the church. 
 For entertainment he can go to the 
 theater. The average person is hungry 
 — hungry for the bread of Hfe. He will 
 hear with gladness of heart the mes- 
 sage of Jesus Christ to a sin-ruined 
 world, and he will be satisfied with 
 nothing else. Alas for the minister or 
 ministry that gives a stone to the hun- 
 gry soul that asks for bread! People 
 want the gospel — they yearn for the 
 Christ of the ages. 
 
 Of all the church services the Sun- 
 day night service should be a time when 
 the unsaved can most easily find Christ 
 as their divine Saviour from sin. An 
 occasional invitation to forsake sin and 
 accept Christ as a personal Saviour will 
 not sufiice. There is great gain in not 
 only making the people familiar with 
 definite appeals to the unsaved, but in 
 doing so with such regularity that it 
 will become as much a part of the serv- 
 ice as praying or singing. Further- 
 more, the preacher must come to the 
 154 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 place where in giving the invitation he 
 will do so in faith believing. Nothing 
 so strengthens faith in this kind of serv- 
 ice as personal work. He who has 
 talked face to face with men during the 
 week, presenting Christ as the personal 
 Saviour, will find that it is not a diffi- 
 cult thing to secure the attendance of 
 a goodly number of such persons at the 
 Sunday night service. Their very 
 presence will be an inspiration to the 
 preacher and he will soon discover that 
 his appeal to the unsaved is charac- 
 terized by an earnestness and tender- 
 ness that are well-nigh irresistible. 
 
 Of course the best method for cast- 
 ing the net should be studied and em- 
 ployed. In doing this great care should 
 be exercised to avoid embarrassing those 
 who make no profession of Christ. 
 Nothing is more unchristian than to 
 "set traps" for people. A man may, 
 by such method, be caught once, but he 
 will see to it that he is not caught the 
 second time. 
 
 155 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 The invitation to accept Christ 
 should not be given in the same way- 
 night after night. It is well to vary it. 
 Use the altar, the inquiry room, and 
 the after meeting. Give the invitation 
 by the use of carefully selected hymns. 
 Study where and how to use them. Use 
 any method that will bring men and 
 women to a saving knowledge of Jesus 
 Christ. It was not that the man who 
 was "borne of four" was let down 
 through a hole in the roof. It might 
 just as well have been a hole in the 
 wall. The business of the "four" was 
 to get the poor fellow to the feet of the 
 Saviour. Whatever be the method, the 
 preacher's aim should always be to 
 bring about a spiritual crisis in the 
 minds and hearts of the unconverted 
 and the Sunday night service furnishes 
 him his best opportunity. 
 
 A sermon occasionally on some sub- 
 ject of vital concern to the community, 
 or to the nation, may be perfectly in 
 order, and not out of harmony with the 
 156 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 plan of continuous evangelism. Fol- 
 lowing a sermon on any such subject, 
 an invitation to the unsaved to accept 
 Christ would be plainly unwise. Such 
 sermons will not be so frequent, how- 
 ever, as to interfere with the spirit and 
 practice of aggressive evangehsm. 
 
 An investigation of the plans and 
 methods employed by ministers who are 
 having the largest measure of success 
 reveals the fact that their Sunday night 
 services are almost without exception 
 evangelistic. Furthermore, the same 
 investigation shows very clearly that 
 the preachers themselves have a holy 
 passion for the conversion of men and 
 women from sin. They beheve in the 
 importance of the service and have an 
 unwavering faith in the gospel they 
 preach. 
 
 Several years ago, the Hon. Albert 
 J. Beveridge wrote an article for the 
 Saturday Evening Post entitled, "The 
 Young Man and the Pulpit." In the 
 course of the article the author referred 
 157 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 to a conversation which he had one day 
 with a friend who was a journahst of 
 ripe years, highly educated, widely ex- 
 perienced, and acquainted with men and 
 life. The friend had just returned from 
 church, and upon approaching Mr. 
 Beveridge, said: "I have just come 
 from church and I am tired and disap- 
 pointed. I went to hear a sermon and 
 I listened to a lecture. I went to wor- 
 ship and I was merely entertained. The 
 preacher was a brilliant man, and his 
 address was an intellectual treat, but I 
 did not go to church to hear a profes- 
 sional lecturer. When I want merely 
 to be entertained I will go to the 
 theater. But I do not like to hear a 
 preacher principally try to be either 
 orator or play-actor. I am pleased if 
 he is both; but before everything else 
 I want him to bear to me the Master's 
 message. I want the minister to preach 
 Christ and him crucified." This is the 
 universal opinion of mankind. The 
 world is hungry for the message of our 
 158 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 divine Lord and Saviour. It does not 
 wish to be argued with or at, but it does 
 want to beheve. There is no excuse for 
 ministers being "Priests of Ice," vainly 
 endeavoring to warm the souls of men. 
 They should be flaming heralds of the 
 divine truth. 
 
 Fourth, He who really succeeds as 
 a "fisher of men" will Hve so close to 
 the Master and will believe so implicitly 
 in his power to save that men will see 
 in him the Christ. In that relationship 
 self will be eliminated and Christ will 
 be all in all. 
 
 A few years ago it was my privilege 
 to be associated with Gipsy Smith in 
 evangelistic services in Seattle, Wash- 
 ington. I asked him to tell me some- 
 thing about his boyhood life, and he re- 
 lated the following incident. He said: 
 "You know I was the son of a gipsy 
 and was very fond of fishing. I knew 
 the streams and I knew the holes in the 
 streams where the fish were. My rod 
 was a hickory limb ; my fishing line bits 
 159 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 of twine tied together, and my hook 
 was a pin which I heated in the forge 
 and made serve my purpose. I was 
 never happier than when I was fishing. 
 If the fish did not bite very well, I 
 would 'tickle' the stream." He ex- 
 plained that this was simply placing the 
 hand in the water and whipping it from 
 side to side which would frighten the 
 fish up the stream to the particular hole 
 where he was sure some of them would 
 go. He continued his story, saying: "I 
 was fishing on one occasion close to a 
 big tree and was having fine luck when 
 an English gentleman, dressed in a 
 most wonderful sportsman's suit, ap- 
 proached me. His suit had wonderful 
 pockets and seemed to be the last word 
 in that kind of dress. His rod was of 
 fine bamboo with silver mountings and 
 he used a silken line. He said to me, 
 'My boy, can you tell me where I can 
 drop my line and catch fish?' " The 
 gipsy said with a twinkle in his eye: "I 
 knew there was a big tree about a mile 
 160 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 up the stream and I recommended that 
 he go up to that tree to fish, for I was 
 very anxious to get him away from me." 
 After quite a while the man returned 
 and was very indignant when he found 
 that the gipsy boy had caught a large 
 string of fish while he had been unable 
 to catch anything. He then explained 
 to the gipsy how he had gone to the 
 very place to which he had been directed 
 and that he had followed his instruc- 
 tions to the very letter, saying, "Why 
 is it I could catch nothing while you 
 have caught this large string of fish 
 with your poor rod and line?" The 
 gipsy lad looked up into the face of 
 the man and said, "Say, mister, if you 
 want to catch fish, you must keep your- 
 self out of sight. Fish never will bite 
 if they see a thing like you." The same 
 principle holds good in fishing for men. 
 If the preacher exalts himself above his 
 Lord, if he endeavors to impress his 
 hearers with his scholarship, his learn- 
 ing or his eloquence, rather than with a 
 161 
 
EVANGELISM 
 
 supreme desire to see men and women 
 surrender to Jesus Christ, he will mis- 
 erably fail. But if the master passion 
 of his life be the salvation of the lost, 
 then Christ will be exalted and the 
 preacher will discover that the Sunday 
 night service offers the greatest oppor- 
 tunity for casting the net. 
 
 162 
 
VI 
 
 SAFEGUARDS OF EVAN- 
 GELISM 
 
VI 
 
 SAFEGUARDS OF EVAN- 
 GELISM 
 
 There are three safeguards of evan- 
 gelism that are absolutely essential if 
 the church is to remain true to her evan- 
 gehstic mission. They are the Christian 
 home, the Christian school, and the 
 Christian ministry. 
 
 The Christian Home 
 
 Cobden said, "The foundation stone 
 of national prosperity is the hearth- 
 stone." The church, state, and civil 
 government, school and hospital, fac- 
 tory and workshop, and many other of 
 the noblest institutions of the world 
 root back into the home. It is, there- 
 fore, of the highest importance that 
 the home be kept pure and strong and 
 true to the highest Christian ideals. 
 
 If it be a fact that in the home our 
 165 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 noblest institutions had their beginning, 
 then the home must be protected and 
 safeguarded with the greatest care. 
 There are certain grave perils threat- 
 ening the American home to-day which 
 if not checked can have but one result 
 and that is the dethronement of the 
 home. 
 
 The complex organization of society 
 is making deep inroads in the home life 
 of the American people. Business and 
 labor crowd the morning hours, making 
 it necessary for the head of the house- 
 hold to leave early and to return late. 
 The exactions of social life create an 
 utterly abnormal condition, rendering 
 it almost impossible for the entire 
 family ever to be together throughout 
 a whole evening. When mothers be- 
 come so absorbed in club life that they 
 neglect the interest of their children and 
 the sacred duties of the family circle, 
 they take the very heart out of the 
 home. The various substitutes which 
 society is offering for the home, such 
 166 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 as the lodge and the club, make it more 
 and more difficult for the home to re- 
 main Christian in the real sense of the 
 term. That there is a legitimate place 
 for these things is readily admitted, but 
 when a man or a woman permits these 
 things to interfere with their sacred 
 obligations to the home, they are un- 
 true to their trust and become a peril 
 to the welfare of society and the nation 
 itself. 
 
 More and more is the moving-picture 
 theater coming in competition with the 
 home. It is now quite the custom to 
 turn to the "movie" for the entertain- 
 ment of guests. As in the case of the 
 club and the lodge, it is readily admitted 
 that there is a place for this sort of 
 thing. The moving-picture theater is 
 here, and it is here to stay. It can be 
 made to serve a noble purpose. But 
 when the "movie" becomes a substitute 
 for the home in the matter of entertain- 
 ment, the influence of the home is 
 thereby greatly weakened. 
 167 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 Sunday is becoming more and more 
 a day of playing golf, for automobile 
 parties, visiting, and recreation. Al- 
 ready it is regarded by vast numbers 
 of people as a holiday and not a holy 
 day. In all such matters many Chris- 
 tian people have become very lax, so 
 that he who endeavors to make the home 
 a sanctuary and Sunday a day of rest 
 and of worship, is regarded either as 
 a "queer" individual or a "religious 
 crank." To those familiar with modern 
 tendencies and conditions this is not 
 overdrawn. 
 
 All of these things are having a very 
 definite effect upon the Christian home. 
 Church attendance has fallen off be- 
 cause the church is not exalted in the 
 home. The family altar has been 
 abandoned to an alarming extent and 
 the invoking of the divine blessing at 
 the dinner table is heard only when the 
 preacher is present as an invited guest. 
 It is not too much to say that in multi- 
 tudes of Christian homes, if the father 
 168 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 or mother were to ask "Grace" at the 
 table, the children would sit with open- 
 eyed wonder and amazement. That 
 home where the Bible is seldom, if ever, 
 read in the family circle, where prayer 
 is almost never heard, and where con- 
 versation on religious topics is un- 
 known, cannot have a very pronounced 
 Christian atmosphere. When reHgion 
 breaks down in the home one of the sure 
 bulwarks of evangelism breaks down 
 with it. In many of our Christian 
 homes there is often an easy and un- 
 gracious criticism of the church and the 
 ministry. The ministry, although a 
 holy calling, is human and by no means 
 free from fault. There is a criticism 
 that is sympathetic and helpful. It is 
 made in the spirit of love and with a 
 breaking heart. There is another kind 
 of criticism, however, that bears all the 
 marks of unfriendHness and even of 
 hostility. It is not always intentional, 
 and to make this charge against some 
 critics of the church would be a shock 
 169 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 to them. Nevertheless, there is much 
 criticism in the home, both of the church 
 and of the preacher, that can have but 
 one effect on children and young people 
 and that is to alienate them not only 
 from the church but from religion as 
 well. Unkind and unfriendly criticism 
 of the church and the ministry is ruin- 
 ous to the religious life of the home. 
 The Christian home should be a great 
 evangelizing center. Christ should be 
 exalted in such a natural and yet in 
 such a definite manner that the boy and 
 girl should be unable to remember a 
 time when the Bible was not read and 
 when the voice of father or mother was 
 not heard in prayer. Our young people 
 need to be taught loyalty to the church, 
 respect for the ministry and devotion 
 to the ideals and teachings of Jesus 
 Christ if our homes are to furnish re- 
 cruits for the ministry and mission field. 
 There is a duty resting upon the 
 church and the ministry in relation to 
 the home that cannot be overlooked. I 
 170 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 refer to the kind of evangelism to which 
 the church gives its sanction and ap- 
 proval. If the home is to back up and 
 support evangehsm, preachers and 
 churches must see to it that the evan- 
 gelism employed is both sane and safe. 
 The Christian Church simply must set 
 herself steadfastly against those evan- 
 gelistic movements, the chief purpose 
 of which is to enrich the "professional 
 evangelist" under whose leadership the 
 "campaign" is conducted. There is too 
 much wild-fire evangehsm for the 
 church to be careless at this point. 
 Large numbers of free-lance evan- 
 gehsts roam over the country building 
 up personal fortunes at the expense of 
 the church. Many of them would com- 
 mand very small salaries in the pas- 
 torate. They are cheap imitators of 
 those men who are really called of God 
 to be evangelists and who do accom- 
 phsh a great work. They are usually 
 extremists, who pride themselves on 
 their vulgarity and who boast of the 
 171 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 unusual, undignified, and unbecoming 
 methods employed by them for "getting 
 the crowd." These are they who bring 
 the fair name of the church into dis- 
 repute and cause the sinful and godless 
 to scorn the profession of Christian 
 people. 
 
 The church must safeguard this 
 point, and in so doing will make a more 
 convincing appeal for the support of 
 evangelism in the home. Thank God 
 for the rich contribution the Christian 
 home has made and is still making in 
 supplying young men and women for 
 the ministry, mission field, and for 
 various other lines of Christian service. 
 Furthermore, it should be remembered 
 that during the past quarter of a cen- 
 tury had it not been for the gifts of sons 
 and daughters to the ministry and mis- 
 sion field made by parsonage homes, the 
 church would again and again have 
 been in a most sorry plight. It would 
 be well if there might sweep over the 
 church a revival of the reading of "The 
 172 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 Cotter's Saturday Night," by Robert 
 Burns. To read again that great poem, 
 would give a new appreciation of the 
 Christian home. It exalts the home and 
 tells so wonderfully of the place that 
 love and faith and prayer and God must 
 have in it if it is to be indeed Christian. 
 The cotter's prayer is subhme. He sees 
 the family circle unbroken. As yet it 
 is unstained by sin, and the cry of his 
 heart is that it may ever be so. 
 
 "Then kneeling down to Heaven's Eternal 
 King, 
 The saint, the father, and the husband 
 prays : 
 Hope 'springs exulting on triumphant 
 wing,' 
 That thus they all shall meet in future 
 
 days: 
 There ever bask in uncreated rays, 
 No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear. 
 
 Together hymning their Creator's praise, 
 In such society, yet still more dear; 
 While circling Time moves round in an 
 eternal sphere." 
 173 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 It has been well said — "God at the fire- 
 side is the guarantee of a nation's glory 
 and permanence," and it might well be 
 added the glory and permanence also 
 of the Church of Christ. 
 
 Let the family altar be rebuilt, let 
 the Bible be read in the family circle, 
 let reverence for the church and the 
 ministry be instilled, by precept and ex- 
 ample, in the minds of the young, and 
 in less than a generation the Christian 
 home will become a bulwark of evan- 
 gelism in the highest sense of the term, 
 and young men and women in increas- 
 ingly large numbers will offer them- 
 selves for definite Christian service. 
 
 The Christian School 
 
 The next outstanding safeguard of 
 evangelism is the Christian school. 
 
 History reveals the fact that the 
 church has always been the conservator 
 of education. The learning of Greece 
 and Rome was preserved by the insti- 
 tution of the Christian Church. The 
 174 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 reason for the establishment of colleges 
 and universities in Europe and America 
 was that the church might be furnished 
 with adequate leadership. The leading 
 institutions of learning of both of these 
 countries owe their very existence to 
 the Christian Church. The history of 
 the American college is most interest- 
 ing. It divides itself into three distinct 
 periods. The first begins with the foun- 
 dation of Harvard College in 1636 and 
 closes with the opening of the Revolu- 
 tionary War; the second begins with 
 the close of the Revolutionary War and 
 continues through the first quarter of 
 the last century; and the third dates 
 from that period to the present time. 
 These periods, or divisions, which mark 
 the development of the American col- 
 lege have been called the Ecclesiastical, 
 the Political, and the Human, and in- 
 dicate the source whence certain of the 
 stronger influences of each period arose. 
 The famous ordinance of 1787 for 
 the organization of the Northwest Ter- 
 175 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 ritory used the expression: "Religion, 
 morality, and knowledge being essen- 
 tial to good government, schools and 
 the means of education shall forever 
 be encouraged." This statement has 
 been quoted as the most advanced in 
 time in relation to human progress. 
 We have passed far beyond that posi- 
 tion to-day, however, for we now insist 
 that education shall be provided for 
 every one of school age. Furthermore, 
 we insist that all of school age shall be 
 educated. 
 
 During the development of the 
 American college its influence has been 
 greatly enlarged. Although it began 
 as an institution for the training of 
 ministers of the gospel chiefly, its pur- 
 pose has so broadened that to-day its 
 aim is to train men and women for a 
 well-rounded and full-orbed life. It 
 now seeks to train men not only for the 
 various professions and specialized 
 forms of service, but for life in every 
 sphere of activity. That it has entered 
 176 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 into the intellectual life of the people 
 may be seen when we recall the fact that 
 it has helped to train not only sixty 
 per cent of America's leading preach- 
 ers, but that it has aided in the train- 
 ing of one third of our statesmen, more 
 than a third of our best authors, almost 
 fifty per cent of our leading physicians, 
 fully one half of our better-known 
 lawyers, and considerably more than 
 one half of our most conspicuous edu- 
 cators. 
 
 In the fifty years in the middle of 
 the last century more than sixteen thou- 
 sand men graduated from eight princi- 
 pal colleges of New England, of which 
 number more than four thousand be- 
 came ministers. No one will question 
 the importance of such a contribution 
 to society and the world. Unfortu- 
 nately, few men graduating from these 
 same institutions to-day choose the 
 Christian ministry as their lifework. 
 More unfortunate still is the fact that 
 in a number of these colleges and uni- 
 177 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 versities religion is given very slight 
 recognition. 
 
 The growth and development of 
 State universities during the past fif- 
 teen or twenty years has been nothing 
 less than phenomenal, and they are as- 
 suming increasing jurisdiction over 
 many of the private schools and are 
 giving more and more attention to in- 
 dustrial and technical education. It is 
 a significant fact that there are more 
 Methodist students in State universities 
 than there are in all the schools sup- 
 ported by the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church. These State schools are sup- 
 ported by the taxing of the people. 
 This is right and necessary. The ques- 
 tion arises, however, as to what should 
 be the attitude of the church toward 
 State universities. I reply unhesitat- 
 ingly that it should be both friendly and 
 sincere. There is no reason why the 
 denominational college and the State 
 university should not be on the best of 
 terms. 
 
 178 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 President Guy Potter Benton, of the 
 University of Vermont, has well said: 
 "We all want to be loyal to our own 
 Methodist colleges, but the fact remains 
 that there are more Methodist students 
 in the State universities than there are 
 in all the schools supported by the 
 church. . . . Therefore, unless the reli- 
 gious interests of these young people 
 are carefully safeguarded and directed, 
 there may not only be a loss to the 
 church but one to society as well." 
 Many of the Protestant churches are 
 giving commendable attention to the 
 very question mentioned by President 
 Benton, and the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church is now studying that problem 
 very carefully in relation to her own 
 students. More and more the church 
 must feel its responsibility for the reli- 
 gious welfare of her students who are 
 in State universities. 
 
 Fully appreciating the worth and 
 value of the State university to the wel- 
 fare of society, we cannot overlook the 
 179 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 fact that religion has a hard time of it 
 in such institutions. As a rule, the 
 atmosphere of our State universities is 
 anything but Christian. While we do 
 find members of the faculties who are 
 devoted Christians and loyal to the 
 things for which the Christian Church 
 stands, it must be admitted that their 
 numbers are comparatively few. 
 
 A Hindoo student in one of the great 
 State universities of America once said 
 to me, "This university is as unchris- 
 tian as the one I attended in India be- 
 fore coming to this country." He may 
 not have been fair in his judgment. 
 He may have misrepresented the real 
 situation, but, nevertheless, his remark 
 is significant. 
 
 In Germany we have had a shining 
 example of what may come to the world 
 through a false system of teaching. 
 Whatever historians may assign as the 
 real cause of the great world war, 
 whether it be the brusqueness of the 
 Austro-German diplomacy, which 
 180 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 "snapped the strained relation between 
 the Alliance and the Entente," or 
 whether there shall be mentioned the in- 
 fluence of powerful economic interests 
 which either led to international quar- 
 rels, or stood to make great gains by 
 the war, one thing is certain — the de- 
 structive influence of the German ideal- 
 istic school will not be omitted. If war 
 is to be avoided in the future, our 
 schools and universities must avoid 
 those metaphysics from which war pro- 
 ceeds. 
 
 The present tendency is to ignore 
 religion in modern education. Some 
 time ago there appeared in the Zion's 
 Herald an article containing the results 
 of certain investigations made by Pro- 
 fessor James Henry Leuba, of Bryn 
 Mawr College. These investigations 
 revealed the fact that of the more emi- 
 nent among the teachers of the youth 
 of America only twenty-seven per cent 
 believe in the existence of God, and but 
 thirty-five per cent believe in the im- 
 181 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 mortality of the soul. If this is even 
 approximately correct, it is enough to 
 make the light heart sad and the stout- 
 est quake with fear. For years many 
 of the most eminent teachers in Ger- 
 many denied the fundamentals of reli- 
 gion. The result was the spiritual life 
 of the people was stifled, the false phi- 
 losophies of the German schools were 
 accepted, and the disaster that has 
 drenched Europe in blood became in- 
 evitable. 
 
 At the World Missionary Confer- 
 ence, held in Edinburgh in 1910, Pro- 
 fessor M. E. Saddler, one of the great- 
 est educational authorities, said, "The 
 educational science of Europe and 
 America has paid far too little heed to 
 the experience of the mission field." 
 In referring to the contribution that 
 educational missions make to the pres- 
 ent problem of the West, where educa- 
 tion is becoming more and more organ- 
 ized, and dependent on public money, 
 he said, "How are we to preserve for it, 
 182 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 amid all the conflicts of belief, the power 
 of a spiritual ideal, without which no 
 education can do that which we here feel 
 to be its prime and its most lasting 
 work." This great educationist further 
 said, "The great danger of the highly 
 organized systems of modern education 
 in Europe is that, being by far intellec- 
 tual, they lead to moral skepticism." 
 Although these words were spoken a 
 decade ago, they are full of meaning 
 and importance for to-day and apply 
 not only to Europe but equally so to 
 America. 
 
 Recently in Japan one of the lead- 
 ing officials of that country and one of 
 the effective promoters of modern edu- 
 cation in Japan, said, "We have already 
 passed beyond the realm of religion; 
 all religion is superstition, and by 
 adopting modern education we lay 
 asid>e our old superstitions; we rise 
 above religion in education." If Pro- 
 fessor Leuba's survey reveals the real 
 situation among America's leading 
 183 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 teachers, we may well ponder the future 
 of our nation unless the present tend- 
 ency is counteracted by distinctively 
 Christian influences. The task of the 
 Christian Church is not lightly to be 
 estimated under these conditions. Here 
 is the reason for the Christian school 
 and college and here is the task. Reli- 
 gion must be given a very definite place 
 in modern education, and only the 
 Christian college can do it. 
 
 It is worthy of notice that the 
 churches which have been most influ- 
 ential in the development of American 
 life have been those which have placed 
 great emphasis upon the worth of a col- 
 lege-bred ministry. The founder of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church was a uni- 
 '^^ersity man, and that church has al- 
 ways been the champion of the Chris- 
 tian school and college. It is a very 
 significant fact that her influence has 
 increased very largely in proportion as 
 she has had a well developed system of 
 schools and coUeges. She is second to 
 184 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 none of the great denominations in her 
 emphasis upon Christian education. 
 
 In endeavoring to fulfill her mission 
 the Methodist Episcopal Church must 
 see to it that her institutions of learning 
 shall be kept Christian. There is no 
 denying the fact that dm^ing the past 
 quarter of a century the educational 
 system of America has felt the blight of 
 German rationalism. Large numbers 
 of our most eminent scholars have gone 
 to Germany to pursue their studies and 
 for research purposes. They have re- 
 turned in many instances thoroughly 
 committed to the German school of de- 
 structive criticism. The entire educa- 
 tional system of America has felt the 
 effect of this, and the denominational 
 schools have by no means escaped. Not 
 infrequently has it been true that teach- 
 ers have been employed in Christian in- 
 stitutions of learning who have made 
 no profession of religion at all, others 
 have been merely nominally Christian, 
 while still others have exerted an influ- 
 185 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 ence over students that has been utterly- 
 destructive of faith. It is nothing less 
 than a betrayal of trust, for Christian 
 institutions of learning to employ as 
 teachers those who are opposed to, or 
 unsympathetic with. Christian teaching 
 and doctrine. Christian schools and 
 colleges must give careful attention to 
 the matter of religion in education, and 
 how can this be done unless the teachers 
 themselves are Christian? 
 
 There never was a time when 
 America needed Christian schools and 
 colleges more than now. It is of the 
 utmost importance that care be given 
 to the selection of teachers and profes- 
 sors. No one who is not a believer in 
 God and in Jesus Christ our Lord, and 
 no one who is not sure of his beliefs, 
 should have a place upon a faculty of 
 any really Christian institution of 
 learning. This has not always been the 
 case, nor is it at the present time. Noth- 
 ing is more important from the stand- 
 point of a sane and safe evangelism than 
 186 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 that our institutions of learning be kept 
 Christian, and this cannot be done un- 
 less the teachers are definitely Chris- 
 tian. 
 
 The Christian college has been the 
 conservator of religious hfe and 
 thought, and has also saved the church 
 from certain fanatical extremes in reli- 
 gion, which otherwise would have 
 brought the church into merited con- 
 tempt. Too much cannot be said in 
 praise of what the Christian college has 
 done for the Christian ministry. For 
 years the church has been dependent 
 upon the denominational college for 
 her ministers and missionaries. In the 
 future she will be more dependent upon 
 the Christian college for her leaders 
 than she ever has been in the past. 
 
 In the remaking of the world, the 
 church school must be given an increas- 
 ingly large place, but it must be kept 
 positively and potently Christian. It 
 is a safeguard of evangelism. It is the 
 handmaiden of the church; it is the re- 
 187 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 cruiting station for leadership that will 
 hasten the conquest of the world for 
 Christ. 
 
 The Christian Ministry 
 
 There is yet another safeguard of 
 evangelism, and that is the ministry it- 
 self. 
 
 War tests all things. The recent 
 world war tested the Christian ministry 
 as severely, if not more severely, than 
 anything else. The result will surely 
 be a stronger, purer, and more sacri- 
 ficial ministry. In the very nature of 
 the case it cannot be otherwise. 
 
 It is generally admitted that the 
 Christian Church is not as evangelistic 
 as it once was. Large numbers of 
 preachers of all the churches have lost 
 their relish for evangelism. The char- 
 acter of their preaching and the manner 
 in which they go about the King's busi- 
 ness furnish ample proof of the correct- 
 ness of this statement. The vast sums 
 of money invested by the Christian 
 188 
 
 A 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 Church for the salvation of the world 
 is in striking contrast to the number 
 of converts and accessions reported by 
 the churches from year to year. It is 
 a significant fact that the church has 
 made her greatest gains in recent years 
 in foreign mission fields where evan- 
 gelism is most pronounced. No 
 thoughtful person can fail to appreci- 
 ate or be thankful for the great social 
 awakening of the church. Her philan- 
 thropic, educational, and benevolent 
 undertakings command the highest ad- 
 miration of all thoughtful people. 
 When, however, we study the growth 
 of the Christian Church, during the past 
 decade, as reported in the year books 
 of the various denominations, there is 
 nothing to boast of, but, rather, every 
 reason for humiliation and contrition 
 of heart. 
 
 Much of modern preaching lacks pas- 
 sion. Platitudes and stereotyped 
 phrases that are hoary with age and 
 empty of meaning will not suffice to 
 189 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 bring conviction for sin to the mind and 
 heart of the modern man. 
 
 The chief reason why the Christian 
 Church, especially that of America, 
 does not possess more evangelistic zeal 
 than it does to-day is because of the 
 influence German rationalism has had 
 upon it. No effort has been spared by 
 the German school to rule the super- 
 natural Christ out of court. There is 
 no denying the fact that this school has 
 set itself against the truth as revealed 
 in the Scriptures of a truly super- 
 natural divine Christ. Similar efforts 
 have also been made to rob the Bible 
 of the supernatural, making it merely 
 a collection of tradition and folklore. 
 So widespread was the influence of 
 the German school of thought that 
 not only Europe felt the blight of 
 it but America also. History contains 
 no more subtle propaganda against the 
 Christian faith than this. It has found 
 its way into the religious literature of 
 all Christian lands and of all Christian 
 190 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 churches. The effect has been a very 
 noticeable drift toward Unitarianism 
 in certain sections of the church. For 
 years American books, newspapers, and 
 magazines have carried the message 
 that only a humanitarian Christ can 
 satisfy the demands of the modern in- 
 tellect. This explains why the church 
 has lost her relish for evangehsm. 
 There can be no other result. When 
 the ministry loses its vital grip on the 
 deityship of Jesus Christ and upon the 
 Bible as the inspired Word of God, 
 there can be no such thing as a passion 
 for souls. The very heart of evangel- 
 ism is the deityship of Jesus Christ. 
 When that is doubted or denied, evan- 
 gelism is gone. 
 
 If the Christian ministry is to retain 
 its apostolic enthusiasm for the con- 
 version of men and women from sin, 
 her theological schools must be great 
 centers of evangehstic power and pas- 
 sion. We do not disparage scholarship. 
 We dare not shrink from scientific in- 
 191 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 vestigation. Theological students must 
 be made familiar with modern life and 
 thought. This is not to be accom- 
 plished, however, at the expense of a 
 definite and genuine faith in Jesus 
 Christ as a personal Saviour. It is not 
 to be brought about by the abandon- 
 ment of a holy enthusiasm for the spirit- 
 ual regeneration of a sinful world. If 
 the Christian ministry of the future is 
 to be evangelistic, the teaching in the 
 schools of the prophets must be positive 
 in character. Classroom instruction 
 must bring the student face to face with 
 scientific thought and achievement, but 
 never at the sacrifice of those things 
 which are fundamental to the Christian 
 faith. 
 
 With the collapse of the German em- 
 pire there must also go Germany's 
 leadership and domination of the in- 
 tellectual and religious life of the world. 
 The failure of the German educational 
 system will be followed by a new inter- 
 est in the study of the Bible as the 
 192 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 revealed Word of God. The new text- 
 ual criticism will be both scholarly and 
 reverent, and there will not be charged 
 against it a purposeful endeavor to de- 
 stroy the foundations of the Christian 
 faith. 
 
 Our theological schools must prepare 
 the future ministers of the church for 
 the great task of remaking the world. 
 To that end they must strengthen the 
 faith of the students and not weaken it. 
 The integrity of the Scriptures must be 
 insisted upon and not questioned. Jesus 
 Christ, the divine Son of God, must be 
 exalted in all the relationships of life 
 with a moral urgency that will carry 
 with it no shadow of doubt. 
 
 Furthermore, if evangelism is to be 
 retained in the new day, it will be at 
 the point where the candidate for the 
 ministry enters into the full obligations 
 and privileges of his holy calling. This 
 is positively vital. No man should be 
 admitted into the ministry of any Chris- 
 tian church who does not do so accept- 
 193 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 ing fully and freely the doctrinal stand- 
 ards of the church he seeks to enter. 
 
 Where there are courses of study, as 
 in the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
 which the candidate for the ministry is 
 required to pass before being admitted, 
 it is of the utmost importance that the 
 books be selected with the greatest care. 
 Any book that is at variance with the 
 accepted doctrines and teachings of the 
 church should be eliminated. The 
 Methodist Episcopal Church would do 
 well to safeguard her sacred interests 
 at this point. 
 
 An intelligent and broad-minded 
 world traveler once said to the writer, 
 "Methodism in some quarters is show- 
 ing a marked tendency toward Uni- 
 tarianism." When challenged to pro- 
 duce proof of such a statement he said, 
 "Analyze carefully the literature your 
 church is producing and you will find 
 ample proof of what I say." I am con- 
 vinced that the gentleman's statement 
 is not wholly correct. I wish it were 
 194 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 wholly wrong. The Conference course 
 of study was never intended to take the 
 place of a college course. Its chief pur- 
 pose is not that of furnishing an edu- 
 cation, but, rather, of ascertaining 
 whether or not the candidate is suffi- 
 ciently famihar with the doctrines and 
 pohty of the church to warrant his being 
 intrusted with the sacred obligations 
 and privileges of the ministry. If the 
 doctrinal standards of Methodism are 
 not safeguarded in the Conference 
 course of study to-day, it will not be 
 more than a generation before Meth- 
 odism will have lost her power as an 
 evangehzing agency. For the welfare 
 of the church of the future we must 
 safeguard the evangelism of the church 
 of to-day. 
 
 What was it that brought the remedy 
 for the unbehef and spiritual evils in 
 the latter part of the Reformation 
 period? It was not scholarship and it 
 was not science. The Church of Christ 
 was the victim of the basest kind of 
 195 
 
EVANGELISM IN THE 
 
 political influences and was herself 
 guilty of the most unspeakable vices. 
 When apostolic simplicity gave way 
 and wealth began to pour into the lap 
 of the church, when priests began to 
 taste the sweets of luxurious living and 
 of power, faith gave way to unbeHef 
 and moral decline set in irresistibly. 
 That which brought relief was the faith- 
 ful proclamation of the living gospel of 
 the grace of God by Luther and his 
 fellow reformers. 
 
 "What rescued the church from the 
 torpor and death of the negative of the 
 eighteenth century?" asks Professor 
 James Orr. His answer to his own 
 question is: "The deliverance came, not 
 from philosophy or learning, not even 
 from the works of able apologists like 
 Butler, but from the tides of the spirit- 
 ual revival that swept over Britain, and 
 were felt in other lands, under the 
 preaching of such men as Whitefield 
 and the Wesleys. This it was which 
 gave evangelism the victory once more 
 196 
 
REMAKING OF THE WORLD 
 
 over indiflPerence and unbelief, and 
 breathed the new breath of life into so- 
 ciety, which introduced the era of mis- 
 sions to the heathen, Bible diffusion, 
 home evangehsm, and the innumerable 
 social reforms of the last century. It 
 is to a hke outpouring of the Spirit of 
 God upon his church, and to the same 
 divine energy manifesting itself in holy 
 lives and practical works far more than 
 to learned confutations, however valu- 
 able these may be in their place, that 
 we must look for the overthrow of the 
 forms of unbehef that lift up their 
 heads among us to-day. The owls van- 
 ish when the dayhght reappears." 
 
 If the demands of the new day are to 
 be met, the church must cultivate, with- 
 out cant and hypocrisy, the passion for 
 souls that characterized the early church 
 and made Christ and his saving grace a 
 reality in the hearts of men. The Chris- 
 tian home, the Christian school, the 
 Christian ministry — ^these three are the 
 safeguards of evangelism. 
 197 
 
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