G.CAMPBELL MORGAN

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EVANGELISM

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EVANGELISM

BY
REV. G. CAMPBELL MORGAN, D. D.

FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY,
CHICAGO. NEW YORK. TORONTO.
Publishers of Evangelical Literature.

COPYRIGHT 1904
BY
REV. G. CAMPBELL MORGAN, D. D.

TO
THE FACULTIES AND STUDENTS
OF
HARTFORD, CHICAGO, BERKELEY AND DAY
TON THEOLOGICAL SEMINARIES
1903-1904.
To whom it was my pleasure and privilege
to speak on Evangelism at their request,
these stenographic reports of those ad
dresses are dedicated with the earnest
hope that they may be of some service in
at least one branch of the ministry of the
future.

CONTENTS

I. The Evangel
11. The Church Evangelistic
III. The Evangelist
IV. The Evangelistic Service
V. The Present Opportunity

7
25
42
63

EVANGELISM. I.
THE EVANGEL".
The Hour is characterized by renewed interest in evan
gelistic work. Men of all shades of opinion, and men who
do not seem to Have very profound opinions of any sort,
are nevertheless turning their attention towards the great
subject of evangelism. I suppose there are a few people
in the Christian Church who have no particular interest
in the subject. All I can say of such is, that they are
living in the mental mood of at least ten years ago.
A new interest in evangelistic work is manifesting itself
in different ways. Some people are giving themselves to
prayer, that God will give us "an old-fashioned revival."
On the other hand, a great many people, equally de
voted and sincere, yet who are out of harmony with what
they speak of as the older methods of theological think
ing, are nevertheless looking for some visitation. These,
instead of praying for an old-fashioned revival are at
tempting to forecast the lines of what they call "the new
evangelism." Now I do not want to be unkindly critical,
'for I am profoundly conscious that the underlying fact
7

8 EVANGELISM.
in each case is of supreme value, but I would never pray
for an old-fashioned revival, nor would I attempt to fore
cast the lines of a new evangelism. But why not pray
for an old-fashioned revival ? Because I want God's next
new thing. Then why not forecast the lines of a new
evangelism ? Because one evangel is enough for all time.
If a man is praying for an old-fashioned revival, in all
probability when God's visitation comes, he will not be
conscious of it. I can quite imagine how forty years
ago, men remembering the marvelous movement under
Finney, might have prayed for an old-fashioned revival
such as that which accompanied his preaching. Then it
is more than likely that when God raised up Dwight
Lyman Moody, such men would be out of sympathy with
all his methods for a long while, for the notes of the two
movements were utterly different. Or to go back still
further before the great awakening under Finney, per
haps some prayed for an old-fashioned revival, like that
under Wesley and Whitefield. If so, they almost cer
tainly lacked sympathy with the new notes at first.
God fulfills Himself in many ways. In every new
awakening there are fresh manifestations of God, new
unfoldings of truth meeting the requirements of the age.
The evangel is always fresh as the break of day, and yet
as old as the continuity of day-break through the ages.
We ought to be so living that when God begins His great
triumphant march, we shall fall in with the first battalion,
and have part in the first victories.

THE EVANGEL. 9
It is equally false to speak of a new evangelism, be
cause there is to be no new evangel. When I read what
that very brilliant, and very devoted Christian man, Dr.
John Watson, says the lines of the new evangelism are to
be, I am in agreement with all he does say, and out of
agreement in that there are things he does not say. All
he says is true. But there are important things he omits.
The next great movement will have within it the notes
of the social and the ethical. But there will not be
omitted from it the notes of blood redemption, and spirit
ual regeneration. These are the truths we have to keep in
mind. When I hear of men speaking of a new evangelism,
it is well to ask their definition of the term evangelism.
When I see that Mr. B. Fay Mills has gone out into
evangelistic work the first impulse of the heart is to re
joice. But when I find that he is simply preaching a doc
trine of a social kingdom, without insistence upon the ne
cessity for regeneration, then it is time we declare our
separation. To say that the new evangelism is to be ethical, and by
that to seem to criticise the old, is to prove a misunder
standing of the old, and also a misunderstanding of
the deepest necessity of the times in which we live
and serve. When a man tells me the next revival will
be ethical, does he mean to say that the last was
not? If the great movements under Wesley, White-
field, Finney, Moody were not ethical, what were they?
They were movements that took hold of vast masses of

10 EVANGELISM.
men, and moved them out of back streets into front ones,
and if that was not ethical, surely nothing can be so.
Beginning with the regeneration of the man, they changed
his environment, and made him a citizen of whom any
city might have been proud. That is the true ethical note.
In approaching a constructive statement concerning the
evangel, I must ask you to take two things for granted :
first, the finality of Christianity; and secondly, that the
New Testament is the authoritative interpretation thereof.
By the finality of Christianity I mean that the writer of the
letter to the Hebrews is correct in his estimate as de
clared in his opening sentences. God speaks to man. He
has spoken to men in the past in divers portions, and in
divers manners. All the messages of prophets, seers,
and psalmists, of rites, ceremonies, and symbols were
but broken lights of essential truth. But He ha9 spoken
unto us by His Son, and He has no more to say to men
than He has said in Jesus Christ. That does not mean for
a single moment that we have perfectly understood the
message of the Son yet. I believe that there is more light
and truth to break out from the words of Jesus, and
from the fact of Christ in the world, than men have ever
seen. But God has said everything He has to say, and any
new so-called revelation in conflict with that spoken by
God in His Son is thereby proven to be not of the Spirit
of God, but from beneath and of the devil.
In the second place it must also be accepted that the
New. Testament is the authoritative interpretation of

THE EVANGEL. 11
Christianity. I hear a good deal today about the Chris
tian consciousness as the true court of appeal in matters
of faith and practice. I am searching for that Christian
consciousness. Is it that of the Pope, or my own ? Is it
consensus of opinion? Then where shall I find it ex
pressed ? I decline to accept it as expressed in any creed.
Where then is it?
The fact is that the Christian consciousness is a vari
able quantity according to differing experiences, and is
therefore wholly unreliable as a criterion of creed or char
acter or conduct. The Christian consciousness must ever
be judged by a standard, and that is to be found in the
New Testament. If you once take away the New Testa
ment as the final court of appeal in matters of faith and
practice, you will lose the Christian consciousness in half
a century. It has been done once. The New Testament
was lost to the churches in the dark ages. Then Luther
arose, and following the restoration of the New Testament
there came back the Christian consciousness. The court
of appeal is the New Testament.
What is the Christian evangel? There is a prelimi
nary question which I shall first attempt to answer. What
is an evangel? This word evangel has come to us from
the Latin evangelium, which simply means a gospel, for
the word was introduced to the language during the eccle
siastical period. So we must pass back behind this word
as it came to us from the Latin, and find it as it stands
upon the pages of our Greek Testament. There it simply

12 EVANGELISM.
means a good message. A good message ! There is no
note of sadness in an evangel. There is not a tone of ter
ror in an evangel. An evangel is good news. An evangel
is a good message.
In the New Testament the thought is invariably that
of glad tidings, of good news, of a message that ought to
fill the hearts of those who hear it with hope and gladness
and joy. The word, and cognate words, are used by the
writers of the New Testament who deal specially with
the subject of the work of Christ in its first application
to the needs of men. And these words are singularly
absent from those writings which deal with the deeper
truths of Christian experience. Take the Gospels, which
we speak of as synoptic, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and
you will find the words recurring all the way through,
evangel, or evangelist, or some cognate word. But in
the Gospel of John, the word is never used simply be
cause the Gospel of John deals with the mystery of
Christ's Person, and this can only be appreciated by those
born again. The evangel is the wicket gate of the king
dom. So also with the other writings. Paul, and Peter
in his first epistle, and the writer of the letter to the
Hebrews have these words, and this because they are in
all these writings dealing with the initial facts. But they
are signally absent from the writings of John and James
and Jude, and the second letter of Peter. All this indi
cates the principal thought of evangelism, and the value
of the word as it lies in the New Testament.

THE EVANGEL. 13
The evangel is not denunciatory of sin. It is not pro-
nunciatory of punishment. It is annunciatory of salvation.
That is its great value. This is not to say that the
preacher will not have to discuss the subject of sin, will
not have to proclaim the punishment of sin. But it is
to say that the preacher who deals with and denounces
sin, will never end his message with such denunciation.
He proclaims God's evangel when he announces the fact
that Christ is able to save from sin, and consequently from
its penalty. So also the evangelist may have, and indeed
will have to deal with the severer aspects of truth. He
will have to tell men that to such as have heard the evan
gel, to such as have been confronted with the claims of
Jesus Christ, there can be no escape if they turn their
back upon that which is God's uttermost in the way of
saving men. But he will never proclaim, that alone. He
must super-add the great and glorious and hopeful decla
ration that their sins were borne by the One Who hung
on the tree, and being so borne, in the infinite mercy and
justice of God they may go free.
An evangel, therefore, is good news to such as need
it. Joy is in it, the note of hope, of optimism. It comes
to a man in the darkness, and brings him light. It comes
to a man in bondage, and announces the way of escape.
It comes to a man under the sentence of death, and tells
him that the sentence has been remitted.
What then is the Christian evangel as revealed to us
in the New Testament ? It has four essential notes.

14 EVANGELISM.
The first is that of a vision ; the second, that of a value ;
the third, that of a virtue; and the fourth, that of a
victory. The evangel proclaims first, the Lordship of
Christ; secondly, the Cross of Christ; thirdly, the resur
rection of Christ ; and finally an indwelling Christ by the
Holy Spirit.
First, the Lordship of Jesus. Now you may say to
me, But have you put these in their right order? Is it
not true that the first business of the evangel is to preach
the Cross of Christ? I do not think so. I believe that
the first note of the true evangel is that of announcing to
men the Lordship of Christ. I am quite willing to grant
you that very largely that has been omitted from much
evangelistic preaching which has been blessed by God, and
yet I am profoundly convinced that the evangelist who is
going to take hold of the masses must return to the old
apostolic method of preaching Jesus as Lord first. But
it may be objected He cannot be Lord of a man's life
until the man is saved. Quite true, but the vast majority
of people will never begin to feel their need of His salva
tion until they have been brought to stand in the light of
the claim of His Lordship, and so I insist upon the put
ting of this first.
This was the apostolic method. In the second chapter
of the Acts of the Apostles we have the first sermon
preached in the power of the outpoured Spirit, which is
a perfect pattern for true Christian homiletics to the
end of time. It is from first to last an appeal to the men

THE EVANGEL. 15
who~ were listening. Peter was not preaching in front
of the people and wondering whether they would like it.
He was preaching to them. And the difference between
the preaching that does nothing and the preaching that
does something is the difference between preaching before
people, and preaching to people. Let us look at its struc
ture. It has two divisions. First, "This is that." Sec
ondly, "He hath shed forth this." "This is that which was
spoken by the prophet Joel," the present manifestation set
in its relation to old time prophesying. This day of Pen
tecost is the fulfillment of the past. "He hath shed forth
this." The past was fulfilled through Jesus. He was
the centre, and heart, and life of the first sermon. And
the final word of the sermon, to which everything led up
was, "Let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly,
that God hath made Him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus
Whom ye crucified."
Thus on the day of Pentecost Peter was proclaiming
the Lordship of Christ. Confronting blind belief, and
flippant scepticism, and idle curiosity, and surging sorrow,
and blinding sin, and masterful passion, and everything
else, he said "Jesus is Lord." That was the first note.
The evangelist, therefore, has first to confront this age
and say to it, There is one King, one Lord, one Master,
one seat of authority, one tribunal to which men may
make their appeal. One Who upholds in His hands the
balance of justice, from Whose verdict there can be no
appeal, and Who is at this moment the Lord Jesus Christ.

16 - EVANGELISM.
This is not a small theme. Start in to preach that,
and you will find you will not finish it next Sunday morn
ing ; no, nor in a month's sermons. Buddha and Confucius
will have a great rest, and Browning and Tennyson and
all the others with their rush lights will not allure you
from the great essential light, the Lordship of Jesus
Christ. We have not merely to claim that Jesus is Lord, but we
have to demonstrate that He is Lord. We have to show
to this age in the light of a new century, with all its
advance, and progress, and civilization, that Jesus Christ
is Lord not merely because God has appointed Him King
— though that is true — but because of His inherent roy
alty. God did not appoint Jesus to Kingship capriciously.
He appointed Him to Kingship because He is King in
the very fibre of His nature, in the very fact of His per
sonality. We challenge the world today, and we say
that the Jesus of the New Testament, the Jesus of the
virgin birth, the virtuous life, the vicarious dying, and the
victorious resurrection, stands amid this age, with all its
fierce light, its boasted civilization, and its new psychol
ogy, facile princeps, the crowned Lord because of the
supernal glory of His own character..
But you tell me that these things are not authentic, that
you have abandoned the Gospel of John, that Matthew and
Mark and Luke are not to be trusted, and that in all prob
ability that Man never existed. Very well. Then my
business is to find the man who imagined this Man, for

THE EVANGEL. 17
the man who imagined Him must be as great as the Man
imagined. You do not get away from the Person revealed
when you think you have done away with the books.
He stands out in the midst of this age, our Master and
Lord, and there never has been one like Him. And you
and I have to tell men to test all sides of their nature
by Jesus Christ. They have to bring up to His royalty
their intellect, their emotion, their will. They have to
test their creed, their character, their conduct by Him.
He has moved into this new century with all its electric
gaudiness, with the supernal loveliness of the King of
men. And no man dare come into the presence of the
Man of Nazareth revealed in the Gospels, and say, I
am mightier or better than Thou, or, I know more than
Thou knowest, O Man of Nazareth. He is the Lord of
men, and our business is to proclaim it, to insist upon it,
to die for it if need be.
But if you stop there you are not preaching the Gospel.
See what follows. If Jesus is indeed preached as Lord,
there must always be as the issue of it an application of the
truth to individual needs. No man ever yet stood searched
by the light of that revelation of life without having to
bow his head with shame, and say, I am a sinner. To
preach the living Lordship of Christ is to create the ne
cessity for His Cross. Do we sufficiently realize this ?
If I said that the first note of the evangel is the Lord
ship of Christ, I am quite willing to grant that the heart
of the evangel is the Cross. This age is peculiarly char-
B

18 EVANGELISM.
acterized by a loose sense of sin amongst men. We have
today to preach to people who are not really willing to
admit that they are sinners: pleasant, refined, cultured
people, whom we hardly feel inclined to tell that they are
sinners, and who, if we did, would not feel quite like be
lieving it. There are people who will never have any
consciousness of sin as long as we keep them at Mount
Sinai. But there is not a man but that, if you bring him
into the presence of Jesus Christ, and say That is your
King, His law is your standard, His realization of life
is your ideal, will go down in the presence of that and
will say, I am a sinner. I have the profoundest sympathy
for the young man in the Gospel who said, "All these
things have I kept from my youth up." I was born in
a Christian family, and through that gracious fact — never
to be undervalued — was strangely and wonderfully de
livered from many of the more vulgar methods of sin,
and I want to say to you, in all honesty, and all sincerity,
I never trembled when I heard the law of Moses. But
when I came into the presence of the radiant loveliness of
Christ, when I heard his teaching, when I saw His per
fection, then I said, If that is what I ought to be, O my
God, how have I sinned ! I stand in the presence of an
external ethical code such as that of Moses, and I do not
tremble. But whenever I come near the Incarnate Purity,
into the presence of the-Incarnate Love, I am ashamed,
debased, bowed in the dust. Brethren, we must preach
Christ as Lord, and there will come to our people a sense.

THE EVANGEL. 19
of sin, a consciousness of inability, of failure, of break
down. There is no other way of bringing men into this
consciou sness. _^**~
Then, thank God, we have the next note of the evangel.
Oh, how shall we tell it? May God keep us living so
near to it that it shall always be to us an element of as
tonishment I
" Were the whole realm of Nature mine,
That were a present far too small,
Love so amazing, so Divine,
Demands my life, my soul, my all."
"Love so amazing!" Are we amazed at that Love?
Are we astonished at that Love ? Think of it, that ideally
perfect One, that infinite Lord and Master, went down
to death. If you are only preaching His Lordship, that
is not enough. If all you have to preach to men is His
example, that is not enough. Unless there is all that the
New Testament claims there is in that death, then that
death is the severest reflection upon the goodness of God
that the world has ever seen. Unless there is a meaning in
it, such as the New Testament declares to be in it, then
in the presence of the Cross, I lose my faith in God.
If death is simply the tragic ending of so beautiful a life,
and nothing more, then God has done nothing when He
ought to have done something. But when I take the
New Testament, and see what Christ says about His
own death, and what the inspired writers of the New

20 EVANGELISM.
Testament say, and when there comes superadded to the
Christ's estimate and the estimate of the apostles, the
answer of my heart to the inner meaning of the Cross,
then I know that the Cross is the heart and centre of a
great evangel. We are to tell men we fail, but the One
Who never failed took our place. You cannot get away
from the words vicarious atonement. The Cross is su
premely the heart and centre of our great evangel. But
I am told today that there are men so cultured and refined
that they do not care to talk about blood; men who cut
out from the singing of the Church such hymns as,
"There is a fountain filled with blood," who object to
sing, " Not all the blood of beasts."
Why do you object to those things ? You say they lack
refinement? Refinement! Do you go to the Cross for
refinement? You go to the Cross to see what sin is.
Is blood objectionable? Of course it is. Is the brutal
murder of a perfect man awful? Certainly it is. But
why was it necessary? Because of sin. Sin is not re
fined, and I come to the Cross to know the meaning of my
own sin. I find my sin when I stand in the presence of
the light of the Cross. But I never know its meaning
until I see the Lord Christ crucified. Certainly there
is no refinement in it. We must get back to the Cross to
know all its. ruggedness, to know all its brutality, its
blood-baptism. It is only there that the heart finds the

THE EVANGEL. 21
conscience cleaned. I am going to put this superlatively.
I am talking out of my deepest conviction when I say
that if God would forgive me without the Cross then
I never can be satisfied with His forgiveness. My own
conscience is not at rest. There is that sin in the past,
and if God says, I will forgive on the basis of pity, that
is not enough, for it is there still. But when God says
to me, It is not there, He, the Son of My love took it.
He in Whom was no sin, was made sin, and in the
passion of His death, in the agony of His baptism, in
the blood of the brutal Cross, all of which had no place
in His life, He was dealing with your sin, then my heart
begins its song, the song that will never end while eter
nity lasts. My conscience demands this Cross, and God
answers that deepest human consciousness of mine, which
He Himself had made. We must be very suspicious of
any new evangel that has no Cross in it.
There is yet another thing, and I am trying to trace
them as they come in the order of experience. A man
stands erect until he sees the vision of the Lord Jesus
Christ, and then he is afraid until he sees the value of
the Cross of Christ, and he says, I am a sinner forgiven.
Now what else? I have to live in the same place, in the
midst of circumstances against me, suffering the same
temptations, still within the midst of forces which will
entice me to sin, though I am forgiven. Then we must
preach the value of the resurrection, that He "brought
life and immortality to light," that men may have life,

22 EVANGELISM.
not merely eternal life, but life as a force and virtue,
a power and possibility in the life. I like my Lord's
words better than any other, "I came that they may have
life, and may have it abundantly ... I lay down
My life for the sheep" and if I "lay it down," I will
"take it again." And that is what He did, He laid
it down in death, and took it again in resurrection.
If righteousness is imputed to me because He died for
me, holiness and a new righteousness are imparted to
me because He lives in me. And that is the great mes
sage we have to bear to men today. There are thousands
of men who will hardly thank you for the doctrine of
forgiveness unless you can tell them there is salvation
from the slavery of sin.
And yet once again. A man will say, I saw the vision,
and I knew I was a sinner. I have received the value
and am forgiven by the Cross. There has been imparted
to me its virtues, and I am enabled to do the things I
could not do. But what other forces are there? Must
I fight this battle alone ? And there comes the crowning
declaration of the evangel, never to be put off as a second
subject, as a second blessing, or anything else. Right
here in line is the coming to man of Jesus by the Holy
Spirit, that Spirit to be the Paraclete, the Advocate, the
One Who in the life is the dynamic, the force that shall
produce the coming victory in the man.
What then shall I say to the men to whom I preach
the evangel ? One thing only, Submit to the Lord Christ.

THE EVANGEL. 23
And if a man do that what then ? Then the Lord Christ
by the Holy Spirit will make over to him the value of
His dying, will communicate to him the virtue of His
living, will pour into him the victory of the indwelling
Spirit. These ttree things are the necessary consequence
of the submission of life to His Lordship. Men will
not be saved by understanding the atonement. Men will
not be saved by explaining the mystery of resurrection.
Men will not be saved by explanation of the mystery of
how the Spirit comes. They will just be saved by yield
ing to the Lord Christ. In the moment of yielding, He
makes over to them all the virtues and values.
I have attempted to speak of the New Testament
evangel. Let me close by saying, the evangel is the
only one that meets the essential needs of human na
ture in any age. It is ageless. You cannot say it is
old or new. It must be zealously guarded from addition
or subtraction. To add conditions to the evangel of
the New Testament, or to curtail it, is to make it value
less and vicious.
To deprive the evangel of any note is to make it in
operative. If you are preaching an evangel with no
vision of the Lord Christ, it is emasculated. If you are
preaching an evangel without the value of His death,
it-is Eenemic. If you are preaching an evangel with no
virtue in it, it is sentimental. If you are preaching
an evangel' with no victory, it is hopeless.
If we have this great whole, the vision of the Lord,

24 EVANGELISM.
the value of His cross, the virtue of His life, the vic
tory of His indwelling by the Spirit, you have yet to find
me the city, the village, the nation, the people, the man,
or the child, that will not have such good news as they
are waiting for, and apart from which there can be no
hope.

EVANGELISM. II.
THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC.
Evangelism apart from the Church is impossible. Christ
was, and is the one Evangelist. He now fulfills His great
work of proclaiming the good tidings through His Body,
which is the Church. In the four Gospels we have a
picture of Christ, and at the opening of His second
treatise Luke makes use of words which indicate for us
the character of the Gospel narrative, and suggest that
of the book of the Acts of the Apostles. "The former
treatise I made, O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus
began both to do and to teach, until the day in which
He was received up." That sentence reveals to us the
character of the Gospel story. The "former treatise"
is the story of the beginning of the doing and che teach
ing of Jesus. The latter is therefore by inference the
story of the continuity of the doing and teaching of
Christ. In the Gospel Jesus is seen — to use His own
suggestive word — "straitened" until His baptism should
be accomplished. In the book of the Acts of the Apostles
25

26 EVANGELISM.
the same Jesus is seen no longer straightened, for the
passion-baptism is accomplished, and He risen, ascended,
enthroned, has come into new relationship with men by
the Holy Spirit, to continue His work through the Church
by the Spirit. Consequently the evangel proclaimed by
Christ in measure during His life, is proclaimed by
Christ in fullness through the Church by the Holy Spirit
in this age
Evangelism apart from the Church is apart from Christ,
and is therefore no evangelism. There can be no evan
gelism save that of Jesus Christ, and that can only be
spoken by Christ Himself through His people by the
Holy Spirit. Anything calling itself evangelism which
is not the outcome of that new life of Christ, realized in
the soul of men, and spoken through men by Christ, is not
evangelism. Unattached and unauthorized evangelism, even by in
dividual members of the Church of Christ, is to say the
least, unwise, and not the most fruitful of permanent
results. I do not desire to criticize unkindly any move
ment that acts independently of the churches, although
I do not hesitate to say that I have grave suspicion of
everything that boasts that it is undenominational. I
have a very great love for everything that is inter-de
nominational, which is quite another matter. But all
unattached, freelance work, unauthorized and ungov-
erned by the Church, is not the best work possible, and
tends to disorder and confusion. We must hold to the

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC. 27
very highest doctrine of the Church, or our evangelism
will be weak and one-sidedLJBelieving therefore that the
relation between the Church and evangelistic work is
all important, we will carefully consider the Church as to
its creation, its nature, and its purpose.
The New Testament deals with the Church in two ways,
as Catholic and as local ; the whole Church of the Living
God, and a church in any given locality. Sometimes
I am asked what church I belong to. When I reply, I am
a Catholic Churchman, I have seen people look sur
prised. Yet that is exactly what I am. Catholic means
universal. The Catholic Church is the whole Church.
Such a phrase as "Roman Catholic" constitutes an ab
surd contradiction of terms. If Catholic, then not Roman.
If Roman only, then by no means Catholic. That is
equally true of the term "Anglican Catholic."
The New Testament deals with the whole Church, but
it also deals with the local church. The word Church
is used sometimes of the whole Church of God, and some
times of a church in a given locality, as in Ephesus, in
Corinth, in Thessalonica, in Philippi.
So far as the records reveal, the Lord only twice in
the course of His public ministry referred to the Church.
He used the word Church once in its catholic sense,
and once in its local sense, so that the general New
Testament uses of the word harmonize with that of Christ.
The first occasion was when Peter had made the su
preme confession of the Messiahship of Jesus, "Thou

28 EVANGELISM.
art the Christ." At that parting of the ways the first
half of our Lord's work was accomplished. He had
taught a little group of men, the nucleus of His King
dom, that He was the Christ, the Anointed, the Messiah
of God. And then He immediately commenced to teach'
them a new thing, to bring them into view of the path
way through which the Messiah should accomplish the
purpose of God. He began to talk to them of the Cross,
but before mentioning the Cross He said to Peter, "Thou
art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church;
and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it."
That is a perfect, final, and all-inclusive declaration con
cerning the Church. First, "Upon this rock I will build
My Church." Secondly, "the gates of Hades shall not
prevail against it," not one thing repeated, but two dis
tinct facts about the Church. I think we have too often
read the passage as though the Lord said the same thing
twice over. But if you follow the figure carefully, you
will find that Jesus was absolute Master of metaphor.
There was no blunder, and no intellectual inaccuracy in
the figures He used. "On this rock," that is the declaration
of the impregnable strength of His Church against the
attacks from without. "I will build," that is an affirma
tion of the certainty of its perfection and completion.
But what follows? The same thing repeated in another
form? By no means. "The gates of Hades shall not
prevail against it." That does not mean that the Church
is impregnable against attack, but rather that she is

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC. 29
unconquerable when she goes forth to attack. An at
tacking force never carries its own gates up to besiege
a city. If Hades is contemplating an attack upon the
Church, it will not carry its gates with it. The idea
is not that Hades will attack the Church, but that the
Church will attack Hades, and as she does so, the very
gates of Hades will yield before her.
Thus we have two declarations about the Church by
the Master ; she is built by Christ on the rock, and when
she goes form on the conquests of Christ, she conquers
all intervening foes, and finally the last enemy, the very
gates of Hades, shall yield to her. She shall conquer
through life, through death, and unto the endless ages.
That is the Church I belong to, the Church impregnable,
unconquerable, marching out in perpetual triumph into
the ages beyond. That is Christ's estimate of the Church.
On a subsequent occasion Jesus mentions the Church
again. "If thy brother sin against thee, go, show him his
fault between thee and him alone; if he hear thee, thou
hast gained thy brother. But if he hear thee not, take
thee one or two more, that at the mouth of two witnesses,
or three, every word may be established. And if he refuse
to hear them, tell it unto the church; and if he refuse
to hear the church also, let him be unto thee as the Gen
tile and the publican." That is the church local. It is
impossible to tell to the whole catholic Church anything
between your brother and yourself; but it can be told
and it ought to be told to the local church if that brother

30 EVANGELISM.
is refusing to listen. It is a perfect picture of the church's
discipline. The church is to be so constituted, a fellow
ship of souls in Christ, that the wrong doing of one is
felt by, and affects the whole ; and the purity of the en
tire Church must be maintained, even at the cost of the
excommunication of a brother who persists in wrong
doing. Thus we learn from the words of Jesus, that the
Church is the building of Christ on the rock, that the
Church is the aggressive force which Christ leads to
ultimate victory, that the Church within herself is a
fellowship exercising discipline, caring for her own in
ternal life, and able to exercise final and Divine authority
in the case of all those in membership. These things are
true of the catholic Church, and also of the local Church.
From these first uses of the word in the New Testa
ment it is at once seen that the local church is a model
of the catholic Church, that all the truths concerning the
catholic Church are true in measure and in degree of
the local church, and if we would understand what the
function and the force of the local church is, we shall
have to attempt to get a vision of the function and the
force of the catholic Church.
Now as I pass from these words of Jesus, one or two
words concerning the use of the word in the Acts of
the Apostles will be in order. In the second chapter of
the Acts of the Apostles, and the forty-seventh verse,
"And the Lord added., to them day by day those that

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC. 31
were saved," the word church is inserted in King James'
Version, It is not in the original text. Its introduction
is of the nature of exposition, and translators almost in
variably break down when they attempt exposition. The
statement there is that, "the Lord added together them
that were being saved," and the translators thought it
must be "added to the Church." Seeing the word Church
was not there in the original, the English and American
revisers altered it, and put "added to them," that is, to
the disciples. That also is only true in a secondary sense.
The thought is that He added them to Himself. Of course
it is true that when He adds a man to Himself, He adds
him to the Church.
Through the Acts of the Apostles the word Church is
used sometimes of the catholic and sometimes of the
local church, and the local is always treated as a part
and model of the catholic. The actual word ecclesia
is used of ' the congregation of Israel in the wilder
ness once. In the nineteenth chapter the word is used
in the purely Greek sense, "Some therefore cried one
thing, and some another: for the assembly was in con
fusion. . . . But if ye seek anything about other
matters, it shall be settled in the regular assembly.
. . . When he had thus spoken, he dismissed the as
sembly." That word assembly is ecclesia. I am not
suggesting that the translation is improper. I think it
is wise that the word assembly is used on this occasion.
What was the assembly here referred to? It was the

32 EVANGELISM.
gathering together • of the members of one particular
trade. It is the first record we have, so far as I know,
of a trade union meeting, and the word assembly indi
cates the truth. The reference is not to the great pro
miscuous crowd which was congregated to see what
was going on, but that particular and select number,
bound together by a common purpose under a common
impulse. The Greek word is there used in its simplest
form. It means a called out assembly. It is the as
sembly of the silversmiths, and it is the assembly of the
town government. That is the word ecclesia, in its
simple etymological intention.
That word has been taken hold of by the Christian
fact, and has become the great word for the Church.
And it means very simply, an assembly of people, called
out, selected from the rest. In the letter to the Ephe-
sians we have a picture of the Church in these wonderful
words, "There is one body, and one Spirit, even as also
ye were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord,
one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all,. Who is
over all, and through all, and in all." There is nothing
in all the New Testament that is more wonderful in
its revelation of the nature of the true Church. Notice
first the apostle describes the Church, as "one body."
What is the body? Christ and every believer. Not the
believers without Christ. The body includes the Head.
Of course if we speak of the Head and the body, then
for the single moment we mean by the body, all ex-

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC. 33
cept the Head ; but in the statement "there is one body,"
in this passage the apostle is taking in the whole fact,
Christ Who is the Head, and all members. "One Spirit,"
that is the life of the one body, the intelligence of the
one body, the emotion of the -one body, the will of the
one body. "He that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit,"
so that the whole body of the Church is one with the
Head, and the Head is one with the body, and that one
unifying Spirit of God, in Christ and in all believers,
creates the one body. One dominating life that of the
Spirit, in Christ and in the believer, unifying Christ and
the believer, and all believers with each other, because
all are united to Christ.
"One body, and one Spirit, even as also ye were
called in one hope of your calling," that is to say, there
is one calling for Christ and the believer, for the whole
Church which is the body. In the former part of the
epistle that calling is declared to be that of showing to
the ages to come the grace of God, and teaching the
principalities and powers in the heavenlies the manifold
wisdom of God. That will be the work of Christ and
His people forever.
One body, Christ and all the members. One Spirit,
filling the whole body up to its last reach. One calling,
the eternal calling of Christ in union with the Church,
and the Church in union with Christ. This is a general
statement concerning the organism, the life, the calling of
the Church.
o

34 EVANGELISM.
The apostle next shows how individual members be
come members of the Church, how the units enter this
living unity. "One Lord," the Object of faith; "one
faith," set upon the one Lord; "one baptism," the bap
tism of the Holy Spirit, that unites the faithful soul with
the living Lord. That is the whole process.
The first note in the evangel is that of the Lordship of
Christ. Jesus is Lord by virtue of the splendour of
His character, by virtue of the victory of His Cross,
by virtue of the power of His resurrection. That "one
Lord," is presented to the soul as the Object of faith. The
answer of faith to the vision of the Lord is the whole
of human responsibility. That is the "one faith." Its
nature is that of believing on Him, or receiving Him as
Lord. It is the act of the will in surrender. That act
of faith is responded to by the "one baptism," that bap
tism of the Holy Spirit whereby the soul believing on
the Lord is made a member of the Lord Himself.
Thus the individual enters the Church. The one Lord
is presented to him. He believes. The Spirit baptizes
him, and he is a member. The human responsibility is
belief, the Divine answer is the baptism of the Holy
Spirit whereby that man is merged into the Christ life,
and becomes a member of Jesus Christ. "One Lord, one
faith, one baptism."
Thus is He building His Church. Man cannot admit
into the catholic Church. No one is admitted into the
Church by water baptism, nor by vote of a church meet-

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC. 35
ing, nor by the decision of a session. A person en
ters the Church when the Holy Spirit baptizes him into
Christ. All the other things may be necessary in order
that the discipline of the local church may be maintained.
There ought to be solemn recognition of some kind when
a man joins the outward and visible church, but all such
matters are outward and visible recognitions of the in
ward and invisible facts. The only condition on which
any person should be admitted to a local church is that
evidence is given of membership in the catholic Church
by the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Once again, "One God and Father of all, Who is over
all, and through all, and in all." That is the last fact of
the sevenfold unity. It indicates the glorious realization
of the purpose and plan of God in His government of,
operation through, and union with the ransomed society.
This great Church of the firstborn is being built, and as
yet man has never seen it. We see parts of it, but the scaf
folding is all about it yet; and sometimes it seems as
though there were more scaffolding than Church. But
when He comes, all the scaffolding will go; and the
glorious Church of the firstborn, made up of ransomed
souls baptized into the life of Christ, the great entity and
unity through which God will manifest Himself to ages
and to principalities, will be revealed in all its radiant
splendour. Let us now think of the local church in the light of this.
Every church is, as is the catholic Church, an assembly

36 EVANGELISM.
of those submitted to the Lordship of Christ. That is
the gate, that is the entrance, that is the foundation fact.
A local church is therefore an assembly of souls submit
ted to the Lordship of Christ. That does not tell all the
story, but it gives the key to the whole truth. Every
thing else follows, and to understand that, let us go back
to our evangel. The first note is that of the Lordship of
Christ. Men submit to that Lordship by believing on
Him. Then not only do they see the vision of the Lord,
but share the value of His death, and the virtue of His
life, and the victory of His presence. In the fifth chap
ter of Romans we see how these things are realized
within the Church in the living members who are bap
tized into union with Christ. The tenth verse, "For if,
while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God
through the death of His Son, much more, being recon
ciled, shall we be saved in His life." The seventeenth
verse, "For if, by the trespass of one, death reigned
through the one; much more shall they that receive the
abundance of grace of the gift of righteousness reign
in life through the One." "Reconciled by His death,"
"reign in life." Now as an aid to memory let us take
three words, reconciled, regenerate, regnant. These
words mark the truth in the case of every individual be
liever. The individual believer submitted to the Lord
ship of Christ, is reconciled to God by the value of
His death, regenerate by the virtue of His life commun-

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC . 37
icated, regnant by the indwelling Christ through the
Holy Spirit.
Now believing that a church is an assembly of such
persons, what results follow? Every church is intended
to be within itself a manifestation of all the purposes and
the facts of the Kingdom of God. A church is an as
sembly of persons, who in the power of the indwelling
life of Christ, realizing the ideals of Jesus, obey the
teaching of Jesus, and take part in the activities of Jesus.
It is here where perhaps the Church has most sadly failed
in the past, and where the failure of the Church today
is most apparent. We have too largely looked upon the
negative side, which has to do almost exclusively with
such facts as constitute the saving of the individual from
sin, and from punishment. These are most important
facts. But the great society of God, vitally one, essen
tially one, socially one, aggressively one, where is it at
the present hour? The Church ought to be a society
accepting the ideals of Jesus, and realizing them in the
power of His life; consequently a society of people obey
ing the moral code of Jesus, and therefore a society of
people manifesting to the world the breadth and beauty
and beneficence of the Kingship of God in and through
Jesus Christ. Is that what the Church is ? That is what
the Church ought to be, for that is the Divine intention.
But someone will say, What has all this to do with the
evangelistic Church. And the very fact of the question
reveals the weakness of the hour, ,' The Church has

38 EVANGELISM.
largely failed in evangelism because the Church has not
realized within her own borders the force of her own life.
We ask how is it that the masses refuse to listen to
her evangel, and are treating her in so marked a degree,
with contempt? Because the masses see perfectly well
that she is not obedient to her own Master's ideals, and
does not realize His purpose. That is the severest crit
icism, and it ought to make us blush, and hide our heads
with shame, that the Church is not fulfilling her Mas
ter's ideals. The evangelistic Church is the Church which
shares Christ's life, and in the power of it obeys His
law, and thus manifests Him to the world. Thus alone
can the Church engage in His work, and carry out His
enterprises. When the Church realizes and manifests her
Lord, in her personal membership, and corporate capacity,
then, and then only is she doing His work, the work of
seeking and saving the lost. That is the evangelistic
Church, and that is the true Church of Jesus Christ.
The purpose of the Church is certainly that of con
serving the life of the saints, but this only in order
that every saint, and all the saints, may be strong for
carrying out the purposes and the work of Jesus Christ.
"Ye shall be My witnesses," not witnesses as talkers
merely, but evidences, credentials, demonstrations, proofs
among men. The only Church which is truly evangelistic
is the Church which realizes within her own borders all
the will of her Lord and Master Jesus Christ,^/
Strength of spiritual life always issues in the mani-

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC. 39
festation through the Church to the world of the facts of
the Kingship of God in Christ, and the power of Jesus
Christ to deal with all the things in human life that are
contrary to the mind and will of God. The Church is to
be aggressive, capturing men, fighting against wrong,
urging everywhere and always the claims of Jesus Christ,
and this she can only be as within her own borders there
is realized the purposes of God.
In conclusion, the evangelical Church is necessarily
evangelistic. There are some things so patent they ought
not to need stating. Yet there seems to be a prevalent
idea that it is possible for a church to be evangelical
and not evangelistic. It is not possible. A friend of
mine in the ministry, a man of whose scholarship and
whose devotion there can be no doubt, talking to me
about evangelistic work, accounting for his own lack of
interest said, "Well I am profoundly evangelical, but I am
by no means evangelistic." There would seem to be
many who take that view. Let me say to you, my breth
ren, that this is an absurd contradiction of terms. No
man is truly evangelical unless he is evangelistic also.
What did my friend mean? He meant that he held
the evangelical doctrines of our holy faith, but he was
not interested in the specific work of winning men to
Christ. Now what are the foundation doctrines of our
holy faith? Evangelical faith affirms the death of Christ
was rendered necessary by the ruin of the race, and that
it is God's provision for man's salvation. It moreover

40 EVANGELISM.
declares that His life is at the disposal of men for their
new life of holiness. Are we evangelical? Do we be
lieve that Jesus died in order that He might save men? If
not, then we cannot claim to be evangelical. But if we
do, can we seriously assert that holding the doctrines, we
are yet content to do nothing for the men for whom
Christ died ? Knowing that we have the deposit of truth,
the great evangel, equal to the salvation of men, are we
careless about making it known ?
Some times one reads an advertisement which declares
a sure and certain cure for cancer has been discovered.
A man so advertising is wholly despicable. In the first
place because the assertion is a lie, but secondly because
if it is true, he is a rogue to hold for purposes of per:
sonal gain a secret which should immediately be given to
the world for the cure of that awful disease. And a
man tells me he is evangelical, he holds the truth about
salvation, and is thankful to God for the salvation of
his own poor miserable soul. I deny it. If the Cross of
Christ in his own life has meant deliverance, cleansing,
purity, that consciousness will drive any man out into
evangelistic work and effort.
Evangelism demands a Church, and wherever the
Church of Jesus Christ is, there is an instrument for
evangelistic work, because there is a company of men
and women in whom the evangel has won its victory,
and through whom it is manifested as a life, and pro
claimed as a message.

THE CHURCH EVANGELISTIC. 41
Let me say to all ministers, you will find you must have
your church act with you if you are going to do any
evangelistic work. And to church members, it is no use
wasting breath in the criticism of a minister because
he is not doing evangelistic work. Let the Church fall
into line. One of the first missions of the ministry will
be to bring his church into sympathy, and that will often
need a great deal of common sense and patience.
No church ought to be allowed to exist that has not
added to its membership by confession of faith. If a
church is existing only by letters of transfer, it is time
the doors were closed, and "Ichabod, the glory of the
Lord has departed" was inscribed across them.
This evangelism must begin in the churches. The
churches themselves must be turned back to the work
of evangelism. We are trusting too much to organiza
tions outside thg_QllArch. It is in the Church the work
must be done.) We shall have to travail in birth for the
souls of our own people. When in our own church life
all the forces of the Christ life are operative without hind
rance, then men will be brought under the sound and
power of the great and glorious evangel. May God
make all our churches, churches after the pattern of
the catholic Church, "one body, one Spirit, one calling,"
and "God over, through, in all," moving to His purpose,
accomplishing that purpose through the Spirit of Jesus
Christ.

EVANGELISM. III.
THE EVANGELIST.
The doctrine of New Testament ministry lies wholly
within that of the Church. The ministry serves the
Church under the Lordship of Christ. That is not to
say that ministers are servants of the Church in the
sense of obeying the Church. They do serve the Church
but they obey the Lord Christ. From that statement
two initial truths are to be deduced and remembered:
First, the ministry has no right to lord it over God's
heritage; and secondly, God's heritage has no right to
lord it over the ministry. I have of set purpose used
Peter's phrase. Writing to the elders and the bishops
he says, "neither lording it over the charge allotted to
you." The word "charge" there is kleros, the word from
which we derive our word clergy. According to Peter,
the whole Church was the clergy, and bishops were men
who were to serve the clergy, and not lord it over them.
Every believer is in the priesthood, and the whole Church
is the clergy, and yet within the whole Church there is a
distinct ministry. 42

THE EVANGELIST. 43
Our present subject is concerned principally with that
section of the Christian ministry indicated by the word
evangelist. But in order properly to understand the
function of the evangelist we must take time to set that
particular aspect of the ministry in relation to the whole.
There is too often a measure of friction between the
evangelist and those who are exercising other gifts of
the ministry, and this friction acts in two ways. Pastors
and teachers sometimes entertain a feeling almost
amounting to contempt for evangelists. The evangel
ist on the other hand, very often manifests a contempt
for pastor and teacher. Now this is all utterly false;
contrary to the spirit of the New Testament, contrary to
the spirit of love, contrary to the spirit of wisdom, con
trary to the Spirit of God. If we may but see the inter
relationship of these gifts, that a man is in the ministry,
not by his own choice, but by the choice of the Holy
Spirit, and that the work of each is not contradictory
to the work of the rest, but complementary rather, then
we shall be a long way towards understanding the true
place of the evangelist, and making for him his proper
place in the work of the Church of Jesus Christ.
"He gave some apostles, and some prophets, and some
evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the per
fecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry." This
is the reading of the King James Version, and we have
interpreted it as though these gifts were bestowed in
order that those receiving them might perfect the saints,

44 EVANGELISM.
and do the work of the ministry. As a matter of fact
what the apostle meant was that these gifts are bestowed
on men in the Church, in order that they may by their
ministry perfect the Church, so that the Church may do
the work of the ministry. The fullest fact of ministry
includes the whole Church, and the men within it who
have received special gifts, have received them in order
that they may perfect the Church to its work of ministry.
The translation of the Revisers makes this much more
clear, "He gave some apostles; and some, prophets; and
some, evangelists ; and some, pastors and teachers ; for the
perfecting of the saints, unto the work of ministering.'
"He gave some apostles." The specific work of the
apostles was the perfecting of the" doctrine, the funda
mental basis of teaching. "He gave some, prophets."
The work of the prophet was the perfecting of the forth-
telling, the declaration of the truth. "He gave some,
evangelists." The work of the evangelist is the perfect
ing of the number of the Church by calling men into
relationship with Christ. "He gave some, pastors and
teachers." Their work lies wholly within the Church,
and is that of perfecting the character of the members
of the Church in order that the whole Church may be
perfectly equipped for its ministry. These are the true
orders of the Christian ministry. These are the fund
amental and spiritual orders, and we must recognize them
if there is to be any fulfillment of the whole function of
our ministry.

THE EVANGELIST. 45
But now let us enquire how a person in the Church
becomes a minister within the Church. Let us turn to
Corinthians, in the first letter, chapter twelve. Here we
have a chapter that always ought to be read side by side
with this fourth chapter of Ephesians, on the subject of
Church order. In that chapter you will find that the
apostle, beginning a section concerning the spirituali
ties, deals first with the Lordship of Jesus, and then with
the ministry of the Spirit of God, and as a sub-section
thereof, with the gifts bestowed by the Spirit. He is
dealing with gifts far larger than those of the ministry
to which he refers in Ephesians. In the course of his
argument he makes a statement of vital importance, that
the Spirit bestows these gifts upon "each one severally
even as He will." In Ephesians the same principle is de
clared, that "He gave some, apostles; He gave some,
prophets; He gave some, evangelists; He gave some,
pastors and teachers." The whole emphasis of the truth
is that capacity for ministry in any form is a gift, and
it is a gift bestowed by the Head of the Church through
the Holy Spirit according to His own pleasure. There
fore no man can choose to be a minister of Jesus Christ,
as any man may choose the profession of medicine, or
of law. No man ever really enters the Christian min
istry in the deep spiritual sense of the term, save as he
receives a gift from the Head of the Church by the
Holy Spirit which perfectly equips him for the work
he has to do.

46 EVANGELISM.
We are hearing a great deal in these days of the dearth
of men entering our theological seminaries. I have been
asked if I would not urge upon young men that they
should give themselves to the ministry, urge them to
adopt the ministry as a calling in life which is high, and
holy, and beautiful. And my reply always is, I dare not
urge any man. No man can enter the ministry of his
own will and choice. The only way in which a man
can possibly enter the ministry is when the Holy Spirit
of God bestows upon him a gift from the Head of the
Church. By that gift he is made a minister of Jesus
Christ. Nothing short of that makes a minister, and that
being so, nothing can prevent his being a minister, except
his own disobedience to the heavenly calling. I would
very solemnly urge young men to consider well whether
or not they have not had the gift and the calling, and
are refusing it. Has there come upon your soul some
where, somewhen, a burning passion to preach the Word,
a great constraint, a sure conviction that you can preach
it ; and have you allowed some secular calling, some ma
terial advantage to persuade you that you can still be a
good Christian and make money? It is at the peril
of your soul you stay there. If once the gift is bestowed
then "woe" is that man if he "preach not the Gospel."
Notice m the next place that these gifts refer to spe
cial spiritual qualifications for the doing of special spir
itual service. What is a gift bestowed upon a man?
What is the gift of the apostle, the gift of the prophet,

THE EVANGELIST. 47
the gift of the evangelist, the gift of the pastor and
teacher ? I do not mean what is the specific value or the
distinction between these, but what is the underlying
quality in each ? What is a gift? The gifts are certainly
not such as may be designated natural endowments.
They are spiritual quantities and qualities, bestowed for
the doing of spiritual work. A man receives the gift of
an apostle. Then in him there is a spiritual force, a
spiritual vision, a spiritual fitness that his brethren have
not, which fits him for doing a distinctly spiritual work,
the work of the apostolate. So with all of them. The
gift is a spiritual qualification.
But while it is true that the gift is bestowed, and is
not merely a natural endowment, it is also perfectly cer
tain that the Spirit of God never bestows a spiritual gift
for service except upon men who have natural endow
ments that will enable them to use it. There is nothing
in the economy of God out of joint and out of place.
There is perfect harmony between God's first creation and
the bestowment of special spiritual gifts. The new birth
does not mean the death of everything essential and noble
in the first birth, but its life. So also when God bestows
the gift of the apostle, or the prophet, or the evangel
ist, or the pastor and teacher upon a man, the gift will
be bestowed upon men who have natural aptitudes and
fitness and endowments for their work. A young man
in my church tells me God has called him to preach.
Then I immediately give him opportunities to preach.

48 EVANGELISM.
I find him an occasion in the Mission Hall, or in a cot
tage ; and in oversight with me there will be my brethren
in the diaconate, and they will hear him, not critically,
but with the" solicitude of a great and passionate desire
to help him. And if after a little while we find that the
man has no natural endowment I would say to him in
love and in all honesty, My friend, you have evidently
made a mistake. God has never called you to preach,
or you would be able to preach.
We have been making the terrible mistake of putting
a man through the theological seminary, and when he has
completed his course we find, and he finds that he is not
a preacher, and so he writes essays to the end of time.
Essays are excellent things, but the writing and reading
of them is not preaching. We must find the men with
natural endowments and the spiritual gifts. If a man
has that twofold equipment, and is responsive to the
heavenly vision, you cannot stop him preaching, and you
cannot stop his preaching with power. The gift is a
spiritual quantity and quality, bestowed upon a man hav
ing natural endowments. The gift of the pastor and
teacher will be a spiritual quality of appreciation of truth
bestowed upon a man who is a born teacher and a born
shepherd. The gift of the prophet will be an apprecia
tion of truth in its application to the needs of his age,
bestowed upon a man, who if he is not a preacher must
be a speaker somewhere or other. It is affirmed that men
with absolutely no gift of speech, receiving the spiritual

THE EVANGELIST. 49
gift have become great preachers. Personally I have
never known such a case. I was told in England some
years ago by a dear man who held very strongly that
all spiritual power in service was spiritual merely, that
.there was no connection between man's natural capacity
and the spiritual gift, and the instance cited was D. L.
Moody, and I was told he had no natural gifts of ora
tory, that everything he had was the spiritual equipment.
I am not undervaluing the spiritual equipment, but if
D. L. Moody had gone into politics instead of preach
ing, you would have found that he would have swayed
vast audiences, and that he was a man of natural endow
ment. A gift is a spiritual quantity and quality be
stowed by the Head of the Church at His own will
through the Holy Spirit upon those who are naturally
endowed to receive it. That is the fundamental truth
concerning the vocation and the force and the power of
the Christian ministry.
Let us now notice the inter-relation of these gifts.
The apostle was the first messenger. The work of the
apostle consisted in the proclaiming of truth first, and
then in the committal to sacred writings of the truth.
It is written in the Acts of the Apostles that the early
disciples "continued steadfastly in the apostles' teach
ing." In that phrase we have the indication of one part
of the work of the apostolate. I am inclined to say
the gift of the apostolate is still conferred under cer
tain circumstances for specific work. At the birth of

50 EVANGELISM.
all great missionary movements there has been an apostle,
a first messenger, one with a specific gift to go forth
and tell at the beginning the doctrines of the Way.
Then we have the work of the prophet. The peculiar
and distinctive note of prophetic utterance is that a man
who is a prophet foretells the truth from God without any
reference to the pleasure or anger of the people. This
is the prophetic note. You find it in the old prophecies.
"Whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear."
The prophet is not an evangelist. The prophet does not
come down into personal dealing, and constraint of in
dividual lives. The prophet is a man whose voice is
lifted in an age, pouring out truth, compelling the age
at least to hear it. Whether it will obey or not is not his
responsibility. That is the characteristic note of the
prophet in all dispensations. And God has never been
without prophets in this Christian era.
The evangelist is a name signifying a man who tells
the glad tidings always with a view to constraining the
man who listens by the evangel, to that of which the
evangel bears testimony. I am inclined to think that
the opportunity of the evangelist is today often made by
the prophet; that in prophetic utterances and prophetic
ministry there is an arousing of conscience and inquiry,
and to that the evangelist comes with his personal and
individual message of the Lordship of Christ; the value
of His Cross; the virtue of His resurrection; and the
glorious victory of His indwelling. And the evangel-

THE EVANGELIST. 51
ist is therefore the one who in the name of the Church
tells men and women outside how they may come inside,
declares the glorious glad news of the infinite Gospel.
As in response to the message of the evangel, men
crowd to the Christ, owning Him Lord, receiving the
value of His death, the virtue of His life, the assurance
of victory, then the pastor and teacher begins to teach
them, and train them, and to watch over them. There
are two words that mark the work of the pastor and
teacher; overseer, and pastor. He is one who watches,
and feeds the flock of God. John Milton, when speaking
of false pastors, and their failure in the ministry de
scribes them in a most remarkable phrase. He speaks
of them as "blind mouths." And he says, "The hungry
sheep look up, and are not fed." It is a terrible indict
ment, and that because it is scriptural. It appears a
contradiction in terms, "blind mouths." It is not 50,
for as Ruskin points out, Milton brought together the
two facts in the work of the pastor and teacher. His
first work is to watch over the flock, but Milton says he
is "blind." His second work is to feed the sheep, but
Milton says instead of doing that he is trying to be fed
himself, he is a "mouth."
Let no evangelist think that the pastor and teacher who
year by year patiently feeds the flock is not doing God's
work because he is not doing that of the evangelist.
And let no pastor and teacher think that the men passing
over the country like a flame of fire, proclaiming salvation

52 EVANGELISM.
and constraining men to acceptance, are sensational
merely. Oh this great Church of Jesus Christ, if we could
only realize it, with its great gifts; the apostle, the first
messenger to the new region; the prophet, the perpetual
voice proclaiming truth, the evangelist, the perpetual voice
calling men to the Christ, the pastor and teacher, in
structing, leading, guiding, and culturing the saints.
But I must leave that larger outlook. \ have at» least
said enough to show the place of the evangelist, and to '
show there is no antagonism between the work of the
different orders. I once heard W. L. Watkinson, one of
the most wonderful preachers in England today, with
a marvelous gift of sanctified satire, say in a great con
gregation of ministers, "The pity is we do not understand
each other." He continued, "I go to one man in the reg
ular . pastorate, and I say to him, 'What do you think of
these special men' and he replies with a curl of his lip,
'Sensation.' " And then I come to a special man and I
say to him, "What do you think of that quiet man down
there' and he says, 'Oh, stagnation !' " And that tells
the truth of the attitude too often indulged in against
each other. In the light of this great truth of the com-
plernentary nature of the gifts we ought to recognize the
fact that every man in the ministry, while he will have
one specific gift above all others, will yet have sympa
thy with all the rest, for I still believe that the Holy
Spirit confers gifts of this order upon the Church, giv-

THE EVANGELIST. 53
ing some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and
teachers. Happy indeed is that church whose eccle
siastical order will allow it to make room for a man
to exercise the gift God has bestowed, and unhappy is
that Church who wants each of its ministers to be some
thing of a prophet, and something of an evangelist, and
something of a pastor and teacher, and thus making him
something of each, makes him the whole of nothing. We
want room for the orderliness of the Spirit of God in
our ecclesiastical arrangements.
But now where this is established, and we see the inter
relation of these gifts, and how there is no conflict but
perfect harmony where the whole Church and ministry
is under the dominance of the Spirit, we may turn to
the specific gift of the evangelist. In the New Testa
ment only two men are definitely spoken of as evangel
ists. Philip is called an evangelist, and in the final charge
of Paul to Timothy, he says "Fulfill thy ministry, do
the work of an evangelist." It is at least significant
that the two men who are called evangelists are in en
tirely different circumstances, and suggests as I think,
the two types of the evangelist. Philip was a man at
large. He was not definitely in charge of any Church,
nor was he, as I believe, set apart by any apostolic
function to his work. He was an evangelist, prepared
by the impartation of a qualification for telling the Gospel,
to tell the Gospel. He moves from place to place. He
goes to Samaria, then he speaks to the individual eunuch,

54 EVANGELISM.
and is caught away to Azotus. Then we find him moving
up through Caesarea, at last settling down, his children
coming up after him, and uttering the same great Gos
pel. That is one evangelist as I see him in the Acts of
the Apostles.
The other is a man, who is in oversight of the Church
at Ephesus, placed in oversight through certain difficul
ties arising there, and the letter of the apostle is writ
ten to instruct him in his work. I am inclined to think
that the more special work of Timothy was that of the
evangelist, moving from place to place. But Paul saw
the necessity of a certain oversight at Ephesus, and
sent him there. And he writes to him of his charge, the
church; and instructs him as to how he shall take over
sight; but the last thing the apostle urges is that he
shall not forget that though he is now in oversight of the
church through certain ecclesiastical difficulties, he is to
fulfill his ministry, and do the work of an evangelist.
It is at least significant that these two men are described
by the term evangelist, the one moving from place to
place, and the other settled in oversight of a church.
Having simply referred to that by way of illustration,
in order that we may understand that the evangelist
may be a man called to move from point to point, or he
may be a man placed by God in the oversight of a church,
I want to speak of this gift itself. I have said of all
these gifts that they are spiritual quantities and qualities.
There is no specific description in the New Testament of

THE EVANGELIST. 55
either of these gifts bestowed. We may however safely
argue from the work the nature of the gift. A man who
receives the gift of the evangelist is one to whom there
is given a clear understanding of the evangel, a great
passion in his heart results from the clear vision, a
great optimism fills his soul, born of his confidence in
the power of Christ to save every man; and growing
out of that passion and that confidence a great con
straint seizes him to tell somebody, to tell everybody
the glad news of salvation by Jesus Christ. Those pecu
liar qualities are not found in all men called to the
ministry. Every man will have sympathy along these
lines. There are however other forms of spiritual gifts,
as we have seen. But where this is the all-consuming
fire, there you have an evangelist.
Granted that a man has the gift, on what line is he
to be trained for the exercise thereof? He must be
trained in theory and in practice, and the training of
theory and practice must go side by side during the whole
time of his preparation for the exercise of his gift.
Wherever possible I would give a man the profoundest
and fullest academic training possible, but I would put
each theological seminary in, or not far from a great
city, and I would send the theological students down
into the slums to teach and to preach. There are men
advising us to save men by education, and the latest
thing I hear suggested is salvation by psychology. This
kind of suggestion is however, always confined to the-

56 EVANGELISM.
ory and does not get beyond the book in which it is
discussed. A good many books issue from the press
which would never see the light if while the man was
thinking out his problem -he had to go into the slum
district or suburban quarter for the definite business
of saving men.
A man must be trained, but the man who has this
passion must exercise it, he must use it. A man who has
this constraint must not be hindered from going out to ex
ercise the gift, or else the gift within him will burn
down to cinders and ashes.
While exercising his gift, let him be trained in every
way. The evangelist ought to be a man, a whole man, a
man who is to be a perfect instrument for . that perfect
Gospel he is called to preach. He is to train physically, to
train mentally, and above everything else, to train spir
itually. We have no right to think that while all the
other vocations of life, of the lawyer, of the doctor, of
the business man, demand preparatory hard work and
training, that we can successfully put untrained men
into the work of the ministry.
If God takes hold of a man He has called to the
work, and it is really impossible for him to obtain
training, and he becomes a veritable flame of fire, that
is no reason why other men should shirk training, and
slip carelessly into the work of the evangelist. The
very magnificence of your Gospel, the very majesty
of your work demands that you should take time, take

THE EVANGELIST. 57
your whole being, and attempt to make it a fit instru
ment for the proclamation of the great Gospel. I would
like to say a good deal about physical training. If a
man is going to preach this evangel, he has no right to
trifle with his physical powers. My body is to be the
temple of the Holy Ghost, Who through me, will pro
claim this evangel, and I am to see to it so far as I am
able, that in all its powers it is an instrument fit for the
Master's work.
And so with the mind. Ignorance is not a qualification
for evangelism My dear young brother, are you look
ing forward to an evangelistic ministry? Then I plead
with you, gird up the loins of your mind, and obtain
all the knowledge possible. No single branch of knowl
edge is out of place to the man who is going to do the
work of an evangelist. You may gather illustrations
from all sciences, from all literature, and if you are only
living close to the centre, and close to Christ, you will
see light gleaming and breaking everywhere. Don't
hurry through training in order to do this work, but
while the training goes on, let there be exercise al'.
the while, and through the process you will gain in
strength, and become presently an evangelist proclaim
ing the message with the vigour of physical strength,
with the acumen of mental equipment, and with the
dynamic of spiritual force. Such are the men for whom
the world waits at this moment, for the preaching of this
great Gospel of Jesus Christ.

58 EVANGELISM.
Then if this is the gift and the training of the evan
gelist, what is his work? The evangelist is to go forth
and preach the Lordship of Christ, preach Him as Lord
until men in the presence of His Lordship become con
scious of their own failure. Then begins the great com
mission of declaring to them that by His Cross salvation
has come to them, that all they are not, they may be,
and all they are, they need not be, that the things
they would not be but are, can be cancelled in blood,
the things they would be, but are not, they may be by
life in the Spirit. Oh this is a great message, the evan
gel of the Cross.
But is the proclamation all ? By no' means ! The evan
gelist must constrain men to obey. There must be that
wonderful wooing note that breaks men's hearts, and
sweeps them to Christ. That is the final and most re
markable note of the real evangelist, by which he con
strains men. Not merely the declaration of the evan
gel, not merely the announcement of the Lordship of
Christ, and the declaration of the Cross, but the ability
to take hold of men, and compel them to Christ.
Of course some worldly critic will call this personal
magnetism. That however is not all the truth. It is
the constraint of the personality of Christ through the
personality of the consecrated men which wins.
Think of the great evangelists, stern men very often,
and yet their sternness always melted into tears. Every
great evangelist has been of that nature. The late Robert

THE EVANGELIST. 59
W. Dale of Birmingham, England, greatest of our theo
logians said to me, sitting in his study one day, "I think
I have only known one evangelist that I felt had the
right fo speak of a lost soul." And I said, "Who was it?"
He replied, "It was D. L. Moody, and it was because he
never spoke of the possibility of a man being lost with
out tears in his voice." He turned from fiery denuncia
tion of sin into quiet plaintive tearful heart-broken con
straint. It is the great equipment. It is the great secret.
If all this be true, what manner of man is the evangelist
to be in his own character ? First of all he must himself
be a credential of the Gospel he preaches. It is no use
my preaching the Lordship of Christ unless I am loyal to
Him. I may eloquently describe His Kingship, I may
with acumen defend Him against the attacks of others;
but if my life is not loyal, my eloquence is sounding brass,
a tinkling cymbal, a blasphemy and an impertinence.
And the man who preaches the Cross must be a cru
cified man. You may preach the Cross and it is nothing
but a Roman gibbet unless you preach it from yourself.
It is the crucified man that can preach the Cross. Said
Thomas "Except I shall see in His hands the print
of the nails ... I will not believe." Dr. Parker of
London said that what Thomas said of Christ, the world
is saying about the Church. And the world is saying
to every preacher : Unless I see in your hands the print
of the nails I will not believe. It is true. It is the man
who is at the end of himself, who has got to the end of

60 EVANGELISM.
reputation, and the end of earthly ambition, the man who
has died with Christ, he it is that can preach the Cross
of Christ.
And yet more. Not only loyal to His Lordship, and
not only realizing the power of His Cross, but revealing
the glory of His resurrection in a life rising above the
things of this life, triumphing every day; not merely
the man of the Cross, but the man of the Easter morn
ing. Are you, dear brother mine, preacher of the evan
gel, are you an Easter morning man ? It is not the Cross
only. It is the Cross and resurrection. Have you come
to resurrection by the way of the Cross ? Is the radiance
of its glory on your brow? Is the song of an assured
victory in your heart? If you are doubting, you cannot
inspire faith. If you are not sure how this thing is going
to turn out, no one will be persuaded. You must be the
man of certainty, a man on the resurrection side of the
grave, the old life behind. You remember the old story
of a boy flying his kite. He could not see it. A gentle
man passing said to him, "What are you doing?" "Flying
my kite." "Oh but," he said, "you cannot see it." "No,
but I" feel its pull." It is the man who feels the pull
of the unseen things that is going to preach this Gospel,
and the only man who does that will be the man who by
the way of the Cross, has come out into the resurrection
life. And consequently the evangelist is a man not only
preaching the possibility of victory by the indwelling

THE EVANGELIST. 61
Christ, he is in himself truly optimistic in the power of
personal realization of victory. Pessimism paralyzes
power in evangelistic preaching; but this great optim
ism of the indwelling of Christ is a perpetual power.
And all this means the necessity for unceasing vigi
lance. The man who is to be an evangelist, the voice
of the Church, proclaiming the glad news, how zeal
ously and jealously he must guard the gift committed to
him. What personal examination and correction are
necessary if this work is to be perfectly done. Oh the
subtle and insidious foes of the minister, sloth, ambition,
pride, distraction, these are the things that spoil us. My
brothers, how we must guard against them. How the
evangelist needs to live in perpetual fellowship with God.
How he needs earnestly to devote himself to the hard
working, brain-sweating study of his message. And how
the evangelist needs to be perpetually on the watch for
souls. Let me gather up and conclude. Sympathy with the
evangelist is in every man gifted by the Spirit, though
all may not have the specific gift. The varieties create
the harmonies. Harmony is a concord of differences.
So whether you have that specific gift or no, you have
sympathy with it if you are Christ's own minister. At
least keep that sympathy alive and warm. Don't let
anything freeze it out, paralyze it.
My, special word is to you, my brothers, perhaps to a
few only, whom God has called to this special work.

62 EVANGELISM.
Let your spirit be carefully guarded. And yet niore
strongly let me say that you as a witness in the Church,
having the gift of the evangelist, ought to be able to in
spire everyone you meet, men and women in your Church,
with the sympathy and passion that consumes you. That
is your first and greatest work even as an evangelist.
And as there is no calling more wonderful than that
of the evangelist, therefore none demands more in cost
and in toil.
And now this final word to those in whose hearts there
burns the sympathy. By your prayer, by your co-opera
tion, by your determined attempt to sweep everything
out of the highway, help these men who are called and
gifted for the proclamation of the message. And if in
the pastor of your church you have discovered a man
in whose heart there is this great passion and constraint,
driving him to win souls, oh, I beseech you, don't hinder
him, don't bind him, don't prevent him, don't demand that
he shall put that which is a gift of evangelism into its
wrong use of taking care of you, but rather in your
co-operation with him, catch the same spirit, carry on
the same great glorious work. Thus all of us in measure,
while some by specific equipment, may be evangelists of
the Cross.

EVANGELISM. IV.
THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE.
This is the phase of our subject which personally I
should prefer to omit. I freely confess to a fear of the
study of methods. I am well aware that such a study
is necessary, but I am always a little afraid lest we
should attempt to press into some ready-made method,
the infinite Spirit of God. "The wind bloweth where it
will, and thou hearest the voice thereof, but knowest
not whence it cometh, and whither it goeth, so is every
one that is born of the Spirit." These words of our
Master have very wide application. They indicate the
spontaneity of the work of the Spirit. No man can tell
whence the wind cometh, or whither it goeth. No man
can foretell the line along which the Spirit of God will
operate toward the accomplishment of the Divine
purpose. It is nevertheless true that no man will make
the wind his servant save as he learns the true method
of answering its law. The wind bloweth where it will,
but if I want the wind to be my servant, and propel
my boat across the sea I must know how to construct
63

64 EVANGELISM.
my boat and my sail to catch the wind. And so while
the Spirit of God is the one Worker, without whom
nothing can be done along the line of true evangelism,
it is nevertheless true that it is important that we should
discover those methods with which He works most
easily and naturally, and in proportion as we do this
we shall be able to co-operate with Him in all His
great work and purpose.
In dealing with the conduct of an evangelistic service,
it must be distinctly understood that I would not at
tempt to compel every man to use one method, and
above all, I would not attempt to suggest that I have
discovered the final or best method by which the Spirit
may work.
I want to speak first of all of the place of evangelistic
services in the course of the regular ministry, and then
of the work of evangelism at special seasons in the
life of a church or community.
The presence in our congregations of those not ac
tually and personally submitted to Christ, must always
create the necessity for such service. Nothing can be
more paralyzing to the life of a minister himself, or
to the congregations that assemble regularly to hear
him as he preaches the word, than that he should come
to think, or should so preach as to make his people
think, that definite decision for Christ is not import
ant in every individual life. There is a very great peril
along that line to all of us in the work of the regular

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 65
ministry. I am very thankful to be able to speak to
you from the standpoint of twelve years' experience in
the settled work of the ministry. I know exactly what
it is to face a congregation Sabbath after Sabbath. There
is nothing more full of delight than that kind of work, but
there is a danger that we take too much for granted
about the people to whom we preach, and if we are not
careful we shall drift into the opinion that because these
people are attending services, therefore there is no need
for the direct appeal of the evangel to be made to them.
We must ever remember that it is necessary that every in
dividual person should come into personal relationship
with Jesus Christ. We must remember that no child
is born a Christian. That is not for one single moment
to enter into any discussion as to the question whether
or no the children of Christian people are born within
a covenant. I believe they are, but they are not born
Christians; and whereas I very strongly hold, — and my
own life's experience is the most remarkable testi
mony to the truth of the fact, — that where a child is
born of Christian parents, and is trained in a Christian
home, the actual acceptance of Jesus Christ as Lord by
that child is likely to be natural and simple, without
revulsion, without earthquake shock, soft as the kiss of
morning on the brow of Nature, sweet as the passing
zephyr over the fields of flowers, yet there must be def
inite submission, and no child because born of Chris
tian parents, is therefore a Christian. In all our preach-
E

66 EVANGELISM.
ing we need to remember that the dear children of our
own members, coming with them to worship — and there
is no fairer sight to my own eyes than that of seeing
father and mother and children sitting before me Sab
bath after Sabbath — must each one for himself and
herself, at some age of understanding and discretion,
yield their own life to Jesus Christ, or else they can
never be Christians.
Now with that conviction in the heart of the minis
ter, he will at once see how there must be in his preaching,
even though he be a pastor and teacher principally, a
desire for the salvation of these, and there must be oc
casionally some message, some appeal, some opportu
nity given to those who sit under his ministry, to make
an immediate decision and a definite confession of Jesus
Christ. No man can have as the burden of his preaching
the Lordship of Christ, whether the special quality be
that of the prophet, or that of the evangelist, or that of
the pastor and teacher, without bringing to the con
sciences of those who hear him a conviction of sin.
In the first of these lectures I laid special emphasis
upon the first note of the evangel, the Lordship of
Christ. It is the great theme of preaching. It is the
message of the prophet to his age. It is the message of
the evangelist to the individual. It is the message of the
pastor and teacher, to his people. The prophet pro
claims that Jesus is Lord over all the affairs of men.

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 67
The evangelist proclaims that Jesus is Lord in the realm
of the salvation of the individual. The pastor and teacher
insists upon the Lordship of Christ in the actual life
of the believer. And no man can preach that Lordship
in all the spaciousness of its meaning, without those
who hear him coming into the consciousness of sin.
Now wherever as the result of the preaching of the
Lordship of Christ, conviction of sin results in the con
sciences of those who hear, there at once is created
the necessity for the proclamation of the way of sal
vation, or in other words, there is the opportunity for
the evangelistic service.
Therefore I submit that the minister of Jesus Christ
ought occasionally to hold meetings where he urges im
mediate decision, and gives the opportunity for the
same. We must not be led astray from the essential
work of the Christian ministry by imagining vve have
some gift which liberates us from responsibi'ity about
the decision of the men and women who listen to us.
There is no gift that does not include within it some
thing of the evangelistic necessity, of urging the claim
of Christ upon individuals. I hold no regular ministry
is complete in which there is never an opportunity for
immediate decision on the part of those who are
brought into contact with the fact of the Lordship of
Christ, and who hear the evangel of salvation.
As to time and season, my own conviction is that in
the work of the regular ministry in the vast majority

68 EVANGELISM.
of cases it is not wise to decide that on every Sunday
night there shall be an evangelistic service. There are
exceptions to this rule. The local circumstances must
always decide. In the Moody church of Chicago, where
Sunday by Sunday there is -gathered together a promis
cuous crowd, no Sabbath evening passes without an
evangelistic appeal, and without decisions for Christ.
Some persons imagine that because it is done there,
it ought to be so everywhere. That by no means fol
lows. Neither do I think it wise to hold an evangelistic
service at stated intervals. That is too mechanical an
arrangement. The pastor who is living in fellowship
with the Spirit of God, and who is seeking to receive
his messages direct from God, will discover when the
moment has come in which he must declare the evangel,
and make his appeal. That is the occasion for the
evangelistic service. If I may refer to my own experience
as a pastor, I have gone on from Sunday to Sunday,
sometimes for one or two months with an evangelistic
service after each evening service. On the other hand
there have been periods when only once in the month
or perhaps twice, such services have been held, and
sometimes months would pass with no such service.
I never went to my pulpit knowing whether I would
have such a service or not. I went with a burden and
a message, and having endeavoured to lead and train
my church in co-operation with me, they were never
surprised if I had an after-meeting. If I did hold one,

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 69
I found my officers and workers ready to do the nec
essary work. There are a thousand men who have
not the specific gift of the evangelist, who yet are able
to do evangelistic work occasionally as opportunity oc
curs. There are a thousand men who have not the
particular quality that draws to their church the pro
miscuous and large multitude, but who nevertheless, are in
the ministry by the gift and appointment of God, and their
special work will be that of preaching regularly to a
congregation composed very largely of the same people,
but into which strangers will constantly be coming.
There is no congregation made up of saints, conse
quently there will be in all congregations an element of
those interested but not submitted, and the minister
must ever have on his heart the burden of such people.
A great many ministers say to me, We don't feel we
can conduct evangelistic services like that. How shall
we do it? First of all by the use of your natural en
dowments. There are men who have remarkable pow
ers of persuasion at an election, who yet say they can
not urge men to decision for Christ. If you have in
fluenced a man to vote as he ought to vote for the
good of the country, you should be able to win a man
for Christ. A man in the ministry of Jesus Christ,
whose heart has been touched with the Spirit of God,
must feel the compassion of the heart of Christ towards
men, and must feel the winning and drawing power
of the Christ over men. If a minister have no compas-

70 EVANGELISM.
sion for men, no yearning tor souls, no knowledge of
what it is to travail in birth for the souls of men, he
should search his own heart and life, and see what it
means, for there must be something wrong between him
and his Lord, or that compassion and power of con
straint would most certainly be there.
As to the conduct of an after-meeting. The first thing
necessary is that the minister should preach so as to
make one necessary. It is no use conducting an after-
meeting after any sort of preaching. If decision has
been urged in the preaching, then I cannot help think
ing that if in the power of the Spirit an appeal be made
for immediate response, it will be realized. Two or
three years ago it was my privilege to take part in
the simultaneous mission arranged for by the Free
Church Council of England. Some people will tell
you that mission was a failure. That is only partially
true. I am quite prepared to admit that it did not suc
ceed in any large extent, in reaching the vast masses of the
unchurched people. There were exceptions of course,
but both in London and the provinces there were whole
regions, residential regions very often, as well as slum
regions, which were hardly touched at all. But the
movement was a glorious success in that it aroused
in the hearts of hundreds of pastors an interest in evan
gelistic work, and turned them to evangelism in their
own churches. The provincial mission which I conduc
ted was held in the Town Hall of the city. There were

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 71
United in that mission all the Free Churches. God
greatly blessed the services, and many were brought
to Christ. The last meeting I held was with the minis
ters, a conference in which they asked what they could
do to take up and carry on the work. I suggested that
on the next Sunday night every man, whether he had
ever done so before or not, should preach to his own
congregation with the distinctive and avowed purpose
of persuading many of them whom he loved, but who
as yet had not yielded to Christ, to yield to Him at once.
To this they agreed, and on that next Sunday night
every minister preached to his own people an evangel
istic sermon, held an after-meeting, and through all the
city men and women were saved. I believe that every
minister who would prayerfully hold such a service in
his own church, and among his own people, would have
actual and definite results.
Now as to evangelistic services at special seasons.
Such seasons may arise in some individual church, or
in some union movement among the churches. I do
not propose now to discuss the union movements. -I
am not discrediting them. I thank God for all of them
which are so much blessed in my own country, and
in this. For the splendid work being done by Dr. Tor-
rey and Mr. Alexander I thank God perpetually. But
what I am principally interested in is a new devotion
to evangelistic work in our churches, and consequently
I want to confine myself very largely to the special mis-

72 EVANGELISM.
sion of evangelism in the church. In the work of a
faithful ministry there will come special seasons when
the minister and office bearers alike will have borne
in upon them the conviction that the time is ripe for
harvest. The movement may begin with some woman
who prays, and keeps on praying quietly and alone,
making no talk about it, until a conviction that God
is beginning to work takes possession of the whole
church. That is the occasion for the work of the special
evangelist. Very many feel that the minister himself
is the true man for the work. It may be so in some
instances, but it is more fitting in the majority of cases
that the minister should seek for some man to co-op
erate with him, whose gift is specifically that of the
evangelist. Now as to method and management. When the
church is conscious of imminent Divine visitation there
must be the most careful and watchful preparation. It
should begin in the gathering together of the church for
united prayer. I think that when the church is conscious of
Divine visitation, of the movement of the Spirit of God,
there need be no indecent hurry. Nothing is lost by a
time of waiting, during which the church is gathered
together for solemn preparation by consecration and in
tercession. Then there must be systematic preparation
as to the needs of the whole neighbourhood. If a church
in a district or neighbourhood is going to hold a series
of special meetings, that is the moment in which that

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 73
church stretches out in actual endeavour to reach the
whole neighbourhood. Every house in the neighbour
hood will receive invitations to the services, and it will
be seen that an invitation 'shall reach every person, not
once or twice, but a dozen times before the services be
gin. That is very detailed and technical I know, but it
is along such lines of hard work, and consecrated prayer
ful preparation that the greatest blessings have come
to services held in connection with individual churches.
During the course of the meetings every member of'
the church should be a worker. It may be urged that
that is a counsel of perfection which can never be car
ried out. At least let it be a counsel of perfection, and
let every church attempt to realize it. It may be ob
jected that it is not necessary that every church member
should be a worker. And yet nothing is more import
ant. There are many kinds of workers wanted in con
nection with evangelistic meetings, house-to-house visit
ors; Christian men and women in the choir to sing
the Gospel ; Christian men as ushers ; specially trained
and qualified enquiry room workers; and beyond all
these, a band of men and women, who unable to help
in any of the ways indicated, shall labour together with
the rest, in earnest pleading prayer. The church mem
bership should be called together, and the burden of
this matter laid upon them in the spirit of prayer. Then
let arrangements be made. Finding out what each is
fitted for, allot "to every man his work."

74 EVANGELISM.
The importance of house-to-house visitation is very
great. Let the visitation be courteous and kind, and yet
insistent as to the claims of Jesus Christ, devoid of
arrogance, but characterized by a winning courteous
manner. Let that be done time after time, until it
shall be impossible for any human being in the neigh
bourhood of the church to say "no man careth for my
soul." As to the singing. If there is one thing not wanted
in evangelistic work it is a number of unconverted men
and women to lead the singing. Christian men and
women are needed, who in all their singing show the
tender and matchless power of Jesus Christ, and they
should be gathered out of the church.
Then as to the stewards and ushers. Are we not
sometimes a little in danger of forgetting the import
ance of them ? The way a man is met at the door and
shown to his chair, may decide him for or against God.
The way a man is welcomed or repulsed may attract
him to Christ or drive him from Christ. In all such
special services there should be the greatest care taken
that those attending should be welcomed by those who
manifest the love of Christ. You may have all your
angular, peculiar, crochetty sidesmen when the church
only is there, but you want the men of gracious strength,
and tender heart, and loving welcome, and genial face,
and sweet Christian life to welcome men into the house

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 75
of God when you are going to urge them to decision for
Jesus Christ.
And finally the enquiry room workers. Let me ut
ter here a solemn word of warning. Make your enquiry
room secure against the intrusion of any person un
known. Let anybody have the right to enter the en
quiry room, and all the fads and fanatics of the district
will be there first. I was jealously, zealously careful
to guard my enquiry room against the intrusion of any
person not known to ,myself. That means there must
be preparation by the minister of his workers, and there
ought to be an enquiry room class in which he shall
meet a chosen band and instruct them in the method
of dealing with souls. These need appointing and ar
ranging for with great wisdom and care.
If the membership is not exhausted by these appoint
ments, then all the rest can pray. I am greatly im
pressed today as I meet with men whom God is using,
and find their experience coinciding so closely with my
own. I crave today more than I ever did in my life,
with a greater longing than I ever felt, to know that
men and women are praying for me. In New York
recently three men came to me, and these three men
looked into my face and said, "For five years we three
have prayed for you every day by solemn covenant."
I cannot tell you what it meant to me. If our evan
gelistic work is going to be a success we must get our

76 EVANGELISM.
people regularly and systematically to pray. Epaphras
agonized in prayer. Now it is not given to everyone
to spend long hours in prayer. Thank God for the
men and women who can do it. God does not mean
everybody should do that. But we can form the habit
of prayer, so that we can pray here, there, anywhere,
everywhere. Let the members band themselves to
gether to pray. It has often been pointed out that it
is a remarkable thing that when Paul preached on
Mar's Hill, there were few if any converts, but when
Peter preached on the day of Pentecost thousands were
swept into the Kingdom of God; and it is an interest
ing question why in the one case so few, and in the
other so many were attracted and influenced. No one
would like to suggest that Peter was more abandoned to
God than Paul. Peter preached in the midst of a com
pany of praying men and women, and Paul did not.
And account for it as you will, go into the mystery
and philosophy of it as you will, the fact remains that
the Holy Spirit of God works more easily in the at
mosphere of praying men and women than without
them. Then the combined business acumen of the church
members should be consecrated to this work. Oh,
when will all the business ability in the church be conse
crated to the work of the Church? Some men think
that they need their business ability for their business,
and that it is enough to give a check to the church. If

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 77
a man is offering for sale something that he wants to
make profit out of for himself, he will push it in front
of your eyes wherever you go. I cannot travel any
distance without seeing the virtues of some soap ex
tolled under my eyes wherever I look. If I could only
get hold of the business acumen, and turn it into ac
count for the Kingdom of God.
I don't quite like the comparison, but I am going to
use it. When the Church begins to run the business
of Jesus Christ like the world runs the business of sell
ing soap, we shall do something. I will tell you a story
out of my own experience. I went at one time to con
duct a series of special services in a district in England.
I was to be there for two weeks. One of the officers
wrote to me just before I went, and he said, "Our
chapel has been renovated, and very beautifully ren
ovated, and we are afraid the crowds may spoil it,
and we are going to have the services only for one
week." Oh, the shame of it! The preservation of
paint of more importance than the salvation of souls !
Let the business men of the Church recognize that
they are in business partnership with Jesus Christ, and
let them apply all the push and go which they use in
their own business to the business of the Kingdom.
That should be so always, but specially in the time of
the special mission. Such preparation is mechanical,
but it is the mechanism through which the Holy Spirit
of God may do His work. The work of the evangelistic

78 EVANGELISM.
mission in our churches first demands all our conse
crated endeavour. If we attempt to do it in any other
way, we shall fail as we deserve to do. If for instance
we say we will hold some special services, and then is
sue two hundred and fifty bills, four inches square,
and open the doors and imagine we have done every
thing, we are demonstrating our unbelief in our own
enterprise, and the world is very apt to measure the
importance of those things by the standard of the
Church's estimate of their value.
We must put into the work of saving men and women
sinew and brain, and muscle, and blood, and then we
shall begin to move the world.
Finally I want to say something as to the actual
conduct of an evangelistic service, whether it be the
occasional service in the regular work of the pastorate,
or whether in the special series.
In an evangelistic service the whole conduct of the
service must be conducive to the one business of win
ning men. I begin with the smaller matters first. The
physical conditions must be remembered. The build
ing in which the evangelistic service is to be. held must
be one in which it is possible for people to be physi
cally comfortable.
There was a good man in Sheffield, England, named
Tom Graham, remarkable in his success in winning
souls, who used to say something not elegant in ex
pression, but perpetually true, "I never knew a man

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 79
saved with cold feet." It is of prime importance that
we attend to the physical conditions. The building must
be such as people can at least be comfortable in, and by
being comfortable forget the physical and attend to
the spiritual. As long as a man is conscious of the
physical it is very hard for him to attend to the spiritual.
The building must be properly warmed and ventilated.
The physical conditions must be of the best.
The next point of importance is that those who enter
the building to an evangelistic service should be wel
comed. The caretaker and the ushers must be chosen
jvith great care if this is to be so. Then accommoda
tion must be provided, and so far as possible those
coming must be courteously seated, and attended to.
We must in love make men feel that they are more
welcome to this service than they ever were in a saloon
or theatre.
Then further in the evangelistic service the general
tone of the proceedings should be carefully guarded.
There should be an absence of merely stilted dignity
on the part of the minister and the office bearers of
the church. D. L. Moody once said that dignity was
not one of the fruits of the Spirit anyhow. If a poor
man comes into the church and is patronized, the chances
of winning him are greatly reduced. And yet the tone
should not only be free from stilted dignity, it should
be free from all undue frivolity. Nothing should be
done by speaker, singer, or anyone else for the sake of

80 EVANGELISM.
simply raising a laugh. I am sorry for the man who
lacks a sense of humour, but humour should be the
play of summer lightning, clearing the air, and not
the degradation of the pulpit into an entertainment,
in which the main object is to make people laugh.
The tone should be that of a reverent gladness, the
hymns pulsating with hope, the attitude of every man
taking part in the work that of one who believes in
God, and in the possibilities of the man that has come
in. Reverent and hopeful in all things let the true
evangelistic service be.
And once again. The whole of the service in the
hands of the evangelist should conduce to the one mat
ter in hand, of winning men for Christ, the singing, the
Scripture, and prayer, and the sermon. I do not be
lieve that it is wise in an evangelistic service that the
evangelist should hand the conduct of the singing over
to any second man. In the actual service he should
select his own hymns, such as will lead up to his sub
ject, and such as will appeal to the people on the line
thereof. I would have half an hour's singing before
the service proper begins, under the charge of the di
rector, but the moment I come to the platform as the
evangelist, I want to select my own hymns. I don't
want a hymn sung absolutely out of harmony with
anything I am going to say. There needs to be this
harmony. So also with the matter of the Scripture
reading. So also with the prayer prayed. An evan-

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 81
gelist will be very careful about whom he asks to
pray. It is a great mistake to take hold of the Rev.
Mr. So and So, who does not believe in evangelistic
meetings, and get him to lead in prayer in order to
enlist his sympathy. I don't want to do him good
just now. I am after this sinner here, and I want the
man to pray who knows the way into the secret place,
who knows how to get at the heart of God. All these
things are important. I do not think we can afford to
miss a single detail.
And as to the sermon. In an evangelistic service
it must be one aimed at the capture of the will for,
Jesus Christ. Different congregations will demand dif
ferent methods. One method of presenting truth will
appeal to one class of the community, and quite another
method will be necessary for another class. Thomas
Chapness says that the most remarkable text on how to
be a soul winner is the text, "I will make you fishers of
men." I once heard him speak on that text, and in the
course of his sermon he said, 'A fisher is very careful
.about his bait. If I want to catch a codfish, I fling them
out a bait as big as a clock weight, and they swallow it.
But if I am going for salmon I have a fly, and whip
the stream with delicacy and art.' There are some
preachers who will appeal along the line of the intel
lect and reason. There are men caught on the flood
tide of emotion. But back of the intellect and emo
tion is the citadel, the will, and it is for that the preacher

82 EVANGELISM.
strives. Whether he captures the will through the intel
lect or through the emotion depends upon the persons
addressed and on the preacher; but the supreme busi
ness is to appeal to the will, and to bring it into submis
sion to the Lordship of Christ. The business of the
evangelist is to get a verdict for Jesus Christ there
and then. To the realization of that everything else must
therefore be subservient in the sermon. The preacher's
literary reputation, the preacher's rhetorical reputa
tion, yes, the preacher's theological reputation. The
evangelist in the preaching of the evangelistic sermon
will not be principally occupied with literary form, or
rhetorical expression, or even of theology as such. His
business will be to get that man for Christ, and when
that is remembered, the sermon will get its true tone,
its true quality.
One other word. The true evangelist will be very
careful to avoid the possibility of a passion for num
bered results spoiling his message. I sometimes fear
lest the desire to have large statistical returns may
tend to make a man make the way of salvation unduly
easy. I think there is a danger. We have been preach
ing 'Believe,' and we have not sufficiently said 'Repent,'
'repent,' 'repent,' and we have still to preach this truth,
that unless a man will turn to God from idols, then his
faith though he boast of it, is dead and worthless.
There is no question of precedence. The quality of
faith must be that of repentence, and the dynamic of re-

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 83
pentance must be that of faith, and when we urge upon
men that they believe on the Lord Jesus, we must say
that belief means submission to the Lordship, and that
means turning from every other lord that has held
dominion over the soul. We must not lower the claim
of truth as presented to the people. Therefore the
evangelistic sermon must be as carefully prepared as
any other sermon. We cannot dare to imagine that
w% have the right to face a great crowd of people, and
declare the evangel unless we have taken solemn time
to know the evangel, its terms, its content, and its mes
sage to men. When some of our best trained men, the
most highly equipped mentally turn to aggressive evan
gelism, then we shall have the most successful evan
gelists. A word about the after-meeting. I feel very strongly
that the best method of conducting an after-meeting
is that of making it an after-meeting rather than a con
tinuance of the first meeting. That runs counter to
many ideas. Let every man be fully persuaded in his
own mind. Personally I do not like an after-meeting
at which any are unwillingly present. I ask that all
those who would like to stay behind do so. I never
make an appeal (or very rarely under pressure of
circumstances) until I have given an opportunity to
everybody to go who desires to do so. It is sometimes
said that by such means we miss so many men upon
whom the Spirit of God has put His constraint. I

84 EVANGELISM.
do not believe it, and I would rather have a dozen peo
ple constrained, convicted, and converted, than a hun
dred caught in some emotional movement, in which
movement there was no real depth of conviction and
result. The after-meeting is to give men and women
an opportunity to decide for Christ and confess Him
immediately and openly. Here occurs the place for
enquiry room work. There is no sacramental virtue
in an enquiry room. The enquiry room is simply for
enquiring souls to come that they may be intelligently
dealt with about the spiritual perplexities. And that
makes necessary the training of enquiry room workers.
You cannot deal intelligently and correctly with a hun
dred at once. Every case has an individual problem,
and there are two words that cover the ground of such
work, and these are the words diagnosis and direction.
By diagnosis I mean that the intelligent enquiry room
worker will take hold of the case and find out where
the particular difficulty is. It is not at all wise to say,
'All you have to do is to believe.' The difficulty in
each case must be discovered, and there needs careful,
spiritual, proper training, in order that it may be done.
When the difficulty is found out, then there must be
the quiet clear pointing of that soul to Christ. Then
whether in the after-meeting or in the enquiry room,
there is a point where preacher or worker must stand
aside, and leave the soul with God alone. I have
seen people go with their Bible to an enquirer, and

THE EVANGELISTIC SERVICE. 85
say, 'Now do you see that verse?' 'Oh, yes.' 'Well,
can you read that verse ?' 'Oh, yes.' 'Read that verse.'
And that person will read that verse, and then the
worker says 'Now do you believe that?' 'Yes, I be
lieve that.' 'Then you are saved.' Now we have no
business to tell any man he is saved. There is a point where
we have to stand aside and let God and the man deal
alone with each other. We can help, lead, point, coun
sel, warn, plead, but at last regeneration is the com
ing of God to the soul that comes to Him, and we have
to draw aside and leave the individual to God.
I close as I began. I do not like lectures on methods,
and I pray you, receive what I have said only as I have
attempted to show principles, and not as I have at
tempted to lay down rules. But the great and supreme
matter is this, that every church of Jesus Christ ought
to have in it evangelistic work going on regularly or
periodically, and add to its membership by such as are
led to Christ individually and directly.

EVANGELISM. V.
THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY.
It is always difficult to measure correctly the times
in which we live. It has been said that no man can
write the history of his own times. Consequently it
is not easy for one to understand the spirit of his own
age, and yet those who are called to lead must know
something of that spirit ; indeed, it is one of the essen
tial qualifications for leadership. When the tribes came
up to make David king at Hebron, it is said of the
children of Issachar that they "had understanding of
the times, to know what Israel ought to do," and im
mediately afterwards it is further said, "all their breth
ren were at their commandment." That is to say, the
men that led were the men of Issachar, and all the rest
of the tribes were willing to follow their lead. That
was the qualification of leadership, "men that had un
derstanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to
do." To any of us God calls to leadership, and I do
not mean only conspicuous examples, but those called
into the ministry of the Word in any form, one of the
86

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY. 87
prime qualifications is an understanding of the times.
It is pre-eminently difficult to form an estimate in
spiritual matters. There is a wide application in the
words of Jesus, "The wind bloweth where it will, and
thou hearest the voice thereof, but knowest not whence
it cometh, and whither it goeth : so is everyone that is
born of the Spirit." There are things about the blow
ing of the wind we do not know, so also with regard
to the spirit of the age. And yet the Master rebuked
the men who did not understand their own age. He
said, Ye hypocrites, "When it is evening, ye say, It
will be fair weather, for the heaven is red. And in the
morning, It will be foul weather today: for the heaven
is red and lowering. Ye know how to discern the face of
the heaven; but ye cannot discern the signs of the
times." Recognizing both the difficulty and necessity then,
I want to speak first of the spirit of the age, and then
to ask, Have we an evangel that meets the demand ?
The spirit of an age is not always to be discovered
at first glance, or by a merely casual survey of the
field. Much that is about us is the issue of a past,
and the true spirit of an age is not to be defined by
the general consensus of opinion, but by the single
voices which are beginning to sound, which for the
moment are startling and full of surprise. If I casu
ally survey the age, the first thing which I notice is
its materialism. We-are cursed by materialism. Com-

88 EVANGELISM.
mercial prosperity has seemed as though it would grind
under its heel all spiritual life. That is the general outlook.
Yet if a man should say that the spirit of the age is that
of materialism, he has missed the deepest note. He has
not heard the deepest voice, but has taken the casual
outlook. A general survey is not what we need. It
was said of President McKinley that he was a great
statesman, because he had the faculty of putting his
ear to the ground, and listening for the things that
were coming. It was a remarkable capacity. A man
who knows how to listen for the new voices, and see
the fresh visions is the true statesman. In the words
of the Bible he is a man "who has understanding of
the times," and knows what the people ought to do.
We don't want to be led astray by the clamour of the
mob. We want to listen for the new voices, the voices
which are forming public opinion. If that be under
stood, I want to say three things. I think that the
spirit of the age is characterized first, by a revolt against
materialism. That is the very opposite of the first
impression. Yet I believe that to be the note which
is sounding clearly at the present moment. And next
there is abroad a new passion for the practical. Call
it altruism, utilitarianism if you will. I prefer the other
phrase because it is more simple. And the third fact is
that there is a great sense present in the hearts of men
today, of some coming visitation. These three notes
mark the spirit of the age in which we are called to live

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY. 89
and serve ; first, a revolt against materialism ; second, a
new passion for that which is practical; and finally, a
great, mystic, mysterious sense of some coming visit
ation. First of all I suppose having referred to materialism,
and then having declared that there is a revolt against
materialism, it is perfectly fair to ask me to demonstrate
my statement. One of the evidences that there is a
revolt against materialism in the air is the marvelous
and astounding growth of Christian Science. As to
Christian Science itself I hold it to be characterized
by an absence of the Christian, and an ignorance of
science. But here is a great movement, and it is fair
that we should ask, What does it mean? I have trav
eled in your railways over eighty thousand miles, and
visited cities, and touched all sections of the Christian
ministry, and there is hardly a place where Christian
Science is not successful. It is not only that they gather
into their fold fanatics or people characterized by neu
rosis, but some of the sweetest and best Christians
have also gone over to them. What is the secret?
Christian Science" stands for two things : the negation of
sin, and the affirmation of the spiritual. That is an
attempt to get at the heart of it. It says, There is
no material, everything is spiritual. Matter does not
exist. It is a mental fault, a mental miscalculation to
imagine you have matter. Thus they emphasize the
spiritual, falsely emphasizing it as we believe, and ab-

90 EVANGELISM.
surdly too, but this very emphasis of the spiritual has
been the attraction of a people tired of materialism.
The materialism of the past said, Matter is everything,
but today Christian Science says, No, matter is nothing,
the spiritual is everything. The argument we hold
to be ridiculous and absurd and laughable, but the
underlying principle is the thing that draws the multi
tudes, a reaffirmation of the spiritual.
And then the negation of sin. Here is where we
supremely join issue with Christian Scientists. They
are calling something Christian which denies atone
ment, because it denies sin. Any theory that denies
the sin of man, and denies the Cross of Christ is some
thing to be dreaded. And yet even though they deny
the atonement of Christ, they endeavour to get rid of
sin by denial. 1 do not hesitate to affirm that if the
Christian Church had only been true to the Gospel
of spirituality, and the Gospel of holiness, there would
have been no room for Christian Science. And yet the
presence of it in our midst is evidence of a revolt
against materialism, and though it is but a will-o-the-
wisp, that dances among the quagmires, men would
rather have the will-o-the-wisp than the dense black
darkness of materialism. It is a sign of the times.
But still far more striking is it that the affirmations
of science at the present hour most remarkably demon
strate the truth that the age is characterized by revolt
from materialism. Huxley, Spencer, Tyndal, Darwin

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY. 91
twenty-five years ago denied the reality of anything ex
cept matter. We heard much of the atom, of the pro
toplasmic germ, of the fortuitous concurrence of atoms,
and these were given to us as the final solution of
which man was capable, of the whole riddle and mystery
of the universe. Lord Kelvin, the nestor of British
scientific thought, perhaps the most remarkable living
man of science, has said, that "Science positively affirms
creative power, and makes everyone feel a miracle in
himself." He says, "It is not in dead matter that
man lives, moves or has being, but in the creative
and directive power, which science compels them to
accept as an article of scientific belief." The latest
scientific pronouncement of the age is that there is
something at the back of matter, that there is a spir
itual force behind. Science has not yet gone far enough
to define, but it has absolutely abandoned the position of
twenty-five years ago, that all that is, is the accidental
coming together of atoms. Darwin's evolutionary the
ory has passed. The evolutionary theory has not passed
but has come to stay. It is probably true in certain
realms. But the evolutionary theory of Darwin is not
held by reputable scientific men today. That some germ
of truth lies within the theory there can be no longer
any doubt, but we are now coming to see that while
the evolutionary theory may have an application to the
material realm, it does not account for spiritual life
at any point. And the scientist is acknowledging it.

92 EVANGELISM.
Two very remarkable books have recently been issued.
First that of Professor James of Harvard University,
entitled, "Varieties of Religious Experiences." This
is a book written not from the standard of a Christian
man, a book written not by a professor in a Christian
Theological Seminary, but by a professor of psychology,
plainly and simply upon the basis of scientific study
of the psychological problems of life. He has gathered
up all kinds of religious experiences, and after carefully
and systematically examining his data, has made his
deductions. Let me read you one sentence from the
part of the book in which the Professor gives his
conclusions. He claims they are scientific conclusions
based upon an examination of data. "We and God
have business with each other, and in opening ourselves
to His influence, our deepest destiny is fulfilled." Here
is a scientific testimony that thousands of men are
reading in this land today. Men that call themselves
scientists, take this book up, and they read that after
examination of the experiences of men, the professor
has come to this twofold conclusion, first that man has
dealings with God, and that human life can only fulfill
its deepest destiny when man is submitted to the gov
ernment of God. The influence of such a deduction
by so eminent a scientific thinker is bound to be lhat
of creating a revolt from materialism in the minds of
thousands of the thinking youth of our colleges and
universities.

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY. 93
And yet once again, there has issued from the press,
since Prof. James' book, a book by Frederic W. H.
Myers. The history of Myers is an interesting one.
He was an Oxonean, and a pronounced High Church
man and during that period of his High Churchism, he
wrote the poem of "St. Paul," to me at least one of the
most exquisite pieces of poetry in the English language.
After that he passed into agnosticism, reverent agnos
ticism, never attacking Christianity, but declaring him
self to be unsure. There he lived for years, became in
terested in the work of the Psychical Research Society,
of the phenomena of spiritual existences as they man
ifested themselves in ordinary life, and outside the
church. He has left two volumes, published after his
death, the title of which reveals the subject. "Human
Personality, and its Survival of Bodily Death." Such a
book is received by scientists, they will read this book,
and they will not all agree that he has proved his
case. But as Myers says, twenty-five years from now
no reputable scientist will question the fact of the res
urrection of Jesus Christ from among the dead. In
the next twenty-five years we have to speak to people in
whom there will be a reawakened sense of the reality
of the spiritual. There is nothing more encouraging
than this, that in the world of purely scientific invest
igation there is a re-affirmation of all the things we
stand for.
The next note of the age is a passion for the prac-

94 EVANGELISM.
tical. I need hardly stay, in speaking to American au
diences, to prove the truth of this. You have a passion
for the practical, for you have no respect for ancient
things. Americans have no respect for institutions
merely as such, and I confess I have the profoundest
sympathy with them. It is the altruistic spirit which
governs this great people, and it is in the van-guard
of humanity at the present moment. The cry today is
for an ethical and social Gospel. Everywhere men are
crying for a social and ethical Gospel, for something
that touches all needs of men's lives. There is a passion
everywhere for something that conditions actual life,
and affects the details of every man's doings. It is a
true passion. The passion for the practical is mani
festing itself in England in a new antagonism to Chris
tianity. Robert Blatchford is writing the most definite
articles of attack on Christianity. He is rousing the
whole of the pulpits in England to consider and answer
them. So strong a paper as the "British Weekly" has
thought it necessary to devote space to answering these
attacks. What is it this man is attacking? He is at
tacking the miraculous and supernatural elements in
Christianity, the virgin birth of our Holy Lord, and
His resurrection. Why? Because Christianity fails
to do what he thinks she ought to do ; and consequently
this very antagonism of his is a new sign of the passion
for the practical.
And lastly there is a sense of coming visitation, of

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY. 95
which we hear from all sides and from divers voices.
Mistakes of interpretation there may be, but the gen
eral fact is recognized. Men everywhere are looking
for something, they hardly know what.
Thus I hold that today the age is characterized by
revolt against materialism, by a passion for the practical,
and by a sense of daybreak at hand.
Now let me ask, Does our evangel fit the needs of
the age? Have we any need to find a new evangel,
or what shall we do? I submit that the evangel of
Jesus Christ exactly answers the need created by the
spirit of the age, for it is a protest against materialism,
and an assertion of the variety of the spiritual; it is
practical, or it is nothing; and the visitation that is to
come must have as its essential notes the very evangel
committed to us to declare.
The evangel is exactly in harmony with the spirit of
the age in its revolt against materialism. What is the'
Gospel that we have to preach? What are the notes of
the Gospel? The first note in the evangel of Jesus
Christ is the assertion of His Lordship. The preaching
of the Lordship of Christ will answer this cry for spirit
uality. Kelvin has affirmed the Divinity of creation
or the Deity at back of creation. Jesus long ago stood
among the flowers and birds, and said, God clothes these
flowers, and feeds these birds. The last scientific asser
tion synchronizes with the simple statement of the Naz-
arene long years ago, that at back of the flower, and

96 EVANGELISM.
bird, and everything, is God. Dr. James says, "We have
dealings with God." That is the last affirmation of psy
chological science. Listen, "Seek ye first His Kingdom,
and His righteousness, and all these things shall be ad
ded unto you." That is the answer of our King. The
last affirmation of psychological science harmonizes with
what He taught. Frederic Myers in his posthumous
work affirms in this day human personality to be
stronger than death, to exist after the death of the
body, that man does not cease to exist when his body
ceases to exist. That is the whole declaration of two
great volumes. Listen. "Be not afraid of them that
kill the body, and after that have no more that they can
do." In neither of these cases did Jesus Christ defend
what these men are affirming. They refer to them as
discoveries. He referred to them incidentally, as es
tablished verities. What this age needs is to show
that Jesus is Lord in the intellectual realm, and that
the last things scientists are saying, are in harmony
with the things Jesus Christ said centuries ago. He
was not the half-educated and half-ignorant Galilean
peasant some would have us believe, but supreme
among men in the intellectual realm ; and stated as the
common-places of His knowledge, things which they
have taken nineteen hundred centuries to spell out. He
affirmed the reality of the spiritual. He told men what
they need is eternal life, and eternal life is not a quan-

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY. 97
tity, but a quality, life that touches the infinite, that is
homed in God, that takes in eternity. All this sighing
after the spiritual is to be answered by preaching Jesus
Christ as Lord, and bringing men into submission to
Him. He will lead them into life, and they will find
they have an answer to their deepest cry, the sense of
the spiritual.
And then as to the passion for practical things. How,
is it manifested? We are told we must have a social
and ethical Gospel. Where will you find it? It is a re
markable thing that these very men when they tell us'
what they want, refer to the Sermon on the Mount.
' Whose Gospel was that? It is the Gospel of our King.
You say you want a practical Gospel, that this age must
have a social and ethical Gospel. Well, here it is. But
Christianity as it delivers its message is more prac
tical than the men who are crying for practical things.
Men are saying, We want an ethical and social Gospel.
We don't want to hear about the Cross. We have had
enough of the Cross. Give us something social and
practical. Christ is so practical that He never asks
men to obey His laws unless they are regenerate.
Christ takes into account the paralysis in human life.
You cannot build up a regenerated society unless you
have regenerated men. You will find that Christianity
is pre-eminently practical. It does not attempt to con
struct a living society out of dead matter, neither does it

G

98 EVANGELISM.
attempt to realize a pure order among corrupt men,
neither does it attempt to give a perfect ethic to par
alyzed individuals. It takes hold of the man first, and
remakes him, and then remakes society. It takes held
of the man fast bound in sin, and breaks his chains, and
then tells him to walk upright. Men will never be in
fluenced by a social Gospel until they have heard and
obeyed the Gospel of regeneration.
Let us thank God for the wider outlook of the age in
which we live. Oh how many children are crying in
the night, and with no language but a cry. Our busi
ness is to interpret the cry of the child to itself. Men
want something. They will sob out all sorts of foolish
things, and tell us what they think they want. Never
let us forget that they will never have the satisfactory
answer to their profoundest and widest prayer save
along the line of personal regeneration. It is a sad
thing indeed when a minister of Jesus Christ thinks of
himself as an interesting entertainer, an intellectual in
structor of his people merely, or a social reformer, or
a political agent merely. He ought to have something
else to do. The principal work to which he is called
wherever he may be sent, is that of bringing individ
uals into touch with spiritual realities, and in propor
tion as he is able to lead men to Christ individually, he
is answering the cry of the age for the spiritual, for the
practical; and contributing to that great visitation for
which men are sighing and waiting in the darkness.

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY. 99
The voices of the age are full of hope. I know the
other side. I know the pressure of the burden, and the
apparent strength of sin. These are but the symptoms
of a day. God is moving towards victory. May He
make us fellow workers with Him.

By Rev. F. B. Meyer

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