The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-01-24
LETTERS TO PREACHERS.
BY zEKE JOHNSON.
NO. ].

Are you a preacher9 Would you mind
reading some letters to preachersa Then
here goes:
Firstly-Be a mani o yes. you are all
right, but some preachers are unmanly.
They squlrm end squirk, grunt and groan,
and grumble until they make people tired.
You should not only bear the ills and dis
appointments of life as well as other people,
but should try to be examples to them. Face
your troubles, don't complain. Do not
wear long face, but be joyful without
frivolity or affectation. Christianity makes
man feel good. Gout is sometimes mis-
taken for religion and dyspepsia for spiritu-
atty of mind. Do not murmur about pow
erty and Inconvenience when your people
sleep on straw beds, get poor wages ard
live in clapboard shanties or log
huts. Suffer with your people
If need be. Most preachers are very
agreeable gentlemen indeed, but some are
as sensitive as porcupine and about as
NICE have seen preachers smoking cigars
or nasty pipes in ladies' parors. | have
seen them spit tobacco juice on n church
floor or In pulpit. / have seen some that
even spit the filthy fluid on their clothes
and let it drip IN their boards! How shock
aug nave huOWu SOLDe ID uFIuk WHISKY
as a beverage, while they pretended to
preach temperance to other people. have
known a few to tell jokes which we're OBJ
scene, or listen and laugh while others told
them. II preacher is not and cannot be
a gentleman. he should leave the sacred
desk. Ii be cannot leave off useless dissipa-
ii n, at least while he is in the house of God
if he cannot refrain his lips from unclean
speech-then let him, for the sake of
(ihristianitU Ion he % l..
can and will be gentlemen.
Secondly-Be preacher. A negro
preacher said. 81 drump | see TWO big letters
on de fence; dey was G.. p, and | say to
meself dat mean go preach, so l go, sab"
"Jes bout like you tool niger; dem big
letters, q. r, mean go pillow, dey do, sab"
replied his companion. There is reason to
believe that some preachers were called
about that way. | do not believe
the good Lord makes any mistakes.
but if he has called every man
who processes to have been called
TO preach, he has made mistake, for some
of them cannot preach. have heard them
aud know. One quoted his text: "Suuinch
not the sparit, and effectually "squinchedn
all the devotional "sparit" had. The Lord
may have called that man to preach, but il
he did he is preaching in the wrong place or
began too soon. An ignoT anus in a pulpit
does much harm. A man SO deficient in
mind that he cannot learn to speak at leas
tolerably well, after living in the world
twenty years or more, has not enough mind
to preach. There is no occasion FOR any
man to remain in ignorance of his mother
tongue with the numerous and improved
facilities for learning furnished in our day.
Ignorance is often the result of laziness.
Any man too lazy to learn Is too lazy to
teach. No calling has greater need of
knowledge in ell departments of thought
than the ministry, but few are burdened
with so much Ignorance. No man is al
lowed to practice law medicine or engineer
ing who is as ignorant of the principles of
OF those sciences as a large percentage of
preachers are OF theology. l know this is q
serious charge, but | believe what write,
and believe can prove it beyond contra,
diction. A man who does not know the
biblical plan of salvation is unfit for the
pulpit. 1t is one thing to be an exhorter
and another and different thing to be a
preacher. Gods cause does not need mems
ignorance. The cause OF Christianity suf-
fers more from its ignorant friends than
from its enemies. Georgia has about $500
white preachers. or Is to the county, and
yet there is much mission ground in the
state, We need more intelligent, conse-
Grated preachers and less Of the other sort.
Many preachers are idle, as If God had
called more than he needed. Who has made
the mistaken The Lord