Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1893-07-06

| them. A country clergyman recently
had an experience that il might be well
forthe pastors of some dead city churches
to adopt The young peoplein the congre-
cation had habit of getting up and go
ing out during the service. At last the
preacher resolved TO act. A youth grew
sleepy one Sunday evening. picked up
his coat and hat and stepped into the
aisle. The young woman who was his
sweetheart had grown tired and gone ont
little before. To his dismay, the min
lister stopped short in his discourse and
said: Young man, the young lady who
went out last is not the one you wish to
see home When she goes, will lei you
know. Sit down. In the future when a
woman goes out will call on the proper
man TO take care of her." He resumed
his sermon. There YVES a great deal of
giggling and considerable wrath, but the
sermons were not interrupted again dur
| ing the winter.
PROPHET VERSUS PRIEST.
It is better even to create a sensation
occasionally that may give rise TO adj
verse comment than to die or to vege-
tate. The temptation of the ministry of
today is to talk smooth things. 1t is to
please the machines. Men object TO be
ing hit. They object to personal meth
cd of applying truth, We have societies
for suppressing vice, but none for sup
pressing advice to the preacher. The
preacher is overwhelmed with advice.
and he is afraid not to take it, A minis
try of power is a ministry of freedom a
ministry that thinks for itself and acts.
as led by the spirit of God. The minis
ter who survives and is of the church
triumphant will therefore be a prophet.
not a priest leader, not an echo. lie
will be led by the spirit Of God, not by
the traditions of men. The keynote 10
his creed will be freedom Of thought and
progress in knowledge. by their fruits
We shall know them A ministry that
has no fruit is a dead ministry. II may
be as orthodox as the recent general as
sembly of the Presbyterian church, but
if it bear no fruit it might be as heter-
odox as the devil for all that it amounts
to in the history Of humanity. The or
thodox church is the church that saves
men. The orthodox ministry is the min
istry of power unto salvation, and this is
the ministry of faith which is the true
successor of st. Peter of old.
Second-It is certainty that tins
church triumphant will bea saving pow
err IL will be known as a church simply
because it saves the world. There are
two conceptions of church current To-
day. One is the election idea; the other
is the commission idea. The one is an
aggregation of saints met together for
self edifcation and self enjoyment, gath
cred apart and out of the world. not
even in it. The other is community
army, sent forth in the world, to live in
il, to die in it and for it. The one means
isolation, the other conduct. The one
means tradition, the other life. The one
that will survive is the one that saves.
The church that has no saving qualityis
good for nothing but to be cast out and
trodden under foot of men. "Ye are the
salt of the nth" The work of the
church is iii salvation Of this world,
here and now lis whole world, man in
his entire rcl rs. And the church /
which lives in this crowded center OF
modern life must be church that /
touches with saving power every ramifi- /.
cation of life. Man is spiritual being. 4
He is a moral being. He is physical I
being. The church must save him
spirit, soul and body. If the church of 4
Jesus Christ does not thus touch man, it l
must die and otherpowers take its place. /
TRADITIONAL TONES.
Its first work must of necessity be a 4
spiritual one. 1t must stand for and /
emphasize the eternal, spiritual verities /
and their triumph over matter. 1t must /
bear witness to the truth thus--it must \
present to thoughtless world the great I
problem ever fresh. what shall it I
profit man if he gain the whole world 1
and forfeit his life?' 1t must teach with I
renewed emphasis from day TO day that
a mans life does not consist in the
abundance of the things that he may
possess. There are plenty of dead
churches in our great cities, that are
dead because they have preached no such
thing, and they died because they did
not preach it, and wealth and pride and
vanity have taken possession and eaten
them up, and the spirit of God has de-
parted. The church that lives and sur
wives will be one that leads back to the
Father the wandering child. the orphan
world. 1t must be full of zeal for man.
It must be full of faith in man as it has
faith in God. The life Of Jesus shows
boundless faith in man. The infidelity
that refuses to believe in the possibility
IF saving men is as mean and as bias
phemous as the infdelity that refuses as
sent TO the postulate OF the Godhead.
The worship of God is the service Of
man. if Jesus is to be believed.
The Protestant church if it must tri-
umph must go back to Catholicism and
learn again the lesson which it has for
gotten, and it is that mans spiritual ma
ture is bound up whether he will or not
with his body. We must relearn the