The Oskaloosa herald., 1902-06-05

wear good clothes anu preaCn.
The large majority are honestly de
ceived by that old pagan idea that q
preacher ought not to work. They Will
talk very wisely about sanctifcation
and the support of the ministry.
1t is one Of the tricks of the great
deceiver to always seal any great
error by holiness. In the early church
as soon as they began to sidetrack on
%ritualism and priest craft the great
watchword was Holiness" 1t was
holy bishops, holy fathers, and holy
sees, and every one who would dare
to speak against any Of their holy
men or any Of their ways was ex-
communicated. Finally the holyness
superstition got such a hold on the
people that it illuminated in the
dogma of the impalibility of the big
dogma of the infalibiity Of the big
est old hypocrit that ever ~disgraced
any religion. If these big, burly
preachers are allowed to go about and
berate the people for ever allowing
a preacher to work,it will not be long
until the people will all think it Is a
disgrace for his holiness" to ever
earn a crumb by the sweat of his face.
Then the devil will have COMPARE
lively Easy sailing to get his finger
in the pie, and it will not be many
generations before he has things his
own way.
/ do not want any man to use this
sermon as an excuse for not being
liberal in the support of the gospel.
While under the old covenant the
people were required to give a tenth,
under thenew we are required to
give all and ourselves to boot. For
whether we eat or drink or what so
ever we do, we should do all to the
glory of God. The nan who Is not
willing to give anything or every
thing for the cause of the Master is
non of HIS There Is no such thing
as a stingy Christian.
Even if a man thinks the salaried
ministry is not for the best interests
of the church and the rest of the
people do, he is a niggerdly fellow
to refuse his support. When ancient
Isreal desired a king to go in and out
before them and lead them to battle
like the nations round about, it was
contrary to the will of Samuel and also
of God. But when they persisted the
Lord chose them a king and told
them if they and their king
would serve Him and keep His COM
mandments they should prosper and
be greatly blest. Then it was the peo-
pies duty to support and be loyal to
him
So with the Quaker Church if they
all clamor for a leader to go in and
out before them and be like the
other churches round about, it per-
haps is the best thing under the cir
cumstances for them to have one, and
it is everyones duty to help support
him. The meanest dead-beat on earth
is the man who will roast his shins at
the fires of the altar and feast his
soul Upon the offerings of the sanctu-
airy and refuse to pay his share of the
expense. The man who will listen to
preaching that is paid for by the
sweat of poor men and the widows
mite had better sneak off like the
ostrich and stick his head in the sand.
The inconsistency of the hiring
ministry is plainly seen in the distri-
button of the emoluments. We fire.
quently see a big strong man getting
twelve or fifteen hundred dollars a
year for preaching two or three SER
mons a week. while some poor widow
who breaches as much and visits the
sick and afflicted more, gets nothing.
This is not Gods way of doing
things for he sees that the hand and
the foot gets as much nourishment as
the head.
You may say that a preacher in
either case gets what he is worth.
But this is not the way Jesus casts up
accounts, for He says that after we
have done our very best we are yet
improbable servants. The only ex-
ception He makes was in the ease of
the poor widow who cast in two mites
into the treasury, for He said that
she had given more than all the others
put together. If He had been con-
suited in the distribution of salaries
He would have seen that the poor wo-
man was served first.
Some people take offense at the
word hiring ministry, but it is a
little hard to see the difference be-
tween the man who works at preach
ing for a thousand dollars a year and
a man who works at blowing for his
two hundred dollars.
Another great objection to the hire
ling ministry is that the preachers
if they have no work to do are al
ways lacking on some needless forms
and ceremonies to the service of
religion. We have seen how the early
preachers as soon as they left of
working and had time to spare be-
gan to invent the useless and foolish
poems of the Catholic church. We
have seen how the Protestant churches
have turned the ancient and useful
sacraments into a child's playhouse
and how like children they have quar-
relied for 1000 years about the ar
rangement Of the dishes and their
playthings.
Nor is this all. Our preachers who
get tired of lounging in their cloist-
ers, forget the Bible injunction to
b not righteous overmuch," and ap-
point so many socials and banquets
and prayer meetings that they wear
every one out who has to work for
his living.
A few years ago II was thought to
be a great thing to get a sinner con-
verted and turned from the error of
his ways. He was then left to the
watchful care of the church, suppos-
ing he would grow in grace and in
the knowledge of the Lord, and to the
perfection of all the Christian graces.
But now before a man is well of the
wounds the evil spirit made in going
out of HIM, some other preacher comes
along and tells him that he has only
taken the first degree in religion. So
the poor fellow pays the fees and lets
them run him through the sanctifica-
ton machine. Within the last year or
two some d. d. has invented a glori.