Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1912-11-12
BY BISHOP
w. 4. GAMBLER
PulpitiSnn"

furnish the supply. The mania for
amusement has gone to great extremes
in our day; and it is not surprising
that il has entered the churches and
demanded to be gratified by the very
men who ought to rebuke and exercise
Il. Men and women. who finding life
hanging heavy on their hands. have
been rushing from one diversion to am
other all the week. can hardly have any
desire for serious religious services on
Sunday: they wish the pulpit to amuse
them until the play-houses can open
again on Monday. They would like the
sermon to be short and spicy, and the
music to be as much like that of the
opera house as possible. And alas! there
are weak men, clad i'm clerical garb and
protesting a call to preach who are
ready to yield to the imperious require
ments of this vulgar horde of amuse-
ment guzzlers. Hence yellow pulpit
ism" points to yellowness in the pews.
Just as yellow Journalism reveals lot
of yellow subscribers. The pulpiteer
is out for patronage, and he offers the
kind of goods which his patrons call
for They pay for what they get and
they get what they pay for But Christ
abhors such trafficking in the house OF
God.
Only once in the life of the Saviour do
we see him moved by such indignation
as approached violence; he drove the
traders from the temple But the wares
offered by the traders, whom ne drove
from the temple in Jerusalem, were far
and away better for selling in the house
of God than the products of yellow
pulpitism". oxen and doves were need
ed for the sacrifices, and people who
came to Jerusalem from over the seas,
ark. M
pleased to find offerings waiting for
them at the temples gate. Moreover,
they would require to have their foreign
money changed before casting their gifts
into the temple treasury. These consid-
erations gave some sort of plausible eX-
cuse for the commerce in the temple
which Jesus drove from That holy place.
But what possible excuse can be made
for traficking in unclean yellow pulpit
ism" in a church? 1t would be bad
enough to offer it for sale anywhere,
but il is doubly criminal to use a church
as the market-place for such shoddy
stun.
1t lies with the people to put an end
to this evil. It will disappear as soon
as public sentiment destroys the morbid
demand for it, and that ought to ne
very soon.
Let us no longer ofrer a premium for
sensationalism in the pulpit Let us
rather esteem more highly those seri-
Gus and earnest men who bring home to
our hearts the great things of Gods
word which belong to our salvation and
make for our peace. Let us prefer
above all others the man of God who
deals faithfully with us, and warns us
against sin and shows us the way Of
salvation.
There is a current complaint that we
have few great preachers and few
great sermons in the churches of today
In so far as the complaint is well-found-
ed, it may be explained by the long
continued prevalence of yellow pulpit
ISM. Frivolous TAinds, exercised on
selecting odd themes and treating such
themes in eccentric ways, can not by
any possibility produce great sermons.
A real sermon is a most serious and SOL
emn thing; perhaps, it would not be too
much to say that a real sermon is an
awful thing. 1t is utterly beyond the
conception of a clerical merry-andrew
and quite out of reach of pulpit
clown.