Between Two Worlds

CHAPTER ONE

The Glory of Preaching: A Historical Sketch

Preaching is indispensable to Christianity. Without preaching a necessary part of its authenticity has been lost. For Christianity is, in its very essence, a religion of the Word of God. No attempt to understand Christianity can succeed which overlooks or denies the truth that the living God has taken the initiative to reveal himself savingly to fallen humanity; or that his self-revelation has been given by the most straightforward means of communication known to us, namely by a word and words; or that he calls upon those who have heard his Word to speak it to others.

First, God spoke through the prophets, interpreting to them the significance of his actions in the history of Israel, and simultaneously instructing them to convey his message to his people either by speech or by writing or both. Next, and supremely, he spoke in his Son, his Word . . . made flesh, and in his Word’s words, whether spoken directly or through his apostles. Thirdly, he speaks through his Spirit, who himself bears witness to Christ and to Scripture, and makes both living to the people of God today. This Trinitarian statement of a speaking Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and so of a Word of God that is scriptural, incarnate, and contemporary, is fundamental to the Christian religion. And it is God’s speech which makes our speech necessary. We must speak what he has spoken. Hence the paramount obligation to preach.

This emphasis is, moreover, unique to Christianity. Of course every religion has its accredited teachers, whether Hindu gurus or Jewish rabbis or Moslem mullahs. Yet these instructors in religion and ethics, even if endowed with official authority and personal charisma, are essentially the expositors of an ancient tradition. Only Christian preachers claim to be heralds of good news from God, and dare to think of themselves as his ambassadors or representatives who actually utter oracles of God (1 Pet. 4:11). Preaching is an essential part and a distinguishing feature of Christianity, wrote E. C. Dargan in his two-volume History of Preaching. Again, Preaching is distinctively a Christian institution.¹

That preaching is central and distinctive to Christianity has been recognized throughout the church’s long and colorful story, even from the beginning. So before we weigh the objections to preaching, and consider how we should respond to them, it seems to me both healthy and helpful to set the contemporary argument in the context of church history. To be sure, neither time-honored opinions of the past nor influential voices of the present are infallible. Yet the impressive unanimity of their conviction about the primacy and power of preaching (and I shall deliberately draw from a broad spectrum of ecclesiastical tradition) will give us a good perspective from which to view the opposing position, and put us in a good mood to do so.

Jesus, the Apostles, and the Fathers

The only place to begin is with Jesus himself. The Founder of Christianity was himself the first of its preachers; but he was preceded by his forerunner and followed by his apostles, and in the preaching of these the proclamation and teaching of God’s Word by public address was made an essential and permanent feature of the Christian religion.² Certainly the evangelists present Jesus as having been first and foremost an itinerant preacher. Jesus came . . . preaching, Mark announces, as he introduces the public ministry (Mark 1:14, cf. Matt. 4:17). So it was entirely legitimate for George Buttrick, later chaplain of Harvard, to take these three words as the title of his 1931 Lyman Beecher lectures at Yale. The synoptic evangelists summarize his Galilean ministry in these terms, Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom. (Matt. 9:35, cf. 4:23 and Mark 1:39.) Indeed, this was Jesus’ own understanding of his mission at that period. He claimed in the Nazareth synagogue that, in fulfillment of the prophecy of Isaiah 61, the Spirit of the Lord had anointed him to preach his liberating message. Consequently, he must do so. It was for this purpose, he explained, that he had been sent (Luke 4:18, 43, cf. Mark 1:38 for that is why I came out). John’s witness to Jesus’ self-conscious mission as preacher and teacher is similar. He accepted the title Rabbi, he claimed to have spoken openly to the world and to have said nothing secretly, and he told Pilate he had come into the world to bear witness to the truth (John 13:13; 18:20, 37).

That the apostles after Pentecost gave priority to the ministry of preaching is specifically stated in Acts 6. They resisted the temptation to get involved in other forms of service, in order to devote themselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word (v. 4). For it was to this that Jesus had primarily called them. During his lifetime he had sent them out to preach (Mark 3:14), although temporarily restricting their ministry to the lost sheep of the house of Israel (Matt. 10:5–7). After his resurrection, however, he had solemnly commissioned them to take the gospel to the nations (e.g. Matt. 28:19; Luke 24:47). According to the longer ending of Mark, they went forth and preached everywhere (16:20). They proclaimed in the power of the Holy Spirit the good news of the death and resurrection, or the sufferings and glory, of the Christ (1 Pet. 1:12). In the Acts we watch them doing so, first Peter and the other Jerusalem apostles who spoke the word of God with boldness (4:31), and then Luke’s hero Paul in his three missionary expeditions, until Luke leaves him in Rome under house arrest, yet preaching the kingdom of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ quite openly and unhindered (28:31). In this Luke is faithfully reflecting Paul’s own perception of his ministry. Christ had sent him to preach the gospel, he wrote, not to baptize; so he felt a certain necessity or compulsion to do so. Besides, preaching was God’s appointed way by which sinners would hear of the Savior and so call on him for salvation, for how are they to hear without a preacher? (1 Cor. 1:17; 9; 16; Rom. 10:14–15). Then at the end of his life, knowing that he had fought his fight and finished his race, he passed the commission on to his young lieutenant Timothy. In the presence of God, and in anticipation of the return of Christ to judge and to reign, he solemnly charged him, Preach the word, be urgent in season and out of season, convince, rebuke, and exhort, be unfailing in patience and in teaching (2 Tim. 4:1–2).

So prominent was the place of preaching and teaching in the ministry of Jesus and his apostles that it is hardly surprising to find the same emphasis on it among the early church fathers.

The Didache, or Teaching of the Lord through the Twelve Apostles, dating probably from near the beginning of the second century, is a church manual on ethics, the sacraments, the ministry, and the second coming of Jesus. It refers to a variety of teaching ministries, to bishops and deacons on the one hand and to itinerant teachers, apostles and prophets on the other. Travelling teachers are to be welcomed, but practical tests are given by which their genuineness may be assessed. If a teacher contradicts the apostolic faith, if he stays more than two days and/or asks for money, and if he fails to practice what he preaches, then he is a false prophet (11:1–2 and 12:1–5). If he is genuine, however, he must be listened to with humility. Be long-suffering and pitiful and guileless and gentle and good and always trembling at the words which thou hast heard. Again, My child, him that speaketh to thee the Word of God remember night and day; and thou shalt honor him as the Lord(3:8; 4:1).³

About the middle of the second century, Justin Martyr’s First Apology was published. He addressed it to the emperor, defended Christianity against misrepresentations, and argued that it is true because the Christ who died and rose was the embodiment of truth and the Savior of mankind. Towards the end he gave an account of the weekly worship of the Christians. It is notable both for the prominence given to the reading and preaching of the Scriptures and for the combination of Word and sacrament:

And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of these good things. Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen.⁴

At the end of the second century, the Latin father Tertullian wrote his Apology in order to clear Christians of false accusations and demonstrate the injustice of the persecutions they were having to endure. Writing of the peculiarities of the Christian society, he emphasized the love and unity which knit them together, and then described their meetings:

We assemble to read our sacred writings. . . .With the sacred words we nourish our faith, we animate our hope, we make our confidence more steadfast, and no less by inculcations of God’s precepts we confirm good habits. In the same place also exhortations are made, rebukes and sacred censures are administered.⁵

Tertullian’s contemporary, the Greek father Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, stressed the responsibility of the presbyters to adhere to the apostles’ teaching:

These also preserve this faith of ours in one God, who accomplished such marvellous dispensations for our sake; and they expound the Scriptures to us without danger, neither blaspheming God, nor dishonouring the patriarchs, nor despising the prophets.⁶

Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea at the beginning of the fourth century and the father of church history, was able to sum up the first two hundred years of the Christian era in terms of the work of preachers and teachers:

They set out on journeys from home and performed the work of evangelists, making it their aim to preach to such as had not yet heard the word of faith at all, and to give them the book of the divine Gospels. But they were content to lay the foundation only of the Faith in some foreign places, appointing others as pastors to whom they entrusted the care of those lately brought in; then they would depart to other lands and nations, with the grace and cooperation of God.⁷

From the later patristic period I will take only one example, indeed the most notable, namely John Chrysostom, who preached for twelve years in the Cathedral in Antioch before becoming bishop of Constantinople in AD 398. In an exposition of Ephesians 6:13 (take the whole armor of God. . .), he voiced his conviction about the unique importance of preaching. Like our human body, he said, the body of Christ is subject to many diseases. Medicines, correct diet, suitable climate, and adequate sleep all help to restore our physical health. But how shall Christ’s body be healed?

One only means and one way of cure has been given us . . . and that is teaching of the Word. This is the best instrument, this the best diet and climate; this serves instead of medicine, this serves instead of cautery and cutting; whether it be needful to burn or to amputate, this one method must be used; and without it nothing else will avail.⁸

It was more than a century after his death that his greatness as a preacher came to be recognized and he was nicknamed Chrysostomos, golden-mouthed: he is generally and justly regarded as the greatest pulpit orator of the Greek church. Nor has he any superior or equal among the Latin Fathers. He remains to this day a model for preachers in large cities.⁹

Four chief characteristics of his preaching may be mentioned. First, he was biblical. Not only did he preach systematically through several books, but his sermons are full of biblical quotations and allusions. Secondly, his interpretation of the Scriptures was simple and straightforward. He followed the Antiochene school of literal exegesis, in contrast to fanciful Alexandrian allegorizations. Thirdly, his moral applications were down to earth. Reading his sermons today, one can imagine without difficulty the pomp of the imperial court, the luxuries of the aristocracy, the wild races of the hippodrome, in fact the whole life of an oriental city at the end of the fourth century. Fourthly, he was fearless in his condemnations. In fact, he was a martyr of the pulpit, for it was chiefly his faithful preaching that caused his exile.¹⁰

The Friars and the Reformers

We jump now, in this brief sketch, more than five hundred years to the founding of the medieval mendicant orders. For the Age of Preaching, wrote Charles Smyth, dates from the coming of the Friars. . . . The history of the pulpit as we know it begins with the Preaching Friars. They met, and stimulated, a growing popular demand for sermons. They revolutionized the technique. They magnified the office.¹¹ Although Francis of Assisi (1182–1226) was a man more of compassionate service than of learning, and insisted that our acting and teaching must go together, he was nevertheless as committed to preaching as to poverty: ‘Unless you preach everywhere you go,’ said Francis, ‘there is no use to go anywhere to preach.’ From the very beginning of his ministry, that had been his motto.¹² His contemporary Dominic (1170–1221) laid even greater emphasis on preaching. Combining personal austerity with evangelistic zeal, he traveled widely in the cause of the gospel, especially in Italy, France, and Spain, and organized his black frairs into an order of preachers. A century later Humbert de Romans (died 1277), one of the finest of Dominican ministers general, said: Christ only once heard Mass . . . but he laid great stress on prayer and preaching, especially on preaching.¹³ And a century later still, the great Franciscan preacher St Bernardino of Siena (1380–1444) made this unexpected statement: If of these two things you can do only one—either hear the mass or hear the sermon—you should let the mass go, rather than the sermon. . . . There is less peril for your soul in not hearing mass than in not hearing the sermon.¹⁴

From this surprising assertion of the primacy of the Word by Franciscans and Dominicans it is not a big step to that great forerunner or morning star of the Reformation, John Wycliffe (1329–1384). Associated all his life with Oxford University, and a prolific writer, his keen intellect gradually broke away from medieval Scholasticism, and he proclaimed Holy Scripture as the supreme authority in faith and life. Responsible for instigating the first complete English Bible (translated from the Vulgate), and probably sharing in some of the translating himself, he was a diligent biblical preacher, and from the Scriptures attacked the papacy, indulgences, transubstantiation, and the church’s wealth. He had no doubt that the chief vocation of the clergy was to preach:

The highest service that men may attain to on earth is to preach the Word of God. This service falls peculiarly to priests, and therefore God more straightly demands it of them. . . . And for this cause, Jesus Christ left other works and occupied himself mostly in preaching, and thus did his apostles, and for this, God loved them. . . . The Church, however, is honoured most by the preaching of God’s Word, and hence this is the best service that priests may render unto God. . . . And thus, if our bishops preach not in their own persons, and hinder true priests from preaching, they are in the sins of the bishops who killed the Lord Jesus Christ.¹⁵

The Renaissance not only preceded the Reformation, but paved the way for it. Beginning in fourteenth-century Italy, with brilliant scholars like Petrarch, whose humanism expressed itself in the study of classical Greek and Roman texts, it gained a more Christian flavor when it moved in the following century into Northern Europe. For the preoccupation of the Christian humanists like Erasmus and Thomas More was the study of the Christian classics, both biblical and patristic. As a result, they were critical of corruption in the church, called for reform according to the Word of God, and recognized the key role of preachers in securing this reform.

The most important function of the priest is teaching (wrote Erasmus), by which he may instruct, admonish, chide and console. A layman can baptize. All the people can pray. The priest does not always baptize, he does not always absolve, but he should always teach. What good is it to be baptized if one has not been catechized, what good to go to the Lord’s Table if one does not know what it means?¹⁶

So the old adage that Erasmus laid the egg that Luther hatched seems to be true. Certainly Erasmus’ insistence on the supremacy of Word over sacrament, because the sacraments depend for their efficacy on their interpretation by the Word, was endorsed and amplified by Luther. The Reformation gave centrality to the sermon. The pulpit was higher than the altar, for Luther held that salvation is through the Word, and without the Word the elements are devoid of sacramental quality, but the Word is sterile unless it is spoken.¹⁷ In all his writings Luther lost no opportunity to magnify the liberating and sustaining power of the Word of God. Thus, the Church owes its life to the Word of promise, and is nourished and preserved by this same Word—the promises of God make the Church, not the Church the promises of God.¹⁸ Moreover, there are only two authentic sacraments, Baptism and Bread, because only in these two do we find both the divinely instituted sign and the promise of the forgiveness of sins.¹⁹ God’s Word is therefore indispensable for our spiritual life. The soul can do without all things except the Word of God . . . if it has the Word it is rich and lacks nothing, since this Word is the Word of life, of truth, of light, of peace, of righteousness, of salvation, of joy, of liberty. This is so because the Word centers on Christ. Hence the necessity of preaching Christ from the Word, for to preach Christ means to feed the soul, to make it righteous, to set it free and to save it, if it believe the preaching.²⁰

Since the health of the Christian and of the church depends on the Word of God, the preaching and teaching of it is both the most important part of divine service²¹ and the highest and only duty and obligation of every bishop, pastor and preacher.²² It is also such a weighty responsibility that it is extremely demanding. Luther gives nine properties and virtues of a good preacher. The first seven are fairly predictable. He should, of course, teach systematically, . . . have a ready wit, . . . be eloquent, . . . have a good voice and . . . a good memory. Next, he should know when to make an end, and, one might add, how to make a beginning, for he should be sure of his doctrine. Then, eighthly, he should venture and engage body and blood, wealth and honour, in the Word and ninthly, he should suffer himself to be mocked and jeered of every one.²³ The risk of ridicule, the risk of losing life, wealth, and name—these according to Luther were the ultimate tests of a good preacher.

Such a statement was no mere academic theory; Luther lived by it himself, notably during the greatest crisis of his life. Excommunicated by papal bull in January 1521, he was summoned in April to appear before the Diet of Worms, over which the Emperor Charles V presided. He refused to recant unless both the testimony of the Scriptures and obvious reason proved him wrong, for, he said, I am bound in conscience and held fast to the Word of God. During the following days he was granted a hearing by a bench of learned judges. But in reality he had been condemned before the trial began. It ended with his ultimatum: Even if I were to lose my body and my life on account of it, I cannot depart from the true Word of God. It was the preaching of this divine Word, not political intrigue or the power of the sword, which established the Reformation in Germany. Luther put it later, I simply taught, preached, wrote God’s Word: otherwise I did nothing. And when, while I slept, or drank Wittenberg beer with my Philip and my Amsdorf, the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that never a Prince or Emperor inflicted such damage upon it. I did nothing. The Word did it all.²⁴

As Calvin wrote his Institutes in the comparative peace of Geneva, he too exalted the Word of God. In particular, he emphasized that the first and major mark of a true church was the faithful preaching of the Word. Wherever we see the Word of God purely preached and heard, he wrote, and the sacraments administered according to Christ’s institution, there, it is not to be doubted, a Church of God exists. In fact, this ministry of Word and sacrament, the audible and visible proclaimation of the gospel, must be adjudged a perpetual token by which to distinguish the Church.²⁵

The English Reformers were strongly influenced by Calvin. To a great extent they accepted his teaching that the sacraments derive their efficacy from the Word and lack efficacy without it, that Word and sacraments are indispensable marks of the church, and that the priesthood is essentially a ministry of the Word. Thus, Anglican Article XIX declared that the visible church of Christ is a congregation of faithful (i.e. believing) men, in which the pure Word of God is preached, and the sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ’s ordinance. And the bishop, while ordaining candidates to the presbyterate, not only gave a Bible to each as a symbol of his office, but exhorted him to be studious . . . in reading and learning the Scriptures and authorized him by the power of the Holy Spirit to preach the Word of God and to minister the holy sacraments in the congregation.

No reformer took this sacred task more seriously than Hugh Latimer, the popular preacher of the English Reformation. Born about 1485 as the son of a yeoman farmer in Leicestershire, and consecrated Bishop of Worcester in 1535, he never became prelatical or lost his homely, rustic touch. Instead, "He spoke from the heart, and his words . . . went to the heart."²⁶

His great burden was that the people of England were still lost in spiritual darkness, and that the clergy were to blame for this because they neglected the ministry of the Word. Specially blameworthy were the bishops. They were so taken up, he said, with ruffling in their rents, dancing in their dominions . . . munching in their mangers, and moiling in their gay manors and mansions that they had no time for preaching.²⁷

Latimer’s best known—and perhaps most powerful—address is known as The Sermon of the Plough, and was preached in St Paul’s Cathedral on 18 January 1548, soon after he had been released from his incarceration in the Tower of London. His theme was that God’s Word is seed to be sown in God’s field and that the preacher is the sower. As he developed it, he drew on his personal experience of farming on his father’s Leicestershire estate. The preacher, he argued, should be like the plowman, because he should labor at all seasons of the year. But he bewailed the fact that instead the clergy spent their time meddling in business and pleasure. As a result, by the lording and loitering, preaching and plowing is clean gone. Then Latimer kept his hearers in suspense by this famous passage:

And now I would ask you a strange question; who is the most diligent bishop and prelate in all England; that passes all the rest in doing his office? I can tell, for I know who it is; I know him well. But now I think I see you listening and hearkening that I should name him. There is one that passes all the other, and is the most diligent prelate and preacher in all England. And will ye know who it is? I will tell you—it is the Devil. He is the most diligent preacher of all others; he is never out of his diocese; he is never from his cure; you shall never find him unoccupied; he is ever in his parish; he keeps residence at all times; you shall never find him out of the way; call for him when you will, he is ever at home. He is the most diligent preacher in all the realm; he is ever at his plough; no lording or loitering can hinder him; he is ever applying his business; you shall never find him idle, I warrant you. . . . Where the devil is resident, and has his plough going, there away with books and up with candles; away with bibles and up with beads; away with the light of the gospel and up with the light of candles, yea, at noonday; . . . up with man’s traditions and his laws, down with God’s traditions and his most holy word; . . . Oh that our prelates would be as diligent to sow the corn of good doctrine as Satan is to sow cockle and darnel!. . . There was never such a preacher in England as he is.

The conclusion of the sermon went like this:

The prelates . . . are lords, and no labourers; but the devil is diligent at his plough. He is no unpreaching prelate; he is no lordly loiterer from his cure; but a busy ploughman. . . . Therefore, ye unpreaching prelates, learn of the devil: to be diligent in doing of your office. . . . If you will not learn of God, nor good men, to be diligent in your office, learn of the devil.²⁸

I have referred to Luther and Calvin for the Continental Reformation, and to Latimer for the English. They were preachers, and they believed in preaching. Yet they were only leading examples of a widespread conviction and practice. Here is E. C. Dargan’s comment:

The great events and achievements of that mighty revolution were largely the work of preachers and preaching; for it was by the Word of God, through the ministry of earnest men who believed, loved and taught it, that the best and most enduring work of the Reformation was done. And, conversely, the events and principles of the movement powerfully reacted on preaching itself, giving it new spirit, new power, new forms, so that the relation between the Reformation and preaching may be succinctly described as one of mutual dependence, aid and guidance.²⁹

The Puritans and the Evangelicals

The prominence which was given to preaching by the early Reformers continued to be given in the latter part of the sixteenth century and in the seventeenth by the Puritans. They have been described by many names, some rude, others not so rude. But the name which best sums up their character, writes Irvonwy Morgan, is the ‘Godly Preachers.’ He goes on to explain why:

The essential thing in understanding the Puritans was that they were preachers before they were anything else, and preachers with a particular emphasis that could be distinguished from other preachers by those who heard them. . . . What bound them together, undergirded their striving, and gave them the dynamic to persist was their consciousness that they were called to preach the Gospel. Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel was their inspiration and justification. Puritan tradition in the first and last resort must be assessed in terms of the pulpit, and the words of the ex-Dominican Friar Thomas Sampson, one of the leaders and first sufferers of the Puritan Movement. . . can stand as their slogan: Let others be Bishops, he says, I will undertake the office of preacher or none at all.³⁰

Among the seventeenth-century Puritans, Richard Baxter, author of The Reformed Pastor (1656), stands out as consistently exemplifying the ideals which the Puritan tradition and his own book set forth. He felt oppressed by the ignorance, laziness, and licentiousness of the clergy, which had been exposed by a parliamentary committee in their report The First Century of Scandalous Malignant Priests (1643), which supplied one hundred shocking case histories. So Baxter addressed his Reformed Pastor to his fellow clergy, especially the members of his Worcestershire Ministerial Association, and shared with them the principles which directed his own pastoral work in the parish of Kidderminster. In a word, he wrote, "we must teach them, as much as we can, of the word and works of God. O what two volumes are these for a minister to preach upon! How great, how excellent, how wonderful and mysterious! All Christians are disciples or scholars of Christ; the Church is his school, we are his ushers; the Bible is his grammar; this is it that we must be daily teaching them."³¹

Baxter’s methods of teaching were twofold. On the one hand, he pioneered the practice of catechizing families. Since there were about 800 families in his parish, and since he desired to enquire into their spiritual progress at least once a year, he and his colleague between them invited to their homes fifteen or sixteen families every week. Each family would come alone and stay one hour. They would be asked to recite the catechism, be helped to understand it, and be questioned about their personal experience of its truths. This catechizing would occupy Baxter two whole days a week, and was one essential part of his work. But the other part, and that the most excellent because it tendeth to work on many, was the public preaching of the Word. It was a work, he insisted, that requireth greater skill and especially greater life and zeal, than any of us bring to it. It is no small matter to stand up in the face of a congregation and deliver a message as from the living God, in the name of our Redeemer.³²

It would be quite mistaken to suppose, however, that the importance of preaching was recognized in the seventeenth century only by the Puritans. Just four years before Baxter wrote The Reformed Pastor, George Herbert wrote his A Priest to the Temple (alternatively entitled The Country Parson, His Character and Rule of Holy Life), although it was not published for another twenty years. There is evidence that the two men knew and respected one another. Certainly Baxter applauded Herbert’s poetry and piety, although Herbert has been described as an early Anglo-Catholic. Yet he laid an essentially Puritan emphasis on preaching. His seventh chapter, entitled The Parson Preaching, begins: The Country Parson preacheth constantly, the pulpit is his joy and his throne. Moreover, he draws his message from the book of books, the storehouse and magazine of life and comfort, the holy Scriptures, for there he sucks, and lives. His main characteristic is not that he is witty, or learned, or eloquent, but holy, and so earnest is he in his desire to communicate that he even interrupts his own sermon with many Apostrophes to God as ‘Oh, Lord, bless my people, and teach them this point.’³³

On the other side of the Atlantic, and a few years later, Cotton Mather, the American Puritan, was exercizing in Boston a ministry whose influence was being felt on both sides of the ocean. Fellow of Harvard, scholarly theologian, and prolific writer, he provided in his book Student and Preacher what he termed Directions for a Candidate of the Ministry. His view of the Christian minister in general, and of the preacher in particular, was extremely exalted. His preface begins:

The office of the Christian ministry, rightly understood, is the most honourable, and important, that any man in the whole world can ever sustain; and it will be one of the wonders and employments of eternity to consider the reasons why the wisdom and goodness of God assigned this office to imperfect and guilty man! . . . The great design and intention of the office of a Christian preacher are to restore the throne and dominion of God in the souls of men; to display in the most lively colours, and proclaim in the clearest language, the wonderful perfections, offices and grace of the Son of God; and to attract the souls of men into a state of everlasting friendship with him. . . . It is a work which an angel might wish for, as an honour to his character; yea, an office which every angel in heaven might covet to be employed in for a thousand years to come. It is such an honourable, important and useful office, that if a man be put into it by God, and made faithful and successful through life, he may look down with disdain upon a crown, and shed a tear of pity on the brightest monarch on earth.³⁴

Cotton Mather died in 1728. Just a decade later, newly returned from two years in Georgia, disillusioned because in his own judgment unconverted, John Wesley was granted his heart-warming experience in which, he said, he put his trust in Christ, in Christ only for salvation, and an assurance was given to him that his sins had been taken away, even his, and that Christ had saved him from the law of sin and death. At once he began to preach the free salvation he had just received. True, influenced by his reading of Richard Baxter, he encouraged a house-to-house ministry and a catechizing of converts. But preaching was his own characteristic ministry. In churches and church yards, on village greens, in fields, and in natural amphitheaters, he proclaimed the gospel and offered Christ to the vast crowds who gathered to listen to him. I do indeed live by preaching, he commented in his journal on 28 August 1757. All the time his textbook was the Bible, for he knew that its overriding purpose was to point to Christ and enlighten its readers for salvation. In his preface to the Sermons he wrote:

I am a spirit come from God, and returning to God: just hovering over a great gulf; till, a few moments hence, I am no more seen; I drop into an unchangeable eternity! I want to know one thing—the way to heaven: . . . God himself has condescended to teach the way: for this very end he came from heaven. He hath written it down in a book. O give me that book! At any price, give me the book of God! I have it: here is knowledge enough for me. Let me be homo unius libri (a man of one Book). Here then I am, far from the busy ways of men. I sit down alone: only God is here. In his presence I open, I read his book; for this end, to find the way to heaven.³⁵

And out of his biblical meditations John Wesley preached, sharing with others what he had found and pointing the way both to heaven and to holiness.

Although John Wesley has become better known to the public than his younger contemporary George Whitefield (probably because of the world-wide Christian denomination which bears Wesley’s name), Whitefield was almost certainly the more powerful preacher. In Britain and America (which he visited seven times), indoors and out of doors, he averaged about twenty sermons a week for thirty-four years. Eloquent, zealous, dogmatic,