And Judas Iscariot: Together with other evangelistic addressesChapman, J. Wilbur (John Wilbur)
Religion
And Judas Iscariot: Together with other evangelistic addresses
Chapman, J. Wilbur (John Wilbur)
Evangelistic sermons; Presbyterian Church -- Sermons; Sermons, American
In the twenty-first chapter of John the fifth and sixth verses we read,
"Then Jesus saith unto them, Children, have ye any meat? They answered
him, No. And he said unto them, Cast the net on the right side of the
ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now they were not
able to draw it for the multitudes of fishes." Although these
disciples had toiled and taken nothing the results were all changed
when they cast their net on the right side of the boat. May it not be
that we have been fishing on the wrong side or fishing in our own
strength, or, as some one has said, fishing in too shallow water, when
we should have been casting our nets in the deep? The fact is, we need
him and without him we can do nothing.
I have been told that of the forty distinct cases of healing in the New
Testament only six came to Jesus by themselves. Twenty were brought to
Jesus and to the fourteen others Jesus was taken. I doubt not that the
proportion is the same to-day, and if it is true then our methods of
work must be changed and instead of praying for them to seek Jesus we
must either take them to Jesus or bring the Master into their company.
There can be no successful winning of the multitudes until the personal
element enters into it all.
1. There must be prayer. When Jacob went forth to meet Esau he walked
with fear and trembling, but in Genesis thirty-second chapter and
twenty-eighth verse we read, "And he said, Thy name shall be called no
more Jacob, but Israel, for as a prince hast thou power with God and
with men, and hast prevailed," so that long before Esau was met victory
was won. There must be no attempt to win the lost without first of all
we have gained an audience with God in prayer, and if we pray as we
ought to pray he will give us the assurance of victory before we start
upon our mission.
2. There must be personal contact. It is said that a man recently went
into a jewelry store to buy an opal and rejected all that were
presented to him. One of them he rejected instantly. The salesman
picked it up and closed it in his hand and finally in a casual way
opened his hand and placed the opal upon the counter. "Why," said the
customer, "that is the opal I want. I have never seen anything finer,"
and yet he had rejected it first. The salesman told him that it was a
sensitive opal and needed the touch of a human hand before it could
reveal its beauty. Oh, how many souls there are like this in the world!
I have read that when Robert Louis Stevenson visited the island of the
lepers where Father Damien did his illustrious work he played croquet
with the children, using the same mallets that they used; and when it
was suggested that he put gloves upon his hands he refused to do so
because, he said, "it will remind them the more of the difference
between us." This spirit must prevail in our work if we are to win
souls.
Two things we may do to reach the lost.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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