The Preacher and His Models: The Yale Lectures on Preaching 1891Stalker, James
Religion
The Preacher and His Models: The Yale Lectures on Preaching 1891
Stalker, James
Preaching
object of their dependence and their prayers; in one word, it was not
till the contemplations of my people were turned to these great and
essential elements in the business of a soul providing for its
interest with God and the concerns of its eternity, that I ever heard
of any of those subordinate reformations which I aforetime made the
earnest and the zealous, but, I am afraid, at the same time the
ultimate object of my earlier ministrations. Ye servants, whose
scrupulous fidelity has now attracted the notice, and drawn forth in
my hearing a delightful testimony from your masters, what mischief you
would have done, had your zeal for doctrines and sacraments been
accompanied by the sloth and the remissness, and what, in the
prevailing tone of moral relaxation, is counted the allowable
purloining of your earlier days. But a sense of your Heavenly Master's
eye has brought another influence to bear upon you; and, while you
are thus striving to adorn the doctrine of God your Saviour in all
things, you may, poor as you are, reclaim the great ones of the land
to the acknowledgment of the faith. You have at least taught me that
to preach Christ is the only effective way of preaching morality in
all its branches; and out of your humble cottages have I gathered a
lesson, which I pray God I may be enabled to carry with all its
simplicity into a wider theatre, and to bring with all the power of
its subduing efficacy upon the voices of a more crowded population."
* * * * *
There is nothing which I should more like to leave ringing in your
ears than this remarkable statement of my great fellow-countryman. But
I cannot close and bid you farewell without expressing the happiness
which I have derived from these weeks spent in your society and
thanking you for the extremely encouraging attendance with which you
have honoured me from first to last. To the authorities of the
college, as well as to many citizens of this town, I have to express
my indebtedness for an amount of kindness and courtesy which I can
never forget, and which will always make my visit to this country one
of the pleasantest of memories.
Let us, in parting, commend each other to the grace of God:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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