"The fact is," says some one of this class, "the man did not touch my
heart at all." Some one else will say, "He was all heart and no head.
I like a man to preach to my intellect." Or, "He appeals too much to
the will; he does not give enough prominence to the doctrine of
election." Or, again, "There is no backbone in his preaching; he does
not lay sufficient stress on doctrine." Or, "He is not eloquent;" and
so on, and so on.
You may find hundreds of such fault-finders among professed
Christians; but all their criticism will not lead one solitary soul to
Christ. I never preached a sermon yet that I could not pick to pieces
and find fault with. I feel that Jesus Christ ought to have a far
better representative than I am. But I have lived long enough to
discover that there is nothing perfect in this world. If you are to
wait until you can find a perfect preacher, or perfect meetings, I am
afraid you will have to wait till the millennium arrives. What we want
is to be looking right up to Him. Let us get done with fault-finding.
When I hear people talk in the way I have described, I say to them,
"Come and do better yourself. Step up here and try what you can do."
My friends, it is so easy to find fault; it takes neither brains nor
heart.
Some years ago, a pastor of a little Church in a small town became
exceedingly discouraged, and brooded over his trials to such an extent
that he became an inveterate grumbler. He found fault with his
brethren because he imagined they did not treat him well. A brother
minister was invited to assist him a few days in a special service. At
the close of the Sabbath morning service our unhappy brother invited
the minister to his house to dinner. While they were waiting alone in
the parlor, he began his doleful story by saying: "My brother, you
have no idea of my troubles; and one of the greatest is, my brethren
in the Church treat me very badly." The other propounded the following
questions:
"Did they ever spit in your face?"
"No; they haven't come to that."
"Did they ever smite you?" "No."
"Did they ever crown you with thorns?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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