Success Measured by Principle, Not Numbers
It is not right to estimate ministerial success by the number who unite with the church. The growth of a church cannot be determined by the numerical increase. God looks to quality and not quantity. If that minister is most successful who adds to his church the largest number of souls, there are churches that are lamentable failures when compared with those of Rome; and thus measured, the most successful church of all is, perhaps, the Mormon. How few converts Jesus had when he died. If we except the great Pentecostal outpouring, Dwight Moody has, in all probability, brought more men and women into the church than any of the apostles. At the end of the first century of the Christian era, there were only about 500,000 professed followers of our Saviour in all the world. The world is not to be converted by numbers, but by principle; not by a large, but by a holy church.