The Minister's Duty

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Jan 4, 1905

The Minister's Duty.

Dr. Theodore L. Cuyler strongly declares a minister's duty in the following extracts from a charge to a pastor, as printed in the Christian Work:

A welcome to the people. You are to stand here as the ambassador of the living God. It is not the office of the pastor to furnish a literature for the press. . . . The chief purpose is to mould character for time and eternity—to make bad people good and good people better—in short, to enthrone Jesus Christ in the hearts of all those who are gathered here before you. Your charge from above, through me to-night, is in three words—"Preach My Word." We ministers run dry. That Book never does. Your ministry is inexhaustible, as long as you can draw on God's deep well. Preach the Word without diminution, deflection, or discount. But, in mercy's sake, never spend a minute here defending it. You might as well defend the law of gravitation. God's Word is self-evidencing. You have nothing to do but preach it, and God will take care of it. I can tell you that. You are responsible for duties, and God is responsible for results. . . . In this pulpit keep the great themes to the front. The great themes! Human sin! Gladstone says, "The most perilous omen to-day is the loss of the sense of sin." Let Sinai's thunders be heard here, remembering that the danger of America to-day is the loss of reverence for law. Over against it lift up the blessed, blessed cross, the streaming blood, and let Jesus be heard in these walls, "Come unto Me, . . . and I will give you rest." My last counsel is to preach for souls! Preach for souls! Remember the words of John Welch, the Scotchman, "Lord God, give me souls, or I die." Aim for immediate impression; and then, dear brother, with such a ministry through the week, and such proclamation of Christ on the Sabbath, we do not doubt you will have the joy of the baptism of the Spirit, and God will give you a beautiful harvest.