PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
To My Younger Brethren: Chapters on Pastoral Life and Work
Moule, H. C. G. (Handley Carr Glyn) · 56,195 words · 138 reading sections
Yet Even He Is Not Perfect.
But then, even in this bright supposed case--a case of which the Church of England contains hundreds of practical examples, thank God--appreciable temptations in the other direction, the wrong, unhappy, fatal direction, may very conceivably creep upon you with time. Your admirable Incumbent is all the while a mortal ma…
326 wordsSECTION 62Grave Possible Temptations To Disloyalty.
But also it is just possible that I am writing for some reader who finds himself in more grave and pressing difficulties than these. My most honoured brethren the Incumbents, if any of them should cast their eyes over these chapters, written by a Curate mainly for Curates, will not blame me for saying that there are ca…
292 wordsSECTION 63Beware Of The Growth Of A Curate'S Party.
I have put a good many supposed cases. How much I should rejoice if I could know that not one reader of this page could find any of my "peradventures" the least in point within his experience. But I must emphasize one of them which is hardly a peradventure at all; namely that the Curate is practically certain, sooner o…
445 wordsSECTION 64*An Example.
Some cases happily in point are present to my own mind. I once knew of a parish in which the truly devoted Vicar was, however, not popular; he had sadly felt the weight of depression and disappointment, and this had had a weakening reflex influence on his ministry. He was joined by a Curate, a man in the prime of youth…
399 wordsSECTION 65"The Lost Grace, Humility."
Surely few Christian men have wider and nobler opportunity than Curates have for the practice of "that lost grace, humility," in its form of unselfish dutifulness, "good fidelity in all things." [Tit. ii. 10.] My Brethren know the sort of humility I mean; no artificial mannerism, nothing in the least degree unworthy of…
281 wordsSECTION 66"Suffer The Word."
Few, very few, are the cases where a man who has accepted a Curacy _with his eyes reasonably open_ finds that such is the friction of the position that his first duty is to seek a release. There are such cases, I am afraid. But, I say it again, they are very few; and in every case which looks as if it were one of them,…
374 wordsSECTION 67Independence And Loyalty.
It is no part of the system of the Church of England, as it is of that of the Church of Rome, to put a man (or a woman) under the "spiritual direction" of a fellow-sinner, who is to be, for the "directed," the organ and representative of the will of God. For such a method is no part of the apostolic Gospel, which never…
270 wordsSECTION 68A Noble Subordination.
"Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder." [1 Pet. v. 5.] I never forget how the Apostle finishes the passage; "Yea, _all of you_, be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility," [Greek: egkoubÙsasthe tÍn tapeinophosynÍn], "tie humility round you" as the servant ties on his apron. Most characte…
317 wordsSECTION 69A Letter On Curates' Grievances.
I close this chapter with a quotation. It is a letter written to the Editor of the _Record_, in the spring of 1885, after the perusal of a correspondence in that paper in which some "grievances of Evangelical Curates" had been set forth, and in which it had been implied that such grievances might give some sufferers oc…
438 wordsSECTION 70"The Pulse Of The Machine."
"I aim to speak with all humility and sympathy. But I cannot but thus earnestly express the unalterable conviction that the only ministerial life which can be 'sanctified and meet for the Master's use' is the life in which conviction is sacred, in which Christ is all, and in which self is nowhere." _PASTOR IN PARISH_ …
377 wordsSECTION 71Visiting.
I set before me then the Curate, and the Parish, with its demands for pastoral labour, and particularly for _Visitation_. Well do I know how immense the differences are between place and place in this same matter of visitation; how the parish of a few hundreds, or even of two or three thousand, is one thing, and the pa…
389 wordsSECTION 72*Pray For Spiritual Readiness And Spiritual Fulness.
What shall be my first suggestion? It shall point to the Throne of Grace. Preface the pastoral round with special secret prayer. Sermons are usually (I wish it were always so now) prefaced with prayer in the pulpit that the heavenly blessing may rest upon the ordinance. Is it less fitting, less necessary, to prepare fo…
650 wordsSECTION 73Method.
So you go forth with real prayer. It is your wonderful privilege, thus going to carry nothing less than the blessed "Fulness of the Holy Ghost" for your inmost equipment. I say deliberately, nothing less than the heavenly Fulness--a far different thing from a mere stir and lift of the emotions. That most divine gift is…
329 wordsSECTION 74But Avoid Hurry.
Obviously this line of caution is more needed by some men than by others. But it is needed by not a few; particularly in respect of the temptation to lengthen out unduly the visits that are pleasant to the visitor. One young Clergyman known to me, an indefatigable and devoted visitor, needed a strong reminder in this d…
426 wordsSECTION 75Be Natural.
A duty which you will carefully remember throughout your round is that of quiet Christian courtesy; impartially shown to rich, to middling, and to poor. I say impartially, with a view to _both_ ends of the scale. Some men (perhaps not many, but some) seem to think that ministerial courage and fidelity in dealing with w…
332 wordsSECTION 76Punctuality.
To turn aside for a moment to the special and sacred work of Visitation of the Sick. It is not to be lightly done, as if it were an easy part of our duty, quite obvious in its aims and methods. The greatest judgment is often needed in the sick-room. We need quickness to perceive how much conversation the invalid can be…
322 wordsSECTION 77Use Of The Bible In Visiting.
Thus prepared by secret and special intercourse with God, and recollecting some simple maxims about practical points, you go out into the parish. But no; let me suggest one other preliminary, which, before most rounds of pastoral visiting, cannot be out of place. You will take in your pocket _two books_, if not more; o…
326 wordsSECTION 78The Visiting Pastor At Work.
Two simple expedients for effective use of the Scriptures in a parish round are presented to me by my own past experience, gathered from several years of regular parochial work. One is, the choice of some short pregnant passage which shall be, for that round, _the_ passage to be read not once only but in house after ho…
309 wordsSECTION 79*Our Advantage As Ministers Of The English Church.
Let me pause for a moment to remind you of one great and valuable advantage which is ours as the Ministers of the National Church and the servants of the parochial system. All honour to devoted servants of God in the Ministry of other denominations; in numberless instances they have done in the past, and are doing now,…
481 wordsSECTION 80Keep It Always In View.
In the ordinary pastoral round no such ingenious merriment will be necessary; though you will of course aim not only to be but to be seen to be _happy_ in your work, and in your Master; _bright_ with a light which is as natural in its influence as it is divine in its origin. In the ordinary round one great principle to…
325 wordsSECTION 81A Happy Rebuke To Cowardice.
There are cases most certainly where this has to be done with peculiar tact and caution unless quite obvious mischief is to be done instead of good. But let the man be always _lying in wait_, and he will very seldom do so quite in vain. An instance occurs to me, in the work of a most honoured veteran in the Ministry. H…
490 wordsSECTION 82Let The Visitor Be A Teacher, Watching For Opportunities.
_PASTOR IN PARISH_ (ii.). _Work on in hope; the plough, the sickle wield; Thy Master is the harvest's Master too; He gives the golden seed, He owns the field, And does Himself what His true servants do._ I take up again the all-important subject of Pastoral Visitation, for the same sort of informal and fragmentary…
500 wordsSECTION 83*The Pastoral Teacher'S Topics.
If possible, let no visit close without some such utterance, if only one. It may be about the very foundations of all Christian truth; about the certainty of Christian facts, the Resurrection above all; about the Person of the Lord Jesus; about His finished work of Atonement; about faith, and our acceptance as believer…
262 wordsSECTION 84Christ "A Blessed Angel."
I need not fill my pages with numberless details. For my plea is that we should rather hold ourselves ready for the natural rise of such or such topics, and for a clear instructive word in season upon them, than that we should propose a theme and deliver a discourse. But I cannot too earnestly remind my Brethren how gr…
357 wordsSECTION 85The Truth Of The Holy Spirit.
And so too is ignorance and misbelief about the work of His Cross, and of His Holy Spirit. "I hope I shall have all my sufferment here," said one poor invalid to me in old days, speaking indeed from a very comfortless bed, in the slow pains of a dire disease. She had been long within sound of clear, bright Christian te…
399 wordsSECTION 86The Truth Of The Sacraments.
On that last subject it is not my intention to enter at any length. But a few words I may take this occasion to say, and I will assume that I am speaking to a younger Brother who in the main agrees with me in what are commonly called Evangelical Church principles. Let me first then counsel you to take care that no one …
617 wordsSECTION 87Mistakes About Church Doctrine.
While on the subject of Church Doctrine, I may go a little further, and remind you how very likely you are to discover in your rounds many mistakes about both the doctrine and the government of the Church of England. I have had considerable experience of such questions in the way of private pastoral ministry; I have fo…
257 wordsSECTION 88Defective Views Of Sin.
But to come back to matters more primary than even these; I must remind my younger Brother that there is, all around him, in the average circles of even church-going people, a sorrowfully faint insight into the sinfulness of SIN; into the terrible realities of its _guilt_ before God (a point too often absent from even …
286 wordsSECTION 89Visitation Of The Sick.
I owe an almost apology for this long talk about subjects of doctrine, and practice, and evidence. But I have kept all along the purpose of this chapter in view. I wish to remind my Brethren how very much they may do, in the course of visitation, to _drop seeds_ of fact, of truth, of principle, in careful, thoughtful w…
368 wordsSECTION 90A Series Of Visits.
W.S. is a retired tradesman, a thoughtful and rather reticent man; brought up a Socinian, and professedly such still. I am trying to lay siege to him, not without merciful tokens of hope from the Lord. And the simple plan is, not to open the controversy between Socinus and Scripture, but to arrange that each visit shal…
755 wordsSECTION 91A Series Of Visits.
[24] I possess a beautiful little Bible given me by dear W.R., who has now been many years with Christ. Such a gift is a very sacred treasure to a Pastor. Then we can walk round the corner--how the beloved streets and lanes rise up in memory before me as I write!--to see J.F., a young printer, dying in the brightest j…
624 wordsSECTION 92A Conversion At Eighty-Six.
The work is very various, very interesting, and full of the call for "long patience," while full, too, of blessed encouragements and surprises. But "the time would fail me." Ah, let me not close without saying to my younger Brother how deeply humbling to me are the memories of those pastoral days, and humbling above al…
569 wordsSECTION 93The Prayer Book Not Perfect But Inestimable.
_Dear pages of ancestral prayer, Illumined all with Scripture gold, In you we seem the faith to share Of saints and seers of old. Whene'er in worship's blissful hour The Pastor lends your heart a voice, Let his own spirit feel your power, And answer, and rejoice._ In the present chapter I deal a little with the…
753 wordsSECTION 94What It Takes For Granted In The Worshipper.
And then, think what the Book _does_ thus searchingly and helpfully "take for granted." It assumes a deep sense of sin, such a sense as is indeed "grievous unto us." It takes for granted our deep desire both for pardon and for spiritual victory. It assumes our desire to be "kept this day without sin"; to "follow the on…
290 wordsSECTION 95Scripturality Of The Book.
In this connexion I am reminded of a characteristic saying of an honoured friend of mine, now at rest with the Lord after a long and faithful ministry. He was one of those men who instinctively speak strongly, perhaps sometimes roughly; but such roughness is often useful. "The Prayer Book," said he, "is always handy to…
288 wordsSECTION 96*"The Preface" On The Bible.
And then go for a moment from the Services to the Preface of the Book, and see what the Fathers of our English Liturgy thought and intended about the place of the Holy Scriptures in worship. I hope my Brethren have all read that "Preface" with care; I mean, of course, the whole length of introductory matter which prece…
301 wordsSECTION 97Use The Book With Diligence.
i. First, I would entreat my younger Brother to resolve in the Lord's name that his own use of the Prayer Book in his ministration be to him a thing of sacred importance and personal reality. We _need_ to form such a resolve deliberately, and to watch and pray over it. Do we not know what strong temptations lie in the …
255 wordsSECTION 98Pray The Prayers.
I can only appeal with all my heart to my younger Brother not to let it be thus with him. And the only effective recipe against the trouble is faith, exercised in prayer and watching, with a full recollection of the urgent importance of the matter. For indeed it _is_ all-important that the servant of God should be "giv…
364 wordsSECTION 99"Give Attendance To The Reading" Of The Lessons.
ii. I spoke just now of what we should do at the lectern. Let me earnestly press upon my Brethren the great duty of rightly reading the Lessons. Do you want to carry out the will and purpose of the Church of England? As we have seen, that purpose is above everything to glorify the Word of God. See then that the Lesson,…
291 wordsSECTION 100Opportunities Offered By The Occasional Services.
iii. As regards the occasional services, Public and Private Baptism, Marriage, Burial, I would earnestly counsel my Brother to put personality into his reading in them all, in the moderate sense indicated above. The fact that such occasions are necessarily more or less _special_ in their interest for some at least of t…
448 wordsSECTION 101Problems Connected With The Use Of The Burial Service.
Of the ritual of the Grave I hardly need to speak. I know only too well that there are funerals and funerals. There are occasions of unrelieved sadness. There are occasions when the Minister's heart is chilled by a manifest and utter indifference. But the saddest, dreariest of burials is an opportunity for the Lord. Wh…
346 wordsSECTION 102The Holy Communion.
iv. Let me say one special word on our administration of the precious ritual of the Table of the Lord. I am not attempting here any discussion of its doctrinal aspects in detail. For myself, as I have said elsewhere, I make no secret of long-settled "Evangelical" convictions. I regard the Holy Eucharist as above all th…
316 wordsSECTION 103Addresses On The Prayer Book.
But probably I write for readers whose inclinations or risks lie little in that direction. And for them I say, let your administration of the blessed Communion always combine a manifest reverence and a restful simplicity. The Lord _is_ there, the Master of His own Table, the Prince of His own Covenant, ready to give Hi…
277 wordsSECTION 104Chapter X.
One last word, and I have done with these suggestions. An English Bishop once told me that he had lately met a gentleman who, after ten years' residence abroad, returned to England, and to his place as a worshipper in our Churches. "Do you remark particularly any change or advance in what you see there?" "I observe on …
321 wordsSECTION 105Temptations To Forget This.
For, indeed, "the Pulpit" (I use the word in its widest application, wide enough to cover the mission-room desk, or the preaching place in the open air) is no mere isolated item in the midst of other matters which call for a Clergyman's attention. If the man is working, and ordering his work, aright, the Pulpit will no…
512 wordsSECTION 106The Pastor Preaches To Those Particular Hearers.
Let me repeat it as earnestly as I can. The sermon, if it is to be what it should be, should be affected at every point by the facts of the preacher's own inner life, and by those of his intercourse with his people. Those facts must, of course, be thoughtfully weighed and handled. The tact which is so important in a Pa…
303 wordsSECTION 107"Labour In The Word."
I linger a little over these thoughts, though they are little more than introductory. For experience tells me how easily, in these days, the Clergyman is tempted to dislocate his "parish work" from his sermons, to the great loss of one or both parts of his duty. And if once he begins to think of his sermons as a thing …
337 wordsSECTION 108"Litho Sermons."
Is it necessary, in the case of any reader of these pages, that I should not only appeal thus in general, but add one special entreaty--always to preach _your own_ sermons? Probably it is not necessary; but it may be "safe" [Phil. iii. 2.] nevertheless. Not long ago I was distressed to read, in the advertisement column…
272 wordsSECTION 109We Must Preach Attractively.
Quite conceivably, there may be rare occasions when another man's sermon may be rightly used by you. But then, of course, you will do it honestly and above-board, telling your people whose it is. In Addison's _Sir Roger de Coverley_ there is a pleasant scene, where the venerable Knight asks the Parson who the preacher …
599 wordsSECTION 110Pleasant Audibility.
Beginning, then, with physical precautions against needless "offences," [Greek: skandala], in our preaching I say first, let us do our best to be _audible_. The word sounds almost amusingly commonplace. But it must be said. Many more of us Clergymen than know it, or think about it, are not audible. The lack of trainin…
543 wordsSECTION 111Good English.
How shall we best work upon such hints? Very largely, by the use of the plainest common-sense and every-day observation on our own part. But largely also by trying to find some friend, equally kind and candid, who will help us "to hear ourselves as others hear us." For myself, after twenty-five years, I welcome more an…
271 wordsSECTION 112A Good Style Is A Practical Power.
Pains will be needed, of course, as we pursue the object of a good style. We must watch and think. We must read and observe good models, the written words of men who have proved themselves powerful preachers to the people, and indeed of men generally who are known masters of English. We shall have, again, to consult ca…
438 wordsSECTION 113"Written Or Extempore?"
Some preachers need much more than others a hint to keep their sentences _straight_, and to avoid the tangle of parentheses, long or short. Here, again, Mr Spurgeon gives me an admirable illustration. His sentences, never thin or weak in matter, are always straight. If any of my younger Brethren are tempted, as I confe…
513 wordsSECTION 114Pains And Faith.
Another important aid to attractiveness is order and division, simply and sensibly managed. Nothing is much more repellent, at least to modern hearers, than an excess of arrangement; headings and subdivisions overdone. But nothing is more helpful to attention than a simple, natural, luminous division, present in the pr…
360 wordsSECTION 115Considerateness.
_PREACHING_ (ii.). _For Thy sake, beloved Lord, I will labour in Thy Word; On the knees, in patient prayer; At the desk, with studious care; In the pulpit, seeking still There to utter all Thy will._ I pursue the subject of attractive preaching, taking still the word attractive in its worthiest sense, and again …
802 wordsSECTION 116Respect Elder Hearers.
But if all this is true of the desk and of the blessed Table, it is true also, and in a high degree, of the pulpit. Singularly independent, up to a certain point, is the position of the preacher. He chooses his own text; he assigns himself (at least in theory) his own length of discourse; he is entitled, under the Êgis…
577 wordsSECTION 117Wrong Kinds Of Attractiveness.
As a matter of most obvious fact (we noticed it in the previous chapter), there is a false and useless attractiveness, as well as a true. There is the poor and miserable attractiveness--it draws a certain class of modern hearers--of mere brevity; the "ten-minute sermon." There are no doubt exceptional occasions when te…
287 wordsSECTION 118We Are Messengers.
Across all our thoughts how to secure attractiveness, as a co-ordinate line which fixes attention to the true point, runs the word "Faithfulness." The preacher is to be attractive while faithful, faithful while attractive. And he is to be attractive not for the sake of so being, but in order that he may win an entrance…
332 wordsSECTION 119"Preach The Gospel."
"_Preach the Gospel--earnestly, interestingly, fully._" Such, I believe, is the prescription given, by the great preacher whom I cited in the last chapter, to the Pastor who would fill his church, and keep it full. In the first instance, no doubt, Mr Spurgeon gives it as a prescription to the Nonconformist Pastor; but …
459 wordsSECTION 120*Preach It As A Witness.
ii. "Preach the Gospel _earnestly_." This does not mean necessarily with vehemence, or even with fervour, of manner. Some men's delivery is fervent, or even vehement, in the most natural way possible; and let such men preach so, if they will do it thoughtfully and to the purpose. But the slightest artificial cultivatio…
373 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
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Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.