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 of the law of the land, to speak on to the end without interruption; he is bound, within the limits of a sanctified common-sense, to speak with the authority of his commission. Here are powerful temptations to an inconsiderate man, perhaps especially to an inconsiderate young man, to show much inconsideration. And therefore, here is a pre-eminent occasion for the true Pastor, who thinks, prays, loves, and is humble, to practise the beautiful opposite. Shall you and I seek grace to do so?
Put yourself often, my dear Brother, while I do the same, into the position--which we once occupied always, and often do still--of the hearer. You, the Curate, or the young Incumbent, have recently come into the parish, and you are full of a young man's energy and enterprize, and a little infected perhaps with a common and natural belief of your time of life, but a belief not quite true to facts, that the world is made for young men. And among your hearers, week by week, as you preach from that pulpit, sit men and women who were working, and thinking, and perhaps believing, literally long before you were born. Put yourself in their place. Into many of their experiences, and their sympathies born of experience, you cannot possibly enter personally. You cannot _feel personally_ how this or that innovation of language or manner, this or that too crude statement of your message, this or that baldly new and perhaps by no means true theory, aired as if it were all obvious and of course, must look and sound to them. You cannot _feel_ it all; but you can think about it. Perhaps these are educated and refined people, and accustomed all their lives to value clear thought and pure diction, in any case accustomed to carefulness in the matter and manner of the sermon. You cannot enter into all their mental habits in your own mental workings; but you can take account of them, and in a loyal and thoughtful _considerateness_ you can remember them in practice, and honestly aim so to prepare and to preach as to conciliate the thoughtful and the elders.
Such considerateness will not mean the stifling of prayerful conviction, or the failure to be faithful as the messenger of the Lord. But it will mean a severity upon yourself as regards the tone and spirit of your thoughts, and also as the manner of your utterance. You will take pains, even at a heavy cost to self (and such costs are always gains in the end), so to minister as to attract the attention of the flock, not to yourself, but to your blessed Master and His Word; preaching "not yourself, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and _yourself their servant_ for Jesus' sake." [2 Cor. iv. 5.]
With this aim of Attractiveness, then, in our minds, and with this motive of Considerateness beside it, let us come to some thoughts in detail about the matter of preaching.
And here first I must bring in another word to meet the word "attractive." That word is "faithful."