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T H E K I N G ' S B U S I N E S S
August, 1935
The Christian M inister’s Danger o f Too Much Secular Teaching B y WILBUR M. SMITH* .,u Coatesville, Pennsylvania
P erha ps the author of this article should begin with just a personal note, so that he may not be misunderstood in some of the things he may say, I have been what is called an extensive reader ever since a boy, and a lover of books and of libraries; and now, at the age of forty, I have the joy and privilege of being surrounded with a library of my own of something over sixty-eight hundred volumes. I had rather browse around a second-hand bookstore than walk through the rooms of the most beautiful palace on earth. I get a greater thrill from discovering, for the first time, some rich volume that I had never heard of before, than I do from feeling a fishing rod’bending with a trout at the end of the line. A book cataloguéis to me an open door into an earthly paradise. On the other hand, I do not live to read. I live to preach. Between giving up my library or giving, up my pulpit, there would never be one moment’s hesitation, if a choice between the two had to be made. I would rather die than not preach. To con tinually read without being privileged to proclaim the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ would be, for me, the most terrible experience on earth. There aré thousands of books I would love to read that I will never open, but if to read them all would necessitate giving up preaching, I could easily look upon them being cast into a fire and consumed before my eyes before I could even debate for a moment as to my choice. One more personal note. I happen to be right now in a place where I have to read hundreds of books that other wise I would not feel absolutely required to absorb. Two years ago there came to me the great privilege of editing the annual volume of Peloubefs Select Notes on the Inter national Sunday-school Lessons. This work not only means the writing of a quarter of a million words every year, but it means also the reading of almost everything worth while on the different passages occurring, from week to week, in the International Sunday-school Lesson series, sometimes four hundred pages of commentaries and sermons for a lesson. However,' I am writing this article as a minister to ministers, ánd I should like to dismiss, for the time being, as far as this article is concerned, the requirements of such
T h e D anger of Too M uch S ecular R eading Having now introduced myself, and, I trust, made it clear that I have no prejudices against wide and extensive reading, I would like to sound just a note of warning, if I might, after nearly twenty years in the ministry. There is a great danger today, especially in our country—whether this is true in Great Britain, I do not know, though the English periodicals would seem to indicate that it is—that those who have been ordained to expound the Word of God and preach the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ may be wooed away from a constant devotion to the reading, under standing, and mastery of the Word of God, to a dispropor tionate devotion of their time to the reading of secular literature. A man can study only so many hours a daiy. If the great proportion of one’s time for study is assigned to the reading of secular volumes, or even religious volumes that have nothing to do with the Word of God—and there are hundreds of them today that have nothing to do with the Scriptures, appearing under the name of religion—then the time which that person gives to becoming intimately acquainted with the pages of the Word of God and to the understanding of its eternal truths must noticeably suffer. C auses of t h e T em ptation to E xcessive S ecular R eading Why are ministers tempted to give too great a propor tion of time to secular reading? There are many reasons today why this temptation is powerful. In the first place, there are so many thousands of books being published, probably more than ever before in the history of western civilization. In 1934 in this country alone, 6,788 new books were published, of which 579 are classified as relating to “Religion,” while there were issued the same year new editions of 1,410 previously published works, of which 23 were in the classification. “Religion.” I remember once hearing the charming wife of a famous religious editor in our country make the statement at her dinner table that the reason that people were tempted to overeat, these days, was that there was such a vast variety of' delicious foods .from which to choose. Our forefathers were severely re stricted in thé variety that could be set upon their tables, sometimes partaking of one particular dish, be it. corn meal,
a task as editing this volume. * Pastor, Presbyterian Church.
One of the finest private libraries to be found any where, now held in trust for use by the public, is the Henry E. Hunting- ton Library at San Marino, Calif. The accompanying pan orama shows the Huntington A r t Gallery (left) and the Library. —C ourtesy Pacifie Mutual Life Ins. Co.
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