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mons to a lone woman at the well. God’s work can never be too small for your greatest powers. Don’t apologize. If you are unprepared it will not help your case by confessing it. Don’t confound violence with energy, nor perspiration with inspiration. Be in earnest, but affect no unwonted zeal. It is the steam in the cylinder, not in the whistle, that enables the locomotive to walk away with the train. Don’t try to make a poor sermon good by continuing to talk when you have fin ished preaching. Quit. The congregation will appreciate it and you will save yourself much embarrassment. Don’t brood over an innocent mistake. Add that to your stock of knowledge and go forward. A man who never makes a mistake never makes anything. Don’t preach to the people while on your knees supposed to be offering pub lic prayer. Don’t scold people in your prayers. That is cowardly. Don’t apologize for the truth; preach it. Don’t try to defend the truth; the truth is its own defense. Don’t appoint another preacher or singer to take your place when you are unable to keep your appointment. Assume that those who invited you are competent to choose a substitute satis factory to themselves. Don’t beg, indirectly, by telling “ hard luck” stories about yourself in your ser mons. If you are a child of the King, act like it. Don’t take advantage of your position on thè platform to get an audience to commit itself publicly with reference to a matter that properly belongs to the Board. Courtesy and Christianity are perfectly compatible. Don’t take advantage of your position as a worker in a camp meeting to take ail offering for some special interest without permission from thè proper au thority. When invited by the one in au thority, do what you are requested to do and then stop. Don’t take advantage of your position in the pulpit to say things to, or about, those in your audience that you should say to them personally. Don’t ask someone to come forward and read the Scripture when you have been appointed to preach. Read your Scripture or quietly ask, before you call your friend out, if agreeable to the one in charge. Don’t —if someone calls out from the congregation and -asks that you be re quested to sing, pray or testify, take recognition of the request. The one in charge is fully capable of taking care of the matter and for you to take cog nizance of such a request is to embarrass that one. Don’t —if you are requested to preach or testify, stop and ask someone to sing who has not been appointed by the leader in charge. You are to preach and that only, unless you have first con ferred privately with the chairman and he is perfectly agreeable to the request. Page Eleven
By W . W . Holland
F IRSJ, get religion. Be certain of your call. Get the very best preparation possible. You cannot ve versatile without a large stock of materials. If every pi geonhole of your brain is not crammed with information, you will soon become as sounding brass and a tinkling sim pleton. He who can and fails to study, but says the Lord will All his mouth as he opens it, will find the filling to be hot air. Don’t be beguiled by the former suc cess of the matriculates of “ Brush College.” Times have changed. The pews have been lifted nearer to the level of the pulpit. Popular education has put in its work since “ the fathers fell asleep.” Science and philosophy are challenging divine revelation today. Don’t despise the day of small things. When ready, begin. Take what you can get. Preachers are long-lived. The big ones do not often resign. If you want a large church, make a little one bigger. The best way to get out of a small place is to work out. Don’t choose the largest church. If you have the choice, between two church es, choose the smaller. Should you fail in the larger one, the smaller church would not want you; but if you suc ceed in the smaller one, the larger one will. Don’t winnow chaff in the prayer meeting.- Grind grain. Give bread. But ter it if you can. Occasionally sand wich it with jelly. Don’t always talk yourself. Dr. Holmes says, “ A dull preacher, hearing no one but himself preach for thirty years, will finally die a heathen for the want of the gospel.” Don’t read anonymous letters. Burn them unread. By so doing you will “fire out” their cowardly writers. “ Ashes to ashes” is the cremation liturgy. If unmarried, don’t become a “beau.” Indulge in no clandestine correspond- S E P T E M B E R , 1 9 4 8
ence. Be no candidate for the universal admiration of the young ladies. Have a view to a wife suited to a minister’s work. Forecast your improvement and provide for it in advance by selecting a woman adapted to its meridian. Don’t get snarled in a set of ribbons, or tan gled up in the fussy-frills of a bobbed haired belle, or deluded by the artificial charms made by a skillful toilet. The ornament of a “meek and quiet spirit” will never lose its charm. Don’t neglect the lambs of your flock. Know them by nature as well as by name. Attach yourself to your young people. Attend their meetings. Interest yourself in their affairs and they will become interested in you and your mes sages. Don’t speak ill of your predecessor. Those who treated him well are apt to be your best friends. Don’t speak disrespectfully of the community. See its excellencies, and be silent as to its defects. The love of lo cality is one of the strongest instincts of human nature. Don’t exalt any part of your work thinking it will cover the neglect of other duties. Don’t neglect the poor. Prove to your people that you seek them and not what they have. Love them for what they are and not for what they own. Do what you can for the church without regard for what it does for you. Earn your salary and you will get it. Work wins and wears. Don’t show your wounds. Hide them. Be deaf as possible to censure. Don’t fear your people. Fear God only. Let nobody own you. Don’t ever be less than your best. A poor sermon added to a rainy Sunday will not improve your wet weather con gregations. A little congregation and a big sermon will help to even things up. Jesus preached one of His greatest ser
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