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THE K I N G ’ S BUS I NESS
H O W G O D Makes Apostles The curse ,of the modem church is the man-made apostle. The dif ference between the God-made and the man-made apostle is as vast as the difference between the paper rose and the American Beauty rose. The man-made apostle may overflow with paraphrastic perfume and abound in poetic pedantry, and the people Who swallow the ministrations of the man whom God has not sent, will ,wither and starve in soul, and like sick sheep will turn into any trail at hand, seeking rest and food. The man-made apostle deals in man-made philosophy, poetry, rational ism, science and political bombast. The God-made apostle feeds the people upon the Word of the living God. He magnifies God’s Son. He presents God’s ultimatum to a wicked and. pleasure-mad generation. Man-made apostles boast their education. God-made apostles rejoice in salvation. Man-made apostles preach legislation as the cure for man’s moral decay. God-made apostles preach regeneration as the only hope for bankrupt humanity. . ■ Man-made apostles deal in interrogation points and subtle denials. God-made apostles use exclamation points and eternal verities. A nalyzing the Diet In Elisha’s time there might have been a dead congregation one day but for the fact that a timely discovery was made that there was poison in the pot and steps were immediately taken to counteract the poison (2 Kings 4:38-41). The concoction that had been prepared from the wild gourds of the world would have put all the sons of the prophets promptly to .sleep. Much depends upon one’s ability to analyze their food—and in the spiritual sense this is especially true. There are_ many who do not care what kind of spiritual food they get just so they are soothed. There are others who actually clamor for wild gourds and will have nothing else. There is some hope for people who will analyze their diet and who will not tolerate wild gourds however delicately dished up with rhetoric or gar nished with intellectual phraseology. Let it be noticed that it was the guests who cried out concerning the poison pottage being served them. Does not the pew share the responsibility of the pulpit? “ The time will come,” said the apostle Paul, “ when they will not en dure sound doctrine but after their own lusts shall heap to themselves teachers having itching ears, and they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto fables.” According to this passage the trouble is not entirely with the pulpit. If God puts an anathema on the faithless shepherds who conform to the popular judgment, let it not be for gotten that He also has one for those who “ will not endure sound doctrine” but cry out for the wild gourds of the world. On the other hand, we must avoid another extreme. It is possible to become mere poison hunters to the neglect of our task of giving out the meal of the Gospel. It is easy to be occupied with arguments to the neglect of Christ Himself. It is not enough that we should know and expose error. We must plant the truth and we must live Christ. Dr. Jowett has said, “ We frequently mistake the passionate defense of dogma for the evidence of a
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