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chariot ride w ith Deacon Philip at his side, talk ing in conversational tone, to win him to th e Lord. There are others th a t you must win in more heroic fashion. Saul of T arsus could never have been won in a quiet way. To have mentioned th e fact th a t you wanted him to become a Christian would have led to your arrest. It took the light from heaven, th e flash from God; it took the blinding and the dark to bring him to consider and make him pray. Edward Payson, w ith his tones of tend er love, pu t some people to sleep. W hat they needed was a Jonath an Ed wards w ith a thunderbolt against sin in every paragraph. “Gypsy” Smith, w ith his fascinating gypsiness th a t has in it th e fragrance of the wild flowers and the sweetness of th e b ird ’s song in th e woods, is very attractiv e to some, and they are glad to h ear the gospel as he preaches it. But there are others (and perhaps th e larger number) who need th e sledge-hammer blows of R. A. Torrey, and th e fiery zeal of “Billy” Sunday. You do not fish for tro u t as you do for sturgeon. T ry your tr o u t. b ait on sturgeon and you will get no fish; try your sturgeon bait on tro u t and you will not fill your basket. So do not criti cize th e tro u t fisher because he refuses to use th e sturgeon method, and do not criticize th e sturgeon fisher because he refuses to use the tro u t method. "By all means save some." Process A word as to Process. “Come ye after Me and I will make you to be come fishers of men.” If you are not a soul w inner Christ can make you one. Ju st tran sfer th e experience of your business to the sp iritual realm and see how it works. You are a merchant? “ Come ye afte r Me,” says Jesus, “ and I will make you a m erchant of men. I will help you to deal in goods th a t
Tact In fishing th e re must be skillful adaptation. There are fish th a t you cannot catch singly. They go in schools. They do not bite hooks. If you ever catch a fish of th a t kind you have to draw the seine around th e whole school. There are people like these fish. They are fond of crowds. They go together. They will come to th e g reat assembly, and when they h ear w itnesses testify for Christ they will believe the testimony. When they see people go into the afterm eeting they will go w ith them ; when they h ear them confess Christ they will be encouraged to confess. You can reach th a t class of people only through the crowd. They are social beings and you must touch them in th e ir social nature. There are other fish th a t do not go in schools. Like th e brook trou t, they hide in out-of-the-way places. They are tim id and wary. A fly out of sea son has no attraction for them . The fisherman must keep out of th e ir sight, and if he breaks a stick he has lost his chance of catching th a t fish. There are men of this kind. They dislike the crowd. They are tim id. They do not like th e personal approach. If you go in the open you will frigh ten them away. We need the wisdom of God in tactfu l approach, th a t we may say ju st the rig h t word and speak it in the righ t spirit. Nicodemus could h ardly have been won in a crowd— th a t meditative, thoughtful, inquisitive mind. He wanted the quiet of th e m idnight hour, and a whisper in the quiet was more to him th an a thunder peal in th e tu r moil. You could not have won the woman a t the well in a crowd. If Jesus had spoken to her in th e pres ence of others she would have been embarrassed and perhaps embittered. The eunuch had been in the crowd in Jerusalem . He had doubtless heard th e Apostles preach, but it took the quiet
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