The Christian ministry

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Preface

IX

What is the motive that brings so large a proportion of the human race for a certain allotted time every week into their various temples, synagogues, and churches ? The city of New York maybe not inaptly termed the Corinth of America. Both its virtues and its vices are those of a commercial metropolis. Its inhabitants through six days in the week are eager in their pursuit of wealth. They jostle one another in the cars and upon the sidewalk; they travel wearisomely an hour or two every day from their homes to their places of business and back again ; they work often in dingy rooms and under disagreeable conditions ; they sacrifice for this pursuit pleasure, education, domestic affection, health, and life itseK; and yet once a week stores and offices are closed, the process of money-getting halts, the throngs lay aside for a day their commercial pursuits, and something like one half of them assemble in their churches. For what purpose? It is idle to say that this is a fashion. How came the fashion to be set? Or that it is a habit. What has caused the habit ? They are not attracted by the music : they can get better music in the concert-rooms ; nor by the oratory ; for few of the preachers are orators ; nor by the social advantages : for the

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PREFACE city church is rarely a social club, and never a successful one.

The object of this book is to furnish some answer to this question ; to indicate to priests and preachers what it is which induces half the population of New York city to lay aside their commercial pursuits and gather in their churches every seventh day ; to interpret to themselves the men and women who form these congregations, and explain to them what it is that they are often unconsciously seeking ; and to indicate to those who rarely or never do go to church the advantage which they might secure if they were in this respect to conform to the custom, not only of their fellow countrymen in America, but of their fellow men throughout the world.

The Christian minister fulfills a fourfold function : he is pastor, administrator, priest, and prophet or preacher. As pastor, he is the personal friend and counselor of his people ; as administrator, the executive head of his church, which should be his force as well as his field. These two aspects of his work are not considered in this volume ; it is devoted exclusively to a consideration of the minister as priest and prophet.

In the fall of 1903 I gave the Lyman Beecher course of lectures before the Yale Theological Sem-

PREFACE xi inary, at New Haven, and in March, 1904, the Earl course of lectures before the Pacific Theological Seminary, at Berkeley, California. While this book is not a reproduction of either course of lectures, both of which were given extemporaneously, the material of which those lectures was composed has been freely used in the composition of this volume, as has also some other material contributed by me at different times to periodical publications or used in public and published addresses.

Lyman Abbott.

Cornwall-on-the-Hudson, N. Y.,

December^ 1904.

Contents

FAGS

I. The Fundamental Faiths of the Ministry

Necessity of Fundamental Faiths 1

Chapter I The Fundamental Faiths Of The Ministry

Every vocation in life assumes as axiomatic certain fundamental principles on which that vocation is founded. Any man who doubts those fundamental principles should not choose that vocation. No one should enter the army if he entertains doubts respecting the right of society to use force. He cannot be enthusiastic as a soldier if the theory of non-resistance, as it is expounded by George Fox and Leo Tolstoy, has any place even in his subconsciousness. No man should enter the legal profession if he regards philosophical anarchism as even a possible social h3rpothesis. He who is a disciple of Prince Kropotkin, or is inclined to be, cannot be a good lawyer. Christian Scientists hold either that the body and bodily ills have no real existence, or that both are emanations of the mind, and, as a consequence, that all so-called bodily iUs are to be cured merely by right thinking. No man to whom this seems a possible hypothesis should enter the medical profession. There are communists who believe with Proudhon that the holding of private property is wrong, that all property should be held in common. One who shares this opinion, or even regards it as worthy of serious consideration, ought not to enter on a mercantile career, for the commercial world is based on the assumption that the acquisition of property is right, and that the ambition to acquire property is a just and laudable ambition.

So there are certain principles or doctrines which underlie the Christian ministry. They are its fundamentals, its axioms. They must be vital convictions in the soul, or the man is unfit to be a minister ; as unfit as a communist to be a railroad president, or an anarchist to be district-attorney, or a Christian Scientist to be a medical practitioner, or a non-resistant to be a soldier. The Christian minister purposes to dedicate his life to the ministry of religion ; therefore he must not merely believe in religion; that belief must be an unquestioned conviction, as clear, as definite, as positive in his experience as is belief in the reality of bodily ills in the mind of a physician, or belief in the legitimate use of force to resist wrongdoing in the mind of a soldier. What, then, is religion ?

To enter at all adequately upon the religious history of the world for the purpose of determining by a fresh investigation what is the nature of religion as a vital force in human history would take me too far from my immediate theme and require too large a proportion of this volume; to enter on this history but casually would be useless. Instead,

I accept two definitions which other investigators have given to the world, and which seem to me, after such study of comparative religions as has been practicable for me, to be the best which the philosophy of this subject affords. The first, by a divine of the seventeenth century, is popular ; the second, by Max Muller, is philosophical; the former lays stress on religion chiefly as a motive power; the latter, chiefly as an intellectual apprehension ; the former needs for exactness further defining ; the latter is possibly too definite to be entirely adequate. He who wishes to inquire for himself what is religion will find the material for such inquiry in the volume from which the second of these two definitions is taken.

Henry Scougall defines religion as “ the life of God in the soul of man.” ^ In this definition he assumes that God is, and that he has such vital relations with man that the life of God may enter into and affect the life of man. Max Muller concludes that “ religion consists in the perception of the Infinite under such manifestations as are able to influence the moral character of man.” ^ In this definition he also assumes that the Infinite is, and is an object of perception by man, and that this perception by man of the Infinite constitutes a motive power which enters into his life and affects his moral character.

1 Henry Scougall : The Life of God in the Soul of Many A. D. 1671.

2 Max MiiUer: Natural Beligion, p. 188.

In this volume I shall assume the correctness of these two propositions. I shall recur to them again and again by way of illustration, and for the purpose of confirming certain conclusions to which they necessarily lead every thoughtful man who accepts them; but I shall make no attempt to prove their truth. I assume, as the postulates on which this volume is founded, first, that God is an object of perception ; that he can reveal himseK directly and immediately to man ; and that man has the capacity to perceive him, either directly and immediately, or indirectly and mediately through such revelation ; and, secondly, that if God is thus perceived the perception will affect for good or ill the moral character of the man thus perceiving him, the nature of that effect being primarily dependent upon the clearness and the accuracy of man’s perception of the Infinite.

This definition of religion implies that the Infinite is really perceived, not merely imagined. If he is not really perceived, there is no real religion ; there is only a deception or an illusion. What is called religion is of all vital phenomena the most widespread and the most influential. Neither art, music, literature, commerce, nor war has done so much to determine the destiny of the nations as religion, because religion has itself determined their art and their music, pervaded, if it has not created, their literature, regulated their commerce by the obligatory ideals which it has imposed on them, and sometimes incited them to war, sometimes mitigated it or restrained them from it. I shall assume that this phenomenon is not due to a deception or an illusion, but is the result of a real, though always partial, often obscure, and sometimes perverted perception of the Infinite. I shall assume the reality of religion.

This definition of religion implies more than a perception of moral ideals, personified under the general title of God. Perception of God means more than a perception of the good ; faith in God means more than belief in justice and mercy. It means belief in a just and merciful Person. ‘‘ Moral Idealism,” truly says James Martineau, “ is not Religion, unless the ideal is held to be B,eal as well as Dimner Religion is more than a perception of an ideal moral principle which exists only in the minds of those who perceive it ; it is the perception of a real moral principle superior to and independent of all humanity, which, if it really exists at all, must exist in some moral Being. Religion is more and other than ethical culture. The minister of religion must have more than a perception, however vivid and controlling, of ethical principles. He must have a perception of a Person who is controlled by ethical principles and whose action manifests them.

This definition of religion implies more than a

^ James Martineau : “ Ideal Substitutes for God,” Essays, iv, 278.

belief in tbe reality and influence of what is called religion in human life. To perceive in religion only a phenomenon in human history is to perceive only a phase, however important, of human experience ; but religion involves a real perception of the Infinite as the cause of religious experience. One may believe in religious phenomena, without beheving that a real perception of the Inflnite is the cause of religious phenomena. Such a belief in the reality of religious phenomena will suffice to make the believer a teacher of comparative religions, but it will not suffice to make him a minister to the religious life. To be such a minister he must perceive the Infinite manifesting himself in the religious life.

This definition of religion implies more than belief in an h3rpothetical Creator conceived of as a necessary supposition in order to account for the creation, as a scientist conceives of ether as a necessary supposition to account for the phenomena of light. It implies more than a rational conclusion that God exists ; it implies a perception of God as a living Being recognized by the spirit of man. Deism is not religion. The philosophical conclusion that God exists is not sufficient to make a man who has reached that conclusion a minister of religion. He must have a perception of the living God, not merely a conception of a theoretical God.

Finally, this definition of religion implies more than the perception of an Infinite and Eternal Energy from which all things proceed. Awe in the presence of mystery is not religion. Religion is such a perception of God as affects the moral character of man ; it must therefore be the perception of God as a Personal Being, not as an impersonal Force. By a Personal Being I mean a Being who thinks, feels, and wills. Religion is a life in ourselves produced by our perception of Another under such manifestations as influence our moral character, that is, our thinking, our feeling, and our wills; but if it is to influence our thinking, our feeling, and our wills, it must be a perception of One who himself thinks, feels, and wills. The minister of religion must have, therefore, not merely an intellectual apprehension of God ; he must have a moral perception of God. He must so perceive him that by that perception his own thinking, feeling, and will are modified, clarified, purified, strengthened. There must be in some true sense a reception as well as a perception of God. Or, to recur to the other definition, he must have some measure of the life of God in his own soul, if he is to minister to the life of God in the souls of others.

Religion antedates religions and is the mother of them all. Religions vary according as curiosity, or fear, or hope, or conscience, or love predominates. Religion is the perception of the Infinite under such manifestations as are able to influence the moral character of man. It may influence primarily to seek for the truth about the Infinite : then it will manifest itself in creeds and theologies. It may influence primarily to fear the wrath of the Infinite : then it will issue in propitiations and atonements and sacrifices to escape this wrath. It may influence primarily to hope for reward from the Infinite : then it will express itself in services and sacrifices offered to the Infinite in hope of recompense hereafter. It may influence primarily the conscience through a belief that the Infinite is a righteous lawgiver : then it will issue in a constant warfare to compel the lower animal nature to obey the laws and regulations which are believed to be the expressions of his holy will. It may influence primarily through love of the Infinite as a Being of illimitable love ; then it will issue in loyal, filial, reverential service of him and in gladness of fellowship with him. The first religion will be scholastic, the second sacrificial, the third and fourth legalistic if not servile, the fifth spontaneous and gladsome. Each of these phases of rehgion will have its excellences and its defects : the first will be definite, but dogmatic ; the second penitential, but superstitious ; the third and fourth will be virile, but hard and sometimes cruel; the fifth will be free and joyous, but vague in thought, possibly sentimental if not irreverent, and sometimes careless and lawless in life. In fact, in all religions these different elements are mingled though in different proportions. There are defects in aU religions, because religion is a human experience ; there are excellences in all religions, because in religion man is seeking after excellence. Religions change with times, circumstances, and temperaments, but religion is universal. It would be easier to destroy the appetites m man, and feed him by shoveling in carbon as into a furnace ; or ambition, and consign him to endless and nerveless content ; or love, and banish him to the life of solitude in the wilderness, than to destroy in him those desires and aspirations and spiritual perceptions which make him kin to God, and inspire in him the higher experiences of awe, reverence, penitence, hope, and love.

But the Christian minister is more than a minister of religion; he is a minister of the Christian religion. If religion “ consists in the perception of the Infinite under such manifestations as are able to influence the moral character of man,” then the Christian religion consists in a perception of the Infinite so manifested in the life and character of Jesus Christ that the manifestation is able to promote in man Christlikeness of life and character. Then, also, if the minister of religion must have a living perception of the Infinite under such manifestations as are able to influence the moral character of man, the Christian minister must so perceive the Infinite as manifested in the fife and character of Jesus Christ, and must himseK possess such measure of Christlikeness, that he can promote in other men a like perception and a like transformation of character.

Religion involves the relation between God and man. All such relations involve obligations on both sides : by the inferior to the superior, but also by the superior to the inferior. The child owes duties to the parent, — the parent, also, duties to the child ; the citizen, duties to the government, — the government, also, duties to the citizen ; the pupil, duties to the teacher, — the teacher, also, duties to the pupil : no less is it true that man owes duties to God, and God also owes duties to man. There is a mutuality of obligation. God is under obligation to man as truly as man is under obligation to God. This mutuality of obligation between God and man is explicitly and reiteratedly affirmed both in the Old Testament and the New Testament. It is expressed by the word “ covenant,” for covenant involves mutuality of obligation. There is, on the one hand, the enforcement on man of his obligation toward God ; there is, on the other hand, the recognition on God’s part of his obligation toward man.

AU religions recognize the obligations of man toward God ; what is distinctive about the Christian religion is that it recognizes the obligations of God toward man. This is equally true of the Hebrew religion ; but the Hebrew and the Christian religions are not separate rehgions, but one. Christianity is the Hebrew religion in flower ; the Hebrew religion is Christianity in bud. When, therefore, I say that what is distinctive about the Christian religion is that it recognizes the obligations of God toward man, I include in that statement the Hebrew with the

Christian religion. This mutuality of obligation is the common characteristic of the one Hebrew-Christian religion.

The obligations of man toward God are expressed, generically, by the term law ; specifically, by special laws; as, the Ten Commandments, the Golden Rule, the summary of the Jewish law as given by Christ in the two great commandments, the precepts which Christ has given (as in the Sermon on the Mount), the moral maxims contained in the Book of Proverbs, or those contained in the twelfth chapter of Romans. These laws are the enunciation of obligations which man owes to God and to his fellow man, because his fellow man is also a child of God. And these obligations which man owes to God are stated, substantially, by the Scriptures of the Old and the New Testament as they are stated by other religions ; more clearly, more simply, but in their fundamental elements identical. And this is because these laws of the Old and the New Testament are the embodiment of the law earlier written in the consciences of men. The law, as it is enunciated by the prophets and the apostles, is the interpretation to man of the law as it is written in his own conscience.

But while other religions recognize the obligations of man to God they do not recognize the obligations of God to man. In the precepts of Confucius, in the teachings of Siddhartha, in the code of Hammurabi, the ethical principles embodied in the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount may be found substantially stated ; but there will not be found in these or in any other religious writings, prior to or apart from the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, any recognition of the obligations of God to man, nor any clear and explicit statement of what God will do in fulfilling his covenant for man. Analogies with the Ten Commandments can be found, but nothing analogous to such promises as this in the prophecies of Isaiah :

Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near : let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts : and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.^

Nor anything analogous to this declaration of Paul :

But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved ;) and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus : that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.^

In these and kindred declarations of what God has done for men and will do for men the Scriptures of the Old Testament and the New Testament are unique ; nothing comparable to them is to be found 1 Isaiah Iv, 6, 7. ^ Eph. ii, 4-6.

in the literature of other religions. In other words, the law, or man’s duty to God, is defined in analogous terms in all religious literatures ; the Gospel, or God’s ministry to man, is peculiar to the Hebrew and Christian religions.

It is not only distinctive, it is emphatic.

Throughout their history the Hebrew people were taught by their religious teachers to look to the future for their Golden Age. This Golden Age they called “ the theocracy,” or “ the kingdom of God.” Their prophets told them that the time would come when the kingdom of God should be established on the earth and the will of God done here as it is done in heaven. This kingdom was portrayed in glowing colors. Education should be universal ; law should have its support in religion ; war should cease, and the warring nations should beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning-hooks ; the blind should see, and the lame should leap and walk ; the very wild beasts of the forest should be transformed ; the wolf should dwell with the lamb, and the leopard lie down with the kid, and the sucking child play on the hole of the asp, and the earth be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the seas ; and there should be new heavens and a new earth, and righteousness and praise should spring forth before all the nations. This kingdom of God was to be initiated by a Coming One, a Messenger of the Most High, a Servant who should be the Messiah, a world Deliverer. Sometimes the Nation is indicated as this Servant of God ; sometimes a single person seems to be foretold ; sometimes he is portrayed as King, sometimes as Prophet, sometimes as Crowned Sufferer.^ How these various prophecies are to be reconciled, or whether they can be reconciled, I do not stop here to discuss : I think myself they are simply different phases of the same great truth. However this may be, it is certain that from the opening chapter of Genesis to the last chapter of Malachi, from the legend which speaks of a time when the seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent’s head to the closing verse of the Old Testament collection which foretells the great and dreadful day of the Lord, the Old Testament writers agree in turning the faces of the people toward the future, and filling their hearts with a glad anticipation of a final world deliverance from sin and sorrow, through Israel, and through some servant of God who should embody all that was best and truest in Israel’s message to the world.

When Jesus Christ came, he began his message with the declaration that the time for the fulfillment of these prophecies had come.^ Going into the synagogue at Nazareth, where he was brought up as

^ Deut. xviii, 15-19 ; Psalm Ixxii ; Isaiah ii, 3, 4, ix, 6, 7, xi, 1-9, xxxiii, 6, XXXV, 6, xli, 8-13, xlii, 1-13, liii, 1-12, Ixi, 1-11, Ixv, 17 ; Micah iv, 2, 3 ; Hab. ii, 14 ; Zech. ix, 9, 10.

a boy, he is asked to preach, and he opens the Book of Isaiah and finds the place where it is written :

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor ; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lordd

He then declares to the congregation that he has himself come to fulfill this Scripture, and that its fulfillment is to carry blessing not merely to the people of Israel, but to the pagan world as weU. This declaration with which he begins his ministry constitutes the theme of his life preaching. That theme is the kingdom of God and himself as its founder. Most of his instructions were conversational ; but he is reported as preaching five great discourses, and this was the theme of the five. In the first, at Nazareth, he proclaims himseK as the One who was to fulfill the ancient prophecy, and initiate the kingdom of God on the earth. In the second, the Sermon on the Mount, preached at the ordination of the Twelve to be his helpers, he explains the nature and expounds the principles of that kingdom. In the third discourse, or series of discourses, the Parables by the seashore, he traces prophetically the growth of that kingdom. In the fourth, on the Bread of Life, he reveals the secret of the power by which that king- 1 Luke iv, 18, 19 ; Isaiah Ixi, 1, 2.

dom of God is to be established in this world : the secret is acceptance of the Christ spirit, possession of the Christ life, loyalty to Christ. In the fifth, the discourse on the last days, he foretells the consummation of that kingdom, and the public recognition of himself as the judge and lord of the kingdom.^

Once he asks his disciples whom they think him to be. When Peter replies by affirming their faith that he is the promised Messiah, he approves the declaration, and affirms that on this faith in him as the world Deliverer, and on the power of that faith to transform men as it will transform Peter from a character as shifty as the waves of the sea to one as firm as a rock foundation, he will build his church. Again and again, in language which would be supremely egotistical were it not divinely true, he points to himself as the source of life in aU its various phases. “ I have come,” he says, “ that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” And what he means by life he makes clear by repeated and explicit invitations. “ Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” “ Come ye after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men.” “ If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.” “ Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst.” “ My peace I give unto you.” “ These things have I ^ Luke iv, 16-21 ; Matt, v, vi, vii, xiii ; John vi, 26-59.

spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you.” ^ Rest, power, contentment, peace, joy, — these are some of the elements in that life which he declares that he has come to give to mankind.

His life draws to a close. Betrayed by one disciple, denied by a second, deserted by the others, he is brought before the Jewish Supreme Court and accused of blasphemy in declaring himself to be the long-promised Messiah. In violation of the Jewish law he is put upon the witness-stand, the oath is administered to him, and he is asked directly the question whether he is the Messiah or no. In full consciousness of the fact that by his answer he seals his own death warrant, he replies, “ I am.” ^ He dies, and in his grave the hopes of his disciples are buried. They return to their fishing. Then it begins to be whispered about among them that the Jesus whom they followed has risen from the dead. With difficulty they are convinced of the fact, but when they are convinced their despair is turned into triumph. The fact that death had no dominion over him convinces them that he was indeed the One who was to bring deliverance to the world ; and with this message they go forth to carry the hope of deliverance to the nations. If the reader will turn to the Book of Acts, and read the reports there given of the Apostolic sermons, he will find that

1 Matt, xvi, 13-19 ; John x, 10 ; Matt, xi, 28 ; Mark i, 17 ; John vii, 37 ; John iv, 14 ; John xiv, 27 ; John xv, 11.

2 Mark xiv, 62.

they are all different forms of the same message.^ That message is not ethical, it is not a new philosophy of life, nor a new interpretation of the character of God, nor the elaboration of a new conception of man’s relation to God. The Apostles are witnessbearers and what they bear witness to is this : The world Deliverer has come, and we know that he is the world Deliverer because he has triumphed over the last enemy. Death, over whom no one before ever won a victory. In that message Christianity was born, by that message Christianity has won its victory in the world. Says Browning :