Preaching

The power of finding the present in the past in the
pages of the Bible is a great power, and is the source
of much interest and originality in preaching. The
absence of it makes Biblical exposition very wearisome.
Some preachers would almost seem to count it a merit to
spend their whole time on the Hebrew soil, or among the
Hebrew people, as if their whole object were to reproduce
a scene two thousand years old. This is little better .
than a piece of dry antiquarianism. The real object is
to illuminate the present by the lights of the past, and in
some measure the past by the lights of the present. It
is a power which may be given to some as an intuition,
but, in the case of most, needs to be most diligently culti-
vated. It depends much on sympathy, — one of the
chiefest of a true preacher's qualities. By means of
sympathy he will read his Bible with and for his people,
and see, as he reads, what will meet their wants. His
people will never be far from his mind, and by his sym-
pathy he will know their feelings almost as if they were
his own. And when he meets them in the congregation
he will be always touching them, coming into living con-
tact with what is fresh and vivid, and inquiring in their
hearts. It will be no painful effort to them to attend.
We own to a suspicion of the preachers who are always
urging on their people the duty of regularity — and hitting
at absenteeism. It may be all right, possibly ; but the
question comes up, If their people found God's Word
brought to bear on their actual wants, their sorrows, their
bitternesses of soul, their weariness, their restless con-
sciences, their unsatisfied hearts, would they not be more
attracted, and not need to be scolded into regularity ?
God's Word is more to be desired than gold, yea, than
much fine gold ; sweeter also than honey and the honey-
comb. But the preacher may utterly fail to bring it
home, in the fulness of these qualities, to his congrega-
tion ; is it wonderful that they get tired, fall asleep, or
drop away ?