God of my Fathers

The ministry of the Word Preaching is God’s great ordinance now, as it has been in the past. Its source and substance is the Word. The truth you are to preach is a Divine revelation, a written system of truth. Your teaching is not the tradition of men on the one hand, or their mysterious speculations on the other, but the revealed Word of the living God. You are not the inspirer or discoverer of truth, you are only its interpreter. It is no light matter to represent with freshness and force the truth when reached. Much work goes to that, not to elaborate but to simplify. The test of clear thinking is clear expression. Let the teaching of Christ be your pattern--words clear and simple as the light of heaven--thoughts deep as eternity. Have faith therefore in hard work. But labour is not enough. The mere interpreter can see but a little way into religious truth. The heart sees best. The rays of truth, that shine down into the closet, are the brightest and the best. Have faith in prayer as well as in toil. But while preaching the Word in its fulness, preach it also in its unity--that is, preach Christ. A Bible without Christ, a pulpit without Christ, would be a world without God. Give Christ the place in preaching that He holds in the Word: Christ’s death--the sinner’s only hope; Christ’s life--the believer’s only pattern; the righteousness of Christ--the ground of pardon; the grace of Christ--the riches of believers; the love of Christ--the power of new obedience. It is only from the height of the Cross that we can get a full view of the Word. Not that you are always to be preaching on the central doctrine of the Cross, just as you are not always looking right up to the sun; but as you view all things on earth in the light that streams from the sun, so should you see all truth in the light that streams from the Cross. That is no narrow theme, or soon exhausted. Christ can enter into everything, into all doctrine, all duties, all experience. Christian doctrine is just Christ’s portrait, drawn at full length. Christian morality is just Christ’s portrait, embodied in the life. Christian experience is Christ realised in the heart. Christian usefulness is Christ’s glory, carried out into all the details of life. And, last of all, preach the Word, for it is the “power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” Preach it for salvation; not only for instruction, that you may save yourself and them that hear you. All its truths are revealed for this end. (J. Riddell.)