USA > West Virginia > The West Virginia pulpit of the Methodist Episcopal church. Sermons from living ministers. With personal sketches of the authors > Part 15
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28
* II. Corinthians, iv: 7.
187
PREACHING THE GOSPEL.
man of signal ability, yet it entered all classes of soci- ety only when it accepted the services and depended upon the efforts of its lay helpers. And so it will ever be. If the Gospel is to triumph everywhere, if this poor sin-cursed world is ever brought to Christ, it will not be through the labors of extraordinary men, for God has not made enough of these to meet the demand ; but the work will be done by those who do not possess ten, nor five talents, but to whom the Great Father has intrusted only two, or one. "No talent is too great, no genius is too brilliant, no attainments are too rich, for the work of preaching; but, thank God, average capacity can be trained into such an instru- ment as God, the Holy Ghost, will employ for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ."
But there were some things possessed by these men which were, and which always will be, necessary to success :
1. They were men of character. Jesus invited all to come to him, and when they came penitent and contrite, he received and blessed them all. None were so low, and miserable, and degraded, but Christ was willing to receive them into his spiritual kingdom. But when he came to select his apostles-his messen- gers-and to give them official positions as ministers and teachers, he had regard for character. He selected those whose characters were above reproach. "Char- acter is important to all men, but most of all to min- isters of the Gospel. Their great business is to reno- vate and improve the character of other men. Hence, it is indispensably necessary that they be examples of what they teach." Character may not, in these de- generate times, be essential to the politician, the scientist, the essayist; for, without this, one may be a learned lecturer on astronomy or chemistry ; may figure upon the platform before literary societies, and discourse most beautifully upon the beauties of Shaks- peare; or may uphold and endorse the opinions of Darwin and Company ; but the Church and the world attach high importance to character in the pulpit. There must go out from the desk the impression that
188
WEST VIRGINIA PULPIT.
the man is greater than anything he says. Even a heathen could see that one of the necessary qualifica- tions to a good orator, is that he be a good man. Em- phatically must this be the case with the Christian orator who would speak the truth as it is in Jesus, and thus win men to purity and goodness. * *
2. They were men of industry. They were not idlers. Not one of the twelve nor of their successors, was found by the Savior lounging in the market places among the idlers. They were chosen from among the world's busy workers. They were found by Christ mending their nets, or fishing-actively engaged in one or another vocation, and from these they were called to be his representatives.
3. They were men of experience. I do not mean that they had that experience which comes with years of trials and afflictions ; they had that in time, but they had a personal religious experience. They were converted men. The Gospel itself had triumphed over them before they triumphed over the world. As Paul testifies in ii Corinthians : " He hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath committed unto us the ministry of reconciliation." First, they had received this gracious experience of pardon and this joy of reconciliation, and from hearts thus full of divine love, and inflamed with love and pity for others, they spoke to the world-spoke with intense- ness of passionate concern, and thus persuaded men. And this personal experience is still necessary to success. A successful ministry must be a converted ministry. Study and learning will not answer as a substitute for this experience. Without this, we shall no more grasp the truth than the sparrow grasps the message passing through the electric wire on which it perches. Without this, we may walk about Zion, and mark her bulwarks ; but unless we have this divine change wrought upon our own souls, we cannot enter into the temple of God. We can form no adequate conception of its glory, of the hallowed services which are rendered there to him that dwells between the cherubim, and can neither describe nor recommend them with success to others,
189
PREACHING THE GOSPEL.
4. They were called men. They were called, not merely to a life of faith in Jesus, but called specially to the work of the ministry. There were others among the followers of the blessed Master, who had character and experience and industry, and who, as faithfully as these, no doubt, discharged their duty in the respective stations in life in which it pleased God to place them ; but these men heard the voice of Jesus saying to them' "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men." Is- it not superfluous for me to say, brethren, this per- sonal call is still essential to success ? It is the infal- lible testimony of God's Word that " no man taketh this honor unto himself, but he that is called of God." There must be this personal individual call. We must be able to say with Paul, "It pleased God to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen." This call must be nothing less than a deep and solemn conviction, and constraint of personal ob- ligation. A " woe is me if I preach not the Gospel," and our ministry can be effective only with such a call from God.
5. They were endued men. With all this precious experience of divine grace in the forgiveness of their sins, with this personal call to the apostleship, some- thing was still lacking. They needed the enduement of power; and this, you remember, was promised them by the Savior. They were Christians before the day of Pentecost. They had the peace of sins forgiven, but yet they had not the enduement of power necessary to the accomplishment of the work assigned them. This enduement was promised by the Savior as he gave them his last commission. They were to tarry at Je- rusalem, until they were endued with power from on high. For this power they waited; and they received it on the day of Pentecost, in the city of Jerusalem. Paul claims to have received this enduement of power. Its effects are seen as men listen to his discourses, and he frequently refers to it in his epistles to the Churches, as he reminds them that he came to them not with en- ticing words of man's wisdom, but in "demonstration of the Spirit and in power." This power was nec- essary to them, and it is necessary to us. This power
190
WEST VIRGINIA PULPIT.
which, as Bishop Simpson shows so clearly and forci- bly in his seventh Yale lecture, is not synonymous with conversion, nor with the call to the ministry- this power we must have if we would turn men to righteousness, if we would save souls from death. And this power, we are told, is not found in books, in the teaching of professors, nor in the curriculum of the schools. It is a gift directly from God-a power which Jesus sheds forth upon his ministers. It is not learning, norrhetoric, nor logic, nororatory, but it uses these for its one great end. It can burn and shine in the highest pe- riods of the most eloquent preacher, and it can thrill in the accents of the unlettered man. It can use all there is of a human being, and of his acquirements, for the glory of God, and for the advancement of his Church. This qualification the apostles had. They were endued men-endued with power from on high.
Now, these called and endued men were to take this Gospel plan and go forth into the world, and in the presence of all to declare it-to present it to all as the grand panacea for all the woes and ills of the race. De- pending upon no gorgeous ritual, upon no enticing words of man's wisdom, upon neither their learning nor their eloquence-using all these, it is true, but tak- ing care not to so ornament the guide-post that the in- scription could not be seen; not to so cover the path to the Cross with the flowers of rhetoric that the humblest and most ignorant could not walk therein-they were to go and preach, remembering that Christ had prom- ised, by the foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe.
As we see this Gospel plan, and these called and en- dued men taking it everywhere, and adhering to the Master's orders, knowing nothing among them but Christ and him crucified, is it any wonder that success followed? Is it any wonder that Paul, as he writes to the Corinthians, could triumphantly and gratefully ex- claim: "Now, thanks be unto God which always caus- eth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savor of his knowledge by us in every place "? The world might wonder at the results, but surely as we see the scheme, the agents and the power, can we not
191
PREACHING THE GOSPEL.
say that failure was impossible? That just so sure as the darkness is driven away by the rising sun, as cold is forced to flee upon the entrance of heat, so sure was it that, when the Sun of Righteousness should appear, the darkness would flee away; that, when Christ was lifted up upon the Cross, and presented to a lost world as dying for their sins, so sure was it that the hearts of men should be drawn unto him?
And now, in conclusion, " like causes always pro- duce like effects." We have the same blessed Gos- pel, and the world still needs it; and if we are faith- ful to declare it, the same blessed results must fol- low. For all this depends, as we have seen, not on genius, not on brilliancy of talent, but on simple, persevering, earnest fidelity to Christ our Lord. We must be careful to meet the conditions. We must take care of character ; we must seek for the endue- ment of power; we must give ourselves wholly to the work. * * *
What a fearful responsibility is upon us; and what a glorious work is ours, to preach this Gospel-to hold up Christ to a dying world ! Let us, then, so long as God shall give us life and strength-let us go pro- claiming this precious Gospel, remembering that he who called us has promised to go with us, and that God hath said, " My word shall not return unto me void." And although we may not have a great name among men, nor all of us rise to positions of prominence in the Church ; though we may not even be so useful as we desire, yet it is written that " he that converteth the sinner from the error of his ways shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins." Though you may save only one soul, yet, under God, you shall plant that soul in the ether of glory, and, perchance, as it circles around the throne, it shall bear upon its bosom, as it wheels its eternal courses, your name to be read by the angels of light. And when life's toil is ended and our work on earth is done, the pearly gates shall open, all Heaven shall welcome us, and the Master himself shall say : " Well done, thou good and faithful servant ; enter into my joy and sit down on my throne."
PERSONAL SKETCH.
IT HAS been truthfully said, that a boy possessed of ener- gy, application, and health, never fails to develop into a cultured, and generally, a useful man. Colleges and universi- ties do not educate. They only teach boys and young men methods and ways, by which they can, if properly applied, edu- cate themselves in subsequent life. The advantages, however, of a collegiate education are great. A boy who starts out in the world, without the aid of skilled teachers, such as are usually found in our universities and colleges, has a rough road to travel, and has to struggle much harder to obtain an education, and its natural sequence-success-than ifhe were favored with their assistance.
One of the self-educated, self-made men, who is now in the front rank of the preachers of the West Virginia Conference of the M. E. Church, is the Rev. Winfield C. Snodgrass. He was born in Ritchie county, West Virginia, December 27, 1849. At the early age of five years, he began to attend school, and was immediately recognized as a studious boy-a reputation which has ever since followed him through life. From that time to the present, he has been steadily toiling in the great, broad field of letters, and the consequent result is, a cultured brain, and a large fund of useful knowledge.
At twelve years of age, the subject of this sketch was converted, and united with the M. E. Church, and at once felt himself called to the ministry. When sixteen, he was licensed as an exhorter; and at seventeen he received his credentials as a local preacher. In July, 1867, he was employed as a supply, to assist Rev. Edgar B. Blundon on Middlebourne Circuit; and in March, 1868, he was admitted into the West Virginia Conference. At his own request, in 1871, he was given work in the vicinity of the West Virginia University, in order that he might avail himself of the privileges of that institution. Here he remained for a consider- able period, attending the University as a student, but not neg- lecting his ministerial duties. He selected his own studies, and pursued them with great energy. These were the only educa- tional advantages he ever enjoyed, outside of the district schools, and his methods of private study in his own home.
Brother Snodgrass has filled a number of important appoint- ments, among which, I mention Chapline Street, Wheeling, Mor- gantown, and Parkersburg-three of the most important stations
193
REV: W. C. SNODGRASS.
in the Conference. God has blessed his ministry with a number of peculiarly powerful revivals ; and in church building, debt pay- ing, organizing and solidifying the Church, he has had a large measure of success. In these, and other various ways, he has accomplished a great amount of substantial good to the Church.
For eleven years he preached from notes ; buthis custom, the last four or five years, has been to leave his notes in his study, and preach without any helps of the kind. The change has been greatly to his advantage, as he now preaches with much more ease, freedom and force. His preaching-always clear and point- ed-is marked both by uniqueness and suggestiveness. Origin- ality and power of illustration, unite to give freshness and inter- est to his sermons. By the study of the best English authors, he has cultivated a literary taste, the legitimate outcome of which is a smooth, easy and forceful style of expression. In all his charges, he is a close student of the feelings, motives, and wants of his people ; and his success is largely due to the facility with which reading, travel and associations with men, are made to minister to ascertained human needs.
Such preachers as Brother Snodgrass, are wanted by our best Churches throughout the domain of Methodism.
SERMON XVI.
BY
REV. W. C. SNODGRASS.
THEME :- GOD PRAISED BY HIS WORKS.
TEXT :- "All thy works shall praise thee, O, Lord."-PSALM cxlv : 10.
In their survey of the universe the cynical man, and the infallible boy, see much to be improved. They search the untenanted wilderness, and the ex- panse of waters, for evidence to impeach the wisdom and benevolence of creation. With critical and solemn indignation they inquire, in the spirit and language of Iscariot, "To what purpose is this waste ?" Their doleful sentiment is voiced in Gray's familiar lines :
"Full many a gem of purest ray serene The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear ; Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air."
From this pessemistic complaint, let us turn to the other side of the question, and listen to one who, with vision clarified by faith and hope and love, sees the world as the obedient servitor of the God who made it :
"' God hath his solitudes, unpeopled yet, Save by the quiet life of bird and flower, Where from the world's foundation he hath set The hiding of his power.
" Year after year his rains make fresh and green Lone wastes of prairie, where, as daylight goes, Legions of light-hued blossoms, all unseen, Their beauteous petals close.
195
GOD PRAISED BY HIS WORKS.
" Year after year unnumbered frosty leaves Expand and darken to their perfect prime, Each smallest growth its destiny achieves, In his appointed time.
ยท Amid the strong enclosures of the hills, Fixed by his word, immutable and calm, The murmuring river all the silence fills, With its unheeded psalm.
" The smallest cloudlet, wrecked in distant storms, That wanders homeless through the summer skies, Is reckoned in his purposes and forms, One of his argosies.
"Where the perpetual mountains patient wait, Girded with purity before his throne, Keeping from age to age inviolate Their everlasting crown,
" Where the long gathering waves of ocean break, With ceaseless music o'er untrodden sands;
From isles that day by day in silence wake, From earth's remotest lands,
" The anthems of his praise shall uttered be, All works created on his name shall call, And laud and magnify his glorious name, For he hath pleasure in them all."
The former view smites man with the paralysis of doubt, and issues in despair, defeat, decay and death. It knows no music but a dirge ; no poetry but an ele- gy ; no eloquence but complaint ; no greatness but in the past ; no opportunity but to weep. Its God, if it have one, is a vanishing quantity, imperiled more and more by every scientific discovery, unable to sur- vive the genius of the age, and only spared immediate extinction by the scant courtesy of a few insolent blasphemers.
The latter view is redolent with the perfume of flow- ers ; it puts into man's hand the wand of hope, and teaches him how to transform deserts into gardens and profligates into men ; its poetry is mingled pean and prophecy ; it keeps pace with the march of intellect ; it knows no antagonism with science; the steam is its draught horse, and the lightning its postman; it sees life as one grand opportunity ; it is devout in the field, the laboratory, and the market place, as well as in the closet and the sanctuary; it recognizes the Bible and the book of nature as coincident volumes, which together constitute the divine and only univer- sal encyclopedia ; its God is immanent in all nature ;
196
WEST VIRGINIA PULPIT.
the majesty and mercy of his revelations grow upon those who devoutly study him in the natural world and in the world of man ; the universe is his temple ; all his works praise him.
God's works praise him when they accomplish the purpose of their creation. This truth may be illustra- ted from the works of men. A watch is intended to keep time. If it does this, it praises the watchmaker. If not, all its quaint and beautiful ornamentation only makes more conspicuous his failure in the essential part of his work. A mirror is intended to give back the image of objects brought before it. It praises its maker only when it casts a true reflection. A paint- ing praises the artist, when its harmonious blending of form and color realize his conception. The highest praise of the farmer's skill, is a bountiful harvest. Expensive equipment, bright and curious implements, splendid barns, and ceaseless activity, are but a mock of agriculture, if the season for reaping be not glad with the shout of the harvesters among the fruitful sheaves. So, any work praises him who performs it, only when it accomplishes his purpose.
If we inquire what end God had in view, in creating the universe, various answers will be received. I shall here dwell upon but two.
I. I shall not, I think, reflect upon the greatness nor the benevolence of the Divine character, in pre- suming to say that one of the ends in view, in the cre- ation, was God's own pleasure. We know that he has ever been willing to make sacrifices for his creatures. He "so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him might not per- ish, but have everlasting life." But is God insensible to the beauties and harmonies of his own creation ? Does not the master painter see in his own work, beau- ties which the untaught eye never beholds and cannot discern? Does not the musical composer hear, in his pieces, a harmony of which rude, untaught ears must forever remain unconscious? Is the architect unmov- ed by the splendor of his own achievements? Is the orator blind to his own triumphs in the art of persua- sion? Can we venture a negative answer to the Psalm-
1
197
GOD PRAISED BY HIS WORKS.
ist's question, "He that planted the-ear shall he not hear? He that formed the eye-shall he not see?"* John, in his Patmos vision, observed that the four and twenty elders in their worship of him that sat on the throne, said, "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glo- ry and honor and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were cre- ated."+
I wish distinctly to record, that this view does not becloud with selfishness the glory of God's character. Rather would selfishness dictate the neglect of his low- ly creatures. Are they the waste and useless material of creation-the odds and ends from God's great work- shop? Is his only concern to get well rid of them? I "have not so learned Christ." Nothing is too small for his notice, too humble for his love, or too common- place to promote his pleasure. He "clothes the grass of the field, which to-day is and to-morrow is cast into the oven." He notes the fall of the sparrow, and counts the hairs of our heads.
Such a God cannot be indifferent to the beauty which the microscope reveals to the delighted natural- ist, as he studies the petal of a flower, the vane of a feather, or the structure of hair. Utility there is in all these, but beauty as well. Man's delight in them grows with his knowledge of them. Surely he who knows them fully, finds, in their contem- plation, a pleasure which is heightened by the be- nevolence which overflows toward them. The vari- ous parts of God's creation are not to be studied by themselves, but in their relations to each other and to his universal plan. He who would make up an in- telligent judgment of a factory, must do something more than peer down the dark smokestack. He who would study a paper mill, must look further than the reeking vat where the pulp is reduced. The scraggy tree may have no beauty in itself, yet be necessary to the completeness and charm of the landscape. So the desert of sand, or the desert of water, the mountain wilderness, or the inaccessible crag, the noisy cataract,
Psa. xciv; 9. Rev. iv: 11.
198
WEST VIRGINIA PULPIT.
or the bellowing volcano, may furnish the ground of some one's foolish impeachment of Divine wisdom in the plan of the world ; but when these are studied in all their relations to the system of which they form a part, they are found to blend with the universal har- mony which praises and pleases the Creator.
II. Another of the ends manifestly had in view in the creation, was the development and education of the human race. Cast upon the world without philosophy, without civilization, without houses, without clothing, without utensils, without skill in handicraft, without the wisdom or the virtue born of experience, man had much to learn.
The brief sojourn of the first pair in Eden, was - like a bright dream and only emphasized the numer- ous and pressing needs of man after his sin. The un- known world which he faced, with all its inhospital- ity and opposition, was full of influences, helpful to the development of its new inhabitant.
The universe is not self centered. All its wonders, and wealth, and beauty, and variety, and mystery, as well as all the results of human thought and labor, are, as a prophet. of this age expresses it, " but the scaffolding wherewith to build a man."
Fallible in judgment, yet sovereign to choose for himself; marring often, by his unskill, the fair and perfect plan of the Divine Architect, man yet builds ever, when he builds at all, along the lines of God's design.
Toward the working out of this divine plan of man's life all the ministries of creation tend. Deny this and his place in the universe is utterly without rea- son or significance ; admit it and the subject is cleared of all its difficulties.
1. By its invitations to conquest the universe is man's perpetual school-master.
The fruit on the tree induced him to develop muscle and judgment in climbing among the branches. Fish and animals stimulated ingenuity and skill in meth- ods and implements of capture. The ascertained fer- tility of the soil, led to the clearing of the forest, and the pursuit of husbandry. The strength and fleetness
199
GOD PRAISED BY HIS WORKS.
of the larger animals soon pointed out their utility as beasts of burden and travel. The severity of weath- er led to the construction of tents and houses, and the preparation and use of vegetable and mineral fuel, as well as the making and adaptation of clothing. The or- der of change in the seasons induced provident fore- cast and accumulation. Physical suffering stimulated researches in the art of healing. The presence of rivers and seas led to rude, but improving navigation ; first, perhaps on a single log, or tree trunk, then upon a raft, afterwards in a canoe, or simple boat of skins ; and finally in a craft embodying the idea of a ship, though still far removed from the iron leviathans that now fly in the force of the storm and court not the favor of fickle winds to bring them to their de- sired haven.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.