THE PREACHER'S TECHNIQUE
dogged, stubborn devotion which will be ready to face the austerity of the divine demand and to pay down the price of discipleship. Jeremiah, writing of the return of the exiles, has a magnificent word about that: "They shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward." Or you may be wanting to strengthen and encourage those who may be passing through the difficult and testing times when faith burns low, and the note of rapture dies out of the Christian song, and dulness and dryness possess the soul. There is a gloriously reassuring word for such a mood in Paul's letter to the Romans—Dr. Moffatt has translated it: "God never goes back upon His call." Or you are impressed with the necessity of setting clear before your people's eyes the twofold character of the Christian life, the indissoluble connection between personal religion and social passion, between dwelling in the secret place of the Most High and going forth on crusade against in- justice and oppression and all manner of evils everywhere. You will find it all summed up in the noble words of the prayer of Asa, king of Judah, on the eve of a great battle long ago: "O Lord our God, we rest on Thee, and in Thy name we go against this multitude."
Such words of Scripture, used as texts, are weapons of immense penetrating power. Even if the sermon should be utterly incommensurate with its theme, the Word of the Lord on which it is based will not return unto Him void. There are texts which in themselves are like a sudden rending of the veil. One of my own
161
