Page:Heralds of God.djvu/76

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HERALDS OF GOD

the narrow orbit of habitual thought-forms, hackneyed social attitudes, doctrinal predilections. There is no plummet that can sound this ocean's depth, no yard-stick that can measure the length and breadth of this Jerusalem. And the surest way to keep your ministry living and vigorous and immune from the blight of spiritual lassitude and drudgery is to draw continually upon the unsearchable riches which in Christian doctrine are lying to your hand; and to remember that you—no less than the New Testament preachers—are commissioned for the purpose of kerygma the proclamation of news, the heralding of the wonderful works of God.


II

Now here we come in sight of that much-debated question: What is the relationship between preaching and worship? You are doubtless aware that there exists to-day a tendency to set preaching and worship in opposition. According to this view, the prayers and praises of the sanctuary, and the celebration of the Sacraments, are divine, in the sense that there we have direct touch with God; whereas preaching is merely human, as representing reflections, appeals and exhortations issuing from the mind of man. It is characteristic of this attitude to disparage preaching, to regret that the sermon should ever have come to hold so important a place in the services of the House of Prayer, and even to hint that the position it occupies is a subtle form of selfishness, detracting from the

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