From Halley's Bible Handbook
typos mine
The most important thing in this book is this simple suggestion:
That each Church have a congregational plan of Bible reading
and
That the pastor's sermon be from the part of the Bible read the past week
Thus connecting the pastor's preaching with the People's Bible Reading.
This suggestion, if followed, would, beyond any doubt whatever, produce a re-vitalized Church: Provided the pastor himself thoroughly believe's in the Bible as God's Word, and puts his heart into the effort.
The Church and the Bible go together. The Church exists to procliam and exalt the Christ of the Bible, and for nothing else. A Church that does not enthrone the Bible in the lives of its people is false to its Mission.
The Bible is not just a sort of text, or pretext, book for preachers and teachers.
It is a book for the people, all the people. And preachers and teachers who build on any other foundation must not be surprised if their work in the end proves to be very superficial.
With all our facilities for propagating Christian truth, our well organized churches and Bible schools, our seminaries, our highly trained ministers and church leaders, with the last word in up=to-date religious education methods, and endless amount of Christian literature, and an ever increasing number of meetins and organizations where we talk and teach and preach in the name of the Bible, even quoting Chapter and verse = yet the great body of our church members treat the Bible as if it were a mere side issue in their lives.
They are willing, provided enough promotional pressure is put on them, to listen to preachers and leaders talk of Bible things; but, as for reading it temselves, only a few do it. Ofa hundred average church members, perhaps one may even know the names of the Bible books, or have any idea what each book is about. Probably more than three-fourths of our American Protestant Church members could not, off-hand, tell where to find the Sermon on the Mount, or the Ten Commandments.
And, on top of this ignorance of the Bible, and indifference to it, and neglect of it, they have no sense of great loyalty to the church, or conscience about it. On an average, less than one-third, or one-fourth, of a congreagation's enrolled professed membership, attend it's Sunday services with any degree of regularity.
What a fearful indictment of prevailing techniques of doing church work! Is not something sadly lacking in methods that are producing churches that are so largely of the Laodicean type, indifferent, half-hearted, lukewarm, disloyal, and worldly-minded; or the Sardis type, in which there are only a few who have not defiled their garments?
I marvel that church people are so indifferent to, and neglectful of, the Book that tells them about their Saviour. But I marvel more that church leaders are doing so little about it. Unquestionably, the most fatal weakness of the present day church is the lack of leadership in the pulpit on this one point of guiding and leading its people into the one habit that is the source and basis of everything that the church exists to accomplish in its people.
Congreational Bible Reading and the Pulpit
I do not wonder that so-called "modernist" preachers, holding the view of the Bible which they hold, show no interest in getting their people to be Bible readers. Rather, like fifth-columnists, udnermining the Christian faith from within, their delight seems to be in blue-pencilling the Scripture. These words are not addressed to them.
But what puzzles me is that our "conservative" preachers, who proclaim with militant vehemence their faith in the Bible as God's Word, and exhaust their vocabulary in exalting and glorifying the Bible, show so little concern about their people reading the Bible for themselves. That puzzles me.
Preachers preach their sermons, teachers teach their lessons, seminary professors diligently train young ministers how to develop their alliterative firstlies, secondlies, and thirdlies - all from the Bible to be sure. But where are the churches, ministers, teachers or seminary professors, who, save for an occasional exhortation, are setting themselves toe stablish Bible reading habits among those who are under their pastoral care?
The whole set-up and technique of present day church organizations and activity seem designed to give the impression that everything depends on sermons. To be sure, preaching is ordained of God, that is, New Testament preaching. It may be a distortion of the New Testament word "preach" to apply it to the present prevalent type of pulpit effusions. Certainly the New Testament never intended that preaching should be so utterly devoid of instruction in the Word of God as are the common run of text sermonds that church going people now have to lsiten to. But be that as it may, preaching, even in its truest sense, and at its best, was never designed of God to be a complete and sufficient substitute for the people themseleves reading for themselves the Word of God Itself.
Every Christian ought to be a Bible reader. It is the one habit, which, if done in the right spirit, more than any other one habit, will make a Chrisitan what he ought to be in every way. If any church could get its people as a whole to be devoted readers oof God's Word, it would revolutionize the church. If the churches of any community, as a whole, could get thgeir people, as a whole, to be regular readers of the Bible, it would not only revolutionize the churches, but it would purge and purify the community as nothing else could do.
Example of the Dar Ages. During the Dark Ages, the church, under the domination of the Popes, for five hundred years, tenth to fifteenth centuries, ruled the world with as despotic a hand as any earthly empire had ever done. Strange, is it not, that Church supremacy and the Dark Ages were co-eval? The church, the "Light" of the world, brought to the world Midnight Darkness. Why? Because the Papacy, suppressed all liberty, and prohibited the circulation of the Bible among the people, even put people to death for reading the Bible; and in their infinite presumption, substituted Papal Decrees in place of God's Word. That is what made the Dark Ages - man's devilish impudence in exalting himslef above God's Word. If the church had submitted itself to God's Word, and taught it to the people, and encouraged its circulation among people, it might have been the millennium instead of the dark ages.
Example of the Reformation. It was the discovery of a Bible by Martin Luther, and its release to the people, backed by Luther's own matchless invinvible sould, that brought forth the Protestant Reformatio,. and proclaimed liberty to the modern world - mightiest step forward in human progress ever known in history. Those who read history know full well how directly we owe our freedom and all that is dear to us to the Bible.
Example of elizabeth England. In Green's Short History of the English People it is stated that "No greater moral change ever passed over a nation than passed over England in the latter part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. England became the people of a Book, and that Book was the Bible. It was read by every class of people. And the effect was amazing. The whole moral tone of the nation was changed."
And now, today, the one best thing that the church could do would be to set itself to enthrone God's Word in the lives of its people. The rest would follow. That one thing in itself would go further in solving all problems, individual, social and national, than anytghing else the church could do. God's Word is the best weapon the Church has.
Is such a thing possible? or Practical? Could a congregation as a whole be made a Bible reading people? It most certainly could, and within a very short time. All that is needed is a pastor who believes in the idea, and will put his heart into it.
It will not be enough to preach sermons on Bible reading, even though that be done ever so frequently. To such some would respond. But should a pastor wish to enlist his whole congregation, the best way to do it would be to make out some sort of a reasonably worthwhile plan of Bible reading, and set it before them, and give them to understand that he expects them to make it a part of the church life, and lead them in it, and hold them to it, and, from Sunday to Sunday, one way or another, keep it before them, year after year, as if he really meant business; all the while making it the basis of his sermons.
As for the sermonds: merely to choose a text from the section of Scripture the people have read, and then branch off into a typical text sermon devoid of any semblance of instruction - that is no stimulant to the people's own Bible reading. Rather, the sermon should be a study of, or in, the section read, as a whole, or a worthwhile part of it, calling their attention to some of its best features, and most interesting facts, and worthwhile lessons, as if he were teaching a Bible class.
There is not the slightest doubt but that any average congregation would respond gladly and whole-heartedly to such an effort on the part of their pastor.
But, says someone, to make the Sunday Church service like a Bible class would be entirely too Prosaic and Uninteresting. A Bible study, more uninteresting than the prevalent type of text sermon? Are wee to assume that the average congregation of church people have too little intelligence to desire and solid instruction from their pastor? or from God's Word?
On the contrary, we are sure that the average congregation would love such a plan. And they would never tire of it. Never. Never. And they would love and honor their pastor for thus leading and encouraging and helping them in the formation of a habit they know they ought to follow.
And what wonders it would work! In church loyalty. Crowded Churches. Interest in the sermons Intelligence about God's Word. Christian growth. Spirituyal power. Family religion. Family unity. And what better medicine for half-hearted, indifferent, pleasure-loving, worldy-minded church members? What one thing could a pastor do that would be more worthwhile?
And what better Evangelistic technique? What easier, surer, and sounder way to lead a person to Christ than through Christ's Own WOrd? What more effective way to reach the unsaved? What better foundation for a revival?
What better task could a church set for itself than the task of turning its community into a Bible reading community? Suppose a church would have such a plan of combined congregational Bible reading and Sunday preaching as here suggested; and suppose the Church would foster Bible reading, not only among its own members, but throughout its community generally; periodically covering the community with leaflets containing its plan of Bible reading, with incidental invitations to the church services - what better evangelistic method could a church have? If this isn't the church'es business, whose business is it? If it isn't the pulpit's business, then just what is the pulpit's business? |
