Chapter 49. The Second Doctrine (propounded in the 45th chapter) further prosecuted.
I appeal to you—has it not been just so? Have God's dealings with you not been as they were with Samuel? You have come time and again to a sermon, but you have looked no further than Eli—to the minister. But when you have come to the word with a heart that says,
"Lord, speak, for your servant hears. Lord, reveal what you will; I see it is your own ordinance, and though the minister may be but a poor, weak man, yet he comes and stands in your stead and speaks in your name," then you will find more in one sermon revealed to you than in a thousand before. This is the reason why many have lived thirty or forty years under a powerful ministry, and though it has sounded in their ears, they have never heard the mind of God savingly revealed to them. It is because they have never truly fallen down and said,
"Lord, speak, for your servant hears." Oh! Do this, and you shall hear the great message from God. Then, God will open Himself fully to you.
Chapter 49.
The Second Doctrine (propounded in the 45th chapter) further prosecuted.
I have made some entrance into this second point. The doctrine is that God and Christ speak through the ministers of His word. What the ministers of God do (according to their rule and Word) is to be regarded as if God and Christ themselves were doing it. This is clear in the text: "As though God did beseech you, we pray you in Christ's stead," saith the Apostle.
For this, I have given you several scriptures, and I might add many more. I had thought to present some more clear scriptures to show you that what the ministers do is as if God and Christ themselves were doing it. I might name forty passages that are clear on this point but shall refrain so that I may proceed. What the ministers of God speak according to the rules, I say, is as if God and Christ spoke, and this must necessarily be true if we consider the power that Christ has in the ministry.
We have experienced that there is such power in the ministry of the word that it could only be due to God speaking in it—God and Christ within it. It has the power to enlighten, to awaken the conscience, to terrify the conscience, to humble, to bring down the proudest heart in the world, and even to convert souls. In John 5:25, the text speaks of the word of the Son of God that brings life: "Verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live." Certainly, this is spoken not only of the voice of the Son of God at the general resurrection but also in the ministry of the word. "The hour is coming, and now is," when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear shall live. It was true at that time, and it continues to be true in the ministry of the word today. There is the voice of the Son of God that makes the dead hear and live.
Further, the word of the ministry must be regarded as God's in this respect; otherwise, there could not be any foundation for faith in what is delivered through the ministry of the word. We know that the ministry of the word is the special ordinance appointed for the begetting of faith: "Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word preached." It does not come so much by reading, not even by reading the book of God—the Scriptures—but by hearing the word preached.
Now, you may say, indeed, the word in the Bible is the word of God.
God speaks there, and Christ speaks there, and we may base our faith on what we read. But we must have something to base our faith upon when we hear it preached by man, just as when we read it. It is clear from Scripture that God works more often through the hearing of it preached than by the reading of it. Unless we regard it as the word of God and Christ, we have nothing to base our faith upon, for nothing human can be the foundation and ground of anyone's faith.
It is not the judgment of a man (no matter how learned or holy he may be) that can ground my faith. But when I come to hear him, and I hear God and Christ speaking through him, then I have something to base my faith upon. This is why so many hear sermons, are moved at the moment, but are not grounded or established in the truth; they hear only the voice of man and do not hear God. But when people can say, as those men from Samaria said to the woman in John 4,
"Here is a man who told me all that I ever did; is not he the Christ?"
They went out to see him, but eventually said to her, "Now we believe, not because of what you told us, but because we have heard him ourselves."
So may many a soul say, "I have often heard sermons, and I have been moved by the preaching of such a man, and I did believe what he said, and it affected my heart to some degree. But now," says the soul, "I do not believe because he tells me this; I have heard, in his preaching, God and Christ themselves. It has not been him, but Jesus
Christ who has spoken to my heart." There could be no foundation for our faith unless what is delivered in the ministry of the word is regarded as God and Christ speaking through them.
Objection: You may say, "Must we believe everything that the preacher speaks, as if God and Christ were speaking it? Men can err."