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Prophets and Kings
said to the Pharisees, “O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to
flee from the wrath to come?”
Luke 3:7
. Why need he have provoked
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the anger of Herodias by telling Herod that it was unlawful for him
to live with his brother’s wife? The forerunner of Christ lost his life
by his plain speaking. Why could he not have moved along without
incurring the displeasure of those who were living in sin?
So men who should be standing as faithful guardians of God’s law
have argued, till policy has taken the place of faithfulness, and sin is
allowed to go unreproved. When will the voice of faithful rebuke be
heard once more in the church?
“Thou art the man.”
2 Samuel 12:7
. Words as unmistakably plain
as these spoken by Nathan to David are seldom heard in the pulpits
of today, seldom seen in the public press. If they were not so rare,
we should see more of the power of God revealed among men. The
Lord’s messengers should not complain that their efforts are without
fruit until they repent of their own love of approbation and their desire
to please men, which leads them to suppress truth.
Those ministers who are men pleasers, who cry, Peace, peace,
when God has not spoken peace, might well humble their hearts before
God, asking pardon for their insincerity and their lack of moral courage.
It is not from love for their neighbor that they smooth down the message
entrusted to them, but because they are self-indulgent and ease-loving.
True love seeks first the honor of God and the salvation of souls. Those
who have this love will not evade the truth to save themselves from the
unpleasant results of plain speaking. When souls are in peril, God’s
ministers will not consider self, but will speak the word given them to
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speak, refusing to excuse or palliate evil.
Would that every minister might realize the sacredness of his office
and the holiness of his work, and show the courage that Elijah showed!
As divinely appointed messengers, ministers are in a position of awful
responsibility. They are to “reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-
suffering.”
2 Timothy 4:2
. In Christ’s stead they are to labor as stewards
of the mysteries of heaven, encouraging the obedient and warning the
disobedient. With them worldly policy is to have no weight. Never are
they to swerve from the path in which Jesus has bidden them walk.
They are to go forward in faith, remembering that they are surrounded
by a cloud of witnesses. They are not to speak their own words, but
words which One greater than the potentates of earth has bidden them