On the multiplication of extra meetings...
July 6, 2011
Clearly, Levy is a man of poor discernment (see the video tour of his library below). But now that I am on the topic of libraries, my recent move has required that I re-shelve my books. It is surprising what emerges when this happens. I discovered, for example, tattered copies of two addresses given by William Still (The Work of the Pastor and More About the Work of the Pastor) on the work of the pastor. The second address contained this typically Still-ite observation on the need for diligence in producing men to do what he calls "other things" so that the minister can give himself to preaching:
"But ministers will not see this as their task. Nor do they know, or believe, what abundant, manifold, astonishing fruit it produces. Anything, but the ministry of the Word, goes. So that when there is a drive to quicken things spiritually, and someone comes away with the novel idea that we need some Bible Study and prayer and devotional life in the congregation, special meetings or groups in cottages or such like are arranged for prayer; and to some it is a great novelty; and the minister or some other leader goes round the group and asks them what they think of this passage, etc. etc. What in God's holy Name are the Sunday services for, if not to feed men's souls on the solid Word of God -- all of it? But because we will not do that, and weakly submit when a congregation says in effect that it will not stand for it, we prepare an evening service, and when the young upstarts say they will not come to Church in the evening, we arrange for another meeting called Youth Fellowship for them, like providing rounds of sweetmeats for children who refuse the solid food we have prepared for them."
