Preached in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, Sunday evening, January 8th, 1860, at the Commencement of the thirteenth Year of Mr.. Beecher's Settlement over the Church as its Pastor. THIRTEEN YEARS IN THE GOSPEL MINISTRY: A SERMON OF MINISTERIAL EXPERIENCE. "For I determined not to know any thing among you save Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power; that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God."-1 COR., ii., 2–5. FROM this passage we are perpetually worried with false interpretations of duty. A minister's business is said to be to preach nothing but Christ; that is, to preach upon no other topic. But if we were looking for a text from which to advocate a wider range of preaching, and one more in sympathy with the every-day wants and experiences of men, we should select this, in connection with the rest of the epistle; for there seems to have been scarcely a subject in civil society, or in social life, which had any direct or indirect influence upon man, that is not handled in the Corinthian letters of the apostle. For in this passage the apostle discloses the nature of that power by which he hoped to affect men in his journey to Corinth; not at all the topics which he meant to speak about. The topics upon which he meant to speak were in the minds and lives of men. The power which he meant to exert upon men in the discussion of these topics was Christ Christ crucified-the life, and death, and teaching of Christ. No matter what topic he spoke about, he intended to discuss it from a heart perfectly inspired by Christ; from the stand-point of the truths revealed by Christ. He determined that every topic which he touched upon should be Christianly discussed. Corinth was a city, I need not say, that for splendor, wealth, pleasure, intelligence, luxury, and the utmost license, stood second to none in the age in which Paul lived. It was a grand thoroughfare. It was the central point between Greece and Asia on the east, and Rome, and Italy, and the whole Western world in the other direction. Streams of men, actuated by motives of pleasure, or business, or curiosity, were constantly passing both ways, tarrying for a time at this central point, which may therefore be said to have been cosmopolitan The entrance into Corinth of one more Jew, alone, without any personal appearance of distinction; without any circumstances of attraction; without heralds; without the sympathy of even his own countrymen for he had receded from the Jewish faith, or rather had fulfilled it in Christ, and acceded to it in his spiritual teaching; wholly opposed to the reigning religion of Corinth; without wealth; without any one element of human power; a poor foreigner, and a mechanic at that for he sustained himself by manufacturing tent-cloth and fashioning tents; neither eloquent, nor, as we should judge from many circumstances recited in his own epistles, even fluent-the entrance of such a man into Corinth was seemingly a matter of very little consequence. How insignificant that history to this old magnificent citythe incoming of one small man, dusty from travel on foot, putting up at the house of a poor man, and beginning to teach doctrines entirely at variance with all the religions of Jews and Gentiles! And yet Paul's entrance proved to be the most memorable event that ever occurred in the history of Corinth! Entering thus, and proposing to himself the revolution of Corinth, how should he produce any impression? He must needs have thought of that as he neared the city. He doubtless said to himself, How shall I gain the ear and heart, how shall I influence the lives of this great people? Many ways, it may be presumed, presented themselves to his mind. He could not but have perceived-for he had already traveled in Grecian cities- that there was an element of influence very much in vogue, by which men gathered to themselves a great train of followers, great personal influence, great wealth, and great consideration. It was this element that he called "excellency of speech"- the attractions and persuasions of an orator who wins men's admiration by his exquisite periods and dainty devices of language, who makes thought, and feeling, and utterance but a varied strain of music. But such an influence as this, although normal in certain relations, would not strike deep enough to do the work which he desired to accomplish; for it was not admiration for himself, but character in his hearers, that he sought. Eloquence had no power to produce that. It might dazzle, it might for the moment excite and give pleasure, but it would produce no lasting effect; for mere eloquence is like the light of shavings, which burn with a sudden flash, blazing for an instant, and then going out, without leaving either coals or heat behind. There were thousands every day, in the various schools of philosophy, who yielded themselves to the attractive displays of the sophists. The higher thinkers, such as Socrates and Plato, and their schools, had died out, and there was a degenerate set called sophists, who had substituted ingenious casuistries and fine word-reasoning for moral thinking. But, although these philosophies had some power, and these teachers had in their schools many disciples, and exercised a certain public influence, they could not do what Paul desired to do-namely, reform the life and save the souls of men. He alludes to them in the most explicit terms in the first chapter of this epistle: |