I've finally finished reading William Still's fine The Work of the Pastor. Perhaps a better heading for this post would be the need for perspective. Anyway, here's a word for our own day:
People who are too easily intimidates by the wickedness of any one generation and who panic over things which go wrong, are living so near their own day that they have lost the message of the ages which is full of such seeming disasters. It is they who run with their poultices and eyewash to meet the needs of the hour instead of abiding by the radical measures of the Word of God which gets down to the elements of the case. It is like trying to purify foul water at the tap, instead if at the reservoir or the poisoned stream. There is an application of the Word of God for even the most urgent contemporary situations, but if we get all hot and bothered about it, and myopically concentrate all our ministry on that, for ever moaning from our pulpits about the evils of the day, what are the hungry sheep going to feed upon the while? The devil is a master of sidetrack. (Page 131)
Why did that stand out to me? Is it that General Synod is in session, and the Primates (or some of them) met in Ireland last week? Or is it that I read that paragraph whilst in the Dentist's waiting room? You decide!
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