THE STRANGER PREACHER
One Thursday in June, several years later, Major Gilcrest was returning
from a business trip which had called him to a distant county. His road
led him by a little log schoolhouse on the banks of Shanklin Creek.
Here he found a meeting in progress in the locust grove surrounding the
schoolhouse.
When last he had been through this region, the little school building
had been used occasionally as a Presbyterian meeting-house, there being
no church building in the neighborhood. Accordingly, Gilcrest, thinking
this a meeting of brethren of his own faith and order, tied his horse
to a sapling, and, joining the congregation in the grove, sat down on a
log not far from the speaker's stand, just as a minister was finishing
his discourse. When he had concluded, a man who seemed to be the
moderator of the meeting rose to speak.
"We are sorry indeed to announce that our beloved Brother Elgood, who
was next to have addressed us, is providentially hindered from being
here to-day. This is a great disappointment; for we who know how
powerful and eloquent Brother Elgood is, had hoped to be greatly
edified by his discourse. It still lacks an hour and ten minutes to
noon; and while we await the time for dinner to be spread in the
grounds, another brother, a stranger from a distant part of the State,
will speak." Thereupon, a tall, ungainly man of about forty years rose
from a seat at the back of the platform and came forward. He was clad
in copperas-dyed jeans trousers, ill-fitting cotton coat, and homespun
shirt. He wore neither stock nor waistcoat, his trousers were baggy and
too short for his long legs, and his cowhide shoes were covered with
dust. His face was pale, his eyes deep set, his hair long and
straggling, shoulders stooping, form gaunt to emaciation. The
moderator's mode of introduction had not been one to reassure a timid
man, nor to prepossess an audience favorably toward a speaker. The
stranger came forward with ungraceful hesitation, and stood silently
facing his audience. The people stared an instant at the uncouth
figure; some laughed, and many turned to leave the auditorium, thinking
that a stroll about the grounds, chatting with friends, would be a more
agreeable pastime until lunch was served than to sit before this
awkward fellow.
Suddenly the stranger regained self-possession, and, drawing his figure
up to its full height, he pointed a long forefinger at a group of
people standing near, who were evidently making sport of him, and
called out, "Thus cried Job unto his revilers, 'Suffer me that I may
speak, and after that I have spoken, mock on.'" His penetrating tones
reached every one in the grove. Some who had risen to leave, sat down,
curious to know what manner of man this might be; but many more, after
a moment's hesitation, started off again. He then cried in still louder
tone, "'Hear, O my people, and I wilt testify unto thee, O Israel, if
thou wilt but hearken unto me!'"
Many more, now smiling and willing to be amused, returned to their
places; but the speaker, seeing many groups still hesitating in the
distance, cried out for the third time, with all the strength of his
powerful lungs, "'Hear my words, O ye wise men; and give ear unto me,
ye that have understanding; for the ear trieth words as the mouth
tasteth meat.'"
Then, as the last straggler returned to his seat, the speaker said with
a winning smile which utterly changed the expression of his gaunt
visage: "And now, friends, you are doubtless beset with curiosity as to
who this strange fellow in butternut jeans and cowhide shoes may be;
but it mattereth not who he is, whence he came, or whither he goeth.
The message, not the man, is the important thing."
Without a Bible he quoted his text, "'Behold, I lay in Zion a chief
corner-stone, elect, precious; and he that believeth on him shall never
be confounded' (1 Pet. 2:6); 'Other foundation can no man lay than that
is laid, which is Jesus Christ' (1 Cor. 3: 11)."
He described the church of apostolic days--its trials, its zeal, its
simplicity, its oneness of aim. "The multitude of them that believed
were of one heart and one soul," and "continued with one accord in
prayer and supplication." He pointed out that this unity was not merely
a spiritual and invisible union, but tangible, visible, organic, a
union in which caste and nationality were ignored, and where Judean and
Samaritan, Israelite and Gentile, Greek and barbarian, rich and poor,
free and bond, formed one common brotherhood, working together with
such harmony and power that, despite stripes and imprisonments,
persecutions and tortures, they multiplied and strengthened, until
idolatry was crushed, paganism vanquished, heathen philosophy
confounded, and unbelief abashed.
For a time, Hiram Gilcrest sat upon his log and listened to the
speaker's vivid eloquence with a satisfaction which amounted to
enthusiasm. "Would that this man," Gilcrest mused, "had been our pastor
at Cane Ridge, instead of that mischief-brewer, that pestilent heretic,
Barton Stone. Then our church would not have been led off into this
schism." But as the stranger proceeded in his discourse, Gilcrest awoke
to the fact that he was listening to what was in his opinion most
dangerous doctrine.
"To-day," the preacher said, "the church is so bound by the shackles of
dogma and doctrine, so crippled by doubtful disputations over 'mint,
anise and cumin,' that she is well-nigh powerless to carry on the task
assigned to her, the evangelization of the world. Sectarianism, with
her vermin swarm of envy, hatred, error, waste and confusion,
devastates the land. In the kingdom of the 'Prince of peace' is heard
the drum-beat of party warfare, where theology prevails against
Christology, dogma against devotion, partyism against piety; and where
the dictation of ecclesiastic councils is obeyed rather than the voice
of Christ."
His musical tones fixed the attention and thrilled every heart. Without
gesture or excitement, his manner was quietly forcible, until he
reached the second head of his theme. Then his spirit seemed to
overleap all impediments; and, as if inspired, he proclaimed the
sovereign efficacy of the sacrifice upon Calvary.
"The existence and development of the church," he said, "rests not upon
the acceptance of any system of opinion or tradition or interpretation,
but upon the acknowledgment of Jesus as Redeemer and Messiah. 'Upon
this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not
prevail against it,' was the reply of Jesus to Peter's confession,
'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.' This is the one basic
truth upon which rests all the testimony of prophet and apostle. This
is the one sure foundation upon which the whole superstructure of the
Christian life must be built. It is the one inspired creed and summary
of the entire purpose and plan of the gospel.
"Since the foundation of our faith," he continued, "is not a set of
doctrinal tenets or a system of theological opinions, but a divine
personality, it follows that the spirit of Christian unity must be as
liberal and as broadly catholic as the spirit of Christ; and if we, the
scattered hosts of the Lord's people, are ever to be brought together
into one common bond of fellowship, we must each first learn to magnify
our points of agreement upon all matters of Scriptural interpretation
and exegesis, and to minimize our points of difference. Let us bear in
mind that whether our own particular system of theology be based upon
Calvin's predominating doctrine, the sovereignty of God and the
unchangeableness of his decrees; or whether we, like Arminius, lay
greater stress upon the doctrine of the freedom of the human will and
man's individual responsibility; whether we be Calvinist or Arminian,
Presbyterian or Methodist, Baptist or Quaker--we all worship the same
God, and through the same Mediator. Therefore, laying aside all malice
and envying and evil speaking and sectarian strife, let us preserve the
'unity of the Spirit in the bonds of peace.'"
Thus the stranger reasoned, and ere he had finished, Hiram Gilcrest,
stripped of the armor under which he had so long battled for his stern
creed, was left helpless and wounded; and the sharpest item of his
defeat was this, that the Wellington of this Waterloo was proclaiming
substantially the same doctrine as that of the hated Stone.
His armor broken, his weapons captured, himself wounded, the old man
sat with bowed head, too weak and crushed to quit the field until the
sermon was finished. Then, unheeded, he threaded his way out of the
throng. Awe at last stole over him as he rode slowly along the quiet
lanes, with his hat slouched low over his face; and he was conscious of
a deeper meaning in his favorite texts of Scripture than he had
hitherto felt. Presently, however, he returned to his own habitual and
(to him) more reassuring reasoning. "That fellow seems to think the
whole ocean of God's eternal purpose and decree can be caught up and
held in one little pint cup; and in his self-confident ignorance he
looks upon the Lord's ways as though they were a child's reading-book
which any man could learn at once. Even if there be truth in what he
says, the simple gospel is too mild and too broad to be used thus
freely. It would make the road to salvation toe easy for the
transgressor. The Westminster Confession and the Shorter and Longer
Catechisms are the skillful condensation and concentration of all
Scripture truth. They are the framework of the church; and one might as
well try to build a house without beams and rafters as to try to hold a
church together without creeds and covenants and confessions of faith."
He said nothing to any one of that sermon in the grove; but the next
few weeks he searched the Scriptures as he had never done before. At
first he sought to find texts to bolster up his preaccepted tenets, but
as the weeks went by, and he grew more and more absorbed in the search,
he began to study the Bible impartially and comprehensively; and,
instead of being satisfied with fragments of truth taken here and there
from disconnected texts, he studied the different passages with
reference to their connected meaning. Reading, studying, pondering
thus, his reason and judgment could not but admit the force of what
Barton Stone and the other "New Light" ministers were teaching. Yes,
his reason and judgment were at last convinced; yet this did not
produce submission and a desire to acknowledge his error, but rather a
feeling of resistance and defiance.