parishes, whatever may have happened in the past. Many of you have
been in your parishes very many years, and no doubt sometimes you
have felt very despondent. Start again to-morrow as if you had just
begun. Though you have toiled all the night and perhaps caught
nothing, cast your net on the right side of the ship, and the next
five years will be the most fruitful years your parish has ever
had. People will notice a different spirit about yourself. Try a
completely new method, and you will have a wonderful success. There
will be a ripple on the water which there has not been before. Be
hopeful about it, and then, if you have to stay on in the same
parish five or ten years more, it may be a wholly different story
from what it has been up to now.
(5) In the next place, a successful fisherman must have a _very
deep faith_. Of course, the ordinary fisherman must have some sort
of faith. The good fisherman believes certain things all the time
he is fishing. He believes in the laws of the wind, studies them,
and acts according to them. He sets his sail according to them, if
he is fishing in the sea, and he knows that he must do so if he is
to reap of the unfathomable harvest of the sea. He believes in all
these things, and on a stormy coast he must be a man of great faith,
dealing with great unseen movements and powers all round him. He
learns their laws, and he knows that if he acts according to those
laws he is successful as a rule. But do you not see that we are
just like that ourselves? Really we are in touch with all kinds
of unseen powers and movements. We have to believe, for instance,
in the salvability of every soul in the world; we have to believe
that every soul is meant for the Gospel, and the Gospel is meant
for every soul. We have to believe in that man in the worst slum
of our parish; we have to realise that the Gospel is fitted for him
and he is fitted for the Gospel. No one has ever been found yet who
could not be made into a bit of a saint in time. And the Gospel,
tremendously deep as it is, is also so simple that the simplest
can understand it. That is the wonderful thing about it. We have
to believe in it--intensely believe in it; we have to believe in
the wonderful power of these tides of the SPIRIT sweeping round a
parish and working wonders; we have to believe in the influence of
the unseen wind that blows over it and to pray often: "Come from the
four winds, O breath, and breathe upon them."
We are, as a matter of fact, working amidst unseen and tremendous
forces. We talk about the power of GOD. The power of GOD! Why, He
keeps the whole universe going, twenty million suns always moving on
through space. He alone knows whither they are going. Twenty million
burning suns! look at the power of that; think what power that
alone implies! and then think of the saving power of one drop of
blood shed upon the Cross, when you consider Who it was that hung
there. Think, again, of the wonderful influence, the downrush of
the SPIRIT: some of you have seen it in missions; we believe in it
at every Confirmation. We are really in touch with most tremendous
powers. If we had more faith we should be better fishermen.
Therefore we do want a stronger faith in our LORD Himself, always at
the heart of our work, a real living faith in a living LORD with us
all the time.
(6) And then, sixthly, we must fish for men _one by one_. Of course,
we can have great concerted movements. I shall never forget a
midnight march through Westminster at half an hour after midnight on
a Saturday night. We swept like a net, bringing quite twenty young
men out of every public-house. As we counted them in the church
school, we could see that most of them were three-quarters drunk.
We could see what would be prevented if the public-houses of London
were shut earlier, as, indeed, they now have been during the war. It
has benefited Russia greatly that she has abolished the whole vodka
traffic. We could not take pledges that night from those men: they
were not in a condition to make them; but the Church of England,
with all her great organisation, ought to be able to prevent that
sort of thing, and catch these souls one by one. Here comes in
the need of personality; we must talk to each of these young men,
provide somewhere else where he may spend his evenings, and remember
that you can only catch fish one by one.
(7) And the last point of all is that, to be successful,
the _fishing-fleet must be kept together_. You really are a
fishing-fleet, and not merely individual fishing-boats. When a
deanery is kept together, it shows a brotherhood, a cohesion, which
is a very beautiful thing to see. To a large extent you are such,
but, still, even the best-worked deanery can resolve to work more
together than they have done, in happy co-operation, the clergy
and people of each parish taking an interest in another's parish,
rejoicing in its successes and praying for it in its troubles. If
the whole deanery meets regularly for united intercession, this must
have a great effect upon the mission work in the district. It must
have an effect also upon mission work among the heathen for the
Church at home to feel part of the same fishing-fleet as the Church
abroad, the workers in one ship beckoning to their partners in the
other ship to come and help them.
Well, then, take back with you these simple thoughts which I am
trying to put before you as your Bishop and fellow-priest. Pray
to be made more keen, more alert, more active and enthusiastic
messengers. Pray to be skilful, patient, thorough, good physicians,
and kinder celestial surgeons. And, perhaps above all, pray to be
hopeful, faithful fishermen; go out together as a fishing-fleet
on the great ocean, believing in all the possibilities which lie
beneath the surface; realise the presence of your Master directing
from the shore the whole fleet. And then at the end of all things,
in the morning of the great day, you will have a harvest of souls to
draw to the shore to His feet.
III
TO GIRLS
WHAT A GIRL CAN DO IN A DAY OF GOD[23]
[23] An address to two thousand girls in Nottingham.
When I think of all the vast influence exercised by those in this
hall, I feel inclined to say what Bishop Selwyn said in the midst of
Eton Chapel--"You can turn the world upside down."
But, before I say anything of my own, I want to emphasise what
has already been said to you, with regard to the influence at
the Front of those who are here at home. As I went down behind
the firing-line in 1915, and held seven or eight services a day,
before each service began I invariably said one thing from end to
end of the line. I said: "I have come here, boys, before we have
any service, to bring you the love from home of your mothers, your
sisters, and your sweethearts." And you saw the soft look that came
into those boys' faces while the guns were firing--and sometimes
an aeroplane was guarding the service for fear the Germans should
not be able to resist a target of four thousand men, and a Bishop in
the middle--you would know what they think of home, and how you have
got the heart of the Empire in your keeping. One of the boys who
has died the death of honour wrote home to his mother: "I have come
here, mother, for one purpose--and that is, that you and the sisters
shall not be treated like these Belgian women have been."
I am going to put the message at the very highest at once. I have
never found young people fail to rise to it. I am going to put upon
your lips, as your resolution, no less a resolution than was on the
lips of our Lord Himself, our great High Priest, just before He went
to His own death--"For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also
may be sanctified in truth." I say High Priest, because I am going
to put this one single thought before you as describing the function
which girls are to discharge in a Day of GOD, and that is, they have
got to be priests of GOD.
Now, that may seem to you a strange thing to say, but before I have
done I shall have failed indeed if you do not believe it. I am
always trying, in London, to unite all the great Christian bodies in
common action. We fight as one family, side by side, against evil,
sin, intemperance, and impurity. Every year all the denominations
in London elect me chairman of the London Temperance Council and of
the Public Morality Council, and it is by focussing the whole of the
Christian thought of London that we are as strong as we are, when
we tackle night clubs, and living pictures, and other abominable
evils, and destroy them in the name of the LORD. I say that because
I believe fully that if everyone understood what the teaching about
priesthood was it would take away much misunderstanding, and I
believe would join together many Christian bodies divided to-day.
_There is only one Priest in the Universe, and that is_ JESUS
CHRIST _Himself_. But He says Himself that the Church is His body.
Therefore, the whole of the Church is the body of a Priest. Those
of us who are called priests are ordained as organs of a priestly
body. We act in the name of the body, and therefore the idea that
we are setting ourselves up above this or that person is wholly
wrong, because we act as organs, as hands and feet--as it were--of
a priestly body. And mark you, the Church is the great company
throughout the world of all baptized persons, baptized by whoever
baptizes them.
If you think that out, you will see what a powerful idea this idea
of priesthood is. Have you ever seen a priest ordained? I wish
sometimes, though I am afraid you would fill the whole dome of St.
Paul's Cathedral, that you could come some day and see what to me
every time is a most touching sight: you would have seen those young
men, thirty perhaps, as were there at a recent ordination, brought
up before the Bishop, who has other priests standing round, and then
on the head of each, as he kneels in front, we all lay our hands,
and I say, "Receive the HOLY GHOST for the Office and Work of a
Priest in the Church of GOD." A young girl said once, "Do you mean
to say every clergyman I see has been through all that?" But now,
if that is so, why do I look round on you and say you are young
priests of GOD? Why? Because you are part of this priestly body. You
are joined to the one great High Priest, and therefore you, whom GOD
knows one by one, are known and named and called. Of course in the
Church Confirmation is the ordination of the lay priest, and if you
are confirmed, I am going to tell you five things you are expected
to do.
1. The first is to be _girded_. I have more to do in my life, and
naturally so, with young men and boys than I have with girls and
women, but that very reason gives me an added authority in speaking
to you, because I know what their difficulties are. I speak,
constantly, to as many young men as there are of you girls; I say,
knowing what difficulty they have at their age to control their
passions, that it is like ruling a horse. A horse is a splendid
servant, but a vile master. When you have got the bit in your
horse's mouth and the reins in your hand, a horse is a splendid
servant; but let him off at full gallop, with the reins round your
feet and the bit in his teeth, then he is a terrible master. So it
is with the boys. They have got to be on the horse with the reins of
GOD's Commandment in their hands, and the bit of self-control in the
mouth, then their bodies are glorious servants. What you young girls
as priests have got to do is to help those boys and young men in the
very flower of their lives not to do anything which is afterwards a
stain upon their conscience. You can rally round them and, if you
are young priests, can help them.
There are three things of priceless value a young girl has on her
side in doing this. The first is her natural modesty. Why are we so
afraid of bad companions breaking down a girl's modesty, and why
are we so afraid of rough horseplay soiling the purity of her soul?
Because it is spoiling her first great gift, her first great power.
It is just that naturally beautiful modesty a girl possesses with
which she is meant to help every young man. That modesty is meant
to help her to be self-controlled, and to help him to be so too.
Then she has a most wonderful power of self-sacrificing love. I say
to the young men, "Never take advantage of the trusting love of a
girl"; but to you I say, you have that beautiful power of true love.
It is that power of sacrifice and self-sacrificing love which is
your great asset to the world. Never soil it, and never spoil it, or
let it be dragged down by anyone. And you have a naturally religious
nature. Those three things, those three splendid things, you have
got with which to gird yourselves. Allow anyone to rob you of them,
and you have lost your strength. Keep them and you have the first
great quality of a true priest of GOD. Gird yourselves with modesty,
unselfish love, and natural and supernatural religion.
2. And when the young priest has so girded herself, the next thing
she has to do in discharge of her priestly office is to _offer up
every day an oblation of prayer and praise to_ GOD. He is looking
for it every day. Do you remember the story contained in a poem by
Browning of a cobbler boy who used to praise God at his work every
day? He was wafted away to another sphere, and there was silence in
the workshop, and GOD said, "I miss my little human praise."
Make then your second resolution, that, having girded yourself, you
will never fail to offer to God this sweet incense of prayer and
praise, and do it perfectly openly. Don't be ashamed of it being
known you do it.
In "Studies in a Devotional Life," Canon Peter Green tells us how
he shared a room in a little hotel in South Africa with two men,
who looked like brigands. Not liking to say his prayers openly in
their presence, he slipped outside, and said them on the veldt,
only to find on his return the "bearded ruffians," who proved to be
Cornish miners, kneeling in prayer themselves. This so impressed the
writer that, when on one of the South African expresses he had to
sleep in the same place as three postmen, he overcame his shyness,
and said his prayers openly. Next morning, one of the postmen, an
old choir-boy who had forgotten to say his prayers for a long time,
confessed that the clergyman's action had shamed him, and he would
begin again that day. So the simple influence of one example ran
down the line.
3. Your third duty, and I get to love it more myself every year,
is not only to pray for yourselves, but to _plead for others_. On
my prayer-desk, there are two or three hundred intercessions for
mothers, whose sons are at the Front, and for the boys themselves.
What a beautiful task it is to intercede for them in turn, so many
a day! We are promised that our prayer shall be heard, your prayer
just as much as mine. Begin with intercession for fathers and
mothers, brothers and sisters, people you are next to at your work,
your parish, or the church you go to, and so on, extending right out
to the boys at the Front. Pray to GOD for victory; don't be ashamed
to pray for victory in a glorious, a righteous cause like this. Pray
that all this may be overruled for the spread of GOD's kingdom in
the world. And always pray for the lonely missionaries, so often
disheartened, so tired, so far away. And mind you, if you have not
begun doing all this, you are going to begin. When I went down to
a parish which had not been very efficiently worked, I collected
a number of girls into a club, and got them to come for their
first service. I had just become Rector of Bethnal Green, and the
committee of the club wrote: "DEAR RECTOR,--We think it our duty to
inform you that in our opinion our club service was a _success_, and
we beg you to have such a service for us every month _until further
notice_."
Well now, those girls were starting their religious life; but when
I go down now I find what I started as a little, tiny thing grown
and grown and grown; those people whom I spoke to first are now
grown women. It all goes on if you once make a good start. Therefore
do take up, if you have never taken up before, this process of
interceding. I am organising all the children in London this year in
intercession for the war, and when we pour in a million children's
prayers, is it not going to be a power which is going to bring down
the blessing of Heaven on our cause?
4. Then we come to the fourth task of the priest.
The fourth work of a priest is to consecrate or _dedicate himself
every day_. I do ask you to realise, as every day comes, what
possibility there is in a day. There was a young Bishop who was
consecrated the other day; I think he was the youngest Bishop
consecrated. I knew him very well, and I had just one minute to
write a note, and I wrote this, and he told me afterwards it had
been more help to him than anything that had been sent to him.
Therefore I pass it on to you: "Take one day at a time," I said,
"and trust the HOLY SPIRIT to see you through." Now I believe that
that is the real secret of spiritual life. Take one day at a time.
Don't worry. Don't be thinking of all kinds of difficulties in
future. Take one day at a time, and trust the HOLY SPIRIT to see
you through. Dedicate every day and consecrate every day. Think
over those whom you are going to meet during the day. Be prepared
beforehand for the special temptations and difficulties of that
particular day; remember that no day will ever come again, and that
every day has to be lived out as a young priest of GOD. If every
girl in Nottingham dedicated or consecrated herself every day like
that--taking one day at a time, and trusting the HOLY SPIRIT to see
her through--why, there would be a power of strength in this city
which would astonish the world.
5. Then we come on to the fifth great priestly task of _service_.
I was talking to a little boy of nine. His mother had turned his
beautiful home into a hospital for wounded soldiers. She herself
was girded, dressed as a nurse, and the little fellow was in bed,
rather seedy that day, and I sat down on his bed at his mother's
request to have a chat with him. He said: "I love, Bishop, having
the soldiers here; we cannot go back to our old life after the war."
There is nothing so good as a life lived out in service, every day
helping other people, and, if we are going to carry nothing else
away, we are going to carry away this, that there is nothing so
valuable as service. Even the lad's mother, a rich woman, who had
served for ten months as a nurse, said: "Had I only known, Bishop,
what to do before, I should have done it. This ten months has been
the most delightful service to me I have ever had in my life."
How can you girls, working girls many of you, serve in your daily
life? All the work you do for the nation in the great factories of
Nottingham, done honestly and straightforwardly, as young priests,
with no bad language or bad stories allowed amongst you, is all
recognised, and all blessed as part of your priestly service. But
you can do more than that. I find again and again that in London the
best Sunday School teachers, the best girl guides, the best members
of the League of Honour there, are hard-working girls. Their service
has gone beyond their professional work, and they also use their
leisure time at home. They are the best girls at home their mothers
ever had. I remember a father saying to me: "Mr. Ingram, I'm not
much of a churchgoer myself"--he did not come at all, as a matter
of fact--"but I will say this, that my boy as does go is the best
boy I have got." What we want them to say about the girl who goes to
church or chapel is: "She is the best girl we have got at home, the
most willing, the most satisfactory, and the most loving."
There, then, you have the five priestly functions to discharge, and
you have got to discharge them "_for their sakes_," as well as for
your own.
For whose sake?
First for the sake of the boys, who are dead. There is a beautiful
poem about the other world, which was given me the other day, and
which I pass on to you in the hope that it may bring a little cheer
in the dark night to any present who have lost their brothers, any
mothers who have lost their sons.
"Lest Heaven be for the greybeards hoary,
GOD, who made boys for His delight,
Goes in earth's hour of grief and glory,
And calls the boys in from the night.
When they come trooping from the War
Our skies have many a new gold star.
"Heaven's thronged with gay and careless faces,
New waked from dreams of dreadful things.
They walk by green and pleasant places
And by the crystal water-springs;
Forget the nightmare field of slain,
And the fierce thirst and the strong pain.
"Forget? GOD smiles to see them merry,
For His own SON was once a boy;
They never shall be old and weary,
But of their youth shall have great joy,
And in the playing fields of Heaven
Shall run and leap, new-washed, new-shriven.
"Now Heaven's by golden boys invaded,
'Scaped from the winter and the storm;
Stainless and simple as He made it
GOD keeps the boy's heart out of harm.
The wise old Saints look down and smile,
They are so young and without guile.
"Oh, if the sonless mothers weeping,
The widowed girls, could look inside
The Country that hath them in keeping
Who went to the Great War and died,
They'd rise and put their mourning off,
Praise GOD, and say, 'He has enough!'"[24]
[24] Katharine Tynan.
Secondly, it is for the boys who will come home that you have your
five priestly functions to discharge. They will come home very
different to what they went out. I saw this wonderful transforming
power as I went down the lines. Boys came out of the trenches, with
the mud upon their puttees, knelt down and asked me to confirm
them, thirty at a time (of course they had been previously prepared
by the Chaplains).
Many came to other services. They sang "When I survey the wondrous
Cross," while the guns thundered close by, with a reality which
it was impossible to mistake. Are they coming back to irreligious
girls, to careless sweethearts, careless sisters who neglect their
religion, to girls who would drag them down? No. Let us have here
a country and a Church worthy of its defenders, to which they can
return. Let us have such a work going on at home, side by side and
step by step with what is going on in Flanders and the Dardanelles,
that when they come back they may find a changed England at home.
For their sakes you must sanctify yourselves--for the sake, too, of
the little sister who looks to you as her model and her example.
You have more influence over her, perhaps, than anyone else in the
house, except her mother. For her sake be a priest of GOD, and--I
say it without the least sense of immodesty--also for the sake of
the children who are to be. I speak to-night to the future mothers
of the children of Nottingham, and it makes all the difference to
the young mother, as she looks round her children, and, when they
grow older, tries to influence her growing sons and daughters,
whether she can look them in the face without shame and without a
blush, and is only asking them to do what she tried to do herself
before she was married. For the sake of the children to be, exercise
this glorious priesthood. If you do you will ennoble Nottingham by
your action. You will make it a city set upon a hill; and "a city
set upon a hill cannot be hid."
IV
TO BOYS
THE EFFECT OF THE HOLY GHOST ON HUMAN CHARACTER[25]
[25] Preached in Marlborough College Chapel. The text is based upon
the report taken by the _Marlborough Times_, kindly lent for this
purpose.
"For he was a good man, and full of the HOLY GHOST and of
faith."--ACTS xi. 24.
I need not tell you, not only how much I look forward to my
Marlborough day, but also how much I have thought as to what message
I would give you. When I think of the many to whom I have preached
at Marlborough year by year, of the three hundred now dead, of the
hundreds more who are fighting, and of the fact that many of those
to whom I am speaking would soon, if the war went on, be in the
thick of it, I realise what a very solemn thing it is to come down
to Marlborough and give a message to my old school.