1924

After preaching tonight at a union service in —— the pastor loci took me about to show me his “plant” (industrialism has invaded even ecclesiastical terminology) and with obvious pride told me of all the progress that the church had made since his advent. One of the most disillusioning experiences which I have had with ministers is their invariable tendency to belittle or to be unappreciative of the work of their predecessors. If one were to take the implications of their remarks about their churches without a grain of salt one would imagine that every church was in an obvious state of spiritual and organic decay before the present generation of prophets took hold of the desperate situation. There are, of course, marked exceptions to this rule. But there is too much of this petty jealousy of former laborers in the vineyard of the Lord. Some of the men are probably victims of fawning parishioners and others are just naturally petty.