1928

Here is a minister making a confession in his weekly paper: “Last Sunday night,” he writes, “I was at my worst and unfortunately there were many strangers in the audience. I tried, but I could not get the ball over the plate. I had taught a Sunday-school class, preached over the radio, gone out to dinner, entertained a guest at supper, met the —— committee and failed to get rest after Easter. I will try to do better next Sunday, so come then.”

It is all very nice and humble, but there is an implication of professionalism in the whole thing that is appalling. The idea is that he didn’t put on a good performance, “didn’t get the ball over the plate.” There you have the whole weakness of a professional ministry, striving each Sunday to make an interesting speech. It simply can’t be denied that the business of furnishing inspiration twice each week, on a regular schedule, by a person who is paid to do just that and whose success is judged by the amount of “pep” he can concentrate in his homilies, is full of moral and spiritual dangers. To follow such a program without running into spiritual bankruptcy requires the resources of a saint.