[CHAPTER V.]
ENTHUSIASM.
“Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.” I want to apply these words to the children of God. If the lost are to be reached by the Gospel of the Son of God, Christianity must be more aggressive than it has been in the past. We have been on the defensive long enough; the time has come for us to enter on a war of aggression. When we as children of God wake up and go to work in the vineyard, then those who are living in wickedness all about us will be reached; but not in any other way. You may go to mass meetings and discuss the question of “How to reach the masses,” but when you have done with discussion you have to go back to personal effort. Every man and woman who loves the Lord Jesus Christ must wake up to the fact that he or she has a mission in the world, in this work of reaching the lost.
A man may talk in his sleep, and it seems to me that there is a good deal of that kind of thing now in the Lord’s work. A man may even preach in his sleep. A friend of mine sat up in his bed one night and preached a sermon right through. He was sound asleep all the time. Next morning his wife told him all about it. He preached the same sermon in his church the next Sabbath morning; I have it in print, and a good sermon it is. So a man may not only talk but actually preach in his sleep. There are many preachers in these days who are fast asleep.
There is one thing, however, that we must remember; a man cannot work in his sleep. There is no better way to wake up a Church than to set it to work. One man will wake up another in waking himself up. Of course the moment we begin a work of aggression, and declare war with the world, the flesh, and the devil, some wise head will begin to shake, and there will be the cry, “Zeal without knowledge!” I think I have heard that objection ever since I commenced the Christian life. I heard of some one who was speaking the other day of something that was to be done, and who said he hoped zeal would be tempered with moderation. Another friend very wisely replied that he hoped moderation would be tempered with zeal. If that were always the case, Christianity would be like a red hot ball rolling over the face of the earth. There is no power on earth that can stand before the onward march of God’s people when they are in dead earnest.
In all ages God has used those who were in earnest. Satan always calls idle men into his service. God calls active and earnest—not indolent men. When we are thoroughly aroused and ready for His work, then He will take us up and use us. You remember where Elijah found Elisha; he was ploughing in the field—he was at work. Gideon was at the threshing floor. Moses was away in Horeb looking after the sheep. None of these eminent servants of God were indolent men; what they did, they did with all their might. We want such men and women nowadays. If we cannot do God’s work with all the knowledge we would like, let us at any rate do it with all the zeal that God has given us.
Mr. Taylor says: “The zeal of the Apostles was seen in this—they preached publicly and privately; they prayed for all men; they wept to God for the hardness of men’s hearts; they became all things to all men, that they might gain some; they traveled through deeps and deserts; they endured the heat of the Syrian sun and the violence of Euroclydon, winds and tempests, seas and prisons, mockings and scourgings, fastings and poverty, labor and watching; they endured of every man and wronged no man; they would do any good, and suffer any evil, if they could but hope to prevail upon a soul; they persuaded men meekly, they entreated them humbly, they convinced them powerfully; they watched for their good, but meddled not with their interest; and this is the Christian zeal—the zeal of meekness, the zeal of charity, the zeal of patience.”
A good many people are afraid of the word Enthusiasm. Do you know what the word means? It means “In God.” The person who is “in God”, will surely be fired with enthusiasm. When a man goes into business filled with fire and zeal, he will generally carry all before him. In the army a general who is full of enthusiasm will fire up his men, and will accomplish a great deal more than one who is not stirred with the same spirit. People say that if we go on in that way many mistakes will be made. Probably there will. You never saw any boy learning a trade who did not make a good many mistakes. If you do not go to work because you are afraid of making mistakes, you will probably make one great mistake—the greatest mistake of your life—that of doing nothing. If we all do what we can, then a good deal will be accomplished.
How often do we find Sabbath-school teachers going into their work without any enthusiasm. I had just as soon have a lot of wooden teachers as some that I have known. If I were a carpenter I could manufacture any quantity of them. Take one of those teachers who has no heart, no fire, and no enthusiasm. He comes into the school-room perhaps a few minutes after the appointed time. He sits down, without speaking a word to any of the scholars, until the time comes for the lessons to begin. When the Superintendent says it is time to begin the teacher brings out a Question Book. He has not been at the trouble to look up the subject himself, so he gets what some one else has written about it. He takes care not only to get a Question Book, but an Answer Book.