I do not believe in this twentieth-century theory of the universal fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. We are all made of one blood—that is true, physically speaking; we are all related. I am talking about the spiritual, not the physical. You are not a child of God unless you are a Christian; then you are a child of God—if you are a Christian.
Samson with the Holy Spirit upon him could take the jawbone of an ass and lay dead a thousand Philistines. Samson without the Holy Spirit was as weak as a new-born babe, and they poked his eyes out and cut off his locks. And so with the Church and her members. Without the Holy Spirit you are as sounding brass and tinkling cymbals, simply four walls and a roof, and a pipe organ and a preacher to do a little stunt on Sunday morning and evening. I tell you, Christian people, that with the Holy Spirit there is no power on earth or in hell that can stand before the Church of Jesus Christ. And the damnable, hell-born, whisky-soaked, hog-jowled, rum-soaked moral assassins have damned this community long enough. Now it is time it was broken up and it is time to do something.
There are three classes in the Church, as I have looked at it from my standpoint. The first are those in the Church personally who want to be saved, but they are not concerned about other people. They do not give any help to other people; they don't lie awake at night praying for other people that they may be brought to the Lord.
The second class are going to depend upon human wisdom. There is no such thing as latent power, expressed or implied—power is just as distinctive in an individual as the electricity in these lights. If these globes are without a current they would be nothing but glass bulbs, fit for nothing but the scrap heap. Without the Holy Spirit you are as sounding brass and tinkling cymbals, and a third-rate amusement parlor, with religion left out.
The third class are church members not from might and honor and power, but from the Spirit.
While at Pentecost one sermon saved 3,000 people, now it takes 3,000 sermons to get one old buttermilk-eyed, whisky-soaked blasphemer.
Happiest Nation on Earth
We have our churches, our joss houses, our tabernacles; we have got the wisdom of the orientals, the ginger, vim, tabasco sauce, peppering of the twentieth century; we have got all of that, and I do not believe that there are any people beneath the sun who are better fed, better paid, better clothed, better housed, or any happier than we are beneath the stars and stripes—no nation on earth. There are lots of things that could be eliminated to make us better than we are today. We are the happiest people in God's world.
Out in Iowa, a fellow said to me: "Mr. Sunday, we ought to be better organized." Just think of that, we ought to be better organized. Now listen to me, my friends! Listen to me! There is so much machinery in the churches today that you can hear it squeak.
Drop into a young people's meeting. The leader will say in a weak, effeminate, apologetic, minor sort of way, that there was a splendid topic this evening but he had not had much time for preparation. It is superfluous for him to say that; you could have told that. He goes along and tells how happy he is to have you there to take part this evening, making this meeting interesting. Some one gets up and reads a poem from the Christian Endeavor World and then they sing No. 38. They get up and sing: