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By J. W. McGarvey
put this question to brother ______________. He had prepared a sermon on Satan and when he was asked,
"Brother _________________ what are you going to preach about tomorrow?” he said, "I am going to give them the
devil." Now that seemed pretty rough. Yet that was one phase of Christ's own preaching, and we are to follow Him.
He said more about the devil, the eternal judgment and the punishment of the wicked than any one of his apostles,
and I rather think he said more than all of them put together, so far as we find their words in the New Testament.
How should you determine what to preach, what subject to preach on, tomorrow and all the time hereafter? Perhaps
some of you are prepared to answer, "I have but one sermon." Well, the thing is, if that is all and that one is worth
preaching, go on and preach it. A man can scarcely preach a sermon that is anything like what a sermon ought to
be without doing good. So, if you have only one, don't be afraid to preach that one. And if you have to preach twice
before you get another, preach the same sermon twice, but make an improvement on it every time. Once I heard
Moses E. Lard, preaching in the old Main Street church, announce a subject on which he had preached five times
before to that congregation. He said, "It may surprise you that I have announced to you a subject upon which I have
preached five times before, but, if it has taken me twenty years to study and work up this sermon I don't think there
is any danger of your learning all that is in it by hearing it only five times." Then he went on and delivered it. I
watched the audience, and I think they were as deeply interested in it as though that were the first time they had
ever heard it.
But how is a man to determine what subject to preach on, if he has a number of sermons? Shall he say, "Well, a
certain one that I have will enable me to show off what little learning I have and I will give them that." That would be
to preach yourself instead of preaching Christ. Shall he say, "A certain one that I have will enable me to show off as
a preacher better than any of the others. I will give them that tomorrow?" Well, that is doing the same thing. That is
to preach yourself instead of preaching Christ. I think that the principle on which we are to determine the selection of
the subject depends upon what preaching is for. "To save yourself and those who hear you." That sermon, then, of
all that you are able to preach tomorrow, by which you can have the greatest hope of saving somebody in the
audience, and thereby save yourself, is the one you ought to preach tomorrow and so every other time you are
called upon to preach.
But, what have you got to do in order to save men? Well, you have got to make them believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ and repent of their sins. These are two very great undertakings. Which is the greater? There is a very
common mistake among preachers in thinking that the great task is to inspire men with faith. But it is easy for men to
believe in this country. It is very difficult for a young man or a young woman growing up in this country to become an
unbeliever. A good many try it. A good many young men and young women try to shake off all the impression that
the gospel has made on their minds and hearts. And they think sometimes that they have accomplished it. But let
some disease seize you, death come near, and the grave seem to yawn, what will that infidelity do? In nine cases
out of ten it passes away. It is not very difficult for them now to believe. But how about repentance? To bring men to
repentance as written in the gospel is the great task at which the Savior himself made a comparative failure. We are
told that he upbraided the cities because they repented not and showed that it would be more tolerable in the day of
judgement for Sodom and Gomorrah because Sodom and Gomorrah would have repented if they had had the
chance of these cities. The skillful general, in invading a city, directs his heaviest artillery against the strongest
fortifications of his foe. And so in the most difficult task of the preacher, bringing men to repentance, against that
stronghold he should direct his heaviest artillery. To that he should devote his mind, his thoughts and his efforts in
the pulpit and in the study and thus save the greater number. The apostle Paul says that the goodness of God
leads you to repentance—evidently by the power of a sense of gratitude to God for his goodness. Well, then, any
effort that you may make to impress upon men's minds and con-sciences the goodness of God to them individually
is one of the means by which to bring them to repentance. We are also told in the Old Testament and in the New
that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. That is not as popular a thought in the modern pulpit as it was in the
pulpit of generations past. The idea of preaching the fear of God, the terror of the judgement and of hell is
becoming unpopular. Not so with the apostles. We are told that God is love and that is true, but it is equally true that
God is a consuming fire. He is one thing to the one class and another to the other. Every thing that you can do to
make men fear God and to thus turn them to repentance is the best thing and the most important thing in this
country in saving their souls. And to neglect that is to neglect the most important thing. The apostle Paul gives his
estimation of that when he says to his brethren, "I have not shunned to declare the whole counsel of God, and I call
you to witness that I am free from the blood of all men." Had he withheld anything that would have been profitable to
their souls, he considered that he would have been guilty of the blood' of men. I advise you, then, young men, to
keep this thought in view. When preaching was my chief business in life, before my whole soul became immersed in
teaching, many a time have I wished and prayed above all other things that I asked for the power to bring men to
repentance. I felt that that was my greatest weakness, my greatest failure. I could interest men generally. I never had
much trouble in that way. I could see that men were paying attention to what I was saying. I often had my eye upon
some individual in the audience whom I was trying and praying to bring to repentance, but all in vain. I very well
remember a man who moved to the community where I was preaching. He was a very proud man in his feelings and
in his family connections. He had married an humble, but most excellent Christian young woman who was a member
of the Christian church. He had been so trained that he had a supreme contempt for what was known as the
Campbellites. He had been brought up in a Presbyterian family, as I remember. His wife had brought her church
letter with her when she moved, but before she got a chance to put it in he got hold of it and hid it. He would not go
to church with her. Finally she managed to find where he had hid her letter. And one Sunday when he was gone she
came and put in her membership. He was too much of a gentleman to make any fuss or outcry about it, but there
they lived without very often darkening the door of the church. Finally she managed to invite me to go with her to
supper on Sunday evenings. He was too much of a gentleman to let his wife go off to meeting with the preacher and
have to come home by herself. So he would go to church with us. Well I never succeeded in bringing that man to
repentance, but in the course of a year or two I heard of his debating on religious questions with men in his store,
for he was a merchant, and always taking our side of the argument. This gave me some hope that he might be
brought to repentance, but he was still impervious. Months and perhaps years went on and God took hold of him. He
loved his wife as well as any man ever did I suppose. She was taken sick and grew worse and worse until she died.
A few weeks after her death he was at church and when the invitation was given he came forward weeping
vehemently to make the good confession. See how much it took to bring that man to repentance. You may witness in
your congregations many a man like that. Do your best with any such man and leave the results to God. But keep
this in mind all the time, that there are men in your congregations that will die in their sins and be condemned if you
do not bring them to repentance. There are men in the audience outside of the church, men in a miser-able
condition. If you would bring home many sheaves with you as we have just sung, keep this in mind and labor to this
end in preparing every sermon that you preach.
