THE PREACHER'S TECHNIQUE
all shadowes, as the sheaves in harvest, to fill all penuries, all occasions invite His mercies, and all times are His seasons." That is magnificent—but try modelling your sermon language upon it, and the result is likely to be disastrous. Or take this, from a preacher of a very different kind, Talmage of Brooklyn. He has just quoted the railing cry of the impenitent malefactor at Calvary, "If Thou be the Son of God"—and he goes on, "If? Was there any if about it? Tell me, thou star, that in robe of life didst run to point out His birthplace. Tell me, thou sea, that didst put thy hand over thy lip when He bid thee be still. Tell me, ye dead, who got up to see Him die. Tell me, thou sun in mid-heaven, who for Him didst pull down over thy face the veil of darkness. Tell me, ye lepers, who were cleansed, ye dead, who were raised. Is He the Son of God? Aye, aye! responds the universe. The flowers breathe it—the stars chime it—the redeemed celebrate it—the angels rise up on their thrones to announce it. And yet on that miserable malefactor's 'if' millions shall be wrecked for all eternity." That, again, is great preaching: and you, too, may have—please God, will often have—those moments when language, winged with the emotion of a mighty theme, soars aloft in genuine eloquence. But artificial eloquence, like sham emotion, is a dreadful thing. Learn to prune your language. Reject every expression that is merely florid and ostentatious. Prefer simple and even homely words to those that are abstract and difficult, direct and pointed speech to involved circuitous
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