Power of the Pulpit - Spring - XIV - Chapter 17 (The responsibility of ministers) & Chapter 18 (A competent ministry to be procured)

Required reading
The Power of the Pulpit by Gardiner Spring (Available from Amazon or free here) - Read Chapter 17 (The responsibility of ministers) and Chapter 18 (A competent ministry to be procured).

My summary
Today we read two shorter chapters.

Firstly in Chapter Seventeen Spring teaches us about the responsibility of ministers: 'There is responsibility in being clothed with an immortal existence ; and in being gifted with powers and faculties of doing good in the humblest sphere. There is responsibility in the successful cultivation of those faculties and powers, by familiarity with the works, and providence, and truth of God, and in the communicated grace that calls the foreigner and exile into the divine family, and gives him a name better than that of sons and of daughters.'

Secondly in Chapter Eighteen Spring gives some directions on how to raise up ministers.  Spring says that:
(i) ministers must examine their own sons;
(ii) ministers must examine young men in their congregations;
(iii) Christian families must examine their own sons.

What grabbed me
Spring made an important point about the need for a minister to be willing to enter the ministry: 'When I say that I tremble for the ministers of the Gospel, I can truly say, that I tremble for none more than for myself. I would not be released from the responsibility ; but I should be afraid to counsel any man to seek it, who has a hesitating conscience or heart. The harvest is great, " and the laborers are few"; and I would " pray the Lord of the harvest to thrust forth laborers into his harvest." I would have no man enter the pulpit, whose heart and conscience will allow him to keep out of it. If, with an honest conscience, and a loving and satisfied heart, he can keep out of it, let him stay where he is. But if conscience urges him, — if a loving heart to his redeeming God and King, and to the souls he has purchased with his blood, constrain him, so that he cannot turn a deaf ear to God's call ; in the strength of the Lord God, and making mention of his righteousness, and his only, let him go to that sacred calling. If the Master thus " thrusts him forth,'' he must go. With all the responsibilities of the work, he must go to it, and trust implicitly, — trust constantly, — trust cheer fully to the Master's promised grace.'

A minister should be one who cannot possibly stay out of the ministry.

Next week's reading
Read Chapter 19 (Ministry compared with other professions).

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.