20 Serving Churches

20. Serving Churches Autobigraphy - James H. Oliphant :-

CHAPTER XX.

We were poor when I commenced serving churches. The churches were not rich, either, and I was foolish enough to think I would care for my family and the churches, too, all without any help from anyone. Brother Moses Hodges, of Spring Creek church, was the first one to offer to give me money. He offered to give me one dollar and I refused to take it. He said that I would see different after awhile, and I found he was right. I think now I ought to have pursued a different course in regard to the matter. I ought to have taught the churches their duty and insisted on their doing it by me. I owed it to myself and family, and the interest of the churches required it. A minister should not be "entangled with the affairs of this life" when the church is able to prevent it. We found it necessary to do hard work and make what we could. I farmed in the summer and taught school in the winter, sold goods part of the time, and being away so much the business did me no good. I sold goods on credit and failed to get part of it. Truly my wife and I had a hard time to care for our family. I served the churches on horseback and muleback. I could detail at least three instances of my horse being washed away by my attempting to cross swollen streams, in all of which I had narrow risk of being drowned. Once I attempted to cross a bridge that was covered by back water from White river. The water on the bridge was two feet deep, and by mistake I guided the horse so that he stepped off at the middle of the bridge. We went under together, but I kept in the saddle, and the horse swam out. I went to a home and dried my clothes and went on to my appointment. My wife and I knew well what hardships were and saw the need of economy, and practiced it rigidly. We loved the churches and enjoyed them very much, and the members loved us. I want to repeat that I ought to have pressed on the churches their duty to their pastors. Remember, he has a family of loved ones that must be clothed and fed, and he must give his time to the churches, and the churches ought to care for him. In my early experience as a minister I bought and shipped cattle and hogs and mules, but I think I would now be better off if I had not done it. In 1890 we moved to near Crawfordsville, Indiana. We were in low circumstances financially, and our children were all with us, and we felt that the task of caring for our family was a big one. The move made it necessary for me to give up the care of all the churches in White river association. I well remember how sorrowful I felt when I drove my team away from my old home in Monroe county, Indiana. I went up a hill from which I could look back and see my home, and the church house that I had built, and the home of some of the members. Tears ran from my eyes. I loved those people, and I knew they loved me, but I felt it was right for me to move. Since then we have been favored with a little better success in worldly things, but we have been more favored in the way of assistance, and I have had an easier way to fill my appointments.

During all my life I have never suffered my business to keep me from meeting, but once. We made it a rule of life to take our children to meeting, and I have had the love and confidence of my children, and I love them in return most tenderly. My grandchildren all are partial to "our church." I hope the Lord will enable them to know the truth and love it long after my labors shall close. I believe I counted the cost of a minister’s life before I began. I expected toil and to make sacrifices. I did not expect to become popular as a minister, and in this I am not disappointed. I think I am respected as a citizen, and as a neighbor, but the doctrine of salvation by grace is not in harmony with public sentiment, and those who preach it will not share largely in the friendship of the world. But we should "overcome evil with good," and make our neighbors respect us by doing right.

It is important that members of the church attend regularly, and are not too late to church. Sometimes the rear seats are filled first and the front seats are left vacant. This is a bad way to do. If the clerk of the church is a slow penman he ought to prepare the minutes at home as nearly as he can, and this will prevent waiting on him. It is an impatient wait for a slow clerk to prepare a minute after the business of the church has closed, and can easily be prevented by the preparing of the minutes at home. Or let the clerk at each meeting read the minutes of the preceding meeting. In this way the minutes can be made at his leisure between meetings at home.

Churches sometimes ignore the home preacher by sending a distance for an elder to attend weddings and funerals. We must not deny that for such occasions members sometimes have a choice, but it is discouraging to a pastor to be ignored when words of comfort are needed for the bereaved. Some good elders do not approve of funeral preaching. It occurs to me that it is lawful and expedient to preach on such occasions. "Wherefore comfort ye one another."-I Thes. v. 18. This is Paul’s idea of what is proper on occasions of death. We cannot benefit or change the state of dead, but we might speak words of comfort to the living at a time when such words ate needed. A dear friend of mine says that at her funeral she does not want to be taken to the church house, and that she wants no show or display, but only a quiet little meeting, where some dear brother will read a chapter and offer prayer. I like this idea well and it would be sufficient for me. The time for our departing out of the world is an important time. "Better is the day of one’s death than the day of his birth." Solemn as it is, it awaits us and is sure to come to us. "The living know that they must die." A lady died who requested that at her death a private member should read and sing and pray at the funeral. The brother did as he was requested. He had been accustomed to "say grace" at the meals, and a very few times had prayed orally, and he dreaded to try to fill the request, but in felt weakness he made the effort. If death were to come to some of my loved ones, and it were left for me to arrange, I would not feel unfavorable to this course. Those who desire some particular elder, even if he lives at a distance, should be allowed to have their choice, but if the choice should be like that of the lady referred to it would be as pleasing to me as any other choice could be. The first twenty years of my ministry were spent at Buena Vista, Indiana. No other minister lived near of any order, and I was called to attend funerals of different denominations, and often it consisted of reading, singing and prayer. A minister is subject to many weaknesses. He may become jealous or envious of one more gifted than himself. "Take heed to yourselves and all the flock." We should wage an unrelenting war on evil passions, such as envy or jealousy. I believe we can lay aside evil thought of our brethren if we love them and regard them as true servants of the churches. But we have seen men that we regarded as untrue, and not faithful, and we have churches in love with such men, and then we have felt a spirit of jealousy. But I feel that I am now free of such an ugly jealousy of worthy men. "Jealousy is as cruel as the grave."

There was a sister in the church when I began trying to preach who would often insist that in our preaching we should doctrinize our experience, and show how the experience of every Christian supports the doctrine of grace. She urged that the same spirit that dictated the words of the Bible also gives our experiences, and he who preaches most in harmony with experiences preaches most in harmony with the Bible. I thought she was right in this, and when I have found Christian men and women that found fault with the doctrine of free grace I have appealed to their own experiences for support, with questions something like the following: What did you learn about it in your experience? Did you begin with the Lord, or did the Lord begin with you? Did you learn by experience that you could do something to remove sin, or that you could not? If you learned that you were not able to make yourself right, why not tolerate this sentiment in the pulpit?

I preached the funeral of Hardin Edwards in Green county, Indiana, many years ago, and went home with his brother George for dinner. I had known George Edwards well for many years. He belonged to an Arminian church, but I. felt sure that he had an experience. He told me that he esteemed me as a Christian man, and that he enjoyed the most of my preaching, but he would enjoy it more if I would give everybody "a chance" in my preaching. I replied, "Tell me how you came to be a Christian." He said that in early life he was wild and indifferent as to his religious welfare, but after he was grown he became deeply concerned about himself---that he was burdened with a sense of sin and ruin so that it was ever on his mind that he was ruined by sin. I said, "George, do you have any idea what caused you to see all this sinfulness in yourself?" He said it was a mercy in the grace of God that enabled him to see his condition as it was. I then said to him, "That is what I preach; but if the Lord would bestow as much mercy and grace on others as he did on you, what effect would it have?" He said it would have the same effect on them it had on him. "Well," I said, "you have learned the doctrine I preach of the Lord." He went on to say how he had tried to do right and how he found sin mixed with all he did; that instead of getting better he seemed to get worse until he saw himself lost and justly condemned, no hope, there was nothing good in himself. And in this extreme distress he gave up all hope of salvation from anything he could do, and when he sank in despair his burden was gone and peace filled his soul. "Well," I said, "don’t I preach that you nor anyone else can do anything to put away sin? I preached just what you professed to be true on bended knees before God, and is what you confess to God, why not believe it when it is preached to you?"

I have tried all through life to teach that experience is a great teacher. We must confess this, or deny experience altogether, and say it is a deception, and those that have been blessed with it will not forget or deny it.

There have been times with me all along that I felt cast down and discouraged to a great extent, and found no light and liberty in preaching. At such times I have wished I could quit trying. I went to Guthries Creek church in 1876, and while there I was under a cloud---a little audience and no light or liberty. I felt almost sick as I looked on to a life spent amid discouragement. The brethren there were good and loved me very much, but I was in the dark, and I thought I was mistaken about being called to the work of the ministry. I decided to quit and make no more appointments. I was thirty-five miles from home and I selected a route for home that would not take me near persons that would ask me to have meeting for them. I was thoroughly discouraged, and resolved to give it all up and stay at home with my wife and growing family. It was a lonely trip I made home, and I was deeply in sorrow. I stopped on the way with a Methodist for dinner, and I told him how sad and lonely and discouraged I felt. I wanted to tell someone my sorrows. He said he expected my liver was bad, and that I needed something to stimulate my liver.

I have often thought of what he said. This cheerless feeling gave way to brighter and more hopeful feelings. I gave out other appointments, and filled them. We are apt to think our sorrows all gone when we are full of hope---that we shall never be in the dark again, and when we are under the cloud we conclude there is never any more sun for us. But I learned years ago that when we are on the mountain top we should remember that we must go down into the dark valley; and when we are down in sorrow’s cavern, remember that by and by we shall be lifted up; and that "that part of the wagon wheel that is now at the top will soon begin to descend, and that part that is now in the mud, will soon be lifted up." This has been my experience through life. When I am blessed with light and liberty, when my cup runs over, I try to avoid pride; and when I make the saddest failures, I try to avoid being unduly discouraged. We need to watch against pride in times of prosperity, when brethren are eulogizing and expressing admiration for the sermon; and when we are down we need to watch against overmuch sorrow. We ought not be affected either by our failures or our success, but let all go together.

We learn over and over again that we "dare not trust in ourselves." When I first was blessed with a hope, "I thought my trials over and all my troubles gone; That joy and peace and pleasure should be my lot alone; But now I find a warfare that often brings me low, The world, the flesh and Satan, they do beset me so."

Although I was reared by Baptists, and thought I believed their doctrine, yet I see I did not. I grew up believing in conditional salvation. I think it natural for men to do this, but after I obtained a hope I still had this about me. "The first liquor put in the pot leaves a little of its odor ever after."

I resolved never to sin again, and to be a good, true and faithful man, and as I went into my little store I resolved never to sin again. Since then I have learned that "When I would do good, evil is present with me." "The evil that I would not, that I do." "Ye can not do the things that ye would." I have had lessons along this line that have destroyed, to a great measure, all my self-reliance, and prepared me to love the doctrine of grace. I do not think men can learn the doctrine of grace as they learn science at school, but by actual experience and tests of self. They come to see and know the weakness, ignorance and unfaithfulness of human nature until it is plain that if our hope were dependent on our own standfastness we would perish in the end. When we learn it this way we never forget it, and as we go along the way we are more and more confirmed in this view---we "grow in grace." We do not get better and better, but we grow stronger and stronger in the belief that a work, or conditional system would not suit our needs. Such a system would be good enough if we were good enough, but while it is true that "the evil I would not that I do," we must not make our eternal all depend on so frail a peg as human faithfulness. No one can understand how grace alone can save us who has not seen his own sinfulness; no one can see the riches of God’s grace that has not seen the sinfulness of sin. When one learns it this way, he never forgets it. "All shall be taught of the Lord."