what a genius! what an orator!' not to go about praising it, but to
come and say, 'Thy words have led me to Christ, and from thee I have
taken the gift of gifts.'

Dear brethren, the encouragement of the minister is in the conversion
and the growth of the hearers. And I pray that in this new lease of
united fellowship which we have taken out, be it longer or
shorter--and advancing years tell me that at the longest it must be
comparatively short--I may come to you ever more and more with the
lofty and humbling consciousness that I have a message which Christ
has given to me, and that you may come more and more receptive--not
of _my_ words, God forbid--but of Christ's truth; and that so we
may be helpers one of another, and encourage each other in the
warfare and work to which we all are called and consecrated.

[Footnote 1: Preached after long absence on account of illness.]



DEBTORS TO ALL MEN

'I am a debtor both to the Greeks and to the Barbarians,
both to the wise and to the unwise.'--ROMANS i. 14.


No doubt Paul is here referring to the special obligation laid upon
him by his divine call to be the Apostle to the Gentiles. He was
entrusted with the Gospel as a steward, and was therefore bound to
carry it to all sorts and conditions of men. But the principle
underlying the statement applies to all Christians. The indebtedness