The Danger of an Unconverted Ministry

Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee. 1 TIMOTHY 4:16

The title of this chapter is not Whitefield’s. It belongs to a sermon preached in 1740 in Pennsylvania by his friend and fellow-labourer Gilbert Tennent, a Presbyterian revivalist, and it became one of the most controversial sermons of the Great Awakening. But the conviction behind it was one that Whitefield shared and voiced over and over again: that a minister who has not himself been born again is a danger to his people, and that there were a great many such ministers in the churches of his day.

It is one of the places where Whitefield was both most right and most wrong, and it deserves an honest chapter.

The greatest curse

The Method of Grace opens with this theme. As God can send a people no greater blessing than faithful ministers, says Whitefield, so “the greatest curse that God can possibly send upon a people in this world” is to give them over to “blind, unregenerate, carnal, lukewarm, and unskilled guides.” Jeremiah’s false prophets healed the wound of the people slightly, crying Peace, peace, when there was no peace. Whitefield believed the same thing was happening in the parishes of England and the meeting-houses of America.

Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! should not the shepherds feed the flocks? EZEKIEL 34:2

His reasoning was straightforward. If religion is an inward work of the Spirit, a man who has never known that work cannot describe it. He will preach morality instead, because morality is all he knows. In The Indwelling of the Spirit Whitefield complains of preachers who feed their people with “the dry husks of dead morality” instead of the doctrines of grace, and who subscribe to the church’s articles as a key to preferment while contradicting them in the pulpit. In The Great Duty of Charity Recommended he rebukes clergy who chase one benefice after another and forget the poor. And throughout his sermons he calls them, with scorn, the letter-learned — men who know the words of Scripture and not their power.

What was right in it

There was real truth in Whitefield’s alarm. Many clergy of his day were, by their own admission, more interested in their livings than their flocks. Some preached little but prudential morality, and some openly scorned the doctrines of their own church. Whitefield was not the only one to say so; serious churchmen across the century said the same. And the principle is surely right. A physician who has never been healed may still prescribe, but a minister who has never met Christ is in a strange and perilous position.

Can the blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into the ditch? LUKE 6:39

Whitefield also held himself to the standard he urged on others. At the close of his sermon Walking with God he turns to the ministers present with a heart, he says, almost too full to speak, and urges them to be like Enoch, who walked with God in a wicked generation.

What was wrong in it

But in his early years Whitefield did not stop at principles. In his published Journals he passed sharp judgements on particular men and places — on respected divines of the previous generation, on the clergy of whole towns, on the colleges of New England — often after the briefest acquaintance. He wrote as though he could see into hearts he had barely met. The effect, in some places, was to split congregations, to set people against their pastors, and to encourage a spirit of censoriousness among his followers that did the revival lasting harm. In 1744 the faculty of Harvard College published a formal testimony against him, and they were not wrong to object to some of what he had said.

Whitefield came to see this. In later years he admitted, publicly and in print, that he had been too rash and hasty in judging persons and places, that he had mixed wild fire with his zeal, and he revised his Journals to remove some of their harsher passages. It is to his credit that he did. It would have been better still had he learned it sooner.

Judge not, that ye be not judged. MATTHEW 7:1

Indeed, his own sermon Directions How to Hear Sermons gives the corrective. He warns his hearers not to be prejudiced against their ministers, reminding them that the clergy are men of like passions with themselves. Even if a preacher teaches others what he has not learned himself, he says, “that is no sufficient reason for rejecting his doctrine.” And he warns just as strongly against the opposite fault: preferring one preacher to another and running after favourites, which he calls earthly, sensual and devilish.

The minister’s own soul

The lesson for today is double. To ministers, Whitefield’s question still stands: have you yourself been born again? It is possible to preach Christ for years and not know Him. No office and no learning can substitute for the Spirit’s work in the heart.

Lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway. 1 CORINTHIANS 9:27

To everyone else, the lesson is caution. It is easy to judge a preacher, and very hard to see a heart. The spirit that sets itself up to pronounce who is and is not converted is rarely the Spirit of Christ. Pray for your ministers, as Whitefield begged his hearers to pray for him. Test what they teach by Scripture. And leave the judging of hearts to God.

Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts. 1 CORINTHIANS 4:5

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. If you teach or lead in any way, ask yourself Whitefield’s question plainly: do I know the Christ I speak about?

2. Pray by name this week for those who preach or teach you, and ask God to give them a living knowledge of Christ.

3. Recall a time when you judged another Christian’s heart on slight evidence. Confess it to God, and if needed, to them.

4. Test the teaching you receive against Scripture, but resist the urge to reject a true word because of the messenger.

5. Guard against running after favourite preachers. Receive God’s word from the ministers He has given you.

A PRAYER

Lord Jesus, great Shepherd of the sheep, give Your church shepherds who know You and feed Your flock with Your truth.

Search my own heart. If I speak of You without knowing You, bring me to new birth before I lead others astray.

Forgive me for the pride that judges hearts I cannot see. Make me zealous for truth and gentle towards persons.

Bless those who preach to me. Hold up their hands, and let Your word through them be sharper than any two-edged sword. Amen.