Joint Statement on Evangelism

It was next brought before the Philadelphia Council of two hundred fifty ministers and other workers, through the large and repre­sentative standing Committee on Resolutions. Its presentation before the full council there was accompanied by an explanatory statement by Chairman Branson, which follows here­after, that all may have the setting forth of the problem involved, the solution offered, and the safeguarding prbvisions accompanying, as did the assembled Philadelphia delegates. Fol­lowing this is attached the covering excerpt from the minutes of the General Conference Committee for January 24, 1935, that makes these principles effective and operative, for these councils of evangelists were not legisla­tive bodies empowered to initiate policies. And that Ministry readers may see how this state­ment was received from the floor, representa­tive excerpts from those speaking thereto com­plete the presentation.—Editor.

Chairman Branson: May I be pardoned if, as chairman, I take a few minutes to make a statement? This recommendation had its origin in the St. Louis Council, and comes to you with the full backing of every preacher and local and union conference president there. When presented by the Resolutions Committee here in Philadelphia, there were no changes made in it. The brethren felt that it was a good statement, and that if it were passed here without change, it would then go on to the General Conference Committee as the unanimous request of the two large councils of evangelists held in the Eastern and Central States.

This resolution was prepared to meet an ob­vious need. When we were discussing the problems of evangelism in the St. Louis Coun­cil, there naturally came to the minds of the pastors there the same question you have been asking ever since this meeting started, namely, "How are we to do it? If we are to go out and do this work of evangelism, how can we still care for these large churches for which we are held responsible?"

I have promised that this question should receive proper consideration, for it is well known that the pastor of a large city church, who really looks after the details of his work, has his hands more than full. He is about the hardest-working minister among us. He has no stipulated hours. He may be called in the dead of night to go to the bedside of a sick or dying member of his flock. He is kept up until all hours of the night, looking after the interests of his people, and he has to work all day long, serving those over whom he is pastor. Ten or twelve meetings a week are sometimes necessary in order to care for the interests of a large church. There are board and committee meetings, and all manner of school and departmental problems that have to be looked after, to say nothing of pastoral visits, seeking out the erring and straying, and endeavoring all the time to bring in new members.

So the question was raised, and properly so, How can we go on doing all the things we are now doing, and yet be expected to hold two or three public efforts a year, each running for ten, fifteen, or eighteen weeks? The question was raised in St. Louis as to whether we dared face the issue. And the answer was given that we dared face any problem that stood in the way of advance in evangelism. So we took the whole problem under consideration. Something had to be done if we were expected to continue doing all the things we have been doing in the churches, and also to launch this larger pro­gram of evangelism. If we are really to at­tempt a great forward movement in evangelism, there must be some way of shifting some of the responsibility in the church. That conclusion seemed inevitable. All were in agreement on that point, just as your committee here was in agreement thereon when it met today.

The question was, Where and how can the pastor or district leader find relief? Can we depend on the laity to do the church work en­tirely, and leave us free to look after the public evangelism? Would that be the best, the safest and sanest way of dealing with the problem? It didn't seem so. Could we train and trust the laity to look after more of the details of the church, and release the pastor for more public work? That seemed to the brethren to be the only solution. And when we got down to studying the counsel given us by the Spirit of prophecy, we found that it was really what we had been advised many years ago to do.

Counsel has come over and over again that we make a mistake in allowing our ministers to settle down with the churches and take over the details of church management, so that no time remains to carry on the work of public evangelism to which we are especially called. We have not followed that counsel very fully. We have been drifting as other denominations have drifted before us,—away from the public platform and the evangelistic appeal, and into the churches,—until we have come to the place where many of our most able men, our most talented and godly ministers, are giving vir­tually their full attention to the care of the churches, and have little time to go out and engage in public efforts for the masses still unsaved. Note this counsel from "Testimonies to Ministers," page 231:

"Our ministers should now be working for the saving of the lost. . . . When the people of God engage in this work with real travail of soul, there will be manifest a decided change in cities and villages. This hovering about churches to keep them propped up, makes them more dependent on human effort. They learn to lean on the experience of their fellow men, and do not make God their dependence and their efficiency. It is time that cities and villages everywhere were hearing the solemn note of warning, 'Behold, He cometh.' "

What is the change that is called for?

"We are not to hover over the ninety and nine, but to go forth to save the lost, hunting them up in the wilderness of the large cities and towns."—Id., p. 232.

It was a new thought to me, when I read this some time back, that the "wilderness" is the large cities and towns. And they surely are a wilderness. When it comes to sin, wick­edness, iniquity, and everything unlike God, they are found in the cities. There are whole sections like the one cited that could be read, page by page, chapter by chapter, counsel that has come to this people as to how we should distribute our ministerial forces; and the com­mand has always been, Don't tie up the min­isterial talent in preaching to the churches to the extent that there is no time to go out and work for those still wandering outside the fold.

Are the churches to be left without leader­ship? No, that surely would not be good gen­eralship. Are our foreign mission interests to be left without attention? No, that is in­conceivable. The churches must be kept strong. The leadership in the churches must be kept strong. The interests of our foreign mission work must be kept constantly before the peo­ple, and all those interests kept strong in every church. How, then, can we shift responsibility from the shoulders of the pastor, allowing him to^- go on with^- these^-other-things and yet-keep the church work strong?

We can do it by following the plan outlined in this resolution,—by beginning in a system­atic way to train godly laymen to take over those responsibilities and carry them. We have many such laymen. There may be churches that are exceptions, churches that do not have proper talent for leadership. But we often fail to recognize local talent because it is easier for the pastor to do these things himself than it is to train someone else to do them. He reasons that so long as this is his special work,—and he isn't particularly burdened about something else,—why should he not go ahead and carry this responsibility?

Just as long as the pastor will carry these responsibilities, his people are usually willing to have him do so. They are willing to have him get most of the Ingathering, for example.

But it is a serious mistake in leadership for us to do everything and let the local talent in the churches remain undeveloped. We should give the laymen much of the burden and detail that we are now carrying, and let them learn to carry it.

A pastor once said to me, "There isn't a lay­man in my church who can do these things as well as I can." I told him that I thought he was stating the truth, but I said, "The reason that is true is because you have had all the experience, and you haven't let anybody else gain experience by actually carrying the bur­den. And you probably couldn't carry it so well when you started as you do now." He was guiding every committee, every little board meeting, having a hand in everything that was done.

In bringing to you a resolution of this kind, we know it is fraught with dangers and pitfalls, if not safeguarded. We know that the laymen in our churches are not going to do things as well as you preachers are doing them—not at first. It is impossible, for you have had years of experience and special train­ing that they have not had. But we know that if we go at this gradually and with a steady hand, go at it in a careful way, we can train laymen in our churches to become mighty burden bearers under God and to relieve us of many responsibilities that we are now carry­ing. Either that is true, or this counsel I have read is wrong. The counsel says that we weaken the churches when we do everything for them, and that we strengthen the churches when we put the burden upon the church, and go out and raise up new churches. If the coun­sel is correct, then this resolution is framed along safe and right lines.

You may ask, "Dare we turn over the spir­itual meetings of the churches to the leadership of laymen in the large cities?" To a surprising extent that would be possible. There are many laymen who can prepare a good sermon. They need a little help. They need to have the benefit of some church officers' conventions. They need to be trained and directed; and to have some burdens laid upon their shoulders. And they will surprise us when we lay these burdens upon them. But it will not be ex­pected, of course, that the ministers will have nothing to do in our church pulpits.

Take Philadelphia here, for example. It would not be necessary for the minister to abandon his pulpit. He could be here and preach on the Sabbath. He could hold what­ever meetings are necessary with the church board, and give guidance, direction, and counsel to the church. But the purpose of this resolu­tion is to encourage that pastor to lay all the minor burdens of that church upon the shoul­ders of others, and let them carry the details. If they do not do as well as we are doing, let them do it nevertheless. Help them to do it better every month. That is the purpose of this resolution. Paul went on and raised up new churches, but he still had the general "care of all the churches" which had been estab­lished.