Pointer's to Progress

COULD GOD TRUST YOU?

Suppose, just suppose, God poured out His Spirit in your next campaign and 500 people in one day accepted the message. Or, suppose He entrusted you with the gift of healing, and as you prayed for men dying from otherwise incur­able cancer, a number arose from their beds and were found to be bodily sound again. Could you guarantee that you would not begin to swagger a little, and to wear an affected expression of almost painful piety, expressing subconscious pride anxious for publicity? Or, could you guarantee that your wife, with pitying condescension, would not sympathize ingratiatingly with the wives of other workers not having "the divine power" entrusted to her husband?

The time will come again when, through the "foolishness of preaching," large numbers will accept the message. Likewise the time is overdue when God's men should have again the gift of healing. However, these divine gifts will only be manifested among men God can trust. Let us be humble men, recognizing that "of ourselves we can do nothing." "Our sufficiency is of God."

Could God trust you?

DRAMATIZE YOUR IDEA!

People in the advertising and selling fields are always looking for simple yet dramatic ideas that will make their work more effective. Some time ago in Advertising Ideas, Ir­ving Levy gave an excellent example that is worthy of careful thought:

"During the afternoon, a radio announcer making a plea in behalf of cancer research, said: 'One out of every eight people will die from cancer—so, donate to this vital cause.' (One out of eight people dying from cancer is an arresting fact.)

"Later in the day, another announcer made the same statement in a little different way: 'One out of every eight people you know will die from cancer.' ('People you know' made this a more personal and effective message.)

"But in the evening, a celebrity appeared on television, looked directly into the camera, and said this: 'Take out your address book. Cross out every eighth name of a friend of yours. Now realize that because every eighth person will die of cancer, every eighth friend in your address book probably will die the same way.'

"Three ways to say the same thing. Each an improvement on the other. A good example of how to dramatize and humanize any basic appeal.

"An arresting statement (the first) is good. Put­ting the you into it (the second) is better. Dramatizing it (using your own address book) really puts a punch into it, brings it home."

Not long ago one of our evangelists was speak­ing on the text James 5:3. In illustrating the im­mense wealth of some of the multimillionnaires of this century he stated that during the height of his career John D. Rockefeller's holdings were so immense that the financial value from his interest, stocks, bonds, et cetera, increased by $883 every time he took a breath! The evangelist was simply dramatizing cold figures in such a way that the audience would ever after remember how tremendously rich just one man has been in these last days.

HONEST CONFESSION

When the other man attempts some­thing and fails, of course some say there's a reason. He doesn't work, doesn't preach correctly, uses wrong advertising methods, and a thousand other weaknesses can be seen.

But when we fail in some project, how many perfectly good reasons we can find for our failure! The weather, counterattractions, the conservative nature of the people, et cetera. What a healthy thing it would be if someone occasionally would say, "I did my best, but seem to have failed miserably. I rejoice that Brother Blank has been so richly blessed of God. I will restudy my own approaches to find my weaknesses. In the mean­time my courage is good, and I am determined with God's help to break through."

STORYTELLERS

As men called to the sacred work of the gospel ministry we should ever remember that we should feed the flock of God on the "bread of life" and the "sincere milk of the word." There is as much power in the Written Word as there was in the Living Word when Christ walked among men. One of the greatest sources of power in our preach­ing is the frequent use of the Word of God backed up by the divinely inspired commentary as found in the Spirit of prophecy.

As a ministry there is danger that we might depart from this. We have heard whole discourses presented in which no scripture at all was used or only a casual introductory reference to the divine Word of God. The rest of the discourse was little more than a succession of well-told stories with an emotional bias. Such preaching might entertain the people and make the preacher tem­porarily popular, but it does not strongly feed the flock of God. Let this ministry be preachers of the "everlasting gospel."