Scandalous Situation
Recently, most periodicals have carried articles on the "preacher shortage". Most of the writers not only deplore the condition but offer the remedy-more money. It is a scandalous situation that certain men have reached a mystical, select class among Christians known as "Gospel Preachers". To deny that such a select group exists among brethren is to fail to observe the facts. Attend any meeting and hear the remark as to the presence of so many "Gospel Preachers" with preference being shown them above other Christians. Attend worship in a strange location and hear the question, "Are you a preacher?", as if just one of the "common herd" would not be as welcome. Having attended a social affair in the home of some Christians, one person was later introduced to an audience as a "Gospel Preacher" and the "good sister" remarked to him afterwards, "If I had known you were a preacher, I would have paid more attention to you the other night."
To one who has taught privately and publicly, (in most instances bearing his own expenses), for a period of some twenty-five years, it is a scandalous situation to hear himself referred to as a "tent maker", a "lay preacher", a "part-time preacher", a "half-baked preacher", etc. , just because he feels the obligation to teach the Word of God to his fellow-man and feels just as strongly the necessity to earn his livelihood by honest labor. Only a casual investigation of the lives of the great pioneer preachers, and even contemporary preachers of this generation, will show that they were, and are, good farmers, fine school teachers, or successful business men, yet they found time to study, write, teach, preach, debate, and travel over the length and breadth of this land bearing their own expenses and suffering great hardships.
It is a scandalous situation when one of the select "Gospel Preachers" begins to speak of those who are qualified to be preachers and those who are not. On what basis does he presume to set the "qualifications" for "Gospel Preachers"? When does one become a "Gospel Preacher" and who decides that he has reached that select-group status? If those who so deplore the "preacher shortage" can find the qualifications and definition of "Gospel Preachers" in the Word of God, immediate steps can be taken to qualify men for this select "profession". On the day of Pentecost, three thousand Jews and Proselytes gladly received the word and were baptized-later the number became five thousand and more. In Acts 8 is recorded the great persecution against the church in Jerusalem and the disciples, except the apostles, were scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria. Verse 4 states, "They that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the word." One wonders who told them that they were qualified and that they were "Gospel Preachers". One wonders what special training they received that qualified them to go everywhere preaching the word. One wonders why they didn't complain about the "preacher shortage" and about the amount they received for their preaching.
It is a scandalous situation that men ever refer to teaching the Word of God in terms of what one makes, (money received) from it. Inevitably, and correctly so, I Cor. 9 is brought up to prove the matter of "paying the preacher." No one can successfully deny that those who preach the Gospel have the right to live of the Gospel, but notice that Paul uses this principle and himself as an example to show that a man should not preach the Gospel just for the purpose of living of it. He points out that a man should preach the Gospel because he is obligated, and every Christian is so obligated, to teach by God. Paul made tents to support himself and those with him and he was an apostle, an earthen vessel, a minister of Christ--"tent maker", INDEED!!
Yes, it is a scandalous situation when Christians become so blinded to the Word of God and their obligation to preach the Word wherever they go that they begin to cry about the "preacher shortage". The scandalous situation is that Christians have allowed and encouraged, from their own number, a mystical, magical, select group known as "Gospel Preachers." Why not admit that there is a clergy system and join the ranks of denominationalism? The scandalous situation is that Christians so fail in their obligation to teach their fellow-men that a shortage of teachers exists. It is time that Christians assume the obligation that God places upon them and stop trying to force it on a "favored few" whom they deem to be "qualified" for some peculiar reason. There is no "preacher shortage"-there is a scandalous shortage of Christians who are willing to do what God expects of them.
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