Excerpt from Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted—A Congregation, Second Phase—Preacher and Newspaper,” Christian Century, August 19, 1920.
[This is from Part 2 of Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted — A Congregation!” This second installment was in the August 19, 1920, issue of The Christian Century. It was entitled, “Second Phase — Preacher and Newspaper.” I am continuing where I left off in my most recent post. Douglas is talking about a minister who has decided to stay with his current church and seek a wider audience there, rather than going elsewhere.]
“It is worth a great deal to our hero to have found out so much as that. Just to have stopped his continuous chatter about ‘the peculiar conditions which obtain in this town’; just to have ceased poring over the column of ‘Calls and Resignations’ in his weekly church paper, in quest of some utopia where the SRO sign would be hung on the church door Sunday mornings at 10:20; just to have left off petting his fatuous dream of Elsewhere — constitutes Mr. Blue’s first long step toward happiness in his ministry.
“This man has given himself to prayer and fasting over his problem. He knows now that there is just one thing in this world that he wants – a crowd! He is conscious of a message burning in his heart – a message so highly potential that if only he could face a large congregation with it, there could be no doubt in anybody’s mind about its value. He recalls the few times he has occupied a pew in a crowded church; the strangely magnetic quality of the audience; its tense attitude of expectancy; how the congregational singing of the hymns seemed to carry a rich overtone almost supernatural in its uplifting power; how vividly the Book poured out its inexhaustible treasures when read to that responsive crowd – a crowd that had been welded into one solid chunk so that it saw, heard, thought, and felt as with the eyes, ears, mind, and heart of one man!
“And the sermon! Inspired! Nothing less than that! Why, almost anybody could preach under such circumstances! The minister seemed fairly lifted up and borne along by the intense interest of his congregation whose size lent new significance to the belief that the gospel is, in very truth, the hope of the world! With such support, Blue knows that he, too, could preach. With the promise of such a congregation, Sunday after Sunday, he could hurl himself into his task of sermon preparation with all the zeal and abandon of a prophet.”
Title page of Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted—A Congregation, Second Phase—Preacher and Newspaper,” Christian Century, August 19, 1920.
[This is from Part 2 of Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted – A Congregation!” This second installment was in the August 19, 1920, issue of The Christian Century. It was entitled, “Second Phase – Preacher and Newspaper.”]
“Weary of preaching listless sermons to a handful of Laodiceans, the minister whom we shall hereafter refer to as the Reverend D. Preston Blue [pronounced ‘Depressed and Blue’] has determined that he must find a congregation of sufficient size to stimulate his best homiletic efforts. It will require, he thinks, the encouragement of a crowd to vitalize him to the point where he, in turn, may energize his constituency.
“Mr. Blue does not pose as a walking monument to Wisdom, but he is canny enough to understand that by resigning his pulpit at Broad Street Church in Centerville to accept that of The People’s Church of Middlepoint, his problem will be altered only as to its locality. He has quite left off belief in the ancient fallacy that the grass is greener and more succulent on the other side of the fence. Blue suspects that if he cannot draw an audience of respectable size on Sundays in Centerville, neither will he be likely to create much excitement with his pulpit message in Middlepoint, seeing that conditions and people are strangely similar everywhere in their relation to a given individual.
“No; our friend has abandoned the idea that by giving his household furniture an expensive boxcar ride of three hundred miles he can develop some hitherto untested pulpit powers. There has been vouchsafed unto him the wisdom that if ever he is to command the attention of a larger congregation, he may make the adventure of recruiting the same here in Centerville quite as easily and with as much promise of success as anywhere else on earth.”
From the first installment of Douglas’s series, “Wanted — A Congregation!” in the 8/5/1920 issue of The Christian Century.
[This is from Part 1 of Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted — A Congregation!” This first installment was in the August 5, 1920, issue of The Christian Century. I am continuing where I left off in my most recent post.]
“All this time, while the minister is planning to gain access to a crowd on this strategic October third, he must never lose consciousness of the fact that he must make the most of that wonderful opportunity when it arrives. If he is a very, very poor psychologist, he will decide to say in his introduction, ‘It gives us a thrill of joy to see such a large congregation with us today. Customarily, this is a lonely place on Sunday. You might have been surprised at the echoes which caromed back and forth from these hallowed walls only last Lord’s Day,’ etc.
“Such a method of greeting his great opportunity would be very like the psychology practiced by the shop which announced, on a large placard placed beside the display of a modish gown: This is the only thing in the store worth looking at. We have put it out in front to bait you inside; but, in solemn truth, the rest of our stuff is awful.
“No mention need be made by the minister in his sermon that this is a red-letter day in his church. There is no reason why he should waste his time saying it, especially since it would be such a stupid remark to make – if he wishes to retain that crowd and draw a larger one. No, he must plan his sermon as if accustomed every Sunday to a throng that elbowed and pushed and jostled to get inside the front lobby.
“Again – let him not commit the indiscretion of scolding his crowd for failure to attend church services regularly. These people may possibly be induced to return another day if they are attracted to the message. They are not going to be attracted by abuse, either explicit or implied.
“That sermon ought, somehow and somewhere, to touch human life with hope, cheer, faith, optimism, and engender a longing to hear more of this gospel. It should be replete with incident. A whimsical phrase – even if smile-provoking – need not be tossed out of the sermon if it demands admission. It’s a very sick and sour gospel that will not permit the disciples to smile now and again.
“Day and night, that sermon is being built in our minister’s mind and heart. Every time he throws some fresh fuel on the fire of his campaign for a congregation, he hurries back to his study to work on that wonderful sermon. Early morning finds him gazing, unseeingly, out at his eastern window – his pulse pounding in his temples, his fingernails biting deeply into his palms – as he contemplates the message that has taken full possession of his soul. That message is going to be worthy of his office and his opportunity! As he considers it, he wonders how he could have won the consent of his own mind to preach so dully, so listlessly, so dispassionately, upon such themes.”
From the first installment of Douglas’s series, “Wanted — A Congregation!” in the 8/5/1920 issue of The Christian Century.
[This is from Part 1 of Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted — A Congregation!” This first installment was in the August 5, 1920, issue of The Christian Century. I am continuing where I left off in my most recent post. Douglas is talking about a minister who has decided to enlarge his audience.]
“At this point the minister is going to be tempted to spoil the whole scheme by listening to well-meaning counselors who feel that if a spoonful is helpful, the entire bottle should be taken at a gulp. He is going to be advised by the Sunday School superintendent that since October third is to be such a big day, it would be well to put on a general renaissance in that department also, on the specified date. The president of the Young People’s Society sees, in this scheme, a chance to ride through to a larger success in her department. All the auxiliary societies will want to use the campaign for a truck to haul their affairs into more prominence. To each and all, the minister will say, ‘No!’ And again, ‘No! Not by a jugful!’
“Here looms up another example of the wretched psychology that is practiced by churches. Consider the show window at the best store in town and be wise. Is it full to the very eaves with hats, caps, boots, shoes, furnishing goods, gowns, perambulators, parasols, and washtubs? It is not. The display is concentrated upon one or two or three concepts — and these concepts are very closely allied. The window dresser knows something about psychology. It is his business to study people’s mental attitudes.
“The minister has decided that he is going to have a crowded church on the morning of October third. Not the evening, but the morning. He must not wreck his scheme by permitting any other motive to get mixed into this process. The Sunday School superintendent is to be given to understand that his only relation to this campaign is to get behind it and boost. The Young People’s Society must keep out of the traffic. No other fact dare intrude itself here. The minister is going to have a crowd on the morning of Sunday, October third — and that’s all there is to it! No other causes need apply. Let us assume that the active membership of the congregation is lined up now and willing to do it honest best to make a success of this adventure. What next?”
[In response, Douglas assumes that his hypothetical minister has been compiling and organizing a list of prospective members, gleaned from conversations in the community. They now go to that list and identify names to contact for the upcoming sermon. (To be continued in my next post…)]
From the first installment of Douglas’s series, “Wanted — A Congregation!” in the 8/5/1920 issue of The Christian Century.
[This is from Part 1 of Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted — A Congregation!” This first installment was in the August 5, 1920, issue of The Christian Century. I am continuing where I left off in my most recent post. Douglas is talking about a minister with a big church building but a small congregation.]
“PITILESS SELF-SEARCH
“Instead of planning a series of sad sermons on the decline of faith as exhibited by this generation, wherewith to increase the depression of the remnant that is still left to him, this perplexed brother could do no better thing than attempt a critical examination of his case, in the solitude of his own study. Let him take stock of his own resources. He should ask himself whether he is entirely convinced that the public needs what he has to offer. If he is assured of that, let him ask himself if he really has it in him to hold and interest a crowd were he to contrive the means to find access to a crowd. If confident of that, he should investigate the possible or probable reasons for his failure to achieve a satisfactory hearing.
“Perhaps the public does not know what it is missing by its refusal to listen when he talks. Do not smile. This is not intended as an ironical slap at our discouraged friend. Many a potentially excellent preacher is hacking away, Sunday by Sunday, at a heart-breaking task who, with a little encouragement in the form of a large and alert audience, would surprise himself and his best friends by the sudden release of a volume of unsuspected pulpit power! In many cases, these latent geniuses lack a proper hearing simply because they are undeveloped. They are undeveloped because they are unknown. The problem, for them, would be fully solved if only they were able to sense the tug of that strong undertow which accompanies the tidal wave of magnetism flowing from a densely packed crowd.
“It is the purpose of this writing to suggest a few of the processes by which a preacher who really thinks he has a message may win an audience of sufficient size to waken his slumbering genius. Stated with the utmost brevity, and in a phrase that will doubtless pull the very house down about our ears — what this man’s pulpit needs is advertisement! The public must be let into the secret that here is a preacher who claims the right to attention.”
From the first installment of Douglas’s series, “Wanted — A Congregation!” in the 8/5/1920 issue of The Christian Century.
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing excerpts from a series of articles Douglas published in The Christian Century in the summer/fall of 1920 under the heading, “Wanted—A Congregation!” (The Christian Century holds the copyright to these essays.) The first of these articles appeared in the August 5, 1920, issue. After a brief introduction in which he mentions John Spargo (and by so doing, reminds readers why Douglas’s name is familiar to them — because he participated in that debate), he launches into his subject:
“WHAT AILS THE PULPIT?
“Every denomination is learning, through its leaders, that the problem of recruiting its ministry is fast becoming acute. The obvious reason for this failure to entice a sufficient number of capable young men to espouse our profession, resides in the fact that there is too much restlessness in our ranks to warrant an ambitious youth in risking his future with an institution whose present employees seem so discontented. If the youth is still unconvinced that this is the case, after reading in the secular press and the religious journals that ministers, in increasing numbers, are trading their pulpits for secretaryships in philanthropic organizations, he need only attend any one of the host of churches where the pulpit is dolefully lamenting the godlessness of this generation and its indifference to Christian duties.
“When the influence of the pulpit grows feeble, and its drawing power enervated, what is the trouble? Is the generation so much to blame? Why should we not look this matter squarely in the face? Who are the dissatisfied preachers? Are they men who habitually face large congregations on Sundays? No; they are men who have lost interest in their pulpits because they are unable to gain a satisfactory hearing. This is a very real problem, and if there is any way to solve it, let the remedy be brought forward without delay.
“No preacher can be expected to invest his finest energies in the preparation of his sermons unless he has an audience in his mind’s eye while he works. If, on Tuesday morning as he settles to his task of planning next Sunday morning’s discourse, he is able only to visualize a congregation of one hundred and fifty people scattered lonesomely over an auditorium built to accommodate six hundred, that fact alone is sufficient to benumb his creative faculties and throttle whatever genius there is within him.
“If he knew to a moral certainty, as he begins to lay out the blueprints for that sermon, that he was to deliver it to a crowded church — to face a compact, alert, shoulder-to-shoulder congregation filling every available seat in the auditorium — he would attack his job with the fine enthusiasm of an artist engaged upon his magnum opus. What he needs to fire his genius is the consciousness of a strong demand for his message. He needs the lift, and drive, and tug of a crowd! His problem is simple enough. Wanted — a congregation!
“Now, this suggestion is going to be riddled to frazzled tatters. I think I can hear the clickity-clack-clack now, of vehement typewriters tapping out the good old warning to beware the seductive temptation to attract crowds. We shall be reminded yet again that the unworthy brother who pats his vanity because he has contrived to pack his church by the bizarre announcement of some sensational theme should indulge himself a sackcloth-and-ashes hour of penitence in which he recalls that a large multitude of people can be collected by a pair of incompatible dogs in the street, or a clown with a monkey on a strap.
“Of course, this is very depressing, and quite enough to make any man thoroughly ashamed of himself who preaches on Sundays in a packed church. To ease his discomfort, however, he can remember that when the crowds that thronged about the Lord grew so congested that the people actually trampled upon one another, the speaker is not reported as having been ashamed. The tug that they made at his great heart was almost more than he could bear, as he viewed with compassion that multitude which reminded him, more than anything else, of sheep — a shepherdless sheep.
“Whoever is ambitious to follow in the footsteps of the Man of Galilee should never speak contemptuously of a crowd! Doubtless there are charlatans to whom a warning might be beneficial. Undeniably there are quacks whose brief vogue has been worn unworthily. But — if a church with a consistency justifying the upkeep of a public auditorium seating six hundred people is unable to draw more than twenty-five percent of that number to the major event of the week, there is something the matter; and the manager of the institution may well inquire of himself whether it is in his power to remedy [the situation].”
The cover of the August 5, 1920, issue of The Christian Century.
I’ve told you before that Douglas debuted with The Christian Century by entering an essay contest. John Spargo’s article, “The Futility of Preaching,” was the subject, and a number of ministers responded to the editor’s call for rebuttals. Douglas was one of them. Through his essay, “Preaching and the Average Preacher,” Douglas demonstrated a style all his own, and the editor, Charles Clayton Morrison invited him to submit more of his writing to the Century. In fact, he urged Douglas to do it right away, while readers still remembered his name.
Douglas did better than that: he submitted a series of articles, and he framed them as a longer, more in-depth response to Spargo’s criticisms. He called the series, “Wanted — A Congregation!” In this series, he offered advice about how one might preach in such a way that people would flock to the church (as his own parishioners had been doing for the past five years at the First Congregational Church of Ann Arbor, adjacent to the University of Michigan). Douglas had a dynamic personality and was especially powerful in the pulpit and at the typewriter, but in this series of articles he claimed that others could learn from his successes (and failures).
It may seem astounding that Douglas could have responded to Morrison’s invitation so quickly and voluminously, but this series was based on a book he had already written more than a year earlier. In January 1919, Douglas sent a manuscript of the book The Mendicant to the Doran Company. George Doran liked the style of Douglas’s writing but wanted the book to be more religious than it actually was. Douglas didn’t take Doran’s advice, and the manuscript sat in his file cabinet, waiting for the right opportunity to try again.
Douglas recognized Morrison’s invitation as that opportunity. Although The Mendicant was written as a series of dialogues, Douglas took the information that was in his manuscript and rewrote it as a series of essays. Over the next few weeks, I will share excerpts from those essays.
“I realize that I have spent considerable time today with this recital of the Palm Sunday story. I have been anxious that you might see the picture clearly and in detail. For it holds much significance for us on this Palm Sunday of 1920.
“We want an ideal leadership in America. We want a political state that shall be our pride and an example to the nations of the earth. We want to rid ourselves, as a nation, of the old tyrannies, the old social injustices, and walk in newness of life.
“But suppose a leader presented himself whose law of life was brotherly love; whose idea of personal greatness was only that he might become a servant of all, assuring every man who cheered for him that all he could ever hope to get out of it would be the place and rank of a servant.
“Would we acclaim that type of leader?
“Do we want that kind of leader? We who, through these latter days, have become so greedy, so callous?
“Does big industrial business in America desire a pure and undefilable leader who will feel the spirit of the Lord upon him to preach the gospel of hope to the poor — who will (not theoretically, through the incredibly show and ineffective processes of high salaried commissions, but practically) bind up the broken-hearted and ensure equal justice and equal rights for all men, regardless of their station?
“Does big commercial business in America want a leader who will institute workable measures to relieve the strain upon the public?
“Would such commercial interests welcome a leader whose program would involve the increased happiness and welfare of the common people, even at the risk of slightly reduced incomes at the top of society?
“America is very sick: with a social fabric badly rent — with a warp of quick and easy riches, too often questionably won; with a woof of sour and sullen poverty, grinding its teeth in hate of those who, smilingly, continue to heap upon them burdens desperately hard to bear.
“There is a way out. There is only one way out. It is his way who taught men the Golden Rule. Is it too late to choose that way?
“America must decide this question promptly. The date on which our option expires may be nearer than we have thought!
“Five days after this strange event of Palm Sunday, a great crowd of Hebrews who had hailed the young Nazarene as their future king dragged him into the presence of the Procurator and asked that sentence of death be passed on him as a disturber of the peace.
“And Pilate looked him over contemptuously — looked at his haggard face, his unkempt hair, his soiled garments, his fettered hands — and shouted to the crowd:
“‘Is this your king?’
“And they growled, ‘We have no king — but Caesar.’
“Ah, how they hated Caesar. And how they hated Pontius Pilate. And how they hated Rome.
“And how much they would have given just to have been able to yell back into the face of the Roman governor:
“‘We loathe your cruel government. We would gladly overthrow it if we could. We are slaves — and you know it — you greedy monster!’
“Yes, they would have liked to say that to Pilate, but they didn’t dare. For they were slaves. They had the hearts of slaves. They had the minds of slaves. Chains had been worn so long that chains became them. They wouldn’t have known how to behave under a decent government.
“Yet, here stood, in their midst, a man who could have led them out of their distresses. He could have unshackled their souls.
“Again, this gentle-spirited Leader speaks to a nation of high ambitions. Says he:
“‘Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. I am the Way. I am the Truth. I am the Life.’
“Is it too late for us to give this august presence room in our national life?
“We will do well to ponder his claims today — for we must accept him or send him to his cross again.
“What then will ye do with Jesus? is a question that a nation may not answer with a nonchalant: ‘We don’t know!’
“When the question is asked, ‘Is this your king?’ the answer must be either, ‘He is our king!’ or, ‘We have no king — but Caesar. We have no ambition to live up to our boasted ideals. We like the old chains. We love the old poverty for the 99% and the fine old luxuries for the one percent. As for this fellow, away with Him.'”
Christ is part of a caravan of pilgrims making their way into Jerusalem for Passover Week. They are singing the songs of deliverance. Douglas says:]
“There was just a slim chance that Israel, feverishly anxious to find adequate leadership, would listen to [Christ’s] message. If ever they were in a mood to hear an interpretation of God’s will, one would think that time was now.
“If he could only lead them to see that their Messianic hope must reside, at last, in a new social order, in a new spiritual commonwealth.
“It was worth trying.
“It would probably be unsuccessful, but it was worth trying. He resolved to submit himself to the outward tests of the Messiah, as picturesquely foretold by the prophets.
“His disciples were ordered to go find a colt, the foal of an ass. They spread their garments on the beast, in the presence of the curious throng of wayfarers. The word was passed along that the Young Prophet of Nazareth who was reputed to have healed the sick, whose words were quoted on every hand as words of authority, was about to ride into Jerusalem as the Messiah.
“Messengers rushed to Jerusalem and spread the tidings.
“Jesus rode slowly at the head of a vast concourse of people. Jerusalem poured through the city gates and hurried out to meet him.
“It is said that the road which he took still exists, winding around the shoulder of Olivet amid groves of figs and palms until, suddenly, across a wide ravine, Jerusalem rises like a city painted on the clouds.
“The crowd rifled the trees of their foliage and strewed the branches along the road for the advancing king. The cries of ‘Hosanna!’ filled the air. The multitude grew hysterical with joy. Never was there a scene of such enthusiasm; never a crowd so infatuated with a sublime idea.
“To those tumultuous throngs, it seemed that the knell of Rome had sounded. The long and often disappointed dream of Jewish nationality was coming true! The golden age had dawned — for, at last, a Jewish king was riding to his capital in triumph.
“Amid this tumult of delight which swept away all sober sense, no one was any longer capable of seeing things in clear and lucid outline; all swam through a dazzling mist; all caught the glamor of imagination.
“And least of all did the multitude perceive the growing sadness on the face of Jesus.
“At the distance of about a mile and a half from Bethany, the road abruptly bends to the right, a narrow plateau of rock is reached, and with a startling suddenness the whole city is revealed. Nowhere perhaps in all the world is there to be attained a view of a metropolis so complete in itself or so dramatic in the suddenness of its revelation.
“It was here that the procession halted.
“There stood the temple, filling every corner of the area with its multiplied and splendid colonnades, with its superb and lofty edifices, which crowded to the very edge of the abyss and rose from it like a glittering apparition.
“The whole city was planned upon a scale of almost equal grandeur. On every hand, mansions of marble rose out of gardens of exquisite verdure. Terrace upon terrace, the city climbed. In the northwest it was crowned by the porticoes of Herod’s palace; a vast aqueduct spanned the valley; and from the Temple to the upper city stretched a stately bridge; while the walls themselves, built of massive masonry and apparently impregnable, suggested a city ‘half as old as Time.’
“It was thus that these ecstatic pilgrims thought of the sacred city. Jerusalem — beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth — would endure forever, when Rome had vanished.
“If Jehovah had humbled her by permitting Roman occupation, it was only for a day — and the hour had now struck. The King was coming to his own. How delightful it was to shout ‘Our King’!
“But these were vain hopes and fond illusions, not shared by him whom they acclaimed. Where all was hope and pride and triumph, he alone was not elated. He alone saw the city with the prophet’s brooding eye; and as the procession halted on this rock plateau from which the whole vast panorama lay unfolded, an utter sadness fell upon his heart.
“And he wept.
“Jerusalem had rejected the things that might have made for her peace. It was too late to avert the disaster.
“To the consternation of his followers, Jesus wept what must have seemed to them tears of weakness in the very hour when courage was most needed to affirm of himself what they affirmed of him, that he was a king.
“Now, I think that anybody could tell the rest of this story even if he had never heard it. Need it be said that the crowd left off chanting and fell into little groups to discuss the situation in bewilderment? Need it be said that they threw away their palm branches and retired from him?
“He rode on into Jerusalem and saw it through. But it was a day of great disappointment — both for him and Jerusalem.
“They were not ready for an ideal king who believed in the social commonwealth of souls. They wanted a king who could give them political freedom — and, at length, political power.”
“Early in the fourth year of his ministry, Jesus became conscious that the hostility of the priests would shortly produce a crisis. Their warnings had become more and more dramatic, and it was evident that another visit to Jerusalem would be fatal.
“Nevertheless, he resolved to go back to Jerusalem. He arrived in the vicinity of the Holy City a few days before the annual feast of the Passover and sojourned in the little village of Bethany among friends.
“I have already reminded you of the extraordinary excitement which agitated the whole of Palestine during the period of these Passover celebrations. On such occasions, the patriotic and religious ardor of the Jews ran like a flame throughout the land.
“There was no populous city of the East, no remote hamlet, which did not furnish its contingent to what was practically a concentration of the Israelitish forces. These innumerable bands of pilgrims marched upon Jerusalem from every quarter, singing the ancient psalms of Israel — encouraging in one another a joyous ecstasy, full of eager, albeit long-deferred, hope of some great national deliverance to which the past history of their race, and especially the history of the Passover itself, gave vigorous sanction. It has been said that not fewer than a million non-resident Jews gathered in Jerusalem on this occasion.
“Camps sprang up outside the city walls, and contiguous villages like Bethany were crowded to overflowing. Every road leading to the city was thronged with pilgrims who daily increased in numbers as the solemn fate drew near.
“Much has been said, from time to time, about the loneliness of leadership. It is true that every great man who has offered the human race some new apprehension of truth has led a lonely life, for all that he was surrounded constantly with crowds of people.
“And there is nothing more touching, I think, than the sight of a great leader repudiating his natural desire for intimate friendships and his innate longing to be in and of the common life of his generation — in order to accomplish his mission.
“St. Paul hinted at this when he said to the young Timothy, whom he had just appointed an ambassador of the Christian religion at a court where the new spiritual cultus was in high disfavor:
“‘No man that would be a soldier dare entangle himself in the affairs of civilian life.
“‘May the Lord give thee understanding of this. Study to show thyself approved of God.’
“Doubtless there was a strong tug at the heart of Jesus to join these singing pilgrims and enter with them into the joy of this great family reunion of his own people. Jerusalem meant much to him. The fascinatingly interesting history of his nation was very dear to him.
“If he could only have put aside for a few days the responsibility of his task and have gone to the feast as a pilgrim, it would have been a delight.
“History furnishes many a tale of young kings who have left their thrones to wander about the country incognito and live for a little time like the common people.
“I suppose there is no more cruel bondage to be had than the slavery connoted by a crown. And the loneliest people in all creation are kings.
“Jesus must have felt strangely apart from everything that the people considered to be worthwhile on the morning of the day which we are now celebrating.
“There they marched, chanting the old petition for a deliverer, a Messiah, who would rule Thy people Israel.
“Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, thy king cometh, riding upon a colt. Rejoice, O Jerusalem. Break forth into joy. Hosanna to the Son of David. Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.’
“Jesus contemplated that situation with increasing interest, and a new idea grappled with him. Would it be possible?
“There was just a slim chance that Israel, feverishly anxious to find adequate leadership, would listen to his message. If ever they were in a mood to hear an interpretation of God’s will, one would think that time was now.”
The Lloyd C Douglas Page 