Set Your Pulpit on Fire — E.A. Johnston

Dear brother pastor, what would happen if, this Sunday, you carried a can of gasoline into the pulpit, drenched it, and set it afire? Your congregation would gasp in horror, then their horror would turn to alarm as they realized they were in great danger of the church burning down.

With them inside, they would run for the doors. It would be complete pandemonium and bedlam. You, of course, would probably lose your job and probably face several lawsuits, but that's one way to set your pulpit on fire.

Encouragement for Discouraged Pastors

Would you like to know of another way to set your pulpit on fire and still keep your pastorate? Listen brother, if you are a pastor and you are beaten down, discouraged, and ready to throw in the towel, I urge you not to do it.

I have some words of encouragement and exhortation for you. And if you are a pastor who has always longed to see your church break out in revival, breaking out of Acts chapter 2 in a Holy Ghost revival, then this message is for you.

It's easy to get discouraged in ministry. I recall Alan Redpath saying in a message that he was continually discouraged by one of his deacons that every week just before the Sunday service, this deacon would poke his head into Redpath's study and comment on the size of the congregation by saying, only half full today.

That comment would greatly discourage Redpath even before he entered the pulpit. Satan's number one weapon against a minister is discouragement. I can remember sitting in a class on preaching that was taught by a prominent seminary professor.

And as this professor lectured on the art of preaching, I glanced across me at a fellow student who had a disturbed look on his face. And when the class was over, this student approached the professor with the following comments.

He said, you taught us today how to preach with personality and projection. But when I studied the life of Jonathan Edwards, I see he had the power of the Holy Spirit in attendance to his ministry. Why do you not mention that aspect of preaching?

The seminary professor answered in disgust, son, you are no Jonathan Edwards. The student walked away crushed, but that young student knew more about preaching than that seminary professor did, who was teaching the class on preaching.

We must remind ourselves that Edwards put his pants on the same way we do. We have the same God as Edwards had. We have the same Bible and we have access to the same Holy Spirit that Edwards had. I want to encourage you, my brethren in the preaching ministry to preach the word of God as God intended you to preach it with power.

Don't let others discourage you. Don't discourage yourself by saying, well, I'm not a Jonathan Edwards. For I'm going to share with you today the story of a man, a plain man, a plain preacher who was a contemporary of Jonathan Edwards.

And he was not gifted as Edwards was. But under this man's preaching, God moved in such a powerful revival that this minister's entire city was shaken for God. This man was such an ungifted preacher, such a poor speaker.

William McCulloch and the Cambuslang Revival

You will stand amazed by the study of his life and what God did through this ordinary man called William McCulloch of Cambuslang, Scotland. This man, William McCulloch, had few gifts for oratory. In fact, his own son wrote about him.

He was not a very ready speaker. He was not eloquent. His manner was slow and cautious. He was given the nickname of Yill or El Minister for when he rose to speak, many of the audience left to quench their thirst in the public house.

Listen, brother preacher, to the following page taken from George Woodfield's journal entry dated August 27, 1742, written while he was in the midst of a great revival at William McCulloch's church in Cambuslang.

Here now are Woodfield's words. This day, fortnight, I came to this place to assist at the sacramental occasion with several worthy ministers of the Church of Scotland. Such a Passover has not been heard of.

The voice of prayer and praise was heard all night. It was supposed that between 30 ,000 and 40 ,000 people were assembled and 3 ,000 communicated. There were three tents. The ministers were enlarged and great grace was among the people.

I preached on Saturday, once on the Lord's Day morning, served five tables and preached about 10 at night to a great number in the churchyard. Though it rained much, there was a great awakening. This, friends, was the Cambuslang Revival, which began under the preaching of the Alminister William McCulloch.

Woodfield wrote in another place that it was such a mighty move of God that the hillside looked like a great battlefield, many lying on the ground and crying out, what must I do to be saved? This revival, friends, was so amazing that 20 ,000 people would feel the preaching praise as they would later be called late at night and stay there to hear a sermon preached till 2 a .m.

Allow me to put this into perspective. Cambuslang was a sparsely populated town on the southeastern outskirts of Glasgow. And in 1742, the entire population was only 20 ,000. So when God moved in revival, the entire populace was gripped with eternity.

And I've been to the grave of William McCulloch and I've stood on the preaching praise there in Cambuslang beneath the church by that little stream. It's amazing to think they were filled with 20 ,000 to 30 ,000 people bowed under by the awful solemnity of a holy God moving in revival.

Preaching About Revival and Preaching for Revival

Now, allow me to share with you how this revival all came about. And here's how I want to encourage you, dear brother pastor, as you listen to this story about William McCulloch, how an ordinary pastor who was a very poor preacher indeed came to set his pulpit on fire with the power of the Almighty.

And listen very carefully, brother preacher, for what the ale minister experienced is possible for you to experience. Yes, God is sovereign in revival. We cannot drum up revival with any of our human efforts, but we can set ourselves to catch those revival winds when they do begin to blow.

One thing I want you to notice today from our story is that there's a great difference in preaching about revival and preaching for revival. First, William McCulloch began to preach about revival to his congregation.

Then when their interest was stirred, he then began to preach for revival. There's a difference. Listen, and you will see what I mean. Bear in mind that this ale minister was just a plain country preacher with no great gifts for preaching, but he was a man sold out to God whom God used as a mighty instrument of revival.

But before God showed up in revival at McCulloch's church, the ale minister went through a transformation and it was this transformation in his life and ministry, which so transformed the life of his church.

Listen to this gripping story. One day, William McCulloch began to hear about the accounts of the great awakening, which was taking place in America in 1740. In New England, under the preaching of Jonathan Edwards, he obtained copies of the accounts of that revival in Northampton, Massachusetts, which Edwards described as it was as if the entire town was gripped with eternity.

As the ale minister began to read these accounts, his heart was stirred and he began to pray that if God would be pleased to send a work of grace like that to his church in Camp Buslang, he'd give God all the glory.

The more he prayed for revival and the more he read the accounts of revival, the more impassioned and burdened this man became to see revival come to his church. This is what the ale minister began to do with his congregation.

He gathered them together and began reading to them the accounts of the revival in Northampton under Edwards' mighty ministry. He read them these accounts every week until his own people grew interested in revival and they too began to long for those same revival fires to appear in their church in Camp Buslang.

This was the first aspect I mentioned earlier that there's a great difference between preaching about revival and preaching for revival. The ale minister was preaching here about revival. Next, he noticed the doctrines that Edwards was preaching to his people in New England were not the doctrines he was preaching to his people in Camp Buslang.

He preached long sermons on Bible passages to them. With such dryness, they got up to go have a drink at the ale house, as it was called. But when William McCulloch decided to change his sermons to change his message, that's when God began to move amidst that little congregation there at Camp Buslang.

The Doctrines That Stirred the Cambuslang Congregation

Well, what did McCulloch preach that so gripped his people and so changed his preaching ministry from a dry, boring lecture to searching preaching that had power? Well, he began to preach on the same doctrines that Edwards was preaching in Northampton.

First, William McCulloch preached a series of messages on the holiness of God. This had a great effect on his people, especially the young people in his parish. Then after that, he began a series of messages on the duty of repentance, immediate repentance.

Many became disturbed under his searching sermons on repentance. Then McCulloch preached a string of sermons on the necessity of regeneration that it was a work of God, which God wrought in the heart of man.

This had a powerful effect on his people, and many of the young people in McCulloch's congregation became awakened to their lost condition and became alarmed, seeking him late at night in counseling and asking him, what must I do to be saved?

God had come to Camp Buslang in revival. Around this time, McCulloch wrote a letter of invitation to George Whitefield to come to his church and preach. Whitefield came in 1742 and a mighty outpouring of grace occurred under Whitefield's mighty preaching to where the neighboring towns flocked to hear Whitefield preach sermons on the hillside beneath McCulloch's church because the church could not contain the crowds, which had grown to over 20 ,000 people staying at all odd hours of the night, laying out on the hillside under deep conviction of sin.

The revival in Camp Buslang began when this simple man, William McCulloch, the ale minister, changed his message when he began to preach on the majesty of God and His holiness, when he preached up man's duty of repentance to a sovereign Lord and the Lordship of Jesus Christ, when he preached the necessity of a work of grace, of regeneration on the heart, to become a true Christian.

Then God began to tend those great doctrines with power. Paul declared in Romans, For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation. There's a great difference, brother pastor, in giving a lecture on the great doctrines of grace, which inform others by our teaching and preaching those great doctrines along with their responsibilities on man's part to obey them and conform to them and preaching those doctrines in a searching way to penetrate the very joints and marrow of hearer's conscience with sword thrust to the heart.

Preaching Repentance, Holiness, and the Sovereignty of God

Preaching about revival is pleasing to the people's ears. Most love to hear stories about revival, what God did in Wales and what God did in the Great Awakening. But when you begin to change your message and start preaching for revival, be ready to dodge a few bricks because there'll be some in your congregation who've whittled out for themselves a God who they are pleased to serve.

And it's not the living God of the Bible. And you have to kill someone's gods before you can show them the true God. And when you start killing somebody's gods, they'll come at you in anger and you'll have a fight on your hands.

The deacons would be up in arms and calling for your head. So many today in our churches are sitting on a false foundation of self-righteousness and good works that if you plainly and clearly show them their duty of repentance to the lordship of Jesus Christ, some will rise up and shout, we will not have this man reign over us.

But listen, we must be honest with folks and show them their danger. We must thunder the law of God around their ears until they see the utter strictness and severity of the holy law of God, that whoever breaks that law is guilty and a rebel against the holy God.

We must preach up the holiness of God. We must show man his wicked heart and his ruined condition. We must be faithful handlers of the word of God and be honest with man on the cost of following a crucified Lord.

We must preach the great doctrines of the Bible with such power that men will see their need for a work of regeneration upon the heart and realize that they need that work to be done. It's something they can't do for themselves.

Only God can perform it. We must preach up the sovereignty of God and salvation that God grants saving faith and he can give it or withhold it and still be a just and holy God. Jesus declared, no man can come to me except the father which hath sent me draw him.

But along with that doctrine, we must preach man's duty of immediate repentance. That's how Azahel Nettleton preached it. That's how Jonathan Edwards preached it. When I went through the handwritten papers of Azahel Nettleton at Hartford Seminary while researching my biography on his life, I found he often preached two main messages.

Number one, man's duty of immediate repentance and number two, the necessity of regeneration. The very same doctrines that Edwards preached in Northampton and McCulloch preached in Cambuslang. God seems pleased to attend the preaching of his great doctrines when they are faithfully proclaimed to sinful man with no fear of man in the preacher.

Faithful Preaching Over Church-Growth Formulas

We today are too afraid we will offend the chairman of the deacons and he will take his checkbook and leave. We've made the great mistake of choosing men to be deacons based on their social and business prominence in the community rather than these men having prominence with God.

And we pay for it regularly as they seem to fight us at every turn. Listen, brother pastor, if you want to see revival in your church, then follow the pattern laid out here today in this message, but be willing to experience hostility in some of your people.

Some may move their membership, but you probably won't miss them if they do. I remember what Stephen Offord shared with me about his meeting with Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones as they sailed across the Atlantic together.

Stephen Offord was a young pastor and he had a concern which he brought to Lloyd-Jones as they were aboard the same ship. Stephen Offord said he was concerned that his preaching was diminishing his congregation and he was worried about it.

And what advice could the good doctor give him? Lloyd-Jones looked him squarely in the eye with that penetrating gaze and replied, My good man, you must first shrink a church before you can grow it. And I say to you, brother pastor, throw out all your books on church growth.

Forget about any formulas for growing your church and preach the great doctrines of grace with such clarity and power that they begin to search the hearts of your viewers. I said, preach them, not teach them.

Preach up man's responsibility to repent. Preach up the necessity of regeneration. Show them their sins and their wicked and deceitful hearts and do it all in love. Be honest with men and tell them that the gate is narrow and few there be that find it, that they may get mad at you.

Some may leave, but God may come in a visitation of grace that is so overpowering, so overwhelming that the very life of your church is transformed for all eternity. But be willing to have your message changed because you have to have your message changed to have this effect.

And listen what William McCulloch did and risk everything for God like he did. Brother pastor, let me show you how changing your message can impact your church by relating the story to you about R .G. Lee.

R. G. Lee and the Need to Preach the Cross

There was a member in Dr. Lee's congregation, an attorney who had to be out of town on business frequently. But no matter where this lawyer went, he made sure to catch a train back to Memphis on Saturday night so he could listen to R .G. Lee preach on Sunday morning.

He loved to hear that man preach. Well, this lawyer got cancer and he was in the hospital dying. And he called for his pastor to come to his bedside. Dr. Lee entered the hospital room whose window overlooked the Mississippi River.

The lawyer told R .G. Lee, I want you to know how much I've enjoyed your preaching through the years, and I never missed a Sunday if I could help it. Now, I lie here dying with only a few weeks left to live, and I want to chastise you, sir, for never telling me how to be saved.

You never preached the cross to where I could see it. You never put the blood out there where I could reach it. I'm a dying and I will die in my sins and I reprimand you for your lack. R .G. Lee left that man's hospital room with his head down, feeling berated and guilty as charged.

It was now dark outside as he walked down to the banks of the Mississippi River. There, he got down on his knees in the mud, getting his white suit pants dirty in the process, and he dipped his hands into the muddy river.

He knelt there a while, reflecting on what that dying man had told him. And right there and then, he promised God from that point forward, he would preach up the cross to where people could see it. He would lay the blood out there where people could reach it.

And he changed his message that night. And in three weeks time, there was a move of grace at that church, that three blocks of downtown Memphis were shaken with revival. It is my prayer, dear brother pastor, that you will set your pulpit on fire for God and preach the hard messages that God has called you to preach, preaching the full counsel of God, that God will help you to reach this generation of hell-bound sinners with the gospel of the glory of the Son of God.

Calling Ministers to Preach the Full Counsel of God

They desperately need a savior. Preach up the cross, dear brother. Preach up the blood. Lay it out there where people can lay hold of it. Call sin black and hell hot. Fear God and not man. And ask the Lord of the harvest to send laborers out to the harvest, for the fields are white and the sun is sinking down and the day is fast declining.