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As preachers, the apostles proclaimed the gospel to men; and as teachers they expounded its doctrines and enforced its duties. In this they obeyed the command of their Lord, "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Go and disciple all nations,... teaching them." During His own personal ministry He exemplified what He thus enjoined. "He went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom."

I. THIS COMMAND WAS LAID NOT UPON THE APOSTLES ALONE, BUT UPON THE MINISTRY WHICH THEY HAD SO VIGOROUSLY INAUGURATED.

1. In the age which succeeded that of the apostles preaching and teaching were sedulously maintained by the Christians. From every congregation men seem to have gone forth as evangelists to make known the message of salvation; and in the assemblies of the believers, besides the reading of the Scriptures, a discourse delivered in the audience of the people formed a regular part of the service. , in the former half of the second century, gives an account of how service was conducted in the assembly of the Christians on the Lord's day; and he says that after the reading of the Scriptures the president delivered a discourse of a hortatory character in which he admonished his hearers to reduce to practice what they had heard read. These discourses were homely, unartificial addresses, partaking rather of the nature of conversational utterances than regularly constructed orations or discourses. In the Eastern churches, where they chiefly were in use in the earliest age, the name homily was given to them, a word which signifies intercourse, converse, and secondarily, instruction. For a long time these homilies continued to be mere expositions of Scripture with practical applications and exhortations, often of the simplest character, but sometimes containing the results of careful investigation and profound thought, as in the case of , whose homilies are still valued by scholars for their suggestiveness and the light they sometimes throw on the meaning of Scripture.

2. As Christianity advanced, and the Christian assemblies became more numerous and cultured, the addresses of the pastors came to be of a more ambitious, character, and to be formed more on the model of the oratory of the senate or the forum. The slightly elevated platform which at first was common.to the reader and to the preacher, was by the latter exchanged for, first, a loftier pulpit, and afterwards for a throne, from which the bishop delivered his oration. Gradually the ancient wholesome usage of expounding the prophetic and evangelic writings was relinquished, and discourses in praise of martyrs, or funeral orations, highly ornate harangues, and pieces of artificial rhetoric were in their stead offered to the people, who, captivated by the gaudy show, followed the usage of the theatre, and at the close of each eloquent burst, expressed their approbation by acclamation and clapping of hands.

3. During the Middle Ages, and on to the time of the Reformation,)reaching and teaching had well-nigh ceased. It is true, sermons continued to be written, and were probably delivered, but as they were in a tongue which only the learned understood, they were confined in their use to the clergy; and it is true also that enlightened rulers like and saw the importance of the people being instructed in religion, and took measures to enforce on the clergy the duty of preaching to the people in the vulgar tongue; but how little prepared were the clergy may be gathered from the fact that the Emperor found it necessary to enjoin that "bishops and presbyters are themselves to understand the Lord's Prayer, and preach it to all that each may know what he asks of God." Now and then a man fired by holy zeal — a Tauler, a Wicliffe, a Huss, a Gerson, a Savonarola — preached the gospel to the people and taught them the truths and duties of Christianity, and doubtless there were faithful but unknown men labouring in retired districts. But for the most part, all through these dreary centuries, the pulpit was virtually a nonentity in Christendom, and the people perished for lack of knowledge. Things were at the worst when the dawn of a better day arrived, and, as Milton expresses it, "then was the Sacred Bible sought out of the dusty corners where profane falsehood and neglect had thrown it, the schools opened, Divine and human learning raked out of the embers of forgotten tongues, the princes and cities trooping apace to the new-erected banner of salvation."

4. All the leading reformers were assiduous and eminent preachers, and by this more than any other means they made good their position and effected a real and lasting revival of religious life among the nations. Since then, in all the Protestant Churches, preaching and teaching have been recognised as a chief duty of the Christian pastor; and even in the Romish and Greek churches the value of these is to a greater or less extent practically acknowledged.

II. A TENDENCY HAS SHOWN ITSELF OF LATE TO DEPRECIATE PREACHING AS COMPARED WITH THE DEVOTIONAL PARTS OF OUR PUBLIC SERVICES. A cry has been heard for less preaching and more of prayer and praise. But after much consideration and observation I am brought to the conclusion, that not for instruction alone, but for devotion and spiritual quickening as well, it is needful that the preaching of God's Word should keep that place in the service of the sanctuary which the wisdom and the piety of our ancestors led them to assign to it. Consider well the following things.

1. The testimony of experience is strongly in favour of the value of preaching as a means of sustaining spiritual life in the Church. Turn over the volumes of Church history and it will be found that the free add earnest preaching of God's Word has ever gone hand in hand with a lively state of religious feeling and an earnest and elevated devotion among the people; whilst, on the other hand, when the Church has relied principally on prayer and praise for the sustenance of her spiritual vigour, coldness, indifference, and formality have become characteristic of her members, and the pure fire of devotion on her altar has given place to a lurid and unwholesome flame.

2. Devotion being the utterance of feeling has no self-sustaining power. No emotion, high or low, holy or common, sustains itself; unless it be fed from without it becomes feeble and dies. But how is devotional emotion to be fed except by the Word of God? But it is by preaching and teaching in the sanctuary that the Word of God is chiefly and most effectually to be ministered to the people.

3. Whatever help devotional exercises may lend to She sanctification of the soul, they can never minister so directly to this as does the preaching of God's Word. If devotion fans the flame, it is preaching that must supply the fuel, and it is by it that the fire is to be kindled. Pure affections spring from holy thoughts, and holy thoughts are the offspring of Divine knowledge.

4. The proper hearing of God's Word is in itself an act of worship and devotion. If indeed it is merely to be pleased by an interesting preacher that people come to church; or if they come merely to sit in judgment on him or to enjoy an intellectual pastime or a sensational display — then truly they are as far from worship as if they were engaged in any secular pursuit or worldly amusement. But if they come to hear God's Word, bowing their minds and hearts to the utterance of the Divine mind and seeking the blessing which lies in the reception of the truth, then do they in that very act rise to a true devotion, and offer a worship which is acceptable to God.

(W. L. Alexander, D. D.)

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KJV: And daily in the temple, and in every house, they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ.

WEB: Every day, in the temple and at home, they never stopped teaching and preaching Jesus, the Christ.