The Ministry As a Life Work The harvest indeed is plenteous, but the laborers CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM OF THE MINISTRY In the progress of the years the Church of Christ has faced many serious problems,-problems that, if they had not been settled rightly, would have subverted the life of the church and prevented it from accomplishing the work for which it was established. No problem, however, is more potent with possibilities of good or ill to both the church and the world than the question now confronting it— the adequate supply of well-trained ministerial leaders for the pastorate and other forms of recognized activities in the Christian ministry. This is not an altogether new problem in the history of American life. It was prominent in the early part of the Nineteenth Century as the tide of population swept over the Alleghanies and flowed down the valley of the Mississippi and its tributaries. New settlements sprang up as by magic, and churches were established everywhere, but there were no men to fill their pulpits. The situation at that time was serious, but it was not so acute as the condition that faces the church at the present hour. We may emphasize the worth of lay leadership in the church, and recognize the splendid values of the printed page in giving the message of the gospel, and yet we cannot escape the conviction that the success of the church in the present, and its welfare in the future, depends upon the numbers and quality of its ministers. The church, humanly speaking, stands or falls upon its ability to summon strong young men to its special service in sufficient numbers to meet its needs. The comparative failure of the church to thus command its youth at the present time is apparent to everybody, and is receiving emphasis through current discussions in the public press. The chaos and restlessness, so marked in other spheres of human society, are reflected in the religious life of our times. The clanging noises of the world are drowning the still small voice that speaks within the soul summoning it to the divine service of the ministry. The appeal of physical sense threatens to submerge the conscience of the nation. The seriousness of the situation was not appreciated for some time, but church leaders are now awakening to conditions and their possible dangers. Great city churches, equally with small country parishes, are having difficulty in securing ministers, and some of them remain pastorless for long periods of time. The Interchurch Survey, made in 1920, tells us that in "One denomination 3,388 congregations did not have regular pastoral care. In another there were 994 fewer ministers than in 1914. In the New England section of one denomination 35 per cent. of the congregations were without regular ministers in 1915. In a denomination having 963 congregations, only 627 had settled pastors." The Year Book for 1920 of one of the largest denominations reported 456 men ordained and 450 men deceased. But this apparent gain of six was changed to a large loss by the retirements from active service ensuing from age and physical disability, and above all, from the drift of ministers into other occupations. This drift, according to competent observers, amounted in the church as a whole to twenty-five per cent. of those ordained. This dearth of ministers is the result of a very serious shortage in the number of men who are preparing themselves for such work. At a conference of theological schools held in Cambridge in 1918, it was asserted that in 1915 there were 1,000 men less preparing for the ministry than in 1895. Fourteen Presbyterian Seminaries reported in 1896, 960 students; in 1916, 840 students; and in 1921 only 639 students. In 1911 the Congregational Seminaries reported 434 students and in 1921, 483 students, an apparent gain of 49. But this gain was largely |