“There is a danger of talking more about salvation than about the Savior. There is a danger of preaching redemption and neglecting to preach the Redeemer. It could be that we know much about justification and little about Jesus Christ, his person and his work. One thing is certain, a man will arrive at right doctrine through Christ, but it is also possible for him to have orthodox doctrine and yet not know Christ. The gospel is not a collection of dry doctrines; it is the revelation of a living, merciful, and ever-present Lord.
Men and women are not going to come to hear you preach the doctrines of grace. But if needy sinners get wind of the fact that you are preaching the grace of Christ, they will give you a hearing. When you only preach to my head in facts so numerous and terms so tedious, you weary me, and forget that I am a human with emotions and a hungry heart! I laugh, I cry, I love, I feel, I sorrow, I doubt, I fear, and I need a minister with whom I can identify in all these, who has the message of God’s mercy; not cold, calculated creeds which ignore these human traits.
The Arminian cheerleader sings joyful hymns, weeps, laughs, rejoices, and calls for men to commit themselves to a movement with no message of hope nor assurance. The Calvinistic professor stands rigidly in his pulpit of pious orthodoxy, daring not to weep lest he be called emotional, daring not to laugh lest he be thought frivolous, daring not to call mourners or seekers lest he be called a free-willer, daring not to let people know him or get close to him lest he lose their respect and awe. Someone may find out he is only a sinner saved by grace.
Lord, deliver me from having to listen to either one of them, and send me an Elijah of like passions who will minister to my heart and to my head — to the whole man.”
-Henry Mahan
