Past Masters: Alexander Maclaren
When Alexander Maclaren entered the study in his home
at 9 every morning to take up his sermon preparation, he would kick off his
slippers and put on heavy outdoor work boots as a reminder to himself of the
hard work he was about to do. It was this work ethic – coupled with his
deep devotion to Christ and His Word – that brought Maclaren the reputation as
“the prince of expositors.”
Alexander Maclaren (1826-1910) labored in England at
the same time as several other prominent preachers, such as C. H. Spurgeon,
Joseph Parker, and F. B. Meyer. Meyer himself, in comparing Maclaren to his
many notable contemporaries, said, “As an expository preacher none of them
equaled Maclaren of Manchester, and no other sermons were so widely read the
world around. . . . Dr. Maclaren is said with truth to have changed the whole
style of the British pulpit, and to have influenced it more (than) any of his
predecessors.”
Maclaren came to prominence during a 45-year-tenure in
the mill city of Manchester, England. Unlike his friend Spurgeon, Maclaren had
only one ministry – preaching. He rarely traveled and started no schools or
publications. The only responsibility he took beyond his own church was two
terms as president of the Baptist Union late in his career.
Since he was from a Baptist nonconformist family, he
could not gain admission to Oxford or Cambridge University so in 1842 he
entered the Baptist College in Stepney where he met one of the most significant
influences of his life, Principle Benjamin Davies. Davies instilled in the
young Maclaren a life-long habit of meticulous study in the Scripture’s
original languages. It became Maclaren’s habit to spend a half hour each in the
Hebrew and Greek texts every morning as part of his devotions. His sermons, while
never flaunting his skills, often show a keen understanding of the language and
grammar of the original tongues.
Maclaren knew from his youth that he was called to
preach and never considered any other vocation. When he preached his first
sermon at the age of 17 he began his written log, recording the sermon number,
location, text and date.
His first charge was a small, dying Baptist
congregation in Southhampton. Only 20 people were coming to a sanctuary that
seated 800, but as Maclaren labored there for twelve years the church steadied
and grew. He later said, “I thank God for the early days of struggle and
obscurity.”
Maclaren’s move to Manchester in 1858 brought an end
to his obscurity. After eleven years there, a new 1500-seat auditorium was
built and every seat was filled morning and evening.
Dr. W. Robertson Nicoll, a prominent publisher of the
day, said Maclaren was without question “the most brilliant man, all round,”
that he ever knew. His scholarship was impeccable. He read widely – from
Augustine to the Quakers, as well as the great British poetry and novels.
But it is not his learning that sets his sermons apart
from others. First and foremost, Maclaren was a true expositor of Scripture.
While he never took long texts, he always dealt with a unit of thought and
elegantly laid bare the logic and force of the text. He had an almost uncanny
ability to lay open a text along its natural lines. His outlines made clear not
only the seams in a passage of Scripture but also in the workings of the human
heart. To this day he is one of those preacher-scholars whom we should not read
too early in our preparation lest we find ourselves unable to think for
ourselves.
Maclaren never used a manuscript, preferring only
sketchy notes, yet his sermons as recorded by stenographers were masterpieces
of compelling, vivid and elegant language. This amazing extemporaneous ability
made his sermons all the more powerful because his clear and poetic language so
perfectly matched the lofty and grand truths of Scripture.
Maclaren usually preached three-point sermons. When
his brother-in-law pointed out this tendency, he responded, “[T]he
three-pronged fork seems to me a thoroughly useful instrument.” His points were
drawn directly from the text. Sometimes he simply labeled the sections, as in a
sermon on Psalm 48 – “the glory of Zion, the deliverance of Zion, and the
consequent grateful praise and glad trust of Zion.” But many other times, his
points captured biblical principles, as in this rare two-point message from Neh.
5:15: (I) “Nothing will go right unless you dare to be singular,” and (II) “You
cannot resist evil unless you give yourselves to God.”
Although Maclaren rarely told a story, repeated a
quotation or alluded to current events, his sermons are vivid with metaphors
and similes, bringing sometimes complex biblical truth to the level of the
ordinary listener. For example, in one sermon he said, “We cannot weave the web
except Christ gives us the yarn, nor can we work out our own salvation except
Christ bestows upon us the salvation which we work out.”
Though he was a disciplined expositor, his sermons
never have the feel of a Bible lecture. They are rich with insight into both
the implications of Scripture and the workings of the human heart. His
introductions were short and pointed, diving right into the meat of the text.
The first two or three sentences were the only part of the sermon he was likely
to write out in advance so that he could be sure, as he put it, “to launch out
into the deep.”
For all his muscular boldness in the pulpit, Maclaren
was a shy and reclusive man. While he did the required pastoral work, he was
never comfortable with it. For example, shortly after coming to Manchester a
godly man in the congregation asked him, “Are you aware that your housemaid is
under serious conviction regarding the state of her soul?” “No,” Maclaren
answered, “I did not know, but commend her to your care. I am able, with God’s
help, to teach His truth to hundreds; you can bring it home better to one or
two.”
Those who knew him well reported that Maclaren
suffered after every sermon, thinking each was a failure. A friend once asked
him if he recalled what he thought about as he waited for applause to die down
after he was introduced at a large gathering. “Yes, perfectly,” he said, “I all
but heard the words, ‘It is a very small thing that I should be judged of you,
or of man’s judgment; he that judgeth me is the Lord.’” He could only face the
awful responsibility of preaching because he so wanted the message to be heard.
Besides being published each week in the Manchester
Guardian, over 400 of Maclaren’s sermons were published in book form, besides
several other non-sermonic books. Then, after retirement, he undertook what
became a 31-volume pastoral commentary entitled Expositions of Holy Scripture,
providing sermonic analysis for virtually all of the Bible.
Alexander Maclaren preached for 45 years in
Manchester, concluding in June 1903 and seldom preached again after that final
Sunday. The last sermon noted in his register, #6860, was given on November 21,
1904, almost exactly 61 years after his very first.
The great preacher, scholar and Christian died May 10,
1910. His body was cremated and his ashes were buried under a cross he had
placed on the family plot years before. The cross bore the words he had chosen:
“In Christo, in Pace, in Spe” – in Christ, in Peace, in Hope.
___________
Lee Eclov is Pastor of the Village Church of
Lincolnshire, IL.
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