Of course, if my business were to establish a set of principles, theological or otherwise, then argumentation would be my weapon, proofs would be my means, and my success would be that I should win your credence, your intellectual consent, and conviction.  If I were here to proclaim simply a morality, then the thing that I would aim to secure would be obedience, and the method of securing it would be to enforce the authority and reasonableness of the command.  But, seeing that my task is to proclaim a living Person and a historical fact, then the way to do that is to do as the herald does when in the market-place he stands, trumpet in one hand and the King’s message in the other—­proclaim it loudly, confidently, not ’with bated breath and whispering humbleness,’ as if apologising, nor too much concerned to buttress it up with argumentation out of his own head, but to say, ‘Thus saith the Lord,’ and to what the Lord saith conscience says, ‘Amen.’  Brethren, we need far more, in all our pulpits, of that unhesitating confidence in the plain, simple proclamation, stripped, as far as possible, of human additions and accretions, of the great fact and the great Person on whom all our salvation depends.

II.  So let me ask you to notice the exclusiveness which this theme demands.

‘Nothing but,’ says Paul.  I might venture to say—­though perhaps the tone of the personal allusions in this sermon may seem to contradict it—­that this exclusiveness is to be manifested in one very difficult direction, and that that is, the herald shall efface himself.  We have to hold up the picture; and if I might take such a metaphor, like a man in a gallery who is displaying some masterpiece to the eyes of the beholders, we have to keep ourselves well behind it; and it will be wise if not even a finger-tip is allowed to steal in front and come into sight.  One condition, I believe, of real power in the ministration of the Gospel, is that people shall be convinced that the preacher is thinking not at all about himself, but altogether about his message.  You remember that wonderfully pathetic utterance from John the Baptist’s stern lips, which derives much additional pathos and tenderness from the character of the man from whom it came, when they asked him, ‘Who art thou?’ and his answer was, ’I am a Voice.’  I am a Voice; that is all!  Ah, that is the example!  We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord.  We must efface ourselves if we would proclaim Christ.

But I turn to another direction in which this theme demands exclusiveness, and I revert to the previous chapter where in the parallel portion to the words of my text, we find the Apostle very clearly conscious of the two great streams of expectation and wish which he deliberately thwarted and set at nought.  ’The Jews require a sign—­but we preach Christ crucified.  The Greeks seek after wisdom,’ but again, ‘we preach Christ crucified.’  Now, take these two.  They are representations, in a very emphatic way, of two sets of desires and mental characteristics, which divide the world between them.