Cylchgronau Cymru

THE WELSH CALVINISTIC METHODIST RECORD. SEPTEMBER, 1853. THE MINISTRY: ITS RESPONSIBILITIES AND DUTIES. BY THE REV. J. HUGHES, LIVERPOOL.* On such occasions as the present it is quite natural as well as customary, (and customary, perhaps, because natural,) to address a few words to the brother who is set apart to the ministry of the word. But before I do this, I beg to premise that I do net consider that the services of this day, how¬ ever natural and customary, constitute the credentials of our brother for his great work. He has, I trust, received his credentials from a higher source than from any man or body of men, even from the Head of the Church himself; not indeed in a direct and miraculous manner, as the apostles received theirs, yet from the same source, and for the same purpose. Our brother may have been a real and authorized minister of Christ without the services of this day, and I trust was such prior to the present proceedings, and if not, the solemnities of this clay are not sufficient to constitute him such. The ordination service is not intended to confer a qualification upon a subject destitute of it, but to recognize it where it exists. Fitness for the ministry, can be given only by the Holy Spirit, and when given can be acknowledged only by the church, and that acknowledgement is thus pub¬ licly celebrated, and formally recognized. Without entering more fully into the essentials of a call to the ministry, I would endeavour at once, in obedience to my brethren, to offer you, my dear brother, a few words expressive of those sentiments and wishes I entertain in reference to your position as a minister of the gospel of Christ. Allow me then to state that the first sentiments which present themselves * A charge, delivered at the ordination of the Rev. W. Smith, Scarisbrick at Liverpool, May lGth, 1853. 2 A