After His Kind
by Dr. Jack Hyles (1926-2001)
(Chapter 9 from Dr. Hyle's excellent book, From Vapor to Floods)
"And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good." Genesis 1:11, 12, 21, 24, 25.
Several months ago a preacher came to me while I was speaking in a distant state. He said, "Brother Hyles, I visited your church and was there for the Pastors' School. The outstanding thing about your church is love. I pastor a church. We are always fussing and wrangling; we cannot get along with each other. What can I do? Could you tell me what I can do to make my people do?"
I turned to Genesis 1:11, "And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind..." I read it and repeated, "...after his kind."
Then I took him to verse 12 where we find those words twice, "after his kind." Then in verse 21 the words, "after his kind," are used two times. Then in verse24 we find the words used twice again, "after his kind." In verse 25 we find the words three times, "after his kind" or "after its kind."
He said, "Brother Hyles, what in the world does that have to do with my people loving me? Why did you use this passage?"
I will tell you folks what I told that preacher.
In this statement, "after his kind" we find the secret of getting church folks to love each other. You see, everything has in itself reproductive powers. A flower has seed in itself to make another flower "after its kind." The Bible says in Genesis 1:11 that grass has seed within itself. It is able to reproduce "after its kind." Each animal has power within itself to reproduce "after his kind." Even man can reproduce "after his kind." It is the law of God. Not only is this a law of God for animal life, plant life and human life, but it is also the law of God for virtues. Every virtue and every trait has in itself the power to reproduce itself.
1. Gloom
That is why when you get around someone who is always full of life you feel more full of life. That is why some people tranquilize us. I went into the Fellowship Hall the other night, and I never felt better in my life. I was bouncing; I just felt like I was full of life. To be honest with you, I thought I looked better than usual. Then the strangest thing happened. A lady looked at me and said, "Your eyes are bloodshot."
"Oh?"
"Yes. You haven't been getting as much sleep, have you?"
"Why," I said, "I..."
"You don't feel good."
"Well, I feel fine." I sat down and somebody walked past and said, "Pastor, you've been working too hard."
Then I said, "Well, I have not been feeling real well."
Listen, I was ready to go and get a check up before the Teachers' Meeting was over. I limped into the auditorium for Prayer Meeting. Why? Every creature can reproduce after his own kind.
Every virtue reproduces itself. The way to get love into your church is to get love in your heart. When love is overflowing in your heart, that love will reproduce itself after its kind in the hearts of other people.
2. Joy
Joy reproduces itself. Happiness reproduces itself.
I had an evangelist in my church in Texas who came to Hammond, Indiana, about twelve years ago, to a revival meeting at the First Southern Baptist Church. He came back and said, "Pastor, I want you to go to Hammond, Indiana, to preach. The folks in Hammond need you."
I asked, "Why?"
He said, "Most of the folks in the area work in the steel mills. They go to work in the steel mills before daylight in the morning, and they work hard all day. When they come out, it is already dark, often it is snowing, and many times it's below zero. You seem to enjoy life. I think if you would go to Hammond for a few days, you would be a tonic to that area."
Yes, our services seem to have more joy than they used to. We are not as afraid as we used to be to laugh in church. It is because I have always been this way. It is incurable! I will always be this way. What am I saying? Joy always reproduces itself. By the way, so does gloom. A virtue has within itself the powers of reproduction. Just as a seed is in a flower and it reproduces after its kind, just as an animal reproduces after its kind and humanity reproduces after its kind, even so joy reproduces after its kind.
3. Soul Winning
When we first came to Hammond, I said to Brother Jim Lyons, "Now, Jim, we want to build a soul-winning church-not just an evangelistic church where the Gospel is preached and souls are saved in the services, but a church where people go house to house knocking on doors, covering the neighborhood."
He said, "What can we do?"
I said, "Let's just start ourselves."
Back in those days, he and I would each make a hundred visits per week. If we had fifteen or twenty conversions on Sunday, eight or ten would be mine and eight or ten would be his. What were we doing? We were trying to start soul winning. Then somebody else got the idea. It reproduce itself.
4. Enthusiasm
Are there some people you've been around who enthuse you? Dr. Lee Roberson is like that to me. Nobody makes me want to do something like Dr. Roberson. I do not cry when he preaches; I just want to go and build a building or burn one down or build another one. I just want to move and do something. Some people affect others like that.
5. Pessimism
I am thinking of a lady right now who is a member of this church. There was one time, about ten years ago, that I asked her how she felt. She has never gotten finished yet. Don't ever ask that lady how she feels! Don't do it! I have never visited her when she was sick yet that I didn't have the same symptoms when I let. I never have. Why? Pessimism reproduces itself. I want to be the kind of person that has joy after his kind, kindness after his kind and love after his kind. Just go around your home, your church and your business scattering joy. It has in itself reproductive powers "after its kind."
Oh, my dear friends, Christian people ought to realize that they can influence others. Joy can have that kind of seed and reproduce after its kind, and the entire office can be changed by our joy. I am sure that there can be again and again and again a home changed by the love of one person. It can be so strong that it reproduces after its kind until the entire home is full of love. That is the way Christians ought to be. Kindness, enthusiasm, joy and love ought to overflow in our Christian lives.
I was driving down Sibley Street one day. I went about a half block past LaFayette School. There I saw a bunch of kids in a huddle. I thought there might be a fight, so I pulled over to the curb and watched. Would you believe what I say? I saw a little kid on top of a box. He had a bunch of kids around him, and he had a Bible open. He was waving his right hand in the air and he was crying at the top of his voice, "YOU KIDS HAD BETTER GET BORN AGAIN! YOU'RE GOING TO SPLIT HELL WIDE OPEN!" He gave an invitation. A dog walked the aisle and was baptized in a mud hole behind the box. (I wonder where that kid goes to church! Right here, of course.) That's one reason why I must be the right kind of pastor. Oh, as God's people, we ought to realize that we reproduce after our own kind. We need to become the people who reproduce joy and love so that people will have those attributes reproduced in them.
6. Love
We should be so filled with love that our love will so overflow that our Sunday school classes will have love, our homes will have love, our schools will have love, our neighbors will have love and our churches will have love. You cannot generate love until you get the love of Christ in your heart. Then that love can reproduce after its kind.
I said to the preacher who asked me what he could do, "Fellow, you can go home and preach on love all you want to, but that will not give your folks love. You can go home and exhort your people to love, yet you must love if your people are to have love."
I was in a barber shop in Springfield, Missouri. I was preaching at the Baptist Bible College for a week, and I went to the barber shop. The barber said, "Your hair is thinning."
I said, "Just cut it."
He said, "Your hair is thinning. I have some stuff that will keep it from falling." He pulled out a bottle and said, "I'll sell you all of it." It was about three dollars. He then pulled out another little tube of stuff and said, "This goes with it."
I spent six or seven dollars before I left (plus the price of a haircut) on some stuff that will help my hair grow. I bought the stuff, walked out, and looked back through that window and discerned something: The barber didn't have a hair on his head! There I stood with junk for which I had paid seven dollars! That man may never get rich selling that stuff because not everyone is as dumb as I.
What am I saying? I'm saying that all of the preaching will never get the job done. It is the practicing that gets the job done. Diligence has its own seed after its own kind. Proper behavior has its own seed after its kind. Hard work has its own seed after its kind. Alertness has its own seed after its kind. Joy has its own seed after its kind.
Oh, my precious friends, let us be what we ought to be so that if the world reproduces not what we say but what we are, then the churches in America will be what they ought to be. I have always said this: I want my church to be what it ought to be 52 weeks a year so that guest coming in on any particular Sunday will see our church always at its best. It is not the big day that counts; it is what you are on the small days.
That, basically, ladies and gentlemen, is what salvation is. Salvation is God reproducing after His kind. When a person is born again, the seed that is in him was grown by God. The Word comes and reproduces God in that person. That is why we call it "being born again." That's why the Apostle said, "Christ in me, the hope of glory." It is God bearing seed after His kind. When one is born again, Christ comes into him to live. In fact, he then becomes a "little Jesus," after God's kind.
There are four basic different kinds of creation: plant life, animal life, human life and spiritual life. If you are not saved, by all means, hear what I am going to say! You can mix animal life, or you can mix plant life and improve each particular type of creation, but you cannot make it another type of creation. For example, you can cross two kinds of beans and get a better bean, but you cannot take a bean and make it into a puppy dog. You can cross a cocker spaniel and a Boston terrier, but you cannot make it into a girl or a boy. There is no way possible for mankind to cross the barrier between plant life and animal life, animal life and human life, or human life and spiritual life. Listen! You can take a green bean and make it the best green bean possible! You can baptize that green bean; you can dedicate that green bean; you can give a degree to that green bean; you can do to it all that you want to do, but that green bean will never become a cocker spaniel. All of the improvement in one are of creation will not make it step up into the next area. Take that cocker spaniel. You can take that cocker spaniel, improve him, set him in church, baptize him, make him into the best cocker spaniel in the world, let him be "Mr. Canine of the Year," teach him not to bark at people who are kind and teach him to bite nobody. Teach him love and how to sit up. Teach him to play dead. Teach him to roll over. Teach him to sing and bark when you play the piano. He might win the award in the county fair, but you cannot make that cocker spaniel into a human being. Why? It is impossible! By the same token that you cannot cause a plant to become an animal or an animal to become a human, you cannot cause a human to become a new creature. Bring him to the church, give him the Lord's Supper, baptize him, make him the best person in the world, and make him the nicest, kindest, most loving person in the world, he is still not a Christian until he is born again! A blade of grass cannot become a cockroach. A cockroach cannot become a boy. A boy cannot become a Christian unless there is a supernatural work of God Almighty. That is why you have to get born again to go to Heaven. Actually, being born again is God reproducing Himself after His kind.
Follow me. A plant is born a plant. An animal must be born an animal. A human being must be born a human being. A Christian must be born again! Don't you see? That is a law and all the logic of the world cannot refute that. It is just as easy to go out and pick a petunia and make it into an elephant as it would be to make a man a Christian, apart from the supernatural work of God. It is just as easy to make that elephant a human being as it is to make a human being become a Christian. No one can naturally cross the divisions between God's forms of creation: plant life, human life, animal life, spiritual life. That means that it is humanly impossible for a person to become a Christian. That is why baptism cannot save you. That is why the Lord's Supper cannot save you. Good works cannot save you. That is why improving yourself cannot save you. It is humanly impossible for one of God's forms of creation to cross into the other. That means all a person can do is to come to God in faith and say, "God, here I am. I trust You in faith." That faith is the thing that causes God to reproduce you after His kind. That explains why suddenly you want to come to church instead of going to the tavern. You are after His kind. Suddenly you exchange your PLAYBOY magazine for a copy of the Scriptures. You are reproduced after His kind!
Every Christian here ought to say, "I am going to be joyful and reproduce joy. I am going to love and reproduce love. I am going to be optimistic and reproduce optimism." I heard a fellow say the other day, "The pessimist says we can't do it; the optimist say that we can do it; but what we need are some 'peptomist' who say that we're doing it!" I'm going to be that kind of person. At work, home, school, everywhere I go, I am going to represent my church and my God. I am going to reproduce after my kind love, joy, peace, kindness, gentleness, love goodness, meekness, temperance and faith.
Those of you who are not saved, you ought to say, "By the grace of God, there is nothing that I can do to save myself, to make me, a human, into a Christian, so I'll give myself to God, and God will perform regeneration." Then you will become born again. God will have reproduced in you after His kind. All you can do is to put your faith in Christ. He must do the work.
Say, "All right, I will. I will put my faith in Jesus Christ. I will trust Him to make me a new person, to begin in me a new work, to create in me a new heart." Then you will be born again.
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“I am an old-fashioned preacher of the old-time religion, that has warmed this cold world's heart for two thousand years.” —Billy SUNDAY
