Finally, Beecher was asked to stand and answer the question. They gave the same answer and were promptly rebuked by their teacher. Several other boys were asked the same question. The teacher became angry and told the boy he was wrong and commanded him to “Sit down!” The boy was obviously confused because he’d thought he’d answered correctly, but he sat down abruptly. It’s said that when Henry Ward Beecher, an early American Congregationalist clergyman, was a boy, he had a teacher at school who asked one of the boys in class a question that the boy answered.
But the more I read the Bible, the more I am convinced about the appropriateness of the title describing the nature of the message of the Gospel. After about 20 minutes of my trying to listen and respond, I realised that the sermon series might seem a bit aggressive, or at least I had better change the series title. I knew something was up, because I have one of those names that nobody forgets. When I was a young preacher, I thought it would be a great sermon topic to give my young adults a series of biblical insights entitled, “Jesus, the only real radical.” I got a phone call from one of my church leaders after he saw the bulletin announcement for the coming series.
