A Well-Ordered Life (S878)

The structure of this sermon is particularly interesting, being slightly more developed than Spurgeon’s norm. He begins by unpacking the detail of his text, then focuses on the matter of sanctification, which he then teases out under three headings: the order of a holy life, the rule of that order, and the great Director of that order. There is something typically Puritanical in the identification of the doctrine and then its development and application. That impression is only heightened in the opening point, where Spurgeon really digs down into what elements of order there are in a holy life. He almost exhausts his time, and certainly skews his structure, by spending so much time here, but does then press home the Scriptures as the rule of such a life, emphasising the way in which the Word of God is obeyed with constant reference to God himself (you can almost read the headings in his notes as he rattles through the material!), before some final conclusions and applications. It reminds us that Spurgeon is alive as he preaches, and that the sermon itself is a bridled stallion which sometimes runs away with the best of preachers; nevertheless, there is no waste here, for the preacher responds to the liveliness of his steed, and still manages to finish his course, setting before us particularly something of the beauty of a life of godliness.

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