From the Heart of Spurgeon

Fearful of Coming Short (S1177)

Spurgeon considers Paul a balanced preacher—not a middle-of-the-road preacher, but one who both offers salvation in all its fullness, to be received and enjoyed with assurance, and who warns lest the faith which a sinner professes be something else than the saving faith which clings to our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. This, then, is a searching sermon, in which the preacher urges us to consider the nature of the true faith which God gives as opposed to the empty faith which some claim. We need to consider the very nature of that faith, and its relation to Christ Jesus. We need to know why it is so important to consider this question, given how many turn away, how many fall short, how many are hypocrites, how many professing Christians simply show little of the evidences of a child of God. We need to understand what is at stake with regard to heaven and hell. We need to know how to respond. Here, Spurgeon is carefully pastoral: these warnings are not designed to crush true faith, but—in shaking it—to send its roots deeper into God, into his truth, into Christ. So he urges us not to draw back but to press on, to cling to Christ wholeheartedly, and so to enter into rest.

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The Lord Chiding his People (S1171)

 

In appreciating Spurgeon the gospel preacher, we should not imagine that his gospel preaching is somehow shallow or narrow, nor that it lacks anything of the pastoral note. Spurgeon cares for the souls of people. He cares that sinners come into the kingdom; he cares that saints be built up in the kingdom. Again, that latter note does not make him a mere sentimentalist. I am not always persuaded that as many of us would have relished sitting under Spurgeon’s ministry as we might imagine! Here he is perfectly straight with his hearers, without being at all harsh. He first reminds us that God will chide, offering some reasons and explanations as to why that will be so. Then he brings in some particular comforts and consolations, emphasising the kindness, patience, and wisdom of Almighty God. His applications are wide-ranging but pointed and searching. It is a grand example of pastoral preaching, gently yet firmly bringing needed truth to bear.

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Without Money and Without Price (S1161)

You probably have no need to be told that Spurgeon almost instinctively reverts to the pure presentation of the gospel when given the merest opportunity. Here his emphasis is on the freeness of divine grace. Preaching from Isaiah 55:1, he tells us why this is so surprising to fallen man, why it is a necessity (not just from our need, but from the character of the God who saves), and then the salutary influence of this fact—the happy effect of being saved by free grace. As so often, on one level there is nothing particularly novel here, nothing unusual in terms of what Spurgeon says as a preacher. Nevertheless, two things in particular stand out. One is the relentless and intense concentration on this primary idea of freeness, which has the effect of holding it before the eyes so as to drive home the issues. The other, developing from that, is the way in which Spurgeon presses that one truth persuasively into the hearts of his hearers, reasoning and wrestling so that they might grasp the wonderful freeness of God’s great grace in Christ. As hearers, we are made to gaze upon this truth so that, under God, we cannot avoid its marvel. As preachers, we are forced to ask whether or not we are so righteously relentless in pressing home God’s word.

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Podcast 169: Daniel Facing the Lion’s Den (S1154) Dan 6:10

Daniel Facing the Lion’s Den (S1154)

Spurgeon delighted in communion with the Lord. He was manifestly a man of prayer, and he regularly exhorts his hearers and his readers to embrace that marvellous privilege. It is worth noting the title and content of the sermon: this is not about Daniel in the lion’s den, but facing it; it is about Daniel’s commitment to prayer in the face of fearful pressures, of his principled obedience in the face of awful threats. The sermon itself, then, is simple and straightforward. Spurgeon considers Daniel as a man committed to prayer and blessed and prospered by means of his communication with heaven. He then addresses the privileges of prayer, urging us to take advantage of the opportunities we have to come before the Lord. Then there is Daniel’s decision, his attachment to his holy habit of prayer despite all that comes against him. Finally, there is Daniel’s deliverance, not from his trial, but through his trial. The whole becomes an earnest exhortation to pursue the right course regardless of the difficulties which it brings. This is by no means shallow or moralistic preaching, but neither is Spurgeon afraid to take the saints of the Old Testament as examples and encouragements in righteousness, and we should take the model to heart.

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Podcast 169: Daniel Facing the Lion’s Den (S1154) Dan 6:10

The Parent’s and Pastor’s Joy (S1148)

Here Spurgeon weaves together something complementary in the work of parents and pastors with regard to their children, both physical and spiritual. First of all, working within John’s figure, he applies the words of his text to parents, underscoring the delight that a Christian father or mother feels in the salvation of their sons and daughters, one of the greatest of all earthly joys. Then, he turns to the figure itself as John uses it, speaking of a pastor’s delight in the conversion of sinners, and the profound pleasure that a preacher feels as a spiritual parent when he sees God’s people walking in his ways. He not only expresses but stirs the joy we might feel, urging us to find it by seeking the salvation of those under our care, but also reminding those who profess faith in Jesus Christ of their responsibility so to walk that parents and pastors might feel such delight, and that—ultimately—the Lord himself would be magnified in his children.

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The Minister’s Plea (S1139)

This, says Spurgeon, is a sermon “mainly upon my own behalf, and on the behalf of my brethren in the ministry.” Specifically, and for the sake of the saints, and ultimately for the glory of God, he intends “to excite you to be much in prayer, both for myself and all ministers of Christ Jesus.” Without any kind of self-indulgence, and in a spirit of honesty rather than complaint, Spurgeon builds a compelling case for the saints to plead with God on behalf of ministers of the gospel. He explains why the saints should so pray, and who should be engaged, and when and where this duty might be carried out. Then, both for encouragement and challenge, he underscores the reality of the Spirit’s supply and its consequent blessing, and so presses home the need for that supply in answer to the prayers of the saints. How do you think about your pastors? What do you know of their labour and their need of grace in that labour? How do you pray for ministers of the gospel, and your minister? Spurgeon, neither boasting nor whining, draws back the veil a little on the work of ministry to excite our prayers, and the expectation of God’s answer to them.

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Clearing the Road to Heaven (S1131)

Spurgeon knows how to reason with men, how to plead and persuade as a preacher. This sermon is a fine example of that often-neglected element of ministry. With wisdom from the Word of God, illuminated by the Holy Spirit and proven over long and happy experience, Spurgeon steps through a good selection of the reasons why people do not come to Christ, or think they cannot or have not, and seeks to remove the stumbling blocks. Then, having cleared the road of obstacles, he covers it over with Christ and paves it with promises, so that sinners might go by him to heaven. Both elements are strikingly simple, but wonderfully helpful. Here is the pastor-evangelist indeed, gently but firmly dismantling mistakes and confusions, and introducing—sweetly and straightforwardly—the Saviour and his so great salvation. If we would be physicians of souls, it is well to follow a gifted doctor on his rounds. We could do a lot worse than to learn from Spurgeon how to preach the gospel not by way of general exhortation only, but dealing closely with troubled souls in order to clear their path.

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God Beseeching Sinners by His Ministers (S1124)

I should, perhaps, confess that this sermon was particularly attractive to me as a result of my needing to preach on a particular theme at an upcoming conference. Having been considering a related topic, this sermon made my heart sing! Here is Spurgeon the gospeller, Spurgeon the evangelist, Spurgeon as preacher and teacher in sweet harmony. Conscious very much that he is an ambassador of heaven, Spurgeon fulfils that role while, as it were, shedding much light—almost incidentally—upon the nature of his work. He does this all in a way which humbles man (considered either as ambassador of grace or recipient of grace) and which exalts God. And yet, for all his description of what he is doing and what other gospel ministers ought to do, there is no doubt that he is actually doing it. With consummate skill, the sermon builds into a grand appeal to sinners to thrown down their arms of rebellion and take Jesus Christ as Saviour.

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Christ Asleep in the Vessel (S1121)

Are you tempted to think, in some way or other, that Christ does not really care for you? Do your present circumstances lead you to fear that he has no regard for your well-being? Against such doubts and fears Spurgeon turns his guns as he reasons with us as to how we should think and what we should believe lest we fall into this trap, describing the genuine regard that our Lord has for his beloved people under all circumstances, and assuring us that this will become apparent to us in due course. He gives us an anatomy of ungodly fear and of God’s own care. Again, here is the blend of tender rebuke and careful encouragement at which our preacher excels; here is that pastoral insight into the hearts of men and that faithful grasp of the heart of God which blend together in preaching to the soul so that we both see what is wrong and are led to what is right.

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Onward! (S1114)

This sermon develops, early on, into a broadside against spiritual self-satisfaction. Spurgeon demolishes—with unusual thoroughness—any sense of spiritual smugness, by taking Paul’s desire for holiness as his proper standard, as well as considering other models of godliness and his broader experience of mankind. He digs deep, asking by what routes men attain to such a sense of contentedness with their present condition, and the root of such self-applause. Having done most of the heavy lifting in the first and bulkiest part of his sermon, considering the present life, he then hits us rapidly with the other three points which form the outline of his sermon: how Paul looks on his past with accuracy, to the future eagerly, all the while engaging fervently. For all his evangelistic fervour, Spurgeon never lets slip the connection between salvation and true godliness, and here he urges us not to become complacent with present attainments in holiness, but rather to press onward—while we rejoice that Christ’s work for us is complete, we must recognise that the Spirit’s work in us is ongoing, and labour accordingly as new men in Christ.

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