Daily reflection and inspiration from the "Prince of Preachers," Charles Haddon Spurgeon.
Monday, November 26, 2012
A Great Transformation
I sometimes meet with persons who claim to be Christians and believers and all that, but they have never experienced any change that they can remember from their babyhood. Well, dear friend, there must have been such a change if you are a Christian. I will not say that you ought to know the day and the hour, but, depend upon it, if you are now what you were when you were born, you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity. If there has not been a turning you are going the wrong way; every man must be turned from the way in which father Adam set his face, for our face is towards sin and destruction, and we must be turned right round so as to have our faces towards holiness and everlasting life. Where there is not such a turning there is the most solemn cause for heart-searching and humiliation and for the seeking of salvation.
Have you undergone a great transformation?
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Idols Abolished." Image by on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Monday, November 19, 2012
Get To Work!
Oh, Christian men and women, you will not glorify God much unless you really put your strength into the ways of the Lord, and throw your body, soul, and spirit - your entire manhood and womanhood - into the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. To do this you need not leave your families, or your shops, or your secular engagements. You can serve God in these things. They will often be vantage grounds of opportunity for you, but you must throw yourself into it.
A man does not win souls to Christ while he is himself half asleep. The battle that is to be fought for the Lord Jesus must be fought by men who are wide awake and quickened by the Spirit of God. “My son, go work to-day.” Do not go and play at teaching in Sunday schools. Do not go and play the preacher. Do not go and play at exhorting people at the corners of streets, or even play at giving away tracts. “My son, go work.” Throw thy soul into it. If it is worth doing it is worth doing well; and if it is worth doing well, it is worth doing better than you have ever done it yet; and even then it will be worth doing better still, for when you have done your best you have still to reach forward to a something far beyond; for the best of the best is all too little for such a God and for such a service. “My son, go work.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Work For Jesus." Image by on Flickr by Smudge 9000 under Creative Commons License.
Monday, October 22, 2012
Set Your Face To The Wall And Pray
Brother, pray if you are between the jaws of death and hell. Pray, brother, if all hope seem to be utterly slain; ay, and if thou canst put thy finger on passages of God’s own word which apparently condemn thee, still pray. Whether thy fears have contorted those threatening passages or not, though many of them frown upon thee, still pray. Perish with thy hand on the horn of the altar if perish thou must. Never believe thy case to be utterly hopeless so long as thou canst plead with God. There can be no hurt come of thy supplication, but good must come of it in some form or other. If God do not prolong life in answer to prayer, as often as he may not, or nobody would ever die, yet still he may give a greater blessing than continued earthly existence; and if it be a greater blessing in God’s judgment, it is better for us to receive it than to have the precise thing we have craved.
In all cases “pray without ceasing.” The mercy seat once stood within the veil where none could approach it except at one set season in the year; but now the veil is rent from top to bottom, and you may come to it when you will. Therefore I charge you come boldly unto the throne of the heavenly grace in every time of need; yea, draw near in the darkest night, and in the most wintry season, when God seems to have forgotten to be gracious, and when thou thinkest he will be favorable no more.
“Men ought always to pray and not to faint.” Pray in the teeth of difficulty, pray though impossibility seem to stand in the way, pray against death and the devil; pray like Manasseh in the low dungeon, and like Jonah out of the belly of hell. Pray against conscience and carnal reason; I was going to say even pray against thy terrifying interpretation of God’s word itself, for thou must surely have misread it if thou hast thought that it forbids thee to pray: it cannot be so, since Jehovah’s glorious memorial is that he is the God that heareth prayer. He has never said to the seed of Jacob, seek ye my face in vain. He may say, and he knows his own meaning when he says it, “Thou shalt die, and not live,” and yet he may afterwards declare, “I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will add unto thy days fifteen years.” He will be favorable unto the voice of thy supplication.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Love's Medicines and Miracles," delivered January 21, 1877. Image by mendhak on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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God,
intercession,
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Saturday, October 20, 2012
Enough of Questioning
Noah came into the ark and his wife, and his sons and their wives. Their obedience was unquestioning. We do not find them asking anything at all, about the reason for the command; but they came as they were bidden. They passed through the doorway, and they were all in the ark. Fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and their wives, daughters and their husbands, and all of you, oh that the blessed Spirit would put you now into such a frame of mind that you should at once yield to the divine precept which says, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.”
Have you not asked questions enough? You have had some of them answered, but every answer has only helped you to invent another dozen questions. Oh, those questions! these quibbles! those debates! those doubts! those cavillings! They are ruining thousands.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "A Family Sermon." Image by Mizrak on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Monday, October 8, 2012
Faith Makes Men Strong
Faith makes men strong - not in the head, but in the heart. Doubting people are generally headstrong - the Thomas-sort of people who obstinately declare that they will not believe unless they can have proofs of their own choosing. If you read certain newspapers, journals, quarterly reviews, and so on, you will see that the doubting people who are always extolling scepticism and making out that there is more faith in their doubt than in half the creeds, and so on, are particularly strong in the upper region, namely, in the head, only it is that sort of head-strength which implies real weakness, for obstinacy seldom goes with wisdom. They are always sneering at believers as a feeble folk, which is a clear sign that they are not very strong themselves; for evermore is this a rule without exception, that when a man despises his opponent he is himself the party who ought to be despised.
When certain writers rave about “evangelical platitudes,” as they commonly do, they only see in others a fault with which they are largely chargeable themselves. Anybody who glances at the sceptical literature of the present day will bear me out that the platitudes have gone over to the doubting side of the house. No people can write such fluent nonsense, and talk such absurdity, as the school of modem doubt and “culture:” they think themselves the wisest of the wise, but, professing to be wise, they have become fools, and I know what I say.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "A Cheery Word In Troublous Times." Image by flatworldsedge on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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belief,
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Evangelical,
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Monday, September 24, 2012
The Best Way To Come To Christ
The best way to come to Christ is to come meaning to get everything, and to obtain all the plenitude of grace, which he has laid up in store, and promised freely to give. Some poor souls who come to Jesus Christ seem as if they wanted a little relief from fear, a hope that they may just get saved, and a fair chance of going to heaven when they die. Pray do not come in that way, my dear friend. Come intending to obtain the fullness of love, the uttermost of grace.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Coming - Always Coming," delivered. Image by on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Christ,
Christianity,
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Thursday, September 20, 2012
Treasures Hidden in the Scriptures
Man’s books have usually far less in them than we expect, but the book of the Lord is full of surprises, it is a mass of light, a mountain of priceless revelations. We little know what yet lies hidden within the Scriptures. We know the form of sound words as the Lord has taught it to us, and by it we will abide, but there are inner store-houses into which we have not peered; chambers of revelation lit up with bright lamps, perhaps too bright for our eyes at this present. If Paul, when the Spirit of God rested upon him, could see so much in the songs of David, the day may come when we also shall see still more in the epistles of Paul, and wonder at ourselves that we did not understand better the things which the Holy Ghost has so freely spoken to us by the apostle. May we at this time be enabled to look deep and far, and behold the sublime glories of our risen Lord.
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Bible,
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Thursday, September 13, 2012
You Are A New Creation
A man in Christ is not the old man purified, nor the old man improved, nor the old man in a better humor, nor the old man with additions and subtractions, nor the old man dressed in gorgeous robes. No, he is a new creature altogether. As for the old man, what is to be done with him? Can he not be sobered, reformed, and made to do us useful service? No, he is crucified with Christ, and bound to die by a lingering but certain death. The capital sentence is passed upon him, for he cannot be mended and therefore must be ended. “The carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.”
You cannot change the old nature, it is immutably bad, and the sooner it is put away as a filthy and unclean thing the better for us. The believer, so far as he is in Christ, is a new creation: not the old stuff put into a new fashion, and the old material worked up into an improved form, but absolutely a new creation.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Christ The Maker Of All Things New," delivered December 10, 1876. Image by nosha on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Tuesday, September 11, 2012
With The Weapon Of Love
He did not use that form of power which is peculiar to the world even for unselfish purposes. I can conceive a man even apart from the Spirit of God rising superior to riches, and desiring only the promotion of some great principle which has possessed his heart; but you will usually notice that when men have done so, they have been ready to promote good by evil, or at least they have judged that great principles might be pushed on by force of arms, or bribes, or policy. Mahomet had grasped a grand truth when he said, “There is no God but God.” The unity of the godhead is a truth of the utmost value; but then here comes the means to be used for the propagation of this grand truth, — the scimitar. “Off with the infidels’ heads! If they have false gods, or will not own the unity of the godhead, they are not fit to live.”
Can you imagine our Lord Jesus Christ doing this? Why then the world would have conquered him. But he conquered the world in that he would not employ in the slightest degree this form of power. He might have gathered a troop about him, and his heroic example, together with his miraculous power, must soon have swept away the Roman empire, and converted the Jew; and then across Europe and Asia and Africa his victorious legions might have gone trampling down all manner of evil, and with the cross for his banner and the sword for his weapon, the idols would have fallen, and the whole world must have been made to bow at his feet. But no, when Peter takes out the sword, he says, “Put up thy sword into its sheath, they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” Well did he say, “My kingdom is not of this world, else would my servants fight.”
And he might if he had pleased have allied his church with the state, as his mistaken friends have done in these degenerate times, and then there might have been penal laws against those who dared dissent, and there might have been forced contributions for the support of his church and such like things. You have read, I dare say, of such things being done, but not in the Gospels, nor in the Acts of the Apostles. These things are done by those who forget the Christ of God, for he uses no instrument but love, no sword but the truth, no power but the Eternal Spirit, and, in the very fact that he put all the worldly forces aside, he overcame the world.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Christ, The Overcomer Of The World," delivered December 3, 1876. Image by Steve Dunleavy on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Christianity,
love,
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Monday, September 10, 2012
More Than A Mere Man
There are certain persons who deny the godhead of our Lord and yet think well of Jesus as a man; indeed, they have uttered many highly complimentary things with regard to his character: but I wonder it should not strike them that there is a great deal of assumption, presumption, pride, egotism, and all that style of folly in this man if he be nothing more than a man. For what good man whom you would wish to imitate would say to others “Be of good cheer: I have overcome the world.” This is altogether too much for a mere man to say.
The Lord Jesus Christ frequently spoke about himself and about what he has done, and commended himself to his disciples as one who was only a man and of a lowly mind could never have done. The Lord was certainly meek and lowly in heart, but no man of that character would have told others so. There is an inconsistency here which none can account for but those who believe him to be the Son of God. Understand him to be divine, put him in his true position as speaking down out of the excellency of his deity to his disciples, and then you can comprehend his so speaking, Yea, it becomes infinitely seemly and beautiful. Deny his Godhead, and I for one am quite unable to understand how the words before us, and others like them, could ever have fallen from his lips, for none will dare to say that he was boastful. Blessed be thou, O, Son of man, thou art also Son of God, and therefore thou dost not only speak to us with the sympathizing tenderness of a brother man, but with the majestic authority of the Only Begotten of the Father. Divinely condescending are thy words, “I have overcome the world.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Christ, The Overcomer Of The World," delivered December 3, 1876. Image by Steve Dunleavy on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Saturday, September 8, 2012
The Devil has been vanquished by Christ
Though Satan is not dead, my brethren, I was about to say, would God he were, and though he is not converted, and never will be, nor will the malice of his heart ever be driven from him, yet Christ has so far broken his head that he has missed his mark altogether. He intended to make the human race the captives of his power, but they are redeemed from his iron yoke. God has delivered many of them, and the day shall come when he will cleanse the whole earth from the serpent’s slimy trail, so that the entire world shall be full of the praises of God. He thought that this world would be the arena of his victory over God and good, instead of which it is already the grandest theater of divine wisdom, love, grace, and power. Even heaven itself is not so resplendent with mercy as the earth is, for here it is the Savior poured out his blood, which cannot be said even of the courts of paradise above.
Moreover he thought, no doubt, that when he had led our race astray and brought death upon them, he had effectually marred the Lord’s work. He rejoiced that they would all pass under the cold seal of death, and that their bodies would rot in the sepulcher. Had he not spoiled the handiwork of his great Lord? God may make man as a curious creature with intertwisted veins and blood nerves, and sinews and muscles, and he may put into his nostrils the breath of life; but, “Ah,” saith Satan, “I have infused a poison into him which will make him return to the dust from which he was taken.” But now, behold, our Champion whose heel was bruised has risen from the dead, and given us a pledge that all his followers shall rise from the dead also. Thus is Satan foiled, for death shall not retain a bone, nor a piece of a bone, of one of those who belonged to the woman’s seed. At the trump of the archangel from the earth and from the sea they shall arise, and this shall be their shout, “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” Satan, knowing this, feels already that by the resurrection his head is broken. Glory be to the Christ of God for this!
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Christ The Conqueror Of Satan," delivered November 26, 1876. Image by Paulo Brandão on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Christ,
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Thursday, September 6, 2012
No longer slaves but children
Since we have put our trust in an atonement provided and applied by grace through Christ Jesus, we are no longer slaves but children, not working to be saved, but saved already, and working because we are saved. Neither that which we do, nor even that which the Spirit of God worketh in us is to us the ground and basis of the love of God toward us, since he loved us from the first, because he would love us, unworthy though we were; and he loves us still in Christ, and looks upon us not as we are in ourselves, but as we are in him; washed in his blood and covered in his righteousness. Ye are not under the law, Christ has taken you from the servile bondage of a condemning covenant and made you to receive the adoption of children, so that now ye cry, Abba, Father.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Christ The End Of The Law," delivered November 19, 1876. Image by nosha on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Thursday, August 30, 2012
The Way To Be Saved
The way to be saved is to come to Christ. Christ is a person, a living person, full of power to save. He has not placed his salvation in sacraments, or books, or priests, but he has kept it in himself; and if you want to have it you must come to him. He is still the one source and fountain of eternal mercy. There is no getting it by going round about him, or only going near to him: you must come to him, actually to him, and there must be a personal contact established between the Lord Jesus and your spirit. Of course it cannot be a natural contact, for his body is in the heavens and we are here; but it must be a spiritual contact, by which your mind, heart, thought, shall come to Christ, and faith, like a hand, shall touch him spiritually, grasp him by believing upon him, and receive life and grace from his divine power.
Just as when the woman of old touched his garment’s hem, the virtue went out of him to her, and she was healed; so now, though he be yonder, faith’s long hand can touch his divine and human person, by confiding, trusting, and resting in him, and so virtue will flow from him into our soul, and our mind shall be healed of whatsoever disease it hath.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Unwillingness To Come To Christ," delivered November 2, 1876. Image by Adam Sparks on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Christ,
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Tuesday, August 28, 2012
The Soul of Religion
What wretched communities some churches are, where the soul of religion is absent. There is a company of people called a Christian church, and a man called a minister who gives them a pious essay every Sunday morning, and they go in and out, and go home, and there is an end of the whole thing: meanwhile their neighbors are perishing for lack of knowledge, but they care nothing, the heathen are dying without Christ, but they heed it not. So much is given to the cause of God as must be paid out of sheer necessity for the maintenance of outward ordinances, but there is no zeal, no consecration, no fervor of love. May we never come down to this.
O my beloved, I long to see among us yet more and more abundantly the spirit of divine life, energetic life, fervent, self-denying life, life which consumes everything to achieve God’s glory. Beloved, ye have this and may have more of it, but ye may also lose it. Life and power may soon depart; pastor and people may alike sleep in spiritual sloth, and then at such times, the power having gone from the church, its energy is no longer felt among the unconverted. A living church grasps with a hundred hands all that comes near to it; it is a mighty soul-saving institution, which with its far-reaching nets draws thousands from the sea of death. A living church attracts even the Sabbath-breaker, and arouses the infidel. It startles those whom it does not save. When the church is in this state her converts are plenteous; then her teaching and preaching are with power, and truth pushes down its adversaries....
I tremble lest we should go to sleep, and do nothing: I am alarmed lest there should be no conversions, and nobody caring that there should be any, and yet everything seeming to be prosperous. I know that people may be growing more respectable, and appearing to be more pious than ever they were, and yet everything may be going back. God forbid that the dry rot of indifference should seize upon the heart of the church while she yet appears to be sound and strong. Before that occurs may God be pleased to take me home.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "And Why Not?," delivered November 12, 1876. Image by Dion Gillard on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Christianity,
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Monday, August 27, 2012
Godly Ambition
Perhaps, young man, you are laboring after fame. You despise gold, but you pant to obtain a great name. Alas, ambition’s ways are very weary, and he who climbs the loftiest peak of honor finds that it is a slippery place, where rest is quite unknown. Young brother, take a friend’s advice and care no longer for man’s praise, for it is mere wind. If thou wouldst rise to a great name, become a Christian, for the name of Christ is the name above every name, and it is bliss to be hidden beneath it, and overshadowed by it. Christ will not make thee great among men, but he will make thee so little in thine own esteem that the lowest place at his table will more than satisfy thee. He will give thee rest from that delirious dream of ambition, and yet fire thee with a higher ambition than ever.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Rest For The Laboring," delivered October 22, 1876. Image by Eduards Pulks on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Saturday, August 25, 2012
Rejoice that your name is written above!
Gifts, attainments, labors, successes, all heaped together, cannot support a soul on the verge of eternity. There is ever present the fact that such things are no sure sign of regeneration. Did not the sons of the Pharisees cast out devils? Did not the people say of Simon Magus, “This man is the great power of God”? Yet these were graceless deceivers. We must have sure evidence of the new birth, we must know that our citizenship is in heaven, we must know that we belong to Jesus, in one word, we must know that our names are written in heaven, or else we shall find ourselves utterly undone in our dying hours. For all these reasons, then, be not too elated, because of devils conquered, crowds gathered, or souls saved; but hearken to your Lord’s voice while he points you to other reasons for rejoicing.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Why May I Rejoice?," delivered October 29, 1876. Image by Diego Torres Silvestre on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Never Cease To Pray For The Lost
Never cease to pray until your sons and your daughters are safe landed on the Rock of Ages, and so secured there that they will need no other rock to hide them in the day when Christ shall come. I beseech you, beloved Christian friends, ask for tenderness towards sinners, towards all sinners, and let your tenderness be shown in fervent prayer, in incessant effort, and in holy sympathy towards the wandering ones.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Wherefore Should I Weep?," delivered October 22, 1876. Image by Diego Torres Silvestre on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Saturday, August 18, 2012
The Sinner's Savior
Gospel blessings are intended for those who have transgressed and are under condemnation, for who else would value forgiveness and justification? I know myself of no gospel for men who have not sinned. I know of no New Testament promises intended for those who have never broken the law; but I perceive all through the wondrous pages of the gospel that mercy’s eye and heart are set upon those who are guilty and self-condemned.
The Eternal Watcher is looking over the vast ocean of life, not that he may spy out the vessels which sail along proudly in safety, but that he may see those who are almost wrecks. “He looketh upon men, and if any say, I have sinned, and perverted that which was right, and it profiteth me not; he will deliver his soul from going into the pit, and his life shall see the light.” Our Lord was more moved at the sight of sickness than of health, and wrought his greatest wonders among fevers, leprosies, and palsies. This is the end and object of the gospel, namely, to save the unrighteous; the God of the gospel is he that “justifieth the ungodly,” “for when we were yet without strength, Christ died for the ungodly.” “God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Sinner's Savior," delivered October 1, 1876. Image by Jenny Downing on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Friday, August 17, 2012
Lord, Increase My Faith!
Faith is not a weed to grow upon every dunghill, without care or culture: it is a plant of heavenly growth, and requires divine watching and watering. He who is the author of faith and the finisher of it, is the only one who can increase it. As no man ever obtains his first faith apart from the Spirit of God, so no man ever getteth more faith except through the working of that selfsame divine power. The Spirit which rests upon Jesus must anoint us also, or the measure of faith will not be enlarged.
Breathe then the prayer to God, my brother, “Increase my faith:” this will be a far wiser course than to resolve in your own strength, “I will believe more,” for, perhaps, in rebuke of your pride you will fall into a decaying state, and even believe less. After having made so vainglorious a resolution, you may fall into grievous despondency: do not therefore say, “I will accumulate more faith,” but pray “Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief.” Herein is your wisdom.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Increased Faith The Strength Of Peace Principles," delivered October 15, 1876. Image by Jackie on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Friday, August 10, 2012
Love Must Be Your Life
You believe yourselves to be twice born, you have received a new and heavenly life; what do ye more than others? Ought ye not to show that there is more in you than in others, by letting more come out of you than comes out of others? Much more is expected of us than of the unregenerate, naturally and rightly expectation runs high in reference to men who make such high professions; and if the professed Christian be no better in his daily conversation than the ungodly, depend upon it he is no Christian man at all. We possess a higher life, and we are lifted to a nobler platform than the common sons of men, and therefore we must lead a nobler life and be guided by sublimer principles. Let the children of darkness meet evil with evil, and carry on their wars and fightings, their strifes and their envyings, their malice and their revenge: but as for you, O believers, ye are the children of the God of love, and love must be your life.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Overcome Evil With Good," delivered October 8, 1876. Image by nosha on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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forgiveness,
love,
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Spurgeon
Thursday, August 9, 2012
The White Robes We Shall Wear
Here a saint has an evident excess of the red of courage, or the blue of constancy, or the violet of tenderness, and we have to admire the varied excellencies and lament the multiform defects of the children of God; but up yonder each saint shall combine in his character all things which are lovely and of good repute, and his garments shall be always white to indicate completeness, as well as spotlessness, of character. We ought to note that the white here meant is bright and shining, to indicate that their characters shall be lustrous and attractive. They shall be the admiration of principalities and powers as they see in them the manifold wisdom of God.
In these white garments they shall shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Our Lord’s garments in the transfiguration are not only said to have been “whiter than any fuller could make them,” but they are said to have been glistering and “white as the light.” The redeemed before the throne shine like stars before the eyes of all who are favored to gaze upon their assembly. What a glory there will be about the character of a child of God! Even those who have seen it long shall still be filled with wonder at what grace has done. God himself shall take delight in his people when he has made them “white in the blood of the Lamb.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Why The Heavenly Robes Are White," delivered September 24, 1876. Image by Paul Bica on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Wednesday, August 8, 2012
His Mercy is not for sale
Christ’s mercy is to be had for nothing, bribe or purchase is out of the question. I have heard of a woman whose child was in a fever and needed grapes; and there was a prince who lived near, in whose hothouse there were some of the rarest grapes that had ever been grown. She scraped together the little money she could earn, and went to the gardener and offered to buy a bunch of the royal fruit. Of course he repulsed her, and said they were not to be sold. Did she imagine that the prince grew grapes to sell like a market-gardener? And he sent her on her way, much grieved. She came again; she came several times, for a mother’s importunity is great; but no offer of hers would be accepted.
At last the princess heard of it and wished to see the woman; and when she came the princess said, “The prince does not sell the fruit of his garden:” but, snipping off a bunch of grapes and dropping them into a little bag, she said, “He is always ready to give it away to the poor.” Now, here is the rich cluster of gospel salvation from the true vine. My Lord will not sell it, but he is always ready to give it away to all who humbly ask for it and if you want it come and take it, and take it now by believing in Jesus.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Aeneas," delivered July 16, 1876. Image by Vladimer Shioshvili on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
The eyes of God see it all
It ought to be a subject of great joy to all righteous souls that the world is not left to itself, or to tyrants: the might is with the right after all, for power belongeth unto God. There is a Governor and Ruler who is Lord of all, and all power is in his hand. Have you not often wished more power to the arm of the man who attacks insolence and cruelty? Be glad, then, that all power is in the hand of the Judge of all the earth, who must and will do right. He will not leave bloodshed unavenged, nor suffer wanton cruelty and horrible brutality to go unpunished; and if the great ones of the earth pass by with indifference, or wink the eye in wicked policy, there is an eye that sees, and a hand that will mete out vengeance stern and sure.
In patience possess your souls, O ye people of God, for “God reigneth over the heathen, he sitteth upon the throne of his holiness.” The needy shall not always be forgotten, nor the oppressed for ever trodden down, for verily the Lord reigneth, and his power shall defend the cause of right.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Mighty Arm," delivered September 17, 1876. Image by David DeHetre on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Thursday, July 12, 2012
Seeking eternal life with all your heart
O man, if thou wert in a burning house thou wouldst be eager to get out of it; if there seemed a probability that thou wouldst sink in a river thou wouldst struggle desperately to get to shore, how is it then that thou art so little moved by the peril of thy soul? Man is aroused when his life is once known to be in peril, how much more earnest ought he to be when eternal life or eternal death are the solemn alternative “What meanest thou, O sleeper? Arise, and call upon thy God!”
Look, moreover, at the greatness of the mercy which thou art seeking. It is none other than pardon of all thy sins, perfect righteousness in Christ Jesus, safety through his precious blood, adoption into the family of God, and eternal enjoyment of the presence of God in heaven. They that seek for pearls, and gold, and precious stones, use all their eyes and all their wits, but what are those gaudy toys compared with these immortal treasures? How ought a man to seek after heaven and eternal life? Should it not be with all his heart?
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "A Second Word To Seekers," delivered September 10, 1876. Image by Linda Cronin on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Monday, July 9, 2012
Worship is our privilege
The genius of the Christian religion is joy, its proper spirit is delight, and its highest exercise is praise. “They shall praise the Lord that seek him.” Now we go up to the house of the Lord with the congregation of the faithful with songs of holy joy: now we draw near to the feast of communion at the Lord’s table with delight, and ere we depart we sing a hymn; now we go forth to the good fight of faith, and our battle song is a jubilant psalm; now do we even go to our beds of painful sickness and sing the Lord’s high praises there.
Since Jesus died our heaviness is dead; our murmuring is buried in his tomb. Since Jesus endured the wrath of God, which was due to us, that wrath has passed away for ever, and it is now the privilege, nay, the duty of every Christian to rejoice in the Lord. Let all the people praise him, and let the redeemed of the Lord be foremost in the joy.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Good News For Seekers," delivered September 3, 1876. Image by Brian Kelly; used by permission.
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Ascribe The Victory To God
The Syrians had been defeated by the Israelites whom they despised. This victory had been achieved by so small a number of men over so vast a host that the Syrians were driven to the conclusion that there was something supernatural about it, and they ascribed their defeat to the God of Israel. They were right in doing so. Brethren, let not these heathen shame us. They knew to whom the crown of the victory belonged, and, little as they understood Jehovah, yet they recognized that his right hand and his holy arm had gotten for his people the victory.
Now, if the Lord has prospered you, if in your souls peace and joy are reigning, or if you have enjoyed success in Christian service, take heed that you do not lift up your horn on high and take honor to yourselves. Render all the glory to God, to whom it is most justly due. Let that psalm, “Not unto us, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory,” be always on your heart, and often on your tongue. The tendency of the human heart towards pride is very strong, and Satan, the great usurper, is always eager to stir us up to rob God of his glory. Yet nothing is more fatal to peace, nothing more sure to provoke God, nothing more certain to bring upon us times of disaster and distress. “The Lord thy God is a jealous God,” and he is jealous of this thing, amongst others, that he will not give his glory to another. He will not allow those whom he uses for his purposes to ascribe their victories unto themselves; the Lord alone must be exalted. Whatever has been done by us, the great Worker who used us must have the praise. We have been nothing more than the axe in the hand of God if we have felled the cedar, nothing more than the net if we have brought the fish to shore. Unto him therefore be praise for ever. So far let us learn from the heathen Syrians.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "God of the Hills and God of the Valleys," delivered August 27, 1876. Image by Vinoth Chandar on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Monday, June 25, 2012
Where wisdom may be found
There is more wisdom in a quarter of an hour’s prayer than there is in a quarter of a year’s consultation with friends. Oftentimes when we have sought counsel of the living God he has befriended us. When we have left things with him, we have always gone wisely. Oh, how he can make the most crooked thing that ever did happen suddenly turn out to be the very straightest thing that ever occurred for our welfare. I know that sometimes I have puzzled my head about some difficulty in my Master’s service — asked opinions of lots of people, like a stupid, and I have gone home with any head aching in deeper uncertainty than ever what to do. And I have never discovered how to unravel a knotty point by my own ingenuity, but I have always found that when I at last bowed the knee, and said, “Heavenly Father, it is rather thy business than mine; it is quite beyond me, and I now leave it in thy hands to guide me,” and when I have just put it up on the shelf, and said, “I will never take it down again whatever happens,” it has gone all right. If I had maneuvered to manage it for myself it would have gone wrong enough.
You are often, dear friends, busy in doing yourself a mischief, when eager to do the right thing; so you do the wrong thing after all, as though there were a fatality about it. “Stand still and see the salvation of God.” A hard lesson to learn, full often, and especially to impetuous spirits, as some of us are. But when it is learnt, if we continue to practice it, we shall find it the way of wisdom.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Blind Befriended," delivered March 9, 1876. Image by Vinoth Chandar on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Saturday, June 23, 2012
Great faith!
Jesus said [to the Syrophoenician woman], “O, woman, great is thy faith.” She had not heard of the prophecies concerning Jesus; she was not bred and born and educated in a way in which she was likely to become a believer, and yet did become a believer of the first class. It was marvellous that it should be so, but grace delights in doing wonders. She had not seen the Lord before in her life, she was not like those who had associated with him for many months: and yet, with but one view of him, she gained this great faith. It was astonishing, but the grace of God is always astonishing. Perhaps she had never seen a miracle: all that her faith had to rest upon was that she had heard in her own country that the Messiah of the Jews was come, and she believed that the Man of Nazareth was he, and on this she relied.
O brethren, with all our advantages, with the opportunities that we have of knowing the whole life of Christ, and understanding the doctrines of the gospel as they are revealed to us in the New Testament, with many years of observation and experience, our faith ought to be much stronger than it is. Does not this poor woman shame us when we see her with her slender opportunities nevertheless so strong in faith, so that Jesus himself commending her says, “O woman, great is thy faith.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Little Dogs," delivered August 6, 1876. Image by Kevin Dooley on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Friday, June 22, 2012
Let us remember God's mercies towards us
What faults there are in our memory touching the work and word of God! Perhaps some of you have very powerful memories, and may be able to treasure up whole volumes as some have done. It might be said of you as it was of Dr. Lawson, that if the whole Bible had been destroyed, he could have reproduced it from memory. This is a great gift and a worthy use for it, but I fear that few of us have it. It is not likely that men could say of us as of the famous Grecian, that out of ten thousand soldiers he knew every one of his men by name. I do not find fault with short memories, but with good memories which are treacherous towards divine things. What I complain of is that memory may be very strong concerning self-interest, grievances, and trials, and yet towards God’s mercies it may be very weak.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Recorders," delivered June 25, 1876. Image by Ian Sane on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
You can walk with God
...Enoch lived in a very evil age. He was prominent at a time when sin was beginning to cover the earth, not very long before the earth was corrupt and God saw fit to sweep the whole population from off its surface on account of sin. Enoch lived in a day of mockers and despisers. You know that from his prophecy, as recorded by Jude. He prophesied, saying, “The Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.” He lived when few loved God and when those who professed to do so were being drawn aside by the blandishments of the daughters of men. Church and state were proposing an alliance, fashion and pleasure ruled the hour, and unhallowed compromise was the order of the day. He lived towards the close of those primitive times wherein long lives had produced great sinners, and great sinners had invented great provocations of God. Do not complain, therefore, of your times and of your neighbors and other surroundings, for amid them all you may still walk with God.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Enoch," delivered July 30, 1876. Image by Noël Zia Lee on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Wednesday, June 20, 2012
The Covenant cannot fail
Under no conceivable circumstances shall the covenant fail; the Lord who made it cannot change, Jesus who sealed it cannot die, the love which dictated it cannot cease, the power which executes it cannot decay, and the truth which guarantees it cannot be questioned. In the eternal provisions of that covenant of peace, which is sure to all the seed, we may rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. My brethren, do you believe this? If you do you ought to be as happy as the angels are. Our lot is supremely blessed. What a loving God we serve, and what great things has he spoken concerning us.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Fat Things, Full Of Marrow," delivered July 23, 1876. Image by Mike Behnken on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
What Is Happy Living?
Is it not a sad proof of the alienation of our nature that though God is everywhere we have to school ourselves to perceive him anywhere? His are the beauties of nature, his the sunshine which is bringing on the harvest, his the waving grain which cheers the husbandman, his the perfume which loads the air from multitudes of flowers, his the insects which glitter around us like living gems; and yet the Creator and Sustainer of all these is far too little perceived. Everything in the temple of nature speaks of his glory, but our ears are dull of hearing. Everything, from the dewdrop to the ocean, reflects the Deity, and yet we largely fail to see the eternal brightness.
I beseech you, my brethren, to pray that you may have this text wrought into your very souls: “I have set the Lord always before me.” Refuse to see anything without seeing God in it. Regard the creatures as the mirror of the great Creator. Do not imagine that you have understood his works till you have felt the presence of the great worker himself. Do not reckon that you know anything till you know that of God which lies within it, for that is the kernel which it contains. Wake in the morning and recognize God in your chamber, for his goodness has drawn back the curtain of the night and taken from your eyelids the seal of sleep: put on your garments and perceive the divine care which provides you with raiment from the herb of the field and the sheep of the fold. Go to the breakfast room and bless the God whose bounty has again provided for you a table in the wilderness: go out to business and feel God with you in all the engagements of the day: perpetually remember that you are dwelling in his house when you are toiling for your bread or engaged in merchandise. At length, after a well-spent day, go back to your family and see the Lord in each one of the members of it; own his goodness in preserving life and health; look for his presence at the family altar, making the house to be a very palace wherein king’s children dwell. At last, fall asleep at night as in the embraces of your God or on your Savior’s breast.
This is happy living. The worldling forgets God, the sinner dishonors him, the atheist denies him, but the Christian lives in him. “In him we live and move and have our being; we are also his offspring.” Visible things we look upon as shadows; the things which we touch and taste and handle perish in the using; the elements of this solid earth shall dissolve with fervent heat, but the ever-present God whom we cannot see is the same, and of his years there is no end, and his existence is the only real and true and eternal one to us. He has been our dwelling-place in all generations, and it were evil indeed not to know our own eternal home. This is a main ingredient in the oil of joy, — to realize always that the Lord is round about us “as the mountains are round about Jerusalem, from henceforth even for evermore.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Secret Of A Happy Life," delivered July 16, 1876. Image by Jean-Raphaël Guillaumin on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Monday, June 18, 2012
God gives the Church increase
When the church is visited by the power of the Holy Spirit she is increased on every side. When a Church in the midst of a vast population remains stationary in numbers, or even becomes smaller, no man can see in such a condition the marks of God’s blessing. Certainly it would be a novel sort of benediction; for the first blessing, the blessing of Pentecost, resulted in three thousand being added to the church in one day, and we find afterwards that “The Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.” We read in the Acts of the Apostles that the churches “walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.”
Ever since those early days, when the Lord has been with his people they have increased in numbers, their children have sprung up as among the grass, and as willows by the water courses. When they have been “minished and brought low” it has been because they have departed from the truth or lost their first love. The clearness of gospel testimony has been dimmed, spirituality has been at a low ebb, the Holy Ghost has been despised, and he has suspended his operations, and then the church has dwindled down till she has had little more than a name to live: but as soon as ever the Lord has returned to her she has become a fruitful mother, and her children have cried out, “the place is too strait for us, give place to us that we may dwell.” When the Lord has sent forth his power with the preaching of the gospel, converts have been as the drops of the dew and as the sands upon the sea-shore, innumerable. It is plain that one of the blessings which we as a church should seek with all our hearts is that of continual increase.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Enquire Of The Lord," delivered July 9, 1876. Image by Nana B Agyei on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Faith will be exchanged for sight
We walk here by faith, not by sight. You believe in God, but you have not beheld his glory as the blessed dead have done. You believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, but it is in one “whom having not seen you love.” You believe in the Holy Spirit, and you have been conscious of his presence by faith, but there is a something better yet; a clearer sight is yet to be had, which we cannot enjoy while we tarry here. At present we take everything on the testimony of God’s word and the witness of his Spirit: but we have not yet seen the celestial city, nor heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps, nor eaten at the banquets of the glorified. We enjoy a foretaste of all these, and anticipate them by faith, but actual enjoyments are not for this world. What a man seeth why doth he yet hope for? As this is the realm of hope we cannot expect to see, but we are going to the place where we shall not so much believe as behold, where we shall not so much credit as enjoy. We are nearing the country where we shall
“See, and hear, and know,
All we desired or wished below.”
And faith shall be exchanged for the clearest sight.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Believer In The Body And Out Of The Body," delivered July 2, 1876. Image by Nana B Agyei on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
He gathers the outcasts
I think you may judge of a man’s character by the persons whose affection he seeks. If you find a man seeking only the affection of those who are great, depend upon it he is ambitious and self-seeking; but when you observe that a man seeks the affection of those who can do nothing for him, but for whom he must do everything, you know that he is not seeking himself, but that pure benevolence sways his heart. When I read in the text that the Lord gathers together the outcasts of Israel, and when I see that the text is truly applicable to the Lord Jesus Christ, because this is just what he did, I see another illustration of the gentleness of his heart, who said, “Take my yoke upon you, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.” Be glad to-night, dear friends, that we gather around such a Savior as this, from whom all pride and self-seeking are absent, and who coming down among us in gentleness and meekness, comes to gather those whom no man cares for — those who are judged to be worthless and irreclaimable. He comes to gather together the outcasts of Israel.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Good Cheer for Outcasts," delivered June 15, 1876. Image by on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Monday, June 11, 2012
Blotting Out The Record Of Your Sin
If he forgive thee, all thy transgressions shall be as though they had never been. He will make clean work of it, blotting out every record of thy sin, so that in God’s book there shall be no grieving memory of thy having been a sinner at all. So powerful is the atoning blood that all manner of sin and transgression shall be forgiven unto men for its sake. Sins against a holy God, sins against Christ’s love and blood, sins against conscience, sins against the law, sins against the gospel, sins which have lain in your bones from your youth up, sins of your middle age, sins of your old age, aggravated sins, black sins, damnable sins, all are gone when he saith, “I have blotted out thy sins like a cloud, and as a thick cloud thy transgressions.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "A Prince And A Savior," delivered June 25, 1876. Image by Jenny Pansing on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Wednesday, June 6, 2012
We must have You, Holy Spirit!
What a mechanical thing prayer is without the Spirit of God. It is a parrot’s noise, and nothing more; a weariness, a slavish drudgery. How sweet it is to pray when the Spirit gives us feeling, unction, access with boldness, pleading power, faith, expectancy, and full fellowship; but if the Spirit of God be absent from us in prayer our infirmities prevail against us, and our supplication loses all prevalence. Did you ever resolve to praise God, and come into the congregation where the sweetest psalms were being sent to heaven, but could you praise God till the Holy Spirit came like a divine wind and loosed the fragrance of the flowers of your soul? You know you could not; you used the sacred words of the sweet singers of Israel, but hosannas languished on your tongue and your devotion died. I know that it is dreadful work to be bound to preach when one is not conscious of the aid of the Spirit of God! It is like pouring water out of bottomless buckets, or feeding hungry souls out of empty baskets. A true sermon such as God will bless no man can preach of himself; he might as well try to sound the archangel’s trumpet.
We must have thee, O blessed Spirit, or we fail! O God, we must have thy power, or every action that we perform is but the movement of an automaton, and not the acceptable act of a living, spiritual man.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Life's Need And Maintenance," delivered June 18, 1876. Image by SteveD. on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Saturday, June 2, 2012
Because He first loved us
“We love him, because he first loved us.” — 1 John 4:19.
Very simple words, but very full of meaning. I think I might say of this sentence what the poet says of prayer: it is “the simplest form of speech that infant lips can try,” and yet it is one of the “sublimest strains that reach the majesty on high.” Take a little believing child and ask her why she loves the Savior, and she will reply at once, “Because he loved me and died for me:” then ascend to heaven where the saints are perfect in Christ Jesus and put the same question, and with united breath the whole choir of the redeemed will reply, “He hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood.” When we begin to love Christ we love him because he first loved us; and when we grow in grace till we are capable of the very highest degree of spiritual understanding and affection, we still have no better reason for loving him than this, “Because he first loved us.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Love's Birth And Parentage," delivered June 11, 1876. Image by Steve Dunleavy on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Friday, June 1, 2012
They come to Him from everywhere
Remember, that of all who come to Christ from every quarter, never one was disappointed with him yet. They come from various regions, drawn by the hope that Jesus will supply their needs, and he does supply them. All sorts of people who come to Christ believingly find in him all that is needed to meet their peculiar cases. Sweet also is the thought that he never casts out a coming sinner come from where he may. They arrive from different quarters, but he has no prejudice against Galilee or Judea, or Tyre or Sidon: he receives all comers. The elder in the Book of Revelation asked a deeply interesting question, “Whence came they?” and, blessed be God, it is one which will never be answered to the prejudice of any one who draws near to Jesus by faith. O sinners, you may come from the thieves’ kitchen, or from the convicts’ cell, you are as welcome to Jesus as those who come from homes of virtue.
You may come from the seat of the scorner, you may come from the bench of the drunkard, and if you come you shall receive a hearty welcome. You, too, O hopeful ones, may come from the home of piety, and from the school of truth, and when you come you will find the gates set wide open to receive you. Come from the tents of Jacob, or from the tents of Kedar, from the holy mountain or from the lonely wilderness, and you shall alike find that he will in no wise cast you out.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Gathering To The Centre," delivered June 4, 1876. Image by Stefano on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
If Jesus loves a man
When I first came to London from the village where I formerly preached, I was very glad to see anybody who came from that region; and if I had seen a dog wag its tail that I had once seen in that village I should have been pleased. I should have loved anybody for the sake of the dear old place; and, surely, when you can say, “My God,” you love all the Lord’s people. Many a young Christian has been deceived by hypocrites because of his love to Christians, and that love is sometimes abated by such ill deeds; but where there is overflowing love to the Father there will be affection for the family. Be it ours to show it. If you see in any man anything that is like Christ, love him for it. If he is not all you would like him to be, remember that you, also, are not all you ought to be.
Surely if Jesus Christ loves a man you should love him too. Seek your brother’s good and aim at benefiting him because he is one of Christ’s members. Love for Christ’s sake all those who can say “My God.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "My God," delivered March 30, 1876. Image by Stefano on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Friday, May 25, 2012
He made us for His Glory
It was for this end that the Almighty made us, and for nothing short of this, that we might glorify God and enjoy him for ever. When a man fashions a vessel or a tool, it is that it may answer the purpose for which he designed it, and if it does not answer his design he casts it away. What man will keep a horse or a cow if it yield him no benefit? And if a dog never owned you as its master, who among you would long call it your own? God has made us that we may glorify him, and if we do not honor him we miss the end and object of our being. I care not what you do nor what you are; though you should be owners of a score of counties, if you love not God your soul is poor and degraded; though men should set you on a column high in air, and account you a hero, if you have not lived for God you have lived in vain. As the vine which yields no cluster is useless, so is a man who has not honored God. As an arrow which falls short of the mark, as a fig tree which yields no figs, as a candle which smokes but yields no light, as a cloud without rain and a well without water, is a man who has not served the Lord. He has led a wasted life — a life to which the flower and glory of existence are lacking. Call it not life at all, but write it down as animated death.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Gone. Gone For Ever," delivered May 28, 1876. Image by Stefano on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Monday, May 21, 2012
The Man of Glory is with you!
They that serve God much, and well, and draw near to his innermost presence, in that proportion draw away from men, as to deriving comfort from them. But, oh, there are no heights to which Jesus has not risen, no attainments which he has not surpassed. That glorious man is with you, with you in the singleness of heart with which you serve your God, with you in the perfect consecration which the Holy Ghost has given you, with you in the intimate fellowship of your soul with the Eternal Father. In your highest flight of ecstasy there is still a man at your right hand, saying, “Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God.”
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Our Lord's Humanity - A Sweet Source of Comfort." Image by Stefano on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Saturday, May 12, 2012
God has given you an anchor
This world is like a sea, restless, unstable, dangerous, never at one stay. Human affairs may be compared to waves driven with the wind and tossed. As for ourselves, we are the ships which go upon the sea, and are subject to its changes and motions. We are apt to be drifted by currents, driven by winds, and tossed with tempests: we have not yet come to the true terra firma, the rest which remaineth for the people of God; God would not have us carried about with every wind, and therefore he has been pleased to fashion for us an anchor of hope most sure and stedfast, so that we may outride the storm.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Anchor," delivered May 21, 1876. Image by Stefano on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Friday, May 11, 2012
You cannot know what Christ has done for you
A superior in the East never washes an inferior’s feet: Christ acts as if he were inferior to his friends, inferior to those poor fishermen, inferior to those foolish scholars who learned so slowly, with whom he had been so long a time and yet they did not know him, who soon forgot what they knew, and needed line upon line and precept upon precept. Having loved them to the end, he stoops to the extreme of stooping, and bows at their feet to cleanse their defilements.
Who, I say, can compute the depth of this descent? You cannot know what Christ has done for you, because you cannot conceive how high he is by nature, neither can you guess how low he stooped in his humiliation and death. With an eagle’s wing you could not soar so high as to behold him as God over all blessed for ever, sitting at the right hand of the Father, the adored of cherubim and seraphim: nor could you dive, even if you dared to take a plunge into the abyss, until you reached the depth of “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me”: and yet you must somehow know the interval, I was about to say the infinity, between these two points of height and depth before you could know what Jesus has done for you.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Unknown Ways Of Love," delivered May 14, 1876. Image by Stefano on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Thursday, May 10, 2012
The tree is known by its fruit
Saving faith appropriates the finished work of the Lord Jesus, and so saves by itself alone, for we are justified by faith without works; but the faith which is without works cannot bring salvation to any man. We are saved by faith without works, but not by a faith that is without works, for the real faith that saves the soul works by love and purifies the character.
If you can cheat across the counter, your hope of heaven is a cheat too; though you can pray as prettily as anybody, and practice acts of outward piety as well as any other hypocrite, you are deceived if you expect to be right at last. If as a servant you are lazy, lying, and loitering, or if as a master you are hard, tyrannical, and unchristianlike towards your men, your fruit shows that you are a tree of Satan’s own orchard, and bear apples which will suit his tooth. If you can practice tricks of trade, and if you can lie — and how many do lie every day about their neighbors or about their goods — you may talk about being justified by faith as you like, but all liars will have their portion in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone, and amongst the biggest liars you will be, for you are guilty of the lie of saying, “I am a Christian,” whereas you are not. A false profession is one of the worst of lies, since it brings the utmost dishonor upon Christ and his people.
The fruit of the righteous is righteousness: the fig tree will not bring forth thorns, neither shall we gather grapes from thistles. The tree is known by its fruit, and if we cannot judge men’s hearts, and must not try to do so, we can judge their lives, and I pray God we may all be ready to judge our own lives and see if we are bringing forth righteous fruit, for if not, ye are not righteous men.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Soul-Winner," delivered January 20, 1876. Image by Jenny Downing on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Work for Christ while you are young!
But there is work for every believer to do in Christ’s vineyard. There is work for children, there is work for young men, work for young women, and it is good to begin early. The Lord Jesus Christ, who was so pleased with the widow’s mite, is very pleased with a child’s love to him. We big people are very apt to think, “What can a little girl do for Jesus?” Oh, but if that little girl does not do something for Jesus now that she is saved, she will very likely grow up to be an idle Christian, and not serve God in after years as she should.
I like to see the little trees which they put into our gardens, you know, the little pyramids, and other dwarf trees; I like to see them even from the first bear just a little fruit. I think, sometimes, that pears, when there are only one or two on the tree, are far finer in flavour than those on the big tree, which too often have lost in quality what they have gained in quantity. That which is done for Jesus Christ by young Christians, by weak Christians, by timid Christians, often has a very delicate flavour about it, precious to the taste of Jesus. It is good to begin serving him in our youth.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Best Burden For Young Shoulders." delivered. Image by Jenny Downing on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
God is jealous for you
Holy fear leads us to dread anything which might cause our Father’s displeasure. A good child would not do anything which would make his father feel vexed with him. “It vexes me,” says he, “if it vexes my father.” So let there be always with us a fear to offend our loving God. He is jealous, remember that. It is one of the most solemn truths in the Bible, “The Lord thy God is a jealous God.” We might have guessed it, for great love has always that dangerous neighbor jealousy not far off.
They that love not have no hate, no jealousy, but where there is an intense, a definite love, like that which glows in the bosom of God, there must be jealousy. And oh, how jealous he is of the hearts of his people! How determined he is to have all their love! How I have known him to take away the objects of their attachment, one after another — break their idols, and deprive them of their precious vanities — all to get their hearts wholly to himself, because he knew it would never be right with them while they had a divided heart, It was injurious to themselves, and so he is jealous of that which injures them, and jealous of that which dishonors him. Let us have this holy fear very strong upon us, and we shall avoid anything which might grieve the Spirit of God.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Godly Fear And Its Goodly Consequence." delivered. Image by Jenny Downing on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Monday, May 7, 2012
He considers your sins to be gone
When God forgives our sin he covers us as completely as the wood of the ark was covered within and without with pitch: our sin is covered and hidden right away from his observation. Child of God, I beg you to think of this for a moment, God is pacified towards you because your sin is covered — all of it; yea, it is all gone. As far as God is concerned your sin has ceased to be. He laid it on Jesus Christ your substitute, and he took it and bore the penalty of it — nay the thing itself; he, as your scapegoat, carried your sin right away, and it is lost in the wilderness of forgetfulness. Into the depths of the sea hath he cast your iniquities. In his own tomb hath he buried your offenses.
What saith the Scripture? “He has finished transgression and made an end of sin.” Grand word! Made an end of it. And if there be an end of it, why there is an end of it, and it has gone. This day, O believing child of God, there is fulfilled towards you that gracious word: “In those days, and in that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none; and the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found: for I will pardon them whom I reserve.” Through faith in Jesus your transgressions are all removed as far from you as the east is from the west. The depths have covered your sins; there is not one of them left. The Lord is pacified for all that we have done, so that no ground of quarrel remains.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Heart Full And The Mouth Closed." Image by Attila Magyar on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Labels:
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Saturday, May 5, 2012
Hunger for Jesus
...Christ is as needful to the soul as bread is to the body. Meat and drink are absolutely requisite: and so you must have Christ or you cannot live in the true sense of that word. Take away food from the body it must die: deny Christ to a man, and he is dead while he liveth. There is in us a natural desire after meat and drink, an appetite which springs out of our necessity, and reminds us of it: labor to feel just such an appetite after Christ.
Your wisdom lies in your knowing that you must have Jesus to be your own Savior, and in owning* that you will perish if you do not receive him, and it is well with you when this knowledge makes you crave, and pine, and pant for him. Hunger after him, thirst after him; blessed are they that do hunger and thirst after him, for he will fill them.
* - that is, admitting
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Truly Eating The Flesh Of Jesus," delivered April 9, 1876. Image by Jenny Pansing on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
Labels:
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Thursday, May 3, 2012
His Strength is made perfect in weakness
I do not wonder when strong men say strong things, but I have often marvelled when I have heard such heroic sentences from the weak and trembling. To hear the sorrowing comfort others, when you would think they needed comfort themselves; to mark their cheerfulness, when if you and I suffered half as much we should have sunk to the earth — this, is, worthy of note.
God’s strength is perfectly revealed in the trials of the weak. When you see a man of God brought into poverty, and yet in that poverty never repining; when you hear his character assailed by slander, and yet he stands unmoved like a rock amidst the waves; when you see the gracious man persecuted and driven from home and country for Christ’s sake, and yet he takes joyfully the spoiling of his goods and banishment and disgrace — then the strength of God is made perfect in the midst of weakness. While the man of God suffers, and is under necessities and distresses, and infirmities, then it is that the power of God is seen. It was when tiny creatures made Pharaoh tremble that his magicians said, “This is the finger of God,” and evermore God’s greatest glory comes from things weak and despised.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Strengthening Words From The Savior's Lips," delivered April 2, 1876. Image by Jenny Pansing on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
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