From the Heart of Spurgeon

Taking a phrase that occurs three times in the book of the Psalms—“Let such as love thy salvation say continually, let God be magnified”—Spurgeon asks three simple questions. With regard to the character, who is speaking? With regard to the saying, what are they testifying, and in what spirit? Then, with regard to the wish, why are they so pleading and desiring? Why should godly people desire that the Lord should be magnified? It is a sermon both to encourage and to challenge, for Spurgeon is constantly showing us the depths of what is being sought, but also asking us repeatedly whether or not we can enter into the character, appreciate the saying, and endorse the wish. On one level, the sermon is not really telling us to do anything; on another, it transforms everything we do, for it revives our energies and directs our expectations. It is, then, aimed very much at the heart, concerning our motives and intents. As such, Spurgeon’s hope is that we will be stirred not only to say, “Let God be magnified!” but also to live out that desire in every sphere. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Stirred by the death of a faithful deacon of the church, Spurgeon brings that man’s dying words to his brothers to the congregation by way of a sermon. He sets before them in potent language the potent fact that they have been bought at the price of Christ’s life-pains, that the Son of God shed his precious blood to make them his own. From that flows a plain consequence: if Christ has bought you then you are not your own, but you belong to God in your body and soul. Spurgeon explores both the negative side of that and the positive. That leads to a natural conclusion, that those who belong to God ought to glorify God in their bodies as well as in their souls. He closes with some particular reminders and exhortations that it is perfectly proper for the world to keep a close eye upon those who claim to be Christ’s purchased possession, and to expect them to live to the standard of men who follow Christ. To fail to do so is to dishonour the one who bought us. Without for one moment lurching into sentimentality, and holding fast to the plain sense of the words, Spurgeon nevertheless takes advantage of the occasion of the death of Thomas Cook to urge the saints to holiness—a fine example of ‘occasional’ preaching, as well as a clear call for consecrated living. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

A multi-texted sermon, this. When Spurgeon uses this approach, sometimes there is sequence and development, sometimes connection, sometimes contrast in his texts. In this case, he uses Isaiah as quoted by Peter, putting both texts side by side. He does so in order to bring out what he believes to be the true meaning of the passage, or at least the emphasis which he brings to light. And so he considers the withering work of the Holy Spirit, the way in which he brings low the glory of man, exposing our sin and our folly, driving home the sentence of death, in order that the incorruptible seed of the word of God, implanted by the Holy Ghost, may be in us, and abide in us for ever. The great bulk of the sermon is given over to a thorough consideration of the way in which the Spirit of God brings the proud heart low, before a brief, earnest testimony and plea concerning the unwithering and unwitherable seed which the Spirit plants in the hearts of God’s people. It is a fine example of a searching sermon, exposing not only our true need but the false refuges to which we might run, in order to bring a challenge to bear, on the far side of which lies the sweetest comfort for those who flee to Christ for safety. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This was a landmark for Spurgeon, reflected in the title and substance of his thousandth sermon. Without drawing excessive attention to the occasion, but rather offering a subtle testimony to the mercies of God through the years to this point, and in a tone of humble wonder and sincere appreciation, the preacher emphasises the exceeding abundance of God’s grace in Christ. There is so much, and for so many, for all who come! As a person trusting in Jesus, as a pastor caring for others, as a preacher holding out the Saviour, Spurgeon exults in the generous goodness of God. As you might expect, he employs the text to offer the most wonderful hope to the most needy of sinners, bringing challenge to those who hold off, and comfort to those who come in. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This is a simple sermon, probably preached by a very sick man. It was printed at the end of a three-month absence from the pulpit at the Metropolitan Tabernacle by Mr Spurgeon, and includes a brief personal note to the congregation at its end, thanking them for their prayers. Although undated, there are intimate touches in it which at least suggest that it came from the period of his suffering. Indeed, the very simplicity of its structure and substance suggests that it may come from the heart of a man who is struggling to do much more than the basics, but who is finding his own comforts, and offering those same comforts to others, from the most basic of truths. With sweet straightforwardness, then, our preacher simply points out the proprietor of the sheep, the marks of the sheep, and the privileges of the sheep, not forgetting—even as he presses home the favours that believers enjoy in Christ—to remind us of our responsibilities to the Saviour, and the need of those who are not yet in his flock to come to the Shepherd that they might receive life from him. Let us not despair of simple sermons, nor assume that sickness spells the end of usefulness, for the Lord is able to show his strength in the weakness of his servants. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Musing on the benedictions that drop from the lips of a faithful man, and in anticipation of his own absence from the flock at the Tabernacle, Spurgeon turns to the words with which Paul closes his letter to the Romans: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.” With an eye to the affection which underpins the apostolic blessing, he dives into the substance of the particular favour which he enjoins upon God’s people, musing upon the grace which is in and through and with Christ, and some of the dimensions of it. This is the bulk of his treatment. More briefly he considers the people who receive the blessing, and how and why we so need the grace of our Lord. Finally, and very warmly, he surveys the sweet results to be anticipated when such a blessing rests upon the beloved of God. Throughout the sermon, and especially having given himself so largely to the first section, one has the sense of a full heart operating under holy constraint, much material and true pastoral affection forced from the heart through the narrow aperture of the preacher’s mouth under pressure of time. It helps us to consider not just how we pray, and with what sense and desire, but also what we can anticipate when the servants of God call down the mercies of the Lord’s on our needy heads. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Picking up the last episode of the parable of the wedding feast, Spurgeon applies it carefully in his own context, acknowledging that times of spiritual excitement often see false professors joining the visible church. He therefore preaches a sermon intended to provoke heart-searching among his hearers, that they may not be found out in the day of God’s testing. With that in mind, he has five simple headings: an enemy at the feast, the king at the feast, who becomes the judge at the feast, making the enemy the criminal at the feast, who is removed by the executioner at the feast. Spurgeon treads through this structure in ever tightening circles, each one built on those preceding. His final charge and plea is to take heed of the gospel sifting that comes through such preaching, before you come to God’s sifting in the day when he draws near, and find yourself exposed to his judgement. Spurgeon never lets go of the stark distinction of life and death, heaven and hell. That breeds a fierce honesty and an earnest compassion, both of which are on display in this telling sermon. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This delightful sermon lays hold of Christ in his present power by pointing to the display of that power when, at his coming, he works the transformation of all his redeemed people at their resurrection from the dead. The logic is simple. First, Christ has power to raise all his people and to transform their vile bodies that they may be like his glorious body. The preacher takes some time to describe and explain something of what that display of power must involve. Second, from his text he underscores that the power which he has just described currently belongs to Christ, who exerts that power in raising his people from spiritual death, emphasising something of the parallels between the physical resurrection and the spiritual, and the hope that gives. Finally, and very briefly, he presses home our desire as believers to see Christ subduing sinners, closing with a powerful plea to unbelievers to be subdued, and to find life and peace in so doing. The sermon is remarkable for the way in which Spurgeon is able not only to set before us some of the glories to come, but also to explain the present confidence of those who have such a Saviour. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This sermon is one in which Spurgeon clings very closely to his text. His three-point outline follows the overall arc of the verses from which he preaches, while under each main heading, rather than arranging some thoughts as he so often does, he rather follows the substance of the biblical wording closely, unpacking it, explaining it, applying it. The result is a sermon as logical as any others in its arrangement, but tied to the text in a way that is fairly distinctive. The substance of the sermon is one of Spurgeon’s particular concerns: the connection between a saved soul and a holy life, the joy that is found in Christ and the righteousness that is pursued in his strength, the happiness that feeds our desire for holiness, and the holiness that increases our happiness. With his customary care to keep the finished work of Christ at the ground and centre of the whole, Spurgeon urges us to purge out all that is displeasing to him, that without malice and wickedness and in sincerity and in truth, we might keep the feast, always feeding upon Christ for our strength and joy. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon is deeply concerned with the prayers of God’s people. The Tabernacle, under his care, was a congregation marked by a prayerful spirit, worked out in various opportunities for intercession, and not least a pattern of regular congregational prayer, with particular seasons for pleading God’s blessing. Behind that appetite for prayer lies a confidence in the God who hears prayer. This sermon is grounded on beautiful convictions about the goodness of God. Spurgeon uses Christ’s comparison between the sinful father who still knows how to give good gifts to his children and the Father in heaven who gives good gifts to those who ask him to assure us that right requests obtain right replies. Then, on the same basis, the best requests are likely to obtain the surest answers. Finally, again on the same foundation, the text itself supplies the best request, and so obtains all needful blessings. The sermon, with its practical applications for a praying people, brims over with confidence in the God whose heart toward his people is full of love, and who will never give a bad thing when a truly good one is pleaded by his beloved children. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

We too easily cease to wonder at the marvel of divine love and the splendour of divine blessing. This sermon, as so many, puts on display Spurgeon’s persistent joy in the salvation of God, in itself and as bestowed upon others. It is one of the sermons in which, rather than deal with a theme suggested by a verse, he engages in close dealing with the text itself—on this occasion, 1 Peter 1:3–5. He simply, sweetly, works his way through the text, exploring the particular favours which the Lord God has bestowed upon his people, culminating where the verse itself begins, with the blessed God, who himself is the portion of his people and the source of all their good. It is our privilege to be so blessed by the blessed God, the Most Merciful and Most Gracious, and therefore right for us to rise up and bless the God of our salvation. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

We ought to have a burning appetite for people to know Christ in salvation. We will do that if we delight in him for ourselves. Spurgeon pre-eminently combines that personal delight and that urgent concern. He therefore sets the Lord Jesus before us in the simplicity of his character as the way from sin and to God, impressing upon us the blessings he brings and constantly persuading his hearers to come to Christ, seeking to attract them with his beauties while also warning them of the dangers of not coming on to the way. The preacher shows his talent for conversational close dealing here—nothing is left in the abstract, nothing is allowed to remain theoretical, but the earthiness of the image lends itself to developing metaphors which call us to come to Christ and keep with Christ in order that we may arrive at heaven at last. As so often, we are left saying, on the one hand, that there is little spectacular in the sermon itself, and yet it is full of Christ Jesus, set forth with a winsome earnestness that we would do well to cultivate. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This is a sermon both weighty and cutting. Spurgeon evidently feels it as he preaches it, and it comes across in the plainness of his language and the starkness and roughness of the structure. The sermons barrels along, heaping thought upon thought. There is clarity and order in it, but there is also a sort of relentless around a straightforward assertion that two things are to be followed and two things are to be avoided. The preacher takes no prisoners in pressing upon our consciences the need to take seriously the divine exhortations, holding before us both vigorous encouragements and unblushing warnings about the seriousness of the matter in hand. No pulpit comic here, no casual entertainer, but a man in deep earnest about the souls of his hearers, and determined that they should know the way of everlasting life, and be turned away from the path of death. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon’s assessment of Martha and Mary is not just a crass comparison between the two women, but is rather used to throw light on a disposition he perceives in the church as a whole. It may not be the kind of sermon that all men are in a position to preach, for not all are exposed to the range of activity, the range of influence, and the range of censure to which Spurgeon was exposed. That opportunity enables him to ask about attitudes he perceives rising in the church of his day, the kinds of critiques perhaps thrown about in the Christian journals and popular newspapers of his day. He responds and instructs by identifying the Martha spirit and its consequences (being careful to acknowledge what is good by desire or intent in her approach) as well as underscoring the important of the Mary spirit. No-one who recognises the kind of labour in which Spurgeon engaged will accuse him of dismissing Martha’s activism or of pursuing mere pietism in insisting that Mary’s communion with Christ was the foundation of all her usefulness. The warning is still well taken today: that mere activity is not enough; we must be close to Christ. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This simple sermon gives a good example of preaching from the human experience recorded in the Scripture. It is an approach often frowned upon today (almost any preaching of human life can be easily dismissed as mere moralism) and yet to throws light on our own thinking and feeling when we can see and hear through the eyes and ears of those whose histories are recorded in Scripture. Spurgeon does that well here, using Nathanael as an example of someone in whom the Spirit had been at work to prepare his heart before he actually encountered our Lord for himself. He introduced us to Nathanael, before stepping through Nathanael’s interaction with and responses to our Lord, with helpful insights into human nature that both flow out of and into what happened to Nathanael. These are not left lying on the surface of our minds, but pressed into our hearts by way of instruction and appeal. Spurgeon is concerned for all kinds of hearers, and Nathanael becomes in this sermon a type of a certain kind, turned to good effect as he pleads with those whose hearts have been awakened to something of a sense of their sin and stirred to desire salvation to come to the Saviour. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon always strives to keep divine sovereignty and human responsibility in their proper and scriptural relationship. The principle he derives from Colossians 1:29 is “that the work of Christ in us and for us does not exempt us from work and service, nor does the Holy Spirit’s work supersede human effort, but rather excites it.” He presses that doctrine in two directions, firstly with regard to a man’s own salvation, and secondly with regard to a man’s ministry for the salvation of others. So stated (in Spurgeon’s words) it may all seem a little stark, but he does a masterful job of weaving together the two strands of the Holy Spirit’s powerful operations and the believer’s active dependence upon and response to those operations. The whole rises to something more than an exhortation, something more than an encouragement—it is a charge to the church, in the light of some particular effort then being made, to throw themselves into the work of the kingdom in expectation of the divine blessing. Our situation may be less specific than when Spurgeon first preached, but the sermon is no less worthy of being taken to heart. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Catching our ears and our hearts, Spurgeon subverts our expectations with a sermon on overwhelming obligations that is about grace and goodness and gratitude. He carries us to the bright depths of our experience of God’s favour toward us, and lifts us to the heights of praise in response to the divine blessing. He is equally ready to draw attention to our experience, surveying the range of God’s kindnesses toward us, and to look through a more doctrinal lens, contemplating the distinct mercies of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Then, at some length, he probes our souls as a true pastor, being very “personal and practical,” asking a series of very searching questions which challenge us on a number of levels about the response we are making to the benefits which the Lord has bestowed. Again, we have a sermon remarkable for the territory it covers, for the depths it plumbs, for the heights it scans, and for the praise it draws forth. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Our preacher’s theological convictions and pastoral compassions are on display once more. He opens his text first as a test of our profession of faith. Are we genuinely free of the dominion of sin—we know sin is remaining, but is it reigning? Spurgeon calls us to a stern and searching self-examination in this respect. Next he takes the text as a promise. Again there is both honesty and sensitivity, rooting our freedom from the power of sin in the divine plan and purpose, especially in that God’s people are not under law but under grace. Spurgeon takes pains to explain that the law cannot promote and secure holiness because of the sinfulness of the human heart, but that grace has a power that sweetly constrains to holy obedience. Finally, he takes his text as an encouragement, directing it toward various different characters in his congregation—the careless, the weak, the embattled, the immature, the backslider, and the unconverted. So he takes in more or less all his hearers in a great sweep, pointing these truths particularly at those in particular need. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon is the kind of man who—not least because of the volume of material he produced, as well as the range of issues he addressed in various contexts—can be easily claimed by any number of different people and groups, each of whom are able to find something he said which (more or less, in some way) might appear to support their own distinctive opinions. Certainly he has been claimed by Charismatic Christians, and certainly he is a man conscious of his dependence on the Holy Spirit and often immediately responsive to the operations of the Spirit in a way that can make some Christians uncomfortable. Nevertheless, to take some of those occasions and comments and to turn Spurgeon into something he was not is neither just nor honest. We do not know if there were a specific occasion for this sermon, but it sets forth a robust concern for and critique of those who set ‘signs and wonders’ against the clear revelation of God’s Word. It may be that most of us might take some issue with some of what Spurgeon says, but what is clear is his insistence upon the supremacy of Scripture, and the folly of putting something else in the place of or even alongside the Word of the living God as the source of truth and the guide for a life that pleases the Lord. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Our preacher has a talent for developing a particular phrase, not necessarily ripping it out of context, but developing a theme or issue from its context. He does that here with the matter of ‘servantising’ (as he calls it), waiting upon the Most High as his servants. So he lays down the foundations of service, then the modes of our service, then he commends such service, and finally he exhorts us to such service. As ever, there is a holy boldness in Spurgeon’s address. We might legitimately suggest that Spurgeon can speak very directly to a very large congregation without necessarily pointing his finger at one or two people, as might happen when dealing with something like inactivity or laxity in a smaller congregation. The flip side of such an assertion is that he is speaking very directly to thousands of people, and he does not pull his punches. As hearers and readers, we feel the force of Spurgeon’s challenge about our service for the Lord; as preachers, we might be reminded of the kind of fortitude that is required to look any number of men and women in the eye, and—with compassion and integrity—point out where they fall short and exhort them to greater endeavour in the Lord’s work. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

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. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Originally preached for the Young Men’s Association in aid of the Baptist Missionary Society, this sermon has particular reference to and relevance for the young. Of course, Spurgeon is well aware that spiritual vigour has no necessary connection to physical condition, but he points out that older saints may need to be incited to zeal, whereas energy is natural to the young, and young Christians often have a flush of early excitement which it is well to encourage. Fundamentally, then, the preacher urges God’s people to pick up their pace and keep up their pace. He sets forth running as a positive metaphor for Christian life and service. Then, taking account of the challenges, he sets out the runner’s girdle (that he waits upon the Lord) and the runner’s staff (that he shall not grow weary). The result is a sermon that both calls and comforts, that provides its particular precept to the eager soul, its particular probe to the lazy soul, and its particular peace to the weary soul. I hope it will do the same for each one of us in these days, whether we are young or old. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

In a sermon directed to every Christian worker (but in which he wrestles not to sound as if he is speaking primarily to ministers of the gospel) Spurgeon sets out the character and labour of the truly successful worker, the reward that he obtains, and the certainty which he says binds together “the weeping service and the rejoicing success.” It is a good reminder to us that it is not just the work itself, mechanically considered, buts its motives and spirit also which must be considered. It is a great encouragement to us that the one who goes forth humbly and earnestly, from God and for God, will obtain a blessing upon the work. It reminds us that the connection is not of man’s effort but of God’s gift. Perhaps we have yet to go—this will help us on our way. Perhaps we have gone with the wrong attitude—this will correct any coldness of heart. Perhaps we have seen little blessing—this will keep us serving. Perhaps we have mourned over scant fruit—this will give us hope that a harvest will yet come. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This is a homiletical gem, showing a simple, clear and compelling progression through the sermon: one glorious person, two precious doctrines, three experiences, and four duties. Not every sermon can be so neat, but it is a good example of a memorable and striking organisation, upon which hangs much sweet substance. The preacher’s aim is to set before us the Lord Jesus in the whole of his character and work, and so to behold his glory in such a way that, out of it, we may receive out of his personal fulness the superabundant grace upon which we rely and in which we rejoice. It gives Spurgeon the opportunity to cover a vast amount of territory (some of which he does at a fair gallop) to provide a broad vista, pressing home the truth, drawing experimental lessons, and pressing home Christian responsibilities in relation to the Christ in all his glory. It displays something of Spurgeon’s genius for the setting forth of Christ, both for adoration and for obligation, as we consider him in his majesty, the blessings he brings, and the duties we owe. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Here is an incandescent sermon in which Spurgeon attempts to show how Christ came to bring fire on the earth. With this image in his mind, he first of all surveys the history of the gospel, beginning with the book of God, then the preacher taken up with the truth, the hearer who feels the heat and light of the good news, and the opposition that is provoked and how the fiery gospel even catches hold in those who oppose. Then he likens the gospel to fire more directly, thinking of how it advances, and comforts, and consumes, and purifies. Finally, he asks what ought to be the effects in us if we have truly caught this flame in our souls? A holy fearlessness, a holy impatience of mere forms and religious proprieties, a holy appetite for prayer, and a holy commitment to Christ’s service. It is the sort of sermon that grieves the reader, for you can only hear the distant rumble of the preacher’s thunder—what must it have been like to hear a man preaching in the power of God’s Spirit, with the storm all full of lightning flashing around you! May the Lord give us something of that same light and heat as we read and hear it still.

Spurgeon is known, even renowned, for preaching from individual texts, often very short ones, even phrases. While some sermons or addresses are linked by their time or place of preaching (think of the lectures to his students), and while it is possible to arrange collections of sermons under certain themes (as many have done, both Spurgeon himself and others since) most of the sermons stand alone by design. This sermon, then, is unusual in that it constitutes part of what seems to be one of the closest things Spurgeon preaches to a series of sermons. This sermon on justification is preceded by one on effectual calling, then followed the next Lord’s day by one on consecration, and the theme deliberately picked up again in a sermon the following year on mature faith, each illustrated by an episode in the life of Abram. So this sermon is notable both in terms of its distinctive relation to other sermons, and the way in which Spurgeon interprets and applies the experience of the patriarch to the believers of his own day. He is unashamed to make clear the commonality between Abram’s faith and life, and ours, and so to make Abram a model for every true believer—to hold him up as, indeed, the father of those who believe. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This interesting sermon approaches the matter of human sin from an atypical angle: that of our sins of omission (sins of commission are things we do which God commands us not to do, while sins of omission are our failure to do those things which we are commanded or obliged to do). Point by point, Spurgeon peels back layer after layer. He begins with how common they are, rooted in our falling short of the requirement to love God with all our hearts and our fellow men as ourselves. Next he digs down to the causes of these things, showing how we evade or excuse ourselves. Then he presses home the sinfulness of these sins, that they are not to be in any way diminished. Finally, he wants us to understand how sins of omission are damning, not only in themselves, but because they involve the neglect of the very remedy for all our sins which God has provided in Christ. When the gap between the church and the world is growing wider and more distinct, and with the risk of self-satisfaction growing in that space, it is good for God’s people to be humbled by the awareness that—even in the proper pursuit of our duties and obediences—there is something lacking in our best efforts which leaves us in constant dependence upon the mercies of God Christ Jesus. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This may not be the sermon that you expect. It is not a sermon about old age. The language of grey hairs is taken to represent decay and decline, and applied to spiritual things in individuals. His concern is with people who are sliding into patterns of spiritual slovenliness and sin but who have no sense of such a departure from the path of real and lively religion. Why are they ignorant of this? Spurgeon offers some suggestions. What are the marks of decay and backsliding for which we should look? Spurgeon identifies some features of spiritual decline. Are there are any remedies? As a good physician of the soul, Spurgeon is ready to make some recommendations. It is not an easy sermon, as the preacher blends explanation and application, speaking plainly to expose our sins, cutting close lest anything should escape the knife, but also making sure that there is some gospel balm at the close for the healing of our wounds. Perhaps, though, we do not mind so much when it is Spurgeon, and we can close the book, or pause the podcast? Let us remember that this is faithful preaching, and our own pastors—if they look us in the eye and deal so straightforwardly with us—are doing the same job to the same end.

Here is our pastor-preacher about his favourite business, the lifting up of the name of Jesus Christ. The construction of the sermon is interesting. Spurgeon first insists on the literal meaning of his text, of Christ as Israel’s glory; then he moves to the new covenant, further showing that Christians today have Christ as their glory because they stand in the same relation to him as Israel did under the old covenant; this asserted, in five points he spells out the glory we receive, and see, and give, and reflect, and expect in and from our Lord Jesus; then, he closes with some practical points. How readily do we, as preachers, turn to this topic? Is it our constant joy, reverently, eagerly, humbly, happily, to dwell upon the person and work of Christ, and to extol his name? How readily do we receive this as hearers and readers, delighted simply to contemplate the glory of the Lord of glory, the benefits we enjoy in and from him, the greatness of our so-great salvation? It is good for us to trace both the central theme and concern of Spurgeon’s sermon, and the manner in which he handles it, showing sensitivity and integrity as an exegete, and so ever-ready to exalt the King of kings and Lord of lords.

As so often, Spurgeon is quite content to shift between the natural and the spiritual. I mean, he begins with the basic sense of the Lord’s question to Job, “Can you bind the cluster of the Pleiades, or loose the belt of Orion?” (Jb 38:31). Who is able to change, restrain, or overcome the divine government in the natural world? However, Spurgeon elevates the question to the spiritual realm, as illustrative of the operations of the Holy Spirit. On the one hand, his mighty working cannot be prevented. On the other, men in their own strength are able to accomplish no spiritual victories. As well as his customary flashes of practical insight, there are some particular lessons to draw from this. Again and again, we see this inventive and creative but not casual or crass handling of the Scripture. Spurgeon knows well that the question, in itself, belongs naturally to the realm of astronomy, theologically to the doctrine of providence as an expression of divine sovereignty. But experimentally and illustratively, it serves well to remind us of our powerlessness in all spiritual matters, and the gracious operations of the Holy Ghost among the people of God. As such, it teaches us to think carefully not just of what the Bible means, but of how it can be applied. It makes for a lively and striking sermon. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon loves to dwell upon the goodness of God, and it is indeed a worthy theme. He does so in this sermon by taking the Lord’s description of his gracious dealings with Abraham and his descendants, described in rich symbolism in Ezekiel 16, and transposing the whole into a new covenant key. In company with some of the finest preachers God has given his church, Spurgeon delights to do this kind of thing. Some might say that he pushes the parallels too far, but his is an eye that sees through a decidedly Christian lens. He dives down two levels in this sermon: first, he is already working with the symbolism of the text, and then further he takes account of what was typical in God’s dealings with Abraham. It seems little effort for him to see in the symbolic kindnesses and typical favours the Lord bestowed on Abraham and Israel the goodnesses that the Lord has granted to those who are trusting in Jesus under the new covenant. Having set forth these things for us, he quite naturally presses home some practical observations in the light of the good things that the Lord has granted to the privileged man. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

For me, a sermon like this shows Spurgeon at something of his plain best. Its simplicity, its directness, its earnestness, all commend it. Rooted in the text, spoken with expectant faith, personally persuasive, it seems to capture something of the very moment of delivery in its straightforward intensity. You can almost feel the preacher looking into your eyes as he addresses you. His concern for the glory of God intertwines with and carries along his desire for the good of his hearers. It lacks some of the poetry of other sermons, it offers less scope for his imaginative faculties, it contains less verbal flair than some of his offerings, but for plain speaking and plain pleading of gospel truth, I appreciate it. If we are preachers, we may not have a poetic bent; we may not be able to wing our way heavenward in our minds; we may struggle to reach Spurgeon’s heights of oratory; we can still preach Spurgeon’s Christ, still hold out the gospel he proclaimed. If we are

This sermon reveals a somewhat unusual arrangement. Spurgeon typically sets out the skeleton of his sermon in a series of stated points toward the beginning, typically three, sometimes four or more. More occasionally, Spurgeon’s outline is revealed stage-by-stage as he works through his sermon. This address, while by no means lacking structure, does lack that more overt outline, and takes the form of a series of observations upon the Lord Christ’s practice of protracted or extended seasons of prayer. That consideration of the example of Jesus is then followed by applications to the church which is gathering for its own particular season of prayer, following something of the same approach. The tone of the whole is quite meditative and conversational. It reads differently to other sermons, and one wonders whether or not it would have been heard differently, and what difference it might have made to the preacher’s manner and voice, his expression and gesture. We cannot answer such questions readily, but we can still derive much benefit from the sermon, as we are encouraged to give ourselves, as individuals and churches, to extended periods of prayer in seeking the blessing of the Almighty. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon closes a year with a sermon taken from the refrain of Psalm 136: “For his mercy endures forever.” In trademark style, and with the meaning of his text lying on the surface and requiring little explanation, as well as picking up hints and ideas from the rest of the psalm, Spurgeon turns the sermons into a developed meditation and application. He takes the phrase as a song of praise; as a solace with regard to the past, the present, and the future; as a sermon with three points; and, briefly, as a summons to come to the Lord for the mercy held out. For preachers, it shows us an inventive way of handling a text—Spurgeon uses the key phrase as a way of harnessing the whole psalm, giving him scope at the end of the year to range over a wide area. For hearers and readers, it covers so much territory, for the minister turns it to various uses, exhorting, rebuking, comforting, instructing, calling. It need not be a year end for us to derive much benefit from Spurgeon’s consideration of God’s enduring mercy, for this is a theme we need at all times. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

One of the more delightful aspects of Spurgeon’s ministry is his present sense of the person of Christ, the immediacy of his relationship to his living Lord, and the manner in which he communicates that to us. It is the very personal dimension of true Christianity which comes to the fore in this sermon, as our preacher picks up the sweetness of Christ living in his people, and our living by faith in him. Having emphasised the personal connection between Christ and the believing soul, he presses home what he describes as “the interweaving of our own proper personality with that of Jesus Christ”—the closeness of the relationship which we sustain to our Redeemer. Then, of course, because he no mere theoretician, but a true pastor-preacher, he considers the life which results from this union between Christ and his people. His text, he says, “rises before my contemplation like a lofty range of mountains, a very Andes for elevation” and his aim is simply to bring us into the sunlit uplands, even if we cannot scale the highest peaks. It is worth climbing as high as we can! Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

The breadth of Spurgeon’s ministry is instructive (bearing in mind that what we have available is only a representative selection, and we are simply sampling that!). His versatility shows itself not just in the way he handles his material, but even also in the material which he handles. So here he deals with self-examination concerning our spiritual fruitfulness, speaking plainly not only concerning the fruit we expect to find in a true saint, but also the reality of pruning in a Christian’s life. Spurgeon is not merely some genial Victorian pulpiteer, dispensing sentimental religious notions. His aim is that we should be true disciples of Jesus Christ, show ourselves and know ourselves to be such disciples, and grow in grace as followers of the Lamb. So here, he does not so much wield the knife as describe how the Lord wields it, teaching us to look carefully at our own souls, and to submit humbly to the heavenly Vinedresser’s dealings with us. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

The sermons Spurgeon preached carry us very high and very low, matching some of the heights and depths of his own experience. Here he is encouraging us with the joy of true religion, and the spirit of the service we render to our Lord and Saviour. In somewhat Puritanical structure, Spurgeon first teases out the primary elements of his text: we serve; we serve the Lord; we serve the Lord with gladness. He then zeroes in on this key idea, and more or less interrogates the notion. Where does this joy come from? Where does it show itself? What makes it so difficult? And, why is it so excellent? Here he is able to bring the truth to bear for instruction and exhortation, for encouragement and challenge. His delight in God and his salvation bleeds out especially under the first main heading, although he is attempting a pastoral balance, recognising the challenges we face and trying to provide sweet spiritual motives for the labour we undertake for our God and Saviour, Jesus Christ. This sermon teaches us to trace the streams of joy back to the fountain of God’s saving love, and there to have our hearts lifted heavenward, and our hands strengthened on earth. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon turns his text in several fascinating directions in this sermon, reminding us that the speed at which he prepared does not mean that he was not meditating upon his subject, though his genius clearly lay along particular lines. Using Peter’s statement that “we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they,” he takes it first as an apostolic statement of faith, reminding us of what it does not contain as well as what it does. Second, and perhaps most strikingly, he emphasises that the statement reminds us not so much that it is a wonder that great sinners are saved, but that even outwardly moral and seemingly good people need just the same gospel as the most wretched and evidently needy. Third, he turns to such sinners and reminds them that this is indeed a gospel for them, and that Christ will save all who come to him. On one level it is very simply, on another, it is most thoughtful. Its careful inventiveness is a good example of how we must think and speak—under God—so as to catch the attention and provoke the heart. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This sermon was not preached at the Tabernacle, but at Surrey Chapel. In it, Spurgeon shows something of his versatility and adaptability, without losing anything of his urgency and vitality. He is as fervent in calling Christ’s people to serve as he is in calling needy sinners to Christ. He sticks close to his text, setting forth Christ in his labour and then bringing an appropriate question and exhortation to the disciples of Christ as to whether or not we are truly following in the footsteps of our Master. He closes the sermon with more direct application to saints, a forceful reminder of our mortality, pressing us to consider the shortness of time. That itself gives rise to that same deep concern for the lost: life is short, time is passing, opportunity flies away—we cannot serve God until we have trusted in Christ. I wonder if, should a preacher emphasise such themes today, he might be labelled as legalistic and morbid! No doubt Spurgeon was in his own day. Do we give him a pass ‘because he’s Spurgeon’? Perhaps worse, do we offer a cool applause to the sentiment without a warm response to the exhortation? Let us, like our Saviour, work while it is day; the night comes when no-one can work. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

In one sense, every true preacher always fails. He knows that he will miss the mark at which he aims, that of properly glorifying God in Christ. The excellence of the preacher consists more in the beautiful target at which he aims and the holy effort with which he strives to reach it; to whatever extent he draws near, it is by the Holy Spirit’s help. That is Spurgeon’s experience in this sermon, one in which he seems particularly conscious of his dependence on the Holy Ghost as he sets forth Christ’s glorious person, the unsearchable riches that belong to Christ, and the divinely gracious intention with which those riches are set forth by Christ’s ministers. The preacher attempts to cover something of the sweep of saving history before bringing the excellences of Christ and the fruits of his work to bear upon the hearts of his hearers. I would rather see and hear a man fail while aiming at such a goal than succeed at anything less—such failure honours the Lord, who uses the weakest of instruments to glorify his own great name! Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

There can be few more fearful prospects for a Christian or a church than that of grieving the Holy Spirit. I wonder how many of us ever contemplate this, searching our own hearts and lives, considering the life of the church, and asking whether or not we are guilty of such a sin? Spurgeon reminds us of this horrible possibility, explaining how and why it may come about. He also explores some of the ugly consequences of grieving the third Person of the Godhead, the damage it does in the life of the church and her members. Finally, he urges a personal argument why the saints should not grieve the Holy Spirit. Of course, the preacher’s aim is not merely to bring us down, still less to keep us down. Rather, the desire is to diagnose and to prescribe, to make us aware of the dangers so that we might either avoid them or address them. While some may be prone to assume that they have grieved the Holy Ghost in some way, too quick to jump to this conclusion, it seems likely today that the opposite problem more prevails—that of failing to consider whether or not one of the reasons for the weakness of the church is that we have distressed the Spirit of God. Here the question is put, here a solution is proposed. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Do you expect a blessing when you pray? Do you expect that blessing to come rapidly? It may be that many of us are in the state of waiting for prayer to be answered, of having long prayed and not yet seen the answer to our prayers. While there is nothing unusual in such delays, this sermon encourages us to consider the state of our hearts in seeking a blessing from God, that “if the whole church…shall be brought to set its face, to be conscious of the deep need of sinners, to confess its own sin, to be mindful of God’s mercy, and to be vehemently, passionately in earnest for a blessing,” we can anticipate the command of mercy, based on the happy relationship between a believer and his God. Furthermore, the preacher urges us to consider the kinds of blessings for which we ought to pray—spiritual delights and heavenly realities bound up with everlasting life. Most Christians grieve over their praying; few would claim to be eminent in the work. Many are, perhaps, accustomed to asking little and expecting slow and slim answers. Here is a sermon to lift up our eyes and hearts, to lift up our petitions, to the throne of grace in anticipation of the blessings we truly need. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

A sermon Spurgeon preached toward the end of one year seems appropriate at any time. He draws on Habakkuk’s declaration of his fear of God and petition for a blessing from the Lord of heaven, that he would in wrath remember mercy. Gripped by divine truth, impressed by recent tragedy, and moved by the Holy Spirit, Spurgeon gives us a straight-down-the-line three-pointer, identifying the alarming voice, outlining an appropriate prayer, and pressing home a potent argument. He seems to have a perpetual appetite for more of God’s grace and glory, and to be able to communicate that appetite in a refreshing and telling way. Perhaps Spurgeon’s urgent exhortations wearied some, but they do our souls good as he insists that we must follow his lead in pleading with God for his blessing on the place where we live and serve. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

This striking sermon seems to arise from questions raised out of the pulpit, about the propriety of “praying for King Jesus.” Working from Psalm 72:15, Spurgeon wants to show us that not only is it proper to pray for Christ, but that it expands, establishes, enriches, and enlivens our praying. As he works through his topic, the preacher helps us to see how putting Christ at the heart of our prayerful desires prevents selfishness and narrow-mindedness, lifts our petitions and our expectations, and offers particular encouragements in prayer. If your prayers, individually or congregationally, too often feel narrow and shallow, crass and constrained, earthy and heavy, then this sermon will be a blessing to your soul. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Though it does not lack gentleness, this is not a sermon to please the dull and sullen Christian, and there are too many such. People who are happy sleeping in a warm and comfortable bed are not often appreciative of the blast of the trumpet and the call to arms. Spurgeon is concerned at his own sleepiness, and the sleepiness of others. He does a masterful job of portraying the nature and the cause of Christian drowsiness, spending the bulk of the sermon on this point. The he turns to the call and the promise of Christ to the sleeper, to awake, and to receive the light of Christ. As so often, this is not a comfortable sermon, especially to believers. You might easily resent it, evade it, dismiss it, but we ought instead to humble ourselves under it, not excuse ourselves from it, but hear it and heed it. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Spurgeon often addresses the kind of Christian despondency that breeds a shameful passivity. He opens this sermon with a lengthy introduction bemoaning the low expectations of God’s people—people who yearn for a lively past and have vague hopes for a brighter future, but have given up all present hopes: “Not here, not now, not us!” This is the attitude that calls inaction, patience, and labels unbelief as realism. To counteract this ugly spirit, Spurgeon presses upon us the signs of harvest (and yes, we might long for more of those in our day!); he points out the wants or needs of harvest, the way in which we should engage in a day when there is work to be done; he warns us of the fears of harvest, reminding all his hearers, both converted and otherwise, that time passes and the work undone might be left undone forever. I can imagine the same despondent Christians today saying that Spurgeon’s circumstances allow him to hope in a way that we cannot; in fact, though we may face particular challenges, the very scope of the work ought to rouse our spirits for labour.

This is the kind of sermon that makes us ask, “If Spurgeon thought that he needed to preach this in his own day, what might he have said to us?!” He addresses those “who are beginning to imagine that weakness is the normal and proper state of a Christian; that to be unbelieving, desponding, nervous, timid, cowardly, inactive, heartless, is at worst a very excusable thing.” In Spurgeon’s understanding, this is a fearful and dangerous conclusion to reach. In response, he identifies some of the spiritual cures that faith in God’s Christ has worked in the experience of the church through the ages. Not satisfied with that, he then analyses faith to determine what are the divinely-appointed ingredients in this medicine. He urges us to go the Spirit of God to obtain the medicine, and praises the Physician who can make us strong out of our very weakness. There is no spiritual strength without the faith which God gives. If Spurgeon felt the church’s need in his own day, then we would do well to heed his counsels in our own. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

In 1866, cholera spread rapidly through London, claiming over five thousand lives. Into our own time, bedevilled with debates about Covid-19 and other such diseases—their causes and their cures—, Spurgeon speaks with a voice of spiritual sanity and reason. Here we find a remarkable blend of heavenly-mindedness and earthly sense, a readiness to acknowledge God’s hand in the spread of sickness, an awareness of divine justice and wisdom, an honesty about the potential causes and purposes of such afflictions. In all the often-silly arguments about diseases and vaccines, conspiracies and cures, have we missed the voice of the virus, speaking clearly and penetratingly to mortal men? Spurgeon lifts us above so much of the pettiness and foolishness of the current conversation and focuses our attention on eternity, and the God before whom we must soon stand. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Joy and peace! Who would not wish to know joy and peace? Spurgeon wants us to know them, but he wants us to know them truly, building upon the right foundation and enjoying the things themselves, and not some cheap and shoddy counterfeits. Therefore he exposes some common errors with regard to joy and peace before going on to deal with the root of true spiritual joy and lasting peace through believing in Jesus Christ for salvation. And so we need to know what that believing means, and what it involves, and to understand that joy and peace always come through believing and are never really found by any other means. With a beautiful simplicity and gospel clarity, Spurgeon shows a pastoral precision in ensuring that the right things are put in the right spiritual sequence and connection. Joy and peace seem in short supply in today’s world. If we want them for ourselves, and if we want others to know them, here we have the guidance we need. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Do you really care about knowing and doing the will of the Lord? It is easy to be zealous in a few things which fall more naturally into our way of thinking, as Jehu did. But that same Jehu “took no heed to walk in the law of the Lord God of Israel with all his heart.” Spurgeon is concerned that many Christian professors fall into the same trap, and so—in this sobering sermon—he urges us to ensure that we are committed to knowing and doing all the law of the Lord with all our hearts. To do otherwise reveals a sickliness at best, a fatal absence of true religion at worst. We must heed all that God has spoken, and make sure that our hearts are right with him. Perhaps some today would dismiss Spurgeon’s employment of Jehu as a negative model as mere moralising. In fact, the preacher shows us how to use such examples to stir and stimulate our souls to watchfulness and self-examination. Connect with the Reading Spurgeon Community on Twitter! https://twitter.com/ReadingSpurgeon Sign up to get the weekly readings emailed to you: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts-1/from-the-heart-of-spurgeon. Check out other Media Gratiae podcasts at www.mediagratiae.org Download the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app