From the Heart of Spurgeon

Sometimes you get a sense of the preacher’s excitement from the very first sentence of his sermon. It is the case here, as Spurgeon bubbles over from the opening line! With such a verse and theme before him, Spurgeon feels his utter inadequacy to express all that is contained in the exceeding riches of God’s grace in Christ Jesus. But, confident that others could preach the gospel better, but coul...

Spurgeon says that this text overpowers him: “It is a gem of priceless value.” Even before he gets to the formal substance of his sermon, his unusually long introduction has turned that gem in the light so that its facets begin to reflect something of the goodness of God, and set us up for the main elements of his address. In fact, he effectively gives us a couple of mini-sermons before he gets to...

This is a sermon full of life and strength preached by a man full of sickness and weakness. The introduction surveys all the key facts contained in the text, giving us the scope of the whole, and then the preacher zeroes in on the reality of the resurrection, unpacking it in its bearing upon other great truths, its bearing on the gospel itself, and its bearing upon us. The sermon is packed full of...

This sermon cuts deeply in order to probe carefully. It is Spurgeon in typically and painfully sober mode. The sermon puts to each hearer the question which Christ asked of his disciples at a season of mass desertion: “Will you also go away?” Searching deeply into our hearts, Spurgeon first asks why Christ asked this question of his twelve disciples, looking at the defections which were taking pla...

In the aftermath of a particular effort on the part of the Tabernacle congregation, Spurgeon calls on the people to consider the spirit in which they have gone about their business: was their service acceptable to God? He is concerned more with the inward disposition of the heart than with any outward activity, energy, or generosity. So he asks whether our service has been rendered out of a sense...

This is a shorter sermon, preached on a Thursday evening, and in it Spurgeon contrasts and compares two texts, each speaking of something good. The first is, perhaps, more surprising: it is good when we are afflicted. The second might make more obvious sense to us: it is good to draw near to God. The first is good when it does not sour the sufferer, but forms, spurs, stirs, sanctifies, and instruc...

This sermon unfolds gradually but surely. We do not know exactly where the preacher will take us, but he is evidently following a planned route, and so we are content to take each development of his theme as he introduces us to it. Considering the fundamental truth that without Christ no Christian can do anything of any spiritual value, Spurgeon first of all considers our Lord’s assertion as an as...

Love labours. In doing so, it overcomes a multitude of difficulties. It triumphs over those difficulties in a way which demonstrates the heavenly source of its energies. Spurgeon actually begins the sermon with a meditation on the Holy Spirit as the only one who can work true Christian love in the heart of sinners like us. Christian love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and...

Though Spurgeon typically preaches from fairly brief texts, he occasionally takes longer sections, and sometimes—as on this occasion—hangs his thoughts on a single phrase. This is not an easy mode of preaching, as it can lead to strained exegesis, shallow substance, or repetitive or tortured structure. While it helps that the phrase in question is the loaded one, “through faith,” Spurgeon also avo...

While Spurgeon usually preaches on single texts he does not invariably preach isolated sermons. On Sunday 5th June, 1881, he preached from 1 Corinthians 3:6–9 about God’s co-labourers. On Sunday 12th June he took up the same theme of labourers on God’s farm, this time from Mark 4:26–29, explicitly linking the two sermons together. If the first sermon showed how far human agency is required in the...

Spurgeon regularly throws a little exegetical advice into his sermons, often at the beginning, and he does so here, encouraging his hearers to interpret each portion of Scripture in its context, which he immediately applies to his text, in which Job claims that “the root of the matter is found in me.” Spurgeon first examines this root and defines it in terms of confidence in a living Redeemer. Nex...

A man’s heart-longings provide an accurate index of his present and future character. Put simply, “Tell me what a man really wants and I will tell you what he is really like and what he will one day be.” Grace gives a man a new and heavenly set of desires for the judgments of God, what Spurgeon calls the saint’s absorbing object. Then he considers the saint’s ardent longing for those judgments. Fi...

How much is joy a feature of your life as a Christian? While he recognizes that the fruit of the Spirit is one cluster, nevertheless Spurgeon wants us to focus in this sermon on joy as part of the believer’s spiritual experience. Some have a melancholy disposition which needs to be overcome; others seem to be committed to gloom as a religious essential. Spurgeon would have us understand that joy i...

This is the last sermon in Volume 26 of the Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit. After a fairly extended introduction in which the preacher sets out to demonstrate that “true penitents do not seek to extenuate or diminish the sin which has been forgiven them, but they own how great it is, and set it forth in all its enormity as it appears before their enlightened eyes,” Spurgeon launches into his main...

In this sermon Spurgeon seeks to plumb something of the depths of Christ’s grief over sin. (Interestingly, the following week, and the following printed sermon, is an effort properly to record the joy of our Lord.) The preacher begins with a brief survey of the three occasions on which our Lord wept, revealing his grief over domestic sorrow, national troubles, and human guilt. It is the second of...

This is one of those sermons which seems to bubble over in a torrent from the preacher’s soul. Rather than broadening out, it narrows down, perhaps a reflection of pressure of time in the preaching, coming to an ever more narrow focus. The sermon begins with the excellence of a humble walk, considering what that means. It moves on to the humble walk as an evidence of salvation, with Christ in his...

This very sweet sermon takes a seminal declaration of gracious forgiveness as the starting point of a very simple treatment of this central theme. After an introduction in which he presses home the need to believe what God says concerning forgiveness, Spurgeon launches into a warm treatment of the measure, manner, and manifestations of forgiving grace. In the first he emphasises the divine largess...

A typically probing sermon from Spurgeon, who is as tenacious in calling for self-examination as he is earnest in pleading the cause of Jesus Christ. Though he gives a little time to John, it is really only to set up the Baptist as the foil for Herod. At first, Spurgeon speaks charitably of all that Herod did which was “so far, so good.” Then, he speaks honestly of all that Herod lacked, and how—d...

Here Spurgeon considers two offices of Christ, those of Judge and Saviour, as they are found in him as Mediator. Both, he suggests, have reference to mankind as sinners, and then he unpacks what that means, and the relationship which they have to each other, and how the one leads us to the other. It is, on some levels, a very simple sermon, and yet the tracing out of the two offices—without being...

This rallying-cry is drawn from Moses’ question to Israel when sin was rampant among the people, and the sermon is preached shortly after a general election when men had been choosing a side. Spurgeon uses the political and social climate to impress upon our souls spiritual truth. After drawing attention to the character of Moses, Spurgeon looks at the question and command which issues from him, i...

This sermon digs deep into our attitude to the Word of God. Sometimes Spurgeon draws lines from a text, at other times—as this one—he draws lines through the text, working phrase by phrase through the verses he is handling, explaining and applying as he goes. It is, in one sense, the very demonstration of the principles he is setting forth. Job stated, “My foot has held fast to his steps; I have k...

“Teach me to do your will.” That may seem like a very simple and straightforward prayer, but what does it mean to pray it, and what kind of answer might we expect? Spurgeon anticipates a child of God who seeks to know what is the path of obedience, but is perplexed and distressed. He therefore unpacks this brief petition to show us the character, the substance, and the intent of a prayer that has...

This sermon might be read as a follow-up to that on “The Dromedaries.” If the former sermon is intended to help us find our proper place, the purpose of this “is for every man to have a good spirit in his present place, so as to occupy it worthily.” The preacher says he is less interested here to arrange the people where they might be and more to encourage the people where they are. Thus in broad...

This sermon has a curious title indeed, and a somewhat unusual text, too. As he delights to do, the preacher draws a parallel between the Old Testament history and the new covenant experience, in this case the kingdom of Solomon and the kingdom of Christ. After establishing some of those parallels, Spurgeon begins to consider the officers who had responsibility in Solomon’s household, showing that...

Spurgeon himself introduces this sermon with a few words of thanksgiving, and tells us, with characteristic desire, “I thought the best way in which I could express my thankfulness would be to preach Jesus Christ again, and set him forth in a sermon in which the simple gospel should be made as clear as a child’s alphabet.” With this in mind, he turns to the bronze serpent which Moses lifted up in...