Preaching Through Adversity: Lessons from Spurgeon's Life

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Spurgeon said to his pastor's College once one crushing stroke has sometimes laid the minister very low, the brother most relied upon becomes a traitor. Ten years of toil do not take so much life out of us as we lose in a few hours by at hi theel the traitor or Deus the apostate. [00:03:49]

Preaching great and glorious truth in an atmosphere that is not great and glorious is a great difficulty. To be reminded week in and week out that many people regard your preaching of the glory of the grace of God as sheer hypocrisy pushes a preacher not just into the hills of introspection but to the precipice of self-extinction. [00:05:02]

Oh how fortunate we are brothers of the pulpit that we are not the first to face these things. We are so fortunate. I thank thank God for the healing of History. Do you read history? Are you slipping into the abyss of the present? It is an abyss Brothers. You cannot know yourself or your times or your God if you only know the present. [00:08:49]

Spurgeon was a truth-driven preacher. I am not interested in the counsel of anyone going through adversity who does not find the solution to that challenge in the truth. If he wants to give me other kinds of counsel and abandon the truth in order to survive, I turn away from that counsel. [00:11:00]

He defined preaching in terms of Truth dissemination and recognition. He said to his students to Be an Effective preacher you must be a sound Theologian. He warned that those who do away with Christian Doctrine, whether they are aware of it or not, are the worst enemies of Christian Living because the Cs of Orthodoxy are necessary to the fire of piety. [00:11:47]

Spurgeon’s attitude towards sacrificial labor would not go over today where Wellness is a great priority. He said if by excessive labor we die before reaching the average age of man worn out in the Master's service then glory be to God we shall have so much less of Earth and so much more of Heaven. [00:23:14]

It is our duty and our privilege to exhaust our lives for Jesus. We are not to be living specimens of men in fine preservation but living sacrifices whose lot is to be consumed. He will qualify that in a few minutes, but that was the temperament of his life. I think the word indefatigable was created for people like Spurgeon. [00:23:29]

He often worked 18 hours a day. David Livingston the missionary asked him one time how do you manage to do two men's work in a single day and Spurgeon replied you have forgotten there are two of us and I think he meant Colossians 1:29 where Paul said I labor striving according to his power which mightily Works within me. [00:25:32]

Spurgeon’s life was marked by deep suffering. He faced criticism, personal tragedies, and health issues, yet he remained steadfast in his calling. His experiences remind us that suffering is an inevitable part of life, but it can also be a powerful tool for ministry. [00:24:04]

He was a soul-winning preacher. There wasn't one week, he said, went by but that his written sermons did not win somebody to Jesus, not to mention the many that were saved week in and week out at the Tabernacle. He did what he called the watch for souls. [00:14:09]

Spurgeon’s Calvinistic beliefs placed God at the center of all things, providing him with a perspective that sustained him through personal and professional challenges. This belief in God’s sovereignty helped him to see his suffering in light of God’s greater plan. [00:15:57]

He preached Calvinism because he believed it honored this Christ more fully than any other system of Doctrine and he preached it explicitly and he tried to build it into the minds of his people not just slip it in sideways. [00:19:20]

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