Hello All, Grace and Peace be to you!
Charles Haddon Spurgeon was known as the "Prince of Preachers". He loved GOD and he loved man. He trusted and obeyed what JESUS said in Matthew 22:36... " TEACHER, which is the great commandment in the law?" JESUS said to him, "You shall love the LORD your GOD with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment and the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets." He understood this and applied this to his life.
He was born June 19, 1834 in Kelvedon, Essex, England to Rev. John and Eliza Spurgeon. He was a brother to seventeen siblings. His parents sent him to live with his grandparents where he learned about JESUS. He was six when he returned to his parents. Though he was surrounded by Godly parents and grandparents, he had not made a personal decision for CHRIST. At the age of fifteen years old he entered the Primitive Methodist Church while trying to make it to his church, but was deterred by a snowstorm. The preacher who was supposed to preach that night was unable to make it due to the storm. A man came forward to help out and he just started speaking from the WORD; He preached from Isaiah 45:22... Look to me, and be saved, all you ends of the earth! For I am GOD, and there is no other.
This is the account given by Charles himself of the day he met the SAVIOR, "When he (the man speaking) had managed to spin out ten minutes or so, he was at the end of his tether. Then he looked at me under the gallery, and I daresay, with so few present, he knew me to be a stranger. Just fixing his eyes on me, as if he knew all my heart, he said, 'Young man, you look very miserable and you always will be miserable. Miserable in life, and miserable in death, if you don't obey my text; but if you obey now, this moment, you will be saved.' Then, lifting up his hands, he shouted as only a Primitive Methodist could do, 'Young man, look to JESUS CHRIST. Look! Look! Look! You have nothing to do but to look and live.'
"I saw at once the way of salvation... and when I heard the word. 'Look!' what a charming word it seemed to me! Oh! I looked until I could almost have looked my eyes away. There and then the cloud was gone, the darkness had rolled away, and that moment I saw the sun; and I could have risen that instant, and sung with the most enthusiastic of them, of the precious blood of CHRIST, and the simple faith which looks alone to HIM."
Charles began preaching when he was only nineteen years old, and his love grew for the LORD and he obeyed HIM with everything he had. It is said that he was not for the flowery speech of the humanists or the rhetoric of the High Calvinists. Nor did he muddle through, as did many of the rural preachers. He spoke simply from his heart and did not try to impress man. He just wanted to impress upon man the glory of GOD, the fallen sinning state of each of us and the salvation of CHRIST. He not only preached to who would hear him, but he also put out a monthy magazine called "The SWORD and the TROWL". He wrote many books and also gave many college addresses and lectures. Through his obedience he brought many to CHRIST.
He was a man who was in constant pain because gout (an acute, recurrent disease characterized by painful inflammation of the joints) had attcked his body. He had a passion for the lost and he never let the pain stop him from preaching or spreading the WORD. He saw his suffering as a blessing from GOD for he was able to move with much compassion on those who were downtrodden.
Charles Jr. had this to say about his dad...
"I know of no one who could, more sweetly than my dear father, impart comfort to bleeding hearts and sad spirits. As the crushing of the flower causes it to yield its aroma, so he, having endured in the long continued illness of my beloved mother, and also constant pains himself, was able to so sympathize most tenderly with all sufferers."
In his last years, Spurgeon went to Menton in South france. In 1892, became very sick. Though illness was upon him, he could not help but continue attending services with his friends and family. In his biography, it was said that he had delivered his message to groups of thousands, but would expound the word of GOD to any group, no matter how small.
His friend, Wilson Carlile, was with him during his last days. Wilson tells of Charles' last prayer... "When he was dying at the East by, Menton, my wife and I went to his family prayers, which he took though in bed. He prayed for all the wandering sheep, concluding, 'THOU, LORD, seest the various lables upon them and rightly regardest them by the mark of the CROSS in their hearts. They are all THY one fold."
He went to be with the FATHER January 31, 1892, but his ministry is still influencing many today through the enormous amount of sermonic material and varied writings he left behind.
Charles Spurgeon wrote and preached 3, 500 individual sermons, and I want to share some of his wise words with you, so every Sunday I will have "Spurgeon Sunday". I hope you will come partake in some wisdom. Here is an example of how much he loved the wandering sheep and how he pleaded with others to reach the lost...
"If sinners will be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our bodies. And if they will perish, let them perish with our arms about their knees, imploring them to stay. If hell must be filled, at least let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go there unwarned and unprayed for." (I love this statement!)
We should all be filled with such compassion for the "wandering sheep". I pray you all will ask GOD to help you find what you need to spread the GOSPEL!
GOD Bless You!
Hello All, Grace and Peace be to you!
A young and successful executive was traveling down a neighborhood street, going a bit too fast in his new Jaguar. He was watching for kids darting out from between parked cars and slowed down when he thought he saw something. As his car passed, no children appeared. Instead, a brick smashed into the Jag's side door! He slammed on the brakes and backed the Jag back to the spot where the brick had been thrown. The angry driver then jumped out of the car, grabbed the nearest kid and pushed him up against a parked car shouting, 'What was that all about and who are you? Just what the heck are you doing? That brick you threw has damaged my new car and it is going to cost a lot of money to fix. Why did you do it?' The young boy was apologetic. 'Please, mister...please, I'm sorry but I didn't know what else to do,' He pleaded. 'I threw the brick because no one else would stop...' With tears dripping down his face and off his chin, the youth pointed to a spot just around a parked car. 'It's my brother, 'he said 'He rolled off the curb and fell out of his wheelchair and I can't lift him up.'
Now sobbing, the boy asked the stunned executive, 'Would you please help me get him back into his wheelchair? He's hurt and he's too heavy for me.' Moved beyond words, the driver tried to swallow the rapidly swelling lump in his throat.. He hurriedly lifted the handicapped boy back into the wheelchair, then took out a linen handkerchief and dabbed at the fresh scrapes and cuts. A quick look told him everything was going to be okay. 'Thank you and may GOD bless you,' the grateful child told the stranger. Too shook up for words, the man simply watched the boy push his wheelchair-bound brother down the sidewalk toward their home.
It was a long, slow walk back to the Jaguar. The damage was very noticeable, but the driver never bothered to repair the dented side door. He kept the dent there to remind him of this message: 'Don't go through life so fast that someone has to throw a brick at you to get your attention!' GOD whispers in our souls and speaks to our hearts. Sometimes when we don't have time to listen, HE has to throw a brick at us. It's our choice to listen or not.
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