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Spurgeon hates sin, and rightly so. It is, in part, a reflection of his love to Christ, and his love to Christ only increases as he considers the sinfulness of sin. This is a profoundly insightful sermon, with shades of John Owen’s books on temptation and the mortification of sin, a sort of anatomy of sin, at least in the way that it tries to draw us into darkness and wickedness. So first we think about the way in which sin deceives, given that its very nature is to assault the truth of God and the God of truth. Spurgeon spends a large proportion of the sermon telling us the kinds of lies which sin whispers in our ears and to our hearts. If we have never thought about this, then the sermon will shock us and teach us. Then we think about the way in which this deceit tends to harden the heart, and again we are in the realm of spiritual experience, and the gradual coarsening of the conscience, the increasing carelessness with regard to conduct, that comes when we listen to sin’s lying tongue and begin to act accordingly. Finally, branching out a little from the text, we are urged to fight against deceiving sin by faith, by confession, by tenderness of heart, and by exhorting one another daily—and that means a willingness both to receive and to give appropriate exhortation. We are not a pack of barking dogs, nipping at each other constantly and unkindly, but we are to look out for each other, both as we commit sins and omit duties. Loaded with pastoral wisdom, here is an outstanding reminder of our susceptibility to sin, and our need to be on guard against it. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/the-deceitfulness-of-sin Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 first delivered on a Thursday evening in the March of the previous year, and then repurposed for reading on the first Lord’s day of the year 1890. It is a delight to think that Spurgeon would preach something so sweet and substantial at an ordinary midweek service, and no surprise to find such a topic so well suited to the opening of a year. Here he develops the sermon with us, moving us on from point to point, thinking about the wonder of man blessing the God who blesses, the spirit in which we go about that happy work, the God whom we bless—that Jehovah who has made himself known to us in mercy—, and the self-awareness that we ought to exercise, as we address ourselves in the face of all discouragements within and without, to go on blessing the God of our salvation. Here is a preacher marked by simplicity of speech, plainness of address, and warmth of tone. Here we are stirred not just to think about what it means to bless the Lord, but to get involved with the business, and to get on with it, that the Lord shall not lack a witness to his majesty and mercy from us. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/the-keynote-of-the-year Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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

While Spurgeon is probably typecast as a classic three-pointer, his sermons actually show quite a variety in structure. This is a simple two-headed sermon, reflected in the title itself. How can peace be gained? How can peace be broken? Under the first heading, Spurgeon insists that true peace, the only peace worth having, is God’s own gift, spoken to his people who are holy. He celebrates the certainty of it and explores something of the beauty of it. Then he comes down from the heights and considers the loss of our peace. Here the preacher shows himself the pastor. The text emphasises that we can lose our peace by turning back to folly, and while that is a proper consideration, Spurgeon takes a few moments to consider some of the other ways in which peace can be lost, not all of them through the sins and failings of true believers. His intention is not to offer us excuses, but not to lay the wrong burden on the wrong heart. The ground cleared, he asks very bluntly about the kinds of sins which lurk in our souls, and which can be the reason why we lose the peace which the Lord speaks. The probing is painful, the speech being plain, and a sensitive heart will find good reason to lament its own folly. Spurgeon concludes with exhortation, giving us a brief barrage of reasons to turn our backs upon folly once and for all, and not to go back to the paths which, because of grace, we have left. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/peace-how-gained-how-broken Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 comfort with a little kick—rich in its consolations but not feeble in its applications. It begins with God’s everlasting covenant, rooted in his own unchanging being, and the promises which cannot be broken, with all the assurance of unending good to those upon whom he sets his love. Spurgeon explores the certainty and security of the covenant, never straying far from Christ’s finished work, whether he is speaking of the covenant itself, or the God who makes the covenant with his people. Then he turns to the promise, “I will put my fear in their hearts so that they will not depart from me” (Jer 32:40). Here he considers how God fulfils that promise, not by a twisting or emptying of certain spiritual realities, but by God’s gracious and sovereign work in the soul, granting his people a holy awe, a filial fear, and a sense of grateful obligation. He considers the work of the Holy Spirit in this connection, giving us a trinitarian perspective on the whole, and uses the guarantee of a people united to God in holy fear to draw sinners to Christ to find certain peace and life everlasting. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/perseverance-in-holiness Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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

During this period, Spurgeon is locked in combat, contending for the honour and glory of Christ. This sermon is situated both in the overall battle he is fighting, but also in the context of a pastoral ministry in which he is conscious of the need to feed and encourage the flock of Christ. So, having previously preached on the Lamb in glory (the previous sermon in this volume, number 2095, if you want to read it for yourself) he now wants to emphasise that this Lamb is the Bridegroom of the church, and that all our hope and happiness centres in him not only in this life but also in the life which is to come. He therefore steps through the prospect that lies before us, noting from Revelation 19 some of the events which precede the moment of marriage. He turns our attention to the marriage itself, asking how it has been brought about and what it involves. He fixes our eye upon the Bridegroom of our hearts, Jesus Christ, in his character as the Lamb of God, pushing us to recognise that this is essential to the union. Finally, he allows us to see the wife of the Lamb as she approaches her Beloved, prepared by him, for him, clothed in the white linen of her righteousnesses. It is a beautiful picture, and one which the preacher would have us ponder, not only to stir up love and faith and hope, but also to ensure that we will, through trust in the Lamb, participate in that glorious consummation. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/the-marriage-of-the-lamb Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 2 Corinthians 5:20, the apostle Paul tells God’s people that “we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God.” If you want a demonstration of this spirit in a gospel preacher after the time of the apostles, you could not do much better that read this sermon from Charles Spurgeon. He begins by insisting that the voice we must hear in the sermon is not that of the prophet who first spoke these words, nor that of the preacher who repeats them, but that of the God who makes known his own gospel grace: “Incline your ear, and come to me. Hear, and your soul shall live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you—the sure mercies of David” (Is 55:3). Here, then, we find—first—two saving precepts, to hear and to come. Then we have, for each precept, a saving promise, each of which Spurgeon explores with spiritual sensitivity and experiential insight. Then, broadening his scope to embrace the direction and tone of the whole chapter, we come to the saving pleadings, the Lord God himself calling on sinners to come, and removing all obstacles and addressing all objections. Spurgeon really climbs inside his text, and makes the voice of God his own, not with the intention of clouding the call of the Lord, but of ensuring that it is indeed Jehovah’s voice alone which the congregation hears, and God alone to whom the congregation responds. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/gods-own-gospel-call Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 we really dwell upon the fullness of God’s love for us in Christ? How much have we grasped the freeness of divine grace? In a sermon of almost relentless focus and intensity, Spurgeon insists upon the freeness of God’s grace, of his grace upon grace. He first considers the things the things which are freely given to us by God, ranging across salvation in all its fulness, and concluding with the crowning blessing, which is God giving himself—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—to his chosen ones. However, there is grace upon grace, for not only are these things given, but God also gives us the power to receive them! We could never have grasped these blessings unless the Lord in his mercy had given us grace to receive his grace. However, there is again grace upon grace, for not only do we receive grace to receive grace, but the Spirit also graciously gives us the knowledge of these things, a saving, experiential knowledges of them. With this goes a particular warning, too, about the spirit of the world which contends against the Spirit of God, a spirit which we cannot entertain if we are to receive these blessings. So we come into true possession of “the things that have been freely given to us by God” (1Cor 2:12). Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/grace-for-grace Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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

Are you a gospel trumpet? That is the dominant image which Spurgeon employs for his sermon from 1 Thessalonians 1:8 about sounding forth the word of the Lord. The sermon builds to some applications which are very specific to the Metropolitan Tabernacle in Spurgeon’s time, and we need to take that into account as we reach them. However, they can easily be turned to help us in our own situations, and the principles which lie behind them are broadly true. So, we are urged to consider the trumpeters themselves, the kind of men who make God’s word to sound out, with Spurgeon ranging across Paul’s description of the Thessalonian believers in his letters to them. This is really a brief study in Christian character. Then we turn to the trumpets, and see how it is that they give forth such a penetrating sound, and here we are in the realm of Christian experience and obedience. Thirdly, Spurgeon insists that there was a pressing present need for just such a trumpet-blast as sounded from the Thessalonian believers, and here the flavour of the hour begins to bleed through, but in a way that I think makes the modern reader add his, “Amen!” to the preacher’s assessment. Finally comes the question of whether or not his immediate congregation had an obligation to sound forth that trumpet-note. While some of the qualities and opportunities Spurgeon identifies are very tightly tied to the Tabernacle gathering, they raise questions and challenges for every church and each believer as to how we respond to the need of the present hour. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/sounding-out-the-word-of-the-lord Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 enduring elements of Spurgeon’s public ministry, reflective of his private life, is his delight in and dependence on the Holy Spirit. He mentions him often, prays to him regularly, delights in him personally, and depends on him resolutely. He is a good guide for us, then, concerning intimate knowledge of the Holy Spirit. As often, Spurgeon is not afraid of his own experience, but his starting point and guiding principle is the Word of God, as he considers what it is to have the Holy Spirit dwelling with us and in us. I think that the personality and operations of the Holy Spirit is a fairly significant weak point in modern Reformed evangelicalism, perhaps because of an over-reaction to Charismatic excess, but I also wonder if we have downplayed his presence and influence because we do not know him very well. Whatever the case, Spurgeon is corrective and instructive as he guides us through the truth of John 14:17, helping us to understand who we know, and how, and what it means to have this intimacy with the Third Person of the Godhead. As one who needs him, and wants him more than I have him, I hope it will be a blessing to you. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/intimate-knowledge-of-the-holy-spirit Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 lovely sermon, grounded in the Lord’s second appearance to Solomon, and our Sovereign’s answer to his humble servant. Spurgeon takes Solomon’s prayer as a model for our own, and looks to God’s answer as a pattern for our faith to expect. He shows us our proper place in prayer, coming before the Lord, and what that means, and how to find him. He explains that the great desire of the praying man is to be heard of the Lord in our prayer and supplication, and what it really means to be heard. He stirs us up to an assurance of answer to prayer, and the ways in which the Lord gives that confidence to his people. Finally, how should we pray? Spurgeon’s counsels to his own people may need a little massaging to fit us, but it is not hard work! He guides us through Solomon’s petitions and their answers, demonstrating how these are the very things that we desire in the church of Jesus Christ. And so, we are taught to pray, being led to the throne of grace, and with our souls stirred to seek a blessing and to look for its coming from the heart and hand of our gracious God. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/idols-found-wanting-but-jehovah-found-faithful Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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

Isaiah contrasts the confidence of Babylon with the hope of God’s people. God’s people have a sure and certain hope. False confidences pass away—whether as evidently as the ruins of Babylon have declared, or in any other case. By contrast, our God abides always the same. Even to old age—and this is a particular emphasis of Spurgeon in the sermon, given its textual context—he will carry us. Whatever else may change in us or around us, God himself does not change in himself or in his disposition toward us. And so it remains true that he has made us, both as creatures and as his people. He carries us, and those mercies toward us never alter. He also will deliver us. The structure of the sermon toward the end gets a little ragged, but the point is clear. We have the same God and the same mercy all through life. Spurgeon’s two primary applications go in two opposite directions. The first is to the young, with whom he pleads to begin life with God, in order that they may enjoy him to the end. The second is to the aged, urging them to trust a God who has never let them down. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/idols-found-wanting-but-jehovah-found-faithful Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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

Charles Spurgeon increasingly inhabited the paradox of which he preached in this sermon: “Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2Cor 12:10). How can a man be weak and strong at the same time? How can he be made strong out of his weakness? To answer this question, Spurgeon first turns the words the other way up, and makes them into a warning of sorts, exposing the pretended strength of the strong, whether that is unbelievers who imagine that they can save themselves, or believers who are resting in their own imagined excellences. So the high-minded are humbled, before Spurgeon flips his text into the right orientation and asks about the ‘when’ and the ‘then’ of the verse, asking especially how the weakness of the saints brings us to Christ, and brings Christ to us, in such a way as to glorify the Lord, as empty self seeks the fulness of him who fills all in all. Are you feeling your weakness? Are you weary and washed out in the way? Then do not pretend to be anything else, and do not try and find strength in yourself, but cast yourself upon Christ and find in him the strength which he alone supplies. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/a-paradox-sermon Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 Spurgeon at his most heartfelt, delighting in grace and urging to holiness. Taking quite a substantial text, and holding fast to its substance and arrangement, he brings us face to face first of all with what we are by nature, what we once were in the evils of our minds, our pursuits, and our hearts. Here he urges us to tears of repentance as he ploughs up our souls. Then he considers what the Lord has done for us, ranging over the wonderful declarations of grace contained in the text, and stirring us up to grateful joy, considering not least the merciful works of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit toward us. Then he brings us to the practical punch, that we should be careful to maintain good works. Here he robustly dismisses any suggestion that this is mere legalistic preaching, making clear that to the unbeliever he calls not to good works, but to Christ only. The exhortation to live as a cheerful servant goes not to the slave but to the son, to those who have been redeemed by grace. Inaction here, careless or passive living, brings dishonour to the Lord who has saved us, and so we must embrace this “faithful saying,” and show by our good fruit the sweetness of our new root. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/the-maintenance-of-good-works Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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

Throughout this sermon, Spurgeon complains that he is falling short of the subject which he has taken. I think other preachers, reading and responding to what he says, might long for such a failure as this! The text itself is a casket of pearls, and Spurgeon, after giving us a survey of them, urges us to ponder them more carefully for ourselves: “Yes, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will assuredly plant them in this land, with all my heart and with all my soul.” Having considered some of what that means, perhaps the high point of the sermon then comes as Spurgeon considers the fact that this whole-hearted, whole-souled demonstration of practical love comes from the triune God, and is manifest in all the dealings of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Those paragraphs are worth soaking in! Finally, he offers consolation and exhortation to the people of God, as we consider God’s heart toward us and examine our own hearts toward him. The whole closes with a heartfelt plea from the preacher for those who do not yet know God’s love in this way to come to him and receive all that is held out. I would urge you to read the whole sermon. I am persuaded it will do much good to our souls. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/the-whole-heartedness-of-god-in-blessing-his-people Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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 us to the field of the lazy man, the vineyard of the sluggard, to learn lessons for our souls and for our lives. While I suppose the sermon could have descended into mere moralism, Spurgeon keeps it from doing so by connecting the life we live to the state of our souls, and by constantly drawing parallels between our attitude to our lives and our attitude to our spiritual well-being. Emphatic about not just the fruitlessness of the natural heart, but about its proper tendency to abound in things vile and pestilential, he urges us to use every proper means to root out what is ugly and to cultivate what is beautiful in God’s eyes. He pleads with us to look to our own fields—our own hearts, the homes over which we are called to govern and in which we serve, the congregations for which we care and the classes which we teach, the towns and cities where we dwell, and the world in which we live. Good intentions produce nothing—the sluggard only wants a little more sleep, a few more minutes in bed, and he will make everything good…but he never quite gets up and gets round to anything. So Spurgeon calls us not to vague assertions of action to come, but of immediate practical engagement, for the sake of our own souls, and the souls of all those around us. Read the sermon here: https://www.mediagratiae.org/resources/the-sluggards-farm Check out the new From the Heart of Spurgeon Book! British: https://amzn.to/48rV1OR American: https://amzn.to/48oHjft 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