Travailing for Souls part3
September 3rd, 1871
by
C. H. SPURGEON
(1834-1892)
In order to understand such preaching, you need to see and hear the
man, you want his tearful eye, his glowing countenance, his pleading
tone, his bursting heart. I have heard of a great preacher who objected
to having his sermons printed, "Because," said he, "you cannot print
me." That observation is very much to the point. A soul-winner throws
himself into what he says. As I have sometimes said, we must ram
ourselves into our cannons, we must fire ourselves at our hearers, and
when we do this, then, by God's grace, their hearts are often carried by
storm. Do any of you desire your children's conversions? You shall
have them saved when you agonize for them. Many a parent who has
been privileged to see his son walking in the truth, will tell you that
before the blessing came he had spent many hours in prayer and in
earnest pleading with God, and then it was that the Lord visited his
child and renewed his soul. I have heard of a young man who had
grown up and left the parental roof, and through evil influences, had
been enticed into holding skeptical views. His father and mother were
both earnest Christians, and it almost broke their hearts to see their son
so opposed to the Redeemer. On one occasion they induced him to go
with them to hear a celebrated minister. He accompanied them simply
to please them, and for no higher motive. The sermon happened to be
upon the gloriesof heaven. It was a very extraordinary sermon, and
was calculated to make every Christian in the audience to leap for joy.
The young man was much gratified with the eloquence of the preacher,
but nothing more; he gave him credit for superior oratorical ability, and
was interested in the sermon, but felt none of its power. He chanced to
look at his father and mother during the discourse, and was surprised to
see them weeping. He could not imagine why they, being Christian
people, should sit and weep under a sermon which was most jubilant in
its strain. When he reached home, he said, "Father, we have had a
capital sermon, but I could not understand what could make you sit
there and cry, and my mother too?" His father said, "My dear son, I
certainly had no reason to weep concerning myself, nor your mother,
but I could not help thinking all through the sermon about you, for alas,
I have no hope that you will be a partaker in the bright joys which
await the righteous. It breaks my heart to think that you will be shut out
of heaven." His mother said, "The very same thoughts crossed my
mind, and the more the preacher spoke of the joys of the saved, the
more I sorrowed for my dear boy that he should never know what they
were." That touched the young man's heart, led him to seek his father's
God, and before long he was at the same communion table, rejoicing in
the God and Saviour whom his parents worshiped. The travail comes
before the bringing forth; the earnest anxiety, the deep emotion within,
precede our being made the instruments of the salvation of others.
I think I have established the fact; now for a minute or two let me show
you the reason for it. Why is it that there must be this anxiety before
desirable results are gained? For answer, it might suffice us to say that
God has so appointed it. It is the order of nature. The child is not born
into the world without the sorrows of the mother, nor is the bread
which sustains life procured from the earth without toil: "In the sweat
of thy face shalt thou eat bread," was a part of the primeval curse. Now,
as it is in the natural, so is it in the spiritual; there shall not come the
blessing we seek, without first of all the earnest yearning for it. Why, it
is so even in ordinary business. We say, "No sweat no sweet," "no
pains no gains," "No millno meal." If there be no labor there shall be
no profit. He that would be rich must toil for it; he that would acquire
fame must spend and be spent to win it. It is ever so. There must ever
be the travail and then the desire cometh. God has so appointed it: let
us accept the decree.
But better still, he has ordained this for our good. If souls were given us
without any effort, anxiety or prayer it would be our loss to have it so,
because the anxieties which throb within a compassionate spirit
exercise his graces; they produce grateful love to God; they try his faith
in the power of God to save others; they drive him to the mercy-seat;
they strengthen his patience and perseverance, and every grace within
the man is educated and increased by his travail for souls. As labor is
now a blessing, so also is soul-travail; men are fashioned more fully
into the likeness of Christ thereby, and the whole church is by the same
emotion quickened into energy. The fire of our own spiritual life is
fanned by that same breath which our prayers invite to come from the
four winds to breath upon the slain. Besides, dear friends, the zeal that
God excites within us is often the means of effecting the purpose which
we desire. After all, God does not give conversions to eloquence, but to
heart. The power in the hand of God's Spirit for conversions is heart
coming in contact with heart. This is God's battle-axe and weapons of
war in his crusade. He is pleased to use the yearnings, longings, and
sympathies of Christian men, as the means of compelling the careless
to think, constraining the hardened to feel, and driving the unbelieving
to consider. I have little confidence in elaborate speech and polished
sentences, as the means of reaching men's hearts; but I have great faith
in that simple-minded Christian woman, who must have souls
converted or she will weep her eyes out over them; and in that humble
Christian who prays day and night in secret, and then avails himself of
every opportunity to address a loving word to sinners. The emotion we
feel, and the affection we bear, are the most powerful implements of
soul-winning. God the Holy Ghost usually breaks hard hearts by tender
hearts.
Besides, the travail qualifies for the proper taking care of the offspring.
God does not commit his new-born children to people who do not care
to see conversions. If he ever allows them to fall into such hands, they
suffer very serious loss thereby. Who is so fit to encourage a new-born
believer as the man who first anguished before the Lord for his
conversion? Those you have wept over and prayed for you will be sure
to encourage and assist. The church that never travailed, should God
send her a hundred converts, would be unfit to train them; she would
not know what to do with little children, and would leave them to much
suffering. Let us thank God, brethren, if he has given us any degree of
the earnest anxiety and sympathy, which marked soul-wining men and
women, and let us ask to have more for, in proportion as we have it, we
shall be qualified to be the instruments in the hand of the Spirit, of
nursing and cherishing God's sons and daughters.
Travailing for Souls part1 C. H. SPURGEON
No comments:
Post a Comment