Notes on *Spurgeon on the Christian Life*

Spurgeon on the Christian Life: Alive in Christ (Theologians on the Christian Life), Michael Reeves, (Crossway, 2018)

Main Idea/Takeaway

• The legacy of Spurgeon's theology of the Christian life is Christ-centered joy rooted in the gospel of grace, and very much alive.

• "This is a book about Spurgeon's theology of the Christian life, and those were the concerns that lay at the heart of it. Spurgeon was unreservedly Christ-centered and Christ-shaped in his theology; and he was equally insistent on the vital necessity of the new birth. The Christian life is a new life in Christ, given by the Spirit and won by the blood of Jesus shed on the cross." (16)

• "Rooted in glory, and gravitating to glory: that, according to Spurgeon, is the nature of the Christian life." (180)

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I: Charles Spurgeon

I. A Man Full of Life

Part II: Christ the Center

II. Christ and the Bible

III. Puritanism, Calvinism, and Christ

IV. Christ and Preaching

Part III. The New Birth

V. New Birth and Baptism

VI. Human Sin and God's Grace

VII. The Cross and New Birth

Part IV. The New Life

VIII. The Holy Spirit and Sanctification

IX. Prayer

X. The Pilgrim Army

XI. Suffering and Depression

XII. Final Glory 

Favorite Quotes by Chapter

Introduction

• "Spurgeon concretely lived out his belief that the Christian life is not a dull, ethereal existence on some higher, invisible plane. It is being more full, more human--brighter, more involved and more lively." (17)

• "Brethren, we should cultivate a clear style. When a man does not make me understand what he means, it is because he does not himself know what he means. ... If you look down into a well, if it be empty, it will appear to be very deep; but if there be water in it, you will see its brightness. I believe that many "deep" preachers are simply so because they are like dry wells with nothing whatever in them, except decaying leaves, a few stones, and perhaps a dead cat or two. If there be living water in your preaching, it may be very deep, but the light of the truth will give clearness to it." - CHS (19)

• "Some preachers seem to be afraid lest their sermons should be too rich in doctrine, and so injure the spiritual digestions of their hearers. The fear is superfluous. ... This is not a theological age, and therefore it rails at sound doctrinal teaching, on the principle that ignorance despises wisdom. The glorious giants of the Puritan age fed on something better than the whipped creams and pastries which are now so much in vogue." -CHS (20)

• "That combination of concerns, for theological depth with plainness of speech, made Spurgeon a preeminent pastorally minded theologian." -CHS (21)

Part I: Charles Spurgeon

I. A Man Full of Life

• "And while he surely struggled, it would be wildly misguided to think of Spurgeon as a fragile pushover. It would be far better to say that tenderness saved him: it kept his robustness of character from steamrolling those weaker than himself, and channeled it for their benefit." (27)

• "Spurgeon was an unmistakably and deliberately earnest man. With a deep concern for the glory of Christ and the fate of the lost, he believed that Christians should be able to say with our master, "Zeal for your house will consume me" (John 2:17; cf. Ps. 69:9)." (29)

• "But perhaps it is Spurgeon's cigar smoking that best reveals his sunny playfulness as well as his vivacious willingness to enjoy created things." (30)

• "Humor, he believed, is normally the fruit of something deeper. Sometimes it can come from no more than high spirits--and this, he admitted, was a temperamental challenge for him.

• We must-some of us especially must-conquer our tendency to levity. Agreat distinction exists between holy cheerfulness, which is a virtue, and that general levity, which is a vice. There is a levity which has not enough heart to laugh, but trifles with everything; it is flippant, hollow, unreal." (31)

• "Most essentially, though, Spurgeon's sunny manner was a manifestation of that happiness and cheer which is found in Christ, the light of the world. The "levity" he found in himself, and questioned, was inextricably related to his clear refusal to take himself-or any other sinner-too seriously." (32)

• "Rather like Jonathan Edwards, Spurgeon believed that it is right to "read" creation as a book full of testimony to the Creator and his ways." (34)

• "Christ is the logic and the light of the world; the gospel is the sum of all wisdom; the Scriptures are able to make us wise-and not just for salvation. Christians should therefore be wise and omnivorous people of comprehensive intellect." (36)

Part II: Christ the Center

II. Christ and the Bible

• "It is blessed to eat into the very soul of the Bible until, at last, you come to talk in Scriptural language, and your very style is fashioned upon Scripture models, and, what is better still, your spirit is flavoured with the words of the Lord. I would quote John Bunyan as an instance of what I mean. Read anything of his, and you will see that it is almost like reading the Bible itself. He... cannot give us his Pilgrim's Progress--that sweetest of all prose poems,-without continually making us feel and say, "Why, this man is a living Bible!" Prick him anywhere; and you will find that his blood is Bibline, the very essence of the Bible flows from him. He cannot speak without quoting a text, for his soul is full of the Word of God." -CHS (39)

• "There is a peculiar majesty, a remarkable fulnes, a singular potency, a divine sweetness, in any word of God, which is not discoverable, nor anything like it, in the word of man. ... It is God's inspired teaching, infallible, and infinitely pure. We accept it as the very word of the living God, every jot and tittle of it, not so much because there are external evidences which go to show its authenticity, -a great many of us do not know anything about those evidences, and probably never shall,-but because we discern an inward evidence in the words themselves. They have come to us with a power that no other words ever had in them, and we cannot be argued out of our conviction of their superlative excellence and divine authority." -CHS (41)

• "The book is the revelation of Christ, who is the eternal Word and revelation of his Father; as such, it cannot be considered apart from Christ. The book is living and active because Christ is living and active. And just as Christ cannot be left out of Scripture, so Scripture cannot be apart from Christ." (42)

• "He treasured the Bible and held it to be entirely trustworthy because he treasured Christ and held him to be entirely trustworthy." (42)

• "The fact that scripture is the Word of Christ, that its purpose and mail theme is Christ, served as a strong melodic line throughout Spurgeon's thought and ministry." (43)

•  "In this way, Spurgeon saw theology much like astronomy: as the solar system makes sense only when the sun is central, so systems of theological thought are coherent only when Christ is central. Every doctrine must find its place and meaning in its proper relation to Christ." (44)

• "Christ himself is the truth we know, the object and reward of our faith, and the light that illumines every part of a true theological system." (44)

• "Jesus is the Truth. We believe in him,- not merely in his words. He himself is Doctor and Doctrine, Revealer and Revelation, the Illuminator and the Light of Men. He is exalted in every word of truth, because he is its sum and substance. He sits above the gospel, like a prince on his own throne. Doctrine is most precious when we see it distilling from his lips and embodied in his person. Sermons are valuable in proportion as they speak of him and point to him. A Christless gospel is no gospel and a Christless discourse is the cause of merriment to devlis." -CHS (45)

• "You cannot taste the sweetness of any doctrine till you have remembered Christ's connection with it." -CHS (45)

• "True Bible reading thus requires wakeful, attentive study and deep reflection on what is written." (47)

• "Scripture is the Spirit-breathed Word of God: we read it to know him, and we need his help." (47)

• "We are begotten by the word of God: it is the instrumental means of regeneration. Therefore love your Bibles. Keep close to your Bibles." (49)

III. Puritanism, Calvinism, and Christ

• "The rise of theological liberalism and Anglo-Catholicism in his day tended to make Calvinistic Puritanism look quaintly olde worlde and not a little pea-brained. More remarkable still was the unbigoted way in which he held this theology. Being so out of step with the theological climate of his day could easily have made him prickly and clannish, yet for all his unbending theological resolution, Spurgeon was strikingly broad-minded. " (51)

• "Yet even more than all the Bunyan references and imagery in Spurgeon's sermons and writings, Bunyan helped shape the very way Spurgeon spoke and wrote. Spurgeon instinctively disliked the flowery pretentiousness of Latinate words, but it was from Bunyan more than any other that Spurgeon learned the power and the simplicity of plain and homely Anglo-Saxon." (53)

• "He was emphatic that the purpose of his Pastors' College was to raise up pastors who would be thoroughly "Puritanic." (55)

• "In Puritan hands, deep and thoughtful theology was never allowed to become a game for the intelligentsia: it fueled worship and it built up the church. This concern he shared with them, for a heartfelt knowledge of the truth--beyond mere intellectual assent to the doctrines of the gospel-entirely shaped his vision for the Pastors' College." (55)

• "Calvinism means the placing of the eternal God at the head of all things. I look at everything through its relation to God's glory." -CHS (57)

• "Calvin's theology, in contrast, is the system of doctrine which most clearly magnifies Christ as a Savior and ascribes all the glory to God, and thus best captures the truth we shall sing for eternity as we gather around God's throne and praise him." (57)

• "God's glory being what it is, Spurgeon argued that Calvinistic theology is that in which Christians will find the greatest joy. Calvinism's deep view of sin and high view of God's grace are not harsh dogmas, except to those who would rather not think of themselves as sinners. They are liberating, joy-giving truths." (57)

• "For, to preach this "Calvinism" is really just to preach the gospel: justification by faith, without works; the sovereignty of God; the eternal, all-conquering love of God; the effective redemption of Christ; and the fact that God is powerful to save and keep to the uttermost." (57)

• "In part, Spurgeon's catholicity reflected a generosity of spirit and a humanity that preferred to treat people as people rather than theological specimens. He had a distaste for bigotry and what Philipp Melanchthon called the rabies theologorum that drives theologians, like dogs, to treat doctrines as bones to bark over." (62)

• "He wanted Christians to have more than a formal confession of faith, however orthodox and Christ-centered. For Spurgeon, healthy theology must involve an earnest and warm affection for the Christ who stands above and before all/Christ must be central, but he is truly central only when he is supremely adored." (63)

IV. Christ and Preaching

• "The special work of our ministry is to lay open Christ, to hold up the tapestry and unfold the mysteries of Christ." (66)

• "Since Christ's great and eternal purpose- and the very reason for his death-is to win for himself a bride, the preacher's purpose is, as it were, to woo for Christ. Preachers are called to make Christ known in all his goodness, beauty, and truth, that his people might yield themselves to him, delight in him, and be one with him." (66)

• "In the pulpit he sought not merely to inform his listeners about the Word of God but also to draw both believers and unbelievers to Christ. His aim was to see people transformed at the very deepest level, their affections and desires turning away from their naturally cherished sins to Christ." (66)

• "The object of all true preaching is the heart: we aim at divorcing the heart from sin, and wedding it to Christ. Our ministry has failed, and has not the divine seal set upon it, unless it makes men tremble, makes them sad, and then anon brings them to Christ, and causes them to rejoice." -CHS (66)

• "As well as distinguishing preaching from mere data-dumping, Spurgeon was clear that "to preach" is not the same thing as "to moralise." "Remember," he told his students, "you are not sent to whiten tombs, but to open them." The transformation he longed for in his listeners was not merely at the superficial behavioral level (though he wanted to see godly behavior), but also at the very core of their being. Through preaching the gospel, he wanted to see the spiritually dead come to new life in Christ, and the living to become more gloriously Christlike and alive." (67)

• "First, the preacher must clearly and faithfully preach Christ. He is "Scripture's great theme" and the bridegroom that the servants are sent forth to make known." (71)

• "'to preach Christ' involves preaching all the doctrines that set him forth. It is a stretching and not a limiting mandate for the preacher. Christ must, after all, be preached for who he is and what he has done in his entirety." (71)

• "Spurgeon was emphatic that keeping Christ central, prominent, and clear was the reason for the fruitfulness of his ministry." (74)

• "Next, if he is to be preached faithfully, the Christ who is the light and glory of God must be preached both clearlyand beautifully." (76)

• "Preachers who woo for Christ, aiming at divorcing hearts from sin and wedding them to Christ, must view themselves as standing in Christ's stead." (78) 

• "In order to serve as a faithful ambassador of Christ, and to dare to stand in his stead, the preacher must embody the new life Christ offers. He should both know and enjoy the truth he seeks to share if he is to share it successfully." (79)

• "Not only must the preacher generally embody new life in Christ; he must, more specifically, embody the actual text he expounds. Spurgeon himself always preached best, he found, if he managed to "bathe" or "soak" in his text, to let the text soak into him." (80)

• "All this advice was summed up in an address he gave at the Pastors' College in 1881, titled "Preach Christ in a Christly Manner." His students were all expecting him to urge them to preach Christ, and he did not disappoint: "Ministers of the gospel, let Christ be your subject, and let Christ be your model: find in him not only the truth you utter, but the way and life of your utterance." (80)

• "As we share the gospel with friends and neighbors, Spurgeon reminds us that it is Christ--in all the multifaceted glories of his person and work-who must be the focal point of our message and the treasure we offer. And as we do that, we will properly adorn our message as we share Christ's own zeal, Christ's own courageous meekness and simplicity, and Christ's own love for both God and neighbor." (82)

Part III. The New Birth

V. New Birth and Baptism

• "He remained a stalwart and passionate Baptist for the rest of his life. What matters for us here, though, is that his Baptistic convictions were not a mere matter of his having to choose a denominational alignment: they were an integral part of his theology of the Christian life." (88)

• "The particular doctrine adhered to by Baptists is that they acknowledge no authority unless it comes from the Word of God. ... If we could find infant baptism in the Word of God, we should adopt it. It would help us out of a great difficulty, for it would take away from us that reproach which is attached to us, -that we are odd, and do not as other people do. But we have looked well through the Bible, and cannot find it."-CHS (88)

• "Spurgeon's passionate commitment to baptistic theology was part and parcel of his commitment to the importance of the new birth and faith in Christ." (91)

• "Regeneration was something he always expected to see as he preached the gospel. A friend of his once came to him, depressed because for three months of ministry he had not seen a single conversion. Spurgeon slyly asked, "Do you expect the Lord to save souls every time you open your mouth?" Embarrassed, the man answered "Oh, no, sir!" "Then, Spurgeon replied, "that is just the reason why you have not had conversions: 'According to your faith be it unto you." (92)

VI. Human Sin and God's Grace

• "The desires of our hears, which should incline us to Christ, incline sinners away from him to anything else." (94)

• "I believe the Eternal might sooner forgive the sin of ascribing the creation of the heavens and the earth to an idol, than that of ascribing the works of grace to the efforts of the flesh, or to anyone but himself."-CHS (98)

• "While God uses his truth, his final object is not the head but the heart. Through his Word he enlightens minds in order that hearts might be healed and won to himself. Preachers, therefore, must avoid vacuousness in their preaching, and they must avoid heartless intellectualism. The object of all true preaching, after all, is the heart, and preaching has failed "unless it makes men tremble, makes them sad, and then anon brings them to Christ, and causes them to rejoice. Sermons are to be heard in thousands, and yet how little comes of them all, because the heart is not aimed at, or else the archers miss the mark." (98)

• The cross-that deepest revelation of the glory of God- is the great weapon that breaks down the heart's defenses. Where the good news of Christ crucified is passed over, preaching must lack the power of God to save sinners." (99)

• "The gift of a"new heart" means the radical transformation of our affections and desires. "The affections are the most powerful part of our nature, they to a great extent mould even the understanding itself, and if the heart be defiled all the mental faculties become disturbed in their balance. God, therefore, commences at the heart."- CHS (101)

• "Here again Spurgeon inserted a helpful pastoral lesson. We must not mistake natural tenderness for this "heart of flesh." Some people are born constitutionally sensitive, but that does not mean they are spiritually sensitive. It may well be that they are simply impressionable and can be influenced quickly for evil as well as good." (103)

• "Regeneration is a work of pure grace- and those the Lord regenerates, he will indwell." (103)

VII. The Cross and New Birth

• "In the end, all talk of the centrality of Christ would, for Spurgeon, be inaccurate if we separated Christ from his work and failed to mention his crucifixion." (105)

• "The cross is the pinnacle of Christ's work and the clearest window into his identity: it was the key and the plumb line for Spurgeon as he contemplated Christ and the new life he offers." (105)

• "The most educated must find their wisdom in the cross, or die fools." -CHS (106)

• "All good things lie within the compass of the cross, its outstretched arms overshadow the whole world of thought; from the east even unto the west it sheds a hallowed influence; meanwhile, its foot is planted deep in the eternal mysteries, and its top pierces all earth-born clouds, and rises to the throne of the Most High." -CHS (106)

• "The cross being so pivotal, Spurgeon made it the emblem of his Pastors' College, surrounding it with the motto Et Teneo Et Tenor, "I Hold and Am Held (fig. 2): "I hold" because Christ crucified is the saving and sanctifying truth we must hold out to all people; "I am held" because the blood of Christ is what attracts us to Christ and what holds us safe in Christ." (107)

• "Spurgeon taught that the minister's "great object of glorifying God" is mainly achieved through the preaching of "Christ and him crucified." There the true wisdom, power, holiness, goodness, love, and sovereignty of God are revealed in all their surprising beauty, winning the hearts of those who look to him." (116)

• "When the glory of God is displayed in the cross, we get to see all God's perfections. We see that God is not merely helpful to the weak but also long-suffering and infinitely merciful to great sinners. We see the riches of his grace, his sovereign power to save, his holy justice, and his love. And never does one attribute clash with another." (117)

• "At the heart of the cross, then, was a work of penal substitution, and Spurgeon would be both persistent and outspoken in teaching and defending this theme." (119)

• "Christs substitutionary sacrifice  is essential to the gospel and to faithful preaching, Spurgeon believed. It is the only message which allows-yes, and demands-us to put all our trust in Christ and none in ourselves for salvation. After all, if Christ is our perfect substitute-if our sin is imputed to him and his righteousness to us--then no merit of ours can be necessary. A penal substitutionary atonement means that we can accept by simple faith (and faith alone) what Christ has done for us."(120)

Part IV. The New Life

VIII. The Holy Spirit and Sanctification

• "Growth in the Christian life is not, therefore, something very different from the initial experience of conversion. It is, first and foremost, about turning to Christ in faith and love. It is, consequently, about increasing likeness to Christ." (126)

• "When considering the work of the spirit in believers, Spurgeon liked to speak of how the Spirit of life makes lively people. As the Son of God is dynamically and fully alive in the Spirit, so he makes the children of God spiritually active and energetic. This is what life means. The idea of a passive Christian, content in sin, content not to know God better, was simply anathema to this understanding of the Spirit." (130)

• "In order to make us holy, the spirit animates us to a particular sort of love above all: that love which finds its joy in God. Spurgeon wrote and preached a good deal on joy." (135)

• "What is the gospel?" he once asked. "Glad tidings of great joy." And why? For the gospel reveals a happy God. The happiness of God was a theme Spurgeon returned to again and again. He held that it "enters into the essential idea of God that he is superlatively blessed. We cannot conceive of a God who should be infinitely miserable." Being infinitely full of happiness, God is a God who delights to share his happiness, and who created us for that very reason. "He is the happy God; ineffable bliss is the atmosphere in which he lives, and he would have his people to be happy... for a joyous God desires a joyous people." (136-137)

• "The Christian life, then, is one of entering into what Spurgeon called"the noblest and truest immortality," whereby we "live as God liveth, in peace and joy, and happiness."'S By rejoicing in the Lord, we "commence our heaven here below." (137)

• "Above all, though-above all the blessings of salvation and adoption--it is God in himself who is the great object of our joy. Thus when our hearts or circumstances leave us feeling that we cannot rejoice in anything else, we can still rejoice, for we rejoice in One who is unchangeably joy-giving." (137)

• "Man cannot please God without bringing to himself a great amount of happiness."- CHS (138)

• "True Christlikeness involves desiring to enjoy God ever more." (138)

• "As Spurgeon saw it, joy in God is part of the very fiber of Christian vitality, and thus he would connect it to every other aspect of holiness." (139)

• "Since we are made to be happy in Christ, joy is an essential part of human health. When a person is full of joy, "it shines out of his eyes, it sparkles in his countenance.. it quickens the flowing of the blood in the veins; it is a healthy thing in all respects." (139)

• "Joy in the Lord has the power to strengthen believers against temptation, for when we find our happiness and satisfaction in him, we will not seek it elsewhere. Joy has a medicinal power to cure the ills that come from grumbling. It therefore has the ability to drive away quarreling and promote peace. It is the cure for fretfulness and anxiety. And it is a contagious good, as cheer in one quickens cheerfulness in others, so spreading its own benefits." (140)

• "Christians must, then, fight for joy, and fight for that intimacy with God that fosters joy." (140)

• "So take care that you rejoice in the Lord when you have other things to rejoice in. When he loads your table with good things, and your cup is overflowing with blessings, rejoice in him more than in them."- CHS (140)

• "The spirit's enlightening work over the years that follow is thus quite bittersweet, for enlightening means not only knowing God better but also knowing self better. The Spirit enables us to see ever deeper into our own darkness, the depths of which would simply overwhelm the young believer. Mature Christians therefore feel themselves to be greater sinners than do young Christians. It is not that they are; rather, the Spirit has made them more sensitive to sin and more averse to it. Those sins we once ignored as petty and worth no attention become to us a source of ever-deeper pain." (141)

• "I do not know, beloved, when I am more perfectly happy than when I am weeping for sin at the foot of the cross." -CHS (142)

IX. Prayer

• "Prayer is communion with God, which is the very nature of eternal life. It is faith in action. It is a taste on earth of the everlasting life of praise Christians will enjoy before the throne of heaven." (144)

• "The habit of private prayer, and the constant practice of heart fellowship with the Most High, are the surest indicators of the work of the Holy Spirit upon the heart." (144)

• "Prayer must not only be the living breath of the new life: it must also be the breath of any faithful ministry. Because of what prayer is, no amount of talent or education--wonderful gifts though they may be to the church-can substitute for it." (146)

• "As a rule, we ministers ought never to be many minutes without actually lifting up our hearts in prayer. Some of us could honestly say that we are seldom a quarter of an hour without speaking to God, and that not as a duty but as an instinct, a habit of the new nature for which we claim no more credit than a babe does for crying after its mother."-CHS (147)

• "To come before God as our Father means that we can pray with boldness, assurance, and even joyful familiarity. It means we are not approaching a stranger or an enemy." (151)

• "It is when we do not feel fit to pray that we most need it. In such times we must pray for prayer--or, as Spurgeon liked to put it, "pray till we pray." And in those times when we do not feel fit for prayer, we must strike quickly, for that is the Devil's hour." (152)

•  "If you cannot speak, cry; if you cannot cry, groan; and if you cannot even groan to God, "let thy prayer be at least a breathing, a vital, sincere desire, the outpouring of thine inner life in the simplest and weakest form, and God will accept it. In a word, when you cannot pray as you would, take care to pray as you can."- CHS (153)

X. The Pilgrim Army

• "Two of Spurgeon is favorite books were by john Bunyan: The Pilgrims Progress and The Holy War; and together they represent two key aspects of the Christian life as Spurgeon saw it." (155)

• "Machismo is a distorted, cartoonish caricature of the human flourishing of manhood Spurgeon promoted. What he longed to see was more strength exercised (and restrained) in the name of love for Christ. In other words, he wanted believers to have a backbone to their faith." (158)

• "The Christian life is one of sharing the self giving life of God. l must then be a proactively generous life committed to blessing others. And it is then that we experience more richly God's own joy." (160)

• "Faithful activism for Christ is a manifestation of affections that have been reordered to share Christ's passions. Thus Spurgeon held that earnest zeal for the glory of God is the most essential quality in a Christian minister." (162)

• "Only with such heartfelt love for God can the Christian truly share the life of Christ, who was consumed by zeal for God's house John 2:17). Only that way can they be faithful and resolute for him.'s Only that way can they be most truly joyous and alive, for to "live entirely for the Lord is to live indeed, all else is mere existing." (162)

XI. Suffering and Depression

• "Knowing by most painful experience what deep depression of split means, being visited therewith at seasons by no means few or far between, I thought it might be consolatory to some of my brethren if gave my thoughts thereon, that younger men might not fancy that some strange thing had happened to them when they became for a season possessed by melancholy; and that sadder men might know that one upon whom the sun has shone right joyously did not always walk in the light." -CHS (164)

• "The gods of other religions might give ease to the good and health to the worthy. Not so in Christianity, where "goodness" is Christ himself, and conformity to him. God will not therefore simply reward believers with ease in this life, for that would make ease, rather than Christ, the greater prize. Suffering is therefore a "covenant mark," a proof that God is our Father and therefore cares enough about us to do everything necessary to mold and clip us into the likeness of his happily holy son." (165)

• "When a pastor patiently endures difficulty and affliction, and keeps rejoicing in God, it powerfully commends the gospel as glad tidings of great joy. The pastor-or, indeed, any Christian who ministers to another--can prove the comfort that is to be found in God in such times. God therefore often leads his under-shepherds through trials, "not so much for their own benefit as for the sake of those to whom they may afterwards minister." (168)

• "Christian ministers should therefore expect a special degree of suffering to be given to them as a way of forming them for Christlike, compassionate ministry." (169)

• "Just now, when anguish fills the heart, and the spirits are bruised with sore pain and travail, it is not the best season for forming a candid judgment of our own condition, or of anything else; let the judging faculty lie by, and let us with tears of loving confession throw ourselves upon our Father's bosom, and looking up into his face believe that he loves us with all his infinite heart." (172)

• "In suffering then, it is not only the case that we get to draw neater to Christ, becoming more like him and leaning more fully on him. In such times Christ draws near to us to walk with his people in the furnace. And not only to walk with us, but to bear us through." (174)

XII. Final Glory 

• "Spurgeon clearly saw that the Christian hope is to enjoy both communion with God and communion with the people of God." (176)

• "Heaven is heavenly precisely because it is the place of communion with Christ, where his glory is enjoyed. And hell is hellish because it is the place of cast-out Christlessness." (177)

• "Spurgeon's theology of the Christian life was one compassed about on all sides by the glory of God. We have life and new life because of the glory of God, and the glory of God is what we live, hope, and aim for. It is our whence, our whither, our where, and our why?" (179)

• "God's greatest glory is that he is good. The brightest gem in the crown of God is his goodness." (179)

• "The glory of the living God is a self giving, fertile glory. He rejoices to give and share his eternal happiness and life, and he has proved this on the cross." (179)

• "The outgoing, self-giving nature of God's glory is the reason for all created life, and it is the reason we have a gospel of grace. But there is a gracious undertow to God's expansive glory: as God in his glory gives out, so in that same glory he draws his creation in to enjoy his life-giving presence." (180)

• "The Christian life blooms and flourishes in the light of God's glory, where God both gives out and draws in. Having received new life in Christ from God's glorious grace, we find ourselves drawn in to enjoy him and to long for more of him." (180)

Notable Content

• How to Read the Bible: (46-48)

  1. The reader must understand what is written.

  2. The reader must seek out Scripture's meaning and intent. 

  3. Scripture reading is profitable.

• Advice for Preachers: (71-82)

  1. Preach Christ 

  2. Preach Clearly and Beautifully

  3. Stand in Christ's Stead

  4. Seek to Embody the Text

  5. Preach Christ in a Christly Manner

• Two essential reasons for opposing infant baptism: (90-91)

  1. First, to give even the impression that dropping water on a head can save a soul undermines entirely the gospel's call for people to be born again.

  2. Second, infant baptism not only conceals our need to be born again; it also draws people to trust in something other than Christ.

• "Third Nature" see footnote 34. (101)

• Sermons on joy. (135)