Charles Spurgeon - Lectures to My Students (1875)

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An ill life will effectually drown the voice of the most eloquent ministry.

Charles Spurgeon
The Master knows better than to exhaust His servants and quench the light of Israel. Rest time is not waste time. It is economy to gather fresh strength.

Charles Spurgeon
A holy life is in itself a wonderful power, and will make up for many deficiencies; it is in fact the best sermon a man can ever deliver.

Charles Spurgeon
Get a friend to tell you your faults, or better still, welcome an enemy who will watch you keenly and sting you savagely. What a blessing such an irritating critic will be to a wise man, what an intolerable nuisance to a fool!

Charles Spurgeon
My witness is, that those who are honoured of their Lord in public, have usually to endure a secret chastening, or to carry a peculiar cross, lest by any means they exalt themselves, and fall into the snare of the devil.

Charles Spurgeon
We have all heard the story of the man who preached so well and lived so badly, that when he was in the pulpit everybody said he ought never to come out again, and when he was out of it they all declared he never ought to enter it again.

Charles Spurgeon
Trust in God alone, and lean not on the needs of human help. Be not surprised when friends fail you; it is a failing world. Never reckon upon immutability in man: inconstancy you may reckon upon without fear of disappointment.

Charles Spurgeon
The closet is the best study. The commentators are good instructors, but the Author Himself is far better.

Charles Spurgeon
Blessed are the peacemakers, and one sure way of peacemaking is to let the fire of contention alone. Neither fan it, nor stir it, nor add fuel to it, but let it go out by itself. Begin your ministry with one blind eye and one deaf ear.

Charles Spurgeon
Quietude, which some men cannot abide because it reveals their inward poverty, is as a palace of cedar to the wise, for along its hallowed courts the King in his beauty deigns to walk.

Charles Spurgeon
Far better for a man that he had never been born than that he should degrade a pulpit into a show box to exhibit himself in.

Charles Spurgeon
The grandest discourse ever delivered is an ostentatious failure if the doctrine of the grace of God be absent from it.

Charles Spurgeon
Rest assured that the most fervid revivalism will wear itself out in mere smoke, if it be not maintained by the fuel of teaching.... Sound teaching is the best protection for the heresies which ravage right and left among us.

Charles Spurgeon
This is the sum; my brethren, preach Christ, always and evermore. He is the whole gospel. His person, offices, and work must be our one great all-comprehending theme

Charles Spurgeon
Master those books you have. Read them thoroughly. Bathe in them until they saturate you. Read and re-read them...digest them...a student will find that his mental constitution is more affected by one book thoroughly mastered than by 20 books he has merely skimmed.

Charles Spurgeon
Whatever call a man may pretend to have, if he has not been called to holiness, he certainly has not been called to the ministry.

Charles Spurgeon
Fits of depression come over the most of us. Usually cheerful as we may be, we must at intervals be cast down. The strong are not always vigorous, the wise not always ready, the brave not always courageous, and the joyous not always happy.

Charles Spurgeon
God save us from living in comfort while sinners are sinking into hell!

Charles Spurgeon
Preach Christ or nothing: don't dispute or discuss except with your eye on the cross.

Charles Spurgeon
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

Charles Spurgeon
We are not called to proclaim philosophy and metaphysics, but the simple gospel.

Charles Spurgeon
Poor human nature cannot bear such strains as heavenly triumphs bring to it; there must come a reaction. Excess of joy or excitement must be paid for by subsequent depressions. While the trial lasts, the strength is equal to the emergency; but when it is over, natural weakness claims the right to show itself.

Charles Spurgeon
It is wisdom to take occasional furlough. In the long run, we shall do more by sometimes doing less. On, on, on for ever, without recreation may suit spirits emancipated from this 'heavy clay', but while we are in this tabernacle, we must every now and then cry halt, and serve the Lord by holy inaction and consecrated leisure. Let no tender conscience doubt the lawfulness of going out of harness for a while

Charles Spurgeon
This depression comes over me whenever the Lord is preparing a larger blessing for my ministry; the cloud is black before it breaks, and overshadows before it yields its deluge of mercy. Depression has now become to me as a prophet in rough clothing, a John the Baptist, heralding the nearer coming of my Lord's richer benison

Charles Spurgeon
A vigorous temper is not altogether an evil. Men who are easy as an old shoe are generally of little worth.

Charles Spurgeon