From Spurgeon and more

Before I forget....
I was listening to episode 43 of the lectures on Church History from the website (no I haven't listened to that many yet, I only started at number 38 because the others are not .mp3 files) and near the end of it, someone asks a question and I am positive it is Clay Finley! It's from October 28th 2001 and he may have been around at that point.

The evening was spent with Jon and Jon at Arby's, we talked about various things happening with the small group, lamenting the fact that people don't cherish the doctrines of Grace, and then wandered off into various topics. It ended with Jonathan describing some really weird dreams he had. I thought my dream last night was weird. I dreamed that I found a mint-condition, 1850 Wheat-head penny. Everybody knows they didn't start making those until 1909! And Lincoln wasn't even president yet in 1850! How bizarre of a dream is that?! Well, Jonathan's "normal" dreams trump that apparently.

On with the quotes.

From Murray:

"The superficiality which is attendant upon Arminianism may be traced to the very centre of its system. 'If you believe that everything turns upon the free-will of man' says Spurgeon 'you will naturally have man as its principal figure in your landscape.' This being the case there is inevitably the tendency to regard Divine truth only as a means to gain men, and whatever truth does not appear to us to be effective towards that end, or whatever truth seems an obstacle to the widest possible evangelism, it is consequently liable to be laid aside. The end must be greater than the means. But what is here forgotten is that the ultimate end of the gospel is not the conversion of men but the glory of God.
It is not man's need of salvation which is the supreme thing, and once this is realized, the attitude which thinks 'we must get men converted' and fails to ask whether the means are according to Scripture, is seen in its true light. 'In the church of the present age there is a desire to be doing something for God, but few enquire what He wills them to do. Many things are done for the evangelizing of the people which were never commanded by the great Head of the Church, and cannot be approved of by him.' We know His will only by His Word and, unless truth comes before results, conversions will soon be regarded as more important than the Divine glory. Spurgeon denounced the kind of evangelism in which there is 'a wretched lowering of the truth upon many points in order to afford encouragement to men'; he saw that it would end 'in utter failure' and bring neither glory to God nor lasting blessing to the Church. He deplored the fact that men were being allowed to 'jump into their religion as men do into their morning bath, and then jump out again just as quickly, converted by the dozen, and uncoverted one by one till the dozen has melted away.' In contrast to this sort of thing, he declared solemnly on one occasion, 'I do not wish for success in the ministry, if God does not give it me; and I pray that you who are workers for God, may not wish to have any success except that which comes from God himself in God's own way; for if you could heap up, like the sand of the sea, converts that you have made by odd, unchristian ways, they would be gone like the sand of the sea as soon as another tide comes up.'"

I liked those last few lines a lot. It's often discouraging to me to labour and not "see" any fruits, yet I try to press on knowing that there may be something which I do not see. And what I do is not because I am to gain anything out of it, it's to glorify God. The answer to the first catechism question "Man's chief and highest end is to glorify God and fully to enjoy him forever" really is something I need constant reminder of. The conversion of men is not my chief end. Glorifying God through submissive service to him is what I need to focus on, regardless of the tide the flows against or the disappointments along the way.

Murray:
"It is true that Arminianism has been productive of many 'holiness' meetings and conventions, but this fact, instead of rebutting the charge made above [the charge had to do with "carnal christian" sort of thinking], rather confirms it, because there was no need of special teaching on sanctification until Arminianism began to prevail in evangelism. Calvinism held that the same message which saves men makes them holy, and that a faith which is not bound up with holiness is not saving faith at all. It was because he knew this that Spurgeon took no part in holiness conventions, but had he been called upon to address worldly 'believers' who needed to be sanctified there is no question what he would have to say: 'Those people who have a faith which allows them to think lightly of past sin, have the faith of devils, and not the faith of God's elect.....Such who think sin a trifle and have never sorrowed on account of it, may know that their faith is not genuin. Such men as have a faith which allows them to live carelessly in the present, who say, "Well, I am saved by a simple faith", .... and enjoy the carnal pleasures and the lusts of the flesh, such men are liars; they have not the faith which will save the soul... Oh! if any of you have such faith as this, I pray God to turn it out bag and baggage.'"

And I see that so often today, well, with the conversations that Jonathan has been having with Ross. People who believe that a person can be truly saved, and yet not acknowledge Christ as Lord, regret their sin, or even turn away from it! Have the "best" of both worlds is their message and this sort of garbage is being preached instead of the gospel.

Spurgeon (referring to the Word as the only way):
"'God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth' he says 'that one truth, if it were to come with power from heaven into men's minds, would shiver St Peter's and St Paul's from their topmost cross to their lowest crypt.'"

Spurgeon:
"Long ago I ceased to count heads. Truth is usually in the minority in this evil world. I have faith in the Lord Jesus for myself, a faith burned into me as with a hot iron. I thank God, what I believe I shall believe, even if I believe it alone."

I appreciated the conviction of that, often we do find ourselves in the minority where everyone seems to be opposed to the truth! May God give me that strong conviction to remain firm in the truths of the Bible and to stubbornly resist all manner of error to the very end.

The Baptist Union, which was leaving it's initial Calvinistic stance (which Spurgeon lamented) was becoming merely a gathering place for churches who had the common doctrine of "believer's baptism" and there were those who denied the deity of Christ! Those who opposed Spurgeon said that they were united under common belief's, that Spurgeon held to his Calvinistic ways and wouldn't consider others as Christians. Spurgeon says:
"Every Union, unless it is a mere fiction, must be based upon certain principles. How can we unite except upon some great common truths? And the doctrine of baptism by immersion is not sufficient for a ground-work. Surely, to be a Baptist is not everything. If I disagree with a man on ninety-nine points, but happen to be one with him in baptism, this can never furnish such ground of unity as I have with another with whom I believe in ninety-nine points, and only happen to differ upon one ordinance..."

I appreciate this statement because that's how I feel sometimes. People become united on a distinctive doctrine but forget the essentials, or treat them as non-essentials.

Spurgeon (preaching):
"We believe in God's covenant. That is a strange, uncouth word to some people's ears. We have friends about who have never heard it; and if their pastors were asked why they never preached about the covenant, they would reply, "Covenant! that is a Scotch thing, is it not? Something to do with the Puritans, and men of that ilk? They are all dead no; at least, nearly all; there are just a few of them left, like fossils of the olden time; they cling to this obsolete form of religion, but there are so few of them that they will soon be quite extinct!"
So they say brethren; but we shall see; and meanwhile, we poor fossils do believe in the covenant; we are almost as absurd as David, who said, "He hath made me with an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure." He who understands the covenant has reached the very core and marrow of the Gospel; but how few do care about it nowadays!"

And that has been my experience too. I hear about F.B.'s classes and how the Puritans and Calvinists are supposed to be dead, extinct, old fossils. Nobody thinks like that anymore! Nobody really believes the doctrine of election and all those old things about the covenant and the doctrins of grace! We preach Christ! So they say brethren, but we shall see. There is such a general ignorance in every field of Christianity, from history to theology to ecclesiology and more! I confess much ignorance on my own part, but I try to learn. Sadly, many don't even want that and instead are insistant that this "new way" (which is really just the old heresies reborn) is the true way. If we see further than our predecessors, it is because we stand on the shoulders of giants, not because we are wiser than they.

Spurgeon:
We admire a man who was firm in the faith, say four hundred years ago... but such a man today is a nuisance, and must be put down. Call him a narrow-minded bigot, or give him a worse name if you can think of one. Yet imagine that in those ages past, Luther, Zwingle, Calvin, and their compeers had said, 'The world is out of order; but if we try to set it right we shall only make a great row, and get ourselves into disgrace. Let us go to our chambers, put on our night-caps, and sleep over the bad times, and perhaps when we wake up things will have grown better.' Such conduct on their part would have entailed upon us a heritage of error. Age after age would have gone down into the infernal deeps, and the petiferous bogs of error would have swallowed all. These men loved the faith and the name of Jesus too well to see them trampled on...
It is today as it was in the Reformers' days. Decision is needed. Here is the day for the man, where is the man for the day? We who have had the gospel passed to us by martyr hands dare not trifle with it, nor sit by and hear it denied by traitors, who pretend to love it, but inwardly abhor every line of it ... Look you, sirs, there are ages yet to come. If the Lord does not speedily appear, there will come another generation, and another, and all these generations will be tainted and injured if we are not faithful to God and to His truth today. We have come to a turning-point in the road. If we turn to the right, mayhap our children and our children's children will go that way; but if we turn to the left, generations yet unborn will curse our names for having been unfaithful to God and to His Word."

Again, something that strikes hard with me. This is another reason why I want to fight so hard, not merely against unbelievers, but against those who call themselves believers and yet are undermining the Christian world! Christ's kingdom will stand but I am saddened by those who are destroying it and yet claim to be helping it. This age, as all others, calls for men and women who are firm in their beliefs and will speak up and go against the tide, not afraid of the opposition but always looking to their Lord and King to lead them onward to the victory.

This next one's a good one so 'listen up smart.'

Murray:
It is a common argument that the PUritan stress upon total submission to the Word of God, along with its sense of accountability to 'obey even in the jots and titles, at all hazards', has a disruptive and dividing tendency. To Spurgeon the truth of the matter was far otherwise. Disunity, he argued, is not caused by a too thorough attachment to Scripture, but by the intrusion and toleration of beliefs and practices which are the products of human wisdom alone: the Lord's 'will is in the Scriptures: and if we searched them more and more, and were determined, irrespective of anything that may have been done by the church, or the world, or by government, or by anybody else, that we would all follow our Lord's will, we should come to closer union. We are divided because we do not study the Lord's will as we should.' This is not to deny that men even in their best state are subject to prejudice and fallibility in their interpretation of the Word. But though human weakness makes our obedience to Scripture imperfect, it in no ways excuses the necessity of such total committal, nor does the record of human infirmity as it appears in the Church history invalidate the great truth that spiritual unity and prosperity cannot be attained along any path except that of submission to the Word of God. 'The statues of the Lord are right ... in keeping of them there is great reward.' (Psalm 19. 8-11)"

I have heard many people shout that doctrine divides! That is why they water down everything until no one really knows what they believe, all they know is that they believe it and you had better not challenge whatever that belief is! Don't set yourself up as a judge over me! Don't judge others lest you be judged! I believe in God, you believe in God, we just interpret the Bible differently. No, you believe what you do regardless of what the Bible says. Oh! if only we were united in holding the Bible as our authority of life, how every other doctrine would fall into place! What a blessed fellowship that would bring! That is why we must be so adamant about the Bible being the only rule of faith and obedience.

This, as Murray said, is a fitting quote to conclude a record of Spurgeon's labours:
"'We love our brethren for Jesu' sake, but He is the chief among ten thousand, and the altogether lovely. We could not live without Him. To enjoy His company is bliss to us: for Him to hide His face from us is our midnight of sorrow ... Oh, for the power to live, to die, to labour, to suffer as unto Him, and unto Him alone! ... If a deed done for Christ should bring you into disesteem, and threaten to deprive you of usefulness, do it none the less. I count my own character, popularity, and usefulness to be as the small dust of the balance compared with fidelity to the Lord Jesus. It is the devil's logic which says "You see I cannot come out and avow the truth because I have a sphere of usefulness which I hold by temporizing with what I fear may be false." O sirs, what have we to do with consequences? Let the heavens fall, but let the good man be obedient to his Master, and loyal to his truth. O man of God, be just and fear not! The consequences are with God, and not with thee. IF thous hast done a good work unto Christ, though it should seem to thy poor bleared eyes as if great evil has come of it, yet hast thou done it, Christ has accepted it, and He will note it down, and in thy conscience He will smile thee His approval."

That means a lot to me as I try to carry on with my labours. May I try harder for I don't try nearly enough. Amen.

I apologize if I've mis-typed anything here. I was going rather quickly and haven't had time to go back and check it all. I hope it was as edifying and encouraging to you as it was to me.