Shepherding with Spurgeon

Weekly Newsletter for Pastors from SpurgeonBooks

Brothers, we should desire for our church to grow, but the latest “church growth” strategies rarely pay off. Remember Christ’s promise that he will build his church.

Praying that this week’s newsletter encourage you.

ENCOURAGEMENT FOR PASTORS (BY SPURGEON)

“As for me, if I am lifted up from the earth I will draw all people to myself.” (John 12:32)

Come, workers for Christ, be encouraged. You fear that you cannot draw a congregation. Try the preaching of a crucified, risen, and ascended Savior; for this is the greatest “draw” that has ever been revealed among people. What drew you to Christ but Christ? What draws you to him now but his own blessed self? If you have been drawn to religion by anything else, you will soon be drawn away from it; but Jesus has held you and will hold you even to the end. Why, then, do you doubt his power to draw others? Go with the name of Jesus to those who have been stubborn up to now and see if it does not draw them.

No sort of person is beyond this drawing power. Old and young, rich and poor, ignorant and learned, depraved or friendly—all people shall feel the attractive force. Jesus is the one magnet; do not try to think of any other. Music will not draw to Jesus, neither will eloquence, logic, ceremony, or noise. Jesus himself must draw people to himself and Jesus is quite equal to the work in every case. Do not be tempted by the quackeries of the day; but as workers for the Lord work in his  way and draw people in with the Lord’s own cords. Draw to Christ and draw by Christ, for then Christ will draw by you.

SERMON ILLUSTRATION FROM SPURGEON

Spurgeon was a master illustrator. You can use this illustration in your own preaching to describe true peace in Christ.

A poor woman was the loving mother of an only son. He was very dear to her. He fell sick; indeed, he was sick unto death; but the mother could not bear to think so. She scraped together the needful fee for a physician; and oh, the peace of heart she had when the trusted man came downstairs and said to her, “Your son will recover; there is no grave cause to fear. Nurse him carefully, and he will soon be at his post again.” The mother was restful of heart, because she believed the doctor. Within a single day her son died, and those hours of false peace were the wormwood and gall of her affliction. It was a sad, sad pity for her hopes to have been raised, for she cried, “If I had only have known he was going to die, I would not have felt the loss so severely; but I am grievously disappointed. How could the doctor tell me he would live?” The physician was either greatly mistaken, or else wished to soothe the mother’s manifest anxiety. If the latter was the case, his untruthfulness was unwisdom. I cannot follow the like course. It is a pity to create a peace which is baseless.

ONE MORE REMINDER: PREACH JESUS THIS WEEKEND

“No Christ in your sermon, sir? Then go home, and never preach again until you have something worth preaching.” — Charles Spurgeon