Charles Spurgeon: The Heart of a Soul Winner

Hailed as the greatest preacher of nineteenth-century England, Charles Haddon Spurgeon is arguably the preeminent preacher of any century. Regarded as the most widely successful expositor of modern times, Spurgeon heads virtually every list of renowned preachers. If John Calvin was the greatest theologian of the church, Jonathan Edwards the greatest philosopher, and George Whitefield the greatest evangelist, Spurgeon surely ranks as its greatest preacher. Never has one man stood in one pulpit, week after week, year after year, for almost four decades, and preached the gospel with greater worldwide success and lasting impact than Spurgeon. To this day, he remains "the Prince of Preachers."

Through the centuries, expositors such as Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli, Calvin, and countless others have committed themselves to preaching in a verse-by-verse style through entire books of the Bible. But this was not Spurgeon's approach. Though he was "an expository preacher par excellence," Spurgeon drew his message each week from a different book in the Bible. This free style distinguished Spurgeon from these other great preachers, positioning him, first and foremost, as an evangelistic expositor.

Throughout his prolific ministry, Spurgeon was consumed with a gospel zeal. He made it his practice to isolate one or a few verses as a springboard to proclaim the gospel. He asserted, "I take my text and make a beeline to the cross." Every time Spurgeon stepped into the pulpit, he set his gaze intently on the salvation of sinners through the proclamation of the saving message of Jesus Christ. As Hughes Oliphant Old notes, Spurgeon was sent "at a particular time to a particular place to preach the eternal gospel for the salvation of souls and God's everlasting glory." Perhaps none can compare with Spurgeon as an evangelistic pastor.

Though he deeply loved theology, Spurgeon stated, "I would sooner bring one sinner to Jesus Christ than unpick all the mysteries of the divine Word." He reveled in seeking the salvation of the lost. Here is how Spurgeon described the central importance of evangelism in his ministry:

I would rather be the means of saving a soul from death than be the greatest orator on earth. I would rather bring the poorest woman in the world to the feet of Jesus than I would be made Archbishop of Canterbury. I would sooner pluck one single brand from the burning than explain all mysteries. To win a soul from going down into the pit, is a more glorious achievement than to be crowned in the arena of theological controversy . . . to have faithfully unveiled the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ will be, in the final judgment, accounted worthier service than to have solved the problems of the religious Sphinx, or to have cut the Gordian knot of Apocalyptic difficulty. One of my happiest thoughts is that, when I die, it shall be my privilege to enter into rest in the bosom of Christ, and I know that I shall not enjoy my Heaven alone. Thousands have already entered there, who have been drawn to Christ under my ministry. Oh! what bliss it will be to fly to Heaven, and to have a multitude of converts before and behind.

To understand this gospel focus is to feel the very pulse of Spurgeon's heart. To grasp this evangelistic zeal is to touch the live nerve of his soul. Simply put, he was compelled to preach the gospel and gather in the lost. As an expositor, Spurgeon truly possessed the heart of a soul-winner.

Why Did God Command the Children of Israel to Kill Every Man Woman And Child In The Promised Land?

Among the countless nuggets of wisdom I have received over the years from my father is this bit of gold—when you are reading your Bible and you come across something that makes you uncomfortable, resist the temptation to simply move on to something else. Where the Bible makes us uncomfortable is precisely where we need to slow down. It is compelling evidence of a specific weakness. When our thoughts or feelings bristle under God's Word, He is right and we wrong.

That said, it is understandable that so many would recoil from God's command that every living person in Canaan be put to death as His people conquer the land. No mercy for those women and children, no compassion on the aged, God's instructions were as clear as they were brutal.

Many outside the faith have planted their flag here, arguing that our God is immoral, monstrous. Many on the fringes of the faith perform sundry exegetical gymnastics to wiggle out from under the account. Many faithful believers are simply puzzled and embarrassed. The God we worship, however, the true and living God, did in fact give this command, and rightly so. If we would rightly worship Him, even here we would praise His name.

There are at least two reasons why God did this. The first is evidenced in what came to pass when Israel did not obey God in this command. God wanted the land cleared of all temptations to His people to turn from Him, His worship and His law. The Canaanites were a threat to the purity of God's people. He had set them apart, consecrated them, adopted them. In giving this order, He was protecting them.

Joshua, for all his faithfulness, left the job unfinished. Once Israel was in the ascendency, once they felt safe, they began to think it might prove helpful to leave some of the Canaanites around, to fetch their water and chop their wood. The book of Judges reveals the results. Those few who were spared became a snare, just as God predicted they would. Soon, everyone did what was right in their own eyes.

Of course one might understand this motive, and still be horrified. These Canaanites were not mere abstractions, but real people. Is it not still rather cruel to kill them all simply for seeking to protect the moral purity of Israel? Perhaps, were that God's only motive. The second reason God commanded them all to be put to death is because they were all, every man, woman and child of them, sinners. And the wages of sin is death. In short, God did this for the same reason He does all that He does, for the good of His people, and for His own glory.

It is because we are sinners, and because God so often showers us with grace, that we lose sight of the justice of God, and the blackness of sin. When we read about the execution of the Canaanites we ought not to ask, "How could God do this?" but "Why does He not kill us all?" The shocking part of the story of the conquest of Canaan is God's love for His rebellious people, not His just wrath toward other rebels. From the moment of our conception we are all under God's just death sentence. Every moment of every day is a momentary stay of execution. When we forget this truth we show ourselves to be the sinners we are. But praise His name, Christ came into the world to save sinners. He who knew no sin became sin for us, and died a sinner's death that we might live. May we who are called by His name never lose either the amazing, or the grace, in amazing grace.

Why We Should Legalize Murder for Hire

I'll be the first to admit it; hit men are shady. But they are shady because they are doing work that no one else wants to do, work that is, in fact, illegal. By labeling contract killing a "crime," we have obscured the fact that hit men provide a valuable service to society. Many women find themselves trapped in unwanted marriages. Matrimony severely curtails a woman's freedom, and husbands can be unreasonably demanding. A woman in such a situation is vulnerable. She sees only one way out, and so she makes the difficult decision to kill her husband.

 But the inconvenient truth is that a woman hiring a hit on her husband will likely have to pay tens of thousands of dollars, with no guarantee that the kill will actually take place. Legalizing the transaction would remove uncertainty. Hired guns could be vetted, trained, and held to professional standards of safety. No one wants a hit to go bad. Removing the threat of prosecution would drastically lower the cost of contract killings. Legalizing murder for hire would bring a sordid industry into the light.

 While divorce may be an attractive alternative to murder for hire in most cases, some women do not have the emotional and financial resources to go through a divorce. A contested divorce can take more than a year to resolve. After attorneys drain the couple's finances, the woman will be left with little money to get on with her life. Additionally, a discrete and well-timed hit protects a husband from the pain of discovering that he is no longer wanted. A truly skilled assassin can take his target painlessly in an instant, without any suffering. The end of a marriage can potentially ruin a woman's life, but if her husband can be taken out quickly and cleanly, it can be a new beginning for her.

 Murder for hire is an uncomfortable subject, and I personally could never order a hit. The better course is to avoid unwanted marriage in the first place. Yet this is not a decision that anyone else can make for a woman. It is her marriage; only she can decide when it must end.

 I realize readers may be hesitant to endorse this proposal, but stop to consider the profound way that the legalization of abortion has taken away the stigma against a woman who wants to kill her child. Abortion was once considered murder and thus could only be obtained secretly and at great risk to women. Now, our country celebrates women who exercise their choice to kill their family members. Why shouldn't we extend this right, and give women the choice to kill their partners?

Church Leaders Who Permit Carnality and False Conversions

Is It Ever OK To Lie?

From Jesse Johnson at The Cripplegate:

Is it ever not a sin to lie? Or—to let the double negative cancel itself out and get right to the chase—does God ever put you in a position where sinning is the right thing to do?

This question is as bothersome as it is perennial. It invariably comes attached to this hypothetical: say you lived in Nazi Germany, and you have Jews hiding in your living room, and the SS guards knock on your door and ask if you are hiding Jews. What do you do? Do you lie?

Let me give you my conclusion, and then try and walk you there with me. First: GOD HATES LYING. So yes, it is always a sin to lie, and no, it is never ok to lie. Proverbs 12:12-13 explains why:

“No disaster overcomes the righteous, but the wicked are full of misery. Lying lips are detestable to Yahweh, but faithful people are His delight.”

Lying lips are one of the seven things that God finds detestable (Proverbs 6:16). Christians are called to let their yes be yes, and lying violates that basic principle (James 5:12). Meanwhile, God is a God of truth (John 14:7), while the devil is the father of lies (John 8:38). Lies are an affront to providence, as they imply that the world would be better if God simply would have worked it out more to our liking. Thus every lie is an attack against the sovereignty of God, and essentially places you in opposition to that which is true. Instead of lying, speak the truth (Col 3:9, Eph 4:22, 24).

It really is that simple.

The Philosophical Problem

The question is it ever ok to lie comes from a faulty ethical construction. In Christian ethics there are basically two schools: graded ethics, and absolute ethics. Graded ethics says there is a triage to God’s commands, and some are more important than others. When they contradict, always follow the more serious one. For example, they would say the duty owed to the Jews hiding in your living room is greater than the commands against lying. So it is better to lie than to betray those in your living room.

On the other hand, those that hold to absolute ethics (like me, Moses, and Jesus) say that all commands from God are binding, and it is never ok to set aside any of them. God doesn’t grade on a curve, so we shouldn’t view his commands in some kind of order of importance.

Those that hold to graded ethics use verses like Mark 12:31 (where Jesus says that Loving the Lord your God and loving your neighbor are the two greatest commandments) as evidence that God holds some of his commands to be higher than the others. Whereas one who follows absolute ethics would look at Mark 12:31 and say that those commands are greater because the other commands are flow out of them—which to say that violating any command would in some way be an offense to either your neighbor or God, but likely both.

The simple problem with the graded-ethics approach is that it is not taught by the Bible—verses like Mark 12:31 notwithstanding. The first person to be stoned to death in the OT was executed for picking up sticks on the Sabbath, so at the very least that causes some problem for the concept of graded morality. Regardless of absolute vs. graded ethics, the first people God strikes dead in the New Testament are Annanias and Sapphira for lying to the Holy Spirit. The moral of that has to be: if you are going to rate sins in some kind of order of seriousness, lying should be pretty close to the top.

The Hypothetical Problem

But this takes us back to the Jews hiding in the living room. What then? Well, when scheming up hypothetical ethical dilemmas, you have to remember that hypotheticals are literally problematic. They are contrived precisely because they expose a supposed weakness in a person’s argument.

So if you are going to play the hypothetical game, remember that God is sovereign, and with that comes his promise that every instance of temptation he will always provide a way of escape (1 Corinthians 10:13)… and that escape is NEVER going to involve sinning. God does not open your escape hatch through sin. In fact, in the context of 1 Corinthians 10, sin is the very thing that God gives you an escape from.

Thus, in any hypothetical moral dilemma you need to remember that there is an unstated contingent—namely, God will give you a way out that does not involve sin.

Back to the guards at the door

So we are back to the guards knocking on the door, and the Jews hiding in the living room. The ground rules are that you can’t sin, and that lying is a sin, and delivering people over to their death is unloving, which is to say that it too is sinful. What is left to do?

Well, this decision is really made before you took the Jews in. When you gave them refuge in your house, you did so while taking responsibility for their safety. If you are brave enough to hide them, then you better be brave enough to protect them. How can you hide them but not be willing to physically defend them? If the guards knock on your door, respond by telling them that they have no right to enter your house, and that what they are doing is morally reprehensible—but that Jesus offers forgiveness for their sins, and they need to repent. Then slam the door, and take the hypothetical from there. A person who is brave enough to lie but not brave enough to be a martyr, isn’t brave at all.

What about war time ethics

As absolutist as that sounds, the Bible keeps room in its moral constructs for war time ethics. God uses countries to bear the sword and punish evil doers. It is expected that war includes both deception and violence. An army can fake left and go right, because they are bearing the sword to suppress evil. But that is fundamentally different than a person—a civilian, if you will—who lies because they have a secret moral agenda. Even if their morality is right, it is undercut by lying because (remember) God will never put you in a position where lying is right thing to do.

What about Rahab

No conversation on lying would be complete without Rahab sneaking on to the set. “What about her?” you ask. “Didn’t she lie?” Well, yes…but that is hardly the point of that narrative. Rahab sided with Yahweh over and against her nation. She heard of God’s work in the wilderness, and when she met the spies, she was soundly converted by faith alone. That faith immediately manifested itself in her devotion to God and his people (James 2:25).

So the point of the Rahab narrative in Joshua 2 is that an idol-worshiping prostitute was radically saved, and that God then used her to help Israel enter the promised land. Did she lie? Yes. She had been a believer for all of ten minutes, so cut her some slack. Is she in the hall of faith in Hebrews 11? Yes. As shocking as it might seem, there are some believers who were both liars and prostitutes (or Sampson, who was a liar while with a prostitute). Yet somehow the gospel is greater than sin, and salvation comes through faith alone. Rahab is always held out as an example of faith for siding with God’s people, and is never held out as an example of lying for the glory of God.