Spurgeon- Preacher Extraordinaire

 

 CHARLES. H. SPURGEON

 (1834–1892) 

 

 Preacher Extraordinaire

 Spurgeon was the son of a Congregational minister, but among his ancestors were Huguenots and Quakers.

 Born at Kelvedon, Essex, he spent much of his youth with his grandfather.He was sent to school in Colchester from 1845 and it was in the same town, in a  Methodist Chapel, that he was saved in 1850. Rejecting the tradition of his father, he decided to be baptized as an adult believer. Convinced that adult baptism was biblical.

 After his baptism, he joined a Baptist church in Cambridge, where he  helped at a school; then he started his own private school. By this time he had discovered his gifts as a preacher and he was much in demand.

 After a brief pastorate near Cambridge at Waterbeach, he was called to the pastorate of the Baptist church in New Park Street,  London. 

The congregation was small when he arrived, but within a few weeks he was attracting large crowds, even though he was only twenty years of age. 

The chapel proved too small, and it was decided to extend it. While this was proceeding he preached at the Exeter Hall, but again the crowds could not be accommodated. When he returned to the extended chapel in New Park Street, this quickly proved too small; so a greater church was immediately planned. While this was being built, he preached to great crowds at the Surrey Gardens Music Hall. The Metropolitan Tabernacle cost thirty-one thousand pounds and could hold six thousand people.
Spurgeon preached there from 1861 until just before his death. His preaching was powerful and even humorous. In theology he was a Calvinist. He was a careful expositor of the Scriptures and a dedicated evangelist.

 The excellency of his sermons is proved by the fact that in their printed and digital form they are still popular and eminently readable today,two centuries later. 

The Tabernacle was more than a preaching place; it was also an educational and social center. Spurgeon founded a pastor’s college in 1856 and an orphanage in 1867—both still exist today. He also founded an association; and from the church, various societies operated to help in the local slums.

 Spurgeon was a prolific writer. From 1855 a sermon by him was printed each week, including in The New York Times. These have been collected in many volumes, including on-line and digital format.

 In 1865 he started a monthly magazine, The Sword and the Trowel. His comments on the Psalms are in The Treasury of David (1870–1885). The advice he gave to preachers is found in his Lectures to My Students (1875, 1877) and Commenting and Commentaries (1876).

 His autobiography, edited by his wife and two friends was published in four volumes between 1897 and 1900. Many of his works still remain in print and digital form.

 In such a popular position he could not escape from controversy. Sometimes he was drawn into it, and at other times he initiated it. He attacked both extremes of Protestant theology—hyper-Calvinism and Arminianism. Then there was the famous “Downgrade Controversy” of 1887. He accused some of his fellow Baptists of teaching radical and modernist theology.They had diluted the gospel and subsequently their preaching This caused great troubles in the Baptist Union in Britain and caused his withdrawal from the Union. Despite these controversies, Spurgeon will always be known as the great preacher, who preached Christ magnificently and faithfully and a barrel-chested orator who could be heard down the back of the 6,000 seat church.