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The Soul-Winner's Reward | Charles Spurgeon · Reformed Thinking

0:00
Imagine you're walking down a really gritty 19th century
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London St. Oh yeah.
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The air is just thick with coal smoke.
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So it's everywhere. Yeah, everywhere.
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And you pass this brick police station, and right there on the
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notice board outside is this massive striking placard.
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OK, I can picture it. And it is offering a huge
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financial bounty. We're talking actual piles of
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gold, You know, a giant cash reward for anyone who can track
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down and bring to justice the people who committed some great
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crime. Like an assassin or something.
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Right, some massive crime and society knows that if you want
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someone to turn it a criminal, you will.
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You have to offer them a fortune.
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Because nobody wants to do it. Exactly, precisely.
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The person who does it, the common and former.
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They earn so much scorn and hate from their peers.
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It is a miserable, dangerous business to be.
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In yeah, you basically have to bribe them to take the.
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Right. But that imagery, it raises a
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really fascinating question for you, the listener, as we get our
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deep dive started today. It really does.
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Society uses these massive financial incentives to motivate
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people to hunt assassins, but what motivates someone to rescue
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a soul, right? Like what is the reward for
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bringing someone to mercy rather than bringing them to justice?
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That is such a stark contrast. It is, and you are listening to
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Reformed thinking. By the way, today we are looking
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at a classic text from the 19th century English preacher Charles
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Spurgeon. The Prince of Preachers.
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Yes, him. We are opening up an excerpt
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from his work called The Sole Winner and we are focusing on a
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section titled The Sole Winners Reward.
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It is honestly a stunning way to open a theological discussion.
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I mean, Spurgeon is looking at the raw mechanics of human
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motivation right there on the street corner.
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Yeah. The contrast he sets up between
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the informer and the rescuer, it sets the entire framework for
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our discussion today. It really does.
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Because the informer is motivated by cash to bring
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someone to punishment, but the rescuer, they are motivated by
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something entirely different to bring someone to pardon.
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And there is so much more work for the rescuer, right?
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Oh yeah, He points out that assassins and burglars are
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comparatively few, but people who need to be sought and saved.
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I mean, they swarm around us in every place.
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They are everywhere. Yeah, there's just an absolute
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abundance of work to do. So our mission for this deep
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dive is to unpack Spurgeon's view on the true rewards of
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bringing others to faith. We are going to dissect the
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motivations behind. It and the failures too.
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Yes, how to handle the inevitable failures that come
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with trying to reach people, and also just the staggering joy of
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the work. But we have to tackle the
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elephant in the room first, don't we?
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We do. Before we get into the joy and
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the mechanics of all this, we have to look really closely at
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that word reward. Yeah, that word is a landmine.
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It is. Spurgeon anticipates right out
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of the gate that this specific word is going to cause a massive
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problem for his audience. He knows some of his listeners
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are going to bristle the second they hear him talk about a
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reward for spiritual work. Because, well, he notes that
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some listeners will immediately prick up their ears and mutter
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the word legality. Legality.
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We should probably define that for the listener.
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Yeah, that is a term we need to define clearly for anyone who
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might not be familiar with those 19th century theological
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debates. Right?
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When Spurgeon talks about legality, he's referring to a
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transactional religion. Like earning your way?
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Yes, the idea that a person might earn salvation or earn
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God's favor through their own moral efforts or good works.
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And in a Protestant context, you know, specifically one that
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aligns with things like the Westminster Confession, earning
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merit before God is an absolute non starter.
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It is a complete theological dead end.
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Salvation is entirely by grace, right?
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There is nothing you can do to put God in your debt.
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So the moment you introduce the concept of a reward for doing
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good deeds, people start getting very nervous.
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They think you are slipping backwards.
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Yeah, they worry you are slipping back into a system
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where you punch a spiritual time clock, do the work, and then
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just demand your paycheck from heaven.
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But Spurgeon hits that criticism him head on, doesn't he?
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He really does. He draws a very sharp
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theological line there. He says this reward is, quote,
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not of debt, but of grace. It is enjoyed with humility, not
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with the proud conceit of merit, Right.
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I want to break that down because it seems like a really
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fine line to walk. It is a delicate balance.
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How can something be a reward, like a true reward, but not be
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based on merit? Well, think about the difference
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between a wage and a gift. OK, A reward of debt means you
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performed a task entirely independently.
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You created value on your own, so the boss owes you a paycheck.
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It is a strict legal transaction.
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Yes, strict transaction, yeah, but a reward of grace means the
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ability to do the work was a gift in the first place.
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Oh, interesting. Right.
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The desire to help someone was a gift.
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The strength to speak the truth was a gift.
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So the whole process starts with grace.
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Exactly, and the compensation at the end is just another layer of
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unmerited favor. So there is zero room for
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boasting. Right.
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Zero room for the proud seat of merit because you did not
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generate the success on your own.
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You cannot strut around heaven saying, look at all the souls I
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saved. Look at how persuasive I was.
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Because you know, you were just a tool in the hands of the
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Craftsman. Yes, that is why this specific
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reward is enjoyed with grateful delight and humility rather than
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arrogance. But he also brings up another
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criticism, and I think this one feels very modern.
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Which one? The idea that some people might
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whisper, is not this a low and mercenary motive?
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Ah yes, the mercenary accusation.
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Right. Like if you are only doing a
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good deed because you want the reward at the end, doesn't that
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cheapen the entire action? It is a fair question.
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And Spurgeon defends this by pointing to Moses.
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He says Moses had respect for the recompense of reward.
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He argues that it is as mercenary as the spirit of
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Moses, because Moses walked away from all the treasures of Egypt.
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Yeah, he left it all behind. Because he was looking ahead to
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a greater reward. The core issue is not whether
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you seek a reward. Human beings are just naturally
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wired to seek outcome. Right, we are goal oriented.
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The core issue is the nature of the reward we're actually
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seeking. I want to push back on this a
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little bit though. Go for it, because I think a lot
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of people listening right now might still feel a bit skeptical
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about that. Doesn't seeking a reward
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intrinsically taint the purity of the action?
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Let me give you an analogy to kind of flesh in this out.
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OK, let's hear it. Imagine you and I are standing
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on a bridge in the middle of winter.
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Freezing cold. Freezing and we see a person
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jump into the icy river below to save a drowning child.
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Oh wow, we watch them risk their life, they pull the kid to shore
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and we think, wow, that person is an absolute hero.
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Of course. But then a week later, we find
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out they only jumped in because they wanted to get a shiny medal
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from the mayor. Yeah, they wanted their picture
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on the front page of the local paper, and they wanted a cash
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prize. That changes things.
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It completely changes things. The moment we find out their
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motivation was external praise, we question their character.
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Right. The action was good, but the
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motive was entirely selfish. So how is Spurgeon's concept of
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reward any different from the guy jumping in the freezing
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river just to get a medal? That is the crucial question,
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and you are right. If the reward you are seeking is
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gold or status or a literal medal from the mayor, then yes,
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the motive is entirely tainted. It becomes about the rescuer.
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Yes, the action becomes about you, not about the person you
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are actually rescuing. But the text gives us the answer
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by completely redefining the reward itself.
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OK, how does he redefine it? Spojin says the reward in this
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case is the joy of doing good, the comfort of having glorified
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God, and the bliss of pleasing the Lord Jesus.
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OK, so the reward is not a physical prize handed to you
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after the fact. Not at all.
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The reward is the alignment of your heart with God's heart.
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Precisely. The reward is internal and
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spiritual. If your highest aspiration is to
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please Jesus and glorify God by rescuing A fellow human being
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from destruction, that aspiration cannot be mercenary.
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Because it is not selfish. Right.
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Why? Because that aspiration is in
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itself a grace given by God. Oh, that loops right back to the
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grace. Argument Yes, a naturally
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selfish human heart does not spontaneously generate a burning
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desire for God's glory. You cannot conjure up that kind
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of pure motive on your own. So seeking that specific kind of
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reward does not taint the action.
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It actually proves the action is driven by a divine impulse.
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I want you, the listener, to think about what this means for
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your daily interactions. Are you paralyzed by the fear of
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doing the right thing for the wrong reason?
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That is a very common fear. It is sometimes we can get so
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caught up in our own heads, analyzing our own psychology,
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wondering if our motives are purely altruistic, that we end
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up doing nothing at all. We talk ourselves.
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Yeah, we think I should talk to my Co worker about my faith, but
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maybe I just want to feel superior so I'll just stay
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quiet. Which doesn't help anyone.
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Right Spurgeon is cutting through that paralysis.
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He is saying if your genuine goal is to see God glorified and
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someone else rescued, do not overthink it.
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That desire is a gift. Run with it.
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Do not let the fear of a mercenary motive stop you from
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pulling someone out of the river.
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And that naturally brings us to the next massive hurdle in this
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text. Well, if the reward is tied to
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the joy of doing good and the joy of rescuing someone, what
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happens when you do not rescue them?
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Oh yeah, what happens when you fail?
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Because failure in this arena is incredible common.
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It really is, and Spurgeon offers some incredibly
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comforting words for those who see no conversions.
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He does. He says that even if the souls
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you are trying to reach persist in unbelief, even if they
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despise you, reject you, and ridicule you, the attempt itself
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is still a divine work. He brings up an Old Testament
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example to kind of anchor this idea.
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King David, right? He talks about King David's
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intent to build the temple. David looked around, realized he
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was living in this gorgeous palace of cedar, while the Ark
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of the Covenant was just sitting in a tent.
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Yeah, that bothered him. Right.
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And he wanted to build a massive, glorious house for God.
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He gathered materials, He made plans.
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He had a pure burning desire to see this project completed.
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But God said no. God told him no, you are a man
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of war. You are not the one who will
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build it. Your son Solomon will do that.
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It must have been crushing for David.
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It probably was. However, God also told David it
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was well, that it was in line heart.
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The intent mattered. Exactly the intent mattered.
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The desire to honor God was recognized, validated, and
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praised, even though the specific outcome David wanted
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did not materialize in his own lifetime.
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So Spurgeon takes that historical event and applies it
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directly to the person who is trying to share their faith but
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getting absolutely nowhere. And he asks A staggering
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question. What if we only learn how to
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join the Savior in His tears? That is heavy.
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It is very heavy. He references that moment in the
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Gospels where Jesus is looking over the city of Jerusalem and
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crying out. How often would I have gathered
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you but ye would not. Yeah, Spurgeon calls it quote
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sublimity itself. To be allowed to stand on the
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same platform with Jesus and weep with Him.
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Let's just sit with that phrase for a minute.
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Sublimity itself? Yeah, we usually associate
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sublimity with massive success. We think the peak of the
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Christian experience is leading thousands to faith, sparking a
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huge revival rival seeing the tangible, undeniable fruit of
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our labor. Right.
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Big numbers, huge impact. But Spurgeon completely upends
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that paradigm. How so?
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He says that standing in the ashes of a rejected message,
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weeping over the stubbornness of those you desperately love, that
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puts you on the exact same platform as the Son of God.
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Wow, you are sharing in his specific sorrow.
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You are feeling the exact emotional weight he felt when he
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looked at a city that refused his mercy.
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I was trying to visualize this while I was reading the text and
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I kept thinking about a weather pattern.
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OK, let's hear it. Spurgeon says if there comes no
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rain out of the cloud yet, it has screened off the fierce heat
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of the sun. So think about a day when you
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were in the middle of a terrible drought.
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The ground is just crack. Yes, the sun is beating down,
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the ground is parched and you are desperate for rain.
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You look up and this massive dark cloud rolls over.
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It looks so promising. Incredibly promising, but
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nothing happens. No rain.
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It just blows past without dropping a single drop of water.
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Yeah, you can look at that cloud and say it's a total failure.
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It did not do the one thing it was supposed to do right.
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But while it was passing over, it blocked the scorching heat.
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It provided shade. Exactly.
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It gave a momentary relief to the dry ground, even if it did
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not solve the drought itself. That is a brilliant way to
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understand what theologians call all common grace.
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Common grace. We should define that.
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Term Yeah. Common grace is the idea that
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God bestows certain blessings, restraints on evil, and general
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goodness on all people, regardless of their spiritual
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state. Like the rain falling on the
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just and the unjust. Yes.
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So when we apply your cloud analogy back to the text, even
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an unsuccessful attempt at sharing the gospel provides a
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shield of common grace. Just by being there.
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Right your demonstration of love, your patience when they
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ridicule you, you, your willingness to endure their
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scoring without snapping back that action is not lost into the
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void it. Provides shade.
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Yes, it puts a temporary barrier of grace between them and the
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harshness of their own choices. The ultimate design of seeing
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them converted might not be accomplished, but the effort
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itself provided shade. It was an act of love.
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So if someone listening is in that exact spot right now, maybe
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they have been trying to reach a sibling, a parent, or a friend
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for decades and every single conversation just hits a brick
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wall. It is exhausting.
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What is the practical take away here?
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Does Spurgeon just say keep trying blindly?
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Doesn't matter if it works, just keep offering shade.
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Not at all. He is intensely practical.
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He gives specific advice for those who are facing failure,
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and he compares them to a farmer.
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A farmer, right? If a farmer has a poor harvest,
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he does not just throw away his plow doing his fields and quit,
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right? He plows again in hope.
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But, and this is the vital part, he also re evaluates his
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methods. Sturgeon says to look steadily
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at your motive, your spirit, your work and your prayer.
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OK, I want to take the time to really dissect those four
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things. Motive, spirit, work, prayer.
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Because this is where the rubber meets the road.
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Let's do it. Let's start with motive.
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If someone is failing to reach their friend, how might their
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motive be corrupt without them even realizing it?
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A corrupt motive often dresses up as righteous zeal.
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Oh, that is good. Are you doing this because you
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genuinely want God's glory and this person's eternal good?
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Or are you doing this to win an argument?
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Right to prove you are smart. Exactly.
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Are you doing this to prove that your worldview is superior?
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Think about a water cooler conversation at work.
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You are debating philosophy or religion with a Co worker.
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If your primary drive is to make them look foolish so you can
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walk away feeling intellectually dominant, your motive is poison.
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You are not a rescuer anymore. Right.
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You are no longer trying to rescue a soul, you are trying to
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win a debate trophy. Spurgeon challenges the worker
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to ruthlessly examine their own heart on this.
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That makes total sense. Yeah.
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OK. What about the second one?
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Spirit. What does he mean by evaluating
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your spirit? Spirit refers to your tone, your
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demeanor, your emotional posture.
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How you carry yourself. Yes.
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Are you coming across as arrogant, condescending and
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judgmental? Or are you coming across as
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humble, broken hearted and empathetic?
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You can have the perfect argument, but a terrible spirit.
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You can have the right motive, but completely ruin it with the
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wrong spirit. If you tell someone they're
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making terrible choices, but you do it with a smirk on your face,
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they will reject the message because they reject your spirit.
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Yeah, nobody listens to someone who is talking down to them.
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Spurgeon would ask, are you speaking to this person as a
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fellow patient in the hospital, offering them the medicine that
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cured you? Or are you speaking to them as a
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healthy person, scolding a sick person for coughing?
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Wow. The hospital analogy hits hard.
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People can spot condescension from a mile away.
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They absolutely can. If your spirit is off, the words
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do not even matter. So that leads to the Third
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Point, the work itself. How do you evaluate the work?
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Evaluating the work means looking at the actual content of
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what you were saying. The actual message.
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Yes. Are you actually using
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scriptural truth? Are you pointing them to the
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objective reality of the cross? Or are you just relying on your
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own clever arguments, your own philosophy, your own political
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views? That happens so often.
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It does. Sometimes we fail because we are
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not actually sharing the gospel at all.
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We are just sharing our opinions.
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We are trying to argue them into a new sociological framework
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rather than introducing them to a Savior.
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And the final piece of the farmer's evaluation is prayer.
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Yes. Are you attempting this entirely
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in your own strength, relying on your own charisma and logic, or
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are you operating in the energy of the Holy Spirit?
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It is a check on self-reliance. Exactly surgeon is saying yes,
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do not be dispirited by failure but be aroused by it.
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Find out the reason for the failure.
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If there is a flaw on your end. Learn from other laborers who
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are seeing fruit, but resolve to leave no stone unturned.
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Want you to think about a time you poured effort into someone
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who completely rejected it. It is so easy to frame that as a
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massive waste of time, a drain on your emotional energy.
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Total loss. Yeah, but Spurgeon is
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challenging you to reframe that apparent failure.
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It is not a waste. It is a shared sorrow with
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Christ, and it is an invitation to evaluate your own heart.
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Check your motive, your spirit, your work, and your prayer, and
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then try again with more wisdom and humility.
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We have spent a lot of time on the pain of rejection, but
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Spurgeon does not stay there. No, he shifts gears pretty hard.
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He transitions from the sorrow of failure to the absolute shock
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of unexpected success. He marvels at this dynamic on a
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very personal level. He expresses sheer astonishment
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at God's mercy to him, and we need to pause and remember who
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is speaking here. We really do.
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Charles Spurgeon is widely considered one of the greatest
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orders of the 19th century. Oh.
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Absolutely. He spoke to crowds of thousands
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in London without a microphone. His sermons were printed in
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newspapers worldwide. He was a master of the English
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language. The literary giant.
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And yet he says that his poor sermons, the ones he would go
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home and cry over because he thought he did such a terrible,
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inadequate job, were the very ones that led scores of people
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to the cross. And he goes even further than
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the pulpit. He talks about casual, ordinary
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conversations. Like just chatting?
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Yes, what people would call mere chance sentences, he says.
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These unscripted, off to cuff remarks acted as winded arrows
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from God piercing people's hearts and laying them wounded
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at Jesus feet. That is wild.
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There is a massive theological concept operating under the
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surface here, which is why does God use a sermon that the
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preacher thinks is a disaster? Why does God use a random
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sentence spoken in passing on the street?
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Right. Why?
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Because God insists on using feeble instrumentality.
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Feeble Instruments. He uses weak tools so that the
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glory goes entirely to him, not to the speaker.
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The concept of the winged Arrow is so vivid.
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It is a great metaphor. It implies a precision and a
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force that does not come from the person holding the bow.
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Like if I pick up a bow and shoot an arrow, it might go 10
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feet and hit the dirt. My aim is terrible.
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Same here. But if God puts wings on that
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arrow, it will find its exact target regardless of my lack of
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skill, right? It showcases the irresistible
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nature of God's calling. It operates completely
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independent of the speaker's eloquence.
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It shatters the illusion that we can manufacture conversion
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through rhetorical brilliance. Because if we could.
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If salvation depended on our eloquence, if it was just a
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matter of making the smartest argument, then the the most
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persuasive speaker would always have the most spiritual fruit.
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And they would get the credit. Exactly, the glory would
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naturally go to the speaker. People would say look at how
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smart he is. He argued them into the Kingdom.
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But God designs the system so that the weak things can found
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the wise. I have to push back a little
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here, or at least point of the irony of this situation.
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Go on. Here is Charles Spurgeon, a guy
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with a vocabulary and a command of language that most of us
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could only dream of possessing. He was brilliant.
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And he is calling his own tools feeble.
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He is crying over his sermons. Is this just false humility?
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Oh, I see what you mean. And what does this say about our
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own self-assessment regarding our ability to share truth?
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If a genius like Spurgeon thought his sermons were
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failures, how are we supposed to evaluate our own stumbling,
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awkward attempts to articulate what we believe?
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It is not false humility. It is an accurate assessment of
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the spiritual reality. It tells us that our
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self-assessment is fundamentally unreliable.
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We are terrible judges of our own effectiveness because we
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constantly judge by earthly metrics.
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Like how smooth we sounded? Yes, we judge by how smooth our
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delivery was, how clever our argument sounded, or how the
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audience visibly reacted in the moment.
21:24
We think, Oh, they nodded, I must have nailed it.
21:26
But the spirit works invisibly. What you consider a botched,
21:31
stuttering, embarrassing attempt at explaining your faith might
21:34
be the exact winged arrow God intends to use.
21:37
Why, though? Because your lack of Polish
21:39
forces the listener to grapple with the RAW truth rather than
21:42
being distracted by your slick presentation.
21:45
Spurgeon elevates this whole concept by calling this work a
21:48
royal business. A royal business?
21:50
Yes, he. Compares it to secular pursuits.
21:53
He says rescuing a soul is far more profitable than the Pearl
21:56
fishers diving or the diamond hunter searching.
21:59
Let's look closely at that comparison, because it's very
22:02
intentional. Pearl diving and diamond hunting
22:04
in the 19th century were incredibly difficult, dangerous,
22:08
and often fruitless pursuits. You could work for years and
22:12
find nothing. A diver might hold his breath,
22:16
dive deep, bring up 100 oysters, and find absolutely nothing.
22:20
A miner might sift through tons of dirt, breaking his back for
22:23
weeks looking for one small stone.
22:26
But when they find it, the payoff is immense.
22:29
It changes everything. Spurgeon is saying that rescuing
22:32
a soul is infinitely more profitable than finding a
22:36
physical diamond. And the tools they used were
22:38
pretty basic, yes. The beauty of this royal
22:41
business is that the worker does not need to be a polished
22:45
diamond themselves. They just need to be the shovel
22:48
that digs the dirt or the diver that holds their breath.
22:51
The shovel does not have to look pretty.
22:52
Right, The instrument does not need intrinsic value, it just
22:56
needs to be willing to be used by the master.
22:59
That is something for you to really consider in your own
23:01
life. Think about the chance sentences
23:03
you speak everyday. At the grocery store, At work.
23:06
Right sitting around the dinner table chatting with a neighbor
23:09
over the fence. We script so much of our lives
23:12
where we stress over having the perfect apologetic argument
23:15
prepared in case someone asks us a tough question.
23:17
We over prepare. But those unscripted moments,
23:21
the casual conversation where you just honestly express what
23:23
you believe or how you view a tragedy through the lens of
23:26
grace, those unpolished everyday sentences might be the very
23:32
arrows God is equipping with wings.
23:34
Notice how Spurgeon shifts the focus here, though.
23:38
How so? Up until this point, he has
23:40
talked primarily about the external target, the person
23:43
being rescued. Right, the criminal or the
23:45
drowning child? But now he turns inward.
23:48
He observes that the effort to reach someone else does not just
23:51
affect the target, it fundamentally alters the person
23:54
doing the reaching. Oh, right.
23:56
The worker themselves receives a massive internal reward.
23:59
Yes, he outlines these very specific internal benefits.
24:02
He says the worker experiences a quote vent for injured fires.
24:06
What a. Phrase.
24:07
That phrase is so intense a vent for inward fires, and he says it
24:11
saves them from the sympathetic misery of watching others ruin
24:14
their souls. Let's analyze the psychological
24:17
and spiritual weight of that concept of sympathetic misery.
24:20
If you truly believe the core tenets of the Christian faith,
24:23
if you believe in the reality of eternal separation from God,
24:26
then looking at the people around you who are casually
24:29
walking away from him should cause a deep, agonizing empathy.
24:33
Should break your heart. It should keep you awake at
24:35
night. Spurgeon quotes a poem to
24:37
illustrate this heavy burden. If another lose the way, my feet
24:41
also go astray. If another downward go in my
24:44
heart is also woe. So if you are feeling that woe,
24:48
that inward fire of anxiety and grief for someone else's
24:51
well-being, the actual act of sharing the gospel is a relief
24:55
foul that is offend. It is event.
24:57
If you keep it locked inside, if you just watch them and say
25:00
nothing, it's an unendurable misery.
25:02
The pressure builds up. Speaking the truth, even if they
25:05
reject it, releases that pressure.
25:07
You have done what you could. You have worn them.
25:09
You have offered the lifeline. You can sleep at night knowing
25:11
you did not stay silent. But the internal reward goes far
25:14
beyond just releasing emotional pressure.
25:18
Spurgeon describes A rigorous hands on educational process
25:22
that happens to the Soul winner. He maps out the steps.
25:25
He does. It starts with watching for a
25:27
soul, then praying for it, then laying clans for how to reach
25:31
them, then speaking with much trembling and endeavoring to
25:36
make an impression. And then, as we discussed
25:37
earlier, inevitably facing disappointment.
25:40
Yes, and that disappointment is the catalyst for the real
25:43
education. Having been disappointed, the
25:46
worker does not just quit. They cry to God more earnestly.
25:50
They are forced to their knees. They try again.
25:53
They dig deeper. They go back to the scriptures
25:56
to look up specific promises that meet the exact case of the
26:00
person they are trying to help. They examine the divine
26:03
character to find encouragement for themselves.
26:05
So it changed them. In every single step of this
26:08
process, they are benefiting themselves.
26:10
They are being forced into a deeper, more robust
26:13
understanding of God and a much more fervent prayer life.
26:16
Let me offer an analogy for this because I think everyone can
26:19
relate to this dynamic. OK, let's hear it.
26:21
Think about a student in a math class.
26:23
They kind of know the material, They can pass the multiple
26:25
choice tests, but they do not truly deeply understand the
26:29
mechanics of the math until the teacher forces them to tutor
26:34
someone else who is completely failing the class.
26:37
Oh, that is so true. When you have to sit down and
26:39
break down a complex equation for someone who just does not
26:41
get it, it forces you back to the basics.
26:44
You have to know it inside out. You cannot rely on shortcuts.
26:47
Yeah, it forces you to understand the why behind the
26:50
what. The act of teaching becomes the
26:53
ultimate form of learning for the teacher.
26:55
That parallel hits the mark perfectly, and Spurgeon makes
26:58
this explicit. He does.
27:00
He says that when you recount the old, old story of the cross
27:04
to a weeping penitent, it calls to mind your own lost estate.
27:08
It. Brings you right back.
27:09
It reminds you of the struggles the Holy Spirit had in bringing
27:12
you to repentance. It takes you back to that
27:14
precise moment when you first realized your need for grace and
27:17
look to Jesus. It prevents spiritual amnesia.
27:20
We are so prone to forgetting what God saved us from.
27:23
Right when you are watching the process of regeneration happen
27:26
in someone else, it anchors your own soul.
27:29
We should probably define regeneration for our listeners.
27:31
Yes, good point. In Reformed theology,
27:34
regeneration is the act of God granting a new heart to a
27:37
spiritually dead person. The new birth.
27:40
Right, the new birth. When you see that marvelous
27:43
transfiguration Passover, the face of a saved person, when you
27:48
see the lights turn on, your own faith is massively confirmed.
27:51
It builds your own confidence. Spurgeon actually takes a subtle
27:54
jab at his critics here. He notes that steptics, you
27:58
know, people sitting in academic towers picking apart the Bible,
28:01
they have very little to do with actual converts.
28:04
They're just debating theory. Yes, but those who labor in the
28:07
trenches and see conversions witness a literal miracle rot
28:11
before their eyes. They are certain that this is
28:14
the finger of God. You cannot deny it when you see
28:16
it. Seeing the truth take root in
28:18
someone else is the most confirming, elevating experience
28:21
for your own soul. It banishes doubt better than
28:24
any apologetics book. So, having looked inward at how
28:27
this changes the worker, we have to turn to the external
28:30
relationships formed by this work.
28:32
The relational aspect. Yes, because Spurgeon brings up
28:36
a highly vulnerable and honestly a very rare personal story in
28:39
this text. It deals with the relational
28:43
reward, the intense joy, but also the agonizing, gut
28:48
wrenching pain of betrayal. He introduces this by talking
28:51
about the sweet reward of gratitude and affection from
28:55
those you bring to faith. That is a wonderful thing.
28:57
It is. He calls it a choice boon, the
28:59
blessedness of joying in another's joy.
29:02
He says there is a unique, powerful bond between the person
29:05
who shares the message and the person who receives it.
29:08
A spiritual kinship. But then to measure the
29:11
sweetness of this recompense, he contrasts it with its bitter
29:14
opposite. He describes what he calls the
29:16
unkindest cut of all. And this is where it gets very
29:19
personal for him. It does.
29:21
He talks about ministers whose own spiritual children, the very
29:24
people they led to faith, turn against them.
29:26
Yeah, he shares an anecdote about a certain household in
29:28
London. He had the immense joy of
29:31
bringing 4 employers and several of their employees to Faith.
29:34
A whole business, essentially. Yes, they were snatched from
29:38
complete worldliness. They were joyful confessors of
29:40
the faith, and they loved him. But things changed, right?
29:44
After a while they imbibe different opinions, they changed
29:47
their views on certain secondary theological issues, and from
29:51
that moment on they had nothing but hard words for Spurgeon and
29:55
his preaching. They turned on him completely.
29:58
He admits his heart was broken, He says.
30:00
I feel the wound much. It hurt him deeply.
30:03
He points out the tragic irony of the situation.
30:06
If they had found out more truth than he had discovered, they
30:09
might at least have remembered where they learned the basic
30:11
elements of the faith to begin with.
30:12
Right. The people who owed their
30:14
spiritual lives to him were the ones holding the knives.
30:17
I have to ask, why does Spurgeon, a man who normally
30:20
projects this immense lion like confidence in his writings,
30:24
share this deeply painful instance of betrayal in a text
30:28
that is supposed to be about rewards?
30:30
It does seem. Odd.
30:31
It seems entirely counterintuitive to bring up
30:33
your worst heartbreak when you're trying to convince people
30:36
that the reward of the work is great.
30:38
He does it to establish the stakes.
30:40
The stakes. You cannot understand the
30:42
rapture of saving a soul from death unless you understand the
30:46
deep, eternal bond it creates. The sharpness of the pain he
30:50
felt when that bond was strained proves how real and how tight
30:53
the bond is in the first place. Oh, that makes sense.
30:56
Think about it, a casual acquaintance disagreeing with
30:59
you does not break your heart, you just shrug it off.
31:01
Only family can break your heart like that.
31:03
He is showing that spiritual kinship is a bond so tight that
31:07
it's severing feels like an unnatural tragedy.
31:10
The pain validates the depth the relationship.
31:13
He compares it to natural relationships.
31:15
To make this point, he says a mother feels great delight in
31:18
your children because of intense natural love.
31:21
It is biologically wired into US, of course, but there is a
31:24
deeper love connected with spiritual kinship.
31:27
Natural relationships, as beautiful and necessary as they
31:30
are, are temporary in their earthly form, but spiritual
31:34
kinship lasts through life and continues in eternity.
31:37
He relies on a specific theological premise here, which
31:40
is he notes that in the city of God they neither marry nor are
31:43
given in marriage. The earthly institutions pass
31:46
away. Right, the Bible talks about
31:48
that. But fatherhood and brotherhood
31:50
in Christ survive. Those bonds formed by grace are
31:55
developed, not dissolved in the better land.
31:58
That is the relational reward. You are building a family that
32:02
outlasts the universe. Think about your own mentors or
32:06
the people you have poured your life into, the relational stakes
32:09
We are talking about our eternal.
32:11
Eternal. Spurgeon says talk about a
32:13
£10,000 reward. That is nothing at all.
32:16
You could spend that amount easily.
32:17
It would be gone in a flash. Right.
32:19
A fortune of gold can be squandered in a year, but you
32:22
cannot exon the delights that come from the gratitude of a
32:25
soul converted from error. The relational wealth is
32:28
infinite. And this brings us to the
32:30
climate of the entire text. We have moved from the internal
32:33
reward of the worker getting their own faith confirmed, to
32:36
the relational reward between people building an eternal
32:39
family. And now we move to the divine
32:41
perspective. The ultimate reward?
32:43
The ultimate reward? Spurgeon says the richest reward
32:45
lies in pleasing God and causing the Redeemer to see the travail
32:49
of his soul. This requires us to look at his
32:51
exegesis of Luke chapter 15. Exegesis.
32:54
Yes, we should define exegesis. For anyone new to theological
32:58
study, please do. Exegesis simply means and
33:00
pulling the true meaning out of a text by looking at the
33:03
original language, the grammar and the historical context
33:07
rather than reading our own ideas into it.
33:09
So digging out what is actually there.
33:11
Right Spurgeon looks at Luke 15, the famous chapter with the
33:15
parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the prodigal son.
33:18
Very famous stories. He focuses on the specific verse
33:21
that says there is joy in the presence of the angels of God
33:25
over 1 Sinner that repenteth. I have always read that verses
33:28
meaning the angels are throwing a party like the angels are the
33:32
ones rejoicing because the Sinner came home.
33:33
Most people read it that way, but Spurgeon's exegesis argues
33:37
that is not the primary intent of the verse.
33:40
Really look closely at the phrasing.
33:42
It does not say the angels have joy.
33:44
It says there is joy in the presence of the angels.
33:48
So whose joy is it? If the angels are standing
33:51
around the throne witnessing this joy, the joy must reside in
33:55
the heart of God Himself. It is God's joy that the angels
33:58
are observing. OK, stop right there, because
34:01
this raises A staggering theological concept.
34:03
It does. Can the infinite bliss of God be
34:05
increased? If God is perfectly happy,
34:09
completely self-sufficient, lacking nothing in his eternal
34:13
nature, which is standard Reformed theology, how can our
34:17
actions add to His joy? It sounds like a contradiction.
34:20
It sounds almost heretical to suggest a human being can make
34:23
God happier than he already is. It is a massive paradox and
34:27
Spurgeon handles it with incredible nuance.
34:30
How does he resolve it? He asks the question directly,
34:33
Is the blessed God capable of greater joy than his own
34:37
boundless happiness? And his answer is this, The
34:40
infinite bliss of God is more eminently displayed if it cannot
34:44
be increased. Let's impact that specific
34:46
phrase more eminently displayed. If it cannot be increased, how
34:50
does that work? Think of a prism sitting in a
34:52
window. OK, a glass prism.
34:54
The white sunlight hitting the prism contains all the colors of
34:56
the spectrum already, right? The prism doesn't add any new
34:59
colors to the light. The light is complete.
35:02
But when the light passes through the glass, the colors
35:04
are displayed in a brilliant spectrum on the wall in a way
35:07
they weren't before. Oh, that is a great analogy.
35:10
God's joy is infinite and complete.
35:13
We don't add to its volume. We don't make God happier.
35:16
But when a lost Sinner is found, that eternal joy is manifested,
35:20
displayed and actualized in a specific event.
35:24
Like the prodigal son. Right.
35:26
The father rejoices above measure.
35:29
When the prodigal son returns, the prism displays the light.
35:33
By participating in this work, by being the rescuer instead of
35:36
the informer, we are providing the occasion for God's eternal
35:40
joy to be put on display for all of heaven to see.
35:43
We are the prism. We are, and the text says it is
35:46
marvelous that we should be employed by the Father to give
35:48
to Christ the purchase of His agony.
35:50
The purchase of His agony. Christ suffered on the cross,
35:53
and the soul saved are the purchase, the reward for that
35:55
suffering. He paid the price and we get to
35:58
hand him the receipt. Let me use an analogy of
36:00
building a physical structure to capture what Spurgeon is saying
36:03
here. Let's hear it.
36:04
Spurgeon notes that bringing one living stone to the sheer
36:08
foundation gives the master more pleasure than erecting a vast
36:12
pile of natural stones for a meetinghouse.
36:14
OK. Building a church Building
36:16
versus building the church. Right, you can build the most
36:18
magnificent cathedral in the world.
36:21
You can stack granite stones to the sky, put in stained glass
36:24
and spend millions of dollars, but God does not live in houses
36:28
made by human hands. It is just.
36:31
Rock, the physical structure is just dead rock, but bringing one
36:35
living stone, a human soul, and placing it on the foundation of
36:38
Christ that brings actual pleasure to the Master.
36:41
This ties back to the core of everything we have been
36:43
discussing, pulling from that broad reformed framework we
36:47
mentioned at the start. The Westminster Confession.
36:49
Right, the first question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism
36:52
asks what is the chief end of man?
36:54
And the answer is man's chief end is to glorify God and to
36:59
enjoy him forever. If that is the absolute truth of
37:02
the universe, then giving Christ the purchase of His agonies is
37:07
the highest possible honor for a human being.
37:09
There is no greater calling. You are doing what you were made
37:12
to do. You are fulfilling the exact
37:14
purpose for which you were created.
37:16
Spurgeon says. What would you give to cause a
37:19
thrill of pleasure in the heart of the well beloved?
37:23
When you bring others to His feet, you give Him joy.
37:26
He makes it very personal. He makes it intensely personal
37:29
for the reader. He asks you to recollect the
37:32
grief you cost Christ, the pangs that shot through Him to deliver
37:36
you from your own sin. In light of that staggering
37:39
sacrifice, don't you long to make Him glad?
37:42
It completely reframes the initial question of motivation
37:45
that we started with. It really does.
37:47
We began with a police bounty on a brick wall, looking at
37:50
mercenaries motivated by piles of gold to do a miserable job,
37:54
the informer right. And we end with human beings
37:57
motivated by a desire to cause a thrill of pleasure in the heart
38:00
of the creator of the universe. It is a massive tectonic shift
38:03
in person. We have gone from the grimy
38:05
streaks outside a police station to the very throne room of
38:08
heaven. Quite a jump.
38:09
We have seen that the reward for rescuing a soul is not some
38:12
legalistic wage that you earn, but a pure grace that you
38:16
receive. Amen.
38:18
We have seen how failure is not a waste of time, but an
38:22
opportunity to share in the tears of Jesus and evaluate our
38:25
own hearts. The farmer evaluating his field.
38:28
Yes, we have marveled at how God uses our feeble, stumbling words
38:33
as winged arrows that hit the target despite our terrible aim.
38:37
Because of his strength, not ours.
38:39
Right. We have seen how the effort
38:41
changes us internally, forces us to rely on the Spirit, cures our
38:46
spiritual amnesia, and builds eternal bonds of kinship.
38:49
The family that outlasts the universe.
38:51
And in the end, we have seen that the highest reward is
38:54
simply being the instrument that displays the infinite joy of
38:57
God. The contrast could not be
38:59
sharper. The informer seeks gold and
39:01
earns the scorn of men. The rescuer seeks nothing but
39:04
the glory of God and receives the gratitude of souls, the
39:07
refinement of their own character, and the smile of the
39:10
Redeemer. And that leaves us with a final
39:12
thought for you to Mull over as we wrap this up.
39:14
We talked about Spurgeon crying over sermons he thought were
39:17
absolute failures, only to find out later that those were the
39:20
very words that pierced hearts like winged arrows.
39:23
Consider the interactions you have had recently.
39:25
Think about the one you are currently evaluating as your
39:28
greatest failure in communicating your faith.
39:30
We all have one. The one where you stumble over
39:33
your words, where you felt foolish, where the other person
39:36
seemed completely unfazed or even laughed at you.
39:38
Right. What if your assessment is
39:40
entirely wrong? What if that specific, flawed,
39:44
awkward interaction is the exact weaned arrow God is using in
39:48
secret right now to bring someone to himself?
39:52
Thank you for joining us on this deep dive into Charles
39:54
Spurgeon's The Soul Winner. Until next time, keep thinking.