The Prince of Preachers Charles
Haddon Spurgeon has been called England's greatest contribution
to the spread of the Gospel in the
19th century.
One of his contemporaries said that the chief
secret of Spurgeon's attractiveness was the fact that
in every sermon, no matter what the text
or the occasion, he explained the way of
salvation in simple terms.
Spurgeon's messages remain one of the great treasure
houses of Christian literature, still bringing the light
of the Gospel and the comfort of the
Scriptures to hungry souls long after the preacher
has passed into glory.
This is Charles Kelch inviting you to listen
to a message from the Prince of Preachers.
C.
H.
Spurgeon preached this message on November 18th, 1855,
at the New Park Street Chapel.
It is entitled, The Holy Ghost, The Great
Teacher.
The text is in John chapter 16 and
verse 13.
Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is
come, He will guide you into all truth,
for He shall not speak of Himself, but
whatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak,
and He will show you things to come.
This generation hath gradually and almost imperceptibly become
to a great extent a godless generation.
One of the diseases of the present generation
of mankind is their secret but deep-seated
godlessness, by which they have so far departed
from the knowledge of God.
Science has discovered to us second causes, and
hence many have too much forgotten the first
great cause, the author of all.
They have been able so far to pry
into secrets that the great axiom of the
existence of a god has been too much
neglected.
Even among professing Christians, while there is a
great amount of religion, there is too little
godliness.
There is much external formalism, but too little
inward acknowledgment of God, too little living on
God, living with God, and relying upon God.
Hence arises the sad fact that when you
enter many of our places of worship, you
will certainly hear the name of God mentioned,
but except in the benediction, you would scarcely
know there was a Trinity.
In many places dedicated to Jehovah, the name
of Jesus is too often kept in the
background.
The Holy Spirit is almost entirely neglected, and
very little is said concerning His sacred influence.
Even religious men have become to a large
degree godless in this age.
We sadly require more preaching regarding God, more
preaching of those things which look not so
much at the creature to be saved as
at God the Great One to be extolled.
My firm conviction is that in proportion as
we have more regard for the sacred Godhead,
the wondrous Trinity in unity, shall we see
a greater display of God's power and a
more glorious manifestation of His might in our
churches.
May God send us a Christ-exalting, Spirit
-loving ministry, men who shall proclaim God the
Holy Ghost in all His offices, and shall
extol God the Saviour as the author and
finisher of our faith, not neglecting that great
God, the Father of His people, who before
all worlds elected us in Christ His Son,
justified us through His righteousness, and will inevitably
preserve us and gather us together in one,
in the consummation of all things, at the
last great day.
Our text has regard to God the Holy
Spirit.
Of Him we shall speak, and Him only,
if His sweet influence shall rest upon us.
The disciples had been instructed by Christ concerning
certain elementary doctrines, but Jesus did not teach
His disciples more than what we should call
the ABCs of religion.
He gives His reasons for this in the
twelfth verse.
I have yet many things to say unto
you, but ye cannot bear them now.
His disciples were not possessors of the Spirit.
They had the Spirit so far as the
work of conversion was concerned, but not as
to the matters of bright illumination, profound instruction,
prophecy, and inspiration.
He said, I am now about to depart,
and when I go from you, I will
send the Comforter unto you.
Ye cannot bear these things now.
Howbeit, when He, the Spirit of truth, is
come, He will guide you into all truth.
The same promise that He made to His
apostles stands good to all His children.
And in reviewing it, we shall take it
as our portion and heritage, and shall not
consider ourselves intruders upon the manner of the
apostles, or upon their exclusive rites and prerogatives.
For we conceive that Jesus says even to
us, When He, the Spirit of truth, is
come, He will guide you into all truth.
Dwelling exclusively upon our text, we have five
things.
First of all, here is an attainment mentioned,
a knowledge of all truth.
Secondly, here is a difficulty suggested, which is
that we need guidance into all truth.
Thirdly, here is a person provided.
When He, the Spirit, shall come, He shall
guide you into all truth.
Fourthly, here is a manner hinted at.
He shall guide you into all truth.
Fifthly, here is a sign given as to
the working of the Spirit.
We may know whether He works by His
guiding us into all truth, into all of
one thing, not truths, but truth.
First, here is an attainment mentioned, which is
a knowledge of all truth.
We know that some conceive doctrinal knowledge to
be of very little importance, and of no
practical use.
We do not think so.
We believe the science of Christ crucified, and
a judgment of the teachings of Scripture to
be exceedingly valuable.
We think it is right that the Christian
ministry should not only be arousing, but instructing,
not merely awakening, but enlightening, that it should
appeal not only to the passions, but to
the understanding.
We are far from thinking doctrinal knowledge to
be of secondary importance.
We believe it to be one of the
first things in the Christian life, to know
the truth and then to practice it.
We scarcely need this morning to tell you
how desirable it is for us to be
well taught in the things of the kingdom.
First of all, nature itself, when it hath
been sanctified by grace, gives us a strong
desire to know all truth.
The natural man separateth himself and intermedleth with
all knowledge.
God has put an instinct in him by
which he is rendered unsatisfied if he cannot
probe mystery to its bottom.
He can never be content until he can
unriddle secrets.
What we call curiosity is something given us
of God, impelling us to search into the
knowledge of natural things.
That curiosity, sanctified by the Spirit, is also
brought to bear in matters of heavenly science
and celestial wisdom.
Bless the Lord, said David, O my soul,
and all that is within me bless his
holy name.
If there is a curiosity within us, it
ought to be employed and developed in a
search after truth.
All that is within me, sanctified by the
Spirit, should be developed.
And verily, the Christian man feels an intense
longing to bury his ignorance and receive wisdom.
If he, when in his natural state, panted
for terrestrial knowledge, how much more ardent is
the wish to unravel, if possible, the sacred
mysteries of God's word?
A true Christian is always intently reading and
searching the Scripture that he may be able
to certify himself as to its main and
cardinal truths.
I do not think much of that man
who does not wish to understand doctrines.
I cannot conceive him to be in a
right position when he thinks it is no
matter whether he believes a lie or truth,
whether he is heretic or orthodox, whether he
received the word of God as it is
written or as it is diluted and misconstrued
by man.
God's word will ever be to a Christian
a source of great anxiety.
A sacred instinct within will lead him to
pry into it.
He will seek to understand it.
Oh, there are some who forget this, men
who purposely abstain from mentioning what are called
high doctrines because they think that if they
should mention high doctrines, they would be dangerous,
so they keep them back.
Foolish men!
They do not know anything of human nature,
for if they did understand a grain's worth
of humanity, they would know that the hiding
of these things impels men to search them
out.
From the fact that they do not mention
them, they drive men to places where these
and these only are preached.
They say, If I preach election and predestination
and these dark things, people will all go
straight away and become antinomians.
I am not so sure if they were
to be called antinomians, it would hurt them
very much.
But hear me, O ye ministers that conceal
these truths, that is the way to make
them antinomians, by silencing these doctrines.
Curiosity is strong.
If you tell them they must not pluck
the truth, they will be sure to do
it.
But if you give it to them as
you find it in God's word, they will
not seek to wrest it.
Enlightened men will have the truth, and if
they see election in Scripture, they will say,
It is there, and I will find it
out.
If I cannot get it in one place,
I will get it in another.
The true Christian has an inward longing and
anxiety after it.
He is hungry and thirsty after the word
of righteousness, and he must and will feed
on this bread of heaven, where at all
hazards he will leave the husks which unsound
divines would offer him.
Not only is this attainment to be desired,
because nature teaches us so, but a knowledge
of all truth is very essential for our
comfort.
I do believe that many persons have been
distressed half their lives from the fact that
they have not had clear views of truth.
Many poor souls, for instance, under conviction, abide
two or three or four times as long
in sorrow of mind as they would require
to do if they had someone to instruct
them in the great matter of justification.
So there are believers who are often troubling
themselves about falling away.
But if they knew in their soul the
great consolation that we are kept by the
grace of God through faith unto salvation, they
would be no more troubled about it.
So I have found some distressed about the
unpardonable sin.
But if God instructs us in that doctrine
and shows us that no conscience that is
really awakened ever can commit that sin, but
that when it is committed God gives us
up to a seared conscience so that we
never fear or tremble afterwards, all that distress
would be alleviated.
Depend on this.
The more you know of God's truth, all
things else being equal, the more comfortable you
will be as a Christian.
Nothing can give a greater light on your
path than a clear understanding of divine things.
It is a mingle-mangled gospel too commonly
preached which causes the downcast faces of Christians.
Give me the congregation whose faces are bright
with joy.
Let their eyes glisten at the sound of
the gospel.
Then will I believe that it is God's
own words they are receiving.
Instead thereof you will often see melancholy congregations
whose visages are not much different from the
bitter countenance of poor creatures swallowing medicine because
the word spoken terrifies them by its legality
instead of comforting them by its grace.
We love a cheerful gospel, and we think
all the truth will tend to comfort the
Christian.
Comfort again, says another.
Always comfort.
Ah, but there is another reason why we
prize the truth.
Because we believe that a true knowledge of
all the truth will keep us very much
out of danger.
No doctrine is so calculated to preserve a
man from sin as the doctrine of the
grace of God.
Those who have called it a licentious doctrine
did not know anything at all about it.
Poor ignorant things!
They little knew that their own vile stuff
was the most licentious doctrine under heaven.
If they knew the grace of God in
truth they would soon see that there was
no preservative from lying like a knowledge that
we are elect of God from the foundation
of the world.
There is nothing like a belief in my
eternal perseverance and the immutability of my Father's
affection which can keep me near to Him
from a motive of simple gratitude.
Nothing makes a man so virtuous as belief
of truth.
A lying doctrine will soon beget a lying
practice.
A man cannot have an erroneous belief without
by and by having an erroneous life.
I believe the one thing naturally begets the
other.
Keep near God's truth.
Keep near His word.
Keep the head right, and especially keep your
heart right with regard to truth and your
feet will not go far astray.
Again, I also hold that this attainment to
the knowledge of all truth is very desirable
for the usefulness which it will give us
in the world at large.
We should not be selfish.
We should always consider whether a thing will
be beneficial to others.
A knowledge of all truth will make us
very serviceable in this world.
We shall be skillful physicians who know how
to take the poor distressed soul aside to
put the finger on his eye and to
take the scale off from him that heaven's
light may comfort him.
There will be no character, however perplexing may
be its peculiar phase, but we shall be
able to speak to it and comfort it.
He who holds the truth is usually the
most useful man.
As a good Presbyterian brother said to me
the other day, I know God has blessed
you exceedingly in gathering in souls, but it
is an extraordinary fact that nearly all the
men I know, with scarcely an exception, who
have been made useful in gathering in souls,
have held the great doctrines of the grace
of God.
Almost every man whom God has blessed to
the building up of the church in prosperity
and around whom the people have rallied has
been a man who has held firmly free
grace from first to last through the finished
salvation of Christ.
Do not think you need have errors in
your doctrine to make you useful.
We have some who preach Calvinism all the
first part of the sermon and finish up
with Arminianism because they think that will make
them useful.
Useful nonsense!
That is all it is.
A man, if he cannot be useful with
truth, cannot be useful with an error.
There is enough in the pure doctrine of
God without introducing heresies to preach to sinners.
As far as I know, I never felt
hampered or cramped in addressing the ungodly in
my life.
I can speak with as much fervency, and
yet not in the same style as those
who hold the contrary views of God's truth.
Those who hold God's word never need add
something untrue in speaking to men.
The sturdy truth of God touches every cord
in every man's heart.
If we can, by God's grace, put our
hand inside man's heart, we want nothing but
that whole truth to move him thoroughly and
to stir him up.
There is nothing like the real truth and
the whole truth to make a man useful.
Now again, here is a difficulty suggested, and
that is that we require a guide to
conduct us into all truth.
The difficulty is that truth is not so
easy to discover.
There is no man born in this world
by nature who has the truth in his
heart.
There is no creature that was ever fashioned
since the fall who has a knowledge of
truth innate and natural.
It has been disputed by many philosophers whether
there are such things as innate ideas at
all.
But it is of no use disputing as
to whether there are any innate ideas of
truth.
There are none such.
There are ideas of everything that is wrong
and evil, but in us, that is, in
our flesh, there dwelleth no good thing.
We are born in sin and shapened in
iniquity.
In sin did our mother conceive us.
There is nothing in us good and no
tendency to righteousness.
Then, since we are not born with the
truth, we have the task of searching for
it.
If we are to be blessed by being
eminently useful as Christian men, we must be
well instructed in matters of revelation.
But here is the difficulty, that we cannot
follow without a guide the winding paths of
truth.
Why this?
First, because of the very intricacy of truth
itself.
Truth itself is no easy thing to discover.
Those who fancy they know everything and constantly
dogmatize with the spirit of We are the
men, and wisdom will die with us, of
course see no difficulties whatever in the system
they hold.
But I believe the most earnest student of
Scripture will find things in the Bible which
puzzle him.
However earnestly he reads it, he will see
some mysteries too deep for him to understand.
He will cry out, Truth, I cannot find
thee.
I know not where thou art.
Thou art beyond me.
I cannot fully view thee.
Truth is a path so narrow that two
can scarce walk together in it.
We usually tread the narrow way in single
file.
Two men can seldom walk arm in arm
in the truth.
We believe the same truth in the main,
but we cannot walk together in the path.
It is too narrow.
The way of truth is very difficult.
If you step an inch aside on the
right, you are in dangerous error.
If you swerve a little to the left,
you are equally in the mire.
On the one hand there is a huge
precipice, and on the other a deep morass.
And unless you keep to the true line,
to the breadth of a hair you will
go astray.
Truth is a narrow path indeed.
It is a path the eagle's eye hath
not seen, and a depth the diver hath
not visited.
It is like the veins of metal in
a mine.
It is often of excessive thinness, and moreover
it runneth not in one continued layer.
Lose it once, and you may dig for
miles and not discover it again.
The eye must watch perpetually the direction of
the load.
Grains of truth are like the grains of
gold in the rivers of Australia.
They must be shaken by the hand of
patience, washed in the stream of honesty, or
the fine gold will be mingled with sand.
Truth is often mingled with error, and it
is hard to distinguish it.
But we bless God, it is said, when
the Spirit of truth is come, He will
guide you into all truth.
Another reason why we need a guide is
the invidiousness of error.
It easily steals upon us, and, if I
may so describe our position, we are often
like we were on Thursday night in that
tremendous fog.
Most of us were feeling for ourselves and
wondering where on earth we were.
We could scarcely see an inch before us.
We came to a place where there were
three turnings.
We thought we knew the old spot.
There was the lamppost, and now we must
take a sharp turn to the left.
But not so.
We ought to have gone a little to
the right.
We have been so often to the same
place that we think we know every flagstone,
and there is our friend's shop over the
way.
It is dark, but we think we must
be quite right.
And all the while we are quite wrong
and find ourselves half a mile out of
the way.
So it is with matters of truth.
We think surely this is the right path,
and the voice of the evil one whispers,
that is the way.
Walk ye in it.
You do so, and you find your great
dismay that instead of the path of truth,
you have been walking in the paths of
unrighteousness and erroneous doctrines.
The way of life is a labyrinth.
The grassiest paths and the most bewitching are
the farthest away from right.
The most enticing are those which are garnished
with rested truths.
I believe there is not a counterfeit coin
in the world so much like a genuine
one, as some errors are like the truth.
One is base metal.
The other is true gold.
Still, in externals, they differ very little.
We also need a guide, because we are
so prone to go astray.
Why, if the paths of heaven were as
straight as Bunyan pictures it, with no turning
to the right hand or to the left,
and no doubt it is, we are so
prone to go astray that we should go
to the right hand to the mountains of
destruction or to the left in the dark
wood of desolation.
David said, I have gone astray like a
lost sheep.
That means very often.
For if a sheep is put into a
field twenty times, if it does not get
out twenty-one times, it will be because
it cannot, because the place is so hurdled
up, and it cannot find a hole in
the hedge.
If grace did not guide a man, he
would go astray, though there were handposts all
the way to heaven.
Let it be written, This is the way
to the city of refuge.
He would turn aside, and the avenger of
blood would overtake him.
If some guide did not, like the angels
in Sodom, put his hand on his shoulders
and cry, Escape!
Escape for thy life!
Look not behind thee!
Stay not in all the plain!
These, then, are the reasons why we need
a guide.
In the third place, here is a person
provided.
This is none other than God, and this
God is none other than a person.
This person is He the Spirit, the Spirit
of truth, not an influence or an emanation,
but actually a person.
When the Spirit of truth is come, He
shall guide you into all truth.
Now we wish you to look at this
guide, to consider how adapted He is to
us.
In the first place, He is infallible.
He knows everything and cannot lead us astray.
If I pin my sleeve to another man's
coat, he may lead me part of the
way rightly.
By and by he will go wrong himself,
and I shall be led astray with him.
But if I give myself to the Holy
Ghost and seek His guidance, there is no
fear of my wandering.
Again, we rejoice in this Spirit because He
is ever present.
We fall into a difficulty sometimes.
We say, Oh, if I could take this
to my minister, he would explain it, but
I live so far off and am not
able to see him.
That perplexes us, and we turn the text
round and round and cannot make anything out
of it.
We look at the commentators.
We take down pious Thomas Scott, and as
usual, he says nothing about it.
It would be a dark passage.
Then we go to holy Matthew Henry, and
if it is an easy scripture, he is
sure to explain it.
But if it is a text hard to
be understood, it is likely enough, of course,
left in his own gloom.
And even Dr. Gill himself, the most consistent
of commentators, when he comes to a hard
passage, manifestly avoids it in some degree.
But when we have no commentator or minister,
we have still the Holy Spirit.
And let me tell you a little secret.
Whenever you cannot understand a text, open your
Bible, bend your knee, and pray over that
text.
And if it does not split into atoms
and open itself, try again.
If prayer does not explain it, it is
one of the things God did not intend
you to know, and you may be content
to be ignorant of it.
Prayer is the key that openeth the cabinets
of mystery.
Prayer and faith are sacred picklocks that can
open secrets and obtain great treasures.
There is no college for holy education like
that of the Blessed Spirit, for He is
an ever-present tutor to whom we have
only to bend the knee, and He is
at our side, the great expositor of truth.
But there is one thing about the suitability
of this guide which is remarkable.
I do not know whether it struck you.
The Holy Spirit can guide us into a
truth.
Now, man can guide us to a truth,
but it is only the Holy Spirit who
can guide us into a truth.
When He, the Spirit of truth, shall come,
He shall guide you into, mark that word,
all truth.
Now, for instance, it is a long while
before you can lead some people to election,
but when you have made them see its
correctness, you have not led them into it.
You may show them that it is plainly
stated in Scripture, but they will turn away
and hate it.
You may take them to another great truth,
but they have been brought up in a
different fashion, and though they cannot answer your
arguments, they say, The man is right, perhaps,
and they whisper, but so low that conscience
itself cannot hear.
But it is so contrary to my prejudices
that I cannot receive it.
After you have led them to the truth,
and they see it is true, how hard
it is to lead them into it.
There are many of my hearers who are
brought to the truth of their depravity, but
they are not brought into it and made
to feel it.
Some of you are brought to know the
truth that God keeps us from day to
day, but you rarely get into it, so
as to live in continual dependence upon God
the Holy Spirit and draw fresh supplies from
Him.
The thing is to get inside it.
A Christian should do with truth as a
snail does with his shell, live inside it,
as well as carry it on his back
and bear it perpetually about with him.
The Holy Ghost, it is said, shall lead
us into all truth.
You may be brought to a chamber where
there is an abundance of gold and silver,
but you will be no richer unless you
effect an entrance.
It is the Spirit's work to unbar the
two-leaved gates and bring us into a
truth so that we may get inside it.
And as dear old Roland Hill said, not
only hold the truth, but have the truth
hold us.
Fourthly, here is a method suggested.
He shall guide you into all truth.
Now I must have an illustration.
I must compare truth to some cave or
grotto that you have heard of, with wondrous
stalactites hanging from the roof and others starting
from the floor, a cavern glittering with spar
and abounding in marvels.
Before entering the cavern, you inquire for a
guide who comes with his lighted torch.
He conducts you down to a considerable depth,
and you find yourself in the midst of
the cave.
He leads you through different chambers.
Here he points to a little stream rushing
from amid the rocks and indicates its rise
and progress.
There he points to some peculiar rock and
tells you its name, then takes you into
a large natural hall, tells you how many
persons once feasted in it, and so on.
Truth is a grand series of caverns.
It is our glory to have so great
and wise a conductor.
Imagine that we are coming to the darkness
of it.
He is a light shining in the midst
of us to guide us.
By the light he shows us wondrous things.
In three ways the Holy Ghost teaches us,
by suggestion, direction, and illumination.
First he guides us into all truth by
suggesting it.
There are thoughts that dwell in our minds
that were not born there, but which were
exotics brought from heaven and put there by
the Spirit.
It is not a fancy that angels whisper
into our ears and that devils do the
same.
Both good and evil spirits hold converse with
men, and some of us have known it.
We have had strange thoughts which were not
the offspring of our souls, but which came
from angelic visitants.
And direct temptations and evil insinuations have we
had which were not brewed in our own
souls, but which came from the pestilential cauldron
of hell.
So the Spirit doth speak in men's ears,
sometimes in the darkness of the night.
In ages gone by He spoke in dreams
and visions, but now He speaketh by His
word.
Have you not at times had unaccountably in
the middle of your business a thought concerning
God and heavenly things and could not tell
whence it came?
Have you not been reading or studying the
Scripture, but a text came across your mind
and you could not help it?
Though you even put it down, it was
like a cork in water and would swim
up again to the top of your mind.
Well, that good thought was put there by
the Spirit.
He often guides His people into all truth
by suggesting, just as the guide in the
grotto does with his torch.
He does not say a word, perhaps, but
He walks into the passage Himself and you
follow Him.
So the Spirit suggests a thought, and your
heart follows it up.
Well, can I remember the manner in which
I learned the doctrines of grace in a
single instant?
Born, as all of us are by nature,
an Arminian, I still believe the old things
I heard continually from the pulpit and did
not see the grace of God.
I remember sitting one day in the house
of God and hearing a sermon as dry
as possible and as worthless as all such
sermons are, when a thought struck my mind.
How came I to be converted?
I prayed, thought I.
Then I thought, how came I to pray?
I was induced to pray by reading the
Scriptures.
How came I to read the Scriptures?
Why, I did read them.
And what led me to that?
And then, in a moment, I saw that
God was at the bottom of all, and
that He was the author of faith.
And then the whole doctrine opened up to
me, from which I have not departed.
But sometimes He leads us by direction.
The guide points and says, There, gentlemen, go
along that particular path.
That is the way.
So the Spirit gives a direction and tendency
to our thoughts, not suggesting a new one,
but letting a particular thought, when it starts,
take such and such a direction, not so
much putting a boat on the stream as
steering it when it is there.
When our thoughts are considering sacred things, He
leads us into a more excellent channel from
that in which we started.
Time after time have you commenced a meditation
on a certain doctrine, and unaccountably you were
gradually led away into another, and you saw
how one doctrine leaned on another, as is
the case with the stones in the arch
of a bridge, all hanging on the keystone
of Jesus Christ crucified.
You were brought to see these things not
by a new idea suggested, but by direction
given to your thoughts.
But perhaps the best way in which the
Holy Ghost leads us into all truth is
by illumination.
He illuminates the Bible.
Now have any of you an illuminated Bible
at home?
No, says one.
I have a Morocco Bible.
I have a polyglot Bible.
I have a marginal reference Bible.
Ha ha, that is all very well.
But have you an illuminated Bible?
Yes, I have a large family Bible with
pictures in it.
There is a picture of John the Baptist
baptizing Christ by pouring water on his head
and many other such things, but that is
not what I mean.
Have you an illuminated Bible?
Yes, I have a Bible with splendid engravings
in it.
Yes, I know you may have.
But have you an illuminated Bible?
I don't understand what you mean by an
illuminated Bible.
Well, it is the Christian man who has
an illuminated Bible.
He does not buy it illuminated originally, but
when he reads it, a glory gilds the
sacred page, majestic like the sun, which gives
a light to every age.
It gives, but borrows none.
There is nothing like reading an illuminated Bible,
beloved.
You may read to all eternity and never
learn anything by it, unless it is illuminated
by the Spirit, and then the words shine
forth like stars.
The book seems to be made of gold
leaf.
Every single letter glitters like a diamond.
Oh, it is a blessed thing to read
an illuminated Bible, lit up by the radiance
of the Holy Ghost.
Hast thou read the Bible and studied it,
my brother, and yet have thine eyes been
unenlightened?
Go and say, O Lord, build the Bible
for me.
I want an expounded Bible.
Illuminate it, shine upon it, for I cannot
read it to profit unless thou enlightenest me.
Blind men may read the Bible with their
fingers, but blind souls cannot.
We want a light to read the Bible
by.
There is no reading it in the dark.
Thus the Holy Spirit leads us into all
truth by suggesting ideas, by directing our thoughts,
and by illuminating the Scriptures as we read
them.
The last thing is an evidence.
The question arises, how may I know whether
I am enlightened by the Spirit's influence and
led into all truth?
First, you may know the Spirit's influence by
its unity.
He guides us into all truth.
Secondly, by its universality.
He guides us into all truth.
First, if you are judging a minister, whether
he has the Holy Ghost in him or
not, you may know him in the first
place by the constant unity of his testimony.
A man cannot be enlightened by the Holy
Spirit who preaches yea and nay.
The Spirit never says one thing at one
time and another thing at another time.
There are indeed many good men who say
both yea and nay, but still their contrary
testimonies are not both from God the Spirit,
for God the Spirit cannot witness to black
and white, to a falsehood and truth.
It has always been held as a first
principle that truth is one thing.
But some persons say, I find one thing
in one part of the Bible and another
thing in another, and though it contradicts itself,
I must believe it.
All quite right, brother, if it did contradict
itself.
But the fault is not in the wood,
but in the carpenter.
Many carpenters do not understand dovetailing.
So there are many preachers who do not
understand dovetailing.
It is a very nice work, and it
is not easily learnt.
It takes some apprenticeship to make all doctrines
square together.
Some preachers preach very good Calvinism for half
an hour, and for the next quarter of
an hour Arminianism.
If they are Calvinists, let them stick to
it.
If they are Arminians, let them stick to
it.
Let their preaching be all of one piece.
Don't let them pile up things only to
kick them all down again.
Let us have one thing woven from the
top throughout, and let us not rend it.
How did Solomon know the true mother of
the child?
Cut it in half, said he.
The woman who was not the mother did
not care, so long as the other did
not get the whole, and she consented.
Ah, said the true mother, give her the
living child.
Let her have it, rather than cut it
in half.
So the true child of God would say,
I give it up.
Let my opponent conquer.
I do not want to have the truth
cut in halves.
I would rather be all wrong than have
the word altered to my taste.
We do not want to have a divided
Bible.
No, we claim the whole living child, or
none at all.
We may rest assured of this, that until
we get rid of our lindsey-woolsey doctrine
and cease to sow mingle seed, we shall
not have a blessing.
An enlightened mind cannot believe a gospel which
denies itself.
It must be one thing or the other.
One thing cannot contradict another, and yet it
and its opposite be equally true.
You may know the Spirit's influence, then, by
the unity of its testimony.
And you may know it by its universality.
The true child of God will not be
led into some truth, but into all truth.
When first he starts, he will not know
half the truth.
He will believe it, but not understand it.
He will have the germ of it, but
not the sum total in all its breadth
and length.
There is nothing like learning by experience.
A man cannot set up for a theologian
in a week.
Certain doctrines take years to develop themselves.
Like the aloe that taketh a hundred years
to be dressed, there be some truths that
must lie long in the heart before they
really come out and make themselves appear so
that we can speak of them as that
we do know, and testify of that which
we have seen.
The Spirit will gradually lead us into all
truth.
For instance, if it be true that Jesus
Christ is to reign upon the earth personally
for a thousand years, as I am inclined
to believe it is, if I be under
the Spirit, that will be more and more
open to me, until I with confidence declare
it.
Some men begin very timidly.
A man says at first, I know we
are justified by faith, and have peace with
God, but so many have cried out against
eternal justification that I am afraid of it.
But he is gradually enlightened, and led to
see that in the same hour when all
his debts were paid, a full discharge was
given.
That in the moment when its sin was
cancelled, every elect soul was justified in God's
mind, though they were not justified in their
own minds till afterwards.
The Spirit shall lead you into all truth.
Now, what are the practical inferences from this
great doctrine?
The first is with reference to the Christian
who is afraid of his own ignorance.
How many are there who are just enlightened,
and have tasted of heavenly things, who are
afraid they are too ignorant to be saved?
Beloved, God the Holy Spirit can teach anyone,
however illiterate, however uninstructed.
I have known some men who were almost
idiots before conversion, but afterwards had their faculties
wonderfully developed.
Some time ago there was a man who
was so ignorant that he could not read,
and he never spoke anything like grammar in
his life unless by mistake.
Moreover, he was considered to be what the
people in his neighborhood called daft.
But when he was converted, the first thing
he did was to pray.
He stammered out a few words, and in
a little time his powers of speaking began
to develop themselves.
Then he thought he would like to read
the Scriptures, and after long, long months of
labor, he learned to read.
And what was the next thing?
He thought he could preach, and he did
preach a little in his own homely way
in his house.
Then he thought, I must read a few
more books, and so his mind expanded until
I believe he is at the present day
a useful minister settled in a country village
laboring for God.
It needs but little intellect to be taught
of God.
If you feel your ignorance, do not despair.
Go to the Spirit, the great Teacher, and
ask His sacred influence, and it shall come
to pass that He shall guide you into
all truth.
Another inference is this.
Whenever any of our brethren do not understand
the truth, let us take a hint as
to the best way of dealing with them.
Do not let us controvert with them.
I have heard many controversies, but never heard
of any good from one of them.
We have had controversies with certain men called
secularists, and very strong arguments have been brought
against them.
But I believe that the day of judgment
shall declare that a very small amount of
good was ever done by contending with these
men.
Better let them alone.
Where no fuel is, the fire goeth out.
And he that debateth with them puts wood
upon the fire.
Few men are taught by controversy, for a
man convinced against his will is of the
same opinion still.
Pray for them that the Spirit of truth
may lead them into all truth.
Do not be angry with your brother, but
pray for him.
Cry, Lord, open Thou His eyes, that He
may behold wondrous things out of Thy law.
Lastly, we speak to some of you who
know nothing about the Spirit of truth, nor
about the truth itself.
It may be that some of you are
saying, We care not much which of you
are right.
We are happily indifferent to it.
Ah, but poor sinner, if Thou knewest the
gift of God, and who it was that
spake the truth, Thou wouldst not say, I
care not for it.
If Thou didst know how essential the truth
is to Thy salvation, Thou wouldst not talk
so.
If Thou didst know that the truth of
God is, that Thou art a worthless sinner,
but if Thou believest, then God from all
eternity, apart from all Thy merits, loved Thee,
and bought Thee with the Redeemer's blood, and
justified Thee in the form of heaven, and
will by and by justify Thee in the
form of Thy conscience through the Holy Ghost
by faith.
If Thou didst know that there is a
heaven for Thee, beyond the chance of a
failure, a crown for Thee, the luster of
which can never be dimmed, then Thou wouldst
say, Indeed, the truth is precious to my
soul.
Why, my ungodly hearers, these men of error
want to take away the truth which alone
can save you, the only gospel that can
deliver you from hell.
They deny the great truths of free grace,
those fundamental doctrines which alone can snatch a
sinner from hell.
And even though you do not feel interest
in them now, I still would say you
ought to desire to see them promoted.
May God give you to know the truth
in your hearts.
May the Spirit guide you into all truth.
For if you do not know the truth
here, recollect there will be a sorrowful learning
of it in the dark chambers of the
pit, where the only light shall be the
flames of hell.
May you here know the truth, and the
truth shall make you free.
And if the Son shall make you free,
ye shall be free indeed.
For He says, I am the way, the
truth, the life.
Believe on Jesus, Thou chief of sinners.
Trust His love and mercy, and Thou art
saved.
For God the Spirit giveth faith and eternal
life.
This message, The Holy Ghost, The Great Teacher,
was preached by Charles Haddon Spurgeon on November
18th, 1855.
This is Charles Kelsch inviting you to join
me again for another message from The Prince
of Preachers.