Faithful to Christ: A Challenge to Truly Live for Christ

by Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Pride is something that should be unnatural to us, for we have nothing to be proud of.

Pride is foolish. It brings no profit with it. There is no wisdom in self-exaltation.

Sometimes pride takes a doctrinal shape. It teaches the doctrine of self-sufficiency. It tells us what we can do, and will not admit that we are lost, fallen, debased, and ruined creatures, as we are. It hates divine sovereignty and condemns the doctrine of election.

It acknowledges that the doctrine of free grace is true, but does not feel it. It acknowledges that salvation is of the Lord alone, but still it urges people to seek heaven by their own works, even by the deeds of the law. When driven from that, it will persuade people to add something to Christ in the matter of salvation.

This right here!

Pride will make him forget that he has not yet attained. It will not allow him to press forward to the things that are before, forgetting the things that are behind (Philippians 3:12-14). It enters into his heart and tempts him to set up an independent business for himself – and until the Lord brings about a spiritual bankruptcy, pride will keep him from going to God.

The true throne of pride everywhere is the heart of man. If we desire, by God’s grace, to put down pride, the only way is to begin with the heart.

“My son, hear the word of wisdom. If you are wrong, do not seek to correct your outward life, but seek first to get your heart correct, for out of it are the issues of life, and your life will be pure when your heart is pure.”

So if you want to get rid of pride, you should not think that you can do so by dressing in a certain way or speaking with pious words, but seek God that He would purify your heart from pride, and then assuredly, if pride is purged from your heart, your life also will be humble. Make the tree good, and the fruit will be good (Matthew 12:33). Make the fountain pure, and the stream will be sweet.

For by grace are ye saved through faith and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast (Ephesians 2:8-9).

it is said in Revelation 3:7 that Jesus holds the key of heaven, and what He opens, no one shuts, and what He shuts, no one opens?” Explaining it to her more fully, he said, “It is Christ, and Christ alone, who can open heaven to you, and not your good works.”

If you think that you will enter heaven by your good works, never was there a more deadly delusion, and you will find, at the last great day, that your hopes were worthless.

Without faith it is impossible to be saved and to please God (Hebrews 11:6), because without faith there is no union with Christ.

If I come before God’s throne with my prayers, I will never get them answered unless I bring Christ with me.

The way to read it is this: “No man can serve two masters.” They cannot both be masters. He can serve two, but they cannot both be his master. A man can serve two, or twenty, who are not his masters. He can live for twenty different purposes, but he cannot live for more than one master purpose – there can only be one master purpose in his soul.

Rest assured that no confession of sin can be genuine unless it is a wholehearted one. It is of no use for you to say, “I have sinned,” and then keep on sinning. “I have sinned,” you say, and it is a good, fair face you show, but you will go away and willingly commit the same sin!

It is meaningless and useless for you to say, “I have sinned,” unless you mean it from your heart. The double-minded person’s confession is of no avail.

The sorrows of time are trivial indeed when compared with the pains of everlasting punishment.

On the other hand, we consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the coming glory which shall be manifested in us (Romans 8:18).

our desires are of a larger span, and nothing but God can fill them. How sad for the one who can find satisfaction in earthly things!

Why do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which does not satisfy? (Isaiah 55:2).

the wineglass of pleasure.” This is the first cup at the banqueting house of Satan.

the self-indulgent person soon discovers that all the rounds of pleasure end in being unsatisfied. He says, “What more can I do?

This is the devil’s second course: the course of overindulgence – a fitful drowsiness, the result of the previous excess.

Some fresh invention whereby they may kill time,

Ouch...

the wine of self-satisfaction, and around the brim you can see the bubbles of pride.

the cup of discontent and restlessness of mind, and there are many who have to drink this after all their self-satisfaction. You who are very good in your own opinion but have no interest in Christ,

the fate of the self-righteous. You thought there was a bridge of ceremonies and religion. You believed that baptism, confirmation, and the Lord’s Supper made up the solid arches of a bridge of good works and duties.

you discover what it is to perish through having neglected the great salvation and attempting to save yourself through your own good works.

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God (1 Peter 5:6). Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved (Acts 16:31).

those who want to be rich fall into temptation and a snare. Wealth ill-gotten, ill-used, or hoarded brings a poison with it that does not harm the gold and silver, but poisons the man’s heart; and a poisoned heart is one of the most awful things a person can have.

There are three things that are never satisfied, yea, four things say not, It is enough: Sheol; and the barren womb; the earth that is not filled with water; and the fire that never says, It is enough (Proverbs 30:15-16).

he who lives to himself here must perish. He who sets his affections upon the things of earth has not dug deep; he has built his house upon the sand. When the rain descends and the floods come, his house will fall down, and great must be the fall thereof.

I see before my mind’s eye the blackened skeletons of hundreds of fine professions of faith. Multitudes – multitudes have perished in the valley of temptation, who once, to all human judgment, had been on the way to heaven and had made a show in the flesh.

Many people have said, “I will be a pilgrim,” but they met Apollyon on the road, and they have turned back.[1] Many people have put on the armor, but have soon given up the battle. They have put their hands to the plow, but looked back. Jesus said unto him, No one having put his hand to the plough and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God (Luke 9:62).

the Christian church, under all its trials, has not been consumed; but more than that, it has not lost anything by its trials. The Lord’s church has never been destroyed by her persecutors and her trials. They have thought they crushed her, but she still lives. They had imagined that they had taken away her life, but she sprang up more vigorous than before.

the truth has in it a living seed that is not to be destroyed.

Christian, if you are truly a child of God, your trials cannot destroy you. What is better still, you cannot lose anything by them. You may seem to lose for today, but when the account comes to be settled, you will not be found to have lost at all due to all the temptations of all the world or all the attacks of Satan that you have endured. On the contrary, you will have wondrously gained. Your trials, having worked patience and experience, will make you rich. Your temptations, having taught you your weakness and shown you where your strength lies, will make you strong.

We even glory in the tribulations, knowing that the tribulation works patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope; and the hope shall not be ashamed, because the love of God is poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto us (Romans 5:3-5).

If the Lord has called you by His grace, all the people on earth and all the demons in hell cannot reverse the calling.

You cannot be idle and have Christ’s precious communion. Jesus walks quickly, and when His people want to talk with Him, they must travel quickly too, or else they will soon lose His company.

Christ, my Master, went about doing good (Acts 10:38), and if you want to walk with Him, you must go about with the same mission.

Idle grace would soon become active corruption.

laziness hardens the conscience.

if we do not want to make hell ring with satanic laughter and make the men of God weep because the cedars of Lebanon are cut down, let us watch unto prayer and be diligent in our Master’s business, fervent in the Spirit, serving the Lord (Romans 12:11).

take notice of David’s fall, and of the idleness that was at the beginning of it, as a warning to yourselves.

Some temptations come to the industrious, but all temptations attack the idle.

Idle Christians are not tempted by the devil so much as they tempt the devil to tempt them. Idleness opens the door of the heart and asks Satan to come in, but if we are kept busy from morning until night, if Satan does get in, he must break through the door.

Under sovereign grace, and next to faith, there is no better shield against temptation than being not slothful in earnest care, but fervent in the Spirit, serving the Lord (Romans 12:11).

May the Lord give you the wildfire back again, for even if it was wildfire, that is better than no fire at all.

a Quaker. He would neither fight nor leave his house, but remained in prayer with his family during the whole bombardment.’ Surely, thought I, it is well with the righteous. God has been a shield to you in battle, a wall of fire round about you, and a very present help in time of need.”