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The noted German pastor and theologian Helmut Thielicke once said, "Sell all [the books] that you have … and buy Spurgeon."

Today—nearly a century after Spurgeon's death—there is more material in print by Charles Haddon Spurgeon than by any other Christian author, living or dead.

What was it about the Victorian London orator that enabled him to captivate the minds and hearts of multitudes—then and now?

Charles Spurgeon came to London as a mere lad, and no preacher received more criticism than the 19-year-old "boy preacher," as he was called. Becoming pastor of the historic New Park Street Baptist Church, he found the press virtually at war with him. The Ipswich Express said his sermons were "Redolent of bad taste, vulgar, and theatrical."

Spurgeon replied, "I am perhaps vulgar, but it is not intentional, save that I must and will make the people listen. My firm conviction is that we have had quite enough polite preachers, and many require a change. God has owned me among the most degraded and off-casts. Let others serve their class; these are mine, and to them I must keep."

Spurgeon saw the value of preaching to the common people in their own language and in a way that captivated their interest. He well understood the sophistication of the Established Church and its irrelevance to his own social setting. One editorial cartoon depicted an Anglican rector driving an old stagecoach with two slow horses—named "Church" and "State." Racing ahead, however, is a young preacher with flowing hair, speeding on a locomotive engine. The title of the second cleric's locomotive? "The Spurgeon," of course.

Even British evangelicalism tended to be an upper-middle-class institution. With his "vulgar" style, however, Spurgeon spoke to the people of the street. Actually, Spurgeon's church became known as a "church of shopkeepers," but the criticism still mounted. Spurgeon finally said in exasperation, "Scarcely a Baptist minister of standing will own me." But multitudes came to hear him preach.

It would not be fair to say that Spurgeon was the only evangelical preacher who took this approach and was criticized for it. Yet Spurgeon was the most successful in preaching to the common culture. When Spurgeon was 20 years old, he wrote to his future wife, Susannah Thompson, about an open-air sermon to a multitude: "Yesterday I climbed to the summit of a minister's glory … the Lord was with me, and the profoundest silence was observed; but oh, the closeness—never did mortal man receive a more enthusiastic ovation! I wonder that I am alive! … Thousands of heads and hands were lifted, and cheer after cheer was given. Surely amid these adulations I can hear the low rumbling of the advancing storm of reproach. But even this I can bear for the Master's sake."

When it came to declaring the gospel in a relevant fashion to the common masses, Spurgeon was a master. He was a nineteenth-century reflection of George Whitefield.

Spurgeon once described his approach to preaching by saying, "I take my text and make a bee-line to the cross." He burned with a desire to preach the Good News and see people won to faith in Jesus Christ. Spurgeon declared that "Saving faith is an immediate relation to Christ, accepting, receiving, resting upon Him alone, for justification, sanctification, and eternal life by virtue of the covenant of grace." He fervently urged people to enter into this faith relationship.

What may seem paradoxical to some today is that theologically, Spurgeon tenaciously clung to traditional Calvinism. Evangelistic appeals came from this preacher who adhered to the traditional five doctrinal points of the Synod of Dort, including unconditional election.

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June (Web-only) 2005, Vol. 49