Lectures to My Students (Hardcover)

Publisher: Banner of Truth
Author: Spurgeon, Charles H.
ISBN-13: 9780851519685
Binding: Hardcover
List Price: $39.00
Westminster Bookstore: $27.30 – 30% Off

The substance of Spurgeon’s regular Friday afternoon addresses to the students of the Pastor’s College (founded by Spurgeon in 1857 to train others for the ministry), this new complete and unabridged Banner edition, newly typeset and smyth-sewn, contains all the lectures in the original first and second series, including “The Minister’s Self-Watch,” “The Preacher’s Private Prayer,” “The Minister’s Fainting Fits,” “The Holy Spirit in Connection with our Ministry,” “The Need of Decision for the Truth,” and “On Conversion as our Aim.” This edition also includes a third series of lectures, originally published as “The Art of illustration,” and Spurgeon’s Commenting and Commentaries, which contains two further lectures and a fascinating and often humorously annotated catalogue of commentaries.

Reflecting on nature of this work, Spurgeon writes, “The solemn work with which the Christian ministry concerns itself demands a man’s all, and that all at its best. To engage in it half-heartedly is an insult to God and man. Slumber must forsake our eyelids sooner than men shall be allowed to perish. Yet we are all prone to sleep as do others, and students, among the rest, are apt to act the part of the foolish virgins; therefore have I sought to speak out my whole soul, in the hope that I might not create or foster dullness in others. May He in whose hand are the churches and their pastors bless these words to younger brethren in the ministry, and if so, I shall count it more than a full reward, and shall gratefully praise the Lord.”

?If ever there should come a wretched day when all our pulpits shall be full of modern thought, and the old doctrine of substitutionary sacrifice shall be exploded, then will there remain no word of comfort for the guilty or hope for the despairing. Hushed will be forever those silver notes which now console the living, and cheer the dying; a dumb spirit will possess this dying world, and no voice of joy will break the blank silence of despair. The gospel speaks through the propitiation for sin, and if that be denied, it speaketh no more. Those who preach not the atonement exhibit a dumb and dummy gospel; a mouth it hath, but speaketh not?

?Would you have me silence the doctrine of the blood of sprinkling? Would anyone of you attempt so horrible a deed? Shall we be censured if we continually proclaim the heaven-sent message of the blood of Jesus? Shall we speak with bated breath because some affected person shudders at the sound of the word ?blood?? or some ?cultured? individual rebels at the old fashioned thought of sacrifice? Nay, verily, we will sooner have our tongue cut out that cease to speak of the precious blood of Jesus Christ.? ( Charles Spurgeon, as quoted in Pierced for Our Transgressions )

(HT: Irish Calvinist)

China’s Millions: China Inland Missions and Late Qing Society, 1832-1905
By Alvyn Austin / Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

Banner-carrying Salvation Army marchers, stone-silent Quakers, jumpy Midwestern revivalists, and Prayer-book Anglicans all made up the mixed multitude sent to the Middle Kingdom by the China Inland Mission (CIM) in the nineteenth century. In China’s Millions veteran historian Alvyn Austin crafts a compelling narrative of the sprawling history of the China Inland Mission.

This book introduces readers to a remarkable array of sights, from the visionary, charismatic sect-leader Pastor Hsi, to the “wordless book,” a missionary teaching device that fit perfectly with Chinese color cosmology, to the opium-soaked aftermath of the North China Famine of 187779. Clear, readable, and well researched, China’s Millions digs deeply into the Chinese and Western past to tell a story of the strange yet hopeful result of two cultures colliding.

This is part of Eerdmans Studies in the History of Christian Missions series. These studies explore the significant, yet often contested, impact of Christian missions around the world. Bringing together monographs by established and emerging scholars, collections of essays on themes in the history of missions, and new editions of seminal primary texts, this series provides rich source material for studying the relation between religion and culture.Alvyn Austin, born in Calcutta to CIM missionaries, teaches history at Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario.