The Precocious Young Pastor

The Precocious Young Pastor

Would your church call a nineteen-year-old pastor?

ON A Saturday afternoon in December 1853 a nineteen-year-old lad came to London from Cambridge on the Eastern Counties Railway and then went to the boardinghouse that was expecting him. It was his first trip to London and he stared wide-eyed at the sights around him. No one observing him would have guessed that this young fellow was about to begin a ministry to the influential city of London that would last thirty-eight years, a ministry unparalleled in the history of the church to that time.

His name was Charles Haddon Spurgeon. His father and grandfather were Congregational pastors. His grandfather had been the pastor of the Independent Church in Essex for fifty-four years, and his father pastored a number of independent churches throughout England. The family had descended from Huguenots, who had fled France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes and had settled in Essex.

When Charles was just ten years old and vacationing at his grandfather’s, a pastor friend of his grandfather’s heard him read a chapter from the Bible in the Sunday service and was extremely impressed at how well he read. The next day, the pastor told the family that he had a conviction that someday Charles would preach the gospel to thousands. He said, “So sure am I of this, that when my little man preaches in Rowland Hill’s Chapel [Surrey Chapel, the largest independent church in London], as he will do one day, I would like him to promise me that he will give out the hymn commencing ‘God moves in a mysterious way his wonders to perform. The promise was made, and the prophecy was later fulfilled. Spurgeon did preach in Rowland Hill’s Surrey Chapel, and the hymn was sung.

After being converted at a Primitive Methodist chapel at the age of sixteen, he began to study the issue of baptism. He became convinced that the New Testament taught that baptism was to be for believers and by immersion. In spite of their belief in infant baptism, his parents encouraged him to follow his own convictions, and so he was baptized. Shortly thereafter Charles joined a Baptist church in Cambridge.

He soon discovered his gift of preaching, and in spite of his young age he was in much demand. After taking a brief pastorate at the age of eighteen near Cambridge, Spurgeon was called the following year to the pastorate of the New Park Street Baptist Chapel in London. It was a small church, but within a few weeks of his arrival he was attracting great crowds. The chapel soon proved to be too small, so the church decided to enlarge the building. During construction the church moved to a large hall, but once again the crowds surpassed what the hall could accommodate. When Spurgeon resumed preaching in the enlarged chapel on New Park Street, it once again proved to be too small.

The decision was finally made to build a tabernacle sufficiently large to accommodate the crowds coming to hear the twenty-five-year-old preacher. On August 16, 1859, the cornerstone of the Metropolitan Tabernacle was laid. The church was built to hold sixty-five hundred, and it was Spurgeon’s prayer that it open debt-free. Metropolitan Tabernacle opened in May 1861, with no outstanding debt. Spurgeon preached there until shortly before his death in 1892.

The Metropolitan Tabernacle was more than just a preaching station. It was an educational and social center. Spurgeon founded a pastor’s college and an orphanage, both of which continue to minister to this day. He also began a literature ministry and provided many services to the nearby slums. Spurgeon’s Metropolitan Tabernacle was one of the great churches of all time.

Reflection

What do you value more in a church—the bricks and mortar or the message that is preached there? Spurgeon’s Metropolitan Tabernacle had both architectural beauty and powerful preaching. But breathtaking sanctuaries have never changed any lives. It is the gospel of Jesus Christ that is the power of God unto salvation.

When we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended, and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense. But to those called by God to salvation, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ is the mighty power of God and the wonderful wisdom of God.

1 Corinthians 1:23-24