The Spurgeon Series 1859 & 1860. Charles H. Spurgeon

It was not long ago there came into this hall, a man who was without God and without Christ, and the simple reading of the hymn —

      Jesus lover of my soul,

      was the means of his quickening. He said within himself, “Does Jesus love me? then I must love him,” and he was quickened in that very same hour. The words which Jesus uses are various in different cases. I trust that even while I am speaking this morning, Christ may speak with me, and some word that may fall from my lips, unpremeditated and almost without design, shall be sent by God as a message of life to some dead and corrupt heart here, and some man who has lived in sin so far, shall now live for righteousness, and live for Christ. That is the first illustration I will give you of what is meant by effectual calling. It finds the sinner dead, it gives him life, and he obeys the call of life and lives.

      6. But let us consider a second phase of it. You will remember while the sinner is dead in sin, he is alive enough as far as any opposition to God may be concerned. He is powerless to obey, but he is mighty enough to resist the call of divine grace. I may illustrate it in the case of Saul of Tarsus: this proud Pharisee abhors the Lord Jesus Christ; he has seized upon every follower of Jesus who comes within his grasp; he has haled men and women to prison; with the avidity of a miser who hunts after gold, he has hunted after the precious life of Christ’s disciple, and having exhausted his prey in Jerusalem, he seeks letters and goes off to Damascus upon the same bloody errand. Speak to him on the road, send out the apostle Peter to him, let Peter say, “Saul, why do you oppose Christ? The time shall come when you shall yet be his disciple.” Paul would turn around and laugh him to scorn — “Begone you fisherman, begone — I a disciple of that imposter Jesus of Nazareth! Look here, this is my confession of faith; here I will hale your brothers and your sisters to prison, and beat them in the synagogue and compel them to blaspheme and even hunt them to death, for my breath is threatening, and my heart is as fire against Christ.” Such a scene did not occur, but had there been any reply given by men you may easily conceive that such would have been Saul’s answer. But Christ determined that he would call the man. Oh, what an enterprise! Stop HIM? Why he is going fast onward in his mad career. But lo, a light shines all around him and he falls to the ground, and he hears a voice crying, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me; it is hard for you to kick against the goads.” Saul’s eyes are filled with tears, and then again with scales of darkness, and he cries, “Who are you?” and a voice calls, “I am Jesus, whom you persecute.” It is not many minutes before he begins to feel his sin in having persecuted Jesus, nor many hours before he receives the assurance of his pardon, and not many days before he who persecuted Christ stands up to preach with vehemence and eloquence unparalleled, the very cause which he once trod beneath his feet. See what effectual calling can do. If God should choose this morning to call the hardest hearted wretch within hearing of the gospel, he must obey. Let God call — a man may resist, but he cannot resist effectually. Down you shall come, sinner, if God cries down; there is no standing when he would have you fall. And note, every man that is saved, is always saved by an overcoming call which he cannot withstand; he may resist it for a time, but he cannot resist so as to overcome it, he must give way, he must yield when God speaks. If he says, “Let there be light,” the impenetrable darkness gives way to light; if he says, “Let there be grace,” unutterable sin gives way, and the hardest hearted sinner melts before the fire of effectual calling.

      7. I have thus illustrated the call in two ways, by the state of the sinner in his sin, and by the omnipotence which overwhelms the resistance which he offers. And now another case. The effectual call may be illustrated in its sovereignty by the case of Zacchaeus. Christ is entering into Jericho to preach. There is a tax collector living in it, who is a hard, griping, grasping, miserly extortioner. Jesus Christ is coming in to call someone, for it is written he must abide in some man’s house. Would you believe it, that the man whom Christ intends to call is the worst man in Jericho — the extortioner? He is a little short fellow, and he cannot see Christ, though he has a great curiosity to look at him; so he runs before the crowd and climbs up a sycamore tree, and thinking himself quite safe amid the thick foliage, he waits with eager expectation to see this wonderful man who had turned the world upside down. Little did he think that he was to turn him also. The Saviour walks along preaching and talking with the people until he comes under the sycamore tree, then lifting up his eyes, he cries — “Zacchaeus, make haste and come down, for today I must abide in your house.” The shot took effect, the bird fell, down came Zacchaeus, invited the Saviour to his house, and proved that he was really called not by the voice merely but by grace itself, for he said, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor, and if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I restore to him fourfold”; and Jesus said, “This day salvation is come to your house.” Now why call Zacchaeus? There were many better men in the city than he. Why call him? Simply because the call of God comes to unworthy sinners. There is nothing in man that can deserve this call; nothing in the best of men that can invite it; but God quickens whom he wishes, and when he sends that call, though it comes to the vilest of the vile, down they come speedily and swiftly; they come down from the tree of their sin, and fall prostrate in penitence at the feet of Jesus Christ.

      8. But now to illustrate this call in its effects, we remind you that Abraham is another remarkable instance of effectual calling. “Now the Lord had said to Abraham, Get out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you,” and “by faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing where he was going.” Ah! poor Abraham, as the world would have had it, what a trial his call cost him! He was happy enough in the bosom of his father’s household, but idolatry crept into it, and when God called Abraham, he called him alone and blessed him out of Ur of the Chaldees, and said to him, “Go forth, Abraham!” and he went out, not knowing where he was going. Now, when effectual calling comes into a house and singles out a man, that man will be compelled to go outside the camp, bearing Christ’s reproach. He must come out from among his very dearest friends, from all his old acquaintances, from those friends with whom he used to drink, and swear, and take pleasure; he must go immediately from them all, to follow the Lamb wherever he goes. What a trial to Abraham’s faith, when he had to leave all that was so dear to him, and go to an unknown place! And yet God had a goodly land for him, and intended greatly to bless him. Man! if you are called, if you are called truly, there will be a going out, and a going out alone. Perhaps some of God’s professed people will leave you; you will have to go without a solitary friend, — maybe you will even be deserted by Sarah herself, and you may be a stranger in a strange land, a solitary wanderer, as all your fathers were. Ah! but if it is an effectual call, and if salvation shall be its result, what does it matter if you go to heaven alone? Better to be a solitary pilgrim to bliss, than one of the thousands who throng the road to hell.

      9. I will have one more illustration. When effectual calling comes to a man, at first he may not know that it is effectual calling. You remember the case of Samuel: the Lord called Samuel, and he arose and went to Eli, and he said, “Here I am, for you called me.” Eli said, “I did not call you, lie down again. And he went and laid down.” The second time the Lord called him, and said, “Samuel, Samuel,” and he arose again, and went to Eli, and said, “Here I am, for you called me,” and then it was that Eli, not Samuel, first of all perceived that the Lord had called the child. And when Samuel knew it was the Lord, he said, “Speak; for your servant hears.” When the work of grace begins in the heart, the man is not always clear that it is God’s work: he is impressed under the minister, and perhaps he is rather more occupied with the impression than with the agent of the impression; he says, “I do not know how it is, but I have been called: Eli, the minister, has called me.” And perhaps he goes to Eli to ask what he wants with him. “Surely,” he said, “the minister knew me, and spoke something personally to me, because he knew my case.” And he goes to Eli, and it is not until afterwards, perhaps, that he finds that Eli had nothing to do with the impression, but that the Lord had called him. I know this — I believe God was at work with my heart for years before I knew anything about him. I knew there was a work; I knew I prayed, and cried, and groaned for mercy, but I did not know that was the Lord’s work; I half thought it was my own.