Conversion of C. H. Spurgeon

Conversion - as experienced in 1849 - by C.H. Spurgeon (born 1834).
This story is such a joy to read. The following is an extract, duly footnoted, and recorded by John Dunn at http://www.newcreation.org.au/books/covers/278.html

One Sunday morning he [Spurgeon] was prevented by a snowstorm from reaching his own church and went into a Primitive Methodist chapel nearby. A simple and not very well–educated shoemaker was the preacher that day. He gave out the text: “Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.”

He began thus:
“This is a very simple text indeed. It says ‘Look’. Now lookin’ don’t take a great deal of pain. It
aint liftin’ your foot or your finger; it is just ‘Look’. Well, a man needn’t go to College to learn to look. You may be the biggest fool, and yet you can look. A man needn’t be worth a thousand a year to look. Anyone can look; even a child can look. “But then the text says, ‘Look unto Me ‘.


Many of ye are lookin’ to yourselves, but it is no use lookin’ there. You’ll never find any comfort in yourselves. Some say look to God the Father. No, look to Him by–and–by. Jesus Christ says, ‘Look unto Me.’ Some of ye say, ‘We must wait for the Spirit’s workin’. You have no business with that just now. Look to Christ. The text says, ‘Look to Me.’

Then the good man followed up his text in this way: “Look unto Me; I am sweatin’ great drops of blood. Look unto Me; I am hangin’ on a cross. Look unto Me; I am dead and buried. Look unto Me; I rise again. Look unto Me; I ascend to Heaven. Look unto Me; I am sitting at the Father’s right hand. O poor sinner, look unto Me! look unto Me!”

Spurgeon recalled that in the middle of the sermon the preacher suddenly looked at him sitting under the gallery. “Just fixing his eyes on me, as if he knew all my heart, he said, “young man, you look very miserable.”

Well, I did, but I had not been accustomed to have remarks made from the pulpit on my personal appearance before. However, it was a good blow, and struck right home. He continued, “And you will always be miserable –miserable in life and miserable in death – if you don’t obey my text; but if you obey now, this moment, you will be saved.”

Then lifting up his hands, he shouted, as only a Primitive Methodist could do, “Young man, look to Jesus Christ, Look! Look! Look! You have nothing to do but look and live!”
“I saw at once the way of salvation. I know not what else he said–I did not take much notice of it– I was so possessed with that one thought. I had been waiting to do fifty things, but when I heard that word, “Look!” what a charming word it seemed to me. Oh! I looked until I could almost have looked my eyes away. There and then the cloud was gone, the darkness had rolled away, and that moment I saw the sun; and could have risen that instant, and sung with the most enthusiastic of them, of the precious blood of Christ, and the simple faith which looks alone to Him. Oh, that somebody had told me this before, “Trust Christ and you shall be saved.”

“I thought I could have sprung from the seat in which I sat, and have called out with the wildest of those Methodist brethren, “I am forgiven! I am forgiven! A monument of grace! A sinner saved by blood!” My spirit saw its chains broken to pieces, I felt that I was an emancipated soul, and heir of heaven, a forgiven one, accepted in Jesus Christ, plucked out of the miry clay and out of the horrible pit, with my feet set upon a rock and my going established.
Between half–past ten when I entered that chapel, and half–past twelve when I was back again at home, what a change had taken place in me! Simply by looking to Jesus I had been delivered from despair, and I was brought into such a joyous state of mind that, when they saw me at home, they said to me, “Something wonderful has happened to you,” and I was eager to tell them all about it.

Oh! there was joy in the household that day, when all heard that the eldest son had found the Saviour and knew himself to be forgiven.” Now everything was alive and fresh. He was filled with joy and gladness. The Bible was ablaze with glory and prayer opened for his approaching soul the very gates of heaven. He wrote and signed a covenant between himself and the Lord.

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... I won't go on further with that. Just to comment, that I thought it was profund, humourous and simple. A little less sophisticated philosophical thought, and discussion of religion, and a bit more directness and simplicity, might help us 2006 'complex' people.