How to Win Souls for Christ
Charles Spurgeon · The Soul-Winner; or, How to Lead Sinners to the Saviour
AN ADDRESS TO OPEN-AIR PREACHERS.
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST.
It is a great privilege to have to speak to so noble
a band of preachers; I wish that I were more fit for
the task. Silver of eloquent speech and gold of deep
thought have I none; but such as I have, give I unto
you.
Concerning the winning of souls. JVIta/ is it to win
a soul/ I hope you believe in the old-fashioned way
of saving souls. Everything appears to be shaken
nowadays, and shifted from the old foundations. It
seems that we are to evolve out of men the good that
is already in them: much good may you get if you
attempt the process! T am afraid that in the process
of evolution you will develop devils. 1 do not know
much else that will come out of liuman nature, for man-
hood is as full of sin as an tgg is full of meat; and the
evolution of sin must be everlasting mischief. We all
believe that we must go to soul-winning, desiring in
God's name to see all things made new. This old
creature is dead and corrupt, and must be buried ; and
the sooner the better. Jesus has come that there may
be a passing away of the old things, and a making of
all things new. In the process of our work, we en-
deavor to bless men by trying to make them temperate ;
may God bless all work of that sort! But we should
think ourselves to have failed if we had produced a
world of total abstainers, and had left them all unbe-
lievers. We drive at something more than temper-
ance; for we believe that men must be born again. It
160 THE SOUL-WINNER.
is good that even a corpse should be clean, and there-
fore that the unregenerate should be moral. It would
be a great blessing if they were cleansed of the vices
which make this city to reek in the nostrils of God and
good men. But that is not so much our work as this:
that the dead in sin should live, that spiritual life should
quicken them, and that Christ should reign where the
prince of the power of the air now hath sway. You
preach, brethren, with this object, that men may quit
their sins, and fly to Christ for pardon, that by His
blessed Spirit they may be renovated, and become as
much in love with everything that is holy as they are
now in love with everything that is sinful. You aim
at a radical cure; the axe is laid at the root of the trees;
the amendment of the old nature would not content
you, but you seek for the imparting, by a divine power,
of a new nature, that those who gather round you in the
streets may live unto God.
Our object is to turn the world upside down; or, in
other words, that where sin abounded grace may much
more abound. We are aiming at a miracle: it is well
to settle that at the commencement. Some brethren
think that they ought to lower their note to the spiritual
ability of the hearer ; but this is a mistake. According
to these brethren, you ought not to exhort a man to
repent and believe unless you believe that he can, of
himself, repent and believe. My reply is a confession:
I command men in the name of Jesus to repent and
believe the gospel, though I know they can do nothing
of the kind apart from the grace of God ; for I am not
sent to work according to what my private reason
might suggest, but according to the orders of my Lord
and Master. Ours is the miraculous method which
comes of the endowment of the Spirit of God, who bids
His ministers perform wonders in the name of the holy
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. KU
child Jesus. We are sent to say to blind eyes, "See,"
to deaf ears, "Hear," to dead hearts, ''Live," and even
to Lazarus rotting in that grave, wherein, by this time,
he stinketh, — "Lazarus, come forth." Dare we do
this? We shall be wise to begin with the conviction
that we are utterly powerless for this unless our Master
has sent us, and is with us. But if He that sent us is
with us, all things are possible to him that believeth.
O preacher, if thou art about to stand up to see what
thou canst do, it will be thy wisdom to sit down
speedily; but if thou standest up to prove what thine
almighty Lord and Master can do through thee, then
infinite possibiHties lie about thee! There is no bound
to what God can accomplish if He works by thy heart
and voice. The other Sabbath morning, before I en-
tered the pulpit, when my dear brethren, the deacons
and elders of this church, gathered about me for
prayer, as they are wont to do, one of them said, "Lord,
take him as a man takes a tool in his hand when he
gets a firm hold of it, and then uses it to work his own
will with it." That is what all workers need ; that God
may be the worker by them. You are to be instru-
ments in the hands of God; yourselves, of course,
actively putting forth all your faculties and forces which
the Lord has lent to you; but still never depending
upon your personal power, but resting alone upon that
sacred, mysterious, divine energy which worketh in
us, and by us, and with us, upon the hearts and minds
of men.
Brethren, we have been greatly disappointed, have
we not, with some of our converts? We shall always
be disappointed with them so far as they are our con-
verts. We shall greatly rejoice over them when they
prove to be the Lord's work. When the power of
grace works in them, ("Glory! ") then it will be, as my
162 THE SOUL-WINNER.
brother says, "Glory!" and nothing else but glory; for
grace brings glory, but mere oratory will only create
sham and shame in the long run. When we are preach-
ing, and we think of a very pretty, flowery passage, a
very neat, poetical paragraph, I wish we could be
restrained by that fear which acted upon Paul when he
said that he would not use the wisdom of words, "lest
the cross of Christ should be made of none effect." It
is the duty of the gospel preacher, indoors or outdoors,
to say, "I can say that very prettily, but then they
might notice how I said it; I will, therefore, so say it
that they will only observe the intrinsic value of the
truth which I would teach them." It is not our way
of putting the gospel, nor our method of illustrating
it, which wins souls, but the gospel itself does the work
in the hands of the Holy Ghost, and to Him we must
look for the thorough conversion of men. A miracle
is to be wrought by which our hearers shall become the
products of that mighty power which God wrought in
Christ when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him
at His own right hand in the heavenly place far above
all principality and power; and for this we must look
out of ourselves to the living God. Must we not? We
go in, then, for thorough downright conversion; and
therefore we fall back upon the power of the Holy
Spirit. If it be a miracle, God must work it, that is
clear; it is not to be accomplished by our reasoning,
or persuasion, or threatening, it can only come from
the Lord.
In what way, since the winning of souls lies here, can
we hopefully expect to be eiidowed with the Spirit of
God, and to go forth in His power? I reply, that a
great deal depends upon the condition of the man
himself. I am persuaded we have never laid enough
stress on the work of God within our own selves in its
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST 163
relation to our service of God. A consecrated man
may be charged with the divine energy to the full, so
that everybody round about him must perceive it.
They cannot tell what it is, nor whence it comes, nor,
perhaps, whither it goes ; but there is something about
that man which is far beyond the common order of
things. At another time that same person may be
feeble and dull, and be conscious to himself that he is
so. See! he shakes himself as at other times, but he
can do no mighty deed. It is clear that Samson him-
self must be in a right condition, or he can win no
victories. If the champion's locks be shorn, the Philis-
tines will laugh at him; if the Lord be gone from a
man, he has no power left for useful service. Dear
brethren, look carefully to your own condition before
God. Take care of the home farm; look well to your
own flocks and herds. Unless your walk be close with
God, unless you dw^ll in that clear light which sur-
rounds the throne of God, and which is only known
to those who are in fellowship with the Eternal, you
wall go forth from your chamber, and hasten to your
work, but nothing will come of it. The vessel, it is
true, is but an earthen one; yet it has its place in the
divine arrangement, but it will not be filled wnth the
divine treasure unless it is a clean vessel, and unless in
other respects it is a vessel fit for the Master's use.
Let me show you some ways in which much must
depend in soul-winning upon the man himself.
We win some sou/s to Christ by acting as witnesses.
We stand up and testify for the Lord Jesus Christ
concerning certain truths. Now, I have never had
the great privilege of being bamboozled by a barrister.
I have sometimes wondered what I should do if I were
put into the witness-box to be examined and cross-
examined. I think I should simply stand up, and
164 THE SOUL-WINNER.
tell the truth as far as I knew it, and should not make
an attempt to display my wit, or my language, or my
judgment. If I simply gave straightforward answers
to his questions, I should beat any lawyer under
heaven. But the difficulty is, that so often when a
witness is put into the box, he is more conscious of
himself than of what he has to say; therefore, he is
soon worried, teased, and bored, and, by losing 'his
temper, he fails to be a good witness for the cause.
Now, you men in the open-air are often bamboozled;
the devil's barristers are sure to come to you, he has
a great number of them constantly retained in his
service. The one thing you have to do is to bear
witness to the truth. If you enquire in your own mind,
"How shall I answer this man cleverly, so as to get
a victory over him?" you will not be wise. A witty
answer is often a very proper thing; at the same
time, a gracious answer is better. Try to say to your-
self: "It does not, after all, matter whether that man
proves me to be a fool or not, for I know that already.
I am content to be thought a fool for Christ's sake, and
not to care about my reputation. I have to bear
witness to what I know, and by the help of God I will
do so right boldly. If the interrupter questions me
about other things, I shall tell him that I do not come
to bear witness about other matters, but this one thing
I do. To one point I will speak, and to no other."
Brethren, the witnessing man, then, must himself
be saved, and he should be sure of it. I do not know
whether you doubt your own salvation. Perhaps I
should recommend you to preach even when that is
the case; since, if you are not saved yourself, you yet
wish others to be. You do not doubt that you once
enjoyed full assurance; and now, if you have sorrow-
fully to confess, "Alas! I do not feel the full power of
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. 165
the gospel on my own heart," you can truly add, "Yet
I know that it is true, for I have seen it save others,
and I know that no other power can save wt'." Per-
haps even that faltering testimony, so truly honest,
might bring a tear into your opponent's eye, and make
him feel sympathy for you. "I preached," said John
Bunyan, "sometimes without hope, like a man in chains
to men in chains, and when I heard my own fetters
rattle, yet I told others that there was deliverance for
them, and I bade them look to the great Deliverer."
I w^ould not have stopped Mr. Bunyan in preaching so.
At the same time, it is a great thing to be able to declare
from your own personal experience that the Lord hath
broken the gates of brass, and cut the bars of iron
in sunder. Those who hear our witness say, "Are you
sure of it?" Sure of it? I am as sure of it as I am sure
that I am a living man. They call this dogmatism.
Never mind about that. A man ought to know what
he is preaching about, or else let him sit down. If I had
any doubt about the matters I preach from this pulpit,
I should be ashamed to remain the pastor of this
church ; but I preach wdiat I do know, and testify what
I have seen. If I am mistaken I am heartily and
intensely mistaken; and I risk my soul and all its eter-
nal interests upon the truth of what I preach. If the
gospel of what I preach does not save me, I shall never
be saved, for what I proclaim to others is my own per-
sonal ground of trust. I have no private lifeboat; the
ark to which I invite others holds myself and all that
I have.
A good witness ought himself to know all that he is
going to say; he should feel himself at home in his
subject. He is brought up as a witness, say, in ^r
a certain case of robbery; he knows wdiat he saw, and
has to make a declaration of that only. They begin
166 THE SOUL-WINNER.
to question him about a picture in the house, or the
colour of a dress which was hanging in the wardrobe.
He answers, "You are going beyond my record; I
can only witness to that which I saw." What we do
know, and what we do not know, would make two
very large books, and we may safely ask to be let alone
as to the second volume.
Brother, say what you know, and sit down. But be
calm and composed while speaking of that with which
you have personal acquaintance. You will never
properly indulge your emotions in preaching, so as to
feel at home with the people, until you are at home
with your subject. When you know what you are at,
you will have your mind free for earnestness. Unless
you open-air preachers know the gospel from begin-
ning to end, and know where you are in preaching it,
you cannot preach with due emotion; but when you
feel at home with your doctrine, stand up and be as
bold, and earnest, and importunate as you please. Face
the people feeling that you are going to tell them
something worth hearing, about which you are quite
sure, which to you is your very life. There are honest
hearts in every outdoor assembly, and every indoor
assembly, too, that only want to hear honest beliefs,
and they will accept them and be led to believe in the
Lord Jesus Christ.
But you are not oiily ivitnesses, you are pleaders for
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, in a pleader, much
depends upon the man. It seems as if the sign and
token of Christianity in some preachers was not a
tongue of fire, but a block of ice. You would not like
to have a barrister stand up and plead your cause in
a cool, deliberate way, never showing the slightest
care about whether you were found guilty of murder
or acquitted. How could you endure his indifference
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. 167
when you yourself were likely to be hanged? Oh, no!
you wish to silence such a false advocate. So, when
a man has to speak for Christ, if he is not in earnest,
let him go to bed. You smile; but is it not better
that he should go to bed than send a whole congre-
gation to sleep without their going to bed? Yes, we
must be in downright earnest. If we are to prevail
with men, we must love them. There is a genuine
love to men that some have, and there is a genuine dis-
like to men that others have. I know gentlemen, whom
I esteem in a way, who seem to think that the working
classes are a shockingly bad lot, to be kept in check,
and governed with vigour. With such views they will
never convert workingmen. To win men, you must
feel: 'T am one of them. If they are a sad lot, I am
one of them : if they are lost sinners, I am one of them ;
if they need a Saviour, I am one of them." To the
very chief of sinners you should preach with this text
before you, "Such were some of you." Grace alone
makes us to differ, and that grace we preach. Genuine
love to God and fervent love to man make up the great
qualifications for a pleader.
I further believe, although certain persons deny it,
that the influence of fear is to be exercised over the
minds of men, and that it ought to operate upon the
mind of the preacher himself. "Noah, moved with
fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house." There
was salvation for this world from perishing in the flood
in the fears of Xoah; and when a man gets to fear
for others, so that his heart cries out, "They will perish,
they will perish, they will sink to hell, they will be for
ever banished from the presence of the Lord," and
when this fear oppresses his soul, and weighs him
down, and then drives him to go out and preach with
tears, oh, then he will plead with men so as to prevail!
168 THE SOUL-WINNER.
Knowing the terror of the Lord, he will persuade men.
To know the terror of the Lord is the means of teach-
ing us to persuade^ and not to speak harshly. Some
have used the terrors of the Lord to terrify; but Paul
used them to persuade. Let us copy him. Say, "We
have come out to tell you, men and brethren, that the
world is on fire, and you must flee for your lives, and
escape to the mountain, lest ye be consumed." We
must give this warning with the full conviction that
it is true, or else we shall be but as the boy who in fool-
ishness cried, "Wolf!" Something of the shadow of the
last tremendous day must fall upon our spirit to give the
accent of conviction to our message of mercy, or we
shall miss the pleader's true power. Brethren, we must
tell men that there is pressing need of a Saviour, and
show them that we ourselves perceive their need and
feel for them, or else we are not likely to turn them
to the Saviour.
He that pleads for Christ should himself be moved
with the prospect of the judgment day. When I come
in at yonder door at the back of the pulpit, and the sight
of that vast crowd bursts upon me, I frequently feel
appalled. Think of these thousands of immortal souls
gazing through the windows of those wistful eyes, and
I am to preach to them all, and be responsible for their
blood if I be not faithful to them. I tell you, it makes
me feel ready to start back. But then fear is not alone.
I am borne up by the hope and belief that God intends
to bless these people through the Word which He will
enable me to deliver. I believe that everybody in that
throng is sent there by God for some purpose, and
that I am sent to effect that purpose. I often think to
myself, when I am preaching, "Who is being convert-
ed now?" It never occurs to me that the Word of
the Lord will fail. No, that can never be. I often feel
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. 169
sure that men are being converted, and at all times that
God is glorified by the testimony of His truth. You
may depend upon it that your hopeful conviction that
God's Word cannot return to Him void is a great en-
couragement to your hearers as well as to yourself.
Your enthusiastic confidence that they will be con-
verted may be like the little finger of a mother held out
to her babe, to help it to make its way to her. The fire
within }our hearts may dart a spark into their souls
by which the flame of spiritual life shall be kindled in
them. Do let us all learn the art of pleading with the
souls of men.
Still, dear open-air preachers, and all of you Christian
people here, we have not only to be witnesses and plead-
ers, but we have also to be examples. One of the most
successful ways of taking wild ducks is the use of the
decoy bird. The decoy duck enters the net itself, and
the others follow it. We need to use more, in the Chris-
tian Church, the holy art of decoy; that is to say, our
example, in ourselves coming to Christ, in ourselves
living godly lives in the midst of a perverse genera-
tion, our example of joy and sorrow, our example of
holy submission to the divine will in the time of trouble,
our example in all manner of gracious ways, will be the
means of inducing others to enter the way of life.
You cannot, of course, stand up in the street, and tell
of your example; but there is no street-preacher who
Is not known better than he thinks. Some one in that
crowd may be in the secret of the speaker's private life.
I once heard of an out-of-doors preacher, to whom a
hearer cried out, "Ah, Jack, you dare not preach like
that at your own door!" It so happened, unfortunately,
that ]\Ir. John had offered to fight one of his
neighbours a little while before, and therefore it was
not likely that he would have done much preaching
170 THE SOUL-WINNER.
very near home. This made the interruption an awk-
ward one. If any man's Hfe at home is unworthy, he
should go several miles away before he stands up to
preach, and then, when he stands up, he should say
nothing. They know us, brethren ; they know far more
about us than we imagine, and what they do not know
they make up. At the same time, our walk and con-
versation should be the most powerful part of our min-
istry. This is what is called being consistent^ when
lips and life agree.
My time is short; but 1 must say a word upon
another point. I have said that the working of the
Holy Spirit depends largely upon the man himself,
but I am bound to add that much will also depend
upon the ki7id of people that are round about the
preacher. An open-air preacher, who has to go out
quite alone, must be in a very unfortunate position. It
is extremely helpful to be connected with an earnest
living church which will pray for you ; and if you can-
not find such a church where you labour, the next best
thing is to get half-a-dozen brothers or sisters who will
back you up, and go out with you, and, especially,
will pray with you. Some preachers are so independ-
ent that they can do without helpers, but they will be
wise if they do not affect solitude. May they not look
at the matter in this way : by bringing in half-a-dozen
men to go out with me I shall be doing good to these
young men, and shall be training them to be workers?
If you can associate with yourself half-a-dozen who
are not all very young men, but somewhat advanced
in their knowledge of divine truth, the association will
be greatly to your mutual advantage. I confess to you
all that, although God has largely blessed me in His
work, yet none of the credit is due to me at all, but to
those dear friends at the Tabernacle, and, indeed, all
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. 171
over the world, who make me the special subject of
their prayers. A man ought to do well with such
a people around him as 1 have. My dear friend and
deacon, ]Mr. William Olney, once said, "Our minister
has hitherto led us forward, and we have followed
heartily. Everything has been a success; do you not
believe in his leadership?" The people cried, "Yes."
Then said my dear friend, "If our pastor has brought
us up to a ditch which looks as if it could not be passed,
let us fill it up with our bodies, and carry him across."
This was grand talk: the ditch was filled, nay, it
seemed to fill itself up at once. If you have a true
comrade, your strength is more than doubled. What
a blessing is a good wife! You women, who would
not be in your right place if you began to preach in
the streets, you can make your husbands happy and
comfortable when they come home, and that will make
them preach all the better! Some of you can even help
in another way if you are prudent and gentle. You can
tenderly hint that your spouse was a little out of line in
certain small matters, and he may take your hint, and
put himself right. A good brother once asked me
to give him some instruction, and he pleaded thus:
"The only instructor I have had was my wife, who had
a better schooling than fell to my lot. I used to say,
'We was,' and 'Us did it,' and she quietly hinted that
people might laugh at me if 1 did not attend to gram-
mar." His wife thus became to him a professor of —
of English language, and was worth her weight in gold
to him, and he knew it. You who have such helpers
ought to thank God daily for them.
Next to this, it is a very great assistance to join in
brotherly league with some warm-hearted Christian
who knows more than we do, and will benefit us by
prudent hints. God may bless us for the sake of others
172 THE SOUL-WINNER.
when He might not bless us for our own. You have
heard, I daresay, the monkish story of the man who
had preached, and had won many souls to Christ, and
congratulated himself upon it. One night, it was re-
vealed to him that he should have none of the honour
of it at the last great day; and he asked the angel in his
dream who then would have the credit of it, and the
angel replied, "That deaf old man who sits on the pulpit
stairs and prays for you was the means of the bless-
ing." Let us be thankful for that deaf man, or that
old woman, or those poor praying friends who bring
down a blessing upon us by their intercessions. The
Spirit of God will bless two when He might not bless
one. Abraham alone did not get one of the five cities
saved, although his prayer was like a ton weight in
the scale; but yonder was his nephew Lot, who was
about the poorest lot that could be found. He had
not more than half-an-ounce of prayer in him; but that
tiny fragment turned the scale, and Zoar was pre-
served. Add then your odd half-ounce to the mightier
weight of the pleadings of eminent saints, for they
may need it.
Dear brother open-air preachers, I am not trying to
instruct you; some of you could far better instruct
me; and yet I do not know, for I suspect I must be
getting rather old from what I hear. A woman, at
the beginning of this year (1887), was trying to get
something out of me, and she said, "I remember hear-
ing your dear voice more than forty years ago." I
said, "Heard my voice forty years ago! where was
that?" She said, "You were preaching at the bottom
of Pentonville Hill, near where Mr. Sawday's chapel
is." "Well," I said, "was it not more than forty years
ago?" "Yes," she said, "It might be fifty." "Oh,"
I said, L suppose I was quite young then?" "Oh,
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. 173
yes!" she said, "you were such a dear young man."
That, of course, was a needless assurance; but I do
not think she was quite so sure of my dearness when
I told her that I never preached at the bottom of Pen-
tonvillc Hill, and that fifty years ago I was only three
years old, and that I thought it shameful for her to
suppose that I should give her money for telling false-
hoods. However, I shall presume upon the woman's
statement to-night, and suppose myself to be that ven-
erable person she described me as being, and I shall
make bold to say to you: Dear brethren, if we are
going to 10 in souls, we must go in for downright labour
and hard work.
And, first, we must work at our preaching. You are
not getting distrustful of the use of preaching, are
you? C'No.") I hope you do not weary of it, though
you certainly sometimes must weary in it. Go on
with your preaching. Cobbler, stick to your last;
preacher, stick to your preaching. In the great day,
when the muster-roll shall be read, of all those who
are converted through fine music, and church decora-
tion, and religious exhibitions and entertainments, they
will amount to the tenth part of nothing; but it will
always please God by the foolishness of preaching to
save them that believe. Keep to your preaching; and
if you do anything beside, do not let it throw your
preaching into the background. In the first place
preach, and in the second place preach, and in the
third place preach.
Believe in preaching the love of Christ, believe in
preaching the atoning sacrifice, believe in preaching
the new birth, believe in preaching the whole coun-
sel of God. The old hammer of the gospel will still
break the rock in pieces; the ancient fire of Pentecost
will still burn among the multitude. Try nothing new.
174 THE SOUL-WINNER.
but go on with preaching, and if we all preach with
the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, the results
of preaching will astound us. Why, there is no end
after all to the power of the tongue! Look at the
power of a bad tongue, what great mischief it can do ;
and shall not God put more power into a good tongue,
if we will but use it aright? Look at the power of
fire, a single spark might give a city to the flames;
even so, the Spirit of God being with us, we need
not calculate how much, or what we can do: there
is no calculating the potentialities of a flame, and there
is no end to the possibilities of divine truth spoken
with the enthusiasm which is born of the Spirit of God.
Have great hope yet, brothers, have great hope yet,
despite yon shameless midnight streets, despite yon
flaming gin-palaces at the corner of every street, de-
spite the wickedness of the rich, despite the ignorance
of the poor. Go on; go on; go on; in God's name,
go on, for if the preaching of the gospel does not
save men, nothing will. If the Lord's own way of
mercy fails, then hang the skies in mourning, and blot
out the sun in everlasting midnight, for there re-
maineth nothing before our race but the blackness
of darkness. Salvation by the sacrifice of Jesus is the
ultimatum of God. Rejoice that it cannot fail. Let us
believe without reserve, and then go straight ahead
with the preaching of the Word.
True-hearted open-air preachers will be sure to join
with their preaching very much earnest private talk.
What numbers of persons have been converted in this
Tabernacle by the personal conversation of certain
brothers here, whom I will not further indicate! They
are all about this place while I am preaching! I recol-
lect that a brother was speaking to me one Monday
night, and suddenly he vanished before he finished the
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. 175
sentence which he was whispering. I never quite knew
what he was going to say; but I speedily saw him in
that left-hand gallery, sitting in the pew with a lady
unknown to me. After the service, I said to him,
"Where did you go?" and he said, "A gleam of sun-
light came in at the window, and made me see a face
which looked so sad that I hurried upstairs, and took
my seat in the pew close to the woman of a sorrowful
countenance." "Did you cheer her?" "Oh, yes! she re-
ceived the Lord Jesus very readily; and just as she
did so, I noticed another eager face, and I asked her
to wait in the pew till after the service, and I went after
the other — a young man." He prayed with both of
these, and would not be satisfied until they had given
their hearts to the Lord. That is the way to be on the
alert. We need a body of sharpshooters to pick out
their men one by one. When we fire great guns from
the pulpit execution is done, but many are missed. We
want loving spirits to go round, and deal with indi-
vidual cases in the singular by pointed personal warn-
ings and encouragements. Every open-air preacher
should not only address the hundreds, but he should
be ready to pounce upon the ones, and he should have
others with him w^ho have the same happy art. How
much more good would come of preaching in the
streets if every open-air preacher were accompanied
by a batch of persons who would drive his nails home
for him by personal conversation!
Last Sunday night, my dear brother told us a little
?tory which I shall never forget. He was at Croydon
Hospital one night, as one of those appointed to visit
it. All the porters had gone home, and it was time
to shut up for the night. He was the only person in
the hospital, with the exception of the physician, when
a boy came running in, saying that there was a rail-
176 THE SOUL-WINNER.
way accident, and someone must go round to the sta-
tion with a stretcher. The doctor said to my brother,
"Will you take one end of the stretcher if I take the
other?" "Oh, yes!" was the cheerful reply; and so
away went the doctor and the pastor with the stretcher.
They brought a sick man back with them. My
brother said, "I went often to the hospital during
the next week or two, because I felt so much interest in
the man w^hom I had helped to carry." I believe he will
always take an interest in that man, because he once
felt the weight of him. When you know how to carry
a man on your heart, and have felt the burden of his
case, you will have his name engraven upon your soul.
So you that privately talk to people, you are feeling
the w^eight of souls; and I believe that this is what
many regular preachers need to know more of, and
then they will preach better.
When preaching and private talk are not available,
you have a tract ready, and this is often an effectual
method. Some tracts would not convert a beetle : there
is not enough in them to interest a fly. Get good
striking tracts, or none at all. But a telling, touching
gospel tract may often be the seed of eternal life; there-
fore, do not go out without your tracts.
I suppose, beside giving a tract, if you can, you try
and find out where a person lives who frequently hears
you, that you may give him a call. What a fine thing
is a visit from an open-air preacher! *'Why," says the
woman, "there is that man come to see you. Bill; that
gentleman who preaches at the corner of the street.
Shall I tell him to come in?" "Oh, yes!" is the reply;
"I have heard him many times; he is a good fellows"
Visit as much as you can, for it will be of use to your-
selves as wtII as to the people.
HOW TO WIN SOULS FOR CHRIST. 177
What power there is also in a letter to an individual!
Some people still have a kind of superstitious rever-
ence for a letter; and when they get an earnest epistle
from one of you reverend gentlemen, they think a great
deal of it; and who knows? — a note by post may hit
the man your sermon missed. Young people who are
not able to preach might do much good if they would
write letters to their young friends about their souls;
they could speak very plainly with their pens, though
they might be diffident in speaking with their tongues.
Let us save men by all the means under heaven; let
us prevent men going down to hell. We are not half
as earnest as we ought to be. Do you not remember
the young man, who, when he was dying, said to
his brother, "My brother, how could you have been
so indifferent to my soul as you have been?" He
answered, "I have not been indifferent to your soul,
for I have frequently spoken to you about it." *'Oh,
yes!" he said, "you spoke; but somehow, I think, if you
had remembered that I was going down to hell, you
would have been more earnest wdth me; you would
have wept over me, and, as my brother, you would not
have allowed me to be lost." Let no one say this of you.
But I hear it observed that most fellows, when they
grow earnest, do such odd things, and say such strange
things. Let them say strange things, and let them do
strange things, if these come out of genuine earnest-
ness. We do not want pranks and performances which
are the mere sham of earnestness; but real white-heat
earnestness is the want of the times, and where you
see that J it is a pit}^ to be too critical. You must let
a great storm rage in its own way. You must let a
living heart speak as it can. If you are zealous, and yet
cannot speak, your earnestness will invent its own
178 THE SOUL-WINNER.
method of working out its purpose. As Hannibal is
said to have mehed the rocks with vinegar, so earnest-
ness will one way or another dissolve the rocky hearts
of men. May the Spirit of God rest upon you, one and
all, for Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.