The Cost of Being a Soul-Winner
Charles Spurgeon · The Soul-Winner; or, How to Lead Sinners to the Saviour
AN ADDRESS AT A TABERNACLE PRAYER-
MEETING.
THE COST OF BEING A SOUL-
WINNER.
I want to say a word to you who are trying to bring
souls to Jesus. You long and pray to be useful : do you
know what this involves? Are you sure that you do?
Prepare yourselves, then, to see and suffer many things
with which you would rather be unacquainted. Ex-
periences which would be unnecessary to you person-
ally will become your portion if the Lord uses you for
the salvation of others. An ordinary person may rest
in his bed all night, but a surgeon will be called up
at all hours; a farming man may take his ease at his
fireside, but if he becomes a shepherd he must be out
among the lambs, and bear all weathers for them ; even
so doth Paul say, "Therefore I endure all things for the
elect's sakes, that they may also obtain the salvation
which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory." For this
cause we shall be made to undergo experiences which
will surprise us.
Some years ago, I was the subject of fearful depres-
sion of spirit. Certain troublous events had happened
to me; I was also unwell, and my heart sank within
me. Out of the depths I was forced to cry unto the
Lord. Just before I went away to Mentone for rest,
I suffered greatly in body, but far more in soul, for
my spirit was overwhelmed. Under this pressure, I
preached a sermon from the words, *'My God, My God,
182 THE SOUL-WINNER.
why hast Thou forsaken me?" I was as much quaU-
fied to preach from that text as ever I expect to be; in-
deed, I hope that few of my brethren could have en-
tered so deeply into those heart-breaking words. I
felt to the full of my measure the horror of a soul for-
saken of God. Now, that was not a desirable experi-
ence. I tremble at the bare idea of passing again
through that eclipse of soul; I pray that I may never
suffer in that fashion again unless the same result
should hang upon it.
That night, after sermon, there came into the vestry
a man who was as nearly insane as he could be to be
out of an asylum. His eyes seemed ready to start
from his head, and he said that he should utterly have
despaired if he had not heard that discourse, which
had made him feel that there was one man alive who
understood his feeling, and could describe his experi-
ence. I talked with him, and tried to encourage him,
and asked him to come again on Monday night,
when I should have a little more time to talk with
him. I saw the brother again, and I told him that I
thought he was a hopeful patient, and I was glad that
the word had been so suited to his case. Apparently,
he put aside the comfort which I presented for his ac-
ceptance, and yet I had the consciousness upon me
that the precious truth which he had heard was at
work upon his mind, and that the storm of his soul
would soon subside into a deep calm.
Now hear the sequel. Last night, of all the times
in the year, when, strange to say, I was preaching from
the words, "The Almighty hath vexed my soul," after
the service, in walked this self-same brother who had
called on me five years before. This time he looked as
dififerent as noonday from midnight, or as life from
death. I said to him, "I am glad to see you, for I have
THE COST OF BEING A SOUL-WINNER. 183
often thought about you, and wondered whether you
were brought into perfect peace." I told you that I
went to Alentone, and my patient also went into the
country, so that we had not met for five years. To
my enquiries, this brother replied, "Yes, you said I
was a hopeful patient, and I am sure you will be glad
to know that I have walked in the sunlight from that
day till now. Everything is changed and altered with
me." Dear friends, as soon as I saw my poor despair-
ing patient the first time, I blessed God that my fear-
ful experience had prepared me to sympathise with
him and guide him; but last night, when I saw him
perfectly restored, my heart overflowed with gratitude
to God for my former sorrowful feelings. I w^ould go
into the deeps a hundred times to cheer a downcast
spirit: it is good for me to have been afflicted that I
might know how to speak a word in season to one that
is weary.
Suppose that, by some painful operation, you could
have your right arm made a little longer, I do not
suppose you would care to undergo the operation ; but
if you foresaw that, by undergoing the pain, you would '
be enabled to reach and save drowning men who else
would sink before your eyes, I think you would will-
ingly bear the agony, and pay a heavy fee to the sur-
geon to be thus qualified for the rescue of your fel-
lows. Reckon, then, that to acquire soul-winning
power you will have to go through fire and water,
through doubt and despair, through mental torment
and soul distress. It will not, of course, be the same
with you all, nor perhaps with any two of you, but
according to the work allotted you, will be your prep-
aration. You must go into the fire if you are to pull
others out of it, and you will have to dive into the floods
if vou are to draw others out of the water. You can-
184 THE SOUL-WINNER.
not work a fire-escape without feeling the scorch of
the conflagration, nor man a Hfeboat without being
covered with the waves. If Joseph is to preserve his
brethren aHve, he must himself go down into Egypt;
if Moses is to lead the people through the wilderness,
he must first himself spend forty years there with his
flock. Payson truly said, "If anyone asks to be made
a successful minister, he knows not what he asks; and
it becomes him to consider whether he can drink deep-
ly of Christ's bitter cup and be baptized with His bap-
tism."
I was led to think of this by the prayer which has
just been offered by our esteemed brother, Mr. Levin-
sohn. He is, as you perceive, of the seed of Abraham,
and he owed his conversion to a city missionary of
his own nation. If that city missionary had not himself
been a Jew, he would not have known the heart of
the young stranger, nor have won his ear for the gos-
pel message. Men are usually won to Christ by suit-
able instruments, and this suitability often lies in the
power to sympathize. A key opens a door because it
fits the wards of the lock ; an earnest address touches
the heart because it meets the state of that heart. You
and I have to be made into all sorts of shapes to
suit all forms of mind and heart; just as Paul says,
''And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might
gain the Jews; to them that are under the law,
as under the law, that I might gain them that
are under the law; to them that are without law,
as without law (being not without law to God,
but under the law to Christ), that I might gain
tliem that are without law. To the weak became I as
weak, that I might gain the weak; I am made all
things to all men, that I might by all means save some."
These processes must be wrought out upon us also.
THE COST OF BEING A SOUL-WINNER. 185
Let us cheerfully bear whatever the Holy Spirit shall
work within our spirits that we may thus be the more
largely blest to our fellow-men. Come, brethren, arid
lay your all on the altar! Give yourselves up, you work-
ers, into the Lord's hand. You who have delicacy and
refinement, may have to be shocked into the power to
benefit the coarse and ignorant. You who are wise
and educated may have to be made fools of, that you
may win fools to Jesus; for fools need saving, and
many of them will not be saved except by means which
men of culture cannot admire.
How finely some people go to work when the thing
needed may not be daintiness, but energ}^! On the
other hand, how violent some are when the desired
thing is tact and gentleness, and not force! This has
to be learned; we must be trained to it as dogs to
follow game. Here is one form of experience: The
brother is elegant; he wishes to speak earnestly, but
he must be elaborate, too. He has written out a nice-
ly-prepared address, his notes are carefully arranged.
Alas! he has left the priceless document at home! What
will he do? He is too gracious to give up: he will try
to speak. He begins nicely, and gets through firsdy.
"Fair and softly, good sir." What comes next? See,
he is gazing aloft for secondly. What should be said?
What can be said? The good man flounders about,
but he cannot swim; he struggles to land, and as he
rises from the flood you can hear him mentally saying,
"That's my last attempt." Yet it is not so. He speaks
again. He gathers confidence; he grows into an im-
pressive speaker. By such humiliations as these the
Lord prepares him to do his work efificicntly. In our
beginnings we are too fine to be fit, or too great to
be good. We must serve an apprenticeship, and thus
learn our trade. A blacklead pencil is of no use at all
186 THE SOUL- WINNER.
till it is cut; the fine cedar wood must be cut away;
and then the inward metal which marks and writes will
have fair play. Brethren, the knife of affliction is sharp,
but salutary; you cannot delight in it, but faith may
teach you to value it. Are you not willing to pass
through every ordeal if by any means you may save
some? If this be not your spirit, you had better keep
to your farm and to your merchandise, for no man
will ever win a soul who is not prepared to suffer
everything within the compass of possibility for that
soul's sake.
A good deal may have to be suffered through fear,
and yet that fear may assist in stirring the soul, and
putting it into fit posture for work; at least, it may
drive the heart to prayer, and that alone is a great part
of the necessary preparation. A good man thus de-
scribes one of his early attempts at visiting, with the
view of speaking to individuals upon their spiritual
condition: '1 was thinking, on the way to the resi-
dence of the party, how I would introduce the sub-
ject, and all that I would say. And all the while I was
trembling and agitated. Reaching the door, it seemed
as if I should sink through the stones; my courage
was gone, and, lifting my hand to the knocker, it
dropped at my side without touching it. I went partly
down the steps from sheer fear; a moment's reflection
sent me again to the knocker, and I entered the house.
The sentences I uttered and the prayer offered were
very broken; but thankful, very thankful, I am that
my fears and cowardice did not prevail. The 'ice was
broken.' " That process of ice-breaking must be gone
through, and its result is highly beneficial.
O, poor souls, you that wish to find the Saviour,
Jesus has died for you; and now His people live for
you! We cannot offer any atoning sacrifice for you;
THE COST OF BEING A SOUL-WINNER. 187
there is no need that we should; but still we would
gladly make sacrifices for your soul's sake. Did you
not hear what our brother said just now in his prayer:
We would do anything, be anything, give anything,
and suffer anything if we might but bring you to Christ?
I assure you that many of us feel even so. Will you
not care for yourselves? Shall we be earnest about
your souls, and will you trifle them away? Be wiser,
1 beseech you, and may infinite wisdom at once lead
you to our dear Saviour's feet. Amen.