(Charles Haddon Spurgeon [1834-1892] – {look him up on the internet and

(Charles Haddon Spurgeon [1834-1892] – {look him up on the internet and

see what you find} was one of the greatest preachers used of God down

through time. His ministry spanned 40 years and he was a prolific writer

and apparently a very intelligent and wise man – his writings would fill an

Encylopedia Britannica. I add this section in reference to the false teachers

in the region of Galatia in Paul’s day spurred by our study in Galatians,

and in reference to “modern criticism” of Spurgeon’s day, and especially

in reference to the philosophical atheism and agnosticism of our own

age – CY – 2009)

Excerpts from:

THE GREATEST FIGHT IN THE WORLD

C.H. SPURGEON’S “FINAL MANIFESTO”

Materials are reproduced by permission." - (here and following):

We are further resolved that we will preach nothing but the Word of God.

The alienation of the masses from hearing the gospel is largely to be

accounted for by the sad fact that it is not always the gospel that they hear

if they go to places of worship; and all else falls short of what their souls

need. Have you never heard of a king who made a series of great feasts,

and bade many, week after week? He had a number of servants who were

appointed to wait at his table; and these went forth on the appointed days,

and spake with the people. But, somehow, after a while the bulk of the

people did not come to the feasts. They came in decreasing number; but

the great mass of citizens turned their backs on the banquets. The king

made inquiry, and he found that the food provided did not seem to satisfy

the men who came to look upon the banquets; and so they came no more.

He determined himself to examine the tables and the meats placed thereon.

He saw much finery and many pieces of display which never came out of

his storehouses. He looked at the food and he said, “But how is this? These

dishes, how came they here? These are not of my providing. My oxen and

fatlings were killed, yet we have not here the flesh of fed beasts, but hard

meat from cattle lean and starved. Bones are here, but where is the fat and

the marrow? The bread also is coarse; whereas mine was made of the finest

wheat? The wine is mixed with water, and the water is not from a pure

well.” One of those who stood by answered and said, “O king, we thought

that the people would be surfeited with marrow and fatness, and so we

gave them bone and gristle to try their teeth upon. We thought also that

they would be weary of the best white bread, and so we baked a little at

our own homes, in which the bran and husks were allowed to remain. It is

the opinion of the learned that our provision is more suitable for these

times than that which your majesty prescribed so long ago. As for the

wines on the lees, the taste of men runs not that way in this age; and so

transparent a liquid as pure water is too light a draught for men who are

wont to drink of the river of Egypt, which has a taste in it of mud from the

Mountains of the Moon.” Then the king knew why the people came not to

the feast. Does the reason why going to the house of God has become so

distasteful to a great many of the population, lie in this direction? I believe

it does. Have our Lord’s servants been chopping up their own odds and

ends and tainted bits, to make therewith a potted meat for the millions; and

do the millions therefore turn away? Listen to the rest of my parable.

“Clear the tables!” cried the king in indignation: “Cast that rubbish to the

dogs. Bring in the barons of beef: set forth my royal provender. Remove

those gewgaws from the hall, and that adulterated bread from the table,

and cast out the water of the muddy river.” They did so; and if my parable

is right, very soon there was a rumor throughout the streets that truly royal

dainties were to be had, and the people thronged the palace, and the king’s

name became exceeding great throughout the land. Let us try the plan.

May be, we shall soon rejoice to see our Master’s banquet furnished with

guests.

We are resolved, then, to use more fully than ever what God has provided

for us in this Book, for we are sure of its inspiration. Let me say that over

again. WE ARE SURE OF ITS INSPIRATION. You will notice that attacks are

frequently made as against verbal inspiration. The form chosen is a mere

pretext. Verbal inspiration is the verbal form of the assault, but the attack is

really aimed at inspiration itself. You will not read far in the essay before

you will find that the gentleman who started with contesting a theory of

inspiration which none of us ever held, winds up by showing his hand, and

that hand wages war with inspiration itself. There is the true point. We care

little for any theory of inspiration: in fact, we have none. To us the plenary

verbal inspiration of Holy Scripture is fact, and not hypothesis. It is a pity

to theorize upon a subject which is deeply mysterious, and makes a demand

upon faith rather than fancy. Believe in the inspiration of Scripture, and

believe it in the most intense sense. You will not believe in a truer and

fuller inspiration than really exists. No one is likely to err in that direction,

even if error be possible. If you adopt theories which pare off a portion

here, and deny authority to a passage there, you will at last have no

inspiration left, worthy of the name.

If this book be not infallible, where shall we find infallibility? We have

given up the Pope, for he has blundered often and terribly; but we shall not

set up instead of him a horde of little popelings fresh from college. Are

these correctors of Scripture infallible? Is it certain that our Bibles are not

right, but that the critics must be so? The old silver is to be depreciated;

but the German silver, which is put in its place, is to be taken at the value

of gold. Striplings fresh from reading the last new novel correct the notions

of their fathers, who were men of weight and character. Doctrines which

produced the godliest generation that ever lived on the face of the earth are

scouted as sheer folly. Nothing is so obnoxious to these creatures as that

which has the smell of Puritanism upon it. Every little man’s nose goes up

celestially at the very sound of the word “Puritan”; though if the Puritans

were here again, they would not dare to treat them thus cavalierly; for if

Puritans did fight, they were soon known as Ironsides, and their leader

could hardly be called a fool, even by those who stigmatized him as a

“tyrant.” Cromwell, and they that were with him, were not all weakminded

persons — surely? Strange that these are lauded to the skies by the

very men who deride their true successors, believers in the same faith. But

where shall infallibility be found? “The depth saith, it is not in me”; yet

those who have no depth at all would have us imagine that it is in them; or

else by perpetual change they hope to hit upon it. Are we now to believe

that infallibility is with learned men? Now, Farmer Smith, when you have

read your Bible, and have enjoyed its precious promises, you will have, tomorrow

morning, to go down the street to ask the scholarly man at the

parsonage whether this portion of the Scripture belongs to the inspired part

of the Word, or whether it is of dubious authority. It will be well for you to

know whether it was written by the Isaiah, or whether it was by the second

of the “two Obadiahs.” All possibility of certainty is transferred from the

spiritual man to a class of persons whose scholarship is pretentious, but

who do not even pretend to spirituality. We shall gradually be so

bedoubted and becriticized, that only a few of the most profound will know

what is Bible, and what is not, and they will dictate to all the rest of us. I

have no more faith in their mercy than in their accuracy: they will rob us of

all that we hold most dear, and glory in the cruel deed. This same reign of

terror we shall not endure, for we still believe that God revealeth himself

rather to babes than to the wise and prudent, and we are fully assured that

our own old English version of the Scriptures is sufficient for plain men for

all purposes of life, salvation, and godliness. We do not despise learning,

but we will never say of culture or criticism. “These be thy gods, O Israel!”

Do you see why men would lower the degree of inspiration in Holy Writ,

and would fain reduce it to an infinitesimal quantity? It is because the truth

of God is to be supplanted. If you ever go into a shop in the evening to buy

certain goods which depend so much upon color and texture as to be best

judged of by daylight; if, after you have got into the shop, the tradesman

proceeds to lower the gas, or to remove the lamp, and then commences to

show you his goods, your suspicion is aroused, and you conclude that he

will try to palm off an inferior article. I more than suspect this to be the

little game of the inspiration-depreciators. Whenever a man begins to lower

your view of inspiration, it is because he has a trick to play, which is not

easily performed in the light. He would hold a séance of evil spirits, and

therefore he cries, “Let the lights be lowered.” We, brethren, are willing to

ascribe to the Word of God all the inspiration that can possibly be ascribed

to it; and we say boldly that if our preaching is not according to this Word,

it is because there is no light in it. We are willing to be tried and tested by it

in every way, and we count those to be the noblest of our hearers who

search the Scriptures daily to see whether these things be so; but to those

who belittle inspiration we will give place by subjection, no, not for an

hour.

Materials are reproduced by permission."