The Joy of the Lord, the Strength of His People (sermon 1027)

This is the last sermon in the volume for 1871, and it was preached on the last day of that year. While Spurgeon very rarely preaches sermons in sequence, he often shows his awareness of sermons recently preached, and of the response that people make to them, often drawing in new themes or reiterating previous ones in order to make a pastoral or polemical point. He does have a penchant for preaching from multiple texts on occasion, as he does here. This particular sermon builds on the previous Lord's day's sermon, and the promise of joy to come. It zeroes in on the joy that the saints possess, its divine origin and practical value, holding out the blessings to all those who would take them. It is worth remembering that, while Spurgeon is emphatic, insistent and repetitive in his calls for Christian energy and endeavour, he never unyokes that calls from a deep and happy awareness of what God has done for his people in Christ Jesus, and how our ongoing relationship with God in Christ is the source of all our cheerful strength. It is a good sermon with which to close a year, and a good sermon for any time in the year.