Fearful of Coming Short (sermon 1177)

Spurgeon considers Paul a balanced preacher—not a middle-of-the-road preacher, but one who both offers salvation in all its fullness, to be received and enjoyed with assurance, and who warns lest the faith which a sinner professes be something else than the saving faith which clings to our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. This, then, is a searching sermon, in which the preacher urges us to consider the nature of the true faith which God gives as opposed to the empty faith which some claim. We need to consider the very nature of that faith, and its relation to Christ Jesus. We need to know why it is so important to consider this question, given how many turn away, how many fall short, how many are hypocrites, how many professing Christians simply show little of the evidences of a child of God. We need to understand what is at stake with regard to heaven and hell. We need to know how to respond. Here, Spurgeon is carefully pastoral: these warnings are not designed to crush true faith, but—in shaking it—to send its roots deeper into God, into his truth, into Christ. So he urges us not to draw back but to press on, to cling to Christ wholeheartedly, and so to enter into rest.