Charles Spurgeon - Strengthen My Spirit: Daily Devotions from the Works of Charles Spurgeon

2004 by Barbour Publishing, Inc.

Compiled by Jennifer Hahn.

Print ISBN 978-1-63609-030-6

eBook Editions:
Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-63609-237-9

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Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the H OLY B IBLE , N EW I NTERNATIONAL V ERSION . NIV . Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.trade; Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture quotations marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible, 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Published by Barbour Publishing, Inc., 1810 Barbour Drive, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683, www.barbourbooks.com

Our mission is to inspire the world with the life-changing message of the Bible. Printed in the United States of America.

Charles Spurgeon is considered the most widely read preacher in history, excluding those of the Bible. He preached his first sermon at the age of sixteen, and by age twenty had delivered over six hundred sermons. Throughout his lifetime, he preached to over ten million people.

This godly pastor was well acquainted with hardship. He endured personal and family illness, as well as the enormous task of leading a church whose congregation also faced numerous difficulties. Spurgeon did not merely instruct his listeners to ask God for the power to withstand adversity, however; he was a living testimony of one who relied on God to be his strength. Missionary David Livingstone once inquired, How do you manage to do two mens work in a single day? Spurgeon answered, You have forgotten that there are two of us.

Strengthen My Spirit is a compilation of lightly edited selections from Charles Spurgeons sermons and writings, preceded by brief passages of scripture. Each day of the year, his words will encourage you to deepen your relationship with Christ. You may be experiencing trials and hardships: financial distress, a broken relationship, physical illness. Whatever you are facing today, God longs to hear you call out, Lord, strengthen my spirit.

Then He who sat on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new.

R EVELATION 21:5 NKJV

I do not know, but it is sometimes as well, when one has been plunged in sorrow or feels ashamed of his past lifeafter having regretted that which is bygone and repented of it and sorrowed over itto feel as if he breathed another atmosphere and had started on a fresh career. Having thrown away the old sword, he is now about to see what he can do with the new; having put off an old garment, he is desirous to walk more worthily of his vocation with fresh ones that are provided for him. Perhaps the thought of freshness, the fact of new time having dawned on our path, may be a little help to those of us who are dull and heavy, and we may be stirred up to action. If not to action, it may awaken earnest hope that the infusion of a new start into our lives, new vigor instead of the old lethargy, new love instead of the old lukewarmness, new zeal instead of the old deathlikeness, new persevering industry for Christ instead of the old idleness may result. God grant that it may be so!

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

2 C ORINTHIANS 5:17 NIV

Christ has been pleased to make us new men. His saints are new creatures in Christ Jesus. They have a new nature. God has breathed into them a new life. The Holy Spirit, though the old nature is still there, has been pleased to put within them a new nature. There is now a contending force within themthe old carnal nature inclining to evil and the new God-given nature panting after perfection. They are new men begotten again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. This new nature is moved by new principles. The old nature needed to be awed with threatenings or bribed with rewards; the new nature feels the impulse of love. Gratitude is its mainspring: We love Him because He first loved us.

This new nature is conscious of new emotions. It loves what once it hated; it hates what once it loved. It finds blight where once it sought for bliss, and finds bliss where once it found nothing but bitterness. It leaps at the sound that was once dull to its earsthe name of a precious Christ. It rejoices in hopes that once seemed idle as dreams. It is filled with a divine enthusiasm that it once rejected as fanatical. It is conscious now of living in a new element, breathing a fresh air, partaking of new food, drinking out of new wells not dug by men or filled from the earth. The man is newnew in principles and new in emotions.

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.

P SALM 42:1 NIV

Now man is new in relationship. He was an heir to wrath; he is now a child of God. He was a bondslave; he is now a freeman. He rejoices in Christ Jesus and feasts to the full. He was the citizen of earth once; he is now a citizen of heaven. He once found his all beneath the clouds, but now his all is beyond the stars. He has new relationships. Christ is his Brother, God is his Father, the angels are his friends, and the despised people of God are his best and nearest kinsfolk. And hence the man has new aspirations. He now pants to glorify God. What did he care about the glory of God once? He now pants to see God; once he would have paid the fareif it had cost his lifethat he might escape from the presence of the Lord. Now he hungers and thirsts after the living God; if his soul had wings and he could break the fetters of this mortality, he would mount at once to dwell where Jesus is. Dear friends, are you new men? If you are, you understand what it is; if you are not, I know I cannot explain it to you. To be born again is a great mystery; blessed is the soul that comprehends it! But he who does not know it will never learn it by the lip; he can only know it by the Spirit of God causing him also to be made a new creature in Christ Jesus.

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you.

E ZEKIEL 36:26 NIV