It was a cold winter morning. Outside, the snow was falling steadily. A fifteen-year-old boy slowly made his way through the streets of Colchester in the southeastern part of England. Being Sunday, all the shops were closed. Here and there, the lad saw small groups of men and women struggling through the snowdrifts to attend the various church services in town. Such a blizzard had not been seen by the city in a long time!

The young man plodding through the snow was named Charles. All his life, he had been exposed to the Word of God. His father was a pastor; his grandfather was a pastor. Charles had read many of the volumes in the family library. He was intimately familiar with the Puritans. But he was as yet a stranger to the Lord Jesus Christ. At fifteen years of age, although familiar with the basic truths of the Gospel, he was desperately searching for a personal and experiential knowledge of the love of God.

For months, he had attended various churches in town, hoping to hear something that would open his heart to the saving grace of Christ. Today’s driving snow made him give up the longer walk to the church he had planned to attend, and instead he turned down Artillery Street and entered the small meeting house of the Primitive Methodist chapel.

The hour of service came. But the pastor was not there, prevented from coming by the blizzard. Finally, after a long, uncomfortable silence, a layman from the congregation rose to his feet, cleared his throat, and advanced to the pulpit with his Bible. He was not prepared to speak. He was not a preacher, but perhaps he could say a few words that would be edifying. When he reached the pulpit, he looked out at the empty pews before him and found a few faces turned expectantly toward him.

He opened his Bible to a simple text from Isaiah 45:22: “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.” The people awaited a word from Heaven. But the layman had no sermon. With a silent prayer to God for assistance, he did the only thing he could think of doing. He read the text again: “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.”

With increasing boldness, he began to make a few comments on the words of this verse. Emphasizing the words unto me, he asserted that it was only by “looking to Jesus” that the sinful soul could hope for pardon. As he said these words, his eyes fell upon the teenager sitting in the rear of the church under the gallery. The layman had never seen the young man before, but he could see in the young lad’s eyes a searching interest.

Looking straight at the boy, he said, “Young man, you look very miserable.” In recounting the story, Charles would one day write concerning that comment, “Well, I did, but I had not been accustomed to have remarks made from the pulpit regarding my personal appearance.”

After a pause, the layman added, “And you always will be miserable: miserable in life, miserable in death—if you don’t obey my text. Young man, look to Jesus Christ. Look! Look! Look! You have nothing to do but look and live.”

History has not recorded the name of this modest layman who braved a snowy day to come to church and open his Bible to deliver a simple message from Heaven. But history has recorded the name of the boy sitting under the gallery. Charles Haddon Spurgeon looked to Jesus that day and found what he was seeking: the love of God revealed in Jesus Christ.

Soon Spurgeon began to share with others what he had found. Salvation could not be found in books, in theology, in church attendance, in baptism, or in the Lord’s Supper. Salvation was found solely in the Lord Jesus Christ. Only a year after his conversion, Charles Spurgeon was installed as pastor of the Baptist church in Waterbeach. His unusual ability to preach directly to the hearts of men attracted attention near and far, and it became evident that the hand of God was upon the young preacher in a remarkable way.

When he was nineteen years old, he was called to the pulpit of New Park Street Chapel in London. The pulpit of this church had been occupied by some of the most famous Baptist preachers in London’s history, among them Benjamin Keach and John Gill. The church had dwindled in numbers in recent years, and some thought that the young preacher could be used by God to kindle a revival.

Within a few short months, all of London was talking about Charles Spurgeon. His messages were centered upon Christ and His redeeming love. Spurgeon said of his own ministry, “It has been my one and only business to set forth the love of God to men in Christ Jesus.”

Spurgeon married Miss Susanna Thompson, a young lady who heard him preach and was converted under his sermons. The Lord blessed them with twin boys, Charles and Thomas. Susanna was a true helpmate for her husband; it was largely due to her efforts that her husband’s sermons were printed and distributed around the world.

New Park Street Chapel soon could not hold the masses who thronged into the church to hear the Gospel proclaimed. The church was renamed the Metropolitan Tabernacle. Sunday after Sunday, Spurgeon preached to a crowd of 5,000 souls, with 1,000 more standing in the aisles and along the walls. The largest audience he ever addressed was 23,654 people at the Crystal Palace in London. When preparing to preach in this immense hall, Spurgeon was testing the acoustics and proclaimed, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). While his purpose was to see how his voice carried in the hall, Spurgeon later learned that a workman making a repair in the gallery heard this sound test and was converted to Christ!

In spite of overwork and bad health, including terrible pain from severe gout, Charles Spurgeon preached the Gospel of Christ for almost forty years. His sermons and books were printed and distributed all around the world. He founded a pastor’s college for the training of young men. He also founded Stockwell Orphanage for the care of the many orphans of London.

Charles Spurgeon was called Home to his eternal reward on January 31, 1892, at the age of fifty-seven. All the church bells in the city of London tolled their solemn salute to the departure of the most famous preacher the city had ever known. Fully 100,000 people gathered to pay their final respects to the “Prince of Preachers,” beloved throughout the world.

At the center of the solemn two-mile long funeral procession was a coffin pulled by a team of horses. Atop the coffin was a Bible, lying open to Isaish 45:22: “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.”

On Spurgeon’s tombstone was carved this simple inscription: “Here lies the body of Charles H. Spurgeon, awaiting the coming of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.” Also inscribed was a portion of one of Spurgeon’s favorite hymns that sums up his life and ministry: “E’er since by faith I saw the stream thy flowing wounds supply, redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die.”

Sources and Further Reference:
Day, Richard Ellsworth. The Shadow of the Broad Brim. Powell, TN: Crown Publications, 2002.
Spurgeon, Charles. C.H. Spurgeon Autobiography. Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 2015.