Spurgeon quote for the day! 4-11-11

“Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved said unto Peter,

It is the Lord.” John 21:7

"Now, secondly, I have to speak upon THE MEANS WHICH WE ARE TO USE SO AS TO GAIN OUR MASTER’S PRESENCE. I have tried to show you that all our success must come from Him and all that He gives us must be ascribed to Him. So how can we secure His Presence? We have it in a measure—how can we have it more fully? Well, let us always remember that He comes just where He wills to come. There is absolute Sovereignty about the work of Christ in the Kingdom of His Grace. As the wind blows where it wishes, so does the Spirit of God work wherever He pleases. I do not think that we can always account for the great success of one preacher and the non-success of another by anything that we can see. We have to fall back upon the Sovereignty of God and say, “God wills it and, therefore, it is.” He will have us know that Sovereignty is His Divine prerogative. He has the key of David—He opens and no man shuts. He shuts and no man opens. If He wills it, the rain shall descend steadily to make fat the fields. But if He wills it, He can restrain the dew of Heaven until the most fertile Church shall become barren as the mountains of Gilboa! He exercises His power not according to our will, but according to His own will—we must never forget that. At the same time, what course should we take in order to secure His Presence? I reply, first, that we had better go on with our work for Him. If we want Christ to bless us and we are doing work for Him, we had better keep on steadily doing it. These disciples of His had been fishing all night. Perhaps if they had not fished at night Christ would not have given them fish in the daytime. He does not often come to bless idlers—He acts Sovereignly, as I have said, but He generally gives His blessing to those Churches that do the most for Him. I have always found that an earnest Gospel ministry and a prayerfully united Church will have God’s blessing when others will not have it. Go on, Sunday school teachers, go on, tract distributors! Go on, Evangelists—go on, all of you who are laboring for Christ—keep, each one, to his own service and even if it has been night with you and you have taken nothing, still keep on at your toil! Probably the best way to bring the Master to you is to labor for Him with all your might."

C.H. Spurgeon- "THE POWER OF CHRIST’S PRESENCE" NO. 3146