“What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops.”
-- Matthew 10:27

Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892) was an English Baptist preacher, author, and editor. Pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle from 1861 until his death. Founded a pastors’ college (1856), an orphanage (1867), and edited the monthly The Sword and the Trowel magazine. To read full biography click here.

I HOPE that many who are now present long beyond everything else to be useful to their fellow-creatures. We do not want to go to heaven alone; we are most anxious to lead others to the Savior. I remember a very remarkable telegram, which was sent from England, by a lady who had sailed from New York with all her children. She landed in England after being shipwrecked, but she had to send to her husband this brief but suggestive telegram, “Saved, — alone.” Ah! that last sad word seemed as if it took almost all the sweetness out of the first one. “Saved alone.” May that never be what we shall have to say as we enter heaven; but may we have the privilege of saying, “Here am I, Father, and the children whom thou hast given me.” May it be my joy to be able to say, “Here am I and all my congregation, saved in the Lord with an everlasting salvation.”

So we begin with the assurance that all of you who know the Lord want to be useful; but, if that is to be the case, preparation is necessary. You say that you are going out to battle, young man, do you? Well, do not be in such a hurry. You have no rifle or sword, you will be in the way of the other soldiers rather than an addition to them. Unless you are, first of all, properly trained, you will certainly make a failure of your soldiering. The man who jumps into the army is not a warrior all at once; there must be drill, there must be a certain course of training, before he can be of any service to the Queen. So is it with Christ’s disciples. He did not send them out to preach directly he called them from their former occupations; but he kept them with himself for a time till they had learned at least some of the lessons they were to impart to others; for how could they teach what they did not know? Can a thing which is not in a man come out of him? And if it has never been put into him, how can it be got out of him? So our Savior, in the words of our text, encouraged his disciples to proclaim, even upon the housetops, the gospel which he had revealed to them; but he also gave them to understand that, first of all, they had need of preparation before they would be qualified to deliver their message: “What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops.”

I. I want, first, to speak to you, who desire to work for Jesus, concerning his own definition of AN INVALUABLE PRIVILEGE FOR ALL CHRISTIANS: “What I tell you in darkness,” “what ye hear in the ear.”

From our Lord’s words, I learn that it is the great privilege of Christians to realize, first, that Christ is still alive, and still with his people, still conversing with his chosen ones, still by his Divine Spirit speaking out of his very heart into the hearts of his true disciples. Christ was born an infant, but he is no infant now. Christ died, but he is not dead now. He is risen; he has gone up into his glory; he sits upon the throne of God; but, at the same time, by a very real spiritual presence he is with all his people, as he said to his disciples, “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.” And there is nothing that can so fit a man for holy service as to have Christ’s eyes looking into his eyes, and reading him through and through, and to have Christ’s pierced hand laid on his heart till the very impress of its wound is there reproduced, filling that heart with a loving grief for others. “Oh!” says one, “I think that I could speak for Christ if that should ever be true to me.” Ah! my friend, you will never speak aright until it is true to you. Not with those mortal eyes will you see him, but your heart shall behold him without any help from those dull optics. Not with your ears shall you hear his voice, but your heart shall attend to his message without the use of those poor impediments of ears. You shall know that he is with you, you shall be sure of it, for his life shall touch your life, his spirit shall flood and overflood your spirit; and then, but not till then, shall you? be fit to speak in his name. That is the first part of this invaluable privilege, — we are permitted to realize our Lord’s presence with us personally.

Next, we are enabled to feel Christ’s word as spoken to us: “I tell you.” The message of the gospel is applied by Christ directly and distinctly to our own soul. We do not look for any new revelation, but we do expect the old revelation to be made to our hearts and consciences in all its wondrous power. We expect that the words which Jesus spoke should ring in our souls with such music as they evoked when he first uttered them, and that we should, by the working of his Spirit, feel the force of those words just as they did who heard him with their outward ears; and we shall never fully preach the gospel till then. A man may go to College, he may learn all about the letter of Scripture, but he is no minister of God if he has not sat at Jesus’ feet, and learned of him; and when he has learned of him, and the truth has come home to his heart as his own per sonal possession given to him by Christ, then shall he speak with more than mortal power, but not till then. Step back into the rear rank, sir, if Christ has never spoken to you thus, and wait there until he has done so. If the Master has given you no message, do not run; what is the use of running if you have nothing to tell? Do you think that you are to make up your own message as you run? Ah! then, you are not Christ’s servant, for his servant waits until he has heard the message from his Master, and then it is both his duty and his privilege to tell it out just as he has heard it: “What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear,” — “I myself whispering it into your personal ear, that you may receive it direct from me, — this it is which you are to go and proclaim upon the housetops.”

The text seems to imply that these communications are made to us again and again. There are some of us who are called to spend our whole lives in our Master’s service; and unless we are often alone with him, listening to the message he has for us to deliver, our streams will not continue to run. I thank God that, during the last few weeks, while I have been in the South of France, I have had a blessed period of privately hearing the word afresh from the Master. It has been a constant joy and delight to me to meditate again and again upon the truths which I have preached, to feed upon them in my own soul, and in quiet communion with God to be gathering spiritual stores of nourishment for you, of which, first of all, I had proved the power and preciousness to my own heart. I would earnestly urge all Christian workers to be sure to get some time alone for the prayerful study of the Word. The more of such time that you can get, the better will it be both for yourself and for others. You know that it is impossible for a sower of seed to be always scattering, and never gathering; the seed-basket must be filled again and again, or the sowing must come to an end. You cannot keep on distributing bread and fish to the multitude, as the disciples did, unless, every now and then, you go back to the Master, and say, “My Lord, I need more bread and more fish, for my supply is running short. Give me more, that I may give out more.”

Make such occasions as often as you can. I am glad to see so many of you, my young friends, busy for the Master; but I pray you not to forget that it was Mary, who sat at the Master’s feet, of whom he said that she had chosen that good part which should not be taken away from her. It is well to be like Martha, busy on your Lord’s behalf; but you cannot do without Mary’s quiet meditation. You must have the contemplation as well as the activity, or else you will do mischief, and not really honor the Master. Suppose you see a carpenter, with a little hammer in his hand, go round the workshop, and gently tap a hundred nails on the head; you rightly say that he has not done any good at all. But here is another workman, with a good heavy hammer, and when he does hit a nail, he drives it home, and he does not leave it till he has driven it home, and clinched it, too. There is a way of seeming to be doing a great deal, and yet really doing nothing; and there is also a way of apparently doing but little, but then it is good solid work, thoroughly well done. Nobody can do this solid, permanent work, in a spiritual sense, without often getting alone with the Lord Jesus Christ. Avail yourselves also, dear friends, of those special opportunities which God makes for you to receive his messages. Sometimes he takes one of his servants, and puts him right away for a while. “Be thou silent,” says he, “and I will talk to thee.” Perhaps the Lord takes away the strength, the bodily vigor of his servant; there is the Christian woman, who longs to be going up and down her district, laid upon a sick bed; or there is the earnest, faithful Sunday-school teacher, no longer able to instruct his class. Yet it is in God’s wisdom that the nets are sometimes drawn out of the water, that there may be an opportunity to mend them, otherwise they would not always take the fish that are ready to be caught. It is true economy to let the cannon rest till it gets cool, or else there may be mischief done to the men who are firing it, instead of to the enemy; and all of us need rest, every now and then, if we are to be fitted for future service. Above all, we need often to go to Christ, to get from his hand a fresh stock of that gospel provision which we are afterwards to dispense to the people in his name. I pray you, who are seeking to serve the Savior, to take good note of the advice I have been trying to give you.

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C. H. Spurgeon, Preacher, author, and editor Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892), preacher, came of a family of Dutch origin which sought refuge in England during the persecution of the Duke of Alva. Charles Haddon’s grandfather, James Spurgeon (1776-1864), born at Halstead, Essex, was independent minister at Stambourne. His son, John Spurgeon, the father of Charles Haddon, born in 1811, was successively minister of the independent congregations of Tollesbury, Essex, of Cranbrook, Kent, of Fetter Lane, and of Upper Street, Islington. To read full biography click here.

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