The Art of IllustrationSpurgeon, C. H. (Charles Haddon)
Religion
The Art of Illustration
Spurgeon, C. H. (Charles Haddon)
Homiletical illustrations; Preaching
Still, brethren, though the earth travels slowly, when compared with
Mercury and Venus, yet, as Galileo said, it does move, and at a pretty
good rate, too. I dare say, if you were to walk for twenty minutes, and
you knew nothing about the speed at which the earth is traveling, you
would be surprised if I assured you that you had in that short space of
time gone more than 20,000 miles; but it would be a fact. This book,
which has already given us much useful information, says: "It is a truly
astonishing thought that, 'awake, asleep, at home, abroad,' we are
constantly carried round with the terrestrial mass, at the rate of
eleven miles a minute, and are, at the same time, traveling with it in
space with a velocity of sixty-six thousand miles an hour. Thus, during
the twenty minutes consumed in walking a mile from our thresholds, we
are silently conveyed more than twenty thousand miles from one portion
of space to another; and, during a night of eight hours' rest, or
tossing to and fro, we are unconsciously translated through an extent
equal to twice the distance of the lunar world."
We do not take any notice of this movement, and so it is that little
things, which are near and tangible, often seem more notable than great
things which are more remote. This world impresses many men with far
greater force than the world to come has ever done, because they look
only upon the things that are seen and temporal. "But," perhaps you say,
"we do not feel ourselves moving." No, but you are moving, although you
are not conscious of it. So, I think that, sometimes, when a believer in
Christ does not feel himself advancing in divine things, he need not
fret on that account; I am not certain that those who imagine themselves
to be growing spiritually are really doing so. Perhaps they are only
growing a cancer somewhere; and its deadly fibers make them fancy there
is a growth within them. Alas! so there is; but it is a growth unto
destruction.
When a man thinks that he is a full-grown Christian, he reminds me of a
poor boy whom I used to see. He had such a splendid head for his body
that he had often to lay it on a pillow, for it was too weighty for his
shoulders to carry, and his mother told me that, when he tried to stand
up, he often tumbled down, over-balanced by his heavy head. There are
some people who appear to grow very fast, but they have water on the
brain, and are out of due proportion; but he who truly grows in grace
does not say, "Dear me! I can feel that I am growing; bless the Lord!
Let's sing a hymn, 'I'm a-growing! I'm a-growing!'" I have sometimes
felt that I was growing smaller, brethren; I think that is very
possible, and a good thing, too. If we are very great in our own
estimation, it is because we have a number of cancers, or foul
gatherings, that need to be lanced, so as to let out the bad matter that
causes us to boast of our bigness.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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