Cited in sermons
Charles Spurgeon
571 sermons · All people cited
The Trial Before Pilate, Part 2
Standing before Pontius Pilate, Jesus declares the nature and origin of his kingdom — not of this world, not advanced by force, but established by truth and governing the hearts of those who hear his voice. The passage exposes the judicial sham orchestrated by the Sanhedrin while simultaneously revealing Christ's sovereign composure as the one who knowingly drinks the cup appointed by the Father. The exchange reaches its climax in the release of Barabbas — a vivid, providentially arranged emblem of substitutionary curse-bearing, the just taking the place of the unjust. Meditating on this before the Lord's Supper, the sermon calls believers to gratitude and renewed confidence in the truth that governs Christ's kingdom.
The King's Exaltation and Future Triumph, Part 2
Psalm 21:8–13 presents the church's confident expectation of Christ's return in final triumph over all who hate God. The sermon expounds two movements: the certainty and finality of the judgment of the wicked (vv. 8–12), grounded in the sovereign righteousness of God and fulfilled in the mediatorial office of the enthroned Christ, and the church's doxological response in verse 13. The sermon traces verse 10's destruction of the enemies' seed back to the protoevangelium of Genesis 3:15, arguing that Christ's second advent is the consummation of the skull-crushing conquest promised there. Believers are called to know the terror of the Lord, to persuade the unconverted, and to praise God for the justice that the cross has satisfied on their behalf.
The King's Exaltation and Future Triumph
Psalm 21 celebrates the exaltation of the true David, the Lord Jesus Christ, whose resurrection, ascension, and session at the right hand of the Father fulfill what the church prayed for in Psalm 20. The psalm moves from a declaration of the king's joy and the Father's bestowal of blessing, crown, and eternal reign upon the Son as mediator of the new covenant, to a prophetic anticipation of his final triumph over all remaining enemies at the second advent. What is true of the exalted head belongs to the body: the church's permanence, blessing, and ultimate glory are secured in Christ's own immovability and intercession. The sermon closes with a call for sinners to flee to the triumphant king and for the church to recover the militant confidence that comes from feasting on the Psalms of the true David.
The Regulation of Priests and Prophets
Deuteronomy 18 governs the two offices through which God communicated with Old Covenant Israel: the Levitical priesthood and the prophetic ministry. The chapter moves from the material provision owed to priests and Levites, through a comprehensive prohibition of pagan divination, to the promise of a succession of prophets culminating in one greater than Moses — the Lord Jesus Christ, identified explicitly in Matthew 17 and Acts 3. The sermon draws out the typological and redemptive-historical unity of the chapter, showing that what Israel sought illegitimately through witchcraft and necromancy, God supplied legitimately through his Word-bearing offices, and that the old covenant's pattern of 'do this and live' finds its fulfillment in Christ who kept the covenant perfectly on behalf of his people.
The Psalmist's Contemplation on the Revelation of God, Part 3
Psalm 19:9–14 presses the believer to consider both the benefits of Scripture and the right response to divine revelation. The fear of the Lord, pure and enduring, is the fruit of sovereign grace working through a word that is perfect, sure, right, and pure — a word more valuable than gold and sweeter than honey. David's closing petitions in verses 12–14 trace a graduated reckoning with sin — secret faults, presumptuous sins, and the dominion of sin — answered not by human resolve but by pardoning, preventing, and restraining grace grounded in God as rock and redeemer. The sermon calls believers to prize Scripture above every temporal good, to deal honestly with remaining corruption, and to rest the whole petition for acceptance on Christ, the true David, whose imputed righteousness alone makes the prayer of Psalm 19 fully and finally ours.
The Psalmist's Contemplation on the Revelation of God, Part 2
Psalm 19:7–11 presents four attributes of Scripture — perfect, sure, right, and pure — and traces the effects each produces in the souls of those the Spirit converts. The sermon argues that 'law' in this psalm comprehends the entirety of God's Word, including the gospel, and that the attributes ascribed to Scripture are inseparable from the perfections of its divine Author. Against a merely convicting or condemning view of the law, the preacher demonstrates that the same Word that exposes sin is the instrument through which the Holy Spirit effectually converts, enlightens, and rejoices the heart of the sinner. Hearers are pressed to receive the Word with joy rather than religious duty, and any who are yet dead in sin are called to cast themselves upon the Lord Jesus Christ, in whom a willing and rejoicing Savior stands ready to save.
2LCF Chapter 30 - Of the Lord's Supper
The Lord's Supper is a divine command, a perpetual memorial of Christ's atoning sacrifice, and a genuine means of grace by which the Holy Spirit nourishes believers' souls with the benefits of Christ's redemption. This confession-study exposition works through all eight paragraphs of 2LCF Chapter 30, contrasting the biblical Reformed view of spiritual presence against transubstantiation, consubstantiation, and the purely commemorative position. The Christian necessity of observing the Lord's Supper is argued on three grounds: its institution by Christ as the only lawgiver, its character as a high and worshipful remembrance of Christ's person and work, and its function as a means of grace through which faith is increased and strengthened. Believers are urged to approach the Table not in rote external compliance but with understanding, faith, reverence, and godly fear, availing themselves of real spiritual communion with the triune God.
The Holy Confidence
Jeremiah 9:23–24 confronts the hollow complacency of boasting in wisdom, might, and riches — the carnal securities that cannot avert the certain judgment of God — and calls God's people instead to a holy confidence whose sole ground is the knowledge of the Lord who exercises lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness. The sermon traces a threefold structure: the folly of earthly boasting illustrated from Scripture and the case of Nebuchadnezzar, the necessity of glorying in God alone as the antidote to every false confidence, and the hallowed contemplations — lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness — that are to fill the believing mind. The Christward trajectory of the passage is pressed home: Christ secures the lovingkindness, bears the judgment, and provides the righteousness that alone avails before God, so that the promise 'believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved' is as certain as every judgment God has already executed.
The Importance of Our Knowledge of Christ, Part 2
Philippians 3:8 frames the Apostle Paul's claim that the knowledge of Christ possesses surpassing worth above all things. This sermon completes a seven-point exposition by arguing that Christ is the sum and substance of the Christian gospel (established from 1 Corinthians 15 and the book of Acts), the head and savior of the church (seen in the Great Commission, worship, baptism, and the Lord's Supper), and the ground of both the believer's present hope and future glory (grounded in 1 Timothy 1:1 and 1 Peter 1:3-5). The Christian's knowledge of Christ is not a cold intellectual exercise but the natural expression of a heart that has found in Christ the one who is precious, and that knowledge ought to animate every dimension of calling — preaching, praying, giving, and testifying.
Ask FGBC Batch 8: Church Planting, Creation, Imprecatory Psalms & More | Reformed Baptist Theology
This Q&A episode addresses ten questions spanning ecclesiology, pneumatology, soteriology, and worship, drawing on confessional Reformed Baptist commitments throughout. Topics range from church planting and confessional subscription to the nature of saving faith versus assurance, the love of God for the non-elect, literal six-day creation, the theology of imprecatory psalms, and the regulative principle of worship as it applies to musical instruments and the offering. The consistent thread is that Scripture and the 1689 London Baptist Confession provide the sufficient framework for answering practical and doctrinal questions facing Reformed Baptist churches today.
The Conduct of Men in Corporate Prayer
What does faithful corporate prayer look like, and who is responsible for leading it? Expounding 1 Timothy 2:8, this sermon argues that Paul's apostolic desire — carrying the full authority of God — requires men to lead in corporate worship prayer, lifting holy hands free from wrath and interpersonal dispute. The sermon establishes male headship in worship from creation order, traces the New Covenant universality of prayer ('everywhere'), and shows from Matthew 5 and 1 Peter 3 that horizontal reconciliation with fellow believers is a necessary precondition for acceptable vertical worship before God.
The Deliverance of the Psalmist, Part 4
Psalm 18:46–50 closes with a threefold ascription of praise to the God who delivers His anointed King — a King who is not merely David but David's greater Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. The passage is expounded under four movements: the praise of God as the living Rock (v. 46), God as the God of vengeance and victory (v. 47), God as the God of deliverance and destruction (v. 48), and God as the God of grace and glory (v. 49), all grounded in the Davidic covenant of 2 Samuel 7. The sermon presses the church to find in the invincibility of God's covenant kingdom the steel needed to persevere through present affliction, and to ground all worship in the theological confession that the Lord lives, that Christ's righteousness is imputed to His people, and that God's promises are yea and amen in His Son.
The Deliverance of the Psalmist, Part 3
Psalm 18:31–50 brings the psalm's three-part structure to its close, presenting Christ's resurrection, heavenly session, and sovereign reign over all nations as the fulfilment of what David celebrated in type. The sermon expounds four movements in the text: the divine power equipping the King for battle (vv. 31–42), the submission of peoples to the King (vv. 43–45), the praise due to the God of the King (vv. 46–49), and the covenant promise that undergirds the King's advance (v. 50). Throughout, David's victories serve as historically grounded prefigurations of Christ's definitive triumph over sin, death, and every opposing power. The application presses the congregation to lean on God's strength in spiritual warfare, to guard the church against both internal and external threats, and to rest in the alien righteousness of Christ credited to every believer by faith alone.
The Deliverance of the Psalmist, Part 1
Psalm 18:1–19 presents David's praise to God for deliverance from all his enemies, and the psalm functions typologically: David points forward to his greater Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, whose sufferings, death, and resurrection are the ultimate fulfillment of what the psalmist describes. Working through three divisions — the occasion of praise (the superscription), the declaration of praise (vv. 1–3), and the motivation for praise (vv. 4–19) — the sermon demonstrates that David's deliverance rests not on David's own prowess but on the sovereign power and delight of Yahweh. The sermon calls believers to love God with the love that is the chief fruit of faith, to cry out to God in distress rather than to despair, and to find consolation in the reality that God moves heaven and earth to vindicate his people and vanquish their enemies.
The Expectation of the Righteous One
Psalm 17 is approached as primarily the prayer of the Lord Jesus Christ according to his human nature — a perfectly righteous man crying to his Father for vindication, protection, and ultimate glorification. The sermon works through three movements: the psalmist's petition grounded in his righteousness, prayerfulness, and defenselessness (vv. 1–9); the character and violence of his enemies (vv. 10–12); and the psalmist's expectation of judgment on the wicked and resurrection presence with God (vv. 13–15). Because Christ's righteousness is imputed to believers by faith alone, the psalm becomes the church's prayer — a call to earnest, importunate intercession, patient endurance in a hostile age, and fixed hope in the resurrection rather than in temporal prosperity.
The Insurrectionist and the King
Luke 23:32–43 sets two criminals beside the crucified Christ — one blaspheming, one confessing — and leaves no neutral ground between them. This exposition works through the passage under three headings: the setting at Calvary (its geography, its Old Testament typology, and the fulfillment of prophecy in the crowd's mockery), the scoundrels (the total depravity of the blaspheming robber, and the remarkable faith of the converted one), and the Savior's response (certainty, immediacy, and felicity in the words 'today you will be with me in paradise'). The sermon closes with an urgent call to believe on Christ now, finding in the dying thief a picture of salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.
The Supper on Betrayal Night
On the night of his betrayal, Christ instituted the Lord's Supper within the context of the Passover meal — a deliberate act of covenantal timing that pressed upon his disciples the reality of what his broken body and shed blood would accomplish. This sermon works through Luke 22:19–20 under two heads, the bread and the wine, tracing the biblical theology of each element: the bread overturning the curse of Genesis 3 by providing divine nourishment freely, and the cup of the new covenant corresponding to the third Passover cup of redemption in Exodus 6. The sermon calls Christians away from coldness and neglect of the Lord's Supper toward a warm, particular reception of the truth that Christ's body was given for you and his blood was shed for you.
The Lament of the Psalmist
Psalm 13 is a lament psalm of David that moves through raw grief — the perceived forgetfulness of God, the daily sorrow of the soul, and the threat of encroaching enemies — to a resolved trust in the covenant mercy of God. The sermon traces this trajectory through the true humanity of Christ, who himself prayed lamentingly in Gethsemane and on the cross, establishing lament as a legitimate and God-given vehicle of prayer for his people. Lament is distinguished sharply from whining: whining refuses to petition God and ends in despair, while biblical lament drives the soul toward God and terminates in doxology. The congregation is called to bring their distress boldly to the throne of grace, resting in the hesed of God covenanted to all who are found in Christ.
The Priestly Blessing of the Ascending King
Luke 24:50–53 closes the Gospel with the ascending Christ lifting His nail-pierced hands to bless His disciples at Bethany — a gesture laden with Old Testament typology, most immediately the Aaronic priestly blessing of Leviticus 9. The sermon argues that this blessing is not a mere farewell gesture but an authoritative, ongoing priestly act: Christ ascended while still blessing, signifying that His intercession and the bestowal of divine favor upon His people never cease. Preached in the context of a Lord's Supper service, the exposition calls believers to receive the sacrament as participants in the everlasting blessing of the great High Priest, and to respond with the pattern of the early disciples — continuous, corporate, joyful worship of the Triune God.
Ask FGBC Batch 7: Anabaptists, Calvinism, Sincere Offer & More | Reformed Baptist Theology
This panel discussion brings together three Reformed Baptist pastors to address questions submitted to Free Grace Baptist Church on confessional identity, soteriology, covenant theology, and Lord's Day worship. The conversation distinguishes Particular Baptists from Anabaptists on historical-documentary grounds, examines the relationship between Calvinism and confessional Reformed Baptist identity, and evaluates the free and sincere offer of the gospel against what the panelists regard as the theological liabilities of well-meant-offer language. The discussion also treats the threefold division of the law, prosopological exegesis, and the scriptural rationale for two Lord's Day services, consistently grounding each answer in the 1689 Second London Baptist Confession and the exegetical tradition of the Particular Baptists.
Ask FGBC #61: Conviction of Sin Before or After Regeneration?
The question of whether conviction of sin precedes or follows faith is examined through the lens of the ordo salutis. Conviction of sin necessarily precedes faith because without it the sinner would see no need for Christ, yet Scripture nowhere prescribes a fixed period of misery as a prerequisite for receiving the gift of faith. Conversion is the divine bestowal of the graces of faith and repentance together, not a staged sequence in which the sinner must accumulate sufficient guilt before God acts. The call of the gospel is not prolonged self-examination but immediate flight to Christ, and the doctrine of presumption that keeps sinners in unnecessary bondage is a Catholic, not Protestant, imposition on the gospel promise.
Pastoral Preparation and Seminary Training for Church Leaders
What level of theological education does Scripture require of a pastor, and does the answer change depending on whether the role is full-time or supported by another vocation? Drawing on 1 Timothy 3 and 5, John 21, and the example of Ezra, this Q&A response argues that while formal seminary training is not an absolute biblical requirement, the pastoral calling demands rigorous, ongoing preparation in the Word and doctrine — not merely a pleasant personality or a willingness to serve. The discussion distinguishes between men called to primary preaching ministry and those serving in a supportive elder capacity, and closes with a frank exhortation that mediocrity in the pulpit has eternal consequences.
Ask FGBC #59: What is Faith?
Faith is defined in two senses in Scripture: as the objective content of the Christian religion (the propositions of the gospel to be believed) and as the subjective act of believing. In its saving sense, faith is the Spirit-given, empty-handed instrument by which a sinner rests upon and receives the Lord Jesus Christ and all the redemptive benefits secured by His obedient life, atoning death, and resurrection. Because regeneration precedes faith and faith itself is a divine gift, the strength of one's faith — or the feelings accompanying it — is never the ground of salvation; Christ alone is that ground. The discussion warns against distortions that load faith with feelings, smuggle faithfulness or love into its definition, or ground justification in evangelical obedience rather than in Christ received through faith alone.
The Authority of Christ Over the Demons
Matthew 8:28–34 records Christ's encounter with two demon-possessed men whose condition — violence, self-destruction, nakedness, and ceaseless torment among the tombs — exposes the wretchedness of Satan's kingdom and the glamorization of the occult as godless deception. The passage stands within Matthew's sustained demonstration in chapters 8–9 that the same authority with which Christ taught is confirmed in His works: one word, 'Go,' expels a legion. The city's request that Jesus depart reveals that the fear of God drives men either toward Him or away from Him, never to indifference. The sermon closes with the application of 1 Timothy 1:15 — that these two men are exhibit A that Christ Jesus came into the world to save even the chiefest of sinners — and an exhortation to parents to raise children who flee to the cross rather than to self-righteousness or the occult.
Ask FGBC #58: How to Start Reading the Bible?
How should a person begin reading the Bible — and how should they read it once they have opened it? This Q&A exchange addresses both the unbeliever encountering Scripture for the first time and the new believer seeking a starting point, recommending the law of God as a mirror of sin and the Gospels as the answer to that conviction. The discussion extends to the manner of reading: attending to the sense intended by the divine author rather than the nakedness of individual words, reading within the interpretive community of the church, and approaching the text through prayerful dependence that guards against the pride produced by knowledge acquired without humility. Practical counsel on guarding reading habits against the fragmenting effects of social media closes the exchange.
2LCF Chapter 19 - Of the Law of God
What role does the law of God play for the Christian now that Christ has come and the old covenant has been superseded? This confession-study exposition of 2LCF Chapter 19 works through seven paragraphs on the law of God, distinguishing moral universals from positive precepts, tracing the threefold division of the law (moral, ceremonial, judicial), establishing the creational and trans-covenantal abiding validity of the moral law, and demonstrating its divinely designed obsolescence in its ceremonial and judicial aspects. The three uses of the moral law — civil, pedagogical, and normative — are then applied to the Christian life, with Christ's active and passive obedience shown to be the only ground of righteousness before God.
The Power of the Peace of God
Philippians 4:6–7 contains both a prohibition and a promise: Paul commands believers to be anxious for nothing and promises that the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard the heart and mind through Christ Jesus. The sermon examines the prohibition against carnal anxiety, the corrective of prayer offered with thanksgiving, and the promise of divine peace — arguing that prayer is not a formula for instant relief but the ordained means by which God's people cast their burdens on God and receive the peace that flows from justification and the indwelling Spirit. The congregation is called to pray with right motivation, godly manner, and kingdom-oriented priorities as modeled in Christ's own teaching on prayer.
The Prayer of the Man of Sorrows
Psalm 6 is read christologically as the prayer of the man of sorrows — not merely a record of David's personal penitence, but a prophetic foreshadowing of Christ's redemptive anguish as the representative of his people. The doctrine of imputation grounds this reading: what Christ bears is not his own sin but the sin of those the Father gave him, laid upon him by divine appointment. The sermon works through two major sections of the psalm — the sorrow of the psalmist in verses 1–7 and the confidence of the psalmist in verses 8–10 — calling hearers to see their sin as atoned for by the Son of God and to live in light of that imputed righteousness, pursuing holiness and resting their prayers upon the same mercies Christ secured.
The Propagation of Israel's Faith
Deuteronomy 6:6–9 commands Israel not merely to profess allegiance to the one true God but to propagate that truth — first by internalizing it personally, then by transmitting it diligently to children and grandchildren in both formal and informal settings. The passage is read against the wider covenantal structure of Deuteronomy and set in parallel with Ezra 7:10, Psalm 119, and Ephesians 6:4 to show that receiving, doing, and teaching God's word are inseparable obligations running across both covenants. The sermon presses home that teaching children the law and the gospel is not a specialist calling for the especially devout but a natural reflex of redemptive grace, as ordinary and non-negotiable as providing food and shelter. Parents are urged to establish modest, consistent patterns of family worship — Scripture reading, catechism, prayer, and informal covenantal conversation — as the primary means of inoculating children against the idolatry of the surrounding world.
The Exhortation to Perseverance and Unity
Philippians 4:1–3 sets before the church two inseparable obligations: standing fast in the Lord and pursuing unity among the saints. Working through the apostle's affection for the Philippians, his call to perseverance, and the concrete dispute between Euodia and Syntyche, this sermon shows that the absence of unity both destroys the church and renders perseverance a near-impossible task. The biblical remedy for conflict — private confrontation, appeal to witnesses, and involvement of the church — is traced from Proverbs 18 and Matthew 18:15–20, with a complementarian reading of 1 Timothy 2 clarifying the nature of Euodia and Syntyche's gospel labor. Hearers are called to fasten their grips on Christ, his doctrines, and one another for the long haul of the Christian life.