The Necessity of the Spirit's Work

Spurgeon argues that salvation is impossible without the Holy Spirit because human nature is spiritually dead—“dead in trespasses and sins”—and utterly unwilling to come to Christ apart from divine intervention. He shows that neither preaching, nor baptism, nor the Lord’s Supper has any saving power in itself, noting that God often uses “earthen vessels” and weak preachers so that the Spirit’s work, not human eloquence, is seen as the true cause of conversion. Spurgeon explains that even the Father’s election and the Son’s redemption remain useless to a person until the Spirit applies them, saying the blessings of the covenant hang too high for us until the Spirit “takes them down and gives them to us.” He illustrates how only the Spirit can humble a moral, respectable man to cry, “God be merciful to me, a sinner,” strip him of self‑righteousness, and bring him to rest solely in Christ’s merits. Finally, Spurgeon points to the Christian’s life—his peace in suffering, his detachment from earthly prosperity, his longing for heaven, and his ability to repent and believe—as living proof that the Spirit must dwell within, for no natural strength could produce such humility, endurance, or joy.Sermon delivered by Charles Spurgeon on May 8th, 1859.