Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the famous 19th-century British Baptist preacher, is known for his booming voice, eloquence, and nearly-perfect memory. However, he has not generally been known for his long bouts of deep depression and despondence. This book seeks to bring balance to our view of Spurgeon, but it also manages to do a lot more, since it is not really a biography. It is not really a work of practical theology or advice for Christian living, either. It doesn’t fit neatly into any of these categories, and yet it is powerful and memorable.
Perhaps the best category for it is what we call retrieval: A modern writer, Zack Eswine, has immersed himself in the works of a historical figure and seeks to ‘translate’ it for a modern audience, to take the crucial insights and strengths of that older teaching and make it available for the present day. This is wonderful because most Christians, sadly, aren’t going to pick up a collection of Spurgeon’s sermons, or books by the early church fathers – not even short ones with an introduction by C.S. Lewis! And I can understand why. The linguistic and cultural gap is usually too great, requiring too much effort.
But if we are ignorant of the past, we are impoverished, cut off from the rich heritage of time-tested truths, and also far more vulnerable to the lies and half-truths embedded in the culture of our own day and age. This is why I am so glad to see so many publishers engaging in the selective reprinting of worthy and edifying classics.
Why did I love this book? It beautifully captures the merciful heart of God towards sufferers of depression and melancholy. You sometimes can get the sense that Christians from other ages were all made of granite and would have told the depressed to repent of their sadness. But Spurgeon does not even begin to fit this caricature. In fact, the more I read the writings of Christian leaders in centuries past the less this caricature seems to fit at all. This book helped me to be more merciful to those going through depression, and wiser in how I try to help.
It should come as no surprise that Spurgeon did not use the medicalized language of our modern time. He was not speaking in terms of “clinical depression,” although I think everything he said could be applied to the experiences we now label thus as well as all the other conditions of heart and mind he meant to cover: sadness, sorrow, despondency, melancholy, discouragement, and so on.
The road to sorrow has been well trodden, it is the regular sheep track to heaven, and all the flock of God have had to pass along it.
Especially judge not the sons and daughters of sorrow. Allow no ungenerous suspicions of the afflicted, the poor, and the despondent. Do not hastily say they ought to be more brave, and exhibit a greater faith. Ask not – “why are they so nervous, and so absurdly fearful?” No… I beseech you, remember that you understand not your fellow man.
Time for some highlights. Chapter 7 is titled “Help that Harms” and in it there is a small section called “Why We Are Harsh with Sufferers.” Allow me just to list the four items which the author expands upon:
- We judge others according to our circumstances rather than theirs.
- We still think that trite sayings or a raised voice can heal deep wounds.
- We try to control what should be rather than surrender to what is.
- We resist humility regarding our own lack of experience.
Whew. As someone who has failed on all these points to some degree, that is convicting but helpful. Some more quotes from the book:
“The mind can descend far lower than the body, for in it there are bottomless pits. The flesh can bear only a certain number of wounds and no more, but the soul can bleed in ten thousand ways, and die over and over again each hour.”
“But isn’t following Jesus supposed to change all of this? Isn’t Jesus supposed to heal our diseases? Many of us feel that if we were more true to Jesus we wouldn’t struggle this way. Others actually tell us earnestly that our salvation in Jesus is threatened and put into question. But just as a man with asthma or a woman born mute will likely remain this way even though they love Jesus, so our mental disorders and melancholy inclinations often remain with us too. Conversion to Jesus isn’t heaven, but [a foretaste of it]… Christian faith on earth is neither as escape nor heaven.”
“It has long been recognized that a spirituality focused only on sunshine, positive thinking, immediacy and quick-fix Bible quoting ‘breaks down impotently as soon as melancholy comes.'”
“It is here, when dealing with spiritual depression, that Charles takes a marked turn in his usually gentle approach as a caregiver and sufferer. Many circumstantial, biological, and spiritual pains outlast our abilities to control them or understand them. But, when we face this ancient foe, the devil, there remains only one thing we can and must do. ‘Fight!'”
“Six years prior to his death, as he looked back over his life, he startles us with his perspective regarding the use of suffering to do good in life. ‘I am sure that I have run more swiftly with a lame leg than I ever did with a sound one. I am certain that I have seen more in the dark than ever I saw in the light-more stars, most certainly-more things in heaven if fewer things on earth. The anvil, the fire, and the hammer, are the making of us: we do not get fashioned much by anything else. That heavy hammer falling on us helps to shape us; therefore let affliction and trouble and trial come.'”
Zack Eswine has written a wonderful little book that captures the merciful heart of God towards sufferers of depression and melancholy. He accomplishes this by exploring the life and teaching of Charles Spurgeon, that great preacher of the 19th century. Spurgeon was a remarkable man in many ways, but perhaps none more surprising than his deep understanding of human suffering, especially mental anguish.
My experience reading this book reminded me of how it felt to read Richard Sibbes’ The Bruised Reed and Thomas Goodwin’s The Heart of Christ. And since Spurgeon was steeped in the Puritans, perhaps that is no accident. These works all capture the lamb-like tenderhearted mercy of God to the weary, sad, and low.
Therefore I recommend this book highly to anyone struggling with depression and also to anyone in ministry (especially if you have never experienced depression). We who would speak for God better make sure we understand His heart towards the weak and struggling, and better still, to so meditate on that heart that it becomes our own.
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