The truth must be known that many of these men respond faithfully, preach faithfully and press on faithfully, even when the people do not listen. They can do nothing else. God’s hand is on them so they continue preaching, teaching, writing and pointing others back to Christ. They are the ones who are standing against iniquity and evildoers. The world may take no notice of them and their task.

Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? Who will stand for me against the workers of iniquity? (Psalm 94:16)

C.H. Spurgeon writes:

Faithful ministers are few, and fewer still are bold enough to stand and defy the enemies of truth. Where are our Luthers and our Calvins? A false charity weakened Israel’s valiant men. One John Knox would be worth a mint at this hour, but where is he? Our great consolation is that the God of Knox and Luther is still with us, and in due time He will call His chosen champions.

From Spurgeon’s The Treasury of David.

I love this quote for two reasons. The first is that Spurgeon languished with the reality that there was so much weakness found in the ministers of his day, just as there is a weakness in the ministers of our day. There are far too many men who enter the pulpits across the country who refuse to do the work to preach God’s word faithfully. They are committed more to being the congregation’s general counselor instead of a true shepherd that is committed to feeding the sheep from God’s holy word. They may use the Bible, but it’s not there for exposition or rebuke, correction, etc. It’s there as life’s road map.

This kind of preaching is quite popular in our day. It does serve the purposes of the masses, but those who truly hunger for the word of God, preached with unction, go hungry. We do want to know that we are loved by God, as only the elect can truly experience His love, but we also want to hear the hard things as well. We want to know of our own sinfulness so that we also see magnificence of His grace. We want to know of His righteous judgment to come so that we understand His mercy toward us. We even want to know of our election so that we are reminded how special we truly are, not special because of anything in us, but because of His rich love toward us.

Yet, the purveyors of the pablum prattle on with their silly alterations and sermons more adapted to Oprah and counseling sessions than messages intended to address the people of God. Paul told us in Romans 10 that when the word is preached, we actually hear from Christ. But Christ is not to be found in many pulpits in our day because the men who stand in those hallowed places are too busy appeasing those who hunger for sweet messages. All the while, those who are truly His hunger all the more for the word.

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