The following excerpt is taken from my new book, The Army of God: Spurgeon’s Vision for the Church (Christian Focus, 2024).
Amid these many conflicts, two controversies stand out: the Baptismal Regeneration Controversy in 1864 and the Downgrade Controversy in 1887–1888.[1] In the former conflict, Spurgeon battled the growing ritualism which arose from the Oxford Movement in the Church of England. In the latter conflict, Spurgeon confronted the increasing rationalism led by theological liberals within the Baptist Union. Speaking in 1857 in the “The War of Truth,” Spurgeon foreshadowed these two conflicts:
We have more to fear than some of us suppose from Rome; not from Rome openly… but I mean the Romanism that has crept into the Church of England under the name of Puseyism. Everywhere that has increased; they are beginning to light candles on the altar, which is only a prelude to those greater lights with which they would consume our Protestantism. Oh! that there were men who would unmask them! We have much to fear from them; but I would not care one whit for that if it were not for something which is even worse. We have to deal with a spirit, I know not how to denominate it, unless I call it a spirit of moderatism in the pulpits of Protestant churches. Men have begun to rub off the rough edges of truth, to give up the doctrines of Luther and Zwingli, and Calvin, and to endeavor to accommodate them to polished tastes…. There is creeping into the pulpits of Baptists and every other denomination, a lethargy and coldness, and with that a sort of nullification of all truth.[2]
Though the battle against ritualism and rationalism would come to a head in those two controversies, Spurgeon’s willingness to confront these errors characterized his ministry from beginning to end. For his willingness to engage in these conflicts, Spurgeon would sacrifice many relationships, endure much heartache, and in the end, it would “cost him his life.”[3]
Driving Spurgeon’s choice to engage in these controversies was his understanding of the warfare of the Christian life. In this age before the return of Christ, the Christian lives in enemy territory. Therefore, it is no surprise that one of the primary images of the Christian found in Scripture was that of a soldier.
The Christian is engaged throughout his whole life as a soldier—he is so called in Scripture—“A good soldier of Jesus Christ”; and if any of you take the trouble to write out the passages of Scripture in which the Christian is described as a soldier, and provision is made for his being armed, and directions given for his warfare, you will be surprised to find there are more of this character than concerning any other metaphor by which the Christian is described in the Word of God.[4]
The militant church, then, was a company of soldiers, banded together for the truth of the gospel. As evil and error abounded in both the Church of England and Dissenting churches, Spurgeon believed it was his duty as a preacher to be “a voice crying in the wilderness,” even if he was the only voice.[5] He did not face these controversies alone, however. He had the support of the church, the army of God. When Spurgeon encountered slander and opposition, his congregation bore them with him. To be a member of the Metropolitan Tabernacle brought with it notoriety among the many who opposed their outspoken pastor, but this only strengthened the bond between the pastor and his people, uniting them in the fight.
The love that exists between a Pastor and his converts is of a very special character, and I am sure that mine was so from the very beginning of my ministry. The bond that united me to the members at New Park Street was probably all the stronger because of the opposition and calumny that, for a time at least, they had to share with me. The attacks of our adversaries only united us more closely to one another; and, with whole-hearted devotion, the people willingly followed wherever I led them. I have never brought any project before them, or asked them to aid me in any holy enterprise, but they have been ready to respond to the call, no matter what amount of self-sacrifice might be required.[6]
Far from weakening the church, Spurgeon believed these controversies bound the church together and strengthened their devotion to the Lord’s work. Spurgeon led his army forward as they battled the evils of his day together.
What is the Church Militant?
Spurgeon drew his doctrine of the church militant from the overarching story of Scripture. Ever since the arrival of the serpent in the Garden,[7] there has been “a deadly hereditary feud between the Christian and the powers of darkness.”[8] This conflict has marked not only Christians, but all the people of God at every point of redemptive history. From Cain and Abel to Abraham’s battles, to the Exodus, to Israel’s march in the wilderness, the Canaanite conquest, and David’s battles, and on through the rest of Israel’s story, the theme of the war between the seed of the woman and the serpent runs through all of Scripture.[9] This war would culminate with the coming of Christ. Through his death, Christ “gave the death-blow to all his enemies. That hour when they thought they were treading on him, he was crushing them, and bruising the serpent’s head.”[10] By his resurrection, Christ triumphed over sin, Satan, and death, and now reigns as the King of God’s armies.
I see the champion awake, he unbinds the napkin from his head, he sees again the light—he rolls off the cerements of the tomb, rolls them up and places them by themselves. He has risen up; the stone has been rolled away; he comes forth into mid air and fires. O Hell, how didst thou shake! O Death, how wast thou plagued!… He rises, and in that moment sin dies…. Nor was sin alone that day scattered. Did not all the hosts of hell fall before him?… Their hopes were gone, they were scattered indeed. As the wax melteth before the fire, so did their hopes melt away.[11]
Now, as the triumphant King, Christ has redeemed for himself a people, and he sends them out among the nations to rescue captives from their bondage through the proclamation of the gospel. What the Old Testament reveals is that Israel’s deepest problem was not their slavery to other nations, but their spiritual bondage to sin. And just as God rescued Israel from slavery, God now saves sinners from their sin through Christ’s finished work.[12] Now, as the redeemed people of God, Christians, like Israel, are called to engage in warfare, not over lands or possessions, but for the truth of the gospel. Though its nature has changed, the warfare remains. Every true Israelite is to follow the Son of David into battle, not against the nations, but for the sake of the nations, against the spiritual forces of darkness.
Like the Spartans, every Christian is born a warrior. It is his destiny to be assaulted; it is his duty to attack…. He must be able to say with David, ‘I come against thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel whom thou hast defied.’ He must wrestle not with flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers. He must have weapons for his warfare—not carnal—but “mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.” [13]
Spurgeon’s understanding of spiritual warfare was also connected with his doctrine of sanctification. Soon after his conversion, Spurgeon encountered the Methodist teaching of Christian perfectionism, which taught “that no child of God [felt] any conflict within.”[14] Though he heard this in the Primitive Methodist chapel in which he was converted, Spurgeon immediately walked out, rejecting any such teaching. His own experience taught him that, for the Christian, there would be “a daily struggle with the evil within.”[15] Moreover, to accept perfectionism would be to deny Scripture’s teaching on the reality of indwelling sin in the believer.
Related to this was Spurgeon’s rejection of antinomianism, “that is, people who held that, because they believed themselves to be elect, they might live as they liked.”[16] This was a view that was popular among High Calvinists and was particularly influential in the region where he first pastored. Antinomianism recognized the reality of indwelling sin but denied the need to battle that sin. Spurgeon certainly believed that salvation was a gift, based entirely on the finished work of Christ. But he also believed that true Christians who are filled with the Holy Spirit bear the necessary fruit of warring against sin.
We cannot be saved by or for our good works, neither can we be saved without good works. Christ never will save any of His people in their sins; He saves His people from their sins. If a man is not desiring to live a holy life in the sight of God, with the help of the Holy Spirit, he is still “in the gall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity.”[17]
Therefore, for Spurgeon, a proper doctrine of sanctification in the Christian meant life-long warfare against sin. “The moment of conversion is rather the commencement than the closing of spiritual warfare, and until the believer’s head shall recline upon the pillow of death he will never have finished his conflicts.”[18] At conversion, the Christian has received a new nature, but this does not change the old nature. Rather, the sign of the arrival of the new nature is that conflict now rages in every believer.[19] For Spurgeon, the mark of spiritual life was not perfection, but persistent struggle against sin. In this life, the Christian was, fundamentally, a soldier. “To be a Christian is to be a warrior. The good soldier of Jesus Christ must not expect to find ease in this world: it is a battle-field. Neither must he reckon upon the friendship of the world for that would be enmity against God. His occupation is war.”[20]
This was true not only for the individual Christian but for the church also. Spurgeon saw his church as an army of soldiers, gathered for war against sin and for the spread of the gospel.[21] Even as engaging in spiritual warfare defined the individual Christian, so it was for the church. “In any one church there will be, there must be, if it be a church of God, earnest contention for the truth and against error.”[22] This theme of conflict could be traced throughout church history, from the days of the apostles to the present day.[23] For Spurgeon, church history confirmed what Scripture taught, namely, that “the church on earth has, and until the second advent must be, the church militant, the church armed, the church warring, the church conquering.”[24]
[1] For a brief account of these two conflicts, see Autobiography 2:82-87; 4:253-64. Much more work has been done on the latter controversy. One of the fullest accounts and analysis of it is an unpublished manuscript by Ernest A. Payne entitled “The Down Grade Controversy,” Spurgeon Collection, Regent’s Park College, Oxford. Also, see Mark Hopkins, Nonconformity’s Romantic Generation: Evangelical and Liberal Theologies in Victorian England (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2006).
[2] NPSP 3:44.
[3] This was his Susannah’s belief, having walked with her husband through the Downgrade Controversy. Autobiography 4:255.
[4] MTP 10:511.
[5] NPSP 2:117.
[6] Autobiography 2:122.
[7] Unlike the historical criticism of his day, Spurgeon held to a literal understanding of the events of Genesis 3, while also understanding those events to have a theological meaning. See Sermon 2165, “The Serpent’s Sentence,” MTP 36:517.
[8] MTP 12:532.
[9] Spurgeon traced this theme of conflict and warfare not only through Israel’s history, but to the New Testament church, and into church history. NPSP 5:42-44.
[10] MTP 7:164-65.
[11] Ibid., 165.
[12] “Observe, the children of Israel were emancipated from bondage, and had left Egypt behind, even as you and I have been rescued from our natural estate and are no longer the servants of sin. They had been redeemed by blood sprinkled upon the door posts and upon the lintel, and we too have had redemption applied to our souls, and have seen that God has looked upon the blood and has passed over us. They had feasted upon the paschal lamb as we have done, for Jesus has become to us our meat and our drink, and our soul is satisfied with him. They had been pursued by their enemies, even as we were pursued by our old sins, but they had seen these furious foes all drowned in the Red Sea, which they had passed through dry-shod; and we, too, have seen our past sins for ever buried in the Red Sea of atoning blood. Our iniquities, which threatened to drive us back into the Egypt of despair, are gone for ever; they sank like lead in the mighty waters, the depths have covered them—there is not one of them left.” MTP 12:530.
[13] MTP 7:545.
[14] MTP 8:167.
[15] Autobiography 1:263.
[16] Autobiography 1:258.
[17] Ibid.
[18] MTP 12:602.
[19] “Conversion and regeneration do not change the old nature; that remaineth still the same; but we have at our new birth infused into us a new nature, a new principle, and this new principle at once begins a contest with the old principle; hence the apostle tells us of the old man and of the new man; he speaks of the flesh lusting against the spirit, and the spirit striving against the flesh. I do not care what the doctrinal statement of any man may be upon the subject; I am sure that the experience of the most of us will prove to a demonstration that there are two natures within us, that only a complex description can describe us at all; we find a company of two armies within us, and the fight goes on, and, if anything, waxes hotter every day. We do trust that the right principle grows stronger, and we hope that through grace the evil principle is weakened and mortified; but, at present, it is with most of us a very sharp contest, and were it not for divine strength, we might throw down our weapons in hopelessness.” MTP 12:531.
[20] MTP 37:229. One of the more unique sermons that Spurgeon preached on this theme was Sermon No. 3188, “Discipline in Christ’s Army,” where he re-interprets Parliament’s “Army Discipline and Regulation Bill” and applies it to the Christian life. MTP 56:121.
[21] “I shall speak especially to the members of this Christian church. I exhort you, dear brethren, who are soldiers of Christ, to be good soldiers, because many of you have been so.” MTP 16:368.
[22] MTP 12:537.
[23] MTP 12:608-12.
[24] NPSP 5:41.