An All Around Ministry - C. H. Spurgeon (continued)
crowded slums of our mammoth cities. May every piece of ground be rained upon by gospel influences!
6. Another thing must not be overlooked; in order to faithfulness,, we must never connive at evil. This injunction will be warmly commended by certain brethren whose only notion of pruning a tree is to cut it down! A gardener comes to a gentleman's house, and when he is told that the shrubs are a little overgrown, he answers, "I will see to them." In a few days, you walk round the garden. He has seen to them with a vengeance; he has done the garden, and done for it! Some persons cannot learn the balance of virtues; they cannot kill a mouse except by burning down the barn.
Did I hear you say, "I was faithful, I never connived at evil"? So far, so good; but may it not happen that, by a bad temper, you yourself produced more evil than that which you destroyed? "Keep that child quiet," says the mother to the nurse, and the nurse immediately throws it out of the window. She has obeyed her mistress, and effectually quieted the child; but small will be her praise. So you fly into a passion, and you "give it" to the people, because they are not all they ought to be: are you all you ought to be? Do you say, "I will let them know that I am master here"? Is that so? Are you master?
But you are, perhaps, moved to answer me by saying, "Do not you, yourself, hold a high position in your own church?" I do; but how have I gained it? I gave no power but that which gentleness and love have brought me. How have I used my influence? Have I sought