C. H. Spurgeon · 45 of 63

Sermon 268. The Ceremony of Laying the First Stone of the New Tabernacle · Part 2

The Ceremony of laying the First Stone was then performed in the customary manner by Sir S. M. Peto, amidst the loud acclamation of the Spectators.

Sir MORTON PETO then addressed the assembly as follows:—My Christian friends, I congratulate my excellent friend Mr. Spurgeon, the deacons, the church, and all our friends assembled on this interesting event. It is one to which you have looked forward for some time. It is the commencement of an edifice in which we must hope that the era of much usefulness inaugurated with his ministry will be continued, and largely increased. That admirable paper which was read before the stone was laid, gave you a succinct, but interesting account of the church up to the present time. We must hope that those glories which have been so remarkably shown in the earlier history of the church, may not only be continued in the salvation of a larger number than has ever yet been known, but that in years to come those glories may be largely increased, and that all who live may have the happiness of feeling that the work which has been begun to-day, was one which the Lord had eminently blessed. It is well, dear Christian friends, in the commencement of any large undertaking, to look warily and see whether we are warranted in what we are about to attempt. I could not but feel, during the reading of that paper; that the fact there stated that the church at Park Street is larger at the present time than can be accommodated in the building, that there is practically no room in the chapel for the world, is one which to every Christian heart, must show that there remained nothing but for the church here to arise and build. I know it may be said, that the Music Hall, and other large places, might have given our friend Mr. Spurgeon an opportunity of making known the unsearchable riches of Christ, but then there are other institutions in connection with an edifice of this kind, which are of equal importance with that to which I have referred. We have not only the assembly of the church within its walls, but we must have an opportunity of gathering the young for instruction; and when we look to the fact that this new edifice will accommodate above two thousand Sunday-school children, and also place nearly five thousand people in the position of hearing the gospel of Christ, we not only feel that the world will be accommodated to hear, and the church amply provided for, but the young will be trained up in the path in which they should go. Then I rejoice, dear Christian friends, to know that this church, though strictly denominational, is in no respect Sectarian. Believing, as its members justly do, that there is no other mode of baptism than that which is figuratively set forth in Scripture by “being buried with Christ in baptism:” while I am sure, my friend Mr. Spurgeon will never, in coming across this truth (as he does not in regard to any other) compromise its due weight, or give it more than fitting prominence that the congregations may hear the simple gospel; yet on all occasions, when the claims of Christian usefulness are to be promoted, I am quite sure the church will be rejoiced to lend this edifice to any, not only of the denomination to which we are so ardently attached, but to any other evangelical denomination that may ask it at your hands. Then, dear Christian friends, let all the denominations feel that if this is to be a metropolitan building, it has large claims on them. While you have a large and a heavy burden, which you are delighted to bear, because it is only one of those things which enable you to evidence your love to Christ, and one of those things which do so much good in stimulating exertion, yet I cannot but feel that my friend Mr. Spurgeon, and the deacons have a very strong claim on all other churches of the metropolis and of the kingdom at large. And I trust that this will be increasingly felt, and that you will have the happiness of doing as good Dr. Rippon did. When my excellent friend, Mr. Spurgeon—as I have no doubt he will if spared, (and I trust he will be spared)—opens this place, and declares the full, free, and finished gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ as the basis of his ministry to come, as it has been the basis of his ministry past—that it will be in a chapel free from debt. I know there is no testimony which his loving heart would so freely acknowledge, as that testimony to himself, or rather to his Lord through him, which would enable him to feel when he first ascends the pulpit of this new chapel, I am here speaking the gospel to a people who are assembled in an edifice which has no claim whatever to discharge. Now, dear Christian friends, I can but hope that my excellent and dear friend, Mr. Spurgeon, may be something like those two worthies of whom we heard—that he and the one who is to succeed him may occupy the century between them. I only hope that my friend’s will be the larger half. I hope and believe that whenever the time comes, he will not allow his increasing years to give an evidence that he desires to occupy a position which he is no longer able to fill, but I am perfectly assured of this, that the divine blessing which has so richly manifested itself in the ministry of his youth, will enable him to feel with advancing years the truth of the promise, and that he will find that he who goeth forth weeping, bearing precious seed, shall find even to the hoariest age, that he will return bringing his sheaves with him. Accept my hearty congratulations on this event, my hearty prayers that every wish of yours may be more than abundantly realised in an the future; that my excellent and dear friend, Mr. Spurgeon and his deacons may not only live to see this house completed without accident, but that they and you occupying it together, may have what after all is of the greatest importance, a rich baptism of that divine influence, without which all that we undertake is worthless. Dear Christian friends, I thank you most heartily for having permitted me the honor of occupying this position on this occasion; and I earnestly desire that as brethren and sisters in Christ, you may find that what we have begun, may be accomplished to your joy, and the enlargement of the Redeemer’s kingdom.

Mr. SPURGEON: My dear friends, this is not the first time that I have borrowed light from Sir Morton Peto. I have often cheered the darkness of a long railway journey, by a most excellent lamp of his own manufacture, which he kindly presented to me, that I might see to read by it as I was traveling. I am very glad to see him blazing forth again today. In the light of his countenance many of us have been made glad. It is my earnest prayer that while God is pleased to bless him with wealth, and rank, and influence, he may find it quite as easy to serve his God in the future as he has done in the past. We owe him much as Dissenters for his great zeal and wisdom in having brought through the House of Commons an Act whereby our chapels are well secured to us. I pray that God may give him grace every day that he may know his own title to the kingdom of heaven to be clearer and clearer as years come upon him. May his course be like that of the sun, which goeth forth in his strength and stayeth not till the full blazing noon. And now I have to say a few words to you this afternoon with regard to this great edifice. I never answer any slanders against myself, and very seldom answer any questions about what I mean to do. It is always enough for me to have my own approbation; I always feel perfectly satisfied with the approval of my own conscience without that of anybody else, and when I have done wrong it is always enough for me to have the condemnation of my own heart. I find that I am obliged to be a self contained man, just going on my way, and letting other people do the same. If I am wrong I will be accountable to my own Master, but to no flesh living or breathing; and if I am right the day will tell it. God knows how true are my intentions even when I may have acted most foolishly. “This place,” I said some time ago, when our brethren were half afraid, “is to be built, and it will be built, and God will fill it with his presence ” There is no doubt whatever about the money being obtained. I scarcely know that I have asked an individual to give anything, because I have such a solid conviction that the money must come. I suppose that out of all that is now in our hands I have collected more than half myself in preaching, and that is the way I dare say the larger part of the rest will come, through the kindness of the provincial and metropolitan churches who have almost all treated me with the noblest generosity. I give this day my hearty thanks to all that have helped me; and I do not know but what I may as well add to all that have not helped me. They many of them mean to do so, and so I will thank them beforehand. There is one gentleman here to-day who is going to make a speech, after Brother Dowson shall have addressed you. I think (albeit that he can speak admirably well,) the best part of his speech will be made with his hand, for he has three thousand pounds with him to give as a noble donation from an aged servant of Christ, long sick and confined to his house but who loves Christ’s ministers and desires to help Christ’s cause. He would not like me to mention his name, and therefore I shall not do it. And now, my dear friends, as to the place to be erected here. I have a word or two to say with regard to its style, with regard to its purposes, and with regard to our faith and our promise. It is to me a matter of congratulation that we shall succeed in building in this city a Grecian place of worship. My notions of architecture are not worth much, because I look at architecture from a theological point of view, not from an architectural one. It seems to me that there are two saved languages in the world. There was the Hebrew of old, and I doubt not that Solomon adopted Jewish architecture—a Hebrew form and fashion of putting stones together in harmony with the Hebrew faith. There is but one other sacred language—not Rome’s mongrel tongue: glorious were that for a battle cry, but of no use for the preaching of the gospel—the Latin! There is only one other sacred language, the Greek, and that is dear to every Christian’s heart. Our fullest revelation is in that tongue; our noblest names for Jesus. The very epitome and standard of our faith is Greek; and this place is Grecian. I care not that many an idol temple has been built after the same fashion. So it may have been that Abraham and the ancient Hebrews may have carried their architecture from some heathen temple in Ur of the Chaldees. Greek is the sacred tongue, and Greek is the Baptist’s tongue. We may be beaten in our own version sometimes, but in the Greek never. Every Baptist place should be Grecian—never Gothic. We owe nothing to the Goths as religionists. We owe our Scriptures to the Grecian language; and a Grecian place shall this be; and God give us the power and life of that master of the Grecian language, the apostle Paul, that here like wonders may be done by the preaching of the Word. As for our faith as a church you have heard that already. We believe in what are called the five great points commonly known as Calvinistic; but we do not regard those five points as being barbed shafts which we are to push into the bowels of Christendom. We look upon them as being five great lamps which help to irradiate the cross, or rather five bright emanations springing from the glorious covenant of our Triune God, and illustrating the great doctrine of Jesus crucified. Against all comers, especially against all lovers of Arminianism, we defend and maintain pure gospel truth. At the same time I can make this public declaration, that I am no Antinomian. I belong not to the sect of those who are afraid to invite the sinner to Christ. I warn him, I invite him, I exhort him. Hence, then, I have contumely on either hand. Inconsistency is urged by some, as if anything that God commanded could be inconsistent. I will glory in such inconsistency even to the end I bind myself precisely to no form of doctrine. I love those five points as being the angles of the gospel, but then I love the center between the angles better still. Moreover, we are Baptists, and we cannot swerve from this matter of discipline, nor can we make our church half-and-half in that matter. The witness of our church must be one and indivisible. We must have one Lord, one faith, and one baptism. And yet dear to our hearts is that great article of the Nicene Creed, the “Communion of Saints.” I believe not in the communion of Episcopalians. I do not believe in the communion of Baptists. I dare not sit with them exclusively. I think I should be almost strict communicant enough not to sit with them at all, because I should say, “This is not the communion of saints, it is the communion of Baptists.” Whosoever loves the Lord Jesus Christ in verity and truth hath a hearty welcome, and is not only permitted, but invited to communion with the Church of Christ. However, we can say with all our hearts, that difference has never lost us one good friend yet. I see around me our independent brethren, they certainly have been to Elim to-day, for there has been much water here; and I see round about me dear strict communion brethren and one of them is about to address you. He is not so strict a communionist but what he really in his own heart communes with the people of God. I can number among my choicest friends many members of the church of England, and some of every denomination under heaven. I glory in that fact. However sternly a man may hold the right of private judgment, he can yet give his right hand with as light a grip to every man that loves Jesus Christ. Now with regard to our prospects. We are to build this place, and the prospect I encourage is that it be paid for before it is opened. I think it is likely too; because if we carry out our intention as a committee, we have a notion that if our friends do not give us liberal contributions we will put the carcase up and roof it in, and allow them to come and stand. Those that want seats can buy them. I am sure my people would soon get me a pulpit, and such is the zeal of our brethren that they soon buy me a baptistry. I leave it open for any generous friend here that pleases to do so, to engage to provide some part of the chapel, and say, “I will give that.” Churchmen give painted windows, and if some of you agree to give different parts of the chapel, it may be so erected. Understand, our large expenditure is caused partly by the fact that we have immense school rooms under ground, and also a vestry for church-meetings holding between 800 and 900 persons. This is necessary, because our church is of such an immense size, and our members come out to every service if possible. There is no church-edifice in London so well used up as ours. They hack it to pieces. We must build this strong I am sure, for the people are always with us. They love to be at the prayer meetings. There is no people that take out their quarter’s seat-money so fully. They say, “We will hear all that we can;” and depend on it, they never give me a chance of seeing the seats empty. But our prospect is, after we have fitted up our vestry, schools, and the like that we shall be able to go on and build other chapels. Now, Sir Morton Peto is the man who looks to build one chapel with the hope it that will be the seedling for another. He has the noblest chance that ever man had for getting this done. We will pretty soon try our hands at it. Our people have taken to chapel-building, and they will go on with it. They built a great chapel that held two thousand persons in Horseliedown for Benjamin Keach; then they built one in Goat Yard; then one in Carter Lane for Dr Rippon, then one in Park Street; and now we have set about building one here. “What are you going to do with Park Street?” it may be asked. Why, my dear friends, we might get out of our difficulties if we were to sell it, but that is what we do not mean to do. Our motto is, “Go forward, and never step back.” You know if we were to build one chapel, and sell another, that would be the “goose-step;” there would be no marching, it is merely putting one foot up and the other down, but never getting farther. Belonging to the Presbyterian order, we have elders in our church, as well as deacons, and the presbytery is capable of the widest extension. That church can be held in connection with our own; two preaching elders can preach the Word there, and the church still remain as one—not two churches. God sparing my life, if I have my people at my back I will not rest until the dark county of Surrey be covered with places of worship. I look on this as the beginning of the end. I announce my own schemes: visionary they may appear, but carried out they will be. It is only within the last six months that we have started two churches—one in Wandsworth and the other in Greenwich, and the Lord has prospered them. The pool of baptism has been stirred with converts. And what we have done in two places I am about to do in a third, and we will do it not for the third or the fourth, but for the hundredth time, God being our helper. I am sure I may make my strongest appeal to my brethren because we do not mean to build this as our nest, and then to be lazy. We must go from strength to strength, and be a missionary church, and never rest until not only this neighborhood, but our country, of which it is said that some parts are as dark as India, shall have been enlightened with the gospel. Now I have laid out a grand scheme, and I have no doubt some of my dear brethren, the ministers of Surrey, especially Dr. Steane, will carry it all out almost before I have begun. We shall be glad whoever may do it so long as it is done. I always try to put my shoulder to everybody else’s wheel, though I have got sometimes a little mire on my shoulders as the result of it; but I am ready to go and give a heave at any time if they will only be kind to me on this occasion and lift my wheel out of the mud. After Brother Dowson shall have spoken, and our friend Mr. Inskip, of Bristol, shall have made his three thousand pounds speech, we shall sing a hymn. This gangway will then be cleared, and all persons present will have an opportunity of placing an offering upon the stone. And if any of you would like to try your hand at building with a trowel you can lay a brick or two, or twenty, at a shilling a brick. Some of our friends will pay a guinea a brick to begin with, as they would not like to give less; but you can begin with a shilling a brick afterwards. We shall pay you nothing for the labor, but you will pay us for the privilege of putting bricks into the wall.

The Rev, H. Dowson: I stand here this afternoon, my dear Christian friends, as the representative of thousands of brethren in the North of England, who love the truth, who love you and who love your pastor, and who would be glad to be here today to mingle their Hosannas with your thanksgivings, and to congratulate you, and thank God upon an that is auspicious and triumphant in the proceedings of this day. Notwithstanding the prognostication of enemies, and notwithstanding the fears of halfhearted friends, this tabernacle is now beginning to look like a great fact, and we can entertain not the least possible doubt of the success of this enterprise, promoted and devised amidst the liberality and the prayers of the people here. Where God gathers together his sheep, and increases their number, he will surely amplify the fold; and when he gives sinners hearts to hear, and hearts to pray, and hearts to believe, he will give them in his providence a place in which to worship. This is the Lord’s doing, brethren. The hand of God has been in this work from the beginning, and I doubt not will conduct to a glorious termination. This vast metropolis of yours is covered in various parts with buildings—institutions of mercy, and hospitals for the relief of almost all the maladies incident to our frail humanity. What is the meaning of this grand edifice which is to fill the place before me? It is to be a hospital, an infirmary for the spiritually diseased. Here the deaf and the dumb, and the halt and the lame and the lepers, are to be assembled together, and they shall be pointed to the great Physician, and they shall be told of the balm of Gilead; and in the midst of it shall be the bath of blood, as well as the bath of baptism; and the bath of blood shall take the precedence of the bath of baptism, for it is the blood of Jesus Christ that cleanseth from all sin. When I listened to that interesting record and sketch of the history of your church, so fostered by a merciful providence and by a Saviour’s care, I could not but rejoice that the same great distinctive principles will be maintained; and that, though there may be a change of position there shall be no change in the doctrines preached and professed. We shall dedicate this sanctuary to the worship of the Trinity—Father Son, and Holy Ghost, we shall dedicate this edifice to the proclamation of the doctrine of the divinity of Christ, and salvation only through his cross; we shall dedicate this edifice to the doctrine of justification by faith, righteousness imputed, even the righteousness of God which is by faith in Christ Jesus, the doctrine of sovereign grace, the doctrine of the personality and agency of the Holy Spirit, the precepts of Christ, the ordinances of Christ, and the free proclamation of the gospel to every creature. The trumpet shall give a certain sound, sinners shall hear the sound,

“Their thankful tongues shall own,

That righteousness and strength are found,

In thee the Lord alone.”

As to your future prospects in the removal of this debt; My dear friend and brother Mr. Spurgeon, has said, that if the money be not raised there will be a probability that the place will be left unfinished. I trust it will not be in the position of a place occupied by a venerable predecessor of mine a hundred years ago, when they commenced the Baptist interest in Bradford, in a place galled the Cockpit, and the females carried their stools under their arms, because they had neither forms nor chairs on which to sit. Surely you will not wish this great Tabernacle to be opened under such circumstanees. This day the eyes of all the provinces of this country, my brethren, are turned towards you. Many parts of the country—the town from which I come to wit—is waiting to give a response to what you do to-day, and that which you shall in your liberality bestow, will give a tone and influence far and wide amongst the provinces, the hearts of whose inhabitants beat with sympathy for your cause and your enterprise. Brethren, we have laid the foundation of a material edifice. There is a nobler “temple, I need scarcely remind you, of which Jesus Christ is the chief corner stone. This is only a tabernacle; these stones will moulder and decay, or some great convulsion or earthquake hereafter shall heave up the mighty foundations of this stable edifice, but the temple of the living God, of which I hope many of you are living stones, shall stand and stand for ever, the memorial of God’s eternal unchangeable compassion, and his pity for the lost and the guilty. May God bless and prosper you, cause his face to shine upon you, and give you peace evermore. Amen

Mr. INSKIP, of Bristol: My Christian friends, after the trumpet-tongued introductions which my friend and brother Mr. Spurgeon, has given me, I am sure you must expect very large things; but I do hope that you and himself will not go away disappointed by very small things. But, however, large things have their commencement from very small beginnings, and as we see yonder ground covered with the sands of the gravel and the stones about it, and as we see the bricks yonder piled, and contemplate the lime which will have a large number of component particles to combine and unite therewith, the preparation for this building which is to be erected; so it is that we have to look forward from small individual materials, to the consummation of the glorious kingdom of our blessed Lord and Saviour. I have, it is true, to appear before you to-day as the representative but of one, and not of the multitude; but well assured I am, that had my brethren in the West known that I was to come here as a representative, or a delegate at all, they would have sent me well furnished and well armed. And it is only for my brother, Mr. Spurgeon, to make his way to the West, and I know that he will find a very hearty response to his warm appeals. However, the response which I have to make to-day is one which comes from a single heart. It comes from the heart of one who is confined to a sick chamber, and has not seen the outside of the city for some years past. But that chamber is enlivened and enlightened by the bright illumination of the Eternal Spirit. That man’s large wealth and large fortune has been dedicated to his Lord. He numbers eighty-three years of age, and has given away upwards of eighty thousand pounds. And he has sent me here to-day to say he will give you three thousand pounds and, what is more, if twenty gentlemen will come forward with one hundred pounds a-piece upon the opening of this chapel, I am prepared to put down twenty hundreds to meet it. “It is not by might, it is not by power, but by my Spirit saith the Lord.” These things, as I said, emanate from small beginnings. It was my honor and my privilege this day three weeks to address a large concourse in laying the foundation stone of a new edifice for the Church of England, in the city of Bristol. The new church for our dear friend and brother, Doudney, is now progressing, through the same gentleman’s bounty. There is one thing you will say, “Dear me, he deserves great praise.” But he says, “Give me none of it, away with it, away with it, it is fulsome, it is annoying. Lay it upon the head of Immanuel, for he gave it to me. He it is that has induced me thus to give you assistance.” It is not for me to laud the man, and therefore I leave him it his solitude—with an earnest prayer which no doubt many of you will reciprocate—that the Lord will bless and grant to him the bright shinings of his countenance in his last declining hours. As regards this building which is about to be erected, it is a matter of considerable delight to me to be able to forward in the least degree the views of my friend Mr. Spurgeon. With much true delight has it been my happiness to hear of many sinners in the West of England having been brought to a knowledge of Christ by his ministry. Let me now ask you earnestly to supplicate that the same blessing may rest upon his labors here, in answer to earnest and incessant prayer—prayer inspired by the Holy Spirit of God who alone is the inspirer of prayer. May the work of conversion proceed! There are many things here to be considered. There are many things to be talked of, but the time would fail me now even to hint at them. I trust by-and-bye, if I should stay to the evening meeting, an opportunity will be afforded me of saying a few words which will be more audible. I leave now others more able to address you than I can possibly be, and I shall be very happy to place on this stone, in accordance with the mission with which I am entrusted, not a painted window, but a printed piece of paper.