Talking for Christ – Charles Spurgeon

THERE lived some fifty years or so ago a set of great table-talkers, who were asked out to dine because of their lively conversational powers. Now if this be in any of you never waste it in mere pleasantries, but say something worth the saying, and aim at the highest results. Remember Jesus was a mighty table-talker, as the evangelists took care to note. I wish I could with discreet adroitness break in upon a conversation in a railway carriage and turn it round to the Savior—turn it round to something worth speaking of. I often envy those of my brethren who can go up to individuals and talk to them with freedom. I do not always find myself able to do so, though when I have been divinely aided I have had a large reward. When a Christian man can get hold of a man and talk to him, it is like one of the old men-of-war laying alongside a French ship and giving her a broadside, making every timber shiver, and at last sending her to the bottom. How many a soul has been brought to Christ by the loving personal exhortations of Christian people who know how to do it! To be able, like Elijah, to stretch yourselves upon the dead child, to put your hands upon his hands, your feet upon his feet, and breathe the life by God’s help into the dead—oh, some of you can do this better, perhaps, than those who are called to speak to hundreds and thousands. Do use it if you have the ability; and try to get the ability if you have it not.