THE PARENT’S AND PASTOR’S JOY.

NO. 1148

A SERMON DELIVERED ON LORD’S-DAY MORNING, DECEMBER 21ST 1873,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

“I have no greater joy than to hear that my Children walk in truth.” — 3 John, 4.

JOHN speaks of himself as though he were a father, and, therefore, we concede to parents the right to use the language of the text. Sure am I that many of you here present, both mothers and fathers, can truly say, “We have no greater joy than to hear that our children walk in truth.” But John was not after the flesh the father of those of whom he was writing; he was their spiritual father, it was through his ministry that they had been brought into the now life; his relationship to them was that he had been the instrument of their conversion, and had afterwards displayed a father’s care in supplying them with heavenly food and gracious teaching. Therefore, this morning, alter we have used the words as the expression of parents, we must take them back again, and use them as the truthful utterance of till real pastors, “We have no greater joy than to hear that our children walk in truth.”

I. First, then, one of T HE P ARENT ’ S highest joys is his children’s walling in truth; he has no greater joy. And here we must begin with the remark that it is a joy peculiar to Christian fathers and mothers . No parents can say from their hearts, “We have no greater joy than to hear that our children walk in truth,” unless they are themselves walking in truth. No wolf prays for its offspring to become a sheep. The ungodly man sets small store by the godliness of his children since he thinks nothing of it for himself. He