"We have come to a turning point in the road. If we turn to the right mayhap our children and our children's children will go that way; but if we turn to the left, generations yet unborn will curse our names for having been unfaithful to God and to His Word"
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A “turning point” is a classic preacher’s device, but Spurgeon sharpens it into a moral trap: once you admit there’s a fork, neutrality becomes disobedience. The line isn’t really about roads; it’s about authority. Spurgeon frames the choice as binary - right equals fidelity, left equals betrayal - and then loads the consequences onto the backs of “children and our children’s children.” That generational forecast isn’t sentimental; it’s a pressure tactic. If you hesitate, you’re not just wrong, you’re endangering the moral inheritance of people who can’t argue back.
The subtext is ecclesial conflict. Spurgeon spoke in an age when Victorian confidence was colliding with biblical criticism, Darwinian controversy, and a growing temptation for churches to soften doctrine to keep pace with modern respectability. His “mayhap” is telling: the “right” path is hopeful but not guaranteed, because even orthodoxy can be squandered. The “left” path, by contrast, is portrayed as certain doom, because unfaithfulness to “God and His Word” is, in Spurgeon’s theological grammar, not a mistake of style but a rupture of covenant.
What makes it work rhetorically is the way it fuses fear and lineage with piety. Spurgeon doesn’t argue policy; he argues identity. The audience is invited to imagine future curses as a verdict on their character, not merely their decisions. It’s a sermon built to make compromise feel like treason - and to make steadfastness feel like love for the unborn.
The subtext is ecclesial conflict. Spurgeon spoke in an age when Victorian confidence was colliding with biblical criticism, Darwinian controversy, and a growing temptation for churches to soften doctrine to keep pace with modern respectability. His “mayhap” is telling: the “right” path is hopeful but not guaranteed, because even orthodoxy can be squandered. The “left” path, by contrast, is portrayed as certain doom, because unfaithfulness to “God and His Word” is, in Spurgeon’s theological grammar, not a mistake of style but a rupture of covenant.
What makes it work rhetorically is the way it fuses fear and lineage with piety. Spurgeon doesn’t argue policy; he argues identity. The audience is invited to imagine future curses as a verdict on their character, not merely their decisions. It’s a sermon built to make compromise feel like treason - and to make steadfastness feel like love for the unborn.
Quote Details
| Topic | Faith |
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