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The sermon centers on Zechariah 4:6, emphasizing that God’s work advances not through armies, institutions, individual strength, learning, or eloquence, but through the Holy Spirit. Spurgeon presents God’s glory as the controlling purpose of creation, salvation, and the church. The church’s great need is spiritual power, so believers must reject formalism and pray earnestly for revival. In the evangelistic conclusion, he teaches that sinners cannot save or regenerate themselves; they must be born again by the Spirit and believe in Jesus Christ, whose death brings forgiveness.
Theological center: The Holy Spirit sovereignly empowers the church’s mission and accomplishes regeneration, ensuring that God—not human ability—receives the glory.
Applications: Pray earnestly for the Spirit · Awake from spiritual lethargy · Believe in Jesus Christ · Human strength cannot advance the gospel
Primary texts: Zechariah 4:6 · 2 Corinthians 11:30
“Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the LORD of Hosts.” Zechariah 4:6 GOD’S first and greatest object is His own glory. There was a time, before all time, when there was no day but the Ancient of days, when God dwelt alone in the magnificence of His sublime solitude. Whether He should create or not create was a question depending upon the answer to another question— Would it be to His honor or not? He determined that He would glorify Himself by creating. But in creating, beyond all doubt, His motive was His glory. And since that time, He has ever ruled the earth and even blessed it with the same object in His infinite mind—His own glory and honor. Lesser motive for God to have were less than divine. It is the highest position to which you or I could attain, to live for God. And the very highest virtue of God is for Him to magnify Himself in all His greatness as the Infinite and the Eternal. Whatever, then, God permits or does, He does with this one motive—His own glory. And even salvation, costly though it was and infinitely a benefit to us, had for its first object and for its grand result, the exaltation of the Being and of the attributes of the Supreme Ruler. Now, as this is true in the general of the great acts of God, this is equally true in the minutiae of them. It is true that God has a church, that that church has been redeemed and will be preserved for His glory. And it is equally true that everything that is done to the church, in the church, or for the church, either with the permission or by the power of God, is for God’s glory, as well as for the church’s weal. You will notice, in reading Scripture, that whenever God has blessed the church, He has secured Himself the glory of the blessing, though they have had the profit of it. Sometimes He has been pleased to redeem His people by might, but then He has so used the might and power that all the glory has come to Him, and His head alone has worn the crown. Did He smite Egypt and lead forth His people with a strong hand and outstretched arm? The glory was not to the rod of Moses, but to the Almighty power which made the rod so potent. Did He lead His people through the wilderness and defend them from their enemies? Still, did He, by teaching the people their dependence upon Him, preserve to Himself all the glory? So that not Moses or Aaron amongst the priests or prophets could share the honor with Him. And tell me, if you will, of slaughtered Anak and the destruction of the tribes of Canaan. Tell me of Israel’s possessing the promised land. Tell me of Philistines routed and la…