Any Other Condition

“Believer, if your inheritance be a lowly one you should be satisfied with your earthly portion; for you may rest assured that it is the fittest for you . . . Remember this. Had any other condition been better for you than the one in which you are, divine love would have put you there.”—C. H. Spurgeon

I think Spurgeon must have sung verse three of Cecil Frances Alexander’s appalling hymn “All things bright and beautiful” a few too many times for his own and other people’s good.

“The rich man in his castle,

The poor man at his gate,

God made them high and lowly,

And ordered their estate.

“All things bright and beautiful,

All creatures great and small,

All things wise and wonderful,

The Lord God made them all.”

It is perhaps difficult for us today to understand how widely, strongly and uncritically this idea was accepted by many of our Christian forebears, but it was. And it is really not that long ago that it was accepted in much of British society. However, there is a philosophical backdrop to this idea that does not derive from the Christian faith, but from pagan Greek philosophy. It is the idea that this present world is the best of all possible worlds.

Behind this is the pagan Greek idea that God, who is the supreme good, must by his very nature and therefore of necessity create all possible good and that this creation can therefore lack nothing good in it. Nothing better is possible and all possible good is brought into being by the supreme good who is the Creator: in other words plenitude. This doctrine of plenitude was then combined with the ideas of continuity and gradation, and these three ideas together constitute the pagan idea of the great chain of being.

Of course it is very easy and convenient to simply equate Spurgeon’s aphorism with the Christian doctrine of predestination, but I do not think that really is its origin, not from my own experience and knowledge of British society, which is the context here, and the Bible in teaching the doctrine of predestination is never pat and cosy in the way Spurgeon’s aphorism is. Why? Because the biblical doctrine of predestination is always balanced by the biblical doctrine of human responsibility and accountability, and the requirement that we work for the establishing of God’s kingdom.

The believer is certainly not called to see and accept the sinful world into which he has been placed by God as a fixed state without the possibility of amelioration, and neither this nor the idea of caste, which it logically implies, have any foundation in the Bible. Rather, he is called to do good and help his fellow men, not merely in the salvation of their souls, but also in the improvement of their worldly condition, as the Bible itself makes abundantly clear. This is also what it means to seek the kingdom of God and his justice.

The Christian is called to serve God and do good works according to his word, so that his life contributes to making this world a better place than it was before he was saved by God’s grace for this purpose. Spurgeon’s teaching above is not part of the Christian faith as it has been understood throughout history, despite its being accepted by many Christians in the past, and the teaching that we must care for and improve our neighbour’s and our own conditions is one the definitive features of the practice of the Christian faith. The Westminster Larger Catechism, for example, teaches that the Eight Commandment requires us to “endeavour, by all just and lawful means, to procure, preserve, and further the wealth and outward estate of others as well as our own” (Q 141. A).

“Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?”—Hosea 3:6. God’s predestination is real, but the Lord Jesus also came to redeem a fallen world, and the biblical doctrines of creation, fall and redemption are not consistent or compatible with the pagan idea of the great chain of being that is behind the philosophical notion that this is the best possible of all worlds, and that I suspect is unwittingly behind Spurgeon’s aphorism.

If this were the best of all possible worlds and necessarily so it would not be in need of redemption. But this pagan philosophy exerted a very great influence upon Christendom, both philosophically, socially and politically, and this influence persisted quite late into Western history and indeed into Christian thinking. Its influence can be seen in the acceptance and justification of slavery, for example, though its origins were probably mostly misunderstood and its acceptance often unselfconscious.

Of course, Spurgeon did not really believe this aphorism himself. Had he done so he would never have set up Stockwell Orphanage to provide a home and education for 500 fatherless boys and girls, nor would he have said the following: “I do from my inmost soul detest slavery . . . and although I commune at the Lord’s table with men of all creeds, yet with a slave-holder I have no fellowship of any sort or kind. Whenever one has called upon me, I have considered it my duty to express my detestation of his wickedness, and I would as soon think of receiving a murderer into my church . . . as a man stealer” (Pike, The Life and Work of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, p. 331). But, the statement that “had any other condition been better for you than the one in which you are, divine love would have put you there” is all the slaveholder needs to justify his slaveholding.

I do not think Spurgeon’s aphorism, although it may appear superficially to be a statement of God’s providence, really is what it purports to be. Nor is it that I deny or take lightly God’s providence or predestination. I believe that in every situation we face we must see the hand of God and accept that he has put us there, accept his absolute predestination, but this is not because there is no better condition for us to be in, but because this is where God has put us to work for a better world, a better condition for ourselves and others that he might be glorified.

This is not the best of all possible worlds, it is a world that is fallen and needs redeeming by the Lord Jesus Christ, and we must work to create this better world, i.e. seek the kingdom of God and his justice before all else, because that is why God has put us in the fallen situations we are in, whatever they may be,—in order that we might work for that better world, the kingdom of God. This is the polar opposite of Spurgeon’s aphorism above, and the proof of this is that although Spurgeon may have said it, praise God he did not live it.