Spurgeon, Church Planting, & Wimbledon

By Michael ONeal

Under Charles Spurgeons ministry, church planting endeavors served as an
important method for fulfilling his churchs mission efforts in England, and especially in
the London area. As Spurgeon planned the building of the Metropolitan Tabernacle, he
made clear that he wanted his church to act as a missionary church, penetrating the
country with the gospel of Jesus Christ. In his autobiography, he wrote:
I am sure I may make my strongest appeal to my brethren, because we do not mean
to build this Tabernacle as our nest, and then to be idle. We must go from strength
to strength, and be a missionary church, and never rest until, not only this
neighborhood, but our country, of which it is said that some parts are as dark as
India, shall have been enlightened with the gospel.
1


Apparently, this resolve led to action. One biographer credits Spurgeon with the
founding of forty-eight new London churches by 1878.
2

Undoubtedly, Londons growing population fueled Spurgeons passion for
church planting around the city. In his view, the explosive increase in population meant a
God-designed opportunity to reach unchurched people in transition. As he wrote in one
article, believers should recognize these times of receptivity and seize these opportunities
with a sense of urgency:
We ought not to allow new towns to spring up around us, and to begin their history
without the means of grace. It is far easier to secure a fitting position for the house
of prayer at the founding of a new suburb than it can be afterwards; and we are
much more likely to get the ear of new-comers than if we allow them to form the
habit of going nowhere, or of frequenting the mass-houses of ritualism.
3




1
Spurgeon, Autobiography, Vol 2, 348-49.

2
Nicholls, Mission Yesterday and Today: Charles Haddon Spurgeon, 1834-
1892, 41.


As noted throughout the writings of the churchs magazine, Spurgeon led
Tabernacle members and students from his college to plant churches in the growing
suburbs of London. Two of these areas were Wimbledon and Surrey. Concerning
Wimbledon, Spurgeon commented that it was growing so rapidly that provision ought at
once to be made for the population.
4
By 1887, there was a congregation already formed
under the leadership of one of his college students, but they had outgrown their small
chapel. He pleaded with his readers to give more money to this work in Wimbledon,
concluding that one of the best modes of using money is to provide houses of prayer
for these growing populations.
5

In the early 1880s, lay ministers from the Tabernacle and students from
the college began a new church, New Baptist Chapel. Again, The Sword and the Trowel
gave attention to the need for a new building to accommodate the growth of the
congregation. Then, the magazine noted the importance of establishing churches in such
areas of growth:
We take deep interest in this church, for it is the direct fruit of work done both by our
earnest lay evangelists and by our students. It is a fruitful scion of the old stock, and is
planted in a region where, by the divine blessing, it must prosper. It is to the last degree
important that these growing suburbs, soon to be great towns, should at once be occupied
by gospel churches.
6


3
Spurgeon, London, 147.

4
Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Wimbledon, The Sword and the Trowel 23
(1887): 490.

5
Ibid.

6
New Baptist Chapel for Carshalton and Wallington, Surrey, The Sword and
the Trowel 21 (1885): 234. No author is listed for this article. A similar article for
another new work in the London area is titled, The Popular and Bromley Tabernacle,
Brunswick Road, Poplar, The Sword and the Trowel 19 (1883): 86. The writer of this
article mentions the need for more money and more laborers because the houses of
prayer do not multiply as the people do.