“Christ is given us to use” — C.H. Spurgeon

“I will give You for a covenant of the people.” — Isaiah 49:8

“Christ is in the covenant to be used. God never gives his children a promise which he does not intend them to use…Christ is given us to use. Believer, use him! I tell thee again, as I told thee before, that thou dost not use thy Christ as thou ought to do. Why, man, when thou art in trouble, why dost thou not go and tell him? Has he not a sympathizing heart, and can he not comfort and relieve thee? No, thou art gadding about to all thy friends save thy best friend, and telling thy tale everywhere except into the bosom of thy Lord. Oh, use him, use him. Art thou black with yesterday’s sins? Here is a fountain filled with blood; use it, saint, use it. Has thy guilt returned again? Well his power has been proved again and again; come use him! use him! Dost thou feel naked? Come hither, soul, put on the robe. Stand not staring at it; put it on. Strip, sir, strip thine own righteousness off, and thine own fears too. Put this on, and wear it, for it was meant to wear. Dost thou feel thyself sick? What, wilt thou not go and pull the night-bell of prayer, and wake up thy physician? I beseech thee go and stir him up betimes, and he will give the cordial that will revive thee…

Oh, believer, do use Christ, I beseech thee. There is nothing Christ dislikes more than for his people to make a show-thing of him and not to use him. He loves to be worked. He is a great laborer; he always was for his Father, and now he loves to be a great laborer for his brethren. The more burdens you put on his shoulders the better he will love you. Cast your burden on him. You will never know the sympathy of Christ’s heart and the love of his soul so well as when you have heaved a very mountain of trouble from yourself to his shoulders, and have found that he does not stagger under the weight. Are your troubles like huge mountains of snow upon your spirit? Bid them rumble like an avalanche upon the shoulders of the Almighty Christ. He can bear them all away, and carry them into the depths of the sea. Do use your Master, for for this very purpose he was put into the covenant, that you might use him whenever you need him.”

— C.H. Spurgeon, Christ in the Covenant

http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0103.htm