The statistics of Charles Haddon Spurgeon’s life and career are remarkable. Born in 1834, he was only 57 when he died in 1892. But he left behind more than 3,500 sermons, effectively something like a hundred from each year of his ministry.1 The numbers who heard him were remarkable. New Street Chapel was built to hold 1200 and his congregation outgrew it. The Metropolitan Tabernacle (his main pulpit from 1861) had a capacity of 4500. In 1857, he preached to more than 23,000 at the Crystal Palace. He is credited with the planting of 48 churches in London and nearly 900 preachers were trained in his college during his lifetime.
The first statistic that caught the imagination was his age. He was only 17 (and had been preaching less than a year) when he was called to be Pastor of the Waterbeach chapel in Cambridgeshire. Two years later he was invited to take up the pastorate of a leading Baptist Chapel in London, New Park Street. He was known as ‘the boy preacher’; some of the early popularity was due to curiosity at this prodigy. But throughout his ministry, crowds flocked to hear Spurgeon. Services at the Metropolitan Tabernacle were ticketed affairs and there were always queues for the non-reserved, public seats.
