“Brethren, we become zealous when we hear the cries and tears of the oppressed.
I think I see a senator standing on the floor of the House of Commons, pleading, in years gone by, the cause of Africa’s down-trodden sons.
I do not wonder at the zeal of Wilberforce, or the marvelous eloquence of Fox. What a cause they had!
They could hear the clanging of the fetters of the slaves, the sighs of prisoners, the shrieks of women, and this made them speak, for they burned with an indignation which carried them away.
Pity pulled up the sluices of their speech, and their souls ran out in mighty torrents of overwhelming eloquence.
Now, think, the Lord this day hears the sighs of the oppressed all over the world. He hears the sighs of the sorrowful.
And beyond that there comes up the daily cries of His elect, who day and night beseech His throne.
Oh! That we were more clamorous! Oh! That we were more intensely importunate! Oh! That we gave Him no rest until He would establish and make Jerusalem a praise on the earth.
For, remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said, ‘And shall not God avenge His own elect? Though they cry night and day unto Him, I tell you He will avenge them speedily.'”
–Charles H. Spurgeon, “The Zeal of the Lord,’” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, Vol. 60 (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1914), 60: 545.
