Welcome back to another episode of five minutes in church history.

Last week we were talking about Charles Spurgeon

and we realized that there is far too much here

than just one episode.

We're again in Seattle.

We're out here for our West Coast Conference at Ligonier. We have Dr. Lawson with us. It's good to see you again, Dr. Lawson.

Well, thank you. To reduce Spurge into five minutes in church history is like pouring the Pacific Ocean into a

Dixie Cup. It just won't fit. You know I think the only one who has better

analogies than Spurgeon is you. Well thank you I resemble that remark.

You know we were together last time we were talking about just the prolific nature of Spurgeon, his preaching, his printed sermons, his writings,

as Spurgeon was nearing the end of his life.

He became involved in a controversy. Now this again cannot be

squeezed into four and a half minutes, but can you just give us the highlight here?

This is the downgrade controversy.

And this was very important,

even transitioning into early 20th century liberalism,

as you reflect back on Spurgeon in the downgrade controversy,

is there anything we can pull out of there

that just helps us understand it and also realize something important from Spurgeon's

legacy?

Well Spurgeon pastored the greatest Baptist church on the planet.

He was the seminal figure in all of England for Evangelicalism. And he saw the Baptist Union on the slippery slope,

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