Like to Hear Spurgeon?
May 23, 2009Would you like to hear Charles H Spurgeon preaching? You can. Well, kind of – courtesy of Doug Whitley. I would be interested to know what people think about this kind of thing? Imitating classic preachers – full dress and all!!?
unashamed 
Where is the broad essex twang?
I like it!
I like it.
I enjoy hearing great sermons of the past actually spoken. I’m sure the voice inflection and mannerisms are not exactly the same, but the same message is still proclaimed with passion. In a sense, sermons are meant to be preached rather than read, like Shakespeare. That said, I think it is fine for a youtube video, but I wouldn’t recommend it for an actual worship service because it is too removed from the actual local congregation.
Christians have wondered for years if there really could be recordings of Spurgeon. The answer, regretably, is no.
Fred Gaisberg (1873-1951) is the man who pretty much created the jobs of record producer and recording engineer. He began working, in the 1890s, for a company that, in time, morphed into EMI. It was he who really got the recording industry rolling when, in 1902, he convinced Enrico Caruso to make records. (Recording technology was considered to be little more than a toy before then.)
Anyway, in his memoirs, he states that there were no recording machines in Britain until the spring of 1898, at the earliest. And he knows, because he is the one who brought it there. (He was based in London for most of his career, retiring in 1938.)
So, while the technology existed, Spurgeon, who died in January, 1892, has left us no recordings, since the ability to do so did not exist in Britain until 6 years after his death.
As Maxwell Smart used to say: “Missed it by THAT much.”
There is at least one recording, that I know of, of D. L. Moody, who died in 1899.
As a friend of Doug Whitley’s, I am not an unbiased commenter. I’m a strong supporter of Doug’s ministry and know him to be a man who walks with his Master. I think Spurgeon is one of his most asked for character presentations. Though he has over 20 historical “preachers of the past” in his catalogue, probably half are Biblical characters. You can find out more about his ministry at http://www.preachersofthepast.com