I downloaded a paper (originally a speech) by John Piper several months ago, and ran across it last night. What an inspirational work. Piper uses Spurgeon as an example of a preacher who “pushed on” despite his circumstances. In addition to depression, Spurgeon had to deal with critics, church politics, and great physical pain. Piper uses this backdrop to answer the question, how do we preach through adversity?

…So when our heart is breaking we must labor with a broken instrument. Preaching is our main work. And preaching is heart work, not just mental work. So the question for us is not just How you keep on living when the marriage is blank, and a child has run away, and the finances don’t reach, and pews are bare and friends have forsaken you; the question for us is more than, How do you keep on living? It’s, How do you keep on preaching. It’s one thing to survive adversity; it is something very different to keep on preaching, Sunday after Sunday, month after month when the heart is overwhelmed…