I love a good biography. I love a good biography when it’s a “standard” or “pure” biography that simply describes a person’s life from beginning to end. But I also love a good biography when it is written purposefully or thematically—when instead of chronologically detailing all the events of a person’s life it provides selective details and draws lessons for its readers. This is exactly the kind of biography Mary Mohler has written about Susannah Spurgeon in Susannah Spurgeon: Lessons for a Life of Joyful Eagerness in Christ. And it’s a joy to read.

Susannah Spurgeon was, of course, the wife of the great preacher Charles Spurgeon, a man so uniquely gifted and whose influence was so vast, that everyone around him stood in his shadow. Yet while Susannah was in no way ashamed to be so closely identified with her husband that she is often only described in relation to him, she had a life, ministry, and impact that was all her own. Yes, she was Mrs. C.H. Spurgeon and plenty pleased with that fact. But she was also her own person with her own gifts, her own talents, her own means of serving others both alongside her husband and apart from him.
Mohler writes this book with the particular audience of Christian women in mind. There is a sense in which it flows out of her ministry at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in which she serves as Director of the Seminary Wives Institute. “My goal,” she says, “is to write about what we as women—primarily women married to men in ministry, but also to Christian women in general—can learn from the remarkable life of Susannah Thompson Spurgeon.” And while she is neither a historian nor a biographer, “I have been a ministry wife for forty years and counting, and have been training future ministry wives for twenty-five years, so I have some stories to tell.”
And that introduces one of the strengths of this book. Because this is not a formal biography, she is able to make it personal and to integrate some of her own experiences—a factor that adds both human interest and life application. In fact, each chapter ends with a number of questions meant for quiet reflection.
Along the way, she chooses to focus on six themes, each of which is applicable to Christian women in general and to ministry wives in particular. She looks at Susannah’s life prior to being married and to her conversion to Christianity; she looks at her marriage and her devotion to her husband; she looks at her commitment to her home, both as a mother and as someone who carried out a ministry from the home; she looks at the deep physical suffering that for many years left her housebound and often bedridden; she looks at her response to some of the controversy she and her husband endured and also to her years as a widow. The book concludes with a selection of Susannah’s own writings for she was a talented and widely-read author in her own regard. In each case, Mohler quotes both original writings by Susannah and Charles Spurgeon along with information gleaned from their many biographers. And in each case, she ensures that the events of Susannah’s life lead naturally to application that is relevant to today’s readers.
Susannah Spurgeon: Lessons for a Life of Joyful Eagerness in Christ is an easy-to-read little biography that is as interesting as it is beautifully written. Whether for a ministry wife, for a Christian woman, or for anyone else (including men), I give it my highest recommendation.
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You probably keep score. I’m sure you don’t mean to. You may not even be conscious of it. But there’s a pretty good chance that you do it. You keep score in your marriage.

You keep score when you tally up the things you do for your spouse and when you tally up the things your spouse fails to do for you. You rarely keep a running total of your own failures or your spouse’s successes. Rather, you maintain records in such a way that you come out ahead. You probably keep the score in your marriage. And I’m sure it makes you unhappy.
Why does it make you unhappy? Because comparison is the thief of joy. Comparison is the thief of joy because it causes you to focus on yourself. Comparison leads inward, to what you desire, to what you long for, to what you are certain you deserve. Yet the path to joy leads outward rather than inward. It leads toward others rather than toward self. There is more joy in loving than in being loved, more satisfaction in doing good to others than in having good done to you. The path to joy in marriage does not lead from your spouse but to your spouse.
Thus, one of the keys to a joyful marriage is to simply stop keeping score—to stop tallying up the good things you’ve done for your husband or wife and the good things he or she has neglected to do for you. Keep no ledger of wrongs and keep no ledger of rights.
That’s a good place to begin, but there’s more to it. Any time you address a sin, weakness, or failure in your life you need to not only put that vice to death but also bring to life the opposite virtue. What is the opposite of this kind of score-keeping? It’s to love freely and lavishly. It’s to love without keeping score, to love even when you feel unloved, to love even when you give much and seem to receive little. It’s to love in such a way that the only hint of competitiveness in your heart is when you ask, “Am I outdoing my spouse in showing honor?”
Of course, there may be times to consider together whether one person is doing all of the household chores while the other is doing none, whether one person is spending a lot of time with the children while the other person is spending little, whether one person is doing all the sexual initiation while the other is consistently being passive, whether one person is wondering if he or she is loved at all. There are times to sit and talk deliberately about desires, wants, concerns, disappointments, and all the rest.
But there is never a time to stop lavishing mercy, grace, and love upon the person God has given you as a husband or wife. There is never a time to withdraw or become resigned, to decide you will only love to the degree you are being loved. There is never a time to stop serving the one God has specially called you to serve.
To that end, why don’t you make it your habit to ask your husband or wife questions like these: How can I serve you today? How can I make your day better? How can I make your evening easier? In what ways can I be a blessing to you today? Is there anything I can get you? Is there anything I can do for you? How can I let you know today that I love you?
And perhaps even better, commit to consistently doing the things you know will serve your spouse, that will make your wife’s day better, that will make your husband’s evening easier. Serve, serve, and serve some more. Act in love even when you don’t feel loved, act with grace even if you don’t feel particularly gracious. Sow extravagant love to the love of your life, and reap the reward of joy. For the path to joy in marriage leads away from you and runs straight to your spouse.

May the Lord be with you and bless you today.

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We can’t separate the Bible’s commands to do justice from its commands to be discerning. The oppressed deserve more than our good intentions. We must love them not merely with our hearts and hands but with our heads too. —Thaddeus Williams