Yearly Archives: 2007

‘When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy’ Matthew 2:10. Jesus was born in Bethlehem, as Micah the prophet promised seven hundred years before He was born. Bethlehem, the city of David, is six miles south of Jerusalem on a limestone ridge, 2500 feet above sea level. The name in Hebrew means […]

Sometimes more is less and less is more. Whether more is less depends upon the character of what is more; whether less is more depends upon the character of what is less. Our first parents had all that they truly needed or could rightly desire. Adam and Eve had holy, loving communion with the God […]

They were sitting on tables and benches in John Newton’s old church on Monday 10 December 2007 for the Banner of Truth London meeting ‘An Evening with John Newton.’ The meeting was held to mark the anniversary of the death of the former Vicar of St Mary Woolnoth, who died two hundred years ago, on […]

The obituary of Aldous Huxley’s wife, Laura, was in The Times on Monday, 17 December 2007. It ended with that quotation which Dr. Lloyd-Jones used to such effect showing that man’s abandonment of God inevitably results in losing the meaning of life. Laura had been interviewed by a journalist in 1992 and asked what she […]

Lectures on Revivals*, by W B Sprague, is published by the Banner of Truth Trust, and has been reset, updating its appearance from their 1958 edition; the book was first published in 1832. Besides the nine lectures, there is an appendix of nearly 200 pages containing 20 letters from noted divines from whom the author […]

‘. . .that they all may be one . . . so that the world may believe that You sent Me.’ John 17:21. Currently the number one, fastest growing website in the United States is www.godtube.com, the brainchild of former CBS television producer and graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary Chris Wyatt. Before going to seminary […]

Sometimes, when I wake in the middle of the night, I hear the endless tramp, tramp, tramp of humanity crossing the arches of the years, each rank enjoying the spotlight of prominence, then passing into oblivion. How pathetically incapable we are of keeping our brief candle alight one second beyond its term! How fragile is […]

This year is the two hundredth anniversary of the passing of the ‘Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade’. It was the culmination of a long period of agitation against a trade which ran strongly in the face of every claim that Britain was a Christian nation. Many of the leaders of the campaign […]

I praise Thee, Father . . . that Thou didst hide these things from the wise and intelligent and didst reveal them to infants. Matthew 11:25. Katherine Hepburn, the four-time Academy Award winner, was born in Hartford on November 8, 1907, her mother being from the Houghton family of the Corning Glass company, and her […]

The Bible is essentially a practical book. Its principles and teachings are never merely academic, philosophical, or speculative, but are always anchored in and aimed at the living God and the daily living of his people. That is one reason why there is so little in the Bible about heaven. The focus of the Word […]

Some selections by Mack Tomlinson of Texas from Rutherford’s The Loveliness of Christ.1 The great Master Gardener, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in a wonderful providence, with his own hand, planted me here in this part of his vineyard; here I grow and here I will abide till the great Master of the […]

William Still was the pastor of Gilcomston South Church in Aberdeen, Scotland, for nearly fifty-two years. He could remain in that pulpit for so long, according to Sinclair Ferguson, because he ‘seemed to live in the Bible.’ Still preached the Bible, the whole counsel of God, straight through, several times in the course of his […]

26 pages, one for each letter of the alphabet, telling very simply, familiar stories from the Bible. Big bold print with illustrations which I loved, drawn with ink and coloured pencil that give a special feel to the pictures. G for Goliath, used on the cover, is a prime example. He is big and fierce […]

Samuel Rutherford lived and preached in the first half of the seventeenth century and yet his life and work are still held in high regard. First published in this form in 1909 this beautifully presented little book is one to treasure and keep close for referring to continuously. These short pieces taken from Samuel Rutherford’s […]

With outlines of the illustrations in A Bible Alphabet this book is for young children to colour in the pictures for themselves. It would be useful if they have had A Bible Alphabet read to them previously, as that will mean they are familiar with the stories portrayed. With letters and words to colour in, and words to copy […]

With some illustrations in colour, others in black and white, this book glorifies our Creator God. Big bold words written in rhyme accompany expressive illustrations beautifully drawn in ink and coloured pencil. Based on the Bible telling of the Creation of the World, Alison Brown has drawn a delightful and child friendly portrayal of Genesis […]

There are some things that we can do that our God cannot do. We can lie, he can speak nothing but truth; we can sin, he can only do righteousness; we can die, he has lived and will live forever. Our capacity to do such things does not make us greater but infinitely less than […]

For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. 1 Corinthians 12:12. Robert E. Webber, in his book The Younger Evangelicals (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2002) observes that denominations as we have known them […]

R. L. Dabney’s Systematic Theology1 was first published in 1871. The first Banner of Truth edition appeared in 1985, and has been reprinted a number of times by the Trust. Robert Dabney is generally considered, with his senior contemporary, J. H. Thornwell, the second great theologian of the Southern Presbyterian Church2 in the USA in […]

One of the major social concerns in our day is that of unruly, disrespectful children. Some youngsters are pampered and spoilt. They think that they can get away with anything and resent discipline. Others have been neglected by parents who put their career ambitions before family life. The politicians and child care experts do not […]

Paul described himself to Titus as ‘a servant of God’. And that was how he imagined himself in his pre-conversion days. He was, so he thought, blameless as ‘touching the righteousness which is in the law’ (Phil. 3:6); he was, in his own eyes, a marvellously-faithful servant of God. But when he met the risen […]

Thy word is truth. John 17:17. David Wells, in his book Above All Earthly Powers [Eerdmans, 2005], observes that postmodernism has done in one generation what evangelicalism has not been able to do in one hundred years, and that is to dismantle modernism. For those of you not familiar with these terms, please allow this […]

A hundred years ago, H. C. G. Moule, the Anglican Bishop of Durham, said in his simple but elegant commendation of The Loveliness of Christ that it was ‘a small casket stored with many jewels’, and expressed the hope that it would have a wide circulation. These pages contain short extracts from the letters of […]

It is clear that there is to be preaching during the public worship of God. There must be some instruction and exhortation during the service or else it degenerates into pure formality and ritual, like the Roman mass. In the Bible we find the examples of Christ instructing the multitude on the mount (Matthew 5-7), […]

When Augustine found himself in controversy with fellow believers, he remarked on more than one occasion to his friend Alypius, ‘Remember, we are washed in the same blood.’ The great Church Father was not downplaying the importance of accurate doctrine. Rather, he was highlighting the foundational truth that, whatever their differences, believers are one in […]