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Yearly Archives: 2015

‘Which is true, whosoever will or sovereign election?’ Like many questions this one demands a false answer. The Bible does not teach one or the other, it teaches both. Considered together the concepts may seem profound and difficult, but they are neither irreconcilable nor opposed to each other. Both are found in Holy Scripture and […]

Category Articles
Date December 23, 2015
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You might, having read the title of this, wonder what is about to follow. Those of you who know even a little about a remarkable eighteenth century Scottish minister called Thomas Boston, will, however, have immediately recognised the source of my title. Boston’s Works run to twelve volumes and contain some lengthy theological treatises.1 When […]

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Category Articles
Date December 16, 2015
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A review by Stephen J. Tracey of Sinclair B. Ferguson’s From the Mouth of God: Trusting, Reading, and Applying the Bible.1 One old Scottish preacher on visiting members of his congregation would habitually ask, ‘What portion of God’s word did you read today?’ It was a wise question for two reasons. First, it was an […]

Category Book Reviews
Date December 9, 2015
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The MLJ Trust has announced that all 1,600 recorded sermons by Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones are available to download, at no cost, to anyone who wants to listen to them. There are no exceptions, so the Ephesians sermons, Romans sermons, etc., will all be available. All one has to do is join the MLJ Library (membership […]

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Category Announcements
Date December 7, 2015
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For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands (2 Timothy 1:6). Paul begins his second letter to Timothy by reminding Timothy of the blessings that are his in Christ. Timothy is reading a personal letter to him from […]

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Category Articles
Date December 4, 2015
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A review by Julian Bull of Media Gratiae’s multimedia presentation Logic on Fire: The Life and Legacy of Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones.1 Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones has been described by some as the ‘greatest preacher of the 20th century’. His ministry at Westminster Chapel in Buckingham Gate, London spanned the years from before WWII to the end […]

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Category Book Reviews
Date December 2, 2015
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Note: the Cyber Monday 2015 sale is now over, but there are still great deals available on Banner books through the end of the year. The Banner is running a 48-hour sale to help you pick up some excellent Christian books this Christmas season. In addition to our ongoing Christmas Sale, we have come up […]

Category Announcements
Date November 30, 2015
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God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not proper (Romans 1:28). Atheist Julian Huxley once wrote, Evolutionary man can no longer take refuge from his loneliness in the arms of a divinized father figure whom he himself created, nor escape from the responsibility of making decisions by sheltering […]

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Category Articles
Date November 30, 2015
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There is a text in the Bible that is often misunderstood (one of many, sadly). Paul writes, ‘What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him’ (1 Cor. 2:9). Preachers especially are prone to quote these words as if they were […]

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Category Articles
Date November 27, 2015
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It’s quite overwhelming to see so many of you here today, November 14th 2015, numbers of you having travelled far, even hundreds of miles to be with us, and have gone to such expense to be at my Golden Jubilee – fifty years of being in the pulpit of Alfred Place. I’m tempted to think […]

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Category Articles
Date November 25, 2015
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Daniel Baker (1791-1857) of Georgia was one of the outstanding evangelists of the Presbyterian Church in America. Late in his life, Baker wrote a letter to one of his sons, a young minister, answering the question as to why God blessed his preaching: If you ask me why my preaching is so much blessed, I […]

Category Articles
Date November 20, 2015
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The Bible is full of remarkable statements. One of the most remarkable is 1 Peter 2:17. Peter is instructing Christians how to live in an essentially Godless, anti-Christian society. He writes, ‘Honour everyone. Love the brothers. Fear God. Honour the emperor’. This is surely remarkable. Love the brothers and fear God we can readily understand; […]

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Category Articles
Date November 18, 2015
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By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him (1 John 4:9). Theologians speak of both the humiliation and exaltation of Christ. I wish, briefly, to take up the issue of our Lord’s humiliation. He emptied […]

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Category Articles
Date November 16, 2015
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Many explanations have been given for the explosion of the charismatic movement in Africa. Many have seen this as a powerful visitation of the Holy Spirit. Whereas there is probably more than one reason, I want to add my own observation to this for what it is worth. In this article, I am not referring […]

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Category Articles
Date November 13, 2015
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A review by Brian Garrard of John Calvin’s Sermons on the Epistle to the Ephesians.1 These sermons by John Calvin (JC) were first published in 1562 and were in French. An English translation by Arthur Golding appeared in 1577, followed by a revision by Leslie Rawlinson and S. M. Houghton in 1973. JC is justly […]

Category Book Reviews
Date November 11, 2015
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A review by Donald Mackay of The St Andrews Seven: The finest flowering of missionary zeal in Scottish history by Stuart Piggin and John Roxborogh.1 This is a reprint of a book that first appeared in 1985. A Korean edition was published in 2002. The claim implicit in the subtitle of the book is not […]

Category Book Reviews
Date November 6, 2015
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Percy John Henry Topping: Born 26 March 2015; died 4 April 2015. Aged 9 days An address given at Bethel Chapel, Luton by Mr. Ben A. Ramsbottom, on Wednesday, 22 April 2015 at the funeral service. Readings: Mark 10:14; Job 19:25-27; Job 1:21; Psalm 23; Jeremiah 31:15-17; 1 Corinthians 15:20-26, 5l-57. Hymns: ‘Sovereign Ruler of […]

Category Articles
Date November 4, 2015
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Rosaria’s Message to the Church Dr. Rosaria Butterfield said it was difficult to describe her unlikely conversion to Christianity, but settled on defining it as a mix of an alien abduction and a train wreck. ‘I lost everything but the dog,’ she said. Butterfield was speaking September 3, 2015 at Central Avenue CRC in Holland, […]

Category Articles
Date November 2, 2015
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George Rose (1873-1965) was a Baptist pastor in Tamworth Road, Croydon, in the years leading up to the Second World War. His biography has just been reprinted entitled Remembered Mercies Recorded (Gospel Standard Trust Publications, 376 pages). From 1933 he issued a Monthly Circular in which he wrote a message to his congregation, and those […]

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Category Articles
Date October 30, 2015
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A review by Gervase N. Charmley of John Knox, by Jane Dawson (Yale University Press, 2015), 384 pages, clothbound, ISBN 978-0-30011-473-7, £25/$45. John Knox was born in either 1514 or 1515, and so this period has called forth a welcome variety of works celebrating, or at least commemorating, the Scottish Reformer. This handsome volume, standing […]

Category Book Reviews
Date October 28, 2015
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‘it is now possible for multitudes of individuals from all generations and from all over the world to reap the benefits and blessings of God’s gift to His church in the form of the life and ministry of one of His most able preachers.’ – Julian Bull on the Media Gratiae multimedia presentation Logic on […]

Category Book Reviews
Date October 26, 2015
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A review by Christine Farenhorst of What Does the Bible Really Teach about Homosexuality? by Kevin DeYoung (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2015), paperback, 154 pages. Over the last number of summers, Thursday nights have been designated for downtown evangelism in Kitchener, Ontario. With a regular team of five or six people, we stood on a corner, […]

Category Book Reviews
Date October 23, 2015
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Of all the major Reformers, John Knox is the one about whose early life we know the least – a fact that may come as a surprise since he wrote a History of the Reformation in Scotland.1 We cannot even be certain of the year in which he was born; it was either 1514 or […]

Category Articles
Date October 21, 2015
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When Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses for public debate to the church door at Wittenberg on the 31st of October 1517, the Protestant Reformation officially began its long journey.1 Luther was not the sole pioneer of Protestantism, as he had already been influenced in his theology by the life of Jan Hus (1369-1415) and […]

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Category Articles
Date October 19, 2015
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In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they shall both be alike good (Ecclesiastes 11:5). My wife Margaret and I have been running Bible stalls in open-air markets since 1999, with a very small start […]

Category Articles
Date October 16, 2015
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