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Puritan Box Sets

Category Resources
Date November 16, 2020

‘Friends have told me that they have discovered books written by some of the Puritans that have been a tremendous help to them! Could you recommend a few classics to me?’

Many Christians ask that question today. Nor are we the first to feel we need someone to guide us. Already in the Puritan period Richard Baxter saw that need — and drew up lists adjusted to finances available. But even his list for the poorest contained around one hundred authors! The Puritan Classics and the Treasures of John Owen box sets are more modest in size, certainly, but they present a single package of attractively produced hardbound editions of some of the most helpful works written in the seventeenth century. All of them came from the ministries of men who were marked by God-centredness, faithfulness to Scripture, and a devotion to pointing people to Christ and maturing them in the faith.

puritan classics box sets

 

These new box sets contain the best of the Puritan Paperback series, now with Smyth Sewn cloth binding, ribbon markers, and each set is packaged with a 32-page booklet introduction from Sinclair Ferguson.

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PURITAN CLASSICS: Welcome to the Library

This little library will, no doubt, be treasured for the quality of its production – its ten volumes are built to last. But it will be even more highly prized for the wonderful selection of Puritan literature it contains.

But who were the ‘Puritans’? They themselves did not use the term. Rather it emerged in the sixteenth century as a demeaning way of describing Christians who wanted to see the Church of England reformed according to God’s word – purified of unbiblical patterns of worship, of laxity in ministry, of sacramentalist views of the way of salvation, and deficient church government. But when a group of people are described by their opponents, it is often the worst caricature of them that is communicated. And so it has been with ‘Puritans’ throughout history.

The volumes in this little library tell a different story. It is one of people committed to knowledge, worship, and service of God, living under his loving care as their heavenly Father, according to his word, experiencing forgiveness and new life in Christ, and conscious of the communion and power of the Holy Spirit.

The authors represented here span the years between 1558 and 1691 – in terms of English history, from the accession of Queen Elizabeth I in 1558 to just after the ‘Glorious Revolution’ of 1688. These 15 titles feature books from: William Perkins, Richard Sibbes, Samuel Rutherford, William Bridge, Jeremiah Burroughs, Thomas Brooks, Richard Baxter, Thomas Watson, John Flavel, Joseph Alleine, and John Bunyan. As you read their writings you will realize they had very different personalities. But they all brought to their ministry the providential ways in which God had shaped their lives.

‘These are the books to return to again and again as old friends. They are also a sacred trust, to pass on to our families, and to recommend to friends. For in these books we have been given light on our path, instruction for our minds, wisdom for our lives, pleasures for our spirit.’ — SINCLAIR B. FERGUSON

Click here to learn more about the Puritan Classics Box Set.

Image of the Puritan Classics Box Set

 

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TREASURES OF JOHN OWEN: Wisdom Everywhere

The seven million words Owen wrote during his lifetime cover a wide variety of topics. When William Goold edited them in the nineteenth century, he divided them neatly into a ‘library’ of five shelves: Doctrinal, Practical, Controversial, Historical, and Exegetical. While a number of Owen’s works were called forth by the circumstances of the seventeenth century, all of them continue – at least in part – to have a relevance for the church in every age. Some of them are, however, largely controversial, or academic in nature – he was after all a massively able intellectual. But within this impressive library we find a series of books that express what lay deepest in his heart.

In recent decades, several of Owen’s works have been edited and published in paperback format to make them more readily accessible to Christians in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Now, in this beautifully produced box set, the Treasures of John Owen, they are being republished in hardback format arranged in five volumes.

Within this box set readers will find themselves entering a world of biblical, doctrinal, pastoral, and spiritual instruction. This instruction is not only accessible to them, but also leads them into a fresh understanding of the greatness of the gospel, and its many practical implications. Here then is a collection of books designed to enable the reader to grow in both knowledge and grace.

‘Now the doors of your John Owen ‘library’ are open. Choose a volume. You can start anywhere; you will find biblical insight, wisdom, and personal help everywhere. And perhaps this little box set of the Treasures of John Owen will one day be part of your own spiritual heirloom…’ — SINCLAIR B. FERGUSON

image of the Treasures of John Owen Box Set

 

Click here to learn more about the Treasures of John Own Box Set.

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