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Poverty of spirit should accompany us all our life long, to let us see that we have no righteousness of our own to sanctification; that all the grace we have is out of ourselves, even for the performance of every holy duty. For though we have grace, yet we cannot bring that grace into act […]

You could not ignore or overlook Rowland Hill. He was not that kind of person. To most of his fellow-Anglicans Rowland Hill was a rogue elephant or a bete noire, to Evangelical Anglicans like Charles Simeon of Cambridge University an embarrassment, to Baptists an object of suspicion as he often treated them with disdain, but […]

The following, with minor alterations, is taken from Vol. 2 of Sermons by the late Edward Griffin (1770-1837), 1839. These volumes contain an excellent memoir by William B. Sprague. * * * According to the plan of grace revealed in the Gospel, God has taken the work of salvation into his own hands. The great […]

The word ‘radical’ means, literally, ‘of the roots’. Radical changes are changes that go to the root of things, and radical solutions are not merely ‘cosmetic’ but are concerned with the foundations. Recently, and on certain questions, ‘radical’ has come to have a generally favourable flavour. A radical is taken to be uncluttered in his […]

At the 2019 Shepherd’s Conference, the Banner of Truth met with divinity students with the goal of encouraging them in their studies for the ministry. Sinclair Ferguson spoke on ‘Romans in 40 Minutes’, and the students enjoyed some fellowship. At the end of the lecture, the students were all handed a copy of the 13th volume […]

Under God the Haldane brothers began a remarkable spiritual movement in Scotland at the close of the eighteenth century. With Robert‘s wealth and drive and James’s preaching abilities, and with a talented band of enthusiastic colleagues, they made evangelistic tours, founded tabernacles and independent churches on Congregational lines and established a seminary that sent out […]

When we consider the surpassing glory of the subject-matter with which theology deals, it would appear that if ever science existed for its own sake, it might surely be true of this science. The truths concerning God and his relations are, above all comparison, in themselves the most worthy of all truths of study and […]

The New Testament never speaks of God being reconciled to man but always of man being reconciled to God. The supreme example of this is Paul’s statement in 2 Corinthians 5:18 ff., ‘All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; […]

Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield was born at ‘Grasmere’ near Lexington, Kentucky, on 5th November, 1851.1 There flowed in his veins the blood of the staunch English Puritans who withstood the oppression of the Stuart kings and the blood of the Ulster-Scotch who first settled in the Cumberland Valley of Pennsylvania and in the up-country of Virginia. […]

The purpose of this article is not to provide answers, but to raise certain questions, in the hope that readers will themselves give sustained thought to these things. Having been in the ministry only a few years it is possible to recall vividly one impression that was mine as I entered my first pastorate. Deep […]

Hugh Martin (1822-85) combined a brilliant analytical and mathematical mind with a child-like heart which rested in Christ and his atoning work, as revealed in the Scriptures. Born and brought up in Aberdeen, he gained the top prizes in mathematics at the University there, before going on to study for the ministry. He cast in his […]

Wherever there has been conversion with power, the souls that have been reconciled to their Creator will not fail to inquire how they may become ‘perfect as their Father in heaven is perfect’; and every one who seeks to turn a sinner from the error of his way must strive with his whole strength and […]

Today more than ever attention focusses on young people. Newspaper headlines of their activities feature everything from revolution to drugs, student sit-ins to the generation gap, hooliganism to hijacking. Not that the news media are unfair or disproportionate: in a year or two the average age in America will be twenty-four. Most of these young […]

A charge that is made repeatedly against historic Christianity is that its stress on doctrine makes it authoritarian, theoretical, and cold. The Christian religion is a practical affair; putting the faith in terms of truth to be believed alienates or repels many who would otherwise be sympathetic. As John Robinson puts it, ‘the effect of […]

One of the greatest of the problems that have agitated the Church is the problem of the relation between knowledge and piety, between culture and Christianity. This problem has appeared first of all in the presence of two tendencies in the Church — the scientific or academic tendency, and what may be called the practical […]

The Cross does not merely tell us that God forgives, it tells us that that is God's way of making forgiveness possible. It is the way in which we understand how God forgives. I will go further: how can God forgive and still remain God? -- that is the question.

That we may the better see how heaven is thus a world of holy love, I would consider first, the great cause and fountain of love that is in heaven; second, the objects of love that it contains. -- An excerpt from Charity and Its Fruits

The man who sees no evidence of depravity must be blind, and he who denies its existence affords suspicion that he is deeply affected by it. It may be important perhaps for us as Sunday School teachers to consider what effect this universal evil has upon us in relation to the important work in which we are engaged. It is certain that something stands in the way of the success of Sunday School operations: on all hands it is admitted that, though a mighty engine for good, it does not produce all that could be wished.

There are two verses in the New Testament which highlight the battle for the mind of man; a battle which was going on in the days of the Apostles and is going on today; a battle which shows clearly the power of the written Word. The first verse brings to us a poignant picture. Paul […]

On November 18, 1559, at one of the most critical junctures in the history of the Scottish Reformation, John Knox sent to England two letters. The first he addressed to Sir William Cecil, chief secretary of Queen Elizabeth, setting forth very clearly the Scottish Protestants’ need for English help, coupled with a serious warning of […]

We shall always, I trust, as a church, cultivate an anxious desire for the conversion of all who come within our gates, yea, and of all who dwell around us. Never, I hope, will you wish the pastor to preach so that you shall be fed, careless as to whether sinners are saved or not; […]

Never in the history of the church has so much been said to so many with so little effect! We have pronouncements by church leaders and church bodies, elaborate reunion schemes, commissions on this, that and the next, and endless discussion groups. The torrent of words flows on and, for the most part, over the […]

Luther stood before church and emperor at Worms and his words cannot be forgotten: ‘Here I stand; I can do no other; God help me.’ Calvin invited an infuriated mob to shed his blood. John Knox rebuffed the queen and her court in Scotland. Courageous actions by courageous men — for courage is one of […]

It was sometime in the year that the Lord mercifully saved both of us, that my father said to me, ‘If a person really understood the gospel, I don’t see how he could reject it.’ His point was that if we could just make the gospel absolutely clear, everyone would perforce accept it. Our pastor […]

Thomas Jolly is representative of the large number of Puritan pastors who left no books by which posterity might be reminded of them, but who were neverthe­less in their own day eminent in spirituality and preach­ing power. We need to remember that the literary remains of Puritans which have been reprinted only represent a comparatively […]