Topic Archives: Christian Living

Psalm 119 is a large collection of very short prayers, most of which we only pray as we read the Psalm itself. Some of them, however, have so woven themselves into our memories and experiences that we frequently find ourselves praying them at other times. A fine example is the prayer of verse 18: ‘Open […]

‘Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent’ (John 17:3). These words are from the greatest prayer ever prayed, and they tells us the answer to the quest all mankind has been engaged in since the fall of Adam: What is eternal […]

Soren Aabye Kierkegaard, the nineteenth-century Danish philosopher/theologian, described life as paddling in an ocean ten thousand fathoms deep. How right he was. This thought is no less and even more appropriate to the study of theology, the coherent teaching about himself that God has revealed to us in the Bible. Some of us know the […]

‘There is no danger,’ writes Albert Barnes, ‘that more constantly besets Christians, and even eminent Christians, than pride. There is no sin that is more subtle, insinuating, deceptive; none that lurks more constantly around the heart and that finds a more ready entrance than pride.’ In a remarkable section in one of his letters, one […]

This is a wonderful little book that deals with that daily battle against Satan, the enemy of our souls. John Brown was a faithful preacher of God’s word who ministered in Scotland the first part of the 19th century. Whilst in Edinburgh he expounded all of 1 Peter. This took 16 years. This book is […]

In this small book the author makes the argument for teaching children the catechism regularly from a young age, quoting many well-known theologians as he goes along. The author discusses the history and strengths of the catechism (specifically the Westminster Shorter Catechism), but it is when he writes about its structure and the way it […]

For many years we have been deeply concerned that there are so many people in our congregations who clearly possess the fear of the Lord, and yet who have never found any real assurance of their interest in Christ, and so have never openly professed the Saviour’s name. The sad thing is that so many […]

Here are some choice selections from Banner’s newest book in the Pocket Puritans series: None But Jesus.1 These quotes from John Flavel will give the reader a good taste of the riches found within this small volume. Buy one for yourself, for your friends and for your family members and drink deeply from Flavel’s edifying […]

Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory! (2 Corinthians 4:17). It is good to know that there is a limit to affliction. It is but for a moment – it has its appointed end. Not always will the war go […]

What do people look like who look like Jesus? One part of the answer is this: they bear what is described by the Apostle Paul as the ‘fruit of the Spirit’, namely, ‘love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control’ (Gal. 5:22-23). In the days of his flesh our Saviour exhibited this fruit […]

The man who wrote the one hundred and nineteenth Psalm was as human as you and me. Consequently, affliction for him was no different from what it is for any of us: painful. Yet he speaks so positively about it. He says in fact that it was good for him to be afflicted (verse 71). […]

Do not grieve the Holy Spirit . . . Do not quench the Spirit . . . Insulting the Spirit of grace (Ephesians 4:30, 1 Thessalonians 5:19, Hebrews 10:29). If the filling of the Holy Spirit yields conviction of sin, conversion, and sanctification;1 if the believer can expect his words to bring forth Holy Spirit […]

The message of the angel Gabriel to Zechariah in the temple was that his wife Elizabeth would bear him a son, that this son was to be called John, and that he would be ‘great in the sight of the Lord’ (Luke 1:13-15). There is a right use and a wrong use to which these […]

In the mid-nineteenth century, archaeologists digging around the Palatine Hill in Rome unearthed a house that formed one part of the palace of the emperor Caligula, an unpleasant man who reigned in Rome from A.D. 37 until he was murdered in A.D. 41. In the years following Caligula’s death, the imperial palace continued to grow, […]

In September 1791 Mary Forbes married Thomas Winslow, a Captain in the army; she was just 17. Shortly afterwards she attended a ball, where she was the centre of attention as the young bride. But later that evening, as she lay sleepless in bed, her thoughts went back to the excitement and the pleasure of […]

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. Paul declares them to be the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22, 23). The reason they appear in the life of the believer is because the Spirit is in the life of the believer. They are wholly the fruit of his gracious presence and […]

Are you a Protestant? I do not mean do you side with the Unionists or with the Separatists in Northern Ireland? I do not mean, do you enjoy open confrontation with Roman Catholics as they go about their blasphemous and superstitious devotions at Walsingham, Knock and elsewhere? I mean, are you a Protestant in the […]

Jesus taught his disciples how to pray, using the so-called ‘Lord’s Prayer’ as a model. Many have noted that the six petitions in the Lord’s Prayer serve as an excellent outline of how God’s people ought to seek him earnestly in prayer.1 When Jesus taught us to pray, ‘Thy kingdom come,’ what does he mean? […]

Christianity teaches us to look to the past as we seek for help in the present. It has laid the foundations of our faith deep in historical events and invites us to build on those foundations all the days of our lives. As believers we unashamedly take our inspiration from days gone by confident that […]

I had a fellow elder in Darlington, Clifford Scurr, who often expressed the conviction that living Christianity reflected itself in people’s very faces. It was something I was occasionally struck with myself – at least by force of contrast. A duty that fell to me to fulfil from time to time was to take funerals […]

The Apostle Paul winds up one of the closing sections of his letter to the Galatians with the following exhortation: ‘as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith’ (Gal. 6:10). Our particular interest lies with this ‘opportunity’ of which he speaks at […]

The Apostle Paul was a very great Christian indeed. He was also very human, a fact that is memorably brought home to us in a story that comes from his own pen. Writing to the church in Corinth he says, ‘When we came into Macedonia, this body of ours had no rest, but we were […]

Sometimes it is not easy to see blessings, and yet when we think more deeply we know that there are so many that it is difficult to single them out. We take them so much for granted, not always because we are ungrateful, but because the blessings we lack fill our thoughts and discomfit our […]

In one of the great promises of the Old Testament, God assures his people, ‘even to your old age I am he, and to grey hairs I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear; I will carry and will save’ (Isa. 46:4). It is, in the first instance, a promise to the […]

Are you blessed? Psalm 1 says that if you do not walk in the counsel of the wicked, or stand in the way of sinners, or sit in the seat of mockers, but delight yourself instead in God’s law, you are! And here is part of the reason. Such a person ‘is like a tree […]