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Topic Archives: History & Biography

The following was given as a radio address for the BBC in Wales, 25 June, 1944 and is featured in Knowing the Times: Addresses Delivered on Various Occasions, 1942–1977. Nothing is more significant of the great change which has happened in the field of theology during the past twenty years than the place now afforded, […]

Category Book Excerpts
Date March 5, 2024
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Elizabeth Prentiss lived in a different century, but the challenges she faced, and the way she responded to those challenges, speak powerfully to us today. Early in their married life, Elizabeth and her husband, George suffered the loss of two of their six children. Eddie died aged five and Bessie died when just a few […]

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Category Articles
Date January 14, 2024
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The following first appeared in the February 1991 issue of the Banner of Truth Magazine (Issue 329). Over the years, the Trust has published several books by Dr R. B. Kuiper. However, there are many readers throughout the world who are more familiar with the titles of Kuiper’s books than with the man himself. It […]

Category Articles
Date November 21, 2023
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The following is sourced from a talk on Samuel Rutherford given at the 2003 Aberystwyth Conference by Ian Hamilton, then of Cambridge Presbyterian Church, and now Associate Minister of Smithton Free Church, Inverness. ‘I am no expert on Rutherford, and I have been selective in what I have chosen to share about him. How are […]

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Category Articles
Date November 9, 2023
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The following testimony is from Near to God: 9 True Stories of a Wonderful Discovery. The love of Christ compels me to give testimony to my conversion from the Roman Catholic priesthood to the born-again life in Jesus Christ. For twenty-five years I was a Roman Catholic priest, strictly following the rituals of a system […]

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Category Book Excerpts
Date August 30, 2023
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The following is excerpted from ‘Doors of Opportunity’, which constitutes chapter 15 of Faith Cook’s Selina, Countess of Huntingdon. It sketches a period of time in which her patronage of new dissenting chapels and itinerant preachers was beginning to bear fruit. As the Countess’s chapels began to increase, so did the administrative labour of ensuring […]

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Category Book Excerpts
Date August 22, 2023
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The concluding piece in Iain H. Murray’s three historical articles on the Great Ejection. EVEN though Farewell Sermons had been preached in many parishes on Sunday, August 17, there was a widespread feeling of uncertainty throughout the nation with regard to the direction and character of coming events. Something of this uncertainty can be detected […]

Category Articles
Date August 18, 2023
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Iain H. Murray provides an insight into the experience of the Puritan ministers facing expulsion from the Church of England in the portentous summer of 1662. Read the previous post, on the build-up to these events. THOUGH many of the Puritan ministers were far removed from the intrigues and disputations going on in London, they […]

Category Articles
Date August 17, 2023
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On 24 August 1662, the English Parliament passed an Act designed to exclude and ‘utterly disable’ a group of religious ministers within the Established (i.e. Anglican) Church. The immediate effect of the Act of Uniformity of 1662 was the forced departure of over hundreds of gospel ministers from the churches they served. Moreover, it represented […]

Category Articles
Date August 16, 2023
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Some books belong to the category of ‘must have’. Alexander Moody Stuart: A Memoir belongs to that category, and perhaps especially for ministers of the gospel it is a ‘must read’. It becomes clear soon enough why Robert Murray M‘Cheyne on first hearing him preach was immediately anxious for his close friends Andrew and Horatius […]

Category Articles
Date July 3, 2023
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If it were to be asked what is the recurring theme in Knox’s words and writings the answer is perhaps a surprising one. Sometimes he could be severe, and sometimes extreme. Given the days and the harshness of the persecution he witnessed, it would be understandable if these elements had preponderated in his ministry. But […]

Category Articles
Date November 24, 2022
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It is rather audacious to claim that we are reformed. It can also be misleading when we call ourselves Reformed Churches. For this might imply that we believe that our denominations are truly reformed; or, even worse, that at some point in the past we were or became reformed and that the task of reform […]

Category Articles
Date October 31, 2022
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The following is the text of Arnold Dallimore’s essay, Spiritual and Moral Conditions in England before the Revival which appears in Volume 1 of his George Whitefield: The Life and Times of the Great Evangelist of the Eighteenth-Century Revival. Righteousness exalteth a nation; but sin is a reproach to any people. Proverbs 14:34 I love […]

Date October 13, 2022
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The Rev Kenneth A MacRae (1883-1964) exercised a powerful ministry over 50 years in the Free Church of Scotland and his memory lives on in the monumental work, Diary of Kenneth A MacRae, edited with additional material by Iain Murray.* He made a lasting impression on my early Christian life. I had correspondence with him […]

Category Articles, Resources
Date October 7, 2022
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The name Thomas Charles of Bala had been familiar to me for many years and I knew that he was an eminent evangelical Welsh minister of a bygone day. But beyond that, I confess, I knew next to nothing about him. If any reader of these lines has to make the same admission let me […]

Date October 4, 2022
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Perhaps you have been disappointed and distressed by tales in the past year of men, often prominent men, who have departed from the faith. Some have drifted from the truth, others have given themselves to particular sins, several have adopted crass fads and carnal fashions. In some cases, you were sadly unsurprised. In others, you […]

Category Articles
Date December 27, 2021
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One of the most difficult things at present for the Reformed Christian is to strike a balance between yesterday and today. This is not perhaps surprising. The Reformed Christian believes that in the sixteenth century the Reformers recovered the biblical faith, and that no Protestant ministry has excelled that of the seventeenth century. Reformers and […]

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Category Articles
Date July 23, 2021
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Paul Washer talks about the impact Iain Murray’s books have had on his life and ministry, especially the biography of D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones. Two Questions Summer is fast approaching and many of us are still stuck at home. Although this can be challenging, don’t you agree that this is a great opportunity to work through a solid […]

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Category Book Reviews
Date June 3, 2020
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John MacArthur recommends The Pastor of Kilsyth; a little biography by Islay Burns on the life and times of his father, Pastor W. H. Burns. In our celebrity-driven age (from which the evangelical church is far from exempt), this is exactly the kind of life we need to study. We need to be reminded of […]

Category Book Reviews
Date May 6, 2020
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Do you know who Ernest C. Reisinger was? In the video above, Katie Irwin, a long-time friend of Ernie’s, recounts her meeting Ernie and talks about the impact the life of this man of God had on her. She refers throughout to Geoff Thomas’ biography of Ernie Reisinger. Readers with an interest in the development […]

Category Book Reviews
Date April 6, 2020
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The following is an extract from Johnson’s biography of Dabney. * * * From 1886 to 1889 R. L. Dabney’s sight became dimmer and dimmer, until the light went out absolutely. On walking into his own brightly lighted parlor of an evening, he would often ask whether the light was on and that, too, when […]

Category Articles
Date December 17, 2019
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Philip Bennett Power was born in Ireland in 1822. He graduated at Trinity College, Dublin, and entered the Church of England ministry about 1846, his first charge being at Leicester, where he remained for some two years, during which he began a week-night service in the parlour of a local pub! From Leicester he moved […]

Category Articles
Date December 3, 2019
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The years between 1662 and 1689 witnessed the ejection from the National Church Establishment, and then the persecution of approaching two thousand of the best ministers England has ever possessed.  The Act of Uniformity, the immediate cause of their ejection, was soon followed by the Conventicle and Five Mile Acts.  The former prevented their gathering […]

Category Articles
Date November 8, 2019
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For one week, take 30% OFF 40+ Reformation titles. View the full list here. Also, we’ve hand-picked 6 of our favorite Reformation titles and given them even greater discounts. There are limited quantities available and you can view them below. We’ve saved the best deal for last – scroll down to see! It is our constant prayer that […]

Category Announcements
Date October 28, 2019
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It is nearly three hundred years since the birth of John Newton and we do well to pay our little tribute to his worthwhile life. In his day Newton was famous for five things — he was an outstanding example of a converted infidel, he was a great hymn-writer, he was a wise spiritual counsellor, […]

Category Articles
Date October 8, 2019
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