Topic Archives: 20th Century

My father was Jackie Ross, a minister in Lochcarron, but best known for his work with Blythswood Care, a Christian charity he started with friends in 1966. He led Blythswood through major growth years in the nineties, and continued to be involved with the leadership team until his death in 2001. I don’t hold him […]

Bill Wilson’s god The beginning of Bill Wilson’s sobriety was a visit from an old friend and drinking buddy, Ebby Thatcher. When Bill offered Ebby a drink, he refused stating that he had ‘got religion.’ Ebby was under the influence of the Oxford Group. (Unfortunately Thatcher’s sobriety did not last.) The Oxford Group (not to […]

In 1 Timothy 5:24 Paul says that the sins of some men are obvious, reaching the place of judgement ahead of them; the sins of others trail behind them.Jimmy Savile is a case in point. Some did have their doubts about him and some few knew there was a problem, but until only a few months […]

In the second half of the nineteenth century, C. H. Spurgeon so towered above English Calvinistic Baptists that other giants seemed to be much smaller, with one outcome being that they were quickly forgotten by subsequent generations. This was the case despite the great achievements connected to some of those men. One was Archibald G. […]

‘He was probably the best exegete Princeton ever had,’ Benjamin B. Warfield once told Louis Berkhof. Abraham Kuyper was so taken with his academic acumen that Kuyper offered him the chair of Old Testament studies at the Free University of Amsterdam when he was only twenty-four years old. J. Gresham Machen commented that if he […]

Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy By Eric Metaxas Nottingham: Thomas Nelson, April 2010 608 pages, hardcover, list $29.99 ISBN: 978 1 59555 138 2 A HEROIC GERMAN PASTOR & MARTYR Having recently had some time off in keeping with my new ‘semi-emeritus’ status, (and having been given an e-reader) I was able to read a […]

Engaging with Martyn Lloyd-Jones: the life and legacy of ‘the Doctor’ Edited by Andrew Atherstone and David Ceri Jones Nottingham: IVP/Apollos, 2011 376 pages, paperback, £16.99 ISBN: 978 1 84474 553 1 The book has emerged from a conference held at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, in December 2010 on ‘Martyn Lloyd-Jones: life and legacy’. Some papers […]

Francis Nigel Lee died on December 23, 2011 in Australia. One thing he left behind is the story of the conversion of the man who murdered his father. In April 1994, I was invited to fly round the world and expound the Lord’s Prayer in the USA during September. Having acquired the plane ticket, as […]

The conversion testimony of Kevin McGrane, elder of Bury St Edmunds Presbyterian church. I was raised in a Roman Catholic family, my father having been born in Dublin of Roman Catholic ancestry. Baptism, Confession, Holy Communion and Confirmation followed in regular course. After junior education under Ursuline nuns, I moved to a boys’ grammar school […]

This is part of a lecture ‘Witnessing in the Workplace’, given by the writer at the Barton Conference on Saturday 15th November 2008. A meeting at a carpenter’s bench at Ramsgate about 1895 was the means of the call by grace of my late grandfather, John William Walley. Working beside him for three months was […]

There have been better-known preachers of the gospel in Scotland than Hugh MacLean Cartwright but few can have been better loved by those whom they served. Among other features that distinguished his ministry was the way in which, by many published articles, he sought to keep alive the memory of Christians of former days.2 He […]

Not many people get the opportunity to attend seminary. In an amazing way I have attended two. The first was training for the Roman Catholic priesthood in Ireland and the second at a conservative Evangelical seminary in England. Raised a Catholic . . . but not knowing God Like most boys in the Republic of […]

By Brian Ellis, Manila, Philippines. What do I mean? I must start with some personal testimony so that I can explain. My interest in religion began when I was in the 6th form at Grammar School and I began to attend the Student Christian Movement meetings each week. There we discussed all manner of matters […]

My father was taken as a prisoner of war. He was assumed dead, so it was a shock for my mother when he returned home. I was one of the results of his homecoming! I was born at home in Finsbury Park in north London, on 23 September 1946. That was just over 65 years […]

‘And call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me’ (Psa. 50:15). The following account is a true incident in ‘the Battle of the Java Sea’ (27th February to 1st March 1942) in the experiences of Victor Hannaford, of Plymouth, England. ‘Abandon Ship!’ – the Captain issued […]

Donald Charles Edward Wheatley, a member of the church at Zoar Chapel, Dicker, for 30 years and deacon for 26 years, passed peacefully away on December 16th, 2010, aged 82. He was born on September 18th, 1928. He was the first child of godly parents, Benjamin and Ivy Wheatley, who put up many prayers for […]

Iain H. Murray, the co-founder of the Banner of Truth Trust, recently gave this interview which is to appear in a coming issue of the fine monthly American magazine Tabletalk that comes from Ligonier Ministries and R.C. Sproul. Tabletalk: What are the top three Puritan works that every Christian should read and why? Iain Murray: […]

WESTMINSTER THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY COMMENCEMENT MAY 2011 I am honoured to be given this Doctor of Divinity degree along with my old room-mate A. Donald MacLeod and Wayne Grudem. Some preachers have been disdainful of the D.D. degree. You recall the rhyme An old Baptist preacher called Fiddle Once rejected this honoured degree; ‘It’s bad enough […]

A new hardback edition of Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ Spiritual Depression: Its Cause and Cure has been produced by Granted Ministries Press, Hannibal, Missouri (www.grantedministries.org). The following biographical foreword has been written by Geoff Thomas. There was no one in the twentieth century more suited to preach, counsel and write on this subject of spiritual depression than […]

The Testimony of Mr. Robert Wright, a Converted Atheist I embraced Christianity around 3.00 p.m. on Saturday 27th January 2007, after 38 years of being an atheist. When I say ‘atheist’ I do not mean an ‘agnostic’, but a fully signed-up anti-Christian, very much in the mould of Richard Dawkins. I was 16 when I […]

A life dedicated to the Lord and the service of others Harold Crowter was first and foremost a preacher of the gospel, sent out to preach by the church at ‘Rehoboth’, Coventry, in 1954, and serving many Strict Baptist churches and individuals around the country until the last few months of his life. He was […]

These remarks were made at Kuiper’s funeral service in Grand Rapids, Michigan on April 25, 1966. Westminster Theological Seminary has compelling reason to thank God for the ministry of R. B. Kuiper. The decades of his teaching at Westminster were the prime years of his life. His remarkable gifts made him a leader in the […]

Audrey Isabella Riche, for 44 years a member of the church at Bethel, Luton, and formerly at Hanover, Tunbridge Wells, passed away on September 4th, aged 81. The following is her own account of her early days, written in May 1986. Sometimes I am asked: ‘How did you come to go to chapel?’ and I […]

This interview is with a retired minister of the Free Reformed Churches of North America (FRCNA), the Rev Henry Van Essen and his wife, Engelina. It took place in their home on Thursday, August 11, 2010. Rev and Mrs Van Essen live in a ‘granny suite’ that’s part of the home of Walter and Marsha […]

My friend, John J. Murray, gave me a booklet when we were at a meeting in Glasgow recently. He and members of his family were involved in its reproduction. It is the diary and life of Cathie MacRae of Lochalsh who was born in 1907 and died in Invergordon Sanatorium in 1948. She started to […]