Topic Archives: History & Biography

I imagine every Christian as he goes about his daily tasks looks for those occasional indications of the divine hand in his affairs to confirm that his work is of the Lord and not merely some scheme of his own. We are now beginning to build the hospital and because of the high unemployment rate […]

INTRODUCTION I have betrayed John Calvin1. We all have. We betray Calvin every time we talk about him, because Calvin did a lot to stop people talking about him. He once commented, ‘I am unwilling to speak of myself, but since you do not permit me to be altogether silent, I will say what I […]

An extract, with slight editing, from Memoirs of the Rev James Fraser of Brea.1 Being at the University, and being at the age of 17 or 18 years, our minister proposed to celebrate the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, of which he gave warning the Sabbath preceding the celebration thereof. I purposed (I know not […]

During this the 500th anniversary of the birth of John Calvin I would like to express three ways in which John Calvin is an inspiration to me. First he is an inspiration as a pastor/preacher. John Calvin was a pastor for 27 years. First he served at St Peter’s Church in Geneva from 1536 to […]

A calm and impartial view of this sad subject has been reserved for this place, and for a chapter1 of its own. The immense advantage of having been able to consult and to weigh the evidence of the principal writers – certainly not fewer than forty – about the case of Servetus, besides several biographies […]

On 10 July 1509, almost exactly 500 years ago, one of God’s greatest gifts to his Church was born. This was John Calvin, whose life began in Noyon in northern France. His father held several important positions in the town, some civil and some ecclesiastical; his mother – who died when John was no more […]

The Lord has given and now the Lord has taken away one of the most faithful, and fruitful ministers of the Word who has ever served in the Church of Christ. On 12 March, 2009, James Philip was called out of this life and into the nearer presence of the God whom he loved and […]

Summary of a 10-minute address at the Banner of Truth Leicester Ministers’ Conference, 2009. One hundred and fifty years ago the Irish province of Ulster came under the powerful influences of the Spirit of God. The spiritual life of churches was revived and their witness to the gospel strengthened. The unconverted were deeply affected by […]

This year is the 500th anniversary of John Calvin’s birth. For some people, the very name ‘Calvin’ conjures up images of a tyrannical despot who ruled the city state of Geneva, and its church, with a rod of iron during the middle decades of the sixteenth century. For others, who know their history a little […]

It is 500 years since God brought John Calvin into this world. During 2009, many Reformed churches and Christians in particular are remembering with gratitude this gift of Christ to his church. Publishing houses are producing books at a rapid pace of knots, articles, papers, conferences, and website and blog postings proliferate. But who was […]

Eunice Grace Field, member of the church at Grove Road, Eastbourne, passed away peacefully in the Hove Bethesda Home on July 3rd, 2008, aged 98. Our friend worshipped in Salem Chapel, Carshalton, with her husband Ben. They were baptized together at Salem and joined the church there on December 5th, 1937. Here her soul was […]

In the spring of 1856 an English lady by the name of Mrs Colville came to Ballymena from Gateshead because she had ‘time and money to spend for God’. She began a programme of house to house visitation with a view to winning souls for Christ. In November she returned to England in low spirits […]

In the year 1967 I was living with my husband and son in the village of Framfield near Uckfield in East Sussex. I was also with child the second time, and was having great problems with the pregnancy. My mother took care of my family whilst I was confined to bed for three months. It […]

Until the age of twenty-six I knew nothing of vital religion, although I lived an outwardly religious, moral and respectable life . . . Brought up under sacramental teaching, I was totally in the dark concerning the grace of God, although . . . I realize that he was leading me all the time. To […]

I just don’t get it! Perhaps someone can explain it to me: how can we act so contrary to what we believe? How can there be such a yawning gap between what we know is true and what we do in the name of the truth we know? You don’t get it either, do you? […]

Christianity is the religion of the Gospel. The Gospel was defined by William Tyndale, the Bible translator, as ‘good merry, glad and joyful tidings, that maketh a man’s heart glad, and maketh him to dance and sing and leap for joy’. ‘Ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven, evermore his praises sing’, we might add. But as time […]

I have been a missionary doctor in Mozambique for many years, and an unusual way to spread the knowledge of the Christian faith has developed here, that of a Scripture memory catechism class. There are 21 men from various churches and backgrounds who meet together on Saturdays to check out on Scripture memory they have […]

Masab, son of Palestinian West Bank Hamas leader Sheikh Hassan Yousef, glances at the friend who has accompanied him to the restaurant where we met. They whisper a few words and say grace, thanking God and Jesus for putting food on their plates. It takes a few seconds to digest this sight: the son of […]

Jeremy Brooks is the recently appointed Director of Ministries at the Protestant Truth Society, for whom I work on a part-time basis. We discuss his new role and matters of Protestant interest. GD: Hello Jeremy Brooks and welcome to ‘Exiled Preacher’. Please tell us a little about yourself. JB: Hi Guy, and thank you for […]

This year marks the one hundredth anniversary of Bavinck’s Stone Lectures at Princeton Theological Seminary, and the appearance in English of the final volume of his four-volumed Reformed Dogmatics1. The time is ripe, therefore, to get (re)acquainted with Bavinck. Bavinck’s Early Life and Education Herman Bavinck was born in Hoogeveen, the Netherlands, on December 13, […]

Although the name of Herman Bavinck may be unfamiliar to some readers, his labours have probably affected all those reading these lines. Bavinck’s legacy to the Reformed world, like that of his contemporary, Abraham Kuyper, was disproportionate to the size of his native Netherlands. I write these lines on the eighty-seventh anniversary of Bavinck’s death […]

Introduction Teresa of Avila calls for our consideration on several counts: 1. Her writings are increasingly popular amongst unconverted but professing Protestants who find her ‘mystical spirituality’ attractive in their own ‘pursuit of God.’ We are thus alerted to a dangerous ‘enemy within the gates.’ 2. She is revered by Romanists as ‘a quintessential Catholic’, […]

While commenting upon the one hundred and nineteenth Psalm, I was brought into most intimate communion with Thomas Manton, who has discoursed upon that marvellous portion of Scripture with great fulness and power. I have come to know him so well that I could pick him out from among a thousand divines if he were […]

The poet John Milton lived from 1608 to 1674, this year being the four hundredth anniversary of his birth (December 9). He was also a controversialist, a Londoner by birth and death, who after education at St. Paul’s School, and Christ’s College, Cambridge, abandoned his intention of ordination in the Church of England because of […]

Matthew Else, the pastor of Grace Baptist Church, Peel, in the Isle of Man received his homecall on 18th May 2008 after a very short illness. His sudden death came as a great shock to his family, and his passing leaves a huge gap in the life and work of his church and its associated […]