Topic Archives: History & Biography

I would like to briefly mention some aspects of life in Turkey as a follower of Jesus Christ. From a spiritual viewpoint Turkey’s soil is hard, and life as a Christian is certainly not easy. For example, perpetrators of various crimes often seem to go unpunished, but anyone who becomes a follower of Christ (or […]

The late Dr Arthur Fawcett lectured on Church History in the Bible Training Institute in Glasgow when I was a student there. His doctoral thesis was published by the Banner of Truth as “The Cambuslang Revival”, and a worthwhile read it is. His unusual appearance, including the shocks of pure white hair on either side […]

Renowned scholar learned to love the Bible at his grandmother’s knee. “I’m not really a scholar,” says J. Alec Motyer softly, “I’m just a man who loves the Word of God.” Now retired as principal of Trinity College in Bristol, England, Motyer has spent his professional career studying the Bible. However, he learned to love […]

Two years ago a representative of the Slav Lands Christian Fellowship was invited to western Siberia to see the fruit of an indigenous missionary outreach that had begun seven years before in this previously unevangelised field. He went not as a tourist but to assess the possibilities of co-operating in a practical ways with our […]

I [Geoff Thomas] first saw Dr Koop in Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia in 1961. He was an elder, and bore a striking resemblance to the pastor at that time, Mariano Di Gangi. He was a surgeon in the Children’s Hospital, Philadelphia. Then I heard of him again when his son was killed rock-climbing one […]

John Newton and William Cowper lived for many years in the little town of Olney in Buckinghamshire. The town is in the middle of a triangle of larger towns with Northampton to the north-west, Bedford due east, and Milton Keyes due south. These two men both wrote hymns, some of them the most outstanding in […]

The history of God’s work in Scotland is profuse and brimming with manifestations of God’s power and grace. In my twenty-five years of ministry here it has been my privilege when time and opportunity afforded to take visiting preachers on ‘the grand tour.’ From the castle at St Andrews in the north-east to the various […]

SESSION 1 The Conference commenced with the 300 men singing the metrical version of Psalm 65, and with prayer. Iain Murray then explained to the Conference that the sickness of Dr Robert Godfrey of Westminster Seminary, California, had prevented his attendance, and that Dr Sinclair Ferguson would speak instead of him. John Marshall opened a […]

During Easter Week Alec MacDougall of Trinity Baptist Church Gloucester took myself and my nephew David on a history tour of that city. We saw the memorial church, built on a site where George Whitefield preached in the open air. I would guess it was built as a Presbyterian chapel. It’s URC now – and […]

A Key to his Courage John G. Paton was a missionary to the New Hebrides, today called Vanuatu, in the South Seas. He was born in Scotland in 1824. I gave my Pastors’ Conference message about him because of the courage he showed throughout his 82 years of life. When I dug for the reasons […]

Modern historians who are sympathetic to Roman Catholicism such as Eamon Duffy have sought to rewrite the history of the Reformation in England. They deny that Protestantism found a welcome response in the hearts of the people. They suggest that it was merely a few eccentrics and some hopeless recusants who had become Calvinists who […]

Two hundred years ago was the beginning of the golden age of missionary expansion from Europe and North America. At that time there were 174m professing Christians in the world which had a population of 730m. So Christians set up missionary societies. The first was founded in 1794, plainly called the Missionary Society. This became […]

This letter arrived from Paul Williams, the pastor of an Evangelical Church in Swindon, which triggered off a chain of thought. “Yesterday Ruth and I had some time off and went to Bristol. We were taken by friends to the George Muller museum there, and also saw for ourselves the vast orphanages. What a joy […]

The start of the new millennium has many pundits wringing their hands about the future, but believers in Christ should he looking to the future with optimism. This may be the year in which the Lord returns. He can come at any time. Again, this may be the year in which we see the beginning […]

The Place of the Reformation in the History of Christianity Merle d’Aubigne made a distinction between the history of Christianity and the history of the Church. In an address delivered in 1832 at Geneva he said, There are two histories, there is what we may call the “History of the Church,” that is of human […]

An Introduction James I. Packer ‘BAXTER, Richard, gentleman; born 12 November 1615, at Rowton, Salop; educated at Donnington Free School, Wroxeter, and privately; ordained deacon by Bishop of Worcester, Advent 1638; head of Richard Foley’s School, Dudley, 1639; curate of Bridgnorth, 1639-40; lecturer (curate) of Kidderminster, 1641-42; army chaplain at Coventry, 1642-45, and with Whalley’s […]

Jean Henri Merle d’Aubigne was born in 1794 to a distinguished Huguenot family in Geneva. In his youth he received a thoroughly classical education, and after completing a course in the Humanities, he commenced, at the age of 19, the study of theology at the Acadamie de Geneve. It is important to note, however, that […]

There is no topic of greater significance than conversion. The great mass of human beings can be divided into two groups, the converted and the unconverted. Alas, we must say that most are unconverted. The question, “Are you converted?” is often asked in sermons. There is no more important and earnest question than, “Am I […]

Swanwick Conference Centre January 11-14. The opening session was chaired by David Kingdon. The first paper was given by Geoff Thomas. On January 6th was the 150th Anniversary of the conversion of Charles Haddon Spurgeon in 1850 in Artillery Street Primitive Methodist Church, Colchester and the theme of the paper was an examination of true […]

There were some weaknesses in Abraham Kuyper. 1. Kuyper’s approach to the Bible was not uniformly helpful because his preaching was not that of the careful exegete. At times his sermons were more like lectures than expository addresses. He would, for example, seize on single words in a text like ‘rooted’ or ‘grounded’ and use […]

INTRODUCTION AND APOLOGIA “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” Never was that proverb more accurate than in this self-initiated enterprise. I have about four words of Dutch. I know about Holland via North America, not because of visits to or discussions with men who live in the Netherlands today. I once exchanged houses […]

THE LIBERATION The shock waves of this action went through the country. They were at war, a nation conquered by the Nazis, and what was their General Assembly doing but virtually excommunicating one of their most famous men. Eight days later, on August 11, a meeting was convened in a church at The Hague to […]