Topic Archives: History & Biography

REFORMATION DAY 2014 The date that marks the beginning of the Protestant Reformation is October 31, 1517. No one could have known it then, but what happened that day set in motion an earthquake whose aftershocks are still being felt in the western churches today. That earthquake had three epicentres, one in Wittenberg with Martin […]

It is strange to write about a life-changing experience that I cannot remember. However, I am told that around 5.45 p.m. on Thursday, August 29, 2013, I was riding my Harley home from the church to lead a Bible study at our house when a car turned and hit me broadside on my left. Then […]

An address given at Bethel Chapel, Luton, on Lord’s Day afternoon, 8th June, 2014, on the occasion of the Sunday School Anniversary. Usually on these occasions I try to speak of something that is topical, but something that will be profitable and for the honour and glory of God. For a long time, my thoughts […]

Tim Challies interviews Dr. Joel Beeke 1. When the Puritans spoke of zeal, what were they referring to? By zeal they meant the fruit of the Spirit, especially love, exercised to a high level in the soul and activity of life. Thomas Manton said that godly zeal is ‘a higher degree of love,’ indeed the […]

As one who owes a debt of gratitude to the ministry of the Rev Kenneth A MacRae (1883-1964) it would not be right to let the 50th anniversary of his death (5th May) pass without a short tribute to his memory. He exercised a powerful ministry over 50 years in the Free Church of Scotland […]

Go now to My place which was in Shiloh, where I made My name to dwell at the first, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel (Jeremiah 7:12). Thirty-seven year old Asahel Nettleton, the powerful Presbyterian evangelist, was exhausted. He had been preaching several times daily in […]

An address by John J Murray to the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) on Tuesday 20 May 2014. We are commemorating this evening the quincentenary of the birth of John Knox. We are doing it in a nation that has airbrushed him out of history. We are doing it in a […]

A transcript of the sermon preached by the Rt. Rev. Dr David Samuel at the 125th Anniversary Service of the Protestant Truth Society. The service was held in Kensit Evangelical Church, Finchley, North London, on Saturday 24 May 2014. May I say first of all it is a great privilege to be asked to preach […]

An extract from Chapter 5, ‘The Hope and Puritan Piety’ in Iain Murray’s The Puritan Hope,1 due to be reprinted (2014) in a new, larger format. At the outset it has to be admitted that an interest in unfulfilled prophecy is not always conducive to Christian piety. The Christians at Thessalonica were only the first […]

Dr. Valerie Young (Knowlton) Murray, died Aug. 8, 2014, at her home in Freeport, Maine. Born on Jan. 9, 1927, in Augusta, to Cecil Knowlton and Ida Muriel (Young) Knowlton. Along with her mother, she lived with her grandparents, Daniel S. Young, Jr., and Maud Young, who raised her and her sister Patricia. She was […]

An interview with Tim Challies by Joel Beeke 1. What is casuistry and why did the Puritans focus on it? Casuistry is teaching people how to know what God wants them to do in specific situations, and how to live with peace of conscience before God. It addresses particular ‘cases of conscience’ or ethical and […]

Every one of the Lord’s people can echo the testimony of King David in Psalm 40:1-3: I waited patiently for the Lord; and he inclined unto me and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established […]

William Booth (1829-1912) is best known as the founder of the Salvation Army, an organization devoted to feeding and clothing the destitute. Beginning as a Christian mission in London’s East End, it was renamed in 1878, and waged war on two fronts – against the biting pinch of poverty, and the degrading power of sin, […]

Dr. William Robinson was a minister and theologian whose life spanned most of the 20th century. He was a professor at Columbia Theological Seminary from 1926 to 1982. As a staunch believer in the doctrines of grace as set out in the Westminster Confession of Faith, Dr Robinson fought a long but ultimately unsuccessful battle […]

People were amazed and critical then and they would be exactly the same today. Here was a star of the British Olympic team, one of the favourites to win the gold medal in the 100 metres, declining to run in the heats because they were being held on a Sunday. The reason? His Christian convictions. […]

I was born in 1974 in a small village in Siberia near the city of Tumen. My name is Vitali. When I look back on my childhood I cannot remember a single happy day. This was because both my parents were alcoholics. My father hardly ever worked and when he did all the money, or […]

A look at the life of John Bunyan, by Pastor Geoff Thomas. HIS CONVERSION John Bunyan had no family influences encouraging him to become a Christian. His grandfather married four times, his father three times, while he married twice. His grandfather was what we might understand to be a kind of ‘travelling salesman’ who left […]

This has been my Ed Clowney week. It began when I was reflecting about how to understand Sabbath better, and remembered I’d never read Clowney’s How Jesus Transforms the Ten Commandments. There it was, he opened it up, he told us so well just what it meant to rest in Jesus, so pastorally. I couldn’t […]

With a population of some 10 million, Wenzhou, in China’s eastern Zhejiang Province, is one of China’s great coastal megacities. A 480km drive south of Shanghai on the East China Sea, Wenzhou is often referred to as ‘China’s Jerusalem’ as it is believed to have the largest Christian population of any city in China – […]

We have no idea what we take for granted in the United States. I emigrated from Syria to American when I was 19 years of age, and became an American citizen four years later, and then a Christian many years later. As a photojournalist for twenty-five years, I have experienced up close and personal this […]

Nine congregants were ready for baptism, all of whom but my second daughter, Shlomit, were immigrants from the former Soviet Union. God had worked wonders among us. Four were couples who had turned to the Lord together. We hired the CM&A Church building in Jerusalem, reserved three buses and made preparations. The Orthodox, who almost […]

2014 is the centenary anniversary celebration of Leon Morris’ birth on 15 March 1914. Leon Morris is arguably Australia’s greatest biblical scholar, best known for his masterful works on the biblical teaching about the atonement [The Atonement: Its Meaning and Significance] as well as studies on The Gospel of John. Leon Morris was also Principal […]

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 […]

The year 2013 marked the 450th anniversary of the closing of the Council of Trent, one of the most significant series of meetings in Christian history. Here are nine things evangelicals should know about the Council and the decrees1 that it issued. 1. The Council of Trent was the most important movement of the Roman […]

John Robert Broome, a faithful minister in the ‘Gospel Standard’ churches for many years, member of the church at Trowbridge, died on February 14th, 2013, aged 81. The first part of this obituary by his son can be found here. During this time, our father was exercised about marrying. He had to give up one […]