Articles

In a corner of the Churchyard at Montgomery, Wales, is a space known as The Robber’s Grave. There lie the remains of a young man named JOHN NEWTON, (not the hymnwriter) who was hanged in 1821 at Montgomery for highway robbery. In token of his innocence he asserted, “The grass for one generation at least […]

What a mercy it is to be able to sing, “Rock of Ages cleft for me”. That is, that we recognise that the Lord Jesus is the Rock that was cleft, who was wounded, who shed His precious blood, for us as individuals. The hymn is based on a number of scriptural analogies. Firstly, it […]

Franco was born on the 7th of July, 1937, in Turin, Italy. From an early age, Franco had a deep hunger for God. For a time he followed a hard life in a monastery near Rome. After that he trained as a priest. His motive was always the same. He wanted to find God for […]

Paul says, “An overseer must be above reproach,” (1 Timothy 3:2) and yet we hear of pastors falling into sin all too frequently. How should such pastors (and I would add Ruling Elders and Deacons) be viewed by the church and how should they be disciplined? Surely most evangelicals believe these pastors ought to be […]

Send in the clowns! Trinity Episcopalian church on Wall Street, New York, had a ‘clowning’ good time at a Sunday worship service. The congregation was encouraged to come as clowns, red noses and all, while the choir and clergy all wore clown outfits with oversized shoes and painted faces. The whole service was done in […]

Dr. Lloyd-Jones would preach every two years in Aberystwyth, and after one occasion I went to see him for morning coffee. It was a great treat for me to be with him alone. These occasions did not happen often. He always stayed in the home of a local doctor who, when he was a medical […]

Does it matter how we worship God? Why was Abel’s offering accepted by God, and Cain’s rejected? Geoff Thomas comments on the beginning of Genesis Chapter 4… Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, ‘With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a […]

Obadiah, Ahab’s chief civil servant (not the minor prophet), was a remarkable man. We know very little about him, but what we know is deeply instructive and hopefully deeply humbling. Obadiah lived at a time of wholesale national apostasy. Ahab, beguiled by his heathen, Baal-worshipping wife Jezebel, had sought systematically to destroy the Lord’s prophets. […]

By the mid 1960’s George and Patti Harrison were deeply into Eastern mysticism, evidenced in a number of George’s songs he had written for the Beatles during that time. But on Thursday, August 24, 1967 their involvement in Eastern mysticism went to a whole new level. Patti heard that the Maharishi Yogi was lecturing in […]

The Christian staff of the Aberystwyth University arranged a meeting at that college for Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach to speak on “A Christian Perspective on Globalisation.” Brian Griffiths is three years younger than me. He was raised in the bi-lingual gospel hall in Fforestfach, in Swansea, where his father Winston was a leader (though his […]

Caroline Hand writes on how reading John Gwyn-Thomas’s Rejoice Always1 helped her. Why is it we do not always see the fulfilment of God’s promises in our own personal circumstances? Romans chapter 5 tells us that tribulation produces perseverance, character and hope, with the end result that God’s love is poured into our hearts. But […]

David declares that our Lord is a God of deliverances, to whom belong escapes from death (Psa. 68:20). Some of those escapes can be quite narrow, as David himself experienced. At one time only a mountain stood between a murderous Saul with his army and a fleeing David and his company (1 Sam. 23:26). At […]

And there is no new thing under the sun. Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us.Ecclesiastes 1:9-10 The sum and substance of the great charge which the Reformers adduced against the Church of Rome was that . . […]

John Shiles, the beloved deacon at Old Baptist Chapel, Chippenham, Wiltshire for fifty-nine years passed peacefully to his eternal rest on September 12th, 2006, aged 94. John Shiles was born at Allington, near Chippenham, on June 9th, 1912. His grandfather, his great-grandparents and three sisters of his father had moved from Devon to Wiltshire on […]

Aaron Burr, Jr. was less than two years old when his father, the President of Princeton, died suddenly and unexpectedly in September, 1758. A few months later Aaron’s grandfather, Jonathan Edwards, who had been elected President of Princeton to succeed his son-in-law, died from complications due to a small pox inoculation. A few months after […]

The situation that we find ourselves in, historically, is not a happy one. Let me begin by saying I hope that you are well convinced that freedom is founded upon Christianity. Our Saviour tells us very plainly: it is only if the Son shall make you free that you shall be free indeed. There has […]

This year sees the 200th anniversary of the death of John Newton. Geoff Thomas here tells the story of the man who “God didn’t give up on.” The promise Lord, and Thy command, Have brought us here today; And now we humbly waiting stand To hear what Thou wilt say. Meet us, we pray, with […]

Today there is a widespread cry for relevance in preaching. But, generally, relevance is measured by the subjective feelings of those who sit, or might sit, in the pews of a particular church. Latching on to such feelings, a community church in Arizona advertised: “Stronger family relationships … greater satisfaction at work … and you […]

The previous article in this series summarised Edwards’ teaching on revival.1 One day in May 1747 David Brainerd, who for the previous four years had laboured with some success among the American Indians, arrived at the Edwards’ home. Brainerd was ill from tuberculosis and was to spend in the Northampton parsonage most of the brief […]

1. THE PURITAN DOCTRINE OF THE ATONEMENT. Garry Williams, a lecturer of Oak Hill Theological College, addressed this subject with Robert Oliver as the chairman. Amongst the Puritans there was a majority doctrine of the atonement and that was the teaching summarized in the Westminster Confession’s eighth chapter: He was made under the law, and […]

Scottish Reformer John Knox once called Geneva, where John Calvin preached, taught and wrote, “the most perfect school of Christ that was ever on the earth.” Meeting in Birmingham June 15-22, the 2006 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) broke the contract with the rich Biblical heritage that Knox and Calvin left Presbyterians. What’s […]

There are few subjects more debated and more hotly debated in the church today than whether or not the miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit continue to this day. We have recently seen a great deal of discussion about this issue in the blogosphere. It is an issue which leaves many believers confused, unsure as […]

Perpetua, a young, well to do woman, lived in Carthage in 200 A.D. Carthage, modern day Tunis in north Africa, had a vibrant Christian community living amongst a pagan people, and Perpetua had come to believe in Jesus as the Christ. She was attending a Catechism class to prepare her for public profession and baptism, […]

Most of you know the story about Eric Liddell, the gold medallist in the 400 meters in the 1924 Olympics in Paris, how he refused to run on Sunday and forfeited his place in the 100 meters, opting to run a race which was not his speciality. What you may not know is that Eric […]

Missionaries in Mali announce that the New Testament is now available in the Maasina Fulfulde language, making the gospel story accessible to more than 1 million Fulfulde Malians who have never seen the Bible written in their native tongue. Fulfulde is spoken in some form in 17 African countries. Numerous dialects make exact communication in […]