Book Description

Christmas, and New Year, are excellent moments to pause and reflect—as scattered families regather for the national holiday, and as the calendar turns over again, with another year gone forever. J. C. Ryle urges us—in the midst of our feasting and festivities and family reunions—to make time to consider our spiritual state and our relationship with God. How is it with our souls? What do we make of Jesus Christ? What will be our future, when all our Christmases are past?

This little book contains five of Ryle’s most popular Christmas tracts, the spiritual wisdom of which is timeless. Ryle challenges us—while we enjoy the wonderful delights of mince pies and mistletoe and mulled wine and music and merriment—to make the most of every Christmas, to consider seriously the person of Jesus Christ and questions of eternal significance.

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To ask and answer the question ‘Why were our Reformers burned?’ could not be more pertinent to the times in which we live, according to Roger Carswell in his Introduction to this edition of J. C. Ryle’s tract on the English Reformers.

This is a booklet that needs to be read carefully and prayerfully. Its aim is not to lead anyone to smug self-righteousness or complacency. To understand the error of a theological system ought to stir within us compassion and winsome boldness towards those who are caught up in it.

We ought to feel deeply thankful to God for those who lived and laid down their lives for the truth of the gospel. The world was not worthy of them: they took up their cross and followed their Saviour. We need to understand why the Reformers of the sixteenth century lived and died as they did, and in our times cultivate a similar, costly commitment to the truth of the gospel.

This booklet is an extract from Ryle’s Five English Reformers and Light from Old Times.

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• Expository Thoughts on the Gospels (7 Volume Set)
• Practical Religion
• Holiness
• Light from Old Times
• Old Paths
• Knots Untied
• Christian Leaders of the 18th Century
• Charges and Addresses
• Upper Room

Want to learn more about each title in this set? Click on the related items below to read in depth about each title, however, remember to add the ‘Ryle Clothbound Deal’ to your cart if you want to receive this special rate.

Reviews

• Review by Tony Doppke

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According to J. C. Ryle, next to praying there is nothing so important in practical religion as Bible reading. God in his mercy has given us a book ‘which is able to make us wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus’ (2 Tim. 3:15). By reading the Bible we may learn what to believe, what to be, and what to do; how to live with comfort, and how to die in peace.

Can anything, therefore, be more important than being in possession of a Bible? However, to have a Bible is one thing, to read it is quite another. Happy is the one who not only has a Bible but who reads it, obeys it, and makes it the rule of one’s faith and practice!

In this little book Ryle clearly explains why we ought to value the Bible highly, to study it regularly, and to make ourselves thoroughly acquainted with its contents.

This book consists of material extracted from Ryle’s Practical Religion, which is also published by the Trust.

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A man of good scholarship, sterling character, wide sympathies, and tremendous zeal, J. C. Ryle accounted it no light thing to be entrusted with the work of organizing and advancing the cause of God and truth in a diocese noted for its extensive industrial development and in a city of world fame. As a man of God he gave unfeigned allegiance to the plenary inspiration of Holy Scripture. Linked with this was his determination to strive for the maintenance of the Protestant character of the Church of England as by law established in the days of the sixteenth-century Reformation. Doctrine, experience, and practice based upon and shaped by the pure word of God were to him the essentials of the ongoing life of the Church.

In the Liverpool Diocese Ryle faced a formidable task. Called to it at the age of sixty-five, Ryle laboured in season and out of season with untiring pertinacity. To present-day readers he will chiefly be known through his expository and biographical writings. The Charges and Addresses here brought together show how he laboured to educate the clergy of his diocese in biblical principles and to impress upon them the vast importance if maintaining evangelical doctrine and practice in their varied ministries and contacts.

In England Ryle stands in the foremost rank of those who have held forth the word of life and fought the good fight of faith. He is one of the Lord’s standard-bearers of the late Victorian age. The ‘healthful spirit of God’s grace’ was upon him. Being dead he continues to speak to our backslidden generation.

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This book, The Power and Sympathy of Christ, contains six studies on John chapter 11—one of the most remarkable chapters in all the New Testament. It deals with themes most useful and interesting to all professing believers.

Just like the rest of the human race, Christians are ‘born to trouble as the sparks fly upward’ (Job 5:7). They live in a dying world and are just as likely to suffer sickness and death as their fellow men and women. Year after year the gaps in their family circles increase; heaven seems to become more full, and earth more empty. That is why, according to J. C. Ryle, it is never too soon to look steadily at such great subjects as sorrow, sickness, death, the grave, and the power and sympathy of Christ.

This little book, drawn from Ryle’s larger work, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels, will help you do just that.

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Although much has been written on the evangelical revival of the 18th century, J.C. Ryle’s account remains the best popular introduction to this great spiritual era. With simplicity and vigour, he traces the lives of the eleven Christian leaders who ‘shook England from one end to another’, giving strong reasons for his belief ‘that excepting Luther and his Continental contemporaries, and our own martyred Reformers, the world has seen no such men since the days of the apostles.’

But Ryle does not write to prompt admiration, and his conclusions and applications of his subject are among the most forceful that ever came from his pen. ‘I am obliged to say plainly that, in my judgment, we have among us neither the men nor the doctrines of the days gone by…Once let the evangelical ministry return to the ways of the 18th century, and I firmly believe we should have as much success as before. We are where we are, because we have come short of our fathers.’

At the beginning of last century, Canon A.M.W. Christopher of St. Aldate’s, Oxford, declared that he had turned to Ryle’s book during every summer vacation for thirty years. It is time Christian Leaders was so read again.

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Can we be saved without any personal knowledge of the Bible’s teaching?

Is it necessary to think clearly and precisely about such teaching?

Is God’s love such that no one will ultimately suffer the everlasting loss of body and soul?

These are very important questions; the answers we give to them will have temporal and eternal consequences for us. The first thing we need to know is, where we stand before God. J. C. Ryle is absolutely right when he says, ‘To understand our position in the sight of God is one step towards heaven.’

Steps Towards Heaven is designed to help the reader take that step. Its five chapters, which clearly explain what the Bible teaches about Sin, Salvation, Conversion, Justification, and the necessity of the work of the Holy Spirit, will help to dispel the darkness of misunderstanding and bring the reader into the light of God’s truth. Above all, this book will leave the reader in no doubt that real Christianity is the outworking of a supernatural work of the Spirit of God in the human soul.

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John Charles Ryle (1816-1900), first Bishop of Liverpool, was one of the most influential evangelical clergymen of the nineteenth century. A popular platform speaker and prolific tract writer, his books are still widely read across the globe.

Edited by Andrew Atherstone, this critical edition of Ryle’s manuscript autobiography, dictated in 1873, is a rich and unparalleled account of the early decades of his life and ministry. He recalls his youthful pursuit of academic plaudits and sporting prowess at Eton College and Oxford University, before his evangelical conversion at the age of 21. He tells of the devastating collapse of the family bank and the enforced sale of their Cheshire estates, which ended his ambitions to enter parliament. Ryle describes his exploits as a young clergyman, his loves and losses, his evangelical networks, and the deaths of his first two wives. He offers a frank assessment of his joys and struggles, and the reasons behind his crucial life choices. Written for his children and never intended for publication, Bishop J.C. Ryle’s autobiography is essential reading for a proper appreciation of the man behind the headlines in the years before he reached national and international fame.

This volume also includes many photographs from the Ryle family albums, never before published. Seven substantial appendices examine the Ryle Family Bible, Ryle’s schoolboy speeches, his conversion, his earliest evangelical tracts, and his final will and testament.

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Book Description

Knots Untied is J. C. Ryle’s leading work in defence of the evangelicalism of the Church of England. When first published in 1874 it proved immensely popular, and by 1885 it was reprinted in a tenth edition. Knots Untied is a classic volume in which Ryle covers the then current disputes about various points of religion within the Church of England, advocating and defending the evangelical position at every turn.

Knots Untied is unashamedly written from the ‘standpoint of an Evangelical Churchman’. Ryle’s presentation of the evangelical position is simply outstanding, ‘not because it differs substantially from what other evangelicals might say, but because’, according to J. I. Packer, ‘he sets it forth so clearly, so brilliantly, and so compellingly – in a word, so very, very well. … In this, as in so much else, his work retains benchmark status; for surely in principle his evangelicalism is neither more nor less than New Testament Christianity.’

‘Show us anything plainly written in that Book, and, however trying to flesh and blood, we will receive it, believe it, and submit to it. Show us anything, as religion, which is contrary to that Book, and, however specious, plausible, beautiful, and apparently desirable, we will not have it at any price…Here is rock: all else is sand.’ J. C. Ryle on the Bible as the only rule of faith and practice.

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The nineteenth century was an age that witnessed great progress in many areas of exploration and learning. However, according to J.C. Ryle, it was an age of great ignorance too. ‘With all the stir made about education’, he wryly observed, ‘the ignorance of our own country’s history is something lamentable and appalling and depressing.’ What particularly distressed Ryle was the scant knowledge of the English Reformation evident amongst his contemporaries. In this lay a grave danger: one of the reasons so many congregations drift form their evangelical foundations is their sheer ignorance of Christian history, and their lack of understanding of the major doctrinal controversies and why they matter. Therefore he taught that one of the best ways to stop Christians wavering ‘with every changing wind of doctrine’ (Eph. 4:14) is to instill in them a deep love for Reformation and Puritan teaching, and a willingness to suffer for those gospel truths. The Bible often calls us to remember the past, Ryle explained, but the devil tries to make us forget. If the church is to be strengthened, then Christians must be persuaded to read the saints of the past and to learn the lessons of church history.

Ryle’s abiding hope for Light From Old Times is that our souls will be stirred to prayer and action by the great testimonies of Reformers and Puritans found within its pages, and then that we will dig deeper into the writings of these spiritual giants.

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‘[Ryle’s writings are] a distillation of true Puritan theology presented in a highly readable and modern form.’ — D. MARTYN LLOYD-JONES

‘I see [Ryle] as a single-minded Christian communicator of profound biblical, theological, and practical wisdom, a man and minister of giant personal stature and electric force of utterance that sympathetic readers still feel…Ryle is magnificent! There’s no other word for it. Do yourself a favor and read this wonderful book, and think about what you read.’ — J. I. PACKER

‘Thoughts For Young Men abounds in reliable counsel and says — with a rare combination of seriousness and graciousness — the very things we need to hear. Young men, for whom it was written, will find it invaluable; but all Christians, men or women, young or old, can read it with lasting benefit. It deserves to be widely read and circulated, and will do spiritual good to every reader.’ — SINCLAIR B. FERGUSON

Book Description

Thoughts for Young Men is practical, spiritual, and lively. Abounding in advice and good sense, it is still as relevant and helpful in the twenty-first century as it was when it was first published in 1865.

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‘A book I think every Christian should read. It is so readable, so accessible, a very simple style of presentation, but absolutely forceful, and discerning. Every time I read it the Lord uses it to press upon me the importance and the possibility of holiness. It’s one of those books that makes you feel convicted but also inspired.’ — KEVIN DEYOUNG

‘…this book is simply the best of Ryle the Puritan-type pastor. Real Christians will find it a gold mine, a feast, a spur and a heart-warmer, food, drink, medicine, and a course of vitamins, all in one.’– J.I. PACKER

Book Description

Holiness: Its Nature, Hindrances, Difficulties, and Roots is perhaps J. C. Ryle’s best-known and, arguably, best-loved book. Although many things have changed since 1877, when this book was first published, one thing remains the same: ‘real practical holiness does not receive the attention it deserves.’ It was to remedy this attention deficit, and to counter false teaching on this most important subject, that Ryle took up his pen.
The twenty-one chapters in this enlarged edition highlight:

• the real nature of holiness
• the temptations and difficulties which all must expect who pursue it
• the life-transforming truth that union with Christ is the root of holiness
• the immense encouragement Jesus Christ holds out to all who strive to be holy.

Holiness, as with all of Ryle’s works, is clear and concise, penetrating and practical.

Mark Jones on Holiness

Banner Trustees on J.C. Ryle

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Review

• Review by Peter Barnes
• Review by Jeremy Marshall

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• Old Paths
• Practical Religion
• Holiness
• Light from Old Times
• Knots Untied
• Christian Leaders of the 18th Century
• Charges and Addresses
• Upper Room

Want to learn more about each title in this set? Click on the related items above to read in depth about each title, however, remember to add the ‘Ryle Clothbound Set’ to your cart if you want to receive the set.

Reviews

• Review by Tony Doppke

The post Ryle Clothbound Set appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

As with all Ryle’s works, Practical Religion is clear, concise and penetrating. It was designed to be a companion to his other books, Old Paths, Knots Untied and Holiness, providing guidance on how the Christian believer is to live. In Ryle’s own words, it ‘treats of the daily duties, dangers, experience, and privileges of all who profess and call themselves true Christians.’

Far from advocating a works-based religion, these papers are all about how a Christian can practically respond to the grace that has been freely given to him in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Ryle was a great enemy of hypocritical and nominal religion, or ‘churchianity’ as he called it. These articles remain a great plea for a real, heartfelt devotion to the Lord in love and service, founded on the great doctrines of Scripture.
No Christian who reads any one of these papers will be left unaffected. ‘Believer in Christ, remember this! Whatever you do in religion, do it well. Be real. Be thorough. Be honest. Be true.’

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‘We prize these volumes. They are diffuse, but not more so than family reading requires. Mr. Ryle has evidently studied all previous writers upon the Gospels, and has given forth an individual utterance of considerable value.’ — C.H. SPURGEON

Book Description

This is a special subsidised price for the full set.

Gospel of Matthew – 1 Volume As the first Gospel in the New Testament, Matthew was, not surprisingly, the first to be published in J. C. Ryle’s series of Expository Thoughts on the Gospels (1856). Ryle’s expositions are a rich combination of doctrinal and practical comments on the Gospel text.

Ryle’s Expository Thoughts can be used as a help in family worship, or as an aid in pastoral visitation, or simply as a companion to the Gospels in the private reading of Scripture.

Gospel of Mark – 1 Volume First published in 1857, Mark was the second book to appear in J. C. Ryle’s series of Expository Thoughts on the Gospels.

The earliest of the Gospel narratives to be written, Mark, says Ryle, ‘is singularly full of precious facts about the Lord Jesus, narrated in a simple, terse, pithy, and condensed style’. Those last four adjectives could well be used to describe Ryle’s own comments on the Gospel!

Gospel of Luke – 2 Volumes Within a year of publishing Mark in his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels series, J. C. Ryle had, in 1858, completed the Gospel of Luke.

Written specifically for a non-Jewish readership, Luke’s Gospel is perhaps the most ‘accessible’ of the narratives of the life of Christ for modern readers. Ryle’s desire for his readers mirrors that of Luke Luke 1:4), that they might gain ‘a more clear knowledge of Christ, as a living person, a living priest, a living physician, a living friend, a living advocate at the right hand of God, and a living Saviour soon about to come again’.

Gospel of John – 3 Volumes ‘The Gospel of St. John, rightly interpreted, is the best and simplest answer to those who profess to admire a vague and indistinct Christianity.’ There were many such in J. C. Ryle’s day, as in our own, and these final three volumes of his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels series provide a detailed commentary upon, and ‘right interpretation’ of the fourth Gospel.

In these volumes Ryle shows again that, as in all his writing and preaching, he was first and foremost a pastor, and as J. I. Packer has pointed out, ‘alongside the question “Is it true?” the question “What effect will this have on ordinary people?” was always in his mind’.

Mark Jones on Expository Thoughts

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El primero en utilizar la expresión sendas antiguas fue el profeta Jeremías, que garantizó aquienes las siguieran que hallarían descanso para [su] alma (Jer. 6:16). J.C. Ryle tenía la misma convicción, y escribió: Cuantos más años pasan, más convencido estoy de que el mundo no necesita un nuevo evangelio, tal como algunos parecen pensar. Estoy completamente seguro de que el mundo solo necesita una enseñanza plena, valiente y sin concesiones de las ‘sendas antiguas’. En este libro, Ryle expone las grandes cuestiones del evangelio y demuestra que, ciertamente, este es el buen camino donde hallar verdadero descanso para el alma.

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¿Qué recomienda usted por lo que se refiere a la predicación?’ es una pregunta que suele hacerse con frecuencia y que puede responderse de diversas maneras. Siempre hay mucho que aprender en este asunto, y existen muchos libros que nos pueden ayudar a lograrlo. Pero, independientemente del resto de cosas que lea el predicador, esta pequeña obra maestra de J.C. Ryle, Sencillez en la predicación, es de ‘lectura obligada’. Ryle condensa más experiencia y sentido común santificado en poco más de dos docenas de páginas de lo que muchos otros consiguen en un largisimo tratado. Y, como toda su obra, este librito es un ejemplo de esa misma sencillez que el autor recomienda a los demás. En nuestras manos tenemos, de hecho, una obra cuyo valor y utilidad superan con creces su extensión. Sinclair B. Ferguson

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Por Cristianismo prático, Ryle no quería decir ‘una religión que funciona’ para cualquiera que la practique, sino una religión que permite funcionar a quienes la profesan: no para salvarse sino por ser salvos. Esa religión, para él, era solamente el cristianismo, y estaba convencido de que no hay ‘un sistema religioso de enseñanza, con cualquier nombre, que produzca en la naturaleza humana la cuarta parte del efecto que produce el antiguo y despreciado sistema doctrinal comúnmente llamado evagélico.’

Cristianismo prático trata de ‘los deberes, peligros, experiencias y privilegios de todos los que profesan ser verdaderos cristianos’. Es un libro que arroja luz sobre todo lo que cada creyente debe ser, hacer y esperar.

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Tomando como base el texto de Efesios 2:1, el autor analiza el estado espiritual del ser humano, llegando a la conclusión de que todos estamos espiritualmente muertos por estar separados de Dios y ajenos a la vida de nuestro Creador.

Demuestra que, por tanto, todos necesitamos ser vivificados como la única manera de poder tener una relación personal con Dios y gozar de su presencia.

En vista de esto, explica la forma en que el alma puede pasar de muerte a vida.

Finalmente hace una aplicación directa y personal de estas verdades al lector, haciéndole ver su necesidad de recibir vida espiritual.

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‘¿Cómo puedo llegar a Dios? ¿Cómo puedo ser salvo?’. Estas son las preguntas más importantes que podemos hacernos. Ryle nos responde a ellas con su exposición de Hechos 4:12 (‘y en ningún otro hay salvación’), en la que desgrana las implicaciones doctrinales de este versículo en cuanto al camino de savación. También analiza cómo encajan dichas implicaciones con la naturaleza del hombre, con la naturaleza de Dios, y con el mensaje de toda la Biblia. Por último, Ryle ofrece respuesta a posibles objeciones al camino bíblico de salvación, tan pertinentes hoy día como en sus propios tiempos, en el siglo XIX.

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Su concepto de la vida cristiana respira un activismo netamente bíblico. Para Ryle, el verdadero cristiano no puede armonizarse con una noción estática de la fe, sino que, por lo contrario, la vida espiritual que se recibe con el nuevo nacimiento es como una fuerza impulsadora que pone a todas las facultades de la persona salva en acción constante. Asi como el movimiento es manifestación de un principio de vida, la actividad en los senderos de la santidad es evidencia de una genuina vida espiritual en Cristo. El enfoque que tiene Juan Carlos Ryle en este libro es de presentar un reto y estímulo al creyente a vivir la vida abundante recibiba en el nuevo nacimiento. ¡Es un llamado vivir!

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The ambiguity and obscurity of statements from religious leaders today often confuse ordinary Christians. J.C. Ryle’s writings were of a different character. His outspoken comments can still help us towards clear Bible-based convictions.

The church’s doctrine and practice are in constant danger of being corrupted from their original divinely-given character. Seeing this, Ryle felt compelled to utter a warning, however controversial this might prove. As he observes, ‘There are times when controversy is…a benefit. Give me the mighty thunderstorm rather than the pestilential malaria. The one walks in darkness and poisons us in silence…The other frightens and alarms us for a little season. But it is soon over, and it clears the air’.

Strong convictions and clarity of expression always mark Ryle’s writings. Nowhere is this more evident than in the addresses and articles brought together as Warnings to the Churches.

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Reviews

• Review by Alan Hill

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Book Description

The dawn of New Testament Christianity in an upper room in Jerusalem and its final triumph when ‘many shall come from East and West and sit down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven’, mark the beginning and ending respectively of the general sweep of this republished volume of papers by Bishop J.C. Ryle.

Sermons in some cases, lectures in others, they all exhibit the robust evangelical doctrine and down-to earth application, characteristic of Ryle’s style. With a vibrant challenging note and an occasional flash of humour, reliable advice, grounded in Biblical principles, is offered to ministers and congregations, parents and children, young and old, converted and unconverted.

Enlivening every word and sentence, the writer’s evangelistic zeal and tender pastoral concern compel the reader’s attention. Few, surely, can fail to be stirred and instructed by these addresses which have an astonishingly contemporary ring.

‘I have reached an age when I cannot reasonably expect to write much more. There are many thoughts in this volume which I do not wish to leave behind me in the precarious form of separate single sermons, addresses, lectures, and tracts. I have therefore resolved to gather them together in the volume I now send forth, which I heartily pray God to bless, and to make it a permanent blessing to many souls.’ — J. C. RYLE

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It was the prophet Jeremiah who first used the expression ‘old paths’ and assured those who followed them that they would find ‘rest for (their) souls’ (Jeremiah 6:16).

J.C. Ryle was of the same conviction and wrote: ‘The longer I live the more I am convinced that the world needs no new Gospel, as some profess to think. I am thoroughly persuaded that the world needs nothing but bold, full, unflinching teaching of the “old paths”.’

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Extract

• Extract from Chapter 4 – ‘Our Hope’.

Review

• Review by Alan Hill

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To J. C. Ryle, the inspiration of the Scriptures was ‘the very keel and foundation of Christianity’, the underpinning without which Christians had no warrant for doctrine or practice, ‘no solid ground for present peace or hope, and no right to claim the attention of mankind’. He deliberately placed a paper on Inspiration at the beginning of Old Paths, his Plain Statements on Some of the Weightier Matters of Christianity, and it is this which is republished here.

But is all Scripture inspired? Are the very words and expressions used by the writers from God, or does inspiration mean something less than this? Ryle was convinced that the very words are from God, and that only this view makes sense of what the Bible itself claims. Here he eloquently defends this position, answers objections, and applies the truth to the conscience of the reader.

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Review

• Review by Brian Garrard
• Review by Alan Hill

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Few martyrs’ words can be more stirring than those of Bishop Hugh Latimer to Dr. Nicholas Ridley: ‘Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man. We shall this day light such a candle, by God’s grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out’.

But, why were such men burned at the stake? What were the great convictions in which they lived and for which they were prepared to sacrifice life itself? What made their lives and testimony to Christ’s gospel so powerful? Do Christians today share either their convictions or their faithfulness?

It was the increasing conviction that martyrs, though dead, can still speak to the church, which led Bishop J.C. Ryle to pen these pungent biographies of Five English Reformers last century. Along with an analysis of the reasons for their martyrdom he pointed out the salient characteristics of their Christian lives. Such men still prove to be examples, warnings and challenges all in one, to Christians today. Readers will rise from the company of their life stories praying for a similar faith in Christ’s power.

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According to J C Ryle, private prayer is the most neglected of all Christian duties. That is most unfortunate because private prayer is the true measure of a Christian’s walk before God and ‘the pith and marrow of practical Christianity’. To bestir his readers to the practice and privilege of private prayer, Ryle points out both the blessings of prayer and the grave dangers of prayerlessness.

Prayer under the blessing of God leads to the new birth, strengthens faith, moves mountains, and promotes spiritual growth and contentment that rises above circumstances. Prayerlessness, on the other hand, is the broad road leading to Hell for the unbeliever and the major cause of backsliding in the Christian. Ryle observes that ‘men fall in private long before they fall in public’. His warning is surely a word in season to our contemporary evangelical church, whose witness during the last generation to a lost and perishing world has been sorely compromised by scandals involving so-called Christian leaders.

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What was it that transformed the people of England during the latter half of the eighteenth century? J.C. Ryle reveals the answer to that question and, in so doing, holds out the hope for all the nations of the world today.

This booklet is a reproduction of chapter two of Ryle’s book, Christian Leaders of the 18th Century.

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What do you recommend on preaching?’ is a frequently asked question that can be answered in a variety of ways. There is always much to learn and there are many books to help us. But whatever else a preacher reads, J.C. Ryle’s little masterpiece Simplicity in Preaching is a ‘must read’. Ryle packs more experience and sanctified common sense into two dozen pages than many others manage in a lengthy treatise. And, like all of his work, this one illustrates the very simplicity he commends to others. Here indeed is a work whose value and usefulness is out of all proportion to its length. , SINCLAIR B. FERGUSON

Reviews

• Review by Kevin DeYoung
• Review by Alan Hill

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Why is it important for men and women to worship God? Does the Bible provide principles that can guide Christians in their worship of God? What are the key elements in wholesome, balanced, church worship? Is there anything Christians should avoid in their worship services? Can we be sure that God is pleased with the worship we offer him?

These questions are taken up and answered in Worship: Its Priority, Principles, and Practice, J C Ryle’s spiritual, insightful, and practical study into the Bible’s teaching on this subject. In an age when there is so much confusion and controversy surrounding Christian worship, Ryle provides sincere Christians with guiding principles that are sure to lead to joyful, Spirit-filled, Christ-centred, and God-honouring worship.

Reviews

• Review by Alan Hill

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As the first Gospel in the New Testament, Matthew was, not surprisingly, the first to be published in J. C. Ryle’s series of Expository Thoughts on the Gospels (1856). Ryle’s expositions are a rich combination of doctrinal and practical comments on the Gospel text.

Ryle loved the Gospels because they were so full of the Lord Jesus Christ. ‘No part of the Bible is so important as this’, he wrote, ‘and no part is so full and complete. Four distinct Gospels tell us the story of Christ’s doings and dying. Four times we read the precious account of his works and words. How thankful we ought to be for this! To know Christ is to have peace with God. To follow Christ is to be a true Christian. To be with Christ will be heaven itself. We can never hear too much about the Lord Jesus Christ.’

Ryle’s Expository Thoughts can be used as a help in family worship, or as an aid in pastoral visitation, or simply as a companion to the Gospels in the private reading of Scripture.

Now reprinted in a fresh, new format, Expository Thoughts on the Gospel of Matthew will bring Ryle’s plain yet profound insights to a new generation.

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First published in 1857, Mark was the second book to appear in J. C. Ryle’s series of Expository Thoughts on the Gospels.

The earliest of the Gospel narratives to be written, Mark, says Ryle, ‘is singularly full of precious facts about the Lord Jesus, narrated in a simple, terse, pithy, and condensed style’. Those last four adjectives could well be used to describe Ryle’s own comments on the Gospel!

In one of the occasional explanatory notes, he quotes the following remarks of Rudolf Stier:

St Mark has the special gift of terse brevity, and of graphic painting in wonderful combination. While on every occasion he compresses the discourses, works, and history into the simplest possible kernel, he on the other hand, unfolds the scenes more clearly than St Matthew does, who excels in the discourses. Not only do single incidents become in his hands complete pictures, but even when he is very brief, he often gives, with one pencil stroke, something new and peculiarly his own.

These Expository Thoughts on Mark do full justice to such an inspired text, and are full of encouragement, wisdom and straightforward practical application. May they continue to fulfil Ryle’s desire to lead the reader ‘to Christ and faith in him, to repentance and holiness, to the Bible and to prayer’.

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Within a year of publishing Mark in his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels series, J. C. Ryle had, in 1858, completed the Gospel of Luke.

This was a much more ‘substantial’ commentary than the earlier ones on Matthew and Mark, and comprehensive ‘explanatory notes’ were appended to the author’s ‘thoughts’ on each passage of Scripture. The purpose of the notes was four-fold-(i) to ‘throw light on difficulties’ in the text; (ii) to provide literal meanings and comparative translations of certain of the Greek words used by Luke; (iii) to quote what other ‘approved writers’ had said on particular passages; and (iv) to use Scripture to ‘combat existing false doctrines and heresies’. Because of this, the Expository Thoughts on the Luke were – and are in this new edition – presented in two volumes, the first covering Luke chapters 1-10, the second chapters 11-24.

Written specifically for a non-Jewish readership, Luke’s Gospel is perhaps the most ‘accessible’ of the narratives of the life of Christ for modern readers. Ryle’s desire for his readers mirrors that of Luke 1:4, that they might gain ‘a more clear knowledge of Christ, as a living person, a living priest, a living physician, a living friend, a living advocate at the right hand of God, and a living Saviour soon about to come again’.

Table of Contents Expand ↓

The post Expository Thoughts on the Gospels appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

Within a year of publishing Mark in his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels series, J. C. Ryle had, in 1858, completed the Gospel of Luke.

This was a much more ‘substantial’ commentary than the earlier ones on Matthew and Mark, and comprehensive ‘explanatory notes’ were appended to the author’s ‘thoughts’ on each passage of Scripture. The purpose of the notes was four-fold-(i) to ‘throw light on difficulties’ in the text; (ii) to provide literal meanings and comparative translations of certain of the Greek words used by Luke; (iii) to quote what other ‘approved writers’ had said on particular passages; and (iv) to use Scripture to ‘combat existing false doctrines and heresies’. Because of this, the Expository Thoughts on the Luke were – and are in this new edition – presented in two volumes, the first covering Luke chapters 1-10, the second chapters 11-24.

Written specifically for a non-Jewish readership, Luke’s Gospel is perhaps the most ‘accessible’ of the narratives of the life of Christ for modern readers. Ryle’s desire for his readers mirrors that of Luke 1:4, that they might gain ‘a more clear knowledge of Christ, as a living person, a living priest, a living physician, a living friend, a living advocate at the right hand of God, and a living Saviour soon about to come again’.

Table of Contents Expand ↓

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‘The Gospel of St. John, rightly interpreted, is the best and simplest answer to those who profess to admire a vague and indistinct Christianity.’ There were many such in J. C. Ryle’s day, as in our own, and these final three volumes of his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels series provide a detailed commentary upon, and ‘right interpretation’ of the fourth Gospel.

Originally published between published between 1869 and 1873, these volumes differ from those previously published in the series, in that they contain ‘full explanatory notes on every verse of the portions expounded, forming, in fact, a complete Commentary’. The long gap between the publication of Luke (1858) and the appearance of the first volume of John (1869) is explained by the loss of Ryle’s second wife, Jessie, in 1860), his being responsible for the care of his five children (the eldest being just thirteen years of age at the time), and his move to Helmingham to the much larger parish of Stradbroke in 1861, with the greater burden of work that entailed.

In these volumes Ryle shows again that, as in all his writing and preaching, he was first and foremost a pastor, and as J. I. Packer has pointed out, ‘alongside the question “Is it true?” the question “What effect will this have on ordinary people?” was always in his mind’.

Table of Contents Expand ↓

The post Expository Thoughts on the Gospels appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

‘The Gospel of St. John, rightly interpreted, is the best and simplest answer to those who profess to admire a vague and indistinct Christianity.’ There were many such in J. C. Ryle’s day, as in our own, and these final three volumes of his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels series provide a detailed commentary upon, and ‘right interpretation’ of the fourth Gospel.

Originally published between published between 1869 and 1873, these volumes differ from those previously published in the series, in that they contain ‘full explanatory notes on every verse of the portions expounded, forming, in fact, a complete Commentary’. The long gap between the publication of Luke (1858) and the appearance of the first volume of John (1869) is explained by the loss of Ryle’s second wife, Jessie, in 1860), his being responsible for the care of his five children (the eldest being just thirteen years of age at the time), and his move to Helmingham to the much larger parish of Stradbroke in 1861, with the greater burden of work that entailed.

In these volumes Ryle shows again that, as in all his writing and preaching, he was first and foremost a pastor, and as J. I. Packer has pointed out, ‘alongside the question “Is it true?” the question “What effect will this have on ordinary people?” was always in his mind’.

Table of Contents Expand ↓

The post Expository Thoughts on the Gospels appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.

‘The Gospel of St. John, rightly interpreted, is the best and simplest answer to those who profess to admire a vague and indistinct Christianity.’ There were many such in J. C. Ryle’s day, as in our own, and these final three volumes of his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels series provide a detailed commentary upon, and ‘right interpretation’ of the fourth Gospel.

Originally published between published between 1869 and 1873, these volumes differ from those previously published in the series, in that they contain ‘full explanatory notes on every verse of the portions expounded, forming, in fact, a complete Commentary’. The long gap between the publication of Luke (1858) and the appearance of the first volume of John (1869) is explained by the loss of Ryle’s second wife, Jessie, in 1860), his being responsible for the care of his five children (the eldest being just thirteen years of age at the time), and his move to Helmingham to the much larger parish of Stradbroke in 1861, with the greater burden of work that entailed.

In these volumes Ryle shows again that, as in all his writing and preaching, he was first and foremost a pastor, and as J. I. Packer has pointed out, ‘alongside the question “Is it true?” the question “What effect will this have on ordinary people?” was always in his mind’.

Table of Contents Expand ↓

The post Expository Thoughts on the Gospels appeared first on Banner of Truth UK.