Book Excerpts

EDITORIAL NOTE. THE ejection of two thousand ministers by the Act of Uniformity in 1662 could not fail to make a great impression on the minds of the people of England, and especially of the ministers who were ejected, and of the people who had enjoyed their ministry. The last utterances of these ministers in […]

The following excerpt, which witnesses to the pastoral ministry of David Dickson (1583–1663), is taken from Samuel Rutherford and His Friends, by Faith Cook. ‘FROM Irvine, being on my journey to Christ’s Palace in Aberdeen, August 4th 1636.’ So runs the inscription on a letter written by Samuel Rutherford to Robert Cunningham, another servant of […]

The following testimony to the faith and trials of evangelist Kim Yoonsup is excerpted from The Korean Pentecost and the Sufferings Which Followed. Evangelist Kim Yoonsup was born in the village of In-doo in Syenchun County of North Pyengan Province. He was brought up in a non-Christian home and was known as one of the […]

The following excerpt is the ‘Epistle to the Reader’ and Chapter 1 of John Flavel’s Preparations for Sufferings, or, The Best Work in the Worst Times. The Epistle to the Reader It was the observation of the learned Gerson (when the world was not so old by many years as now it is) that mundus […]

The following is excerpted from Jock Purves’s Fair Sunshine: Character Studies of the Scottish Covenanters.   Richard Cameron (1648? – 1680) Cameron of the Covenant stood And prayed the battle prayer; Then with his brother side by side Took up the Cross of Christ and died Upon the Moss of Ayr. Henry Inglis, Hackston of […]

The following passage is excerpted from Richard Alderson’s No Holiness, No Heaven: Antinomianism Today (BoT., 1986, rep. 2001). In it, Alderson speaks to the issue of antinomianism and its proponents. They have their (false) prophets of love whose favourite texts are I John 4:8 (‘God is love’) and Romans 13:8 (‘Love one another; for he […]

There is much confusion today about the relationship between the law of God and the gospel of God. Are Christians still ‘under’ the law? If we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, do we still need to keep the commandments of God? Questions like these are important to answer biblically. In the except […]

The following is excerpted from The Incomparableness of God by George Swinnock, which the Banner publishes as a Puritan Paperback, and which appears in Volume 4 of Swinnock’s Works. The incomparableness of God in his being. It is from itself, for itself, and wholly independent. The incomparableness of the divine being will appear in several […]

The child on the moss she laid And she stretched the cold limbs of the dead, And drew the eyelid’s shade, And bound the corpse’s shattered head, And shrouded the martyr in his plaid; And where the dead and living slept, Sat in the wilderness and wept. Henry Inglis, The Death of John Brown The […]