So far in this series we have set out our stall and considered love as the first mark of the effective personal evangelist. The second mark of the effective personal evangelist is tenacity . This is the spirit of a dog with its bone, fiercely attached to it to the extent that you could probably...

Whether we are prepared to admit it or not, most of us have 'celebrity pastors,' or at least men to whom we offer a measure of unqualified and uncritical appreciation or even adulation. We go beyond that properly Berean spirit that receives the word with all readiness and searches the Scriptures to...

Robert Candlish on the prospects for the resurrection body: And when all is spiritual, and all immortal, what an opening is there for the spiritual and immortal soul, possessed of a kindred body, and ushered into a congenial world, -- first , to express itself in communion with all holy...

In recent weeks there has been a spate of arrests of Christian brothers in the UK involved in street preaching and other open-air witness. As someone who preaches in this way fairly regularly, this is obviously a matter of interest and concern, and that on a number of fronts. For the record, I do...

Another snippet from Fuller, this time from an ordination sermon from Matthew 25.21, concerning the work and encouragements of the Christian minister. As he does often in such writings, Fuller fixes his eye on the last day and the great prize: Place yourself in idea, my brother, before your Lord...

Andrew Fuller wrote a series of "Letters to a Young Minister" in which he discoursed on the various aspects of pastoral labour, focusing on the preaching of sermons (which he distinguished in some ways from what he called "expositions"). Speaking of all preparation for the labours of the Lord's day...

Do you laugh or cry? For the sake of the gospel I desperately want this to be a spoof, but I fear it is for real.

Charles Spurgeon was not the only man of God to be labouring during the heyday of the gospel's progress in Victorian London. On the other side of the river lived and worked that most excellent servant of Christ, Archibald Geikie Brown. He is the subject of Iain H. Murray's fairly recent biography,...

Iain D. Campbell and William M. Schweitzer, eds., Engaging with Keller: Thinking Through the Theology of an Influential Evangelical (Darlington: Evangelical Press, 2013), 240pp. paperback, £9.99/ $15.99 This fascinating volume is something of an in-house discussion into which, because of the nature...

Reformation21 blogger Iain D. Campbell is one of the editors of and contributors to an imminent volume from Evangelical Press entitled Engaging with Keller: Thinking Through the Theology of an Influential Evangelical (the other editor is William M. Schweitzer). Ian Hamilton provides a sincere...

For a nice blend of topics, sit back first for a leisurely Trueman on the sufficiency of Scripture , and then enjoy a bracing Mohler on the age of the universe . The former provides a good basis for the latter.

You may be interested to know that a new site explaining and promoting Reformed/Particular/Covenantal/Confessional/Calvinistic Baptist covenant theology (choose whichever label least offends you) is alive and kicking. Catchily entitled 1689 Federalism , the key piece at present is a helpful video...

The Westminster Conference gathers annually in London in December to benefit from two days of thoughtful and stimulating study of church history, seeking to make plain the applications from the past to present challenges and opportunities. The conference this coming winter takes place on Tuesday...

A few days ago I was contacted by an American brother who had recently received an email inviting him to preach at a conference in London. The email, as many do, lacked a little coherence, but was addressed directly to him and essentially invited him, at fairly short notice, to preach at a...

It is with great sadness that I report the homegoing of Graham Harrison. Mr Harrison was a stalwart of the Reformed and Evangelical scene in the UK, and a fixture at gatherings in Wales and the UK more widely where doctrinal and experimental Calvinism was declared and cultivated. With a fierce pair...

There are a few things that frustrate me about a number of the books that I have read recently. One is those extravagant examples seemingly designed to showcase the brilliance of some penetrating thinker: Barry (not his real name) is a basketweaver from Clapham. Having been reared by donkeys, when...

It seems that apologies for absence are de rigeur on Reformation21 at the moment. I am not sure whether I should follow suit, because nasturtiums have been cast against me. First of all, I was not in the seventeenth century developing a patent Puritan throat tonic, but rather swanning about in the...

The Word of God must be preached plainly and simply, not in allusions and doubtful terms, not in innuendoes and learned phrases; not in words which man's wisdom teacheth, but in words which the Holy Ghost teacheth; not with the refinements of the schools, but so that the women, and children, and...

C.M. (Godre'r Coed) How can this guilty sinner flee The judgement that is mine? How can a wretched man escape The punishment divine? Tell me where wrath and mercy meet; Show me God reconciled. Where can a rebel find true peace, Rest for a heart so wild? Come, take the path to Calvary, Climb up her...

Preachers are meant to be conduits for the pure word of God. Sometimes the pipe gets dirty and what comes out is impure. Sometimes the pipe gets clogged and the truth gets impeded. Some preachers have poorer settings: trickle, fine spray, jet. I suppose gush can be healthy, if sometimes a little...

Having trawled through the following . . . Introduction . Principles 1 and 2 . Principle 3 . Principles 4, 5 and 6 . Principles 7 and 8 . . . . we come to the end: 9. Train and restrain your appetites. He who earnestly seeks good finds favour, but trouble will come to him who seeks evil. (Prv 11.27...

What's a Time Lord to do? He dabbles a little in the 17th century and the shadowy fiend known mainly as the Pope of Ealing throws twitterbombs in his direction. He dips an intergalactic toe in the murky waters of the 21st century, and Davros himself pitches up and gets narky. But not to worry,...

So far, the introduction and the first two principles . Today, the most developed of the principles, concerning the power of words. While the applications are specific to social media, I hope that the principles are transferable to any communication. 3. Remember the power of words. The mouth of the...

Social media is perhaps the most common or popular expression of what is sometimes called Web 2.0. Web 1.0, for those who may be wondering, consisted mainly of static pages containing fixed data. Web 2.0 is the more dynamic, interactive expression of the interweb which we all now enjoy, or at least...