“This does not mean that Calvin was unaware of rhetoric. He was a master of it! He knew Aristotle, Cicero, and Quintilian well. He had carefully schooled himself in John Chrysostom and Augustine, both accomplished in the art of rhetoric. As is often said of very great artists, he had mastered his art so completely …
An Essential Part of the Offering
“The exposition of Scripture in course became one of the biggest planks in their platform of Christian revival. To them it was an essential component of a Christian worship that was according to Scripture and after the example of the ancient church. To these Reformers the sermon was an act of worship. It was the …
Your Wretched Regulations
“To the pure mind, none of the powers of manhood are common or unclean. Humour can be consecrated, and should be . . . some preachers are so unnatural themselves, that the human nature of their hearers refuses to subject itself to their operations. O ye who are evermore decorously dull, before ye judge a …
I Know God Is For Me
INTRODUCTION:The troubles that David went through on the way to his promised throne were many. But this meant that before he assumed the rule of God’s people, he had seen that many answers to prayer, that many deliverances. David was not dropped on his throne from Heaven, rather he was delivered out of tribulation, as …
And Are Reckoned Crazy in the Meantime
“Men who are in advance of their age are abused for principles which in due time become accepted” (Spurgeon, Eccentric Preachers, 117).
Scattering Metaphors With Two Hands
“It is this jaundiced eye of cold matter-of-fact which is unable to perceive the beauty of sparkling metaphors and images, and therefore sees instead mere eccentricity . . . Doubtless there are many others who are condemned for their eccentricity by the simpletons around them, because they have wealthy creative minds, and scatter pearls with …
All the Regular Fudge
“It is easy enough among Dissenters to find regulations as rigid as could be invented by any bench of bishops; you may not vary the length of the hymn or the order of the service by a hair’s breadth, or you will sin against your own reputation and the feelings of the conservative portion of …
A True Oddball
“But of this I feel quite sure, that if any man will make up his mind that he will only say what he believes to be strictly true, he will be thought odd and eccentric before the sun goes down” (Spurgeon, Eccentric Preachers, p. 79).
When the Whole Man Fights
“The man who serves his God with his whole heart is apt to forget his surroundings, and to fling himself so completely into his work that the whole of his nature comes into action, and even his humour, if he be possessed of that faculty, rushes into the battle” (Spurgeon, Eccentric Preachers, pp. 75-76).
Ensconced in the Establishment
Assuming an anabaptist start, the project started to go off the rails early. Not only did Gentiles start to come into the kingdom in the first few decades of gospel preaching, but so also did some of their rulers (Acts 13:12). And there is no sign or hint of Sergius Paulus having to step away …