I guess it is a lot like our own day. Go into a Christian bookstore today and the resources found there can be excellent, very good, very bad, extremely bad or sometimes even downright heretical. Voddie Baucham was right when he commented, “There ought to be a sign posted in every Christian bookstore that reads, ‘The views expressed in these books do not necessarily express the views of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.’”

Yet, we sift and sort through the material on the Christian bookstore shelves and often find something immensely helpful to us, as well as materials we would wish to put into the hands of others.

While no author today is writing Scripture, when we find an author who can be trusted we tend to return to them again and again because they are faithful guides in helping us to understand God’s word. Each of these are gifts of the Ascended Lord Jesus to His body (Eph. 4:7-16). Of course, everything they say or write should ALWAYS be tested by the God-breathed Scripture. Scripture alone is the word of God. Indeed, the best teachers remind us of that. They will say, “where what I say or write disagrees with Scripture, go with the Scripture. That is the infallible guide. I am not.” We know this. We understand this.

And… I write all this to ask you this question, “have you heard of the Puritans?”

I am sure you have. The Puritans were professing Christians who lived after the Protestant Reformation was well under way. Much could be said about their times. It is fair to say that America was founded by the Puritans. While the Puritans were a mixed bag, we owe them a huge debt of gratitude, especially for their stand for the Lord Jesus and His gospel truth.

Like the writings of today, none of these men and women were infallible. The Puritans had their blind spots, and some of them are fairly easy to detect. We have our blind spots too, and these are often harder to see…. but the good thing is this: the blind spots the Puritans had were different blind spots to ours. Understanding this allows us to draw from their writings and when we do, we find that some very gifted brothers and sisters in Christ have left a massive legacy for us.

Here are three helpful quotes in this regard:

“It seems odd, that certain men who talk so much of what the Holy Spirit reveals to themselves, should think so little of what he has revealed to others.” – C. H. Spurgeon, Commenting and Commentaries (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1876), 1.

“The best way to guard a true interpretation of Scripture, the Reformers insisted, was neither to naively embrace the infallibility of tradition, or the infallibility of the individual, but to recognize the communal interpretation of Scripture. The best way to ensure faithfulness to the text is to read it together, not only with the churches of our own time and place, but with the wider ‘communion of saints’ down through the age.” – Michael Horton, “What Still Keeps Us Apart?

“Tradition is the fruit of the Spirit’s teaching activity from the ages as God’s people have sought understanding of Scripture. It is not infallible, but neither is it negligible, and we impoverish ourselves if we disregard it.” – J.I. Packer, “Upholding the Unity of Scripture Today,” JETS 25 (1982): 414

I agree – and I write all this because I would like to introduce you to a Puritan – a man named Thomas Watson.

Was he infallible? No. Certainly not.

Could he be helpful to us? Yes, for sure. He got a lot of things right and had great insight on many matters. And here is where this becomes helpful to us. When we see what he saw, it allows us to stand on his shoulders, so to speak, so that we can see further than we would have without him… did you catch that? …“further than we would have without him.”

What do we wish to see?

Oh that is easy. We wish to see the glory of our great God; the wonders of the Lord Jesus Christ and the splendor of the gospel.

Oh Lord, by the power and work of God, the Holy Spirit, help us see – truly see!

Let me give you a taste of what I mean by means of the following, an excerpt from Thomas Watson’s book on the Ten Commandments (available for free in ebook, mobi and pdf formats here)

It is an article entitled “7 Visible Signs of our Love for God.” Perhaps you can print this out and either today or over the next few days, read through it. I think you will find it a rich resource in helping you draw near to the Lord this week. Each point made in the article is a meditation on His word. I would say – a deep meditation – on His word.

One warning: There is old English to work through and there may even by times when we need to check with a dictionary in order to understand certain words being used that are very unfamiliar to us… but that’s ok. I believe doing this is worth any effort involved.

My hope is that it will be a blessing to each of you and that you will draw nearer to the Lord through the words that follow. That is my prayer for each of us.

Enjoy!

7 Visible Signs of our Love to God by Thomas Watson

(original source here)

Before all else let us remember, our love to God is a sign of his love to us. ‘We love him because he first loved us.’ I John 4: 19. Continue reading →

wrote:

The Puritans [were] burning and shining lights. When cast out by the black Bartholomew Act, and driven from their respective charges to preach in barns and fields, in the highways and hedges, they in a special manner wrote and preached as men having authority. Though dead, by their writings they yet speak: a peculiar unction attends them to this very hour (Works, 4:306-307).

Whitefield went on to predict that Puritan writings would continue to be resurrected until the end of time due to their scriptural spirituality. Today, we are living in such a time. Interest in Puritan books has seldom been more intense. In the last fifty years, 150 Puritan authors and nearly 700 Puritan titles have been brought back into print.

Puritan literature has so multiplied that few book lovers can afford to purchase all that is being published. What books should you buy? Where can you find a brief summary of each Puritan work and a brief biography of each author so that you can have a glimpse of who is behind all these books?

These kinds of questions motivated Randall Pederson and me to write Meet the Puritans: With a Guide to Modern Reprints. In this book, we tell the life stories of the 150 Puritan writers who have been reprinted in the past fifty years. We have also included concise reviews of the 700 newly published Puritan titles plus bibliographical information on each book. And we have noted the books that we consider most critical to have in a personal library.

We had four goals for writing this book: first, that these godly Puritan writers will serve as mentors for our own lives. That is why we have told the stories of the Puritans on a layperson’s level and kept them short. You could read one life story each day during your devotional time. Second, we trust that when you read these reviews of Puritan writings, you will be motivated to read a number of these books, each of which should help you grow deeper in your walk with the Lord. Third, we hope this book will serve as a guide for you to purchase books for your families and friends, to help them grow in faith. Finally, for those of you who are already readers of Puritan literature, this guide is designed to direct you to further study and to introduce you to lesser-known Puritans that you may be unaware of.

Definition of Puritanism
Just who were the Puritan writers? They were not only the two thousand ministers who were ejected from the Church of England by the Act of Uniformity in 1662, but also those ministers in England and North America, from the sixteenth century through the early eighteenth century, who worked to reform and purify the church and to lead people toward godly living consistent with the Reformed doctrines of grace.

Puritanism grew out of three needs: (1) the need for biblical preaching and the teaching of sound Reformed doctrine; (2) the need for biblical, personal piety that stressed the work of the Holy Spirit in the faith and life of the believer; and (3) the need to restore biblical simplicity in liturgy, vestments, and church government, so that a well-ordered church life would promote the worship of the triune God as prescribed in His Word (The Genius of Puritanism, 11ff.). Continue reading →

David Mathis of Desiring God Ministries interviews Joel Beeke:

Primer on the Puritans – Interview with Joel Beeke from Desiring God on Vimeo.

Joel R. Beeke is President and Professor of Systematic Theology and Homiletics at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary, Grand Rapids, including, “A Puritan Theology: Doctrine for Life.”

There are a number of reasons why the time of the Puritans is often referred to as “the Golden Age of Preaching.” Dr. Beeke explains why:

Part 1:

Part 2