The Days of the Fathers in Ross-shire by Dr John Kennedy. Christian Focus Publications. Price £3.75.
This is a reprint of the fourth edition of Dr Kennedy’s book. It contains a brief biographical introduction on Dr Kennedy by Rev. Neil Ross, Ullapool. “The Days of the Fathers in Ross-shire” has been out of print for some time and therefore a reprint is very welcome. The book gives us some indication of the state of religion in Ross-shire and elsewhere in the Highlands in former times. It records interesting accounts of the noted ministers and men of Ross-shire at a time when Easter Ross particularly was like a well-watered garden. It pleased the Lord to raise up eminently godly ministers and men in Ross-shire who were shining lights in their day and generation. Sadly, these times have largely passed away and parts once highly favoured are like a desolate wilderness. What a galaxy of stars were ministers such as Thos. Hogg, John McKilligan, James Fraser, Alness, John Porteous, Hector MacPhail, Charles Calder, Lachlan MacKenzie, Mr Macadam, Cromarty, and Dr Angus MacIntosh, Tain. To these could well be added the names of the noted men of those times. A chapter on the religion of Ross-shire defends that religion from the many aspersions cast on it. In the chapter Dr Kennedy deals with such matters as the introspection of the Highlander, the development of the fellowship meeting, the paucity of communicants, etc., and indicates the view held by the Ross-shire Fathers on the difference between admission to the sacrament of Baptism and to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.
The second half of the book is on the Minister of Killearnan, Rev John Kennedy of Redcastle, Dr Kennedy’s own father and a noted servant of Christ. He traces his father’s life from his birthplace in Kishorn on to his student days in Aberdeen, then to Lochbroom in Wester Ross, Eriboll in the North of Sutherland, Assynt in the West of Sutherland and finally to Killearnan in Easter Ross. In all these places his labours were owned of the Lord in the conversion of sinners. Anecdotes are told of the noted Christians in these different parts, including the ‘woman of great faith’ from Kinlochbervie. At Killearnan great crowds would gather for the Communion which was held in the open. As many as 10,000 people met on a communion Sabbath, with nearly 2,000 communicants being present. On ordinary Sabbaths a few hearers walked twenty miles to Killearnan, and one woman, Jane Bain came all the way from Sutherland, a distance of thirty miles. What a thirst there was for the water of life in those days. Many of the utterances of John Kennedy concerning future events bordered on the prophetic. Dr Kennedy explains these in the words of Scripture: “The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him.”
We are glad to commend this book to our readers.
D.B.M.
The Beauties of Boston, edited by Samuel McMillan. Christian Focus Publications. Price £5.95.
This reprint of “The Beauties of Boston” has a brief foreword on Thos. Boston by the late Rev. Ian R. Tallach. The book consists of selections from the writings of the noted Thomas Boston of Ettrick. The selections were made by Rev. Samuel McMillan who also was responsible for the well-known volumes, “The Beauties of Ralph Erskine.” Mr McMillan was well qualified for making the selection from Thos. Boston’s writings as he was responsible for editing the 1848 edition of the Whole Works of Thos. Boston. In that edition Boston’s Works extend to eleven volumes, giving a total of 6,700 pages, including his noted works on the Four Fold State, the Art of Man Fishing and the Crook in the Lot.
In the Beauties of Boston, McMillan has succeeded in reducing the matter to about one tenth of the whole, the present edition containing 616 pages. These selections contain extracts from Boston on subjects such as Scripture, Prayer, Priesthood of Christ, Faith in Christ, Election, the Fall of Man, and the Covenants of Works and Grace, all of which Boston was well qualified to handle most Scripturally.
The ‘Beauties of Boston’ is to be welcomed as it will give an opportunity to many to become more acquainted with the writings of this eminent Scottish divine than might otherwise be the case. The massiveness of his complete works might be a discouragement to many, but this volume will remove that difficulty. We are glad to commend these writings, though they need no commendation from us.
D.B.M.
From Grace to Glory by Rev. Murdoch Campbell. Banner of Truth Trust. Price £1.50
This paperback is a reprint of Rev. Murdoch Campbell’s Meditations on the Book of Psalms. These consist of brief meditations extending to about a page or two on each Psalm. They are rich and have an unction about them, indicating that the writer was deeply exercised in soul and had a relish for the Word of God as contained in the Book of Psalms. The Author’s breathing after heaven — where he is now — is ‘apparent throughout the book. The personal and other anecdotes in the book also add to its attractiveness. Its devotional content and short meditations would make it eminently suitable for daily reading. We are glad once again to commend it to our readers.
D.B.M.
The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment by Jeremiah Burroughs. Banner of Truth Trust. Price £1.50.
This is the reprint of a paperback issued earlier by the Banner of Truth Trust. It is by one of the Puritans on a subject which should be of the deepest interest to Christians. The grace of Christian Contentment is, as the Author indicates, a rare jewel, but it ought not to be so rare as it has become in our day.
Burroughs describes Christian contentment as “that sweet, inward, quiet, gracious frame of spirit, which freely submits to and delights in God’s wise and fatherly disposal in every condition”. He divides the treatise into four sections:
- The nature of Christian contentment
- The art and mystery of it.
- Lessons needed to bring the heart to contentment
- The glorious excellence of this grace
Under the first of these he shows that Christian contentment is not opposed to a due sense of affliction, nor to making our moan and complaint to God, and to our friends, nor to seeking for help in different circumstances, nor to endeavouring to be delivered out of present afflictions by the use of lawful means, but is opposed to murmuring and repining at the hand of God, to vexing and fretting, to sinking discouragements, to sinful shiftings to get relief and to rebellious risings of heart against God. Under the second matter — the mystery of Christian contentment — Burroughs explains that the contented Christian is not only the most contented man in the world, but also the most unsatisfied, Godliness, he says, teaches us this mystery; that is, not to be satisfied with all the world as our portion and yet to be content with the meanest condition in which we are, He explains it further by showing that a gracious soul can be satisfied with nothing less than the Lord as his portion. He shows also that the gracious heart gets its supply of all things from the Covenant, and so comes to have contentment.
Under the third matter, Burroughs explains what lessons are to be learned in order to attain to contentment. Some of these are as follows: That I am nothing and deserve nothing; that I can do nothing; that I am worse than nothing; also the vanity of the creature; and that one thing is necessary. The final section of the book shows that the excellence of contentment consists in this — that by it worship due to God is given to Him, grace is much exercised, the soul fitted to receive mercy and do service, is delivered out of many temptations and is comforted. Burroughs, to bring out more clearly the excellence of contentment goes in quite fully to the evils of a murmuring spirit and concludes the whole treatise with advice on how to attain to contentment.
All in all the book is a rich jewel leading to the attainment of a rare jewel. May many peruse this book in a prayerful spirit and attain to the virtue of which it speaks — that is, in the words of Apostle Paul: “I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.”
D.B.M.
A Lifting up for the Downcast by William Bridge. Banner of Truth Trust. Price £1.50.
This Puritan paperback contains thirteen sermons on Psalm 42:1. He speaks first of the inward peace ordinarily enjoyed by the people of God, then that this peace may be interrupted and God’s people cast down, and, last of all, that the people of God have no reason for their discouragements whatever their condition may be. He shows that true saving peace loves to be examined, is willing to examined, loves to be tried but that false peace cannot endure examination, flies from the light and does not love to be tried. He indicates what a mighty deep of discouragements the people of God may fall into and yet be godly and gracious. In general he says, God permits this for their own good, yet he shows also that there is much evil also in these discouragements. The rest of the book, that is, the main part of it is taken up with proposing encouragements for the lifting up of the downcast discouraged (1) by their greater and grosser sins, (2) from weakness of grace, (3) from failing in duty, (4) from lack of evidence for heaven, and non-assurance of the love of God, (5) from temptations, (6) from desertions, (7) from afflictions, (8) from unserviceableness, and (9) from their condition itself.
As this is a day when the people of God have much to contend with to make them discouraged, here is a book fitted to lift them out of a downcast state and encourage them to hope in the Lord.
D.B.M.
Isaac Watts Remembered by Rev. David Fountain. Gospel Standard Baptist Trust Ltd. £1.50.
This book was written as part of the celebrations of the 300th anniversary of the birth of Isaac Watts at Southampton in 1674. The author is minister of Spring Road Evangelical Church, Sholing, Southampton. In the book we are taken back to the aftermath of the Act of Uniformity of 1662 which ejected 2,000 ministers of the Church of England, and are given a vivid picture of life among the Dissenters in Southampton, London and other places.
Isaac Watts, born when his father was in prison for his religion, was a puny, delicate child, and remained a weakling all his days. Nevertheless, he lived to the age of 72. Intellectually bright, he was given a good education and sound Christian upbringing. From the book we learn a great deal about family and church life among the Independents of the period, and it makes very interesting reading.
At the age of 24, Watts became assistant to Dr Chauncey at Mark Lane in London, and two years later became minister of the congregation. His long ministry was very intermittent on account of frequent and sometimes long-continued illness. He gained note also as a poet, author and educator.
As Isaac Watts is best known as a hymn-writer, Mr Fountain does not fail to inform us how it came about that, at a time when Psalm-singing was the established form of praise, this dissenting minister should write and introduce hymns into the worship. His aesthetic taste seems to have been early offended by the Sternhold & Hopkins version of Metrical Psalms dating from 1562. These have been described as “very faithful, but somewhat coarse and homely in phraseology.” To Watts their faithfulness did not at all compensate for their coarseness, because he did not believe that the Psalms were the sole God-given medium of the universal Church’s praise in public worship. Watts took seriously the suggestion that he himself should try to improve this part of the worship, and he began, significantly, not to produce a better version of the Psalms in metre, but to write hymns. Later he began a process of offering and commending these hymns to the churches.
When he turned his attention to “paraphrasing” the Psalms, he went far beyond that. A paraphrase is a rendering of the sense of a passage in other words, but Watts (to quote the author) believed that the meaning “should be developed in the light of the fuller New Testament revelation.” The result was that his version was really his own loose and free interpretation of the Psalms, containing such alterations, additions and omissions as would make them better described as “The Psalms of David as amended by Isaac Watts.”
Mr Fountain uses Ps. 117 as one of his examples because of its brevity, but a comparison of Watts’ two stanzas with the two verses in the Authorised Version shows that in even the shortest of the Psalms, the poet’s treatment leads to the loss of the vital connection between the verses, the introduction of extra matter in the first verse, and the obscuring of the point of the Psalm which is that at a future time the Gentiles would praise the Lord for the very same reason as Israel. Watts’ production does not compare with the Scottish Metrical Psalm for faithfulness to the original, and its poetry is no better either.
Contrary to the views on this subject expressed in this book and elsewhere, we believe that Isaac Watts did a great disservice to the Church of God in this land by introducing hymns into its worship, and regretfully we feel bound to describe his efforts at versifying the inspired Psalms as a presumptuous interference with Holy Scripture.
The book is a well written and well printed paperback with a good number of interesting illustrations.
A. McP.
Hope is never ill when faith is well.
John Bunyan