The Pastor of Kilsyth, The Life and Times of W H Burns, by Islay Burns, published by the Banner of Truth Trust, hardback, 312 pages, £12.50, obtainable from the Free Presbyterian Bookroom.
Rev William Hamilton Burns (1779-1859) was a minister throughout one of the most important and stirring periods in the history of Christianity in Scotland. As a student, he was present at the General Assembly of 1796, when the proposal to send missionaries to the heathen was quashed by the
8Free Presbyterian Magazine, vol 34, pp 155,277-278,357.
9For biographical information on John A Mackay and his early life as a Free Presbyterian in the Inverness congregation see John Mackay Metzger, The Hand of the Road: The Life and Times of John A. Mackay, Louisville, 2010, pp 1-44. At Princeton, Mackay became a leading figure in the World Council of Churches. For the historical background behind John Murray ceasing to be a Free Presbyterian ministerial student see Iain H Murray, The Life of John Murray, Banner of Truth Trust, 2007, pp 39-57.
Moderate majority. This was when John Erskine made his memorable stand to plead for the gospel to be sent overseas. Burns lived to become one of the Disruption fathers and was a commissioner at the famous Assembly of 1843, when the Free Church was formed to defend the spiritual independence of the Church from the intrusion of the state.
He witnessed revival in his congregation in Kilsyth, Stirlingshire, in 1839 and this book, naturally, describes the events of that time in some detail. There is an interesting and profitable discussion of duties and dangers during a time of revival. When we hear of days when many were turned to the Lord from the ways of sin, it should make us long for an outpouring of the Spirit in our own time. The sermons contained in the appendix alone make the book worth buying and include one preached during the revival by Burns’ son, William Chalmers Burns, the well-known missionary to China. The doctrine in these discourses is sound, the exposition is clear and full, and the application is close and searching.
The biography was written by another of Burns’ sons, Islay Burns, who was successor to R M M’Cheyne in Dundee and later became a Professor in the Free Church College in Glasgow. One of the themes emphasised in these pages is the fact that much of the ordinary work of a gospel minister labouring in a congregation is largely unseen and often leaves biographers with little in the way of striking material to include in their accounts. It is good then to be reminded of the importance and dignity of the work of the ministry when prosecuted by men who did not hold a prominent place in the public eye.
We cannot quite agree, however, with the opinion expressed on the front cover that this is “one of the best Scottish ministerial biographies”. It certainly provides a good deal of edifying material which demonstrates the solid piety and learning which characterised men like Burns and many other Evangelical ministers in Scotland in the first half of the nineteenth century. The book does not, however, rivet the attention of the reader in the way, for example, of Bonar’s Memoir and Remains of R M M’Cheyne, nor does it contain as much personal and experimental insight, for example, as David Brown’s Life of Rabbi Duncan or the biographies of Revs Donald Macfarlane, Donald Macdonald or Neil Cameron.
(Rev) A W MacColl
O for such a look of Christ as will scatter sin! O for such a discovery of His glory as will draw forth love to Him! O for such a sight of Him as will never let the eye off from Him again – such a sight as would make us follow Him through good report and through bad report, through life and through death – such a sight of Him as would lead us to seek to be with Him where He is, that we may behold His glory!
Cherish trust in the Lord and diffidence in yourself.
John Duncan
Protestant ViewMary Stuart’s Prayer Book
A prayer book belonging to Mary Queen of Scots has recently sold at auction in London for a figure in excess of £300 000. As is well known, Mary Stuart was an ardent Romanist and no friend of the biblical Reformation established in God’s wonderful kindness in Scotland during her lifetime. The use of prayer books has historically been very common among Roman Catholics and others, such as High Anglicans, whose brand of religion tends to over-emphasise the external form rather than the inward, spiritual aspect of devotion to God. Roman Catholic prayer books, such as this one, almost invariably contain idolatrous pictures and superstitious prayers addressed to Mary and the “saints”.
Outside of the Church of England, Calvinists have generally been wary of using manuals of devotion with set prayers – even when the prayers were based on Bible truth – lest such things should pander to the formality and self-righteousness of the human heart. How we need to pray that the Lord would come in the power of the Holy Spirit to this generation, so that a spirit of prayer would become a reality in the souls of many. Then little value would be placed upon mere forms of godliness which deny its power. AWM