John Berridge

He was, by most accounts, rather eccentric. More sophisticated preachers accused him of saying odd things and using unrefined illustrations in his sermons. In his defense, the great preacher Charles Spurgeon said, “What a lump of quaintness he was, but what a...

Alexander Carmichael

It was an obsession that lasted fifty years. Old Gaelic (Celtic) songs and hymns were about to disappear from the living history of the Scottish people. An over-zealous religious establishment sought to suppress these ancient prayers, dismissing them as worthless...

George MacLeod

“Faith without works is dead” (James 2.17). Nothing subtle about it! George MacLeod (1895-1991) served churches in poor sections of Glasgow, Scotland. He was troubled by how little the church addressed the plight of working people. He embarked on an...

Bede the Venerable

We need to talk about boredom in relation to prayer. We lose our appetite for prayer, slack off from reading the Bible, and spiritual lethargy sets in. We become bored with the things of God. This is not a problem unique to our age. A fourth-century monk, Evagrius...

Austin Farrer

I referenced C. S. Lewis so often in my sermons that one friend in my congregation claimed I had a man crush on Lewis. Austin Farrer was a name that I had not associated with Lewis until recently. Farrer was a chaplain at several colleges in England and a first-rate...