The Dr Lloyd-Jones Library

In 1914 Scots preacher and scholar George S Duncan wrote that "the minister's library is his chest of tools." "How very essential tools are!" he says "Every worker, mental or manual, must have them".(1)

In the first volume of his biography of Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones (1899-1981), Iain Murray describes how when he began his first pastorate in Sandfields, Aberafan, South Wales, in 1927, the 'middle room' at 57 Victoria Road, in Sandfields, Port Talbot, a room ten feet by twelve at once became the study, where the 300 to 400 books which he had brought with him from London soon lined the walls. In a real sense that room was to become the centre of the work, not only as the place where young converts were to visit him in the years ahead, but more as his place of retreat where prayer, study and preparation for the pulpit occupied the best part of the hours of each day.(2)

Today at The London Seminary in leafy Finchley, North West London, adjacent to the main lecture hall, there is a slightly larger room, about 10 feet by 20 feet, with glass fronted lockable bookcases on three sides, that is known as The Dr Lloyd-Jones Library. The Library has been housed at the seminary, though not in this room, for many years and was moved to this room in 2009. To add to the atmosphere the walls are adorned with framed photographs of Lloyd-Jones and the exterior and interior of Westminster Chapel, London, where he went on to minister from 1939-1968.

Some caveats

It has been said that "you can learn a lot about a man by looking through his library". If that is true then here is an interesting vantage point from which to consider the towering figure of Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones.

Having said that, some prior caveats are necessary. Firstly, this is technically not Lloyd-Jones's library but the Lloyd-Jones family library as handed on to the seminary. So, for example, there is a copy of The Agricultural Community in South-west Wales at the Turn of the Twentieth Century by David Jenkins, a present to his wife in 1971, inscribed "To Bethan with all my love Martyn x". He writes "A reminder of our origins and the places where we both spent so many happy days together". Also, some few of the volumes here, such as The Collected Writings of John Murray and other Banner of Truth publications did not appear until after Lloyd-Jones's death.

Further, we know that he was given a set of the Works of John Owen - not found here - and he surely had a set of Matthew Henry commentaries, again conspicuous by their absence. Although there are some secular volumes here, one assumes there were others now dispersed to the four corners. John Buchan and Walter Scott novels for example, which we know he enjoyed. I did hear someone once suggest that all the Doctor's medical books and journals were here but that is not the case.

Even the books that were his were never, of course, found in this form. The books have been arranged according to the library cataloguing system used at the Seminary. The first 42 items in the collection are Bibles and Testaments and similar material which are no more likely to have sat together like that in Lloyd-Jones's time than the more than 80 hymnals that come a little later in the collection.

It should also be remembered that Lloyd-Jones was a great user of libraries. Iain Murray describes how, in 1932, Lloyd-Jones discovered B B Warfield in the library of Knox Seminary, Toronto and his fascination with the Beinecke Library at Yale on a later trip across the Atlantic.(3) His daughter Elizabeth Catherwood, in a lecture given in 1982, says he had read everything by the historian Owen Chadwick, but only one volume is found here (the one on The Reformation).(4) She also mentions him reading the Roman Catholic theologian Hans Kung but there is again only one volume here (What must remain in the church).

Iain Murray's second volume of biography refers to his enjoyment in retirement of the Sion College Library (now subsumed by the Lambeth Palace Library).(5) He was introduced to that Library by his friend Philip E Hughes. (6) In one of the volumes (the 1975 work Perspectives on Charismatic renewal edited by E D O'Connor) there is a note from Sion College asking for the return of the book Jesus and the Spirit by James Dunn (also published in 1975) dated 21.10.76.

His championing of the Evangelical Library and his instrumentality in bringing it to London is fairly well known. The Library was always very good to the Doctor about borrowing volumes and when his own library was transferred to the Seminary, there was some confusion over whether some volumes had been his or had belonged to the Library.

First impressions

There are nearly 3000 volumes in the Library altogether. One notices immediately the variety of spines – some dust wrapped and quite modern, others leather bound and ancient. The multi-volume sets are noticeable – a five volume Hastings Bible Dictionary; The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia; The Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge; word studies by Kittel, Robertson, Vincent, Vine and Wuest; several commentary sets (Alford, Calvin, Ellicott, Hawker, Kitto, Lange, Poole, Scott, Trapp, etc); Alexander Whyte's Bible Characters in six volumes.

There is also Annals of the American Pulpit in nine volumes; Nelson's Encyclopedia in 25 small volumes; Neale's History of the Puritans; Stoughton on The History of Religion in England and six volumes on the early Methodists.

As for Puritan and other evangelical works, there is a nicely tooled 23 volume edition of Baxter, a ragged three volume edition of Bunyan and a modern six volume edition of Flavel. Also, multi-volume sets of Thomas Brooks, Thomas Charles, Thomas Goodwin, Oliver Heywood, John Angell James, John Newton, B B Warfield, George Whitefield and John Wesley.

At the very end of the collection there are seven or eight shelves of books chiefly of Welsh interest. Many, perhaps half of these, are in the Welsh language, which both Dr and Mrs Lloyd-Jones spoke and read fluently.

Kenneth Kirk on The Vision of God

Lloyd-Jones would keep larger volumes for holiday reading. Here you will find, for example, Kenneth E Kirk's 1928 Bampton Lectures The vision of God. Iain Murray tells us that the Doctor found the book "absolutely seminal". He regarded it as one of the greatest books he had ever read.

Emil Brunner's Divine Imperative

Elizabeth Catherwood describes her father with the family sat on the beach at Borth, near Aberyswtyth, some time in the thirties. As the family went about more traditional beach activities, the Doctor, in grey three piece suit and hat, was leaning against a rock and reading the 1937 volume The Divine Imperative by Emil Brunner. The book is in the Library. I have checked it for grains of sands and found none.

The Works of Edwards

More gratifying, however, is to see among the works two large volumes of Jonathan Edwards. (Another tatty six volume edition is next to it). This must be the set Lloyd-Jones once described finding. The New England preacher was the Doctor's favourite author. He discovered Edwards' name in Protestant Thought Before Kant by A C McGiffert. Lloyd-Jones wrote

After much searching I at length called at John Evans’ bookshop in Cardiff in 1929, having time available as I waited for a train. There, down on my knees in my overcoat in the corner of the shop, I found the two volumes of the 1834 edition of Edwards which I bought for five shillings. I devoured these volumes and literally just read and read them. It is certainly true that they helped me more than anything else. If I had the power I would make these two volumes compulsory reading for all ministers! Edwards seems to satisfy all round; he really was an amazing man.7

Interestingly, the first volume has the pencil mark “2 vols 6/-”. That suggests Lloyd-Jones, a good Cardiganshire man, managed to beat down the price!

Commentaries

Knowing that Lloyd-Jones preached extensively on Romans, one expects to see a good supply of commentaries on that book and one is not disappointed. There are some 40 volumes from Barth's tome that appeared in English in 1933 to G B Wilson's little digest of 1977 via Haldane, Murray, etc, compared with only a quarter that number on Galatians. Similarly, there are about twenty volumes on Ephesians, another subject for an early series of published sermons.

History and biography

It is no surprise to see large sections of church history and biography. Perhaps it is similarly unsurprising to see large sections on the Holy Spirit and revival and on healing and speaking in tongues – areas of interest to him as a medical practitioner and pastor and areas over which controversy raged in the 1960s and 1970s. Volumes here include the one by Henry Frost for which he wrote an appreciation. His name can be found in this copy.8

Better and fasting reading

One book that stands out because of its clear spine is How to read better and faster by Norman Lewis published in 1960. This is the volume that Lloyd-Jones apparently sent for after seeing an advertisement for it. He was frustrated that he was a rather slow reader. There is no evidence that the book helped him to get any faster.

Inscriptions

Most of the books appear to have no identifying marks. In some the Doctor has written his name - perhaps books he lent to others. A few have been given as gifts.

So for example there is a very nicely bound two volume set of Luke Tyerman on Whitefield, a gift from Peter Golding, a member of the Westminster Fellowship.9 The Doctor first read the Tyerman biography in the summer of 1969. David Otis Fuller has inscribed a copy of his 1961 volume Valiant for Truth: a Treasury of Evangelical Writing.(10) (He has written Martin instead of Martyn. This was something Dr Lloyd-Jones had lived with since childhood. A book in the Library is a prize from Tregaron County High School and also spells his name incorrectly.)

From 1952 Lloyd-Jones began to commend the writings of the American A W Tozer and in 1956 they met for the only time, sharing a conference in Toronto. Inside the 1964 biography of A W Tozer by D J Fant it says "To D M Lloyd-Jones with best wishes, Leonard Ravenhill".(11)

A volume called Ysgrifau Beirniadol vol viii (Critical writings 8) edited by J E C Williams has a typewritten inscription in Welsh signed by J Elwyn Davies. It is intended to recall a get together (Encil) in Bryn-y-Groes, Bala and thanks Lloyd-Jones and his wife for their Christian love and kindness.(12)

Cornelius Van Til

Lloyd-Jones was a great admirer of Cornelius Van Til and in 1964 he wrote a review of Van Til's Barth and Christianity for The Westminster Theological Journal.13 His copy of the volume is inscribed "Martyn Lloyd-Jones with warm regard C Van Til". Still between the pages are two pieces of paper with typewritten notes headed Disseminated sclerosis. On the reverse are some scrawled notes in pencil that have been written for the review. In the Library the earlier Van Til volume Has Karl Barth become Orthodox? can also be found.

Marginalia

One would need to go through each individual book page by page to discover what exactly is hidden away here. Certainly some of the books are well marked. The 1975 book by Thomas Smail (1928-2012) Reflected Glory The Spirit in Christ and Christians is full of pencil marks, mostly disagreeing with the author. On page 44 where Smail says "The Holy Spirit is central" Lloyd-Jones adds a firm "No!" in the margin. Again, to Smail's contention that the second blessing obscures the centrality of Christ we have another emphatic "No!"

Similar pencil written "No!"s can be found in the book Fundamentalism by James Barr (1924-2006), published in 1977. He objects to Barr's idea that Scripture was given divine status merely because it was written down and he is very unhappy with the idea that fundamentalists have not studied what non-conservatives say. The library itself would suggest that Barr is wide of the mark with regard to Lloyd-Jones certainly.

Further study

The purpose of this short article is to do two things. Firstly, to alert people to the existence of the Library. Any future work on Lloyd-Jones ought to be aware of this resource for the study of his life and work. Who knows what might be buried in the pages to be found here?

Secondly, here is a reminder to pastors, of the importance of reading. Thomas Murphy writing for pastors in the 19th century says

It will be taken for granted that the pastor will read much, and that most of his reading will of course be on religious subjects. The importance of this should be very deeply impressed upon the mind of every minister. (14)

In our own day, the American Presbyterian pastor Ligon Duncan III has lamented that

Protestant pastors don’t read or study very much these days, and most churches don’t encourage them to do so. There are fewer pastor-readers than ever before (and surfing the web, dabbling in this oddity and that, doesn’t count!).(15)

He quotes Spurgeon on 2 Timothy 4:13 who notes what a rebuke it is to those who do not read.

He is inspired, and yet he wants books! He has been preaching at least for thirty years, and yet he wants books! He had seen the Lord, and yet he wants books! He had had a wider experience than most men, and yet he wants books! He had been caught up into the third heaven, and had heard things which it was unlawful for a man to utter, yet he wants books! He had written the major part of the New Testament, and yet he wants books!(16)

As in so much else, Dr Lloyd-Jones is an example to us. In his Library of a diligent pastor who gave himself to reading.

This article appeared in Reformation Today

1 The Biblical World Vols 43 and 44, Chicago 1914

2 David Martyn Lloyd-Jones: the first forty years, 1899-1939 Iain Murray, Edinburgh 1982, 154

3 Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield 1851–1921 Professor of theology at Princeton Seminary 1887-1921

4 Martyn Lloyd-Jones: the man and his books, F and E Catherwood, London and Bridgend 1982

5 David Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The fight of faith, 1939-1981 Iain Murray, Edinburgh 1990, 710

6 Philip Edgcumbe Hughes 1915-1990 Anglican clergyman and New Testament scholar born in Australia, who spent his formative years in South Africa, was ordained in England and died in the USA

7 David Martyn Lloyd-Jones: the first forty years, 1899-1939 Iain Murray, Edinburgh 1982, 253, 254

8 Miraculous Healing: Why does God heal some and not others? Henry Frost, originally published 1931

9 The Westminster Fellowship is the ministers fraternal begun by Lloyd-Jones in 1942

10 David Otis Fuller 1903-1988 was an American pastor in Atlantic City then Grand Rapids, USA

11 Aiden Wilson Tozer 1897-1963 American pastor, author and magazine editor. Leonard Ravenhill 1907-1994 Evangelist and author who focused on prayer and revival. Why revival tarries is his best known book

12 J Elwyn Davies 1925-2007 was a leading minister in Wales, a founder of the Evangelical Movement of Wales

13 Cornelius Van Til 1895-1997 Dutch Christian philosopher and Reformed theologian credited as the originator of modern presuppositional apologetics.

14 Pastoral Theology: The Pastor in the Various Duties of His Office, Thomas Murphy, Philadelphia 1877, 141

15 See http://t4g.org/2006/02/pastors-studying-and-reading-1/ accessed June 7 2018

16 Spurgeon Sermon #542 "Paul - His Cloak And His Books" in Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit 9 (1863), 668, 669

Voyage of the Dawntreader - Film Review

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader Rated: PG, 115 minutes,

The latest film in the Chronicles of Narnia series Voyage of the Dawn Treader appeared in cinemas in December 2010 and will no doubt soon be available on video. Based on the third published book in the original series of books by C S Lewis from the 1950s, the film is inevitably different to the book in many respects. However, it maintains the spirit of the original and accurately represents its thrust. Many who see the film will not have read the book and may never get round to reading it and so it deserves consideration on its own merits.

As a family film it scores very well in all respects. Inevitably there are moments of what I believe is now known as 'mild peril' but there are no questionable scenes or language, as one would expect with C S Lewis. The whole thing is done very well with the special effects at an optimum level and the acting of a high standard. The presentation as a whole is excellent. We start off in wartime Oxford and spend just long enough there to establish how normal these children are before heading into Narnia by means of an amazing water scene.

Once in Narnia, the story rapidly unfolds, rarely losing pace. The actor playing Eustace (Will Poulter) is brilliant. I would guess Lewis is describing himself as he once was, before his conversion. I was slightly disappointed with the dragon turning into the boy again scene as I seem to remember more about layers coming off (“when he began pulling the skin off it hurt worse than anything … Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off ... and there it was lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly-looking than the others had been. And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been … I’d turned into a boy again.”) However, as a starting point for discussing conversion it is still excellent. Temptation and death are among the other vital subjects opened up in this treatment - the temptations faced by Edmund and Lucy, and the passing over of Reepicheep (a fascinating character - perhaps Lewis's ideal of a true Christian - a mouse of great modesty but very brave!).

Towards the end of the film we get what someone has called the John 3:16 of the books "arguably the most succinct and precise evidence of a possible parallel between Narnia and The Bible". When asked by Edmund whether or not Aslan exists in their world, Aslan replies:

"I am ... but there I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name. This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there."

Hopefully this film will also help some in finding the true Aslan and the true Narnia. It certainly will not hinder them at all.

Machine Gun Preacher - Film Review

Machine Gun Preacher Director: Marc Forster Writer: Jason Keller (screenplay) Stars: Gerard Butler, Michelle Monaghan and Michael Shannon

A Hollywood film is currently on general release by the name of Machine Gun Preacher stars Gerard Butler, has high production values and tells the story of Sam Childers, an American citizen but a man who still spends much of his time in Southern Sudan seeking to help children affected by the terrible atrocities that have taken place in recent years in that part of the world. Childers is both a preacher and a man unafraid to use his machine gun. No doubt he is in fact better with his gun than as a preacher.

Most Christians will not want to see this film as it is not only violent but in two sections there is also vile language, reflecting the period firstly before Childers made his decision for Jesus and another time where he seems to lose all profession of faith in Christ.

This is a general problem with films that depict modern life especially where someone has come to Christ from a godless life. Murder and drug taking are easy enough to simulate but without actually committing the sin, swearing is not.

After an important initial episode in Southern Sudan the film begins with Childers on the day he is released from prison. His stripper wife appears to have found faith at a local church but Childers is resistant until eventually making his decision after coming close to a serious crime. It is through contact with his local church that the work in East Africa flows.

Anyone who can get through this unpleasant opening section may find that there is enough stimulus in this thinking man’s action film to keep watching and then discuss with others the issues raised, including man’s depravity – to what extent is it progressive (this in light of the appalling things children have been made to do in Southern Sudan)? Poor theology – how dangerous is it? American self-belief and the gospel – what are the main differences?

One brief section in the film struck me – where Childers tries to teach the children in the orphanage that he founded in a war zone, how to play baseball. They are not interested and only want to play soccer. It doesn’t quite fit but it seemed a partial metaphor for the fact that his American get up and go only takes you so far. Life is complicated and without a rigorous theology, compromise is inevitable. This is not to suggest that theology can solve everything. This film shows that is far from being the case.

This review originally appeared in Evangelical Times in 2012

Courageous - DVD Review

If you are familiar with the work of the Kendrick Brothers and Sherwood Pictures (‘Flywheel’, ‘Facing the Giants’ and ‘Fireproof’) then you will know what to expect from their current DVD ‘Courageous’. The theme this time is fatherhood with the focus on four different fathers, three of whom are in the local police department. Again there is the Albany, Georgia backdrop, the focus on several different characters, the gentle and attractive humour, people praying and being converted and the positive small town American charm. Perhaps the effort to be multicultural and multisocial is more obvious. As ever, the acting is good, the storyline well written and the production values high. The budget was up fourfold this time, to $2 million (but quickly recouped many times over at the box office). However, the project was, as ever, bathed in prayer, involved many extras from the local church, relied on volunteers and has a credit list that still includes people like babysitters and caterers, again from the local church. The film actually ends with a Father’s Day service at the Sherwood Baptist church.

So, a film made by Christians with the laudable aim of drawing attention to fatherhood and what a crucial role fathers can have on the rising generation. What’s not to like? Well, it was a little long I thought. It is relentlessly didactic and even if you agree with the basic premise you might find it a little irritating. The fathers in the film decide to show what committed fathers they are by signing a pledge and making a public commitment. One father gives his teenager daughter one of those purity rings that have been so popular and controversial in the States. All very American and fair enough for an American film, perhaps. My real fear, however, is that with the title Courageous the film is suggesting that all we fathers need to do is to try a little harder, spend a little more time with our kids and everything will be dandy. It is difficult to say whether the problem lies in the Kendrick brothers theology or the medium itself. When you write a story or make a film then you are in a sense acting as God. There is no failure on the part of the writers to introduce conflict and they never suggest that being a father is easy. Nevertheless it would be very easy to watch it and even with the closing text in your head (Joshua 24:15) to think that all we need to do is try a bit harder.

When I was at university studying English I wrote essays that chiefly aimed to convert the lecturer. I now see that was a mistake. That is not what an academic essay is intended to do. Watching and making feature films is surely not a sin. However, we must always remember that Christ conquers sin and wins hearts to himself through preaching not through feature films. Perhaps next time the Kendricks, who are undoubtedly good story tellers, will try and be more subtle and aim more at entertainment rather than trying so hard to convert us all.

This review first appeared in Evangelical Times in 2012.

Noah - Film Review

Paramount Pictures Directed by Darren Aronovsky Starring Russell Crowe Cert. 12A

One of my pet hates is the dinky sort of ‘Noah’s ark’ you see in toy shops and children’s books. The ark in Paramount Pictures’ film Noah is nothing like that. It is a hulking great thing, and when the animals come into it and it floats on the surface of the water in a worldwide flood, it is a great sight to behold.

However, that is probably the best that can be said for a film that most Christians will be very disappointed with. The fact that I need to use the term ‘spoiler alert’ here gives a hint at how far from the Bible account Darren Aronovsky’s film strays.

Wholly fictitious

Turning biblical narrative into a cinematic experience is fraught with difficulties. Indeed, the film’s own ‘health warning’, ‘12A: Contains moderate violence, injury detail, threat’, alerts us to that.

We know too that a feature film will never simply follow a narrative, but needs to build in its own dramatic tensions, so we were pleased not to have to hear an actor giving the voice of God and not surprised to see Noah’s wife (Jennifer Connolly) given such a big part.

We were willing to allow a large part to Shem’s wife (Emma Watson, famous from the Harry Potter films) and can see that there is some room for argument on how Methuselah, Lamech and Ham might be presented, and on whether Noah became a grandfather while on the ark (the film takes us from Noah’s childhood to his drunkenness and repentance, with backward glances to the earlier chapters of Genesis).

We can even overlook inaccuracies, such as ignoring the 120-year gap between the command to build the ark and the flood.

What is much harder to stomach is the blatant rejection of the biblical narrative, in favour of a wholly fictitious presentation of Noah (Russell Crowe) as a man with a death-wish against humanity; and an ark containing seven people not eight, one of them a villainous Tubal-Cain, who stows away for months, only to be murdered before the Ararat denouement!

One of the problems with suggesting, as the film does, that Noah wanted to kill his own grandchildren and so leave the human race with no future is that, far from creating dramatic tension, anyone who is thinking about the plot will be utterly unfazed by all the drama that those playing Noah, his wife and daughter-in-law pour into their parts, since the very fact we are here watching the film dictates the eventual outcome!

Spectacularly wrong

Perhaps we simply have to accept that, when those who are unwilling to treat God’s Word as sacred are let loose on the Scriptures, they will almost inevitably go wrong sometimes; or, as here, spectacularly wrong.

The theological problems with this film are there from the outset. We open with the hopeful words, ‘In the beginning there was nothing’. Everything in the believer cries out, ‘Actually, in the beginning there was God’, but you say, ‘Okay, this is as near as we are likely to get from such a source’.

A few frames in, however, we are introduced to ‘The watchers’, an angel-like race who are fallen and yet redeemable, and who help Noah build his ark. This is highly problematic, as is the film-makers’ inability throughout to distinguish between the miraculous and the magical.

Even when we get a countdown of creation, the idea that the sun and moon were made on the fourth day is firmly rejected, regardless of what Genesis may say on the matter.

Perhaps the biggest problem with the film is the way the Bible’s chief theme of Messiah has been completely removed. The main characters come over as clones of 21st century man, in all his ignorance and arrogance, not as antediluvians longing for Messiah to come.

Damaris Media

I was able to see this film ahead of time, thanks to the efforts of an organisation called Damaris Media (http://www.damaris.org). Led by Nick Pollard, Damaris seeks to capitalise on the existence of films like this, by encouraging discussion of the gospel with people who see it.

The group’s aims are laudable and they have produced excellent materials to accompany the film. I just wonder if the task of getting from the outright fiction of Noah to the true Genesis story will be a step too far in most cases. We do not have to tie our hands behind our backs before we evangelise.

Of course, some people will see the film anyway, and Damaris may be a help in highlighting how to take discussion forward.

This review first appeared in Evangelical Times in 2014

Unbroken - Film Review

Many readers will be aware of the book War and Grace by Don Stephens (EP Books), a collection of short biographies of Christians from the two World Wars.

Its first story concerns an American of Italian extraction called Louis Zamperini. The new edition of the book reveals that he died on 2 July 2014 and mentions the 2010 biography Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, and a forthcoming film of the same name, directed by Angelina Jolie.

Well, this film has now appeared, going on general release in British cinemas on Boxing Day, 2014. We are always looking for ways to introduce Christ to our unbelieving neighbours and so the fact that a biopic about a Christian has appeared is good news.

Sadly, the film, unlike the book by Hillenbrand that it is drawn from, chooses very much to downplay the fact that Zamperini became a Christian after the war and spent much of his life talking about Christ and the forgiveness that can be found only in him.

Don Stephens prefaces his life of Zamperini with seven summarising points: the first five are well covered by the film, the three middle the most extensively — an airforce bomb aimer, decorated for gallantry in action; a survivor of 47 days adrift on a life raft; an ill-treated prisoner of war of the Japanese for two and a half years.

The bulk of the film looks at these periods, most of the time being devoted to his harrowing years as a POW, when a man known as ‘The bird’ did all he possibly could to ‘break’ this prisoner.

Much of this, which includes a great deal of senseless violence, does not make pleasant viewing. Hence it has a ‘15’ certificate. Zamperini had recurring nightmares after his experiences, until he came to Christ. One can imagine some people having nightmares after watching this presentation.

The first two summarising points — a juvenile delinquent in California, and an Olympic runner at the Berlin Games of 1936 — are covered here by means of flashbacks that bring out his Italian background, the racism he suffered, his delinquency and the way his older brother eventually steered him in a better direction by means of sport (leading to some success at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin).

As for Stephens’ final two points — a drunkard who almost wrecked his marriage, and a Christian — these are almost entirely ignored by the film. It ends with the war, although a few subsequent points are covered in a brief epilogue.

All this means that the only Christian elements are a snatch from a sermon by a Catholic clergyman when Zamperini was a boy (blurring the fact that he later rejected Catholicism for the gospel), his prayer in the life raft that he would dedicate his life to God if he survived, and some conversations about God with his fellow survivor Russell Phillips.

It is hard to understand why the film-makers were not keener to depict the moment when Zamperini returned to Japan after the war in 1950 and, having preached to his former guards, warmly shook them by the hand and expressed his forgiveness. They chose not to do it this way, however.

That still leaves us with an opportunity to take advantage of this brief spotlight on Zamperini to draw attention to him and his Saviour, by means of Don Stephens’ book or other materials that highlight his conversion and Christian life.

This review originally appeared in Evangelical Times in 2015

Knox. The life and legacy of Scotland's controversial reformer - DVD Review

Knox is a documentary produced by Murdo MacLeod, marking the 500th anniversary of the birth of the influential Scots Reformer, John Knox. The documentary is presented in a manner that we have grown used to. Philip Todd, the film’s youthful presenter (in dark jeans, loose narrow tie, etc.), moves from location to location (Edinburgh, Perth, St Andrews, Stirling, Berwick, Geneva), telling Knox’s story.

This is interspersed with a number of talking heads (ministers and academics, such as Rev. Maurice Roberts, Professor John McIntosh and Knox biographer, Jane Dawson). Cartoon images, with Stuart Falconer reading the actual words of Knox, plus a sprinkling of other appropriate images, ancient and modern, are also included. Throughout, music (Charlie Wilkins) and other audio are used to enhance the presentation.

It is all done to a high standard, although the cartoons are not really up to the standard one might desire (this might be the point where a senior youth group starts to snigger, if it gets to see it). The documentary has, understandably, a Scottish feel, which may limit its use in some places. However, it is far more balanced than hagiographic.

The chief aim of the documentary is to give a clear and accurate history, but from time to time participants make statements no doubt intended to encourage true faith in Christ and challenge believers today. Such instruction comes over in the quotations from Knox too.

In the final section, the conviction is clearly expressed that Scotland needs a new reformation. The final words are those of Knox himself, calling upon us to know God, to be faithful and to seek blessing for Scotland. It is encouraging to know that such materials are being made.

This review appeared in Evangelical Times in 2015

Flywheel Facing the Giants Fireproof - Film Review

If you are in the habit of sitting down of an evening to watch a DVD with family or friends then you may have come across one or more films produced by an American group called Sherwood Pictures (not to be confused with Sherwood Films, a quite different Edinburgh-based entity).

Three feature-length films have appeared so far – Flywheel (2003), Facing the Giants (2006)and Fireproof (2009). The third of these films features actor Kirk Cameron, a former atheist who made his name on TV in the comedy Growing pains (1985-1992) but is now working with the American evangelist Ray Comfort.

The films’ subtitles give some idea of the themes: ‘In every man’s life there is a turning point’; ‘With God all things are possible’; and ‘Never leave your partner behind’. The films have been moderately successful. They are now available in a three box set with many extra features including Bible studies. A further film (Courageous) is expected next year.

Whether you came across them by accident or design, you will have been pleased to sit through a heart-warming evening’s entertainment, without having it sullied by the nonsense that so often creeps into the average film on general distribution today. (Having said that, do note that the second film is a PG, probably owing to some of its themes such as infertility.)

The first film Flywheel (a flywheel is a car part, and serves as a background parable) is a sort of modern version of the story of the New Testament character Zacchaeus. The next film Facing the Giants makes college level American football the background, as it focusses on the coach, his failing team and the greater issues he has to face. The third film (Fireproof) is set in a small town fire station, with its story of how a man’s marriage is saved, as well as the man himself.

It is not difficult to commend such films when they are so pleasant and wholesome. Although they are clearly low budget films (Flywheel was made for $20,000; Fireproof for $500,000; whereas an average Hollywood film today costs over $100 million), the production values are high, the story lines decent, the tone engaging, the acting mostly of a good standard and the action fairly well paced, although the dialogue is sometimes rather poor. The projects are evidently bathed in prayer and executed with great integrity.

There are some concerns, however. The films are the brainchild of two brothers, Alex and Stephen Kendrick. Both are pastors on the staff of a large and prosperous Southern Baptist Church with many ministries, in Albany, Georgia – Sherwood Baptist Church.

They say that the first film was prompted by a survey from the George Barna organisation suggesting that movies and television shows are more influential in American culture than the church. In light of that, says Alex Kendrick, ‘we decided as a church to step out in faith and produce a full-length feature film’. However, even if what Barna suggests is true (which is debatable), it is far from being clear that this is the right response to the problem. Certainly, it is hard to see how a local church has a New Testament mandate for such an activity.

Theologically, Sherwood Baptist Church appears evangelical. In the first film the health and wealth gospel approach is just about side-stepped, but all three films present conversion as something that happens quickly and definitely. They may betray signs of a decisionistic mentality.

Of course, the whole problem of how certain matters are presented on screen is a major headache. Kirk Cameron is apparently unwilling to do on-screen kissing. He is reported to have said that ‘In Fireproof, there is a romantic and touching scene where he (the character) kisses his wife. Because I have a commitment not to kiss any other woman, my wife Chelsea came in to the set and wore the dress my character’s wife wore.

‘We shot the scene in silhouette, so when I kiss my ‘wife’, I’m actually kissing my wife and honouring our marriage’. One admires such thought-through commitment, but wonders what Christian actors are doing when they are supposed to be praying in a film – something that happens quite often in these films and that you almost never see in others.

Are they praying or simply pretending to pray? Given that private prayer is to be a private matter, surely it would be better to avoid such scenes anyway?

If you are one for watching DVDs, these films will give you a few relaxing and thought-provoking hours. If you look further into them through the Internet (www.sherwoodpictures.com) or the enhanced DVDs, you will discover the ministry tools that Sherwood Baptist Church are making available to churches and believers for evangelisation, strengthening marriages and similar goals.

Some will want to make use of such tools and one can see how in the context of an active local church they may prove useful. Others will see such an approach as a distraction and not something they want to use as a tool.

D. L. Moody is said to have answered a critic of his evangelistic methods once by saying that he preferred his own way of doing things to the other man’s way of not doing them. One is slow then to criticise what is clearly a sincere attempt to win the lost and to help God’s people.

This article originally appeared in Evangelical Times in 2010

James Harvey 1816-1883 Part 3 (Last)

London Baptist

By that time there was also a Devon born missioner at Heath Street, William Rickard, who started the work in nearby Childs Hill. Constituted as a church in 1877, they had put up a building in 1870. Harvey laid the foundation stone on July 28, 1870.

At the end of 1865 Spurgeon and Brock formed the London Baptist Association. Unsurprisingly, Harvey was first treasurer, and continued until 1881. In 1870, he offered to help defray the debts of many chapels. If they paid one third by the end of 1871 he would give 10% of the remainder. He ended up parting with £500.

Another cause Harvey helped was Shoreditch Tabernacle, where William Cuff (1841-1926) ministered, developed in the 1880s. The meeting on December 1, 1876, held in Harvey's Hampstead drawing room, where it became clear that the new building could be financed was one of great joy to Cuff and his deacon.

Harvey felt a duty, as noted, to give an example but tried to conceal much of his giving. In 1867 his good friend Spurgeon wrote seeking a contribution to the recently begun Stockwell Orphanage. Harvey anonymously gave £600 for the second house, called The Merchant's House in his honour.

A letter of July 16, 1867, acknowledges the gift. “You find it more easy to perform noble actions than I do to thank you for them”. A similar sum was given for the girls' orphanage 13 years later.

Spurgeon wrote in a brief obituary in the Sword and Trowel for April 1883

He was for many years one of the most liberal helpers of the work which the Lord has entrusted to us: and we hear that he has left a legacy of £500 to the Orphanage. We may not mention many of the things which were done of him in secret; but we may say that he was the donor of the house on the boys’ side of the Orphanage, which is known as "the Merchant’s House". This he gave without a request or even a hint from us.

Another example of his kindness through Spurgeon came in the Summer of 1876 when he sent £100 to pass on anonymously to ministers in need of a summer holiday. Spurgeon wrote back, passing on letters thanking him and acknowledging where the thanks should go.

In 1882 a gift for the Baptist work in East India Dock also produced a very thankful letter.

Harvey was also a great supporter of the Baptist Missionary Society. In 1881 he called on supporters to make 1882 a year of Jubilee, urging each one to see himself as “the steward not the irresponsible owner of the manifold gifts of God”.

Nothing by halves

It was only a short way into 1893 that, on February 9, after two days' illness, Harvey rather suddenly died at home. He was 66.

With a favourite turn of phrase, Alfred wrote “Never was there a man more naturally modest and unpretentious than he. His unassuming geniality and consideration for others was the same in whatever company he was ....”.

He was a man of buoyant spirits. The Freeman (February 16, 1883) observed how he “had a rare confidence in his own powers ...” taking up various pursuits, “singing ... preaching to the poor ...” and apologetics, and mastering them. He was a “keen sportsman” and “a jocund traveller”; “I cannot conceive of Mr Harvey doing anything by halves”. He was paradoxically “devoid of personal ambition, and yet ... ambitious”. He sought “no satisfaction save success” and never rested on his laurels.

Glover writes of Harvey’s promptitude in discernment and resource, his kindness and “the influence of his Christian manhood.” “He was above all things devout, and rich in the reserves of conviction and experience ...” exhibiting “the kind of piety of a former generation; that name namely built on the Fear of God.”

Spurgeon commended Brock's words, in what he called an admirable sermon,

While in good health he was exemplary for punctuality at the service of God; and on very rare occasions was he absent from his place. ‘I am come,’ he said to me, the very Thursday evening before his fatal illness, when I expressed surprise at seeing him, ‘because I am able to go to business, and I do not think I ought to be absent from the church meeting.’

Spurgeon added

Our personal loss is very heavy, and, hence, we can the more tenderly sympathise with the esteemed mourners who have lost father and brother. We shall not soon look upon his like again. Are there not other merchants who love our Lord, and will be baptised for the dead, filling up the vacancies caused by these many deaths, and taking thought that the cause of Christ shall know no lack?

Lessons

This brief life of Harvey reminds us of the centrality of conversion. Doctrine in the head, accurate or inaccurate, cannot be enough. We are also reminded of the importance of generosity and the dread of wealth that marked him. There is also the importance of evangelism and seeking to win people on their own territory. Finally, there is the importance of a catholic spirit which is most commendable but that can, without care, lead us astray.

The article appeared in Reformation Today 

James Harvey 1816-1883 Part 2

Employer

It is hard at this distance in time to imagine life for an employee in nineteenth century London. Harvey was keen to improve their lot. As soon as he became head of the firm he invited his sister Rachel to come and help him both at home and bringing changes to the work place. She was responsible for things such as introducing tablecloths and, with Harvey, a library and newspapers and other amenities. He also encouraged monthly discussion classes.

From 1842 he was involved in the early closing movement. The pattern when he first became head was for business to end at 9 pm (winter 8.30 pm). He got that down in his area first to 8 pm (winter 7 pm) then, in 1855, unilaterally, to 7 pm all year round, closing on Saturdays at 5 pm. He made a number of speeches in favour of such moves.

He also worked with the evangelical organisation the YMCA, begun in London by George Williams (1821-1905) in 1844.

On August 12, 1851, Harvey's diary reveals that he made a long considered resolve to make it a point to speak to young employees words of Christian caution and advice as appropriate.

The dread of wealth

The dread of wealth is a chapter heading in the memoir. The phrase is no exaggeration. Harvey was always successful in business (unlike Peto, who suffered bankruptcy). Nevertheless, his son comments that “in spite of his success, there was never in the City of London, a man who set his mind on money making less than he.” Proverbs 28:20 was a watchword, “A faithful man shall abound with blessings: but he that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent”. He hated all sharp practice in business.

Addressing the YMCA at Aldersgate Street on February 28, 1878, having spoken of getting on in business, he said “Be careful, however, for what purpose you wish to get on.” Live according to your means. He quoted Proverbs 16:8 “Pride goeth before destruction ...” and urged fair play.

It was not simply that he feared money but, more positively, he also had a strong sense of stewardship. On May 26, 1853, he made the remarkable resolution about his income alluded to earlier - not to spend more than a third on himself and family, not to save more than a third and to give a third to religious and charitable purposes. He also resolved, perhaps unrealistically, never to be worth more than £20,000. He renewed these vows from time to time. The continual growth of his business made it impossible to remain worth no more than £20,000. It caused him some consternation but he sought to keep to the resolution as best he could and even carried it over into the terms of his will. His son remarks that this lifestyle made people think he was richer than he was. In truth, he was simply very generous.

Bowers picks up on something interesting about the “self-made merchant of stern cast and great generosity” that is in the biography. “He maintained that much of his giving should be anonymous, but some public to show Christian duty and as a stimulus for others” (Sense and Sensitivity)

Deacon, husband

In 1850 Harvey joined the Bloomsbury church and was soon made one of five deacons, alongside Peto and future brother-in-law, James Benham (1820-1885). He was very involved in evangelism in the nearby slums, an important part of the church's work.

In 1852 he wrote

I desire a wife, if it will help me to serve God better, to discharge my private and official duties more efficiently, and by these means to honour my Lord and Saviour; and not else. Do I believe that a Christian woman like-minded with myself would thus help me, and I help her? I do.

Ever a practical man, by November 1853 he had married Jane Benham (1828-1855), daughter of John Lee Benham (1785-1864), a Wigmore Street businessman – Ironmongers, bath makers, stove, grate and kitchen range manufacturers and hot water engineers. Jane, like Harvey, was the youngest of seven. The Benhams were a prominent family in the church (See Bowers, The Benhams of Bloomsbury, BQ).

The son describes his mother as a woman of judgement like the father. Though they were very practical about the arrangement, the son insists, “Never did man and woman love one another in holier and more devoted love than they.”

Father, widower

Their time together at 22 Bloomsbury Square was tragically brief. On August 17, 1855, their only son was born and by August 27 Mrs Harvey was dead. Two years later Harvey wrote of his continuing faith despite the severe blow. His sister Rachel had been helping an invalid since the marriage. He died around the same time and so she came to look after Harvey again, becoming what Alfred touchingly calls his “almost mother”.

Civic life

In 1853 Harvey became a Liveryman of the City Company of Lorimers. He soon gained the freedom of the City then became a Common Councilman. He retired in 1861 but not before he had made a resolute and successful attack, including the launch of legal proceedings, on abuses of poor law administration going on in his Farringdon Without ward.

He was Chairman of the Board of Guardians for many years. In this connection a dinner was given in his honour in August, 1859. In this capacity he was involved in the erection of a new West London workhouse, necessitated by the building of Holborn Viaduct (1865-69) sweeping business premises, including his own, from the area. He moved to Gresham Street in late 1865.

Even in the last 20 years of his life in Hampstead he was involved in civic life. His love of strict justice and individual liberty was reflected in his efforts to get the law on oaths changed. The new law allowed witnesses to simply affirm rather than go on oath, something atheists preferred.

Apologist

Harvey, it seems, always loved reading and was very interested in Christian evidences or Apologetics as it is now called. He regularly read The Reasoner, “a journal of free thought and positive philosophy” sending in letters signed “Inquirer”.

On October 21, 1855, he went to the Scientific and Literary Institution at 23 John Street, Fitzroy Square near Tottenham Court Road, a free thinker gathering place, to hear Robert Cooper (1789-1868) “a distinguished advocate of secularism”. Author of an 1852 booklet ridiculing death-bed repentances and editor of the secularist London Investigator Cooper spoke on Miracles. “The time is approaching, gradually indeed but surely,” he claimed “when this delusion - this imposition upon the understanding of mankind - will be consigned, as it deserves, to public contempt”. Harvey entered into debate with him and felt able to trouble him with at least one argument.

On March 30, 1856, Harvey had opportunity to reply to Cooper at the same venue. He begins by identifying with his audience, a first rule of rhetoric, saying he too is a free thinker, one with a good working class background. He is not an enemy, as he seeks just what they seek – the truth and the good of the people. He went on to speak of the reasonableness of the evidence for the truth of Christianity and what it is mankind wants, arguing that miracles are possible and the apostles reliable, before coming to what is really wrong with this world and how it can be rectified.

Having been able to say something worthwhile, he nevertheless resolved to give more time to reading and study in this area.

On January 11, 1857, he spoke at John Street again, this time in reply to a lecture by freethinker, atheist and editor of The Reasoner, George Jacob Holyoake (1817-1906) against Christianity as a system of morality. Holyoake called Christianity indefinite, inadequate and inoperable; Harvey said it was definite, adequate and operative.

In September, 1862 Harvey was asked to umpire a six night debate between a Rev W Barker and notorious freethinker and radical, later MP and President of the National Secular Society, Charles Bradlaugh (1833-1891) who until 1868 billed himself as “Iconoclast”. The first two evenings both sides had a chairman but Harvey's impartiality “gave so much satisfaction” according to a biographer of Bradlaugh, “that the last four meetings were left entirely under his charge”. Attendance at a school room on City Road on some nights was so great that people were turned away and averaged 1200, around a thousand hearing all the debate. People came from far and near. A book of over 200 pages was later produced, Bradlaugh's biographer says, containing “much that is interesting and much that is dull, a little that is witty, and more that is weak”. These debates were popular at the time.

Catholic and evangelical

Glover speaks of Harvey's “faithfulness to conscience, the Love of Christ, the scrupulous Honour, the carefulness to know the exact truth of God on all points of our Creed and Duty”. At the end of his memoir, however, the son speaks of his father's catholicity. Harvey was an evangelical first. “Baptist though I am,” he wrote “yet I have ever objected to work especially as a Baptist; I prefer to do so on the much broader basis of a disciple and servant of Christ.” Typical of him was how on holiday in Southwold he saw a need and immediately sent 10 guineas to the vicar to help.

He was happy to read Anglican Thomas Griffith (1798-1883). When his Fundamentals or bases of belief concerning man, God and the correlation of God and men came out in 1871 Harvey wrote offering to finance a wide distribution of the book. Griffith sadly was a universalist, which suggests that Harvey's broadness sometimes led him astray. This perhaps lays behind Spurgeon's later remark

He was a man of mark: independent, yet ready to learn; lenient towards doubt, but himself a firm believer. His views of truth were his own, and would not be parallel in all points with those of anybody else; but we always felt at one with him, and even where we judged him to be mistaken we were glad to love him just as he was.

Hampstead

Harvey spent his latter years just outside London, in Hampstead. It was thought that better air would help his sickly new born baby. This led eventually to a permanent move to Hampstead in 1861. They began on Haverstock Hill, moved up it once, then took up residence in newly built Mount Grove on the Greenhill Estate in 1870.

Baptist James Castleden (1778-1854) had laboured in Hampstead until his death but the only nonconformist chapel at that time appears to have been a high one in both senses - high in its Calvinism, high in its location - atop Holly Bush Hill. Harvey resolved, partly as thanks to God for his son's refound health, to build a new chapel but the people of the area were poor and there was no place for it anyway.

It was another four years before they obtained land - a former fruit and vegetable garden. A committee was formed to plan a building but it was too expensive and the committee was dissolved. However, at long last, on June 4, 1860, Harvey signed a contract to build a chapel and other buildings at a cost of £4,800. It was not built at his sole cost, others gave; but he was a generous contributor. The Heath Street building opened in July, 1861. The Freeman called it “a neat, light and elegant structure presenting the same architectural ensemble as Bloomsbury Chapel” with a schoolroom below. Its frontage is more ornamented than Bloomsbury.

Harvey became a member and deacon and a generous provider. They called William Brock Junior (1836-1919), Dr Brock's son, as first pastor. Once again the intention was that the membership would be “open to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ in truth and sincerity” with true believers being baptised by immersion.

Services were held in Heath Street in 1864 to celebrate the clearing of the debt on it with an afternoon sermon by the Methodist W M Punshon (1824-1881). In the evening Dr Brock spoke and Harvey, presiding over the meeting, revealed that the entire cost of chapel and school-room (upwards of £6,300) had now been covered.

In 1871 Harvey's son, Alfred, then just 16, made known his desire to be a gospel minister. Harvey Senior wrote that he had long “hoped for it and prayed for it and have expected it” yet he says it “... seems almost to take me by surprise ...”. He had pursued the policy of never hinting at the matter to him. Harvey Junior went on to be a vicar in Shirehampton, Bristol.

The article appeared in Reformation Today

James Harvey 1816-1883 Part 1

By Frank Holl Photo credit: Bristol Museums, Galleries & Archives

A previous article noted our ignorance of 19th century Reformed Baptists apart from Spurgeon and, thanks to Iain Murray, Archibald Brown. Having drawn attention to Samuel Morton Peto (1809-1889), we turn now to another Bloomsbury deacon, businessman James Harvey.

Biography

In 1900 a brief memoir From Suffolk Lad to London Merchant appeared. By Harvey's son Alfred James (b 1855), it is the main source for knowledge about him. A loving memoir not a critical biography, it includes the intriguing fact that while still relatively young he resolved not to spend more than one third of his income on himself and his family, not to save more than another third and to give another third of his income to religious and charitable purposes.

Suffolk lad

Harvey was born in Badingham, near Framlingham, Suffolk, then a village of 1800, now more like 500. Born May 16, 1816, he was the second son and youngest of seven. His farmer parents were good living people, if nothing more, who called him "Little Jems". Educated first in the village “Dame school”, a private elementary school, he went on to Heveningham, then Framlingham.

If the family were a good influence, parish rector Clement Chevallier (1765-1830) was not, having no interest in the way of truth. A new and better man came later but Harvey was ready to leave for London by then. His one positive experience of something better came, aged around 10 or 12, when a woman Methodist preacher preached on the village green, probably a Primitive Methodist, a nineteenth century movement seeking to regain the fervour of Wesley's day.

London merchant

On November 2, 1832, Harvey travelled to London by stagecoach to began work in a warehouse at the bottom of the old Holborn Hill (where Holborn Viaduct now stands). His High Calvinist employer Henry Bardwell (d 1845) dealt in woollen and cotton (Manchester) goods wholesale and retail. James started as a Junior assistant at £12 per annum, that soon rising to £20 then £32 then £40. He sent money home to pay off his outstanding school fees and help his parents.

By 1837 he was a Junior partner and when Bardwell died in 1845, joint head of the company alongside contemporary, Joseph Bartram (b 1815). By this time he had saved £2,500. Bardwell left him another £1,000.

Harvey's son comments that the secret of his father's success was twofold. First, he loved hard work. He had good health and never took long holidays. He was not obsessed with money. He was able to relax too enjoying "books of gristle" and foreign travel. He loved work for its own sake but was also driven by a strong sense of duty.

There was also the high principles of conduct that he espoused even before conversion. "Patient continuance in well doing" (Romans 2:7) was a motto text he often quoted. Early on, in a message called What traits of character are most desirable in a business man? he spoke of a proper degree of self-respect (business is not all about profit and loss. Even tradesmen are capable of higher feeling); honesty (the golden law must be recognised and is important); persevering industry; clearness of purpose ("virtue and industry shall never go unrewarded" is one of God's laws). Here was an upright, churchgoer. However, as we shall see, he had more to learn and experience.

James Wells

With no fixed convictions of his own, Harvey joined Bardwell at what was known, from 1838, as Borough Road Tabernacle and, after its first enlargement in 1850, Surrey Tabernacle, Southwark. He sat under the ministry of the leading London Strict Baptist, James Wells (1803-1872).

Hampshire born Wells grew up a godless man but, following an illness in his early twenties, he came under deep conviction and was converted through the witness of Hyper-Calvinists. He became a gifted preacher and had a large and loyal congregation, second only in size to that of his much younger neighbour, C H Spurgeon.

Wells (pseudonym Job) tangled with Spurgeon in the pages of the Earthen Vessel in 1854 and 1855. Spurgeon sometimes called him “King James”. The press called him “Wheelbarrow Wells” or the “Borough Gunner”.

Hyper-Calvinists say gospel invitations are not to be given to all without exception. Only the elect should be addressed. They say the warrant a sinner has to come to Christ is found in his own experience of conviction and assurance and human inability means a man cannot be urged to come immediately to Christ. They also deny God's universal love.

Most dislike being termed hyper, though Wells did not mind. Unlike others, he distanced himself from Calvin and would always mention election and reprobation, often attacking “duty faith” as they call it. Ian Shaw says (High Calvinists in action, 248)

Wells contended that although it was the duty of man to believe the Bible, to repent of his sins, and appear before the bar of God to give an account of his sin, he “dare not say it is the duty of any man upon the surface of the globe to believe to the saving of his soul”. He declared, in 1859: “I will have no fellowship, no personal friendship, with any duty-faith minister; I have no personal antipathy towards him, but I will have no personal friendship with him, because it leads to truth's compromise.”

He had a strong experiential emphasis. “Religion without experience is no religion at all”. A born controversialist, he weighed into controversies over Rahab’s lie, backsliding and against the Son's eternal generation.

Harvey sat under Wells 15 years. He was convinced of election and reprobation and tried to convince others but did not think he himself was elect. He was “unhappy and a stranger to the peace of God that passeth understanding”. Many others appeared to do so but Harvey did not find Wells' ministry helpful. Wells once wrote “I would rather keep a child of God out for seven years than let one hypocrite in, and so deceive the souls of men”. Perhaps that did not help.

On Harvey's piety, Richard Glover, in the memoir, calls it “meditative, intellectual, well-informed” and suggests he perhaps “owed more than he knew” to Wells' “exaggerated Calvinism”. “The gentler gospel which he reached by fighting” says Glover “he held with fuller conviction and deeper sense of its meaning ... the Fear of God was there, and that high Fear ennobled, restrained and strengthened him.”

Bloomsbury Chapel

On December 5, 1848, “the first Baptist chapel to stand proudly on a London street, visibly an ‘ecclesiastical edifice’” not hidden in a back alley, was built. Bloomsbury Chapel, situated strategically between fashionable Bloomsbury Square and the then slums of St Giles, is still there, though the impressive spires of its twin towers were removed in 1951 for safety reasons.

The chapel was built by Peto and the first pastor was William Brock (1807-1885) who, from a standing start, gathered a church of 52 members by July 1849. The church was so constituted that though “recognising no other Baptism but the immersion of professed believers” it would nevertheless “welcome to its fellowship all followers of Christ”.

Faith Bowers (Sense and Sensitivity of Dissent, Baptist Quarterly) wrote that “the term Baptist was deliberately avoided in the title. The Trust Deeds spoke of 'A Christian Church knowing only the Baptism of Believers'.” Brock could write in 1863, “No term of communion has been insisted on but personal religion ... Membership with Christ has been the only prerequisite for membership with our church”.

Born in Devon, of good nonconformist stock, Brock, a watchmaker, trained for the Baptist ministry at Stepney College. He succeeded Strict Baptist Joseph Kinghorn (1766-1832) in St Mary's, Norwich, controversially taking the church in an open communion direction. E C Dargan called him “an admirable pastor and a strong though not brilliant preacher”. Bowers says he was “unconventional, unaffected and warm-hearted, and ... always concerned to relate religion to everyday life”. Active in public affairs, especially the slavery question, he originally moved to London because of ill health but remained at Bloomsbury until 1872.

Harvey had been unimpressed when he heard Brock in Norwich in the late 1830s but he decided to attend the new church for six months, to “give the minister and the doctrines which should be preached a fair trial”. “The first month had not passed away” he came to write “before I found what I had long been seeking in vain. I was able to rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” He began to keep a diary, one of its first entries being made at 7 am on Saturday, December 30, 1848. He wrote:

This has been the most remarkable night of my existence, and the most precious. Not one wink of sleep have I had during the whole time, from 11 o'clock last night till 7 this morning. Last night, as has been my custom recently, I noted down the most important circumstances which occupied my mind during the day; and having had many very important and apparently difficult matters to arrange when I arose in the morning, which during the day were arranged in a way and manner much more satisfactory than my partner and I had been able to conceive of, I felt impelled to record my gratitude to God for so marked (as it appeared to my mind to be) a manifestation of His over-ruling all things to accomplish in the end His own purposes.

On retiring to rest I committed myself to God in prayer, with more freedom of speech than usual; and in pleading for the pardon of sins, and realising the bare possibility of their being forgiven and blotted out for Christ's sake, I felt overwhelmed and could not say another word. In bed, I desired the Lord to have mercy upon me and accept of my imperfect gratitude for His abundant mercies and from that time till 4 am my mind was occupied on matters of business with which I had been concerned during the day, and as I appeared to be at an end of my musings, knowing that today is our stock-taking, and that I shall be engaged in the warehouse till 12 o'clock at night, I again tried to go to sleep, and breathed a desire (which, if it be the Lord's will, may He grant) that He might enable me to be a benefit amongst those under our own roof both for their temporal and spiritual welfare. When in a moment I was arrested by an idea, and these words were fixed in my mind 'Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him.' As a father! - 'as a father pitieth his children.' Never did I realise the pity and mercy of God in such a sweet and endearing light. I could but repeat, 'As a father pitieth'. Seest thou a father embracing his son? Seest thou a father whose son is in trouble, whose son is in danger? Seest thou a father bestowing his riches and honour on his son in all the love of his heart? So, even 'the Lord pitieth them that fear Him'. A man may pity a faithful dog, a favourite horse; but as a father pitieth his children.' While lost in admiration in the thought, came one more precious still. 'Because you are children, God hath sent His Spirit into your heart Crying, Abba, Father.' 'God my Father' in this sense, and with these endearing words, can it be to me? When, lo! 'If children, then heirs, heirs to God and joint heirs with Christ.' This was too much for my heart; my only language was, Oh, for faith to believe!' - and I could not possibly restrain my tears. I could only cry, 'Lord, help! Can it be my portion?' And I continued with this threefold text in my mind adoring its beauty though its blessedness seemed far too great for me; when again: 'Can a woman forget bet sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the fruit of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will not I forget thee.' I laid thus for some minutes, for my heart was full to overflowing, and enquired 'What does this mean?' Then came as an answer: 'The love of God shed abroad in the heart.' Then followed: 'God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.' The words 'everlasting life' seemed fixed in my ears. There came as a climax: 'I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee.' I could hardly repeat the words. Then came back the thought, 'As a father pitieth,' but I could not repeat the words;' God, my father, who hast loved me with such a love,' I could not say them for several times trying. The thought returned: 'The love of God shed abroad in the heart,' and 'God manifesting Himself to me as He doth not unto the world.' I remembered that I had pleaded with Him for this, and it appeared as an answer to prayer. I then enquired, and do so now I am writing, What is all this that is done ? Is it not to prepare one for some coming trial or difficulty? And my answer from my heart was Come sickness, poverty, peril or death, I can meet them all with the love of God shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Ghost. I resolved to write it all down, if God enabled me, as soon as I arose ... If this which I am writing ever be read by any other being, I pray that he may experience the blessedness which I this morning, from the hours of four till seven o'clock, have been made to feel.

The article appeared in Refomation Today 

Samuel Morton Peto 1809-1889 Part 4 (Last Part)

Bankruptcy

In 1865 Peto travelled to America and wrote a book relating his experience. It was the financial problems that he hit the following year that forced him to leave Parliament two years later, despite the support of both William Gladstone (1809-1898) and Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) and many others.

Brian and Faith Bowers, describing what happened, write that “as everything that Peto did was on a grand scale, so was his failure”. In 1862 Peto, Betts and Crampton contracted to extend the London, Chatham and Dover Railway from London Bridge through Blackfriars to what is now Holborn Viaduct. On May 11, 1866, they had to suspend payment. The immediate cause was the failure of the previously rock solid Overend, Gurney & Co Bank, on whom they were dependent for funds while the contract was in progress. Peto generally employed directly rather than using subcontractors but this required more capital. Peto had weathered financial crises before but this time there was no escape and the following year he was in the bankruptcy court.

Spurgeon's letter to Peto at the time is preserved in a footnote in Spurgeon's autobiography

A little time ago, I thought of writing to condole with you in the late tempests; but I feel there is far more reason to congratulate you than to sympathise. I have been all over England, in all sorts of society, and I have never heard a word spoken concerning you, in connection with the late affairs, but such as showed profound esteem and unshaken confidence. I do not believe that this ever could have been said of any other man placed in similar circumstances. The respect and hearty sympathy which all sorts of persons bear towards you could never have been so well known to you as they are now by means of the past difficulties.

Peto received a similar letter from Baptist principal Joseph Angus (1816-1902).

The bankruptcy was raised at a Bloomsbury church meeting on July 5, 1867. Dr Brock was asked to write to Peto, who was absent, expressing “in the kindest way the sympathy of the Church with him and with Lady Peto under their heavy trial”. The church agreed to consider the matter further when Peto's affairs were finally arranged. Peto was thankful for the support and assured Brock that his chief concern had been to protect his creditors.

A year later, the bankruptcy proceedings now complete, the matter was raised again. Deacons James Benham (1820-1885), partner in a law firm, and George Kinnear were deputed to investigate and report. Their 5000 word report acknowledges Peto's ready assistance and admits that the system of finance Peto was involved in, though criticised by some, had been common practice. They admitted how difficult the whole process was to follow and that, as in this case, legal fictions were sometimes employed. However, they fully exonerated Peto of all wrongdoing or dishonesty. He had “conducted himself with perfect candour, openness, and integrity”. There were three criticisms, nevertheless. They felt he had put too much power in his own hands, taken on too much liability and had failed to avoid all appearance of evil. A reproof was later administered by the church though there was no church discipline.

One of the church's concerns was that Peto had allowed his name to be associated with others who had ultimately brought his name into disrepute. The Baptist historian J C Carlile (1861-1941) says that “after this catastrophe Sir Morton practically retired from public life”. Another Baptist historian, A C Underwood, observed that he “never again occupied quite the same place among Baptists”. In 1872 he was involved in alterations to the Metropolitan line, however, and work on the Cornish Mineral Railway.

*

One of Peto's biographers, Edward C Brooks, writes of Peto as at times flamboyant and one who loved public life and challenges in personal and business life. He was calculating, astute, shrewd, he says, but with a warm heart and generous disposition

- the sort of person you would walk up to and start a long conversation, knowing that there was scarcely a subject in which he lacked interest, be it politics, education, defence, architecture, art, religion, railways, social needs, the care of the poor, disadvantaged, the widow and orphan, all within a local, national, and international framework ...

A man, he concludes “with a rich and varied personality and a wide penetrating vision”. That is surely an accurate assessment of a man of faith who ought to be better known. He died at the age of 80 in 1889 and is buried in the churchyard at Pembury in Kent.

Readers will be interested to know that shortly after the above article was completed a new biography of Peto appeared. Hitting the Buffers by Douglas C Sparkes can be obtained from The Baptist Historical Society.

The article appeared in Reformation Today

Samuel Morton Peto 1809-1889 Part 3

Bloomsbury Baptist

Bloomsbury Chapel, seating 1700, opened in December 1848 and a church of 52 members was constituted in July 1849. It was the first non-conformist chapel to stand prominently on a London street instead of being tucked away in some back alley. Good dissenters were wary of turning chapels into churches but as larger premises were required, buildings became more church like, more Gothic. Indeed, when Bloomsbury Chapel was being planned the authorities stipulated an ecclesiastical character for the building. Peto had seen that the site was a good one, not only handy for the Petos themselves in Russell Square but also on a new road between the comfortable squares of Bloomsbury to the north and the appalling slums of St Giles to the south, where a mission work was begun from the start, under George Wilson M'Cree (1822-1892). Peto also subsidised an elementary school in the basement. Apparently, the freeholders wanted the church to be built with shops beneath but Peto resisted that idea.

Tradition has it that when he sought to lease the land (freehold was not an option) he was told that non-conformist chapels were dull and a church should have a spire - “a spire?” exclaimed Peto, “my lord, we shall have two!”. Twin spires graced the towers of the chapel until 1951 when they were removed for safety reasons. Peto defended them against critics saying that they were necessary as staircases for ventilation. John Gibson (1789-1900) was the architect. Spurgeon, of course, preferred Greek to Gothic style. He observed that Peto was a man who built a chapel in the hope that it would be the seedling for another.

Peto was also instrumental in getting William Brock to become the first minister of Bloomsbury. They saw eye-to-eye on many important religious and social issues. While still in Norwich, Brock had use of a railway mission account with the Norwich Bank to be drawn on at his own discretion and funded by Peto. We say more about Brock in another chapter but he was the original preacher with a newspaper in one hand and a Bible in the other.

In 1855 the congregation at Bloomsbury paid off a much reduced portion of their debt of £10,000 to Peto and he used it to convert the disused Diorama behind Nash Terrace into another Baptist Chapel. He provided £5,000 for the project. Spurgeon preached there on many occasions. The street where what became Regent's Park Chapel once stood is called Peto Place (he is also honoured in Peto Street, near the East India Dock). The first minister was William Landels (1823-1899).

Peto also built a chapel in Notting Hill in 1863, beginning with materials that had been used for the Great Exhibition. Spurgeon's brother James Archer Spurgeon (1837-1899) was the first minister.

Peto was the generous benefactor and sponsor of more than 300 mission halls in East Anglia and elsewhere to serve the navvies. He also paid for missionaries to work among them. He supported Baptist Union schemes to provide for aged and infirm ministers. His missionary enthusiasm led him to defray the expenses of five deputations to India, West Africa and Jamaica, where he paid a debt of £9,000 and a Mountain was named after him. He also paid for a replacement schooner for Alfred Saker (1814-1880) to carry on work in the Cameroons and encouraged Baptist work in Italy.

Member of Parliament

Peto served as a Member of Parliament for two periods between 1847 and 1868. He was out of Parliament 1854-1859 as he was under government contract to build a railway in the Crimea for the army. It was for this work that he received his baronetcy in 1855. He was Liberal MP for Norwich 1847-1854, Finsbury 1859-1865 and Bristol 1865-1868. During this time he was a prominent figure in public life. He was constantly moving house. In 1843 he bought Somerleyton Hall near Lowestoft and extensively rebuilt it. He also restored the parish church and built an Independent chapel there. He had been a member of the old Devonshire Square Baptist Church under John Howard Hinton (1791-1873) but from 1848 was a member at Bloomsbury. When he moved to Pinner he joined Beechen Grove Baptist church, Watford, and retained membership there after moving to Blackhurst, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, where he attended the Congregational Church.

Among his other claims to fame is his making a guarantee towards the financing of The Great Exhibition of 1851, backing Joseph Paxton (1803-1865) the designer of the Crystal Palace. Chown says also that “Reedham orphanage, Haverstock Hill Working School, Essex Hall and Earlswood Asylum, all bear witness to his wide and generous philanthropy” and quotes a journalist saying of Peto and the social reformer Lord Shaftesbury (1801-1885), “Night after night you see one of these two men filling the chair at Exeter Hall. How I envy the Baptists Sir Morton Peto, whose twinkling and fine presence bespeak a broad humanity”.

In 1861 he introduced a Bill regarding the Burial of Dissenters in Churchyards. “I believe,” he said,

that were the measure I ask leave to introduce to become the law of the land, one of the causes of offence now existing would be removed; and if the Church of England is to prosper, I am sure it can only be by the exercise of a large-minded, large-hearted charity; by the adaptation of itself to the spirit of the times, and by its seeking the good of the community at large, not by an exclusive action, but by an earnest co-operation in works of faith and labours of love with all those denominations of Christians who, while differing in forms of worship and ecclesiastical polity, are yet united in the belief that the Bible is the only rule of faith, and the revealed will of God, the only guide to fallible man.

He reminded the House that by the rubric, three classes were excluded from Christian burial - the suicide, the ex-communicated and the unbaptised. He told the House that in his denomination those only were baptised who by credible evidence showed sincere repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and asked if members of his denomination should be included in the same category with the suicide and the excommunicated. He concluded his speech

The abolition of the Test Act and other measures have done much to create a better feeling, and I beseech the House not to hesitate in its onward course. What is the first book you place in the hands of your children which most interests them? Is it not the Pilgrim's Progress of John Bunyan? And yet the spirit which dictated this rubric imprisoned John Bunyan himself for 12 years in Bedford Gaol; and Nonconformists have their martyrology, as extensive in its chronicles as any that Foxe ever wrote. But I rejoice that in the present day a better feeling exists. You do not value Milton's immortal works the less because they were written by a Baptist, and I beseech you to join with me in an effort to prevent our differences being exhibited at the grave, where at least we may hope the differences of life would be forgotten, and the mourners be permitted to resign to their last resting-place the precious remains of their friends in that way which would be most in consonance with their own feelings and those of the dead.

One writer says that on most social questions, as the first Baptist MP since 1784 he was progressive without being censorious or rigid. He supported the abolition of flogging in the armed services as dehumanising and advocated reforms of the criminal law where it put the rights of property above those of personal injury and natural rights. "Peto's Act" of 1850 simplified the administration of chapel trusts.

The article appeared in Reformation Today