“There should be the previous working of a Home Missionary among the families of the locality for which it is destined. . . . We set a parish missionary amongst them, who can give his whole time to the work, and who, by his unwearied ministrations among the sick, and the dying, and the ignorant, and the young, has created such a demand for Sabbath attendance, that his preaching-hall, which holds 300, is filled to an overflow; and we feel encouraged to build a church (to be set about immediately,) in the confident hope that many hundreds, who till now have been living in heathenism, will be reclaimed to the good old habits of their forefathers.”
“But wherever a new parochial economy is meant to be set up, it is in all cases most desirable that a moral preparation should go before the erection of the material apparatus. I do not know a more useful set of labourers than our local missionaries, who ply the families through the week, and congregate them at preaching stations, either on week-nights or on the Sabbath” (Chalmers, Works 18:228-29, 270).
Posted in Missiology, Parish Theory & Practice, Thomas Chalmers | Leave a Comment »
The way of the Lord on which the Christian walks “hath all the properties of a good way, none so pleasant and plain;—how sweet and pleasant sights all the way! It is an alley of delight,—the way of his commandments; it wants not accommodation in it to refresh the traveller. The most delightful company is here; the Father and the Son, who sought no other company from all eternity, but were abundantly satisfied and rejoiced in one another. This fellowship the Christian hath to solace himself with, and he is admitted to be partaker of that joy. There is nothing that doth disburden the soul so of care and anxiety, nothing doth rid a man of so many perplexities and troubles, as this way. But the way of sin in itself is most laborious, most difficult. It hath infinite by-ways that it leads a man into, and he must turn and return, and run in a circle all the day, all his time, to satisfy the infinite lusts and insatiable desires of sin. O how painful and laborious is it to fulfil the lusts of the flesh! How much service doth it impose! How serious attention! What perplexing cares and tormenting thoughts! How many sorrows and griefs are in every step of this way! Do you not perceive what drudges and slaves sin makes you,—how much labour you have to satisfy your lusts? And you are always to begin, as near that which you seek in the end of your years, as in the beginning. How thorny, how miry is the way of covetousness! Are you not always out of one thorn into another, and cut asunder, or pierced through with many sorrows? 1 Tim. vi. 10; Matt. xiii. 22. Is that a pleasant and easy way, I pray you, that makes all your sorrow and your travail grief, and suffers not your heart to take rest in the night? Eccl. ii. 22, 23. What pains of body! What plotting of mind! What labour and vexation of both must a sinner have as his constant attendance in this way! The way is intricate, deep, unpassable, that leads to that satisfaction you desire to your lusts. Your desires are impotent and impatient, the means to carry you on are weak and lame, nowise accommodated or fit for such a journey, and this puts you always, as it were, on the rack, tormented between the impatience of your lusts, and the impotency of means, and impossibility to fulfil them. Desires and disappointments, hopes and fears, divide your souls between them. Such is the way after the flesh, an endless labyrinth of woes and miseries, of pains and cares, ever while here.”
Hugh Binning, The Sinner’s Sanctuary
Posted in Church of Scotland, Covenanters, Experimental Religion & the Cure of Souls, Practice of Piety | Leave a Comment »
I could not bring myself to watch all of this, it’s just so idolatrous. But the observation is, if modern pagans take Halloween as their own, should it not raise some serious second thoughts among Christians who participate? “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.”
Posted in Sabbatarianism & the Church Calendar, Spiritual Warfare; the Occult, Worship, True & False | Leave a Comment »
“Is the decline of reading making American politics dumber?” The opening piece is so tragic; and it bodes very ill for America if things are not reversed. Christians, you who are “salt and light,” resist the great dumbing down! Take up and read!
Posted in Contemporary Issues, Culture | Leave a Comment »
Alas, how far have we fallen from a right honoring of the Lord’s day in a land that was once “a city on a hill!” And how short is our collective memory of far better and holier days. But a simple search will bear witness. Our center of pleasure has shifted from the sacred to the secular, from God to games. The following is the Wikipedia entry for “Sunday sporting events.” Telling.
“Sunday sporting events were not usually played until the early 20th century. In North America, they were prohibited due to blue laws at first, but then cities like Chicago, St. Louis, and Cincinnati later decided to legalize them. Other cities such as New York City and Philadelphia had intense political and court battles to legalize the games. Nowadays, professional sports leagues schedule games on Sundays in the United States, though this practice continues to be opposed by some Christian denominations upholding first-day Sabbatarian doctrine.”
[Image courtesy of Google Gemini.]
Posted in Establishments, Psalmody in Culture, Sabbatarianism & the Church Calendar, Sacred & Secular, Secularization | Leave a Comment »
“Under a local system, the teachers move towards the people. Under a general system, such of the people as are disposed to Christianity, move towards them. . . .
“It is the pervading operation of the local system, which gives it such a superior value and effect in our estimation. It is its thorough diffusion through that portion of the mass in which it operates. It is that movement by which it traverses the whole population; and by which, instead of only holding forth its signals to those of them who are awake, it knocks at the doors of those who are most profoundly asleep, and, with a force far more effective than if it were physical, drags them out to a willing attendance upon its ministrations. . . .
“The schools under a local system are so many centres of emanation, from which a vivifying influence is actively propagated through a dead and putrid mass.”
Thomas Chalmers, Collected Works, 14:79, 81.
Posted in Gathered Church Ecclesiology, Parish Theory & Practice, Thomas Chalmers | Leave a Comment »
“He has dressed the whole Supper Himself, covered the table, and there is no more for us to do, but sit down and eat. If we look to this dressed Supper, Christ dressed it all Himself, in the furnace of God’s wrath, and the bread that we here eat is His flesh, which He gave for the life of the world. The wine, which is mingled and drawn is His blood. And, O, sirs, was not our Lord a hot man in making ready this Supper? Not one dish is mis-cooked, all is set before us in the gospel, and Jesus craves no more for all His pains, but only that His friends come to the banquet and eat and be merry; and if ye will come, Christ will pay all the reckoning. When the Israelites were fed with manna, they behoved to go out of the camp, and gather it themselves; but we furnish nothing of this Supper. God be thanked, Christ bears all the expense. Alas! alas! that the unhappy world will not eat heartily, since Christ pays for all. The poor sons of Adam were all sick and at the point of death, and their stomachs were so spoiled with a sour apple that Adam did eat, that they were famished and not able to eat. In comes Jesus and makes a medicinal dinner of His own flesh and blood; lays down Himself and is slain to make physic of His crucified body for us, in order to affect our cure. It is just they die for hunger, and lose their stomach for evermore, who loathe this meat. In the sacrament all things are ready; whatever the soul wants, it shall find at the Table. All the hungry shall find Christ meat and drink.”
Samuel Rutherford
Posted in Church of Scotland, Ordinary Means Ministry, Sacraments, Samuel Rutherford, The Lord's Supper | Leave a Comment »
Pope Leo apparently just said, “Someone who says ‘I’m against abortion but says I am in favor of the death penalty’ is not really pro-life.”
Thomas Aquinas said, “Therefore if a man be dangerous and infectious to the community, on account of some sin, it is praiseworthy and advantageous that he be killed in order to safeguard the common good . . . .” (ST IIa-IIae, q. 64, a. 2).
And, “It is permissible to kill a criminal if this is necessary for the welfare of the whole community. However, this right belongs only to the one entrusted with the care of the whole community — just as a doctor may cut off an infected limb, since he has been entrusted with the care of the health of the whole body” (ST IIa-IIae, q. 64, a. 3).
Rome the same, “everywhere, always, by all,” right?
Semper protestans!
Posted in Christian Ethics, Protestantism & Romanism, Social Issues, The Civil Magistrate | Leave a Comment »
West Port Experiment 