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The Life And Ministry Of Polycarp
The life of Polycarp, a disciple of St. John, and bishop of Smyrna, a martyr and faithful minister of Jesus Christ. His character was excellent to a very high degree. The Christians of his time speak of him with the greatest respect, declaring that he was adorned with eminent piety, a teacher truly apostolical; and even spoken of by the Gentiles themselves as an eminent teacher and a famous martyr. After having been 86 years a shining ornament of Christianity, he was crowned with martyrdom, by being burnt at Smyrna, aged 100 years. Polycarp was born towards the latter end of Nero’s reign, that is, about seventy years after the incarnation of our blessed Lord; The place of his birth is not certainly known; some…
Further Study
70. Polycarp
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Hugh Latimer (1487-1555): Apostle of England
Leicestershire has reason to be proud of its connection with the history of our country's Reformation. Two of the most prominent leaders of this movement—Hugh Latimer and John Wycliffe—spent a portion of their valuable lives in this county; the former his childhood, and the latter his closing years. In the small, quiet town of Lutterworth did Wycliffe industriously labour as rector; it was here that he preached the truths of the Gospel with a characteristic fervour and simplicity; it was here that he penned a large number of those outspoken tractates that so powerfully influenced the minds of his countrymen; it was here that he rendered verse after verse, chapter after chapter, book after book, into his mother tongue, until there lay before him the…
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Selina, Countess Of Huntingdon And Her Connexion
Lovers of eighteenth century church history will have often come across the name of Lady Huntingdon and the ministry which she founded. Often, however, her name is merely dropped here and there in passing and when more space is afforded her, it is invariably in conjunction with well-known preachers such as Wesley, Doddridge, Whitefield, Toplady, Romaine and Venn. This fact has tended to place her in a subsidiary position in modern research into eighteenth century evangelism and church-growth. This is a pity as the very fact that Lady Huntingdon’s name is associated with nearly every important move of the Spirit in the eighteenth century shows what a great influence she had under God during these times. She thus deserves to be studied as a person…
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The Life And Ministry Of Nicholas Ridley
Nicholas Ridley has rightly been regarded by Christian readers throughout the centuries as a pioneer of reformation and renewal in the Church of Christ and one who defied intense persecution and death rather than betray his Lord. Though Ridley came from a long line of noblemen and Reformers, Ridley’s kinsman and biographer says of him, ‘Descended from this ancient stock, he degenerated not from the virtues of his ancestors, but gave a much greater lustre to his family than he derived from it.’1 John Foxe, the martyrologist, describes Ridley as ‘a man beautified with excellent qualities, so ghostly (spiritually) inspired and godly learned.’ Augustus Toplady says of our subject, ‘He was esteemed the most learned of all English reformers: and was inferior to none of…
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Miles Coverdale: Superintendent-At-Large Of The Reformation
Miles Coverdale was born in the North Riding village of Coverham in 1487. Little is known of his early biography apart from the fact that he studied philosophy and theology at Cambridge University, gained his doctorate at Tübingen, Germany and was ordained priest at Norwich in 1514. Thereafter, Coverdale became an Augustinian monk, spending some ten years in the service of the Roman Catholic Church. Coverdale got on very well with his superior Robert Barnes, called by John Strype ‘the great restorer of good learning’, who was later to experience a martyr’s death under Henry for his reforming theology. Coverdale and Barnes found access to the doctrines of grace through Augustine’s works which pointed them to the Bible. Both men then gathered together students and…
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The Life And Death Of Arthur Triggs
Long before this Number of the Gospel Magazine is in the hands of its readers, they will doubtless have heard of the removal to his eternal inheritance of our late valued friend and occasional correspondent, Mr. Arthur Triggs. He now realizes, in all their fulness and power, those glorious things upon which, during a lengthened ministry, he was wont to dwell. That “most glorious Christ,” whose sacred person was his all-engrossing theme, now stands revealed to him in all His perfection, loveliness, and glory. The consciousness of this fact brings to our remembrance a little circumstance in connexion with his ministry when he was in the zenith of his popularity as a preacher. He was preaching on a Sabbath evening, as was usual, to a…
