In his first sermon on 2 Timothy John Calvin discusses God’s aim in preaching and his gracious desires for his people. God only speaks for our profit. He wants his love, his mercy, is infinite goodness, to be laid out before us. He wants us to be assured of our salvation. He wants us to […]
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“As Becomes the Oracles of God”
This is a powerful portrait of preaching from Thomas Foxcroft’s book, The Gospel Ministry. Note his combination of close study and earnest, clear exposition. “They must endeavor for as thorough an understanding and penetration into the mysteries of godliness as they can, and labor to draw the images thereof in their sermons as near as […]
Augustine, On Christian Doctrine
I have finally plugged one more gap in my education by reading Augustine’s On Christian Doctrine. As is often noted, this English title might cause people to think it is a survey of doctrine. In fact it is a handbook on biblical interpretation (Books 1-3) and proclamation (Book 4). At the end of the book […]
Anthony Esolen on the Pastoral Epistles
Due to some technical problems I have not been able to post at PastoralEpistles.com for a good while. However, we have worked out the issues and the overhauled site is now being hosted by the good folks at Logos Bible Software. I am grateful to Logos for making this possible and especially to Rick Brannan […]
Proper Eloquence in Preaching
“When ministers study to be florid rather than solid, and labor continually for lofty phrases and great swelling words of vanity, they are only spinning a spider’s web. The prater perhaps may win applause, but the minister in the meantime may not win a soul, the divine end of preaching. They must follow the example […]
