PILGRIMS, WARRIORS, AND SERVANTS
Puritan Wisdom for Today’s Church
Edited by Lee Gatiss. The Latimer Trust, 272 pages. £8.99
ISBN 978 0 946 307 777
The godly, disciplined passion of the Puritans continues to inspire and motivate many Christians today and understandably so.
For those yet to be touched by the ‘essence’ of Puritanism, Pilgrims, Warriors and Servants would be an excellent starting point.
The book is a compilation of the first decade of the St. Antholin’s Lectures, an annual event which began in 1991, as something of a revival of a great Puritan tradition.
The ten lectures, edited into stirring essays, cover a variety of themes and people, all seeking to bring Puritan passion and wisdom to bear on the modern church. J.I. Packer, a noted devotee of the Puritans, contributes no less than three of the essays, while two (including one of Packer’s) concern John Bunyan and Pilgrim’s Progress. Lee Gatiss, who edited the collection, contributes a helpful introductory chapter on the popularity of ‘Lectureships’ during the Puritan era, and the part that St. Antholin’s Church played in that movement. The book’s title is drawn from Packer’s opening essay, on Richard Baxter (p.27).
Along the way there are a number of helpful and challenging issues raised. Alister McGrath, for example, in his essay on Evangelical Spirituality, bemoans the widespread ignorance among many evangelicals today of their spiritual heritage — an ignorance which leads many to seek ‘spirituality’ from other traditions. Bruce Winter offers a stern critique of modern evangelical piety, which he argues is corrupted by the hedonism of our age. The two historical essays by Geoffrey Cox and Peter Adam illustrate the areas of debate for Puritans and the range of views that existed among them.
As a whole, the book has something of an eclectic feel, but this is hardly surprising, given the annual lecture format in which the material was originally delivered.
