Barton at Barnton

Yesterday I got to preach in a Church planted by Charlotte's chapel in Edinburgh. As I found out my dissertation is due four weeks earlier than I had anticipated I revamped an older sermon from 1 John chapter 1. Fellowship with God. You can hear it on their website:- Barnton Baptist Church. I enjoyed the church and especially the fellowship with one family who put us up for the weekend. The church had a youthful vibe to it, so Joy and I really enjoyed our time there.

Shalom
Stephen

The Life of God in the Soul of Man- The Revivial booklet

Last week my wife Joy and I went with her parents to visit Christian Focus Publishers here in the Highlands. One of the books that I had bought for me was, 'The Life of God in the Soul of Man' by Henry Scougal. Scougal became a divinity professor at Aberdeen when he was just 19. He is Scotland's forgotten Puritan. He died in 1657 at the age of 27. His effectiveness though did not cease because this amazing book was given to George Whitefield by his friend John Wesley and became the means of the conversion of Whitefield, and so was used of God to start the Great Awakening. I decided that I would highlight anything that stood out, I now have a little yellow book. On page 48 he contrasts false religion with the genuine article:
'This forced and artificial religion is commonly heavy and languid, like the motion of a weight forced upward: it is cold and spiritless, like the uneasy compliance of a wife married against her will, who carries It dutifully toward the husband whom she doth not love, out of some sense of virtue or honour.'

'I come next to give an account why I designed it by the name of Divine life; and so it may be called, not only in regard to its fountain and original, having God for its author and being wrought in the souls of men by the power of His Holy Spirit; but also in regard of its nature, religion being a resemblance of the Divine perfections, the image of the Almighty shining in the soul of man; nay, it is a real participation of his nature, it is a beam if the eternal light, a drop of that infinite ocean of goodness; and they who are endued with it, may be said to have "God dwelling in their souls", and "Christ formed within them." '

In spite of the Old language and the long sentences, this is as Piper rightly says on his blurb, ' a remarkable book.'
This is an excellent little book.
God Bless
Stephen