William Booth (1829–1912) was the only surviving son of a successful businessman who became a drunkard after he was bankrupted due to poor investments. Pulled from school, Booth was apprenticed to a pawnbroker. Two years later, he was converted and became overwhelmed with the deep spiritual and physical needs of those around him. He wrote: […]
George Watmough hitchhiked across America, witnessing to thousands. Once leaving Tucson on his way to Phoenix, he was given a ride by a young man who stopped his witnessing by saying, “I was raised in a preacher’s home and have no time for religion.” “Isn’t that strange,” Watmoungh replied, “I don’t have much time for […]
“That in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death” (Php 1:20). In the same spirit, Jim Elliot prayed: “Father, make of me a crisis man. Bring those I contact to decision. Let me not be […]
“I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications…be made for all men…For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior; who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:1-4). During the English Keswick Week of 1925, Irish evangelist W.P. Nicholson […]
How important is consistent Christian testimony to effective gospel witness. In Chartist times (a Victorian era workplace reform movement), people often labored in little hovels for a mere pittance. W. Y. Fullerton tells of a Christian in the market town of Kettering, England, who worked his knitting machine in a little lean-to behind a grocer’s […]
At meetings being held in the north of England, Lionel Fletcher noticed a rough-looking man showing the ravages of sin on his face. He was the first to rise at the end and rush to the preacher. The story poured out in sobs. His son had trusted Christ shortly before. His father was the worse […]
“What do you have that you did not receive? Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?” (1 Cor 4:7). C.S. Lewis writes in Mere Christianity: “Every faculty you have, your power of thinking or your moving your limbs from moment to moment, is given […]
Edward Studd, after making a fortune in the tea business in India, returned to England to raise his family in a life of lavish excess, living for the world that is soon to be burned. But in 1875, that changed when their father was saved under the preaching of D.L. Moody. The three eldest boys, […]
How were the books of the Bible selected? “Canonicity” refers to the standard used to include these writings. God determined canonicity by inspiring certain men to write the Bible. Norman Geisler and William Nix give the questions used by the early church to determine this: 1. Is it authoritative? Though the writers claimed no authority […]