Recently I read what I consider to be the most fascinating and spiritually beneficial 250 pages I have come across in a long time—The English Connection, by Dr. Bryan W. Ball, head of the religion department of Newbold College near London. I don't often editorialize about a book, but this volume has done so much for my own soul and mind that I must recommend it to you and share some concepts from it. (See also the excerpt on pages 10-12 and ordering information on page 24.)
What is this "English connection" that has so excited me? In a nutshell, it is that there is a clear stream that connects much of the best in present Christian thought and practice to Puritan Bible study and theology. Dr. Ball is particularly interested in tracing the Puritan roots of Seventh-day Adventism's major doctrinal positions. We little realize as Seventh-day Adventists (or Baptists, or Methodists, or Lutherans) the doctrinal debt we owe to these godly students and expositors of God's Word. We stand upon a foundation of scriptural understanding that was shared by many Puritan thinkers.
Puritans, by and large, have had a bad press. Johy Pym's neat phrase "that odious and factious name of Puritan" conjures up the stereotype of narrowness, bigotry, even hypocrisy. Dr. Ball persuasively refutes this view and presents these preachers and writers of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England as men with firm principles, strong beliefs, and a dedication to truth that should be the envy of us all. These men of God knew what they believed and stood faithfully for it even unto death. Their chief concern was for purity of doctrine and holiness of life. Their primary question was: Does this practice or doctrine have the support of Scripture?
Puritans such as Baxter, Flavel, Alleine, Owen, Bunyan, and others are little known and even less read today. It was not always so. The writings of these men were widely read in their own day and have led countless individuals, then and later, to understand the plan of salvation and how to find peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. John Bunyan wrote nine books while in a jail for his beliefs. (Only his Pilgrim's Progress remains widely known today; other works, such as Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners and The Holy City, have fallen into undeserved obscurity.) John Flavel wrote six volumes of devotional and doctrinal thought, warm and practical to the end. Joseph Alleine's Alarm to the Unconverted sold twenty thousand copies when first published in 1672 and was so popular that another edition of fifty thousand was published three years later. It is a pity that so few are acquainted with these and other Puritan works today. In spite of the centuries between their time and ours, the spiritual themes they talked about are those time less ones that still concern us. Their statements are gripping and burn with the fire that the Holy Spirit transmits through those whom He uses to explain and expound the Word. This is not to say that these writers were faultless in all they believed or taught. But I'm convinced that their grasp of Scripture and their personal devotion and commitment to the Lord Jesus would put most of us modern preachers to shame.
Their convictions were forged in the crucible of their experience in attempting to purify or bring reform to the Established Church. Many suffered cruelly for their faith. Between 1,700 and 2,000 clergy, many of them the cream of the nation's spiritual and intellectual leadership, refused to compromise their consciences by complying with the Act of Uniformity passed by Parliament in 1662. What came to be known as the "Great Ejection" followed, in which those who would not swear total loyalty to the Established Church were ejected from their pulpits and positions. Further restrictions followed. The Corporation Act excluded them from preaching; the Conventicle Act prohibited private meetings for worship attended by more than four persons other than the immediate family; the Five Mile Act prevented ejected clergy from living within five miles of a town in which they had preached in recent years! An end to such measures came in 1689 with the Toleration Act, but it was in these years of persecution that Puritan thought flowered and reached its maturity.
From the rich harvest field to be found in the twelve chapters of this book, let me share with you some gleanings dealing with righteousness by faith, baptism, the relationship of obedience to faith, and Christ's return. I'm sure you will find, as I have, many gems of thought to use in sermons as well as to enrich your own soul. There is room for only a sampling here; to have the entire treasure, you will need to buy the book for yourself.
On the subject of the Lord our righteousness, Puritanism was never more certain of its claims than when contending that Jesus Christ has provided the full and final answer to man's terrible spiritual dilemma. The strength of Puritan theology is that it comes to grips with the whole message of Scripture, much in the same manner as did the apostle Paul. That message begins with the human race falling rapidly from righteousness to unrighteousness. This unrighteous condition is like "a desperate disease" striking at the very heart of man's being and threatening his future.
Many Puritans taught that man is "doubly lost" and subject to a "twofold unrighteousness." By this they meant (1) the guilt of Adam's imputed sin gives man an unrighteous standing before God, and (2) man's unrighteous character is due as well to his own sinful actions. Thus man's unrighteousness has both a legal and a moral aspect. He is unrighteous when measured against the holiness of God's character and the requirements of His law, and he is also unrighteous in himself since he has a fallen nature. Thus Richard Baxter concludes that Christ came to seek and to save that which was "doubly lost," those who are both "guilty" and "unholy" (page 52). Since man is doubly unrighteous, it is God's purpose, the Puritans taught, to restore him through the gospel "to that twofold righteousness which he lost"—to freedom from guilt and to holiness of life.
Above all, it is Christ only that provides the righteousness man needs. Baxter claims that the righteousness that man may have as the basis of his salvation "is wholly in Christ, and not one grain in ourselves" (page 53), and that nothing can, or need, be added to that righteousness in order to- make it sufficient for salvation.
George Downham (Treatise of justification) sums up justification simply as "the imputation of righteousness," which counteracts both the imputation of Adam's sin and the guilt of man's own sin. On the subject of imputation John Flavel has this gem: "If Adam's sin became ours by imputation then so doth Christ's righteousness also become ours by imputation, Romans 5:17. If Christ were made a sinner by the imputation of our sins to Him, who had no sin of His own, then we are made righteous by the imputation of Christ's righteousness to us, who have no righteousness of our own."—Page 57.
Puritanism was united on most issues, but it was divided, sometimes very deeply, on the question of Christian baptism. According to Ball, the first known Baptist Church in England dates from 1612, but for political and ecclesiastical reasons it was not until after 1640 that Baptist convictions took firm root in English soil. The Baptists were a new breed of Puritan, and a new brotherhood of preachers. Baptists believed that according to the Bible, the essential characteristics of Christian life and experience were to precede the external application of water. Baptism was therefore the outward testimony to an inward experience. There was no efficacy in the act itself, no regenerating or cleansing property in the water. Rather, it was symbolic; baptism without faith would not result in salvation. Thus they stood opposed to infant baptism on scriptural grounds. Said John Tombes: "You may as soon extract water out of a flint, as draw a command to baptize infants out of Scripture."—Page 91.
The point of contention between the Baptists and the rest of Puritanism was that the former accused the latter of not practicing what it preached. Puritanism professed complete adherence to Scripture as the norm for faith and practice, but it failed, said their Baptist brethren, to follow the form of baptism outlined in Scripture. There Jesus commanded that the new believer must be taught before being baptized. A prerequisite to baptism is belief, an intelligent commitment to Jesus Christ. Thus the Baptists concluded from their Bible study that baptism was to be administered only to believers, upon con sent and profession of faith, and they saw as their divinely ordained task the taking of Puritanism to its logical conclusion.
"Gospel Obedience," a chapter title in Ball's book, is taken from Puritan writer Richard Baxter, and not, as one might suspect, from a source with a strong legalistic bent. The Puritans saw obedience as the sequel to faith, law as the concomitant of grace. To the Puritan mind, law in its broadest meaning applied to the entire Bible. In this sense, law was understood fundamentally as God's revealed will. It was normal for Puritans to distinguish between moral, ceremonial, and civil (or judicial) law. John Owen divided the whole Mosaic code into these three sections. The civil law, given by God to Israel under Moses' leadership, was not binding in the moral sense, but according to John White there was much in it of permanent value to mankind as a whole.
Puritan writers saw a distinct difference between the moral law and the ceremonial law. The latter pointed specifically to Christ and the way of salvation to be revealed in Him at the cross, and obviously had a restricted function and a limited duration. The moral law applied to all people in all times. They pointed out that the ceremonial laws were written on scrolls while the moral law was inscribed on two tables of stone.
On the other hand, the moral law they deemed to be in an entirely different category. To the Puritan mind the Ten Commandments were nothing less than a transcript of the character of God and a verbalization of the essence of the divine nature. Ralph Yenning declared that "to find fault with the Law—were to find fault with God" (ibid.). Since God is eternal, His ten commandments are viewed as eternal, never to be repealed or disannulled. This point was well emphasized by Francis Bampfield: "There never was, never will be, a repeal of this law, which is so lively an expression of the holy, righteous nature of Elohim Himself."— Page 124.
Antinomianism, of course, has persisted through the years in one form or another. Many Puritan preachers and writers consciously opposed these attempts to abrogate the Ten Commandments, yet, while doing so they were careful to show that there is no saving merit in the law. It can point out the disease, but it cannot heal. The law is like a mirror that discovers sin in the life. In the words of Flavel, "Till God show you the face of sin in the glass of the law . . . till you have had some sick nights and sorrowful days for sin, you will never go up and down seeking an interest in the blood of His sacrifice."—Page 131.
One of the main contributions that Puritanism made to the recovery of the total Biblical message was a renewed emphasis on Christ's second coming and the doctrines associated with that event.
Puritans rejected a spiritualized interpretation of this doctrine as contrary to the plain meaning of Scripture. There was possibly no point of wider agreement among Puritan theologians than that of the manner of Christ's coming. They firmly believed the scriptural passages describing the Lord's coming with flames of fire and a host of angels in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. Baxter describes it thus: "If there be such cutting down of boughs and spreading of garments, and crying hosanna, to one that comes into Jerusalem riding on an ass; what will there be when He comes with His angels in His glory? If they that heard Him preach the gospel of the kingdom have their hearts turned within them, that they return and say, 'Never man spake like this man,' then sure they that behold His majesty and His kingdom will say 'There was never glory like this glory.'"—Page 180.
Thomas Adams was one of the many seventeenth-century Puritans who saw the entire post-New Testament age in an eschatological sense. For them, the last days began in the time of the apostles and reached down to the last day. The second coming of Christ meant that the work of salvation that He had begun at His first coming would be completed. That work, they argued, could not be complete, or finally efficacious, until Christ had returned.
The Advent hope had tremendous effects upon the Puritan mind. That hope was an essential element in their Christian faith. It motivated them to prepare for the coming of the Bridegroom. Belief in Christ's second coming was a very special way to help Christians thrive in grace and holiness. To many of these Puritan preachers, fellowshiping with Christ in glory was measurably dependent on fellowshiping with Him in grace. Thus the Second Advent hope was an indispensable factor, perhaps even the chief factor, in the marked spirituality that characterized both church and individual believer in Puritan England.
All this Dr. Ball beautifully brings out in his book. But it is the words of these Puritan preachers themselves that stir my soul and drive me to my knees praying for greater devotion and understanding. It is the clarity with which they present the Lord Jesus and the scriptural basis for their beliefs that causes me to thank God that I have the privilege of raising my voice to preach a gospel that can build on their foundation and restore neglected truth to a world that desperately needs to know the Lord Jesus Christ before He comes.— J.R.S.
