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The Life And Death Of John Kershaw
John Kershaw was born in Lancashire, August 25th, 1792. His autobiography gives an interesting account of his early life, call by grace and to the ministry; also of his fifty-two years' pastorate at Hope Chapel, Rochdale, and the Jubilee meeting, 1867, when handsome presents were made to Mr. and Mrs. Kershaw, by their loving and beloved friends. After speaking of his early convictions Mr. Kershaw says:— "I was for a time shut up as in despair, wishing I had never been born,—shut up to the faith in Christ, or, as the Apostle hath it, “unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed' (Gal. 3:23). "In this perplexed state of mind I went to Bacup, and heard Mr. Hurst preach from Isaiah 45:22: 'Look unto Me,…
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The Life And Ministry Of Isaac Lewis
Mr. Lewis was born at Burnham, in Essex, on August 13th, 1823, of gracious parents, his mother dying when he was eight years old. In his young days his life was several times preserved in times of danger, but he grew up, as he said, “’like a wild ass's colt,' hardened to everything that was good, and greedily running after evil;" and eventually, with two other boys, he ran away from home and took to a seafaring life on board a man-of-war, where he continued for nearly four years. After he was paid off from the ship he gave full bent to the propensities of his evil heart, much to the grief of his godly father, who adopted the language of David, "Oh, Isaac, my…
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The Life And Death Of John Warburton
The lamented death of our dear friend, John Warburton, will lead our readers to feel an especial interest in the portrait and sketch which we give in this number. The father of our friend thus writes concerning the subject of this memoir, in his "Mercies of a Covenant God”:— "I shall now relate another sore trial that I passed through, which was one of the keenest I ever had in all my life, so much so that at times I felt as if my very heartstrings were breaking. It was respecting my son John, who is the youngest of ten children now living. I agreed with a person in Trowbridge, who was a tailor, to teach him the business, to whom he went for a…
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The Life And Testimony Of John Warburton
John Warburton (1776-1857) was a link between two generations, for in the early years of his ministry he was encouraged by William Huntington and afterwards became the friend of Joseph Charles Philpot, whom he baptized at Allington in 1835. Of him Mr. Philpot says: "I have heard Mr. Gadsby preach as great, perhaps greater sermons, but I never met with a minister whose prayer in the pulpit, or whose conversation out of it, was so weighty. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, have borne witness to the power and savour which rested upon his testimony; but the blessing he has been made to the Church of God will never be fully known until the day when the secrets of all hearts shall be revealed." Rochdale and Trowbridge were…
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The Life And Testimony Of Mrs. John Grace
Almost with the ushering in of the new year the work of death was renewed among our friends, and one known, by report at least, to many of our readers, and much loved by a wide circle of godly friends, was called to her eternal home and rest, after some years of affliction and suffering. We refer to the widow of the late Mr. John Grace, minister, of Brighton, a man of blessed memory in the Church of Christ. Mrs. Grace had for some time been almost wholly confined to the house through the increasing severity of her complaint, bronchitis, and during the last few weeks of 1879 she was compelled to keep her room, and finally her bed, which she did not again leave…
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The Life And Testimony Of Anne Steele
Miss Steele was the descendant of a family who had inhabited for many years the village of Broughton, Hampshire, her father and ancestors being pastors of the Calvinistic Baptist congregation in that town, the foundation of which dates back to the time of the Commonwealth. One, Mr. Henry Steele, was ordained to the pastoral office in the year 1699, which office he held for forty years. He was very popular, and greatly beloved by many of the inhabitants of Broughton, so that on an episcopal visitation the clergyman complained to the Bishop that his parochial province was sadly invaded by the Dissenter. "How can I best oppose him?” was his query to the Bishop, the celebrated and godly Gilbert Burnett. "Go home,'' said the wise…
