Issue 31 - 31/05/2007

 

Welcome to the latest edition of Kevin's Outpost. With this issue you will find quite a lot of new content added to the particularbaptist.com site. In fact, there has been quite a bit of work done at the site recently, with plenty of new content and improvements.

A couple of the pages have a few hymns playing now, including 'Rock of Ages' and 'Be Thou My Vision.' Excessive amounts of sound can be annoying on web sites, however, I don't think these are two bad and they end after only being played once.

I've been really enjoying the Random Thoughts Blog which is mentioned later in this issue. I jumped on the Blog bandwagon fairly early in the piece, but never really put much online with my Blog sites. I've changed that now and I'm pretty much adding at least one entry every day to the Random Thoughts Blog.

Perhaps you would like to start a Blog ~ if so, visit my Blog page on the site (different to Random Thoughts), where there is a link to a site that gives free web pages to Reformed people. Have a go, you'll enjoy it soon enough.

Enjoy the issue.

 

CONTENTS:

 

RECENT ADDITIONS TO particularbaptist.com:

This is a new section of Kevin's Outpost. What I intend to do here is add links to recently added articles and books to particularbaptist.com. It will make finding new content on the site a little easier. Not all of the works will be completed, but there will be comments to indicate if they are not. Content featuring in a current edition of Kevin's Outpost will not be included (they will feature elsewhere in the ezine).

Recent Additions are:

 

KEVIN'S FAMILY - HISTORY SITE:

The 'Kevin's Family - Online History Site' is in the process of being moved over to this site. There is a wealth of information available at the site, with quite a lot of historical content becoming available there. There is Australian history, American history, English history, etc. So why not have a look at the site ~ not all of the family photos are available just yet, but they will be eventually.

Visit the site at:
http://particularbaptist.com/matthewshistory/index.html

Recently added to the site have been the following works:

 

MINISTRY OF THE HOME:
Octavius Winslow

The law is a mirror to reflect our sinfulness, and not a laver to cleanse our guilt. Looking into this holy and perfect law, we see our true image as sinners- but, washing in the atoning blood of Jesus, we are cleansed from all sin. Joshua, therefore, signifies Jesus, because he temporally saved the children of Israel by conducting them fully into Canaan; and so it was said of our blessed Savior, "His name shall be called JESUS, for He shall SAVE His People from their sins.

But, in addition to his civil relation to the Church of God, Joshua filled the sacred office of a Christian minister; he was, as it were, a priest over his own house, and hence it was a pious house. It was here, amid its hallowed influences, doubtless, that his personal piety was nourished, his religious character was nurtured, and his spirit was trained and encouraged to undertake and achieve great things for God and for His Church.

He lived in degenerate times - amid much laxity of morals and religious declension, against which he was enabled, by the grace of God, to oppose a powerful and decided resistance. The children of Israel were proud, vacillating, and rebellious. To them he addressed the solemn, searching words, "You cannot serve the Lord, for He is a holy God; He is a jealous God; He will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins. Put away the strange gods which are among you, and incline your hearts unto the Lord God of Israel." And then appealing to his own personal and solemn decision, he gave utterance to the noble sentiment of our text. Whatever religious declension might exist within the church, however the people of the land should pervert their ways, decline from the fear of the Most High, forsake His ordinances, and set up strange gods in their dwellings, and be so corrupt as to destroy their households, there yet can be one home consecrated to God, one sanctuary within which true piety should find a retreat - one safe asylum for real religion, one altar upon which should glow the fire of faith and virtue, of devotion and love to God ...

Full Book Available at:
http://www.particularbaptist.com/library/ministryofhome_contents_winslow.html

 

AUSSIE OUTPOST WEBSITE:

News at the Aussie Outpost:

 

ATTRACTION OF THE CROSS:
Gardiner Spring

We may be interested in the narrative of the cross; but what if it should turn out to be fiction? If it is a true narrative, what is its significance, and what are the truths it embodies? Men need a religion which satisfies their intelligence. We affirm that the cross furnishes such a religion; that it is the religion revealed from heaven; the only religion which possesses the attraction of truth and certainty, and in which the most skeptical may have immovable confidence. Religion may venture to more than chasten her faith with hope, and timidly trust that the word of the God of truth has not deceived her. She dwells by the well-spring of life, and draws from it the pure waters of salvation. If men may be certain of anything that is not the mere object of sense, they may put confidence in the truth of the cross. The topics on which it treats are grand and dreadful, as well as inexpressibly interesting and tender; but it has nothing to do with vague conjecture, studied mystery, profuse verbiage without meaning, or laborious trifling without intelligence and instruction. It is not a dim uncertainty that rests upon the views there acquired. They are clear and permanent convictions, because they are true. God approves them; and the Holy Spirit, the Author of truth and peace, gives them a stability and power which delusion and error can never originate.

The NARRATIVE OF THE CROSS IS ITSELF A TRUE NARRATIVE. This is a simple question of fact. Was there, or was there not, such a person as Jesus Christ, who, under the reign of Tiberius Caesar, was accused of treason and blasphemy, found guilty, and put to death? The most full and satisfactory account of this transaction is found in the writings of the four Evangelists; which, by the wonderful care of Divine Providence, after having been distinctly recognized from age to age as the works of those whose names they bear, and as the same uncorrupted works as when they came from the pen of their authors, and after having been circulated throughout the whole Christian world, have come down to us in all genuineness and authenticity. Their authors were either deceived, or deceivers, or honest and true men. They were not deceived, because the events which they narrate never could have been the creatures of imagination. The wildest enthusiast in the world could not have been the subject of such delusion, as to have believed them real, when they were unreal.

Nor were they deceivers. There is every consideration against such an hypothesis which can be furnished by the nature of the case, by their own character and history, and by their published writings. The events and circumstances of the crucifixion are such as never could have been got up by artful and designing men; much less by the illiterate fishermen of the lakes of Judea, who left their nets to announce them to the world. To an impartial mind, their narrative carries the evidence of its verity on the face of it. No impostor ever penned such an account as that in the closing chapters of the four Evangelists, furnishing, as each of them does, in the minuteness of his details, so many continually recurring means of detecting deception if any were practiced. While each narrator speaks for himself, and the variations in his narrative show that each wrote independently, and without any secret collusion with the others, each gives substantially the same account; and the seeming inconsistencies, just enough to test the sincerity and research of the reader, all disappear upon a careful inspection ...

Full Book Available at:
http://www.particularbaptist.com/library/AttractionofCross_GardinerSpring_contents.html

 

KEVIN'S PLACE:

A whole heap of information about my life and who I am can be found via a page I call Kevin's Place. From this page you can gain entrance into my Blog. There isn't a real lot there, but I'm trying to 'blog' more regularly these days - I just need to remember to do so.

Also on this page there are links to other things that interest me, as well as a link to Kevin's Library (which is a work in progress). Kevin's Library is all about my actual library - it may be of interest to fellow book lovers. I still have many hundreds of books to add to the list.

Also on the page are links to my 'family and friends' letters. They are generally 'mundane' in content, though I hope to be adding more 'spiritual' content to them in the future. They are currently in a transition stage, from what I used them for previously, to what they will now become.

Visit the page at:
http://www.particularbaptist.com/kevins/kevin.html 

 

DISTINGUISHING TRAITS OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER:
Gardiner Spring

In what consists those fruits of the Spirit which show plainly to ourselves and others that we are born of God? This inquiry is of the most practical kind as it brings every man to sit in judgment on his character. “Know yourself ” is an injunction which comes to us under the combined sanction, both of reason and revelation, and which, though not without difficulty in its impartial fulfillment, may and must be fulfilled if we would discharge our duty or enjoy the full measure of comfort which the religion of Jesus imparts. It must be conceded that men have no right to mistake their own moral character. There is a wide and essential difference between holy and unholy affections. God has given them all proper and necessary means to assist them in an acquaintance with their own hearts; He has expressly forbidden them to mistake “the nature of their religious affections and to deceive themselves in respect to their spiritual state; and it is impossible they should make the mistake unless they are under the influence of some selfish and sinful motive with which they have no right to comply. The Holy Spirit would not so often have urged the sentiment— “Do not be deceived,” “Let no man deceive himself,” “You know not what manner of spirit you are of,” “Examine yourselves whether you be in the faith; prove your own selves; know you are not your own selves?”—if there were any necessity for self-deception.

There are some things which neither prove nor disprove the existence of grace in the soul; there are others that prove the existence of it, and that may be safely relied on as furnishing conclusive testimony that we have passed from death unto life. It is no less important to examine the inconclusive than the conclusive testimony, and it is to the former that we solicit your attention for several of the earlier essays in this little volume.

There is no certain evidence that a man is the friend of God resulting from his visible morality. There is much apparent religion in the world which consists in mere visible morality. “Man looks on the outward appearance.” When you see a person of unblemished moral character you involuntarily adjudge him worthy of your esteem and confidence. There are such multitudes in this apostate world who are dishonest, idle, faithless, intemperate, unfriendly, and unkind, that when you meet a man who is honest, industrious, faithful to his promises, and punctual in his engagements, and who to these laudable qualities adds a friendly, humane, generous and amiable spirit and urbane demeanor, you are tempted to believe that such a man is a pattern of rectitude, and that there is no higher standard of excellence. It is quite natural that such a man should not only secure the esteem and confidence of his fellow men, but command his own. Though he may confess he is not so good as he ought to be, yet he is very apt to imagine himself much better than he really is. He cherishes a high degree of satisfaction in the contemplation of his own excellencies, if not of exultation, in the comparison of his own with those of the multitude around him ...

Full Book Available at:
http://www.particularbaptist.com/library/Distinguishing_GardinerSpring_contents.html 

 

KEVIN'S WILDERNESS JOURNEYS:

There has been some major progress in the migration of this site from previous hosts. Most of the photos associated with Kevin's Wilderness Journeys are now all located in the same location and easily accessible for all. If you are into wilderness, especially Australian wilderness, why not have a look at Kevin's Wilderness Journeys?

Visit Kevin's Wilderness Journeys at:
http://kevinswilderness.com/index.html

 

OF TRUE RELIGION, HERESY, SCHISM, TOLERATION; AND WHAT BEST MEANS MAY BE USED AGAINST THE GROWTH OF POPERY:
John Milton

IT IS unknown to no man, who knows aught of concernment among us, that the increase of popery is at this day no small trouble and offence to the greatest part of the nation; and the rejoicing of all good men that it is so. The more their rejoicing, that God hath given a heart to the people, to remember still their great and happy deliverance from popish thraldom, and to esteem so highly the precious benefit of His gospel, so freely and so peaceably enjoyed among them.  Since, therefore, some have already in public, with many considerable arguments, exhorted the people to beware the growth of this Romish weed, I thought it no less than a common duty to lend my hand, how unable soever, to so good a purpose.  I will not now enter into the labyrinth of councils and fathers, an entangled wood, which the papists love to fight in, not with hope of victory, but to obscure the shame of an open overthrow, which yet in that kind of combat many heretofore, and one of late, hath eminently given them.  And such manner of dispute with them to learned men is useful and very commendable.  But I shall insist now on what is plainer to common apprehension, and what I have to say without longer introduction.

True religion is the true worship and service of God, learned and believed from the Word of God only.  No man or angel can know how God would be worshipped and served unless God reveal it: He hath revealed and taught it us in the Holy Scriptures by inspired ministers, and in the gospel by His own Son and His apostles, with strictest command, to reject all other traditions or additions whatsoever: according to that of St Paul: ‘Though we or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be anathema, or accursed.’  And Deut. iv. 2: ‘Ye shall not add to the word which I command you, neither shall you diminish aught from it.’ Rev. xxii. 18, 19: ‘If any man shall add, etc.  If any man shall take away from the words,’ etc.  With good and religious reason, therefore, all Protestant churches with one consent, and particularly the Church of England in her thirty-nine articles, article 6th, 19th, 20th, 21st, and elsewhere, maintain these two points as the main principles of true religion—that the rule of true religion is the Word of God only; and that their faith ought not to be an implicit faith, that is, to believe, as the church believes against or without express authority of Scripture.  And if all Protestants, as universally as they hold these two principles, so attentively and religiously would observe them, they would avoid and cut off many debates and contentions, schisms, and persecutions, which too oft have been among them, and more firmly unite against the common adversary.  For hence it directly follows, that no true Protestant can persecute, or not tolerate, his fellow-Protestant, though dissenting from him in some opinions, but he must flatly deny and renounce these two his own main principles, whereon true religion is founded; while he compels his brother from that which he believes as the manifest word of God, to an implicit faith (which he himself condemns) to the endangering of his brother’s soul, whether by rash belief, or outward conformity: for ‘whatsoever is not of faith is sin.’ ...

Full Article Available at:
http://www.particularbaptist.com/library/2007_0531_popery_milton.html 

 

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31/05/2007

AN OUTPOST PRODUCTION