Dr. Robert Sumner passed away in December 2016. The Biblical Evangelist newspaper is no longer being published and the ministry of Biblical Evangelism has ceased operation.

The remaining inventory of his books and gospel tracts was transferred to The Baptist Tabernacle of Los Angeles and may be ordered here.

A PURITAN SPEAKS TO OUR DYING NATION
by R. L. Hymers, Jr.

A PURITAN SPEAKS TO OUR DYING NATION by R. L. Hymers, Jr.; Hearthstone Publishing Co, Oklahoma City, OK; 12 Chapters, 122 Pages; $15.95, Paper

This is a valuable addition to Fundamentalist/Evangelical literature. One of the first books we purchased as a young preacher was the tome by Puritan Richard Baxter (1615-1691) known as, A Call to the Unconverted. We knew nothing of Baxter at the time, but any call to the lost sounded good to us and we bought it at a secondhand store. Alas, the old style English was a hindrance to our full enjoyment of the volume.

What Hymers has done is to take the heart of Baxter’s Call (he wrote it in 1657, nearly 350 years ago) and put it into modern English, adding a few of his own notes and comments as he goes along. When a liberal is quoted favorably, as in Leonard Ravenhill’s quote of Elton Trueblood for example, Hymers notes that he is a liberal.

Baxter rejected, as we do, what is known in our day as “decision salvation” (make a profession and “you are on your way to Heaven”), insisting on heartfelt repentance and faith in Christ. His 7th chapter, showing the fruit of real conversion, we considered one of his best and his real “call” in chapter 8 is a masterpiece. Chapter 9 is a strong warning about neglecting the means God uses to reach the lost, such as church attendance when His Word is being preached, and chapters 10-12 deal strongly with hindrances to conversion. You might say that for this reviewer, the book got better the farther along Baxter went.

The old English of Baxter was used by God to convert multitudes in days gone by. There is no reason to doubt that Baxter’s work in modern English won’t do the same. Get it and share it with “the unconverted.”

This is an outstanding book and it has our enthusiastic, wholehearted recommendation!

[Note: We are publishing Chapter 8, with Dr. Hymers’ permission, in this issue. It should whet your appetite for the whole.]