Fodder for hard times

SEARCHING OUR HEARTS IN DIFFICULT TIMES
By John Owen
Banner of Truth. 160 pages. £5.00
ISBN 978 1 848 718 814

Though John Owen lived in a different era, he grappled with a pertinent topic. Speaking later in his life, he addressed those painfully familiar with ‘hard times, perilous times, difficult times, those of public plague when death lies at every door’.

Yet, even in the sharp shadow of the great plague, the great fire and mass riots, Owen holds that ‘departing from the wellspring of life is … the most prevalent plague of our age.’

A punchy series of questions cutting to the heart of our faith forms the largest section of the book, ‘Searching our hearts’. As Owen refreshes the world-weary Christian in the gospel of grace, he is of full helpful distinctions which direct spiritual health and wellbeing. Since ‘grace will change the nature of the wolf,’ it will also bring ‘a constant counterworking of the inclinations that arise from our constitutions’.

If you haven’t encountered Puritan sermons before, you may not be familiar with the many short divisions and sections. The book retains this format, and also captures the inspirational warmth of Owen’s tone, whilst elegantly simplifying his famously complex writing style. As such, this work lends itself easily to be used in short bursts as quiet-time fodder.

An analysis of ‘difficult and dangerous times’ in a single, longer sermon, forms the second section, much of it a necessary warning against complacency. Owen leads us to mourn this before God and be renewed in our zeal for the truth.

Hope for renewal fuels the four short sermons on ‘living by faith in difficult times’ in the final section. He believes difficult times are a sign of spiritual decline and calls us to have faith in the faithfulness of Christ.