Category: On This Day

Today (December 5) is the birthday of Christina Rossetti (1830-1894). Rossetti is remembered these days for the Christmas lyric “In the Bleak Midwinter,” the long, strange, poem Goblin Market which launched a thousand knowing dissertations, and charming, harmless children’s verse like “Hurt no living thing:Ladybird, nor butterfly.” But Rossetti also wrote a devotional commentary on…

Today (December 4) is the birthday of John Cotton (1585-1652), a Puritan pastor with a ministry in both Bostons: The Boston in Lincolnshire, England, and later the Boston in New England. He was an accomplished Cambridge University man (graduate of Trinity, fellow of Emmanuel) whose theological opinions were consistently moving in a more Puritan direction…

Today (December 2) is the anniversary of the death of Jan van Ruusbroec, also called John of Ruysbroeck (1293-1381), a 14th-century Flemish mystical writer whose work is often considered a high point of medieval Christian mysticism. In a 1984 lecture in Kentucky, Louis Dupre called him “Western Christianity’s most articulate interpreter of the trinitarian mystical…

Today (November 29) is the birthday of C. S. Lewis (1898-1963), the professor of English who just wanted to be left alone with his books and his handful of bookish friends. But he turned out to have a headful of exactly what the world needed: Christian faith that ran deep, that embraced the whole world…

Today (November 28) is the birthday of John Bunyan (1628-1688). Most famous for his Pilgrim’s Progress, Bunyan also authored a number of theological and devotional works of lasting value. They all have that Bunyan charm: The fluency with Scripture, the lightning-quick associative leaps, the natural vigor, the homespun power of the English language. If you…

Robert Lowth (1710-1787) was born this day, November 27. Lowth (his name rhymes with south) was Bishop of Oxford and later London. He was best known his works on Biblical poetry and English grammar. In the 1740’s he delivered a series of lectures at Oxford that were published in 1753 as De sacra poesi Hebraeorum…

Today (November 26) is the birthday of English hymn writer William Cowper (1731 – 1800), who collaborated with John Newton on the collection called Olney Hymns. The most famous of the Olney Hymns is of course Newton’s Amazing Grace. Newton also wrote the lion’s share of the hymns in the collection. Newton could out-produce, out-promote,…

Today (November 7) is the birthday of Billy Graham, born in 1918. When you look back over the turbulent twentieth century, the ministry of Billy Graham stands out as remarkably steady and consistent. Compared to the fates of other prominent evangelists who stood in the spotlight through these long and perplexing decades, it’s tempting to…

Today (Nov. 5) is the day when Benjamin Breckenridge Warfield (1851 – 1921) was born. The title of “America’s Greatest Theologian” is pretty universally ceded to Jonathan Edwards, and after him there is a tight race for “Second Greatest.” In my opinion, Warfield is a contender for that second slot. He even edges out fellow…

Today (November 4) is the birthday of Augustus Montague Toplady (1740-1778), the Anglican clergyman who wrote “Rock of Ages,” one of the greatest English hymns ever. The hymn was first published in March 1776 in the magazine of which Toplady was editor, the Gospel Magazine. It was appended to an article about that most unedifying…