Don Carson on the Puritans

"Their works are not infallible, and in terms of scholarly criticism and modern exegetical tools, their tomes are strangely dated. Nevertheless it is impossible to read them without feeling the fire burn within, without being humbled by their almost fantastic grasp of Scripture, of theology. Indeed, it is a little disturbing to testify how difficult it is to find areas in which the Puritans may be faulted. Such an apparent scarcity of defects is likely to reduce the credibility of a historical account. If God by matchless grace has worked to to produce an abundant fruit of superior quality in centuries past, let us lay on Him with the importunate cries of faith to perform in men once again the good work done in those whom history dubs "the Puritans".

D A Carson - "THE PURITANS: WHAT THEY HAVE THAT THE MODERNS HAVE NOT" - Northwest Journal of Theology 1 (1972): 75–92.

Dr Lloyd-Jones on Obsession with Orthodoxy

"Is there not a real danger of our becoming guilty of a very subtle form of Arminianism if we maintain that correct doctrine and understanding are essential to our being used by the Spirit of God ... I said that John Wesley was to me the greatest proof of Calvinism. Why? Because in spite of his faulty thinking he was greatly used of God to ptreach the gospel and convert souls.! That is the greatest proof of Calvinism, predestination and election".

Dr Lloyd-Jones - "The Puritans: Their Origins and Successors" - Banner of Truth Trust, Edinburgh (1991) - (p297).

J C Ryle on the Puritan's Writing

"Their works still speak for them on the shelves of every well-furnished theological library".

J C Ryle - "Foreword to the Works of Thomas Manton" - Volume 2: pxi - cited in Beeke, Joel R and Pederson R J - "Meet the Puritans" - Reformation Heritage Books (2oo6) - (p2).

Joel Beeke on the Puritans and Writing

"Although Puritans were barred from the pulpits and universities, the repressive measures could not silence their pens".

Beeke, Joel R and Pederson R J - "Meet the Puritans" - Reformation Heritage Books (2oo6) - (p9).

R T Kendall on Balance in Doctrine and Experience

"If it is true that if our doctrine of salvation is not accused or being antinomian, it is likely we have not really preached justification, then I think it is also true that if our doctrine of the immediate witness of the Spirit is not accused of being charismatic, we probably have not really held to a robust doctrine of the Spirit".

Dr R T Kendall - "John Cotton - First English Calvinist?" - in "Puritan Experiment in the New World" - Westminster Conference Papers - (1976).

Joel Beeke on Joseph Caryl's Works on Job

"Caryl's work on Job had been called the crown jewels of Puritan preaching".

Joel Beeke and Randall J Pederson - "Meet the Puritans" - RHB, Grand Rapids, Michigan (2006) - (p136).

Joel Beeke on Defining Puritanism

"Doctrinally Puritanism was a kind of vigorous Calvinism; experientially it was warm and contagious, evangelistically it was aggressive yet tender, ecclesiastically it was theocentric and worshipful, politically it aimed to be scripturally balanced and bound by conscience before God in the relations of kings, Parliament and subjects".

Joel R Beeke and Randall J Pederson - "Meet the Puritans" - RHB, Grand Rapids, Michigan (2006) - (pxviii).

J I Packer on a Needed Revival of Puritanism

"Churches and Christians today are sadly Laodicean; complacent, somnolent, shallow, stuffy. We need reviving. What to do? Opening the windows of our souls to let in a breath of fresh air from the seventeenth century would, I suggest be the wisest possible course".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p106).

J I Packer on Puritan Writing

"Puritan analytical method accounts for the length of Puritan expositions - Joseph Caryl's 6000 pages on Job; 2000 plus in folio on Hebrews from John Owen, Hildersham's 152 sermons on Psalm 51:7, over 800 pages of small print in William Gurnall's treatment of Ephesians 6:10-20 ... What led the Puritans into such long-windedness was their passion for throughness in extracting all doctrines and developing all applications.

Clearly once they started drawing out implications and applications they found it hard to stop. Yet their variety of matter is great, repetition is minimal, the sense that they begin in the middle rather than at the beginning is soon overcome and interest once gained does not fade".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p95).

J I Packer on Defining a Spiritual Gift

"A spiritual gift is an ability, divinely bestowed and sustained to grasp and express the realities of the spiritual world and the knowledge of God in Christ for the edifying of both others and oneself".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p296).

John Owen on the Gifts of the Holy Spirit

"By these gifts doth the Lord Christ demonstrate His power and exercise His rule".

John Owen - "Works of John Owen" - Volume 13 - Banner of Truth, Edinburgh, (p426).

J I Packer on the Gifts of the Holy Spirit

"Gifts of the Spirit are Christ's sole weapons for setting up, extending and maintaining His Kingdom".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p294).

J I Packer on John Owen and the Gifts of the Spirit

"It is clear that were Owen with us today he would be urging us to seek a recovery of 'every member ministry' through a renewed quest for the best gifts of the Holy Spirit".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p293).

J I Packer on the Puritans and Communion with God

"In private they talked freely of their experiences of God, for they had deep experiences to talk about it".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p283).

J I Packer on the Puritans and Communion with God

"We cannot but conclude that whereas to the Puritans communion with Godwas a great thing, to evangelicals today it is a comparatively small thing. The Puritans were concerned about communion with God in a way that we are not ... when Christians meet, they talk to each other ... but rarely of their daily experience of God".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p282).

John Owen on the Song of Solomon

"He is white in the glory of His deity and ruddy in the preciousness of His humanity".

John Owen - "Works of John Owen" - Volume 2 - Banner of Truth, Edinburgh - (p49).

John Owen on the Gospel

"Christ's great undertaking in His life, death, resurrection, ascension, being a mediator bewteen God and us ... to bring us to an enjoyment of God".

John Owen - "Works of John Owen" - Volume 2 - Banner of Truth, Edinburgh - (p78)

John Owen on the Gospel

"Let faith look on Christ in the gospel as He is set forth dying and crucified for us. Look on Him under the weight of our sins, praying, bleeding; bring Him in that condition into the heart by faith; apply His blood so shed to thy corruptions. Do this daily".

John Owen - "Works of John Owen" - Volume 6 - Banner of Truth, Edinburgh - (p85)

J I Packer on Prayer and Mortification

"The activity by which the Christian directly secures the mortification of his sins is prayer".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p263).

J I Packer on John Owen

"Owen did not write for superficial readers. He wrote rather for those who, once they take up a subject cannot rest until they see to the bottom of it and who find exhaustiveness not exhausting but satisfying and refreshing".

J I Packer - "Among God's Giants" - Kingsway (1993) - (p253).