Dale Johnson: I am thrilled to have with me on this first day of our conference in Fort Worth, Texas, “Ancient Paths, Soul Care in Past Places. I’m delighted to have with me Dr. Stephen Yule. He’s married to Allison. They have two daughters, two grandsons.” Dr. Yuille is the director of Puritan Publishing at Reformation Heritage Books. He also serves as pastor at Fairview Covenant Church in Granbury, Texas, and as professor of Church History at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Stephen was my pastor when I was a professor at Southwestern. I’m so delighted to have this brother with me. He’s going to be speaking at our conference along with Joel Beeke and Sinclair Ferguson, and we’re really looking forward to talking about the Puritans and the things that they have to offer. Our task today, Stephen, is to talk about Puritan Treasures For Today. I’m so excited and delighted to introduce our listeners to a series of books that you guys are doing at Reformation Heritage Books on this topic, Puritan Treasures For Today.
First place to start, as I welcome you here, is who are the Puritans?
Stephen Yuille: Great question. That indeed is the place to start. When we speak of the Puritans, we are thinking of a movement in the late 1500s into the 1600s in England, and a movement that encompasses a few different branches. There is something of an ecclesiastical emphasis to it. Those within the Church of England who wanted to reform the Church, bring it into greater conformity with Scripture, and so they were dubbed Puritans. Those who wanted to purify the Church, get rid of some of the ceremonies, weren’t thrilled with everything in the Book of Common Prayer. And then at times it has something of a theological connotation. You know, the 39 Articles is a reformed confession of faith. There was a movement away from that in the 1620s. And then those pastors, scholars, theologians who wanted it to remain true, particularly to Article 17, they were dismissed as, well, crazy Puritans. And then the word has a third connotation, and this is the one that really interests us. This is the one that excites me and is of most relevance today. It is used to describe a movement in what we would call spirituality or godliness. Same time period, it included most of the same men, really this emphasis on what we call experiential religion. What does it look like to know Christ and Him crucified? What does it look like to know the power of His resurrection?
What does it look like to experience God’s grace in every conceivable area of life? They were answering that from Scripture, through the lens of Scripture, rooted in reformed theology, but very just dissatisfied with the prevailing approach to godliness and understanding of the Christian life. Very much committed to, then, this experience of God’s grace as manifested in repentance and obedience and perseverance and patience and endurance, and this understanding of godliness that then encompasses every facet of life. And by their enemies, their opponents, they were dismissed as Puritans. And so when we think of Puritanism, I would encourage our listeners to think of that third category. And this is, you know, when you hear the word Puritan being used today in our circles, and you hear names like Thomas Watson and Thomas Manson and John Flavel, that’s typically what people have in view. It is this approach to the Christian life, this approach to godliness rooted in this conviction that intellectual knowledge is not enough. There must be an affective, a heartfelt appropriation of God’s truth. That’s what they were all about. I think that’s what resonates with us today. And when I’m using the word Puritan, that’s typically what I have in view.
Dale Johnson: So helpful. And what you guys are doing at Reformation Heritage Books, I am so appreciative of, particularly with the series, Puritan Treasures For Today. I’ve benefited. I think you guys, at this point, have 16 volumes out. You’re working on more. The most recent one that I’ve finished reading is Vanity of Thoughts by Thomas Goodwin. But so many of these in the series have blessed me personally. The Blessed and Boundless God by Swinnock, we’ve given away at conferences. Stop Loving the Flesh by William Greenhill has been one that’s particularly helpful to me. The Fading of the Flesh by Swinnock as well. John Flavel’s Triumphing Over Sinful Fear. All of these books have been so helpful and clarifying, encouraging in the ways in which they think about Scripture, how they exegete Scripture, how they categorize in meaningful ways some of the concepts that we as biblical counselors wrestle with all the time. So I want you to talk about the uniqueness of this particular series that you guys are working on and building upon as time moves forward.
Stephen Yuille: I appreciate that. This is, you know, I really appreciate the opportunity to speak to this. I think it’s really important. I mean, this series, Puritan Treasures For Today, it’s been around for, oh, 10, 11, 12, 13 years. I’ve lost track. And in that time, yes, we have 16, 17 volumes out. So we may be a little more than one a year. And these are books that are smaller in size, identified as practical in emphasis and useful, essential for God’s people. Over the past year at Reformation Heritage Books, we’ve been going through a little bit of a transition, still very much committed to this Reformed experiential theology, very much committed to publishing the best of Reformed experiential theology, wherever it’s found over the past four or 500 years, but really placing the onus on the Puritans and really centering again on this series, Puritan Treasures for today, with a goal, beginning in November, of actually publishing one a month. So you think, you know, 16, 17 over the past 15 years, we’re now going to start turning out one a month. And just this conviction we have that this is for this moment and what God’s people need, not just here in North America, but around the world. And so when we think of this series, Puritan Treasures for today, the Puritans, they have this conviction that everything is rooted in the cultivation of faith and faith in the Lord Jesus. Well, how is that done? They believe it’s done primarily through biblical meditation and meditating and appropriating God’s Word. Well, how is that done? They speak quite frequently. Thomas Manton, in particular, uses this phrase a lot. They speak of lively truths. And by those lively truths, they mean primarily the glory of God. I mean, I would really encourage our listeners to think through this lively truths, the glory of God, the severity of sin, the beauty of Christ, the mystery of providence, and the certainty of glory. Now, let me repeat those. The glory of God, the severity of sin, the beauty of Christ, the mystery of providence, and the certainty of glory. And they’re convinced that those five lively truths must occupy our thoughts with regularity. And we need clarity when it comes to what the Bible says about those five. And we need hearts that are engaged, whereby these truths, central to the Christian faith, become lively. They actually resonate within us, and they stir the three chief Christian graces, which are faith, hope, and love. And there is the key to confronting sin. There is the key to persevering amid trials and afflictions and unspeakable suffering. There is the key for enduring opposition and persecution. And so this is the paradigm they’re working with. It’s the paradigm we’ve tapped into, and it’s what we want to emphasize moving forward, is giving people the best of the Puritans, especially as it relates to those five categories. And then coupled with, well, how did they meditate? How did they pray? How did they worship? And then how did they speak to specific issues, such as fear and anger, contentment and perseverance and repentance?
And just give them this composite picture of the Christian life and the pursuit of godliness. But doing it in such a way—I’m rambling here, Dale, you just cut me off whenever—doing it in such a way that they’re accessible. So we’re taking some liberty when it comes to not only editing these works, but abridging them, because we want them to be readable and we want them to be beautiful. And so formatting them, moving forward in terms of sort of that range of 30, 35, 40 chapters, four or five pages each, so people can sit down, read one of these books for their devotions over a month or two, and meditate upon these truths and Scripture as they’re going through these books and glean from them. And so we want it to have that kind of feel and accessibility. And then what I’m really excited about is we have, I can’t remember how many agreements, I think we’re in the 30s in terms of translating these books, languages worldwide, because we want to get this message, we want to go global. And not because we want people to get all excited about the Puritans, but because we want God’s people to get excited about this emphasis as it relates to the Christian life, what it means to follow the Lord Jesus, and what we perceive to be just such a helpful approach, this emphasis on these five lively truths as then engaging the key Christian graces as then the impetus for living all of life for God’s glory. So, there’s a little bit of what’s going on at RHB, why I’m so excited, and I just think in terms of ACBC biblical counseling, the points of application are countless.
Dale Johnson: I’m sitting over here thinking this series up to this point has been so helpful personally to me. I use some of the concepts so often in the counseling room as I’m teaching, even personally in my own life as I wrestle with the world, the flesh and the devil. And you just said that you guys are going to now release one a month, and I’m thinking how in the world am I going to rearrange lunch money to be able to pick up these books as they come out? So I’m super excited about this, and as I think about our folks with ACBC and biblical counselors even around the world, these are exciting tools because, as you mentioned, this is not old crusty intellectual theology. It does challenge the mind, but by the same token, it is interconnected to how we live, and they believe that any truth that was worth believing was worth putting into practice in how they lived. And so I want you to take just a second and talk about why biblical counselors should think about this series and make this series essential reading for their preparation and their encouragement. I think it’s all in the book titles.
Stephen Yuille It really is. I mean, you think of what’s already there, Triumphing Over Sinful Fear. I mean, that is inescapable. It’s everywhere. In a counseling context, it arises time and time again. Dealing with unjust anger, the root of anger and malice and bitterness. You referenced the vanity of thoughts earlier, and so just those titles. And then in terms of what’s coming from November of this year, I mean, just thinking of six months out from there, in November, Thomas Manton, Holy Meditation. He is going to explain how we meditate on God’s Word and get the most of it. So how useful that is for biblical counseling when you think in terms of homework, and what to emphasize, and how to do so in a way that bridges the gap between head and heart.
And then lined up in December, Obadiah Sedgwick, God’s Special Providence for Anxious Souls. Just the title, and that should just resonate with people immediately how useful that can be. Into the new year, William Perkins, The Way of Repentance, and what repentance really looks like, how we cultivate it in our lives. Another one from William Perkins, Living and Dying Well. If you want to die well, you better live well. And the key to living well is to prepare to die well. What does that mean? What does that look like? Especially in our day and age where we typically, in polite circles, don’t talk about death. We have sequestered it, the entire experience. Not so 400 years ago. It was a daily reality. And what does it mean to live life knowing death is coming and preparing for it accordingly? I mean, that’s invaluable. And then moving on from Perkins, we have Thomas Manton again, A Blessed Hope. And so the hope of glory. And what it is to live life with our eyes fixed on what is coming, whereby we make that future hope a present reality, whereby it shapes our dreams, our values, our expectations, our perspectives, and it shapes how we react in a godly manner, a biblical manner to circumstances way beyond our control and often beyond our understanding. And I could go on and on, but just the titles themselves, they speak to issues we deal with daily in our own lives and issues that arise consistently in a discipleship counseling context. And so what a rich resource to be able to tap into these books penned by authors, unsullied by everything that’s gone on the last couple hundred years in terms of all theologies, and just immersed in Scripture, sound, orthodox theologically, and yet great physicians of the soul in terms of penetrating insight and application. Yet, I think that just speaks for itself.
Dale Johnson: I’m excited as we think about the volumes that are coming out, but there are 16 that are out currently. And if somebody is going to pick up one of these books and say, you know, I’m not sure where to start, help them to know, is there a particular order in the series? Maybe I should read this one first and work my way up, or how should we approach the series?
Stephen Yuille: I mean, everyone is different, right? And everyone’s coming at it from different background, training, and familiarity with the Puritans and some of the content. But generally speaking, I encourage people to begin with George Swinnock’s The Blessed and Boundless God, because ultimately that is everything. God, who He is, and finding our delight in Him. What it means to take God as our portion, right? You think of the nation of Israel, the apportion, the land, and the psalmist’s celebration, you know, the lot has fallen to me. I have a pleasant portion. And what it means to take God as our happiness when He takes us as His people, as His possession. I think that’s the place to begin. And then from there, William Perkins, A Perfect Redeemer. Because in George Swinnock, The Blessed and Boundless God, you have the nature of God, the essence of God. And then with William Perkins, A Perfect Redeemer, you move to the incarnation and Christ person and work. But what it really means to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. That is a tremendous work, because also in our own lives, and as we seek to be used of the Lord in the lives of others, ultimately we’re pointing them to Christ. Well, we need to know who he is and how we are to do that. So those are the two I encourage people to start with. And then from there, it’s really just a question of interest. I mean, you can go to Jeremiah Burroughs, his work on prosperity and contentment. Yes, Flavel overcoming fear. David Clarkson on the importance of public worship. It really then just becomes a question of, oh, what am I interested in? What am I dealing with presently? Where do perhaps I need help? And you can go to any of those volumes and derive immediate benefit from them.
Dale Johnson: I’ve given away several individual copies. I’ve given away a couple of the whole series. I mean, it has been that impactful to me personally. I’m so grateful for you and Dr. Beeke and the vision that you guys have at Reformation Heritage Books. And we’re delighted to partner with you guys at ACBC. Everyone at the conference will receive one of these, we’re going to give a couple of these series away at the conference, because I do think this would be so helpful. Helpful in our understanding of Scripture, how we think hermeneutically about the Bible, how we think about meditating and preparing as we minister the Word, as we grow in the Word ourselves. This series, I think, really encourages the touch points that we see so often in the counseling room. So grateful for your work, Dr. Yuille and Dr. Beeke as well. And pray it continues and the Lord blesses this project. So, thanks for telling us about it.
Stephen Yuille: I appreciate the opportunity.