Journal: Puritan Reformed Journal
Volume: PRJ 05:2 (Jul 2013)
Article: Ready To Receive: Humbling And Softening In William Perkins’s Preparation Of The Heart
Author: J. Stephen Yuille

PRJ 5:2 (July 2013) p. 91

Ready To Receive:
Humbling And Softening In William Perkins’s Preparation Of The Heart

J. Stephen Yuille

William Perkins (1558-1602) was born in the village of Marston Jabbett in Bulkington parish, Warwickshire.1 Very little is recorded of him until 1577, when he enrolled at Christ’s College, Cambridge. As a student he quickly made a name for himself, but not for the reasons we might expect. By his own admission, he was given to recklessness and drunkenness. Compounded by his interest in witchcraft,2 his spiritual state was desperate. But God soon began to work in his heart, producing conviction for sin. Before long, Perkins turned to Christ, the Savior of sinners. After his conversion, he devoted himself to his studies, receiving his B.A. in 1581 and M.A. in 1584. After graduation, he was appointed lecturer at St. Andrew’s Church—a position he held until his death. Around the time of this appointment, he was also elected to a fellowship at Christ’s College. During the next decade, his reputation as a teacher was unrivalled. When Thomas Goodwin enrolled at Cambridge in 1613—a full ten years after Perkins’s death—he could write, “The town was then filled with the discourse of the power of Mr. Perkins’s ministry, still fresh in most men’s memories.”3

PRJ 5:2 (July 2013) p. 92

In the words of Ian Breward, what makes Perkins “so important is that by the end of the sixteenth century his writings had begun to displace those of Calvin, Beza, and Bullinger.”4 The popularity of his writings makes him pivotal to the development of Puritanism on both sides of the Atlantic—a movement that has profoundly shaped Christianity in the West.5 The focus of this essay is Perkins’s view of how God works faith in the heart. Perkins sees God’s involvement as consisting in two key steps. First, God “prepareth the heart that it may be acceptable of faith.” Second, God “causeth faith by little and little to spring and to breed in the heart.”6

Preparation For Faith

According to Perkins, God prepares the heart for faith by “humbling and softening” it.7 That is to say, God convinces us of our ailment (sin) so that we are prepared to embrace His remedy (Christ). For Perkins, God employs four chief means by which He brings the heart into this state of readiness.8

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