Journal: Southern Baptist Journal of Theology
Volume: SBJT 25:1 (Spring 2021)
Article: Remembering Baptist Heroes: The Example Of John Gill
Author: Michael A. G. Haykin

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Remembering Baptist Heroes: The Example Of John Gill

Michael A. G. Haykin

Michael A. G. Haykin is Professor and Chair of Church History at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky, and Director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies, located at Southern Seminary. He is also on the core faculty of Heritage Seminary, Cambridge, Ontario, where he is Professor of Church History. He also serves as the Director of Newton House, Oxford, the theological research center of Union School of Theology, Oxford and South Wales. Dr. Haykin is the author of many books, including “At the Pure Fountain of Thy Word”: Andrew Fuller As an Apologist (Paternoster Press, 2004), Jonathan Edwards: The Holy Spirit in Revival (Evangelical Press, 2005), The God Who Draws Near: An Introduction to Biblical Spirituality (Evangelical Press, 2007), Rediscovering the Church Fathers: Who They Were and How They Shaped the Church (Crossway, 2011), Patrick of Ireland: His Life and Impact (Christian Focus, 2014), and Reading Andrew Fuller (H&E, 2020).

Should Christians have heroes? It is very tempting in an age besotted with celebrities from the realms of entertainment and sport to answer this question with a resounding no, were it not for one fact—the Scriptures speak otherwise. The Bible is filled with narratives that are designed, among other things, to display patterns of life to emulate and ways of behavior to avoid.1 The author of the letter to the Hebrews, for example, has a lengthy section of his work devoted to past heroes of the faith—what we know as Hebrews 11—that calls upon the original readers to live wholeheartedly for God by encouraging them through the lives of past saints who were faithful to God through thick and thin.2 And in Hebrews 13:7 the readers are urged to

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“remember” those who originally spoke the Word of God to them. They are to do this by spending time reflecting on aspects of these leaders’ lives so that they might imitate their faith-filled character.3 As John Piper has noted by way of this verse, “God ordains that we gaze on his glory, dimly mirrored in the ministry of his flawed servants. He intends for us to consider their lives and peer through the imperfections of their faith and behold the beauty of their God.”4 Hebrews 13:7 is thus nothing less than an exhortation to read church history th...