The Magazine Podcast

What is the proper relationship between a preacher and his books? How can a minister prioritise the most helpful kinds of reading and study?  These and other questions were addressed by the Rev Iain H Murray in his address to the Bethlehem Pastors' Conference in early 1996. We read part of his address this week.    Resource read:  Iain H. Murray, 'The Preacher and Books,' Banner of Truth Magazine Issue 389 (February 1996).    Similar resources:  The Pastor and His Study    Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

We were saddened to hear of the recent death of Paul Helm (1940–2025). Paul, who is perhaps best known for his work in philosophical theology, has had a long and fruitful association with the Banner of Truth.  Daniel J. Hill, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Liverpool, has written a tribute to Paul. We are grateful to Dr Hill for reading it for us on the podcast.    Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

J. Gresham Machen (1881–1937) is noted for his earnest and powerful contending for the truth of the Bible and of the historic Christian faith in the early part of the Twentieth Century. Early on in his life, however, he almost fell prey to the liberalism that was sweeping through the seminaries and churches of the Western world. This encounter with liberalism, and the grace of God in preserving him from it, set him in good stead to warn others of its dangers.  This week, with the help of Nick Needham, we delve deeper into the story of J. Gresham Machen, a man whose courage and love of the truth we desperately need today.    Featured Resource:  – Nick Needham, 'Shapers of Christianity: J. Gresham Machen (1881–1937),' Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 713 (February 2023).    Read more like this:  Nick Needham, Shapers of Christianity (paperback, 112 pages)   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

In this standalone short episode, we provide some details of an exciting opportunity at the Banner of Truth Trust. With our General Manager nearing retirement, the trustees are prayerfully seeking a Chief Operations Officer to guide the work into the future. Could that be you, or someone you know? Will you pray for the right person to be appointed?  Read more about the role: https://banneroftruth.org/uk/resources/announcements/2025/retirement-recruitment-and-a-unique-opportunity-to-serve/    To apply:  Please email your CV and a covering letter describing your suitability for the post and your interest in the ministry of the Banner of Truth Trust to: jobs@banneroftruth.co.uk. The closing date for applications is Friday 16 January 2026. It is expected that interviews will be held in Edinburgh in the week of 26 January 2026. Please note: only those with the right to live and work in the UK should apply for this role. 

A hundred years ago, the great New Testament scholar J. Gresham Machen sounded the alarm about educational freedom in America. He believed that the state had begun to encroach in a most grievous way upon the sphere of the family, assuming duties it had no warrant to perform.  Machen's words of caution are most timely for us. We live in an epoch in which, informed by UN policy goals, western governments are showing fresh determination to become arbiters and guarantors of the education of each and every child. This week we look in detail at what is happening in the UK, and consider what a faithful Christian response to these pressures might look like.    Featured resources:  – Excerpt from J. Gresham Machen, 'Shall We Have a Federal Department of Education?' – Excerpt from Ned B. Stonehouse, J. Gresham Machen: A Biographical Memoir (1954, repr. Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1987, 2020), p. 468.  – Joshua Kellard, 'When the State Presumes to Educate', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issues 743–4 (August–September 2025).    Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast  

In this short bonus episode, we read an apt New Year meditation from the pen of Professor John Murray: 'Memory and Prospect.'    Featured Resource:  – John Murray, 'Memory and Prospect', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 172 (January 1978).    Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

This week we review some of the ground we have covered on the podcast in 2025, and read an article from our editor, Mark G. Johnston, 'When Preachers Sing the Blues'.  The article reminds us that the charge to preach God's word is often, perhaps always, accompanied by a heavy spiritual burden. While the Lord's grace is sufficient for every preacher, that sufficiency is proved in and through very trying times. May this editorial be a spur to all to pray for ministers and elders, and an encouragement to them to keep going, even in the darkness.    Featured resource:  – Mark G. Johnston, 'When Preachers Sing the Blues,' Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 748 (January 2026).    Most-downloaded episodes of 2025:  5. The Life of John Newton 4. A Holy Minister: Robert Murray M'Cheyne 3. The Seafarer's Friend: John Flavel 2. The Prince of Puritans: John Owen 1. Let's Study Romans, with Sinclair B. Ferguson   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast  

Maurice Roberts, who edited the Banner of Truth Magazine for many years, is noted for his poignant editorials. This one, from the December 1994 issue of the magazine, is typically probing and helpful. Are we battle-weary? Are we disappointed? Are we, dare we admit it, spiritually sleepy?  If so, Rev. Roberts' article can help us see our need and seek the Lord for the grace of repentance and the gift of renewal.    Featured Resource:  – Maurice Roberts, 'Are You Battle-Weary?', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 375 (December 1994).    Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

The gospel of God is to be offered freely to all. Accordingly, all who hear the gospel have a warrant to believe it. As Samuel Rutherford wrote, 'reprobates have as fair a warrant to believe as the elect have.' This week we consider the offer of the gospel made freely by God, addressed to every sinner—indeed, addressed to you and to me.    Featured resources: – Iain H. Murray, 'The Free Offer of the Gospel,' Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 11 (June 1958).  – Robert Murray M'Cheyne, excerpt from his sermon 'The Acceptable Year of the Lord' on Isaiah 61:1–3, found in Andrew Bonar, Memoir and Remains of Robert Murray M'Cheyne (1844, repr. Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1966, 2024), pages 583–4.    Banner Resources on the Free Offer of the Gospel:  Andrew Fuller, 'The Gospel Worthy of All Acceptation' in The Works of Andrew Fuller (clothbound, 1012 pages) Iain H. Murray, Spurgeon vs. Hyper-Calvinism: The Battle for Gospel Preaching (paperback, 168 pages) John Bunyan, The Jerusalem Sinner Saved (paperback, 144 pages) John Murray, The Free Offer of the Gospel (booklet, 32 pages)     Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

This summer the Trust brought out a new, retypeset edition of William Cunningham's Historical Theology (1863). This week we read its new introduction by Banner Trustee Donald John MacLean, to find out why this work is of unique value to the 21st Century reader.   Read Material: – 'William Cunningham's Historical Theology – An Introduction', Donald John MacLean, in William Cunningham, Historical Theology (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1960 and 2024). First edition 1863.   Buy the work (2 volumes): https://banneroftruth.org/store/theology/historical-theology-3/   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us a voice message: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

The poor are a priority to God, and must be a priority for us, too. This week we focus on this aspect of the biblical witness with the help of Peter Barnes (Revesby Presbyterian Church, NSW, Australia) and Thomas E. Peck, the nineteenth-century Southern Presbyterian minister and teacher.    Featured resources: – Peter Barnes, 'Looking After the Poor: Biblical Principles', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 502 (July 2005).  – Thomas E. Peck, 'The Gospel Preached to the Poor' in The Writings of Thomas E. Peck (repr. Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1999), Vol. 1, pp. 25, 27–8.      Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

There are many pitfalls in preaching. One area which many preachers struggle with is application. And yet, in a sense, application is the whole of preaching. David Vaughn's letter to a fellow Christian leader in the December 2025 issue of the magazine addresses this very subject.    Featured resources: – David Vaughn, 'What can we learn from John Knox?', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 514 (March 2006). Excerpted from A Scottish Christian Heritage.      Resources Mentioned by David Vaughn:  D. A. Carson and J. D. Woodbridge, Letters Along the Way (Wheaton: Crossway, 1993), p. 99-100. Available free as a pdf.  A. T. Pierson, The Divine Art of Preaching, (New York: The Baker and Taylor Company, 1892), pp. 24-27.  Jay Adams, Review of John Stott's Between Two Worlds in The Journal of Pastoral Practice, Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation (Vol. VIII, No. 2, 1986), p. 62.  The Works of Jonathan Edwards, (repr. Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1987), vol. 1, p. cxc.  Ron Taylor anecdote from an article in The Journal of Pastoral Practice, Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation (Vol. 4, No. 4, 1980), p. 109.  John Broadus, A Treatise on the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons (New York: A. C. Armstrong and Son, 1896), p. 230.      Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

This week's normal Magazine Podcast episode will be delayed. In the meantime, we are publishing Iain H. Murray's address, The Benefits and Dangers of Controversy from the Ministers' Conference in Leicester in 2012.     

This week, by kind permission of Dr Robert Tracy McKenzie, we read his insightful piece on the motivations of the Mayflower Pilgrims. As we mark 405 years since they made landfall in Provincetown, Massachussetts, what can we learn of spiritual benefit from their reasons for going to the 'New World'?    Original article:  https://faithandamericanhistory.wordpress.com/2017/11/12/why-the-pilgrims-really-came-to-america-2/    Books by Robert Tracy McKenzie: The First Thanksgiving: What the Real Story Tells Us About Loving God and Learning from History We the Fallen People: The Founders and the Future of Democracy   More on the podcast about the Pilgrims:  Episode II: The Congregation on Two Continents   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast  

Part II of Warren Peel's preaching on Proverbs 4:23 from the 2025 Australia Conference.   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

Of all of the great imperatives found in Scripture, few are more crucial than that found in Proverbs 4:23:    'Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.'   If we fail to do this, all else will be in vain. This text was taken by Warren Peel, pastor at Covenant Christian Fellowship in Galway at the recent Banner Conference in Australia (February 2025). The conference theme was 'A Lifetime in Ministry.' We will post both instalments of this message on the podcast in the next week.    Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

This week we consider the life and legacy of the great Scottish Reformer John Knox (c. 1514–1572). In particular, we focus on his preaching and ask what made it so effective.   Featured resources: – Iain H. Murray, 'What can we learn from John Knox?', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 514 (March 2006). Excerpted from A Scottish Christian Heritage.  – D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, 'Remembering the Reformation', featured in John Knox and the Reformation and Knowing the Times.    Books by or about John Knox:  – The Works of John Knox (clothbound, six volumes, 3824 pages) – The Select Practical Writings of John Knox (clothbound, 336 pages) – John Knox and the Reformation (paperback, 144 pages)   Episode 73: The College Master: Laurence Chaderton   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

There is much talk of awakening, revival, and 'quiet revival' in the churches in the West at present. While we wish to avoid the extremes of sensationalism and cynicism, it is right for us to hunger to see God move again, and to give ourselves afresh to studying how the Lord has moved in the past. This week's piece helps us to reflect on one aspect of the Great Awakening of the eighteenth century: the Lord's work among young people and children.   Featured resources: – Ian Shaw, 'Young People in the Great Awakening', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issue 169 (October 1977).   On the Great Awakening and men associated with it:  – Jonathan Edwards, Thoughts on the New England Revival: Vindicating the Great Awakening (Clothbound, 304 pages) – Joseph Tracy, The Great Awakening (Clothbound, 472 pages) – Select Sermons of George Whitefield (paperback, 200 pages)   More from the author: – Ian Shaw's article, Phillis Wheatley (1753–1784), in the present issue of the Banner of Truth Magazine (November 2025, no. 746).     Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

This week's bonus episode is an interview with Jeremy Walker, a pastor at Maidenbower Baptist Church in Crawley, West Sussex, just south of London. Jeremy has long been a friend of the Banner and serves as book reviews editor for the magazine.  We sat down with Jeremy to talk about his Christian pilgrimage, call to ministry, some favourite books and, well, where he stands on the pronunciation of John Flavel's name.    Note: Jeremy mentioned a book chapter that had helped him towards greater assurance and he identified that as a chapter on the fruits of the Spirit in B. B. Warfield's The Saviour of the World. In retrospect, we think that the chapter in question is actually that on 'The Spirit's Testimony to Our Sonship, Romans 8:16' in Warfield's Faith and Life.    Resources Mentioned or Relevant From the Heart of Spurgeon Podcast If you enjoy the Banner Magazine podcast, you are likely to find From the Heart of Spurgeon most valuable. The episodes, of which to date there are 260, consist of Spurgeon sermons read by Jeremy Walker.    Bunyan, John, The Pilgrim's Progress Fuller, Andrew, The Works of Andrew Fuller (Banner one-volume edition).  Spurgeon, C. H., Pictures from Pilgrim's Progress Spurgeon, C. H., The Saint and His Saviour (available in a free pdf and epub version from Monergism) Walker, Jeremy, The Brokenhearted Evangelist (Reformation Heritage Books) Walker, Jeremy, Passing the Baton: How to Equip the Next Generation of Pastors and Teachers (EP Books) Read Brad Franklin's review at 9Marks.  Walker, Jeremy, Rooted and Grounded: A Light Modernisation of the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith (EP Books) Warfield, B. B., Faith and Life   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast

Some articles have what it takes not only to arrest the attention, but also to change the life. Maurice Roberts published just such an article in the August–September 1995 issue of the magazine.  'Why Is There No Wrestling?' is a passionate plea for urgent prayer. It is a call to arms that is just as timely today — perhaps more so — as it was to its original readers thirty years ago.  We read the piece in full in this week's episode.    Featured resources: – Maurice Roberts, 'Why Is There No Wrestling?', Banner of Truth Magazine, Issues 383–384 (August–September 1995). Read the piece as a web article.    This week's featured article also appears in Maurice Roberts' paperback The Christian's High Calling, which is a compilation of pieces he wrote for the magazine.    The Banner 2026 Calendar: https://banneroftruth.org/uk/store/calendar/banner-2026-calendar/ Truth Spoken in Love: An Anthology of Quotations from J. C. Ryle (edited by Daniel W. McManigal): https://banneroftruth.org/store/devotional-books/truth-spoken-in-love/   Explore the work of the Banner of Truth: www.banneroftruth.org Subscribe to the Magazine (print/digital/both): www.banneroftruth.org/magazine Leave us your feedback or a testimony: www.speakpipe.com/magazinepodcast