Thomas Barnard, Jr., born in 1748, was 27 years old on February 26, 1775 (250 years ago). Fewer than three years before, he had become pastor of North Church in Salem after his father had become paralyzed in 1770. Thomas’ legacy of reformed theology went back to his great-grandfather, Thomas Barnard, who had later repented…
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Edmund Burke was born January 12, 1729 in Dublin, Ireland. Though his mother, Mary, was a Roman Catholic, he adhered to the Protestant beliefs of his father, Richard, remaining in the Anglican Church. While attending Protestant Trinity College in 1744, he started his own debating society, “Edmund Burke’s Club.” Though his father desired him to…
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This iconic picture, taken on December 20, 1920, recreated the attempt to move Plymouth Rock from the waterfront on December 22, 1774. Both events were strategically done close to Forefathers Day, the day the Pilgrims stepped on Plymouth Rock in 1620. But why did they want to move the Rock in memory of the Pilgrims…
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The year was 1862. The bloody seven-day battle at Harrison Landing, also called the Peninsular Campaign in Virginia, had just concluded. General Daniel Butterfield had lost 600 men and was wounded himself. He thought that the traditional bugle call to mark the end of the day, known as “Lights Out,” was too formal and not…
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Remember the one who fell overboard from the Mayflower? John Howland, the young man whose life was almost snuffed out in 1620, is John Howland the man in 1634 – in command of a post 170 miles north of Plymouth, refereeing a political dispute, driving away a threat to Plymouth’s wellbeing, and coming out of…
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You may recall the sad saga of Rev. John Lyford we chronicled in the June e-news of this year. In summary, the Pilgrim congregation in Plymouth had been taught by Pastor John Robinson in Leyden to discern the character of their leaders, not just their knowledge. This is why it took a while for the…
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John Hancock, at 24 years of age, witnessed the coronation of King George III (who was 22) in London on September 22, 1761. Hancock had graduated from Harvard in 1754 and was on a business trip for his uncle, Thomas. He was there when George II died, and he wrote his uncle that he hoped…
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To set the context for this story, we need to rehearse the theology of the Pilgrim Church in relation to its minister. Pastor John Robinson had taught them in Leiden that “a company of faithful people thus covenanting together are a church, though they be without any officers among them.” Robinson had taught that “if…
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The spring of 1624 in Plymouth brought a contrast of character that provides lessons today for both the youngest of children all the way to those old enough to have experienced these observations first-hand. Bradford writes, “They began now highly to prize corn as more precious than silver, and those that had some to spare…
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In the spring of 1624, the Pilgrims realized that changing the “common course and condition” (communal farming) to a private initiative where each family was responsible to produce its own corn was wise. Bradford writes, “…Having found the benefit of last year’s harvest, and setting corn for their particular, having thereby with a great deal…
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Battles inspire us when we rehearse the ideas worthing dying for. Texas was initially owned by Spain, but as George McAlister writes, “Three major independent factors changed the destiny of Texas.” They were U.S. independence from Britain in 1781, U.S. acquisition of the Louisiana Territory from France in 1803, and the independence of Mexico from…
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On August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke at the now-famous March on Washington. About two thirds of the way into his speech, he paraphrased Amos 5:24 when he said, “We will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.” Amos the prophet, writing in 760 B.C.,…
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On January 10, 1920, the League of Nations was founded by the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. The initial covenant of the League was signed on June 28, 1919 as a part of the Treaty of Versailles. One of the chief architects of both the Treaty and the League, and the…
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On December 2, 1823, the Monroe Doctrine was proclaimed by President Monroe. It was the culmination of key ideas drawn from the Bible and articulated in the Reformation. Three words came to define the foreign policy of America and the application of the Monroe Doctrine: independence (rejecting interdependence), neutrality (rejecting intermeddling), and interposition (rejecting interventionism.)…
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Most people may be aware that the “teddy bear” has some relation to President Theodore Roosevelt. However, the embedded lessons that can be learned can be seen as lessons from the Pilgrims in 1620 who planted a church in covenant with Christ and one another. They were willing to endure hardship, “whatsoever it should cost…
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