Voices from the Past: Puritan Devotional Readings

I picked up the recommendation for this from another book and had not heard of it prior to that. As usual with Banner this is a nicely produced hardback that will last for years - always a good sign in a devotional daily readings book. But that is merely the wrapping, it is the content that counts. That's where 'Voices From the Past' really scores. These are carefully chosen selections from a wide range of Puritans, all of them very gracefully modernised so that one can read and enjoy without puzzling over archaic language. You'll meet Puritans like Matthew Mead, Thomas Case and Ezekiel Hopkins in these pages, as well as the 'regulars' such as Brooks, Manton, Alleine, etc. So you really get two benefits from this book: an enhancement to your daily reading that has been carefully chosen to help you think and sometimes to encourage and challenge, and an introduction to some great Puritan works that you might otherwise never have come across. Unhesitatingly recommended.

This book would be much better if banner of truth and the author had not stripped it of the reverential thees and thous that the puritans and the AV bible would have used. They did a great job of ruining what could have been an excellent devotional.

No reservations about this, no caveats, no criticisms. It is simply an excellent little book, consisting of well-chosen daily readings from across a range of Puritan writers (Sibbes, Goodwin, Manton, Owen, Flavel, Watson). Rosaria Champagne Butterfield (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Secret-Thoughts-Unlikely-Convert-Expanded-ebook/dp/B00ODF2R90/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1465055504&sr=1-3&keywords=rosaria+champagne+butterfield) says this is one of the most influential books she has read, and I would have to concur.The readings are transformative, and remind us of the theological depth to these oft-derided Christian theologians. Their writings are practical, pithy, entreating, and provide a useful meditation on the correlation between human experience and Scripture. If you were allowed two books on your desert island, this would be the other one.

This is something else! Moved deeply by these truths. Love it. I have volume 1 and 2. One for morning and evening each day.

Excellent daily devotions for a year and antiquated language has been modernised. When I read the second volume I thought it Puritan blessed thought rather than an exegesis of the texts but now I see the editor chose the texts to fit the daily readings. I note Watson and Baxter are deservedly the main contributors - the most quotable and the most prolific of Puritan authors. But as I said on volume 2, it is a pity dates were not given nor references to actual sources.

There is a great deal of editorial skill and sensitivity in this volume. The compiler has not just selected apposite passages, but has sometimes condensed them or otherwise reworked them in order to give the essence of several pages. Unlike some other such works, the source of the material is given on each page, so particularly fruity portions may be traced to their root. Here you will find uniformly profitable substance in all the freshness and variety that different authors brought to their work. Well-known men jostle among lesser lights to provide the reader with a daily morsel of good things, stretching the soul in various directions over the course of time. If you seek something to spice up your morning or evening devotional material, then you would be well served by this excellent volume.