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OCTOBER
 

Salvation considered as coming from man is the creating principle of all error and abuse."

-Merle D'Aubigne-
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2, 1187 --Israel. Jerusalem has been for a brief time in the possession of the crusaders. Today, the city falls to Saladin, the powerful Seljuk leader. Most of the Latin Christians depart while the Greeks remain.
     The fall of Jerusalem will ignite the Third Crusade at which time Saladin will renew the walls of the city to withstand a threatened siege by Richard Coeur de Lion in 1191-1192. Sultan Malik-Al-Muazzain of Damascus will order the destruction of these walls that they might not serve as protection to Christians during the years of 1219-1220.

2, 1679 --England. Matthew Poole, the English Non-conformist preacher who has written such books as the Nullity of the Roman Faith, has fled to Holland when he narrowly escaped being waylaid one night in an alley. He happened to be with a friend when he met with two men who were waiting for him in an alley near his home. Though they left him alone, Mr. Poole overheard something of their conversation and afterwards declared to his friend, "I had been murdered had not you been with me."
     He dies today in Amsterdam, and it is generally believed he has been poisoned. He leaves behind him English Annotations on the Holy Bible which he has completed to Isaiah 58. Friends will complete it. Of these Annotations, Mr. Charles Spurgeon will remark, "On the whole, if I must have only one commentary and had read Matthew Henry as I have, I do not know but what I should choose Poole . . .. Poole is not so pithy as Matthew Henry, but he is perhaps more accurate, less a commentator, and more an expositor."

2, 1758 --Massachusetts. After five days of illness, Miss Sarah Pierrepoint Edwards will die. She has been the renowned wife of Jonathan Edwards, and due to her early conversion at the age of five years, much attention has been given her.

2, 1789 --Nova Scotia. John Charles Beckwith is born. He will become a soldier in the English Army, and will lose a leg in the Battle of Waterloo.
     In 1827, he will providentially look into a book on the Waldensians and will become so interested in them that he will move to Italy where he will endeavor to raise their educational standard and to revive their uncompromising protestations. He will found one hundred and twenty schools throughout the valleys of the Piedmont.

2, 1792 --England. Impressed by the hand of God, Mr. William Carey convinces the local Baptist ministers to form the first missionary society. It will be established in Kettering, and its first secretary will be Mr. Andrew Fuller. Mr. Carey himself will be its first missionary and will go to India, and there will become known as the "Father of Modern Missions."
     When Mr. Fuller would walk the streets of London accosting people to give to the need of missions, hardness of hearts so moved him that he would turn aside into alleys to weep.

2, 1845 --Scotland. "Finished today my notes upon the book of Leviticus making it ready for the press. Praise to the Lord who alone can bless it."
     When Mr. Bonar sends a copy of it to Charles Spurgeon, Mr. Spurgeon will write back requesting him for a picture of himself, and will comment, "Mr. Andrew Boner has a keen eye for a typical analogy, but he always keeps the rein upon his imagination, and is therefore safe to follow. He is a master in Israel.”

2, 1930 --Missouri. The International Lutheran Hour, whose motto is "Bringing Christ to the Nations," begins today. It is carried on a network of thirty-six stations and until his death in 1950, its regular speaker will be Mr. Walter A. Maier, professor in Concordia Seminary in St. Louis.



 

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