Rating: ★★★★★

Who: F. W. Boreham, British pastor and author of more than 50 books. He spent most of his life pastoring in New Zealand and Australia. (See the article “Who Is F. W. Boreham?”)

Genre: On Boreham’s spiritual essays: F. W. Boreham is difficult to place into a genre. A reviewer wrote in Preacher’s Magazine, “There is only one Boreham.” His writing is a mix of essay writing and what I call “literary preaching”—preaching that is intensely informed by both Christian and classic literature. In the main body of his work (“classic Boreham”), some chapters were originally sermons; others were culled from his 3000 biographical essays. In any case, most of his 49 books are a goldmine of suitable (if light) devotional reading. (See my guide to his published works.)

Overview:

The Home of the Echoes is another great book of Boreham sermons, from the period when he was at his prime. My favorites were “The Magic Mirror,” on looking away from self to Christ (see quote below), and “Breaking-Up,” on the end of a school term and separating from treasured friends.

Quotes:

SECOND-HAND THINGS:

“A gregarious religious is essentially a precarious religion. . . . She simply went with the rest; she followed the crowd; her faith was a second-hand faith. . . .
The young prophet had to choose between his own first-hand vision and the elder prophet’s second-hand one.” (loc. 137-141)

“I was hastening on to eternal destruction when the great tremendous God met me like a lion in the way.” (John Haime, Lives of Early Methodist Preachers, qtd. in loc. 156)

THE KINGFISHER:

“What are mountains for but to be climbed? What are oceans for but to be sailed? What are rivers for but to be crossed?” (loc. 204)

“[John Milton’s] only gleam of comfort lay in the fact that he had written, during his last year of eyesight, a pamphlet on the Civil War! ‘He could not foresee,’ his biographer remarks, ‘that in less than ten years his pamphlet would be [obsolete] and only be mentioned because it had been written by the author of Paradise Lost.” (loc. 193)

DOCTOR DIGNITY:

“He had too much respect for his dignity to stand on it.”

THE MAGIC MIRROR:

“[Richard] Baxter is a past-master in the art of self-examination. . . . Writing toward the close of his life, he makes a significant and instructive confession. ‘I was once,’ he says, ‘wont to meditate most on my own heart, and to dwell all at home, and look little higher; I was always poring either on my sins or wants, or examining my sincerity; but now, though I am greatly convinced of the need of heart-acquaintance and employment, yet I see more need of a higher work; and that I should look oftener upon Christ, and God, and heaven, than upon my own heart. At home I can find many distempers to trouble me, and some evidences of my peace, but it is above that I must find matter of delight and joy and love and peace itself. Therefore, I would have one thought at home upon myself and sins, and many thoughts above upon the high and amiable and beautifying things.’” (loc. 1609-1613)

This review was written in November 2015. I wrote this review using the Kindle version of the book.