Ian Hamilton Resources

Paul’s Letter to the Romans is a pastoral tour de force. It is of course richly theological. Nowhere does Paul more deeply and beautifully open up to us the gospel of God’s saving grace in Christ. But Paul’s theology of grace is not an abstract exposition of doctrine. He is concerned to explain to the […]

The Christian life is a life of faith. More accurately, the Christian life is a life of faith in God. It is the object of faith that gives faith its lustre, and nothing more enriches, ennobles, and establishes faith than the God who made the heavens and the earth, who reigns in unrivalled splendour over […]

Soren Aabye Kierkegaard, the nineteenth-century Danish philosopher/theologian, described life as paddling in an ocean ten thousand fathoms deep. How right he was. This thought is no less and even more appropriate to the study of theology, the coherent teaching about himself that God has revealed to us in the Bible. Some of us know the […]

Recently I attended the communion service in Magdalene College chapel in Cambridge. The service was rich in Trinitarian worship, in elevated God-centred prayers, in excellent hymns and a fine, if too brief, sermon. As I sat and shared in the worship, this thought came to me, ‘How diverse the church of Jesus Christ is.’ Here […]

Why would anyone in their right mind believe the Bible, believe Jesus Christ, and believe that belonging to a Christian church was a sane and sensible thing to do? Reason 1 why you shouldn’t believe. The Bible! It is simply unbelievable. Who today in this modern, scientific, rational world believes in creation out of nothing […]

Sometimes reading a Puritan author can take you into another world. The Puritans are not always the easiest of men to read, though the difficulty is often over-hyped. However, what follows is essentially an extract from the Works of John Owen, Volume 2, pages 77-78.1 He has been expounding the Christian’s communion with Christ, showing […]

Book Review: From Heaven He Came and Sought Her: Definite Atonement in Historical, Biblical, Theological, and Pastoral Perspective; edited by David and Jonathan Gibson, with contributions by Sinclair Ferguson, Henri Blocher, Paul Helm, Robert Letham, John Piper, Thomas Schriener and others. [Crossway Books, hardback, 704pp, $50/£25-£33 (also available on Kindle).] Historically referred to as ‘limited […]

Why did John Calvin preach eight times a week in Geneva? Eight times a week! How did he make the time? Was he not writing commentaries on almost every book of the Bible? Was he not writing treatises on numerous theological and pastoral subjects? Was he not the Reformation’s premier letter writer, writing to hundreds […]

First a confession: Christmas is not my favourite time of year. This is partly due to temperament; I don’t particularly enjoy the ‘jollity’ of the season (my children will testify that there is something of the ‘bah humbug’ in their father at this time of year). However, Christmas does present us with a focused opportunity […]

The day before John Owen departed to be with Christ (23 August, 1683), he dictated his last letter to a friend: ‘I am going to him whom my soul has loved, or rather who has loved me with an everlasting love, – which is the whole ground of my consolation.’ The following day William Payne […]

Some years ago I was sitting in a ministers’ conference enjoying very much hearing God’s Word preached with grace and power. The preacher, a dear friend, paused and said something that riveted me. He quoted some words of Geerhardus Vos, ‘The reason God will never stop loving you is that he never began.’ Vos was […]

What should a church be looking for when it seeks a pastor? This is a question that should deeply exercise not only elders but every church member. What qualities should a search committee have uppermost in their minds as they look to God to provide them with a man after his own heart? Perhaps before […]

It is the easiest thing in the world to say, ‘The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord’, when all is well with you and yours. When life is sweet, when your children are trusting in Christ, when your church is united and loving, when your spouse loves […]

In recent weeks I have been reading Augustine’s Confessions. It is a great and compelling read, a 300-page prayer that illuminates Augustine’s search for God and for life. As I read the opening chapters I was struck by a word that Augustine regularly uses and that had not registered with me before. Again and again […]

The present state of the Church of Scotland should be a cause for Christians everywhere to cry to God for mercy. For a professing Christian church to pass legislation that permits a congregation to call a minister (man or woman!) who is in a same-sex relationship is a theological scandal and a moral monstrosity. No […]

This is the second part of the 2012 Annual Lecture of the Evangelical Library in London. The first part can be found here. The lecture for 2013 is to be given on Monday June 3rd at 6.30 pm at the Evangelical Library and the subject is ‘The Doctrines of Grace in an Unexpected Place: 19th […]

This is the first part of the 2012 Annual Lecture of the Evangelical Library in London. The second part can be found here. The lecture for 2013 is to be given on Monday June 3rd at 6.30 pm at the Evangelical Library and the subject is ‘The Doctrines of Grace in an Unexpected Place: 19th […]

Ian Hamilton has been minister of Cambridge Presbyterian Church since 1999. He graduated from Edinburgh University in 1979 and became the minister of Loudoun Church of Scotland, Newmilns, Ayrshire in the same year, serving there for almost twenty years. He is married to Joan, and they have four children. Ian Hamilton is a Trustee of […]

Reading the Letters of Samuel Rutherford is to enter a world where love to the Lord Jesus Christ is the absorbing preoccupation. Writing to a lady parishioner in 1637, he said, ‘Christ is a well of life; but who knoweth how deep it is to the bottom? . . . And oh, what a fair one, what […]

One of the most remarkable statements in the Bible is found in Isaiah 62:5, ‘as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you’. The prophet Zephaniah takes the thought a step further, and deeper: ‘The Lord your God is with you . . . he will rejoice over you with […]

Every believer who has ever lived has faced and experienced disappointment. There have been and will be no exceptions. Even the perfect Man of faith, our Lord Jesus Christ, experienced disappointments, difficulties, hardships. As he hung alone and abandoned on Calvary’s cross he cried out, ‘My God, My God, why . . .?’ Woven into […]

It is only too easy for Christians to become daunted and deeply pessimistic. The world we live in is a dark and presently an ever-darkening, place. The gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is increasingly and publicly mocked and marginalized throughout society, particularly in the media. Our Government passes legislation that defies the living God. […]

If someone were to ask you, a neighbour, a fellow worker or fellow student, ‘What exactly is the gospel?’ what would you say? Perhaps I could ask you to stop reading this article, pick up a pen (or turn on your computer), and write in a few brief sentences what is the heart of the […]

The glorious doctrine of God’s redemption of sinners through the sin-bearing, sin-vanquishing death of Christ on Calvary’s cross lies at the heart of the Christian faith – and at the heart of every Christian’s faith. We believe this. We love this. We sing this. ‘In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of […]

The Christian life is lived at the intersection of the ages, this present age and the age of the world to come that has already, in Christ, punctuated this present age. In Christ, believers are a ‘new creation’ (2 Cor. 5:17). Paul does not mean here that believers are inwardly renewed men and women, but […]