Revival: Spiritual Awakening in the Reformed Tradition

This book ‘seeks to stoke the passion’ for revival by looking, first, at the Evangelical Revival/Great Awakening in Britain and America in the mid-18th century and second, the revival among Particular Baptists in Britain later in that century.

Haykin describes the low spiritual condition of British society at the beginning of the period. Benjamin Keach laments how common sodomy is; Isaac Watts and John Guyse that ‘the work of conversion goes on very slowly’. In Northampton in America, it was a time of extraordinary dullness in religion, licentiousness among young people and factionalism in the community. Then we learn about the impact of the ministries of George Whitefield (a transatlantic ministry), William Grimshaw (a local parish ministry), and Jonathan Edwards (the theologian of revival, with a summary of his treatise on the Religious Affections).