The similar phrase 'Worldly Christianity' is one used by Bonhoeffer. It's J Gresham Machen that I want to line up most closely with. See his Christianity and culture here. Having done commentaries on Proverbs (Heavenly Wisdom) and Song of Songs (Heavenly Love), a matching title for Ecclesiastes would be Heavenly Worldliness. For my stance on worldliness, see 3 posts here.

Fine gold from Yorkshire

As we were to be spending some days in Yorkshire I thought I'd start reading Faith Cook's new set of biographies Fine gold from Yorkshire. I've just finsihed it here in the dales. This is a collection of a variety of short biographies of various lengths and from various periods and contains some well known Christians such as Wilberforce and Wycliffe, unknowns like Ruth Clark and Robert Arlington, people not necessarily known as Christians, such as Titus Salt, Kit Calvert and Anne Bronte, and others such as Hudson Taylor who are well known enough but may not necessarily be connected with Yorkshire. Faith Cook has a light touch and keeps up the interest well. The first and last words are given to Roger Carswell and it is clear that one hope is that the book will be picked up by the casual reader and that they will be drawn to the gospel. We pray that will be so. There are 21 biographies from various ages though perhaps with a bias to the 18th century and a little rag bag at the end mentioning a few more.
PS On the way up here we popped into Barnsley hoping to see the pharmacists where Hudson Taylor began but all we managed was a puncture! Ah well, next time!

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