David Ceri Jones, The Fire Divine: An Introduction to the Evangelical Revival (Nottingham: IVP, 2015), 184pp., ISBN 978-1-78359-290-6.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this overview of the eighteenth-century evangelical revival. I’ve been trying to read more Church history and Christian biography recently, so this was enormously helpful for putting in place a slightly bigger picture of the period covered. It focuses particularly on John Wesley, George Whitefield, and (though to a lesser degree) Jonathan Edwards, and the revivals in Britain and America associated with their ministries – all of which have left their legacy on evangelicalism today.
The posture of the work suited me well; it’s courteous about its subject matter, but keeps enough distance in its account to allow me to make my own value judgments. I particularly appreciated its transparency around the evident ‘flaws’ of those whose work is described. It’s respectful, but far from hagiographical, and (I think) the better for it.
I had been wondering whether to buy and read Thomas S. Kidd’s recently-published Yale biography on George Whitefield. This book persuaded me it would be a good next step to do so.
