On November 5, 1642 Rev. Matthew Newcomen, the Puritan Minister of the Gospel at Essex, England delivered a sermon before the Honorable House of Commons, assembled in Parliament. The sermon was titled The Craft and Cruelty of the Church’s Adversaries.

Demonstrating ways that the enemies of God have engaged in undermining His people, he sought to trace some of those ways from history and Scripture and to “give you a brief view of the several arts and crafts, whereby the adversaries of the Church have sought to hinder their proceedings and cause the work to cease.”

By way of example he reminded his hearers of the many and mighty visible persecutions which God’s people have undergone from Satan and his emissaries. Beginning with Pharaoh of Egypt who said, Come let us deal wisely with them (Exodus 1:10), he unfolds designs “that hath been practiced against the Church of God many a time.”

The minister declares that one of the historical enemies of both Church and State—one which 1642 England had no dealing, but does in 2009!—was Islam.  

In the 17th century those who followed the religion of Islam were often referred to as Turks, because they predominated in Turkey. Commenting on this enemy over 350 years ago, he said:

“To give you ocular proof of the cruelties whereby the enemies of the Church have from time to time endeavored to cause the work to cease, would be the business, not of a sermon, but of a volume, and yet easily done, had we but time, because their cruelty ever appears in its own likeness, in the shape of one of those beasts that had three ribs in the mouth of it, and they said unto it, Arise, devour much flesh (Daniel 7:5). You may trace the monster foot by foot, from Abel unto this present in steps of blood. The persecutions of the Jewish Church under Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, Antiochus, and of the Christian Church under the heathen, and after them the Arian emperors and bishops. Since them, under . . . the Turk . . . are so known, I need not mention them.”

This is what Christians have historically experienced in places which have been dominated by “the religion of peace.” He goes on to state:

“The art of the great Turk at this day though he pretend to let the Christians in Greece and those countries under him enjoy their lives and their religion, yet so heavy is his yoke upon them, that they have little joy of their lives, and for the most part as little care of their religion scarce anything more than the name of Christ generally to be found among us.”

Courtesy of Bill Foster…..

September 19, 2009

The 70-page sermon from which these brief extracts were taken, was expanded by the author and originally published by the House of Commons in 1643. The full modernized format will be available as an e-book no later than Oct. 12, 2009.

For more information on this work, please contact 5ptsalt.com.

These e-book titles are fully self-executable on almost any computer and easy to search as well as ridiculously affordable!

Related Post:

A Puritan On Islam (Part 2)