John Watson (3 November 1850 – 6 May 1907), was a minister of the Free Church of Scotland. He is remembered as an author of fiction, known by his pen name Ian Maclaren. I'm currently reading his short story collection "St Jude", but am also fascinated by his life. Here was a man who stood out against a narrowness in his creed, and who was indeed "a generous soul".
The Life of The Rev. John Watson, D.D. "Ian Maclaren"
A Generous Soul
By W. Robertson Nicoll
John Watson was anything but a trifler. He took hold of his work with strong resolutions to do his best. It is now known that during the early years of his ministry he adopted much of the Roman Catholic discipline. He observed the fasts; he aimed strenuously at self-conquest and self-knowledge as well as at knowledge of books and men. All this was done in the strictest privacy. He gave over these methods, but he always maintained that moderate asceticism as a discipline of character and as a means of training men to master themselves is of the highest value. Another conviction of a Catholic mind was that worship and adoration ought to be a far more substantial part of Christian life than is usual in Protestant Churches.
He began his preaching with an enthusiastic love for Christ, and this love kept running and gleaming through all his years like a thread of gold. He had little polemical ardour, and took small part on theological controversy, but he never at any time wavered on the central facts of Christianity.
I heard his first sermon there, from Rev. xiv. 6, " The Everlasting Gospel." There were touches in it which made me even then think that it had been preached at Logie-almond for example, he said if the Gospel ceased to be preached by its accredited representatives, the Spirit of the Lord might come upon some shepherd on the hills and send him forth to proclaim the glad tidings.
Once Mr. Watson happened to preach in the morning from Hebrews, and expressed a doubt whether Paul was the writer. In the afternoon Dr. Miller also preached from Hebrews, and gave an elaborate defence of its Pauline authorship, and closed by saying that they were but " babes and sucklings in Christ " who thought otherwise !
Watson had very little part in the Protestant controversy. With many of the Evangelical clergy, including Bishop Ryle and Bishop Chavasse, he was on terms of cordial friendship. There was in him a deep and passionate Evangelicalism, and to Evangelical teaching as shown in spiritual earnestness he always responded eagerly. His relations with the Roman Catholic priests, and to a lesser extent with the High Church clergy, were even more cordial. There was a side of his nature that turned their way. But he was also very much drawn by the literary culture, the piety, and the noble ethical teaching of the Unitarians. While he maintained the best relations with the Evangelical Nonconformists, he was for long less intimate with them than with others of the Liverpool ministers.
His strength lay in the many-sidedness of his sympathies. He could preach sermons which pleased the Evangelicals; sermons which pleased the Unitarians; sermons indicating great breadth, and sermons of such intensity and urgent appeal that they might have come from a flaming evangelist in the great revival. Thus he was able to draw round him a congregation of very various constituents. They might not be all equally well pleased on any Sunday, but very soon they heard a sermon to which they could listen with perfect satisfaction.
I need hardly say that there was not the faintest touch of insincerity or unreality in all this range of method. Watson was simply expressing his mood, and the largeness of his comprehension enabled him to understand the spiritual needs of men who in their training and in their dogmatic convictions were far apart. There were very few congregations in England made up of recruits from so many armies as Sefton Park Church. He said himself three years before his death :
" Not only have we members of every shade of Presbyterianism Scots, Irish, English, Canadian, Established Church, Free Church, and United Presbyterian, but we have had people of many nations French, Germans, Swiss, Danes, North Americans, South Americans, Russians, Greeks, Austrians, Belgians and as many creeds, high and low, narrow and broad, and no creed at all. I have taken a section of fourteen pews, and I find, so far as I know, that the following is its ecclesiastical ancestry: four Presbyterian families, six Episcopalian, four Congregationalist, three Baptist, two Welsh, two Unitarian, two German, one Swiss."
Liverpool is a large cosmopolitan world, and Watson's singular adaptability had a most congenial outlet there. Liverpool was always responsive. But there was never any doubt as to the real drift of the preaching. Watson was always a convinced Evangelical of broad sympathies which perhaps grew broader and broader. He understood them all the mystic, the Catholic, the Evangelical, the revivalist, the moralist, the sceptic, and for each as the time came round he had a living message. He said at the close of his first sermon in Sefton Park Church:
“Brethren, I feel sure that these words have made my aim as a preacher clear to you all. I shall not try to astonish you with any display of learning, nor attract you by the mere eloquence of words, but I promise by the grace of God and according to my ability to preach the Cross of Christ. The Cross as I understand it combines both the doctrine of forgiveness and the doctrine of holiness, and I trust to be able also to show that a Christ who is our sacrifice is also our ideal. Some of you may prefer one doctrine, some the other, I am sure you will all see both are necessary. If I seem unpractical, ask yourselves if the fault be altogether mine, if personal do not suppose this intentional, do not weary when I ask your faith, do not be angry when I point out duty, but always search the Scriptures and see whether these things are not so, and so we will be blessed.”
“Beloved brethren, the double responsibility of work and prayer lies on me, the responsibility of prayer lies also on you. Pray that I may be led into the truth myself, and so be able to lead you. Pray that I may be able to deal honestly with intellectual difficulties and wisely with cases of conscience. Pray that I may have grace to speak tenderly to mourners and simply to the children. Pray that I may ever be found offering a full and free Christ to sinners, and exhorting the saints to follow Him more closely. Pray I beseech you that the messenger may be lost in his message, that if any good results should come of his preaching the glory may be all given unto the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, one God now and for ever. Amen."
The Life of The Rev. John Watson, D.D. "Ian Maclaren"
A Generous Soul
By W. Robertson Nicoll
John Watson was anything but a trifler. He took hold of his work with strong resolutions to do his best. It is now known that during the early years of his ministry he adopted much of the Roman Catholic discipline. He observed the fasts; he aimed strenuously at self-conquest and self-knowledge as well as at knowledge of books and men. All this was done in the strictest privacy. He gave over these methods, but he always maintained that moderate asceticism as a discipline of character and as a means of training men to master themselves is of the highest value. Another conviction of a Catholic mind was that worship and adoration ought to be a far more substantial part of Christian life than is usual in Protestant Churches.
He began his preaching with an enthusiastic love for Christ, and this love kept running and gleaming through all his years like a thread of gold. He had little polemical ardour, and took small part on theological controversy, but he never at any time wavered on the central facts of Christianity.
I heard his first sermon there, from Rev. xiv. 6, " The Everlasting Gospel." There were touches in it which made me even then think that it had been preached at Logie-almond for example, he said if the Gospel ceased to be preached by its accredited representatives, the Spirit of the Lord might come upon some shepherd on the hills and send him forth to proclaim the glad tidings.
Once Mr. Watson happened to preach in the morning from Hebrews, and expressed a doubt whether Paul was the writer. In the afternoon Dr. Miller also preached from Hebrews, and gave an elaborate defence of its Pauline authorship, and closed by saying that they were but " babes and sucklings in Christ " who thought otherwise !
Watson had very little part in the Protestant controversy. With many of the Evangelical clergy, including Bishop Ryle and Bishop Chavasse, he was on terms of cordial friendship. There was in him a deep and passionate Evangelicalism, and to Evangelical teaching as shown in spiritual earnestness he always responded eagerly. His relations with the Roman Catholic priests, and to a lesser extent with the High Church clergy, were even more cordial. There was a side of his nature that turned their way. But he was also very much drawn by the literary culture, the piety, and the noble ethical teaching of the Unitarians. While he maintained the best relations with the Evangelical Nonconformists, he was for long less intimate with them than with others of the Liverpool ministers.
His strength lay in the many-sidedness of his sympathies. He could preach sermons which pleased the Evangelicals; sermons which pleased the Unitarians; sermons indicating great breadth, and sermons of such intensity and urgent appeal that they might have come from a flaming evangelist in the great revival. Thus he was able to draw round him a congregation of very various constituents. They might not be all equally well pleased on any Sunday, but very soon they heard a sermon to which they could listen with perfect satisfaction.
I need hardly say that there was not the faintest touch of insincerity or unreality in all this range of method. Watson was simply expressing his mood, and the largeness of his comprehension enabled him to understand the spiritual needs of men who in their training and in their dogmatic convictions were far apart. There were very few congregations in England made up of recruits from so many armies as Sefton Park Church. He said himself three years before his death :
" Not only have we members of every shade of Presbyterianism Scots, Irish, English, Canadian, Established Church, Free Church, and United Presbyterian, but we have had people of many nations French, Germans, Swiss, Danes, North Americans, South Americans, Russians, Greeks, Austrians, Belgians and as many creeds, high and low, narrow and broad, and no creed at all. I have taken a section of fourteen pews, and I find, so far as I know, that the following is its ecclesiastical ancestry: four Presbyterian families, six Episcopalian, four Congregationalist, three Baptist, two Welsh, two Unitarian, two German, one Swiss."
Liverpool is a large cosmopolitan world, and Watson's singular adaptability had a most congenial outlet there. Liverpool was always responsive. But there was never any doubt as to the real drift of the preaching. Watson was always a convinced Evangelical of broad sympathies which perhaps grew broader and broader. He understood them all the mystic, the Catholic, the Evangelical, the revivalist, the moralist, the sceptic, and for each as the time came round he had a living message. He said at the close of his first sermon in Sefton Park Church:
“Brethren, I feel sure that these words have made my aim as a preacher clear to you all. I shall not try to astonish you with any display of learning, nor attract you by the mere eloquence of words, but I promise by the grace of God and according to my ability to preach the Cross of Christ. The Cross as I understand it combines both the doctrine of forgiveness and the doctrine of holiness, and I trust to be able also to show that a Christ who is our sacrifice is also our ideal. Some of you may prefer one doctrine, some the other, I am sure you will all see both are necessary. If I seem unpractical, ask yourselves if the fault be altogether mine, if personal do not suppose this intentional, do not weary when I ask your faith, do not be angry when I point out duty, but always search the Scriptures and see whether these things are not so, and so we will be blessed.”
“Beloved brethren, the double responsibility of work and prayer lies on me, the responsibility of prayer lies also on you. Pray that I may be led into the truth myself, and so be able to lead you. Pray that I may be able to deal honestly with intellectual difficulties and wisely with cases of conscience. Pray that I may have grace to speak tenderly to mourners and simply to the children. Pray that I may ever be found offering a full and free Christ to sinners, and exhorting the saints to follow Him more closely. Pray I beseech you that the messenger may be lost in his message, that if any good results should come of his preaching the glory may be all given unto the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, one God now and for ever. Amen."
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