The Greatest Preacher America Ever Produced

Samuel Davies and the Greatness of His Preaching

Welcome back to the Whole Council Podcast. I'm Jon Snyder and I'm with Chuck Baggett. And this week, we're looking again at the book, Salvation in Full Color. And we've come to the sermon on repentance.

And so far, I think each week, Chuck, almost every week I think, well, this is my favorite sermon in the book. I mean, we've been through it as a church a couple of times. And I've read through it before that.

But really, I have to say it again, this is probably my favorite sermon so far. And part of it's because of the pastor that preached it, Samuel Davies. Samuel Davies is considered by some, including Martin Lloyd-Jones, to be the greatest preacher that America has ever produced.

So he didn't say greatest theologian. That might be Edwards or whoever. But greatest preacher. So able to take these deep truths and speak in a way that the common man is able to understand. And I remember hearing that and then getting the three-volume set of his works, it used to be Soli Deo Gloria, published those.

And we'll see if Teddy can put a link to them in the show notes. But those three volumes, they're not easy to find, but they really are worth it. And I think they've been recently republished. I remember reading his sermons and finding such a balance in there that so it was kind of like having all the flame and, you know, all the captivating logic of a Whitfield or a Spurgeon.

Why Repentance Matters in the Gospel

But also, you know, so clearly laid out, it was easy to know the outline. And this is really a very simple and deep sermon. And I think this sermon is particularly helpful for us today on two opposite camps.

One is kind of the sinner's prayer approach, which has recently, you know, taken a lot of criticism. And a lot of it is, it should have been criticized. But, you know, the idea that just repeat kind of a formulaic prayer, and that's the end of everything.

Or that that is essentially the beginning of everything, that God just, you know, responds to that formula. I mean, you know, one of the things that's wrong with that is that really a repentant heart isn't necessarily part of that.

Even if you mention repentance, are they repenting? Are they turning from and turning to? But I think also the doctrine of repentance is a doctrine that the Reformed camp has struggled to keep in its proper perspective.

As we have returned to reconsider truths that the Reformation, you know, unearthed again and brushed off and made brilliant, the doctrine of Christ's, you know, sufficiency, you know, salvation by grace through faith, somehow the doctrine of repentance has not kept its appropriate place.

The 1689 Confession and the Danger of Turning Repentance into a Work

And so we were talking some years back when we looked at the 1689 Confession, so it's the Baptist version of, you know, of kind of the Westminster Confession, that its statement on repentance was a little weak.

And I don't know, you know, I don't know why that would be, except that perhaps we try to guard the nature of salvation, that it's holy of grace. So we don't want people to think that repentance is a good work.

You know, clean up yourself and come to Jesus. That's exactly not what we're talking about. You know, in running to Christ, turning to Christ, turn your back on all the empty things. Samuel Davies does a great job, though, covering the nature of repentance here.

So we'll hit that in a minute. Just a couple of words about Samuel Davies. Other than the fact that he was such an extraordinary preacher, let me read what a man named Sprague says about him. He said, His glowing zeal, combined with exemplary prudence and an eloquence more impressive and effective than had then perhaps ever graced the American pulpit, Davies made his way among all classes of people and was alike acceptable to all, from the most polished gentleman to the most ignorant American slave.

Of course, this is during the time of slavery. A manifest blessing from on high attended his labors, and within about three years from the time of his settlement, and mostly he labored in Virginia with the Church of England there, after three years of being settled, no less than 300 had been gathered to the communion of the church.

Princeton, the Great Awakening, and Davies's Early Death

Then in 1753, he and Gilbert Tennant make a trip from the colonies over to the UK on behalf of the College of New Jersey, which eventually was renamed Princeton. Princeton needed funds. Princeton began as a very evangelical effort, and so as Harvard and Yale were kind of slipping, Princeton was established, and so these men sent evangelical ministers to go to England to talk to the churches there from the Great Awakening who would support it.

Later, he was asked to take the presidency of Princeton after Edwards had died. He refused at first because he wanted to continue to labor as a pastor in Virginia. Later, he accepted it, but after only 18 months, he died, and he was only 36 years old.

If you really like the sermon in the book, you ought to go get the three volumes of his sermons because they're really helpful.