Andrew Bonar — Michael Haykin

Scottish Christianity Before Andrew Bonar

But before we look at Bonner, I thought it would be helpful and appropriate to look at something of a Scottish Christianity. Christianity in Scotland in the decades and even centuries before a Bonner appears in the scene of history his birthday being 1810 and He died in 1892 and thus his life spans much if not most of the 19th century but I want to go back and quite a number of years to give you something of the shape and character of Christianity in Scotland before Bonner comes and there are a number of reasons for doing this.

One is because I suspect that Scottish Christianity is not as well known as it should be. The second is Some of the key events in Bonner's life namely what's called the disruption in 1843 is Not understandable if you don't have some idea as to what has been taking place in Scottish Christianity.

Well Christianity first came to Scotland in the 500s. It was Irish Evangelists coming across from Ireland who planted the gospel in the early 500s on the Isle of Iona. If you ever go to Scotland, it is well worth taking a couple of days.

And it does take a couple of days really. To go over to the West and to the inner Hebrides to take a ferry most of them leaving from Oban Across to the Isle of Mull and then a bus trip across Mull to a little another little ferry that goes about a mile at that to the Isle of Iona where Columba came in the 540s and An island that was still within sight apparently on a clear day.

The one occasion when I was there was not as clear a day as it could have been and so. But on a clear day apparently you can see Ireland. But it was there that Columba began to you began to use the Iona as a kind of center for propagating and evangelizing propagating the gospel and evangelizing Scotland.

Well, I'm sure you know that through the most of the Middle Ages following the those early days. And those early days were if there was anywhere in Europe where the gospel was as was purely preached. It was in in Scotland and very northern England and Ireland in the 500s in the 600s by the time you move into the Middle Ages those days were long past and the Celtic Church as it had been known in the time of Columba had been emerged or swallowed up or taken over by the Roman Catholic Church and The gospel does not appear In with the sort of light that it should have until The 1500s and then it's probably the name of John Knox That stands out When Reformation comes to Scotland mostly in the lowlands not the highlands but mostly the lowlands with John Knox being gripped by the need of Scotland for the gospel.

In fact, he spent some time in prison then as a galley slave. He was imprisoned on a Catholic galley ship and then eventually finds his way to Geneva where he has a rich time of learning under John Calvin and then comes back to Scotland were against the overwhelming military odds because Scotland politically in her Constitution and her alliances was still very Catholic.

He begins to preach the gospel the Queen of Scotland the time was the very well-known Mary Queen of Scots who once on one occasion said she feared John Knox's prayers and all the archies of Europe and Knox's great cry to God gives me Scotland or I die.

Was a request that was granted him. And Reformation came to Scotland and the way in which the Reformation Church took root in Scotland was one in which we was what that which we call a Presbyterianism and Presbyterianism and Scottishness Seem to have been interwoven because over the next Centuries it is very very rare to find any other groups, but Presbyterian groups.

Active and flourishing in Scotland there will be for instance Baptists who come in in the 1640s, but they never take deep roots. Presbyterianism for some reason appealed an appeal to the Scottish soul and Scotland becomes in many respects at least in the lowlands the Highlands are a bit of a different story so later becomes a nation of Presbyterians.

And this isn't forgetting there are other groups there are some Episcopalians and so on but Presbyterianism takes deep roots in Scotland and it is John Knox who stands at the forefront of that with others in the 1500s and down to the early 1700s there really was one Presbyterian Church.

There were no schisms there was one state church it was the established church. The arm of the state was used to to encourage men and women to Go to church and support the ministry. There was a dark time in the 1600s between the 1650s and the 1680s when there was great persecution the king of both Scotland and England was Charles the second who sought to impose an Episcopalian or an Anglican model of church government and life upon Scotland and it's that period in which we have much of the stories of the Scottish Covenanters men and women who were determined to worship God as they read the scriptures and many of them severely persecuted for their faith by the early 1700s.

Revival, Moderatism, and the Erskine Secession

With the impact of the age of reason upon Scotland many of the Presbyterian churches in Scotland had lost their fire and there were a number of Periods of renewal and blood of revival in the 1700s but not without schisms and the first break in the Presbyterian Church of Scotland comes in the 1730s and it is associated with two men Ralph and Ebenezer Erskine two of the the most prominent Evangelical ministers in Scotland in this period of time and their great protest.

It's one that will occur in Bonner's life as well and their great protest was against the state authorities imposing on believing ministers upon congregations. When the Presbyterian Church was set up in the 1500s, it was intertwined with the state such that the state Basically had to approve appointments to Church to churches those ministers were Appointed the churches were approved by the state and the earth skins were distressed by the fact that some of the men who were appointed Were unbelievers as far as they were concerned men who were not grips by by the gospel in their heart and soul and thus they protested against against this but to no avail and eventually in the 1730s there was a schism the first schism within the Church of Scotland and the Men who went out with the earth skins became known as the associate presbytery and Today that group still exists in North America as the associate reformed Presbyterians.

I mentioned this at some length because it'll be an issue that will occur in The Bonner in Bonner's life as well this whole issue of patronage does the the do the the does the state have the right and Privilege to appoint ministers, and it'll be an issue as I say that'll occur in the 1800s.

The other issue that the earth skins were deeply involved in was seeking to bring revival to Scotland and renewal To Scotland and it was on this in this life that they invited the great preacher George Whitfield to come to Scotland and Whitfield did come in the 1740s and there were remarkable scenes of revival especially a place called cams Lang Spelled C. A. M. B. U. S. L. A. N. G. Not campus Lang.

But felt that sounded that's the way it's spelt but sounded cams Lang which at that day in those days was a small village not far from Glasgow and here in the summer of 1742 extraordinary scenes of of 10 -15 ,000 on a regular basis going out to hear preaching of the gospel and and hundreds of conversions some of them quite striking as Whitfield and other Scottish preachers Presbyterian preachers preached.

One of those who went to hear the preaching was a Scottish minister by the name of John Bonner. The man had been ministering in that part of Scotland since 1693 he was an he was in an older man by this period of time almost at the end of his ministry but he made the journey of considerable a distance just to see the sight of thousands sitting under the preaching of the word and the conversions that were taking place and despite his age and infirmity he made that journey and was blessed because of it and would pass down in his family the this great longing for revival and He is the great grandfather of the man that we want to talk about today.

Andrew Alexander Bonner. And so you have then in the mid 1700s revival that comes to Scotland. It impacts not only the earth skins, but it also impacts the Presbyterian Church in Scotland. Which is still the main grouping?

Only a few had gone out with the earth skins in seven in the 1730s. But there were really two divisions in the in the Presbyterian Church in Scotland the state church. There were those who embraced the revival who are known as evangelicals.

The others who rejected the revival and what had problems with it were known as the moderates and they were liberal. Theologically there were men who had been impacted deeply by the age of reason. Who because of the age of reason which is the the dominant worldview of the 18th century had come to suspect? Scripture as not being inspired.

They had suspicions in their minds about the deity and divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ. They had problems of the doctrine of the Trinity. They had problems of the miraculous of Christ. It problems of his resurrection and so on in other words.

They they really were seeking to exercise Christian ministry. Outside the parameters that God lays down for such a ministry. And it's not surprising that these two bodies within the Church of Scotland found themselves at each other's throats.

The Haldanes and Evangelical Work in the Highlands

And one illustrative of the power of the moderates. Are incidents that take place about 40 years before Bonner's ministry really takes off in the mid 1800s. In the 1790s, there were two men converted who had exercised a very powerful in ministry in Scotland.

James and Robert Haldane and the Haldane's were very wealthy noblemen and both of them were converted within the Church of Scotland in the 1790s and they had enormous wealth at their disposal and Began to feel the constraints of the Spirit of God at work in their lives that they give this wealth To the furtherance of the gospel.

In fact, Robert Haldane Wanted to go as a missionary to India with William Carey this well-known Baptist who had gone to India in 1793 but it was it didn't work out that way. Instead they turned their attention to the highlands.

Now the highlands of Scotland up until this point had really not been impacted by either the Reformation in the 1500s or by Evangelical Christianity and the revivals that it served to foster that evangelical Christianity in the 1700s much of the vibrant reformed Protestant evangelical life that we've been talking about is all in the lowlands.

It's not in the highlands the the Gaelic speaking area of Scotland the whole the lowlands. Speaking really a variant of English or at least a language Known as Scots, which has roots similar to English, it's not at all the like Gaelic and The Gaelic speaking Scotland had not been impacted by the gospel.

In fact, there was no Gaelic Bible to speak of until the 1700s and for whatever reason the lowland Scots Reformed Presbyterians or lowland Scots Evangelical Presbyterians had not been able to give attention to the still largely Catholic highlands.

Thus it had been for instance in the 1740s and 1746 when the Roman Catholic Pretender to the throne Bonnie Prince Charlie Charles Edward Stuart had landed in northern Scotland in the highlands. Most of the clans that rallied to his cause were highlands Catholic clans.

There was some Anglicans as well, but they were not the Presbyterians. And so there was a division in Scotland. But the Holbeins began to realize that right in their own backyard was a huge mission field.

But they didn't have to go to India to be missionaries. There was all of the highlands. And those days the highlands were still fairly populated today. They are being depopulated for a variety of reasons, but still Large populations in many of the highlands and so James Holbein in particular every summer.

He became a minister in Edinburgh, but every summer he would take off and his church gave him leave to do this and take preaching tours up in the Highlands in the Orkneys those cluster of islands even further north in the eye and the sea above Scotland and the Outer Hebrides places like Lewis and Skye and Harris Places today where if there is anywhere in Scotland where evangelical Christianity is deeply rooted it is in the out and isn't it is in the Outer Hebrides, but in those days it was not so and And God blessed their ministry and churches were planted in this area a considerable number of churches planted in the in the what had been a bastion of Catholic Gaelic speaking Highlanders.

But there were many in the Presbyterian Church but problems with the Holbeins ministry and these were the moderates and in fact there was a huge debate in the very late 1790 1799 running into the early 1800s that eventually eventuated in the Holbeins leaving the Church of Scotland and becoming congregational.

And it gives you some idea that there was a very strong party within the Presbyterian Church of Scotland that had little interest in the things that had gripped the heart of men like Knox and the Covenanters of whom probably the most famous would be Samuel Rutherford and the Erskines.

Namely the importance of the preaching of the word and the winning of souls to Christ. Many of these men Had been so impacted by the age of reason that they had lost hold of the central Truths or verities of the gospel and for them a church life was more of a social affair than Something that had to do with eternal truth.

Bonar's Birth and Thomas Chalmers's Conversion

Now this is the context in which Andrew Bonner was born in 1810. Context in which there had been driven out to some degree some of the finest evangelicals in the Church of Scotland men like the Holbeins would become congregational a Context in which Moderatism the moderates were exercising a very powerful influence in the Church of Scotland that dampened the fire of evangelicalism.

It's interesting that in the year that Bonner was was born Was the year that a man named Thomas Chalmers was converted. The trauma ch a l n e r s had been like many of the ministers I've been describing who we call moderates.

He was born in 1780. He had gone through for the ministry had become a Presbyterian minister without a saving knowledge of Christ. It had been a social thing for him a way of attaining social prominence and so on and then in 1810 at the age of 30 after a number of years already in the ministry he was converted and he now saw his whole life in a very different perspective saw his ministry in a whole different perspective and In Edinburgh began to exercise a very powerful ministry eventually would be called to be professor of theology at the University of Edinburgh where a Bonner would sit under his ministry and be strongly shaped by that ministry.

Well, that's something I mean of the the shape of Scottish Christianity prior to Bonner's life, and it's a very quick Overview and we did it in 15 minutes and a lot a lot a lot a lot more could be said.

Bonar's Writings and Spiritual Heritage

Now Bonner is remembered today as the author of probably One book that he did authored is probably the one that most remember him as the author of and it's this one. It is the life of Robert Murray McShane and McShane died at the age of 29 a Bonner as you could see from the notes died at the age of 82 and the only over 50 years later and Bonner I never forgot his friend and not long after his friend's death McShane's death he wrote this life of his friend which became a best-seller and became a spiritual classic and The life of McShane has never been out of print.

It's one that has made a deep impress upon many as they've read of this man McShane's a commitment to Christ. Bonner wrote a number of other books. But probably his best remembered work besides the the life of McShane is the one that he never published himself.

But his daughter published and it is this one the diary and life of Bonner. Which is actually comprises two books, and we're going to use much of it in what we want to talk about today comprises two books one his life and letters and then another his reminiscences and One writer had said it reads like a treatise on prayer.

These were never intended to be published. It's his own private diary in which he recorded how God impacted his life and ministry over Roughly about 45 50 years never intended to be published. But it records very well the the inner life of a man of God and we want to spend some time Looking at that I have a blow-up of the picture there.

I'm not sure how well that that can be seen back there. How well can you see that David? Not well at all probably okay. Well, maybe in the second hour with the break we can pass this around depicts Bonner in his probably in his 70s towards the end of his ministry.

Bonar's Conversion and Friendship with McShane

Now Bonner as I said had was born into a family of Evangelicals and his great-grandfather John Bonner had gone to see the the revival that was taking place at Cams Lange under the ministry of George Whitfield in the 1740s and Was a minister for 54 years and that was near the end of his own ministry because his own ministry ended in 1747 his son also called John Bonner had also let had a ministry an Evangelical ministry for a number of years until he died prematurely.

Leaving a widow with a large family To move to Edinburgh and seek to struggle through life in a context in which the word often no social assistance no social web to help widows and among her children was James Bonner the seventh son in that family and James Bonner was Andrews father.

He also was a very strong evangelical became eventually an elder in a church in Edinburgh. Now Andrew Alexander Bonner is the seventh son of James Bonner. James marrying a woman named Marjorie became his wife and They had 11 children.

Three of whom did not survive infancy eight of whom did and there were five sons. Four of the five sons became ministers in the Church of Scotland Presbyterian ministers. The other one whom you may know very well is Horatius Bonner and You may know Horatius Bonner from his hymns.

Andrew Bonner never wrote hymns it would appear but Horatius Bonner wrote probably about three or four hundred hymns of which some are still sung. Andrew entered high school at the age of 11. The Educational system was a bit different in those days.

He was reported that during his teens here at high school in Edinburgh high school. He was one of the best Latin scholars that the school had ever had. But he is not converted until he was 20 great in giving Appreciative of the gospel from a very early age and records that he was impressed by the gospel.

But he was not converted until he was 20. It was in the year 1830. He wrote when he was 82 it was in the year 1830 that I found the Savior or rather he found me and Laid me on his shoulders rejoicing and I've never parted company with him all these 62 years and so.

Now having Encountered what we would describe as conversion a Bonner was ready to pursue minister Preparation for ministry and he went to seminary in Edinburgh began his theological studies there at the University of Edinburgh.

And the key theological influence of the university was Thomas Thomas who was the professor of theology. He had enormous influence over Bonner. Not only Bonner, but also Horatius Bonner who went with his brother and among the men that Bonner met there was Robert Murray McShane and I want to spend a few moments talking about McShane and Bonner's friendship with McShane.

Thomas gave Bonner a great theological repository. He gave him the the Theological knowledge necessary and foundation necessary to exercise a Powerful ministry over the next 50 or so years. It was friendship though with McShane that left Bonner with a hunger for holiness.

And the impression that McShane made upon those who met him was not so much anything he ever said. But was it his character his person? McShane would Bonner would later describe McShane's impact this way the impression left was chiefly that there were had been among us a man of peculiar holiness.

Some felt not so much his words as his presence and his holy solemnity. As if one spoke to them who were standing in the presence of God. It was McShane would say in words that Bonner would quote in his life of McShane that the thing that God Looks most for in a minister.

It's not great learning or great gifts but his holiness. And that he felt that is that what his people who sat under his ministry in the ministry He exercised at st. Peter's Presbyterian Church in Dundee what they needed most was a holy man.

And McShane was right and It it indicates I think problems within Evangelicalism broadly speaking in North America today, but often when we look for to call a minister or a pastor that we look for a great pulpit a Speaker or we look for one with great administrative abilities.

Instead of recognizing that pastors and ministers they are primarily to be men of God. That what we as congregations need is a man who spends time in God's presence and in his word. Administration can be done by another but it is battle which is what is greatly needed.

Bonner records we also record the testimony of Isabel his Dixon Dixon. Isabel Dixon was his future wife and She was not a Christian when she sat under the ministry of McShane. And she later told her husband this there was something singly attractive about McShane's holiness.

It was not his matter the things he spoke about Necessarily noise manner that struck me it was just that he was a living epistle of Christ a Picture so lovely. I thought I was given all the world to be as he was and it was to Bonner's great blessing.

That he became one of McShane's closest friends. What he liked about McShane was McShane's transparency and honesty in its friendship. Bonner often recalls how he McShane would faithfully warn him if he felt a Bonner was in danger of something and That he was not afraid to tell Bonner things that maybe Bonner didn't want to hear.

But McShane knew were good for Bonner's soul. Now by 1838 after a number of years of study and Preparation all of the circle of men around McShane including Bonner had found churches and there were a number of these men.

And we don't have time to go into them all men like Prince's William Burns Who would go as a missionary to China and have a an incredible ministry in China over the years? But Bonner was settled in a village called Colisee and it's a little village which is between roughly between Perth and Dundee if you know where the first or fourth is and Perth on that and then if you go up the east coast of Scotland you'll come to Dundee.

Well roughly halfway between these two towns is Colisee a C-O-L-L-A-E-E A little village in those days and Bonner would be there from 1836 to 1858 he came as an assistant minister to a man who was a moderate man who was not a converted individual and It was one of Bonner's great prayer requests That this man's soul would be touched by the gospel.

But he would never it never appears that he was ever converted. Bonner in his diary near first of a number of times in the diary never mentions his name but simply calls him the old minister and His relations with his Senior minister were not cordial.

Because his senior minister did not like at all Bonner's evangelicalism. Nonetheless he was minister with this man for a good number of years at his ordination. Bonner's ordination. It was his prayer that he would have one affection for the people in the church.

Secondly he would always have an anxiety about the old minister's soul. Those were his exact words. And as the diary unfolds the relations as I say with this senior minister were very frosty and They never seemed to have warmed.

The man remained aloof from Anything that Bonner was involved in even when revival came to the church. Revival came to the church in 1839 1840 and 1843. Well the church began to be packed out. Well by the end of Bonner's ministry there.

There were five or six hundred Communicant members that is members who received the Lord's Supper at the quarterly Celebration of the supper as it was done in those days in the Presbyterian Church. And yet the senior minister wanted nothing to do with it.

It's quite remarkable. Despite the fact the man saw revival taking place in his own church. There's no indication that he was that he ever became a friend of the revival and he remained a stranger of things of God.

Bonner's ordination was attended with a profound sense of God's presence. McShane apparently came as long as well as Bonner's brothers his older brother John and Horatio's and When they laid their hands on me Bonner said and the words of prayer ascended.

I felt like one for whom very strong intercession was going up to God to the various very highest heavens and In great calmness and strong desire. I gave myself to God my Savior and expected henceforth this promised spirit.

From his earliest days his longing and his preaching which conveyed this longing was to see men and women Converted in that church. You won't can imagine the sort of Sitting under the ministry of this man who I was not a friend of the gospel that there were very few in that church Men and women who were genuinely Christians they bore the name.

Scotland was a Christian nation so called in fact one writer could say and I think probably with great truth that Up until around the year 1810 no other nation in Europe had ever sent so many things to heaven.

Scotland those were the exact words. But many of these people were living on the riches of the past many of them were living on the the heritage The spiritual heritage of great-grandparents and grandparents and they themselves were strangers for the gospel.

So it's not surprising that there were those who came to church, but they were not converted and so Bonner's longing a longing that was expressed on the occasions when he was able to preach Seeking their conversion.

He was greatly encouraged when a young woman they called Elizabeth Morrison became a Christian she was the first of very very many and Revival came to that church in 1839 1840. Bonner was not there he had preached for about pretty solidly for about two years on occasions and Preaching for revival and conversion, but when revival actually came he was away in Palestine with Robert Murray McShane they had gone on a mission to Palestine and The man who was preaching was a man named William Burns another of their close friends.

It was interesting when Bob when Bonner heard of the revival to become he wrote this in his note in his diary The lesson God is teaching me is this That William Burns is used as an instrument where others have been laboring in vain.

He's talking about himself. Why. Because he is much in prayer beyond all of us. And the theme of prayers as I say one that runs through all of his diary. I should mention that Burns and rather Bonner and McShane Unlike most presbyterian ministers in this generation Were pre-millennialists in their early years.

They had been impacted not only the ministry of many of the man named Thomas Chalmers they had also been impacted by the ministry of Edward Irving and Some of you may know the career of Edward Irving one of the probably the most famous preachers of his day Scottish Presbyterian preacher who Found himself caught up in a movement really in some respects of fanaticism and gave his blessing and to it and ended his life very sadly and Eventually was disfellowshipped by the Presbyterian Church in England.

But during his life had one of the great Impacts that he had made on many not only for instance Bonner and McShane, but also John Nelson Darby the founder of the brethren was to convince them that the the the View that what had prevailed regarding the end of time in the end of history among most Protestants in England which was either a our millennial view that there was going to be no Millennium That Christ would return and then there'd be the judgment and I would all and that would be the end of history.

Or it was post millennial that is the the Millennium would come. Before the return of Christ it would sweep the earth and then Christ would come. Irving was a key impact or key catalyst in in convincing many that this was not biblical and He was pre-millennial that Christ would come first the Jews would be converted the Millennium would be set up and he would rule from Jerusalem and Then it would come Armageddon and the end of history and Bonner was fervently pre-millennium like McShane and Very few present hearing ministers in this period were and it remained from the view of many present hearings Let's say evangelical present hearings.

It remained a bit of an oddity in their in their view and that's why Bonner and McShane had gone to Palestine. They'd gone on a preaching tour and and their tour to kind of survey the land to see if they could establish a mission To win Jews in Palestine the few that were there.

And one of the great interests that McShane Bonner had all of his life was to see Israel converted. While he was away he hears about revival that's come to his church and it wasn't it didn't come to him and But as he reflects on this he realizes the importance again of prayer.

The Disruption of 1843 and the Authority of Scripture

There was opposition as I mentioned the the old minister whom he doesn't name remained in a thorn Thorn in his side. There were others in the church and in the district who were theologically liberal.

Bonner could say this there is stronger opposition and bitterness on the part of the ungodly just now than ever. But God's people are more prayerful. Now the period of time we're talking about him. What I'd like to do is spend a little Time talking about an event that should take place in the early 1840s.

It would have a great impact upon Bonner's ministry. The period of time which we're talking about is is one in which the Differences between the evangelicals and the moderates in the Church of Scotland was coming to a head and it would issue what is known as the disruption of 1843 when there would be a major division within the Church of Scotland and Again the issue was very similar to those divisions that have taken place in the 1730s over the issue of patronage.

Does the state have the right to interfere in the life of the church? The way that John Knox and the others had set up the Presbyterian Church of Scotland in the 1560s was one in which the church was intimately wed to the state.

They longed to see a a national church a state church in which the church supported the Which the state supported the church. But there was a downside to that which is the state had the ability also to interfere with the church and part of the great bane of Scottish Presbyterian Church life through the 1700s and the early 1800s was the power that The state had to appoint ministers.

Many of the churches in Scotland during a period of time were owned the actual land upon that which the church was built were owned by lords by the various aristocrats and many of those men Who were not evangelical themselves controlled their well all these men controlled the appointment of ministers.

They could choose who would receive the the ministry of the church on which their land which stood on their land. And if these men were not evangelicals, it meant that they were often imposed upon evangelical congregations men who are not Christian and this became a great thorn in the side and it in 1843 finally came to a head.

When Thomas Chalmers and 400 ministers in the Church of Scotland Broke with a state church over this issue. Does the state have the freedom and liberty to interfere in the life of the church? That was one issue.

The deeper issue is what is going to be the authority for our life as Christians and Chalmers and Bonner and it was saying that he had lived. We'll see. He doesn't live for this period of time. Asserted that the Word of God and God's Word only is the authoritative book for the life of the church and those ministers who go out and become known as the Free Church of Scotland go out because they feel that that authority was being threatened.

This is not the first time in the history of the church this sort of thing that comes to pass. And you can go all the way back to Acts 5 verse 29 With a statement that is made by Peter and John to the civil powers of that day the Sanhedrin we also obey God rather than men and schism and Fraction in the church.

The visible church a visible church is nothing that one ever longs for but there are times When it is absolutely and utterly Indispensable if Spiritual life is going to continue in local congregations.

It is very interesting to note that it is in the year 1843 when the great disruption takes place within the Church of Scotland and 400 ministers go out that it is also a year of great revival a policy itself.

Where a Bonner was ministering it was a it was a year of great Spiritual blessing as many found God and Bonner would take that as an indication of God's vindication of the stand that they had taken to assert the Sovereignty of God and his word in the life of the local church and that the state had no rights Interfering with the life of the church.

And so it is. In 1843 this break takes place. And it is a major break. There had been as I said a schism of the the Erskine brothers in the 1730s. But it was a minor one only about eight or ten ministers actually left the President hearing church at the time.

But about 400 at this period of time led by Thomas Chalmers broke with the state church and formed a free church of Scotland but almost as great an event and I want to now conclude the first hour of this as Almost as great an event as the disruption in Bonner's life was the death of McShane.

McShane's Death and Bonar's Sense of Unworthiness

At 29 Bonner had heard he received word that McShane was ill. McShane had been exercising a very powerful ministry at st. Peter's in Dundee. Not that far from Colisee he had heard that McShane was very ill.

But he didn't appreciate how ill a letter had been sent telling him that he was dying McShane the letter never reached him. Until someone came on March the 25th with another letter to tell him that McShane was dead.

And the Bonner had been probably his closest friend. This afternoon he wrote in his diary about five o 'clock a message has just come to tell me of Robert McShane's death. Never. Never in all my life have I felt anything like this.

It is a blow to myself to his people to the Church of Christ in Scotland. Oh Lord work for thine own glory sake arise. Oh Lord the godly Caesar Caesar and the faithful fail. My heart is sore. It makes me feel death is near myself now life has lost half its joys.

Worth not for the hope of saving souls. There was no friend whom I loved like him. Then I begin to reflect upon his impact in his own life. I've been feeling very lately very much of my evil neglect of the privileges and opportunities Which I've been given and my very small degree of holiness.

Usually when one compares oneself with another Christian it usually is not a good thing. But in Bonner's case it did. It was something that God used to bless him. As he looked at McShane after McShane's death what he saw was the Transparency of McShane's life that the Christ who lived within him Shone through so so brightly so brilliantly.

And McShane was transparent in a transparent bearer or a reflector or radiator Of the love and person and glory of Christ and he felt he was so opaque. This is Bonner. Shortly before McShane's death Bonner could say this when he had found out that McShane was ill.