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The Art of Manfishing
by Thomas Boston.
Christian Heritage. 104 pages.
ISBN 1857921062

Also available from Monergism Books, and online for free.

After finishing Dever’s The Gospel and Personal Evangelism, I decided to follow it up with a jump back in time to 1699, to Thomas Boston’s The Art of Manfishing, also on evangelism.

Unlike Dever’s book, which deals with evangelism on a personal level, Boston deals with it from the standpoint of the minister of the Word of God - how a preacher is to be a fisher of men (hence the title) from the pulpit. And yet, much of it is applicable to personal evangelism as well.

While the book is available online for free (link above), I heartily recommend the Christian Heritage edition, if for no other reason than the excellent introduction by J. I. Packer. Packer gives a good overview of the theology and drive behind the Westminster Puritans. He also gives a wonderful comment about the Puritans and assurance:

Believing that the fallen human heart is desparately prone to optimistic self-deception, Westminster Puritans stressed the need for constant self-suspicion and self-examination. There was nothing of morbid introspection about this; on the contrary, it was experienced as a bracing and reassuring exercise, as the regenerate discerned within themselves the signs of life from the Holy Spirit.

Boston himself then examines his own evangelism, his own obedience to Christ’s command to follow him, and become “fishers of men.”

Along the way, he provides amazing insight into many of the same issues we face today, whether in the pulpit, or in simply sharing the Good News about Jesus Christ. He laments, as previously mentioned, that our own gifts don’t matter in saving souls - and therefore we should not try to be clever in our evangelism. Rather, like Dever, he presses us for a biblical approach, with the clear and precise presentation of the Gospel message.

Boston also points out that the message of the cross is indeed a “rock of offense,” but we should not let that sway us in our boldness of preaching:

…Yet my conscience tells me of much slackness in this point, when I have been in private with people and have not reproved them as I ought when they offended, being much plagued with want of freedom in private converse.

In other words, I’m not straightforward with people about their sins, even in private, because I want them to be comfortable with me and like me. Convicting words, and Boston shares many more. And this is one of the real strengths of the Puritans - the ability to be both soundly convicting and yet encouraging at the same time:

You know not when your Master will come. And blessed is that servant whom, when his Lord shall come, he shall find so doing [preaching of the Gospel]. If Christ should come and find you idle, when he is calling you to work, how will you be able to look him in the face? They are well that die at Christ’s work.

Amen. Maranatha.