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The Visitor's Book of Texts: A Vital Tool for Pastoral Visitation

Andrew A. Bonar (Author)

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Or the Word Brought Near to the Sick and Sorrowful

Binding: Paperback
Page Count: 296
Publisher: Banner of Truth
ISBN#: 9781848710719

Availability: Usually ships the same business day.

Description: The pastoral visitation of the sick and sorrowful is a spiritual exercise. Its purpose is to bring God's Word to those in need in the prayerful hope of the Spirit's blessing upon it. Such visitation is not the preserve of pastors only; it is the duty of the whole church, as our Lord reminded his disciples with the words, 'I was sick, and ye visited me' (Matt. 25:36).

How we should visit the sick, and what we should say on our visits to them are the important matters addressed in this most useful book. Written by a spiritual giant of the nineteenth-century church, the book contains much-needed advice and clear guidance. Bonar gathers together a great number of Bible verses that will prove eminently suitable for a wide range of individual cases. These selected Scriptures are interspersed  with the author's own brief, spiritual, and helpful comments. Here then is a book that should be in the hands of every Christian visitor. It ought to be consulted prayerfully before embarking with God's Word to the sick and sorrowful.

From the Introduction:
What we say to the sick should be brief: and when we pray with the sick we should be short in our prayers. One who for some weeks lay within the shadow of eternity, though afterwards restored, writes, ‘Few things are more injurious than very long prayers at sick-beds. I am persuaded that short, frequent, and, I may add, fervent prayers at a sick-bed, are most suitable.’ He says again, ‘I am persuaded that those that visit the sick would do well to confine themselves to the simplest view of Scripture truth; and it may be well, also, that these views should be embodied in some select texts of Scripture. It was in this way that Dr. C. treated me when I was under those fears, and I have admired his wisdom. He approached my bedside, and after hearing my views, he repeated the text, "This is the record, that God has given us eternal life; and this life is in his Son." He again repeated it until he was sure that I held it in my mind.’ He adds, that when other mental strength failed him, 'The exercise of faith in the Saviour never fatigued him. Like the hand, it retains its grasp firm in death.' —Thoughts in the Prospect of Death.

This book is formed upon this principle; for the testimony quoted is not a solitary case. Indeed, it originated in the feeling of two Christian friends, that something which would help a visitor to deal thus with the sick was most desirable. A Book of Texts, while it may furnish ready materials to some, will lead on others to passages of a like kind which are not given, and which the visitor may feel to be all the more interesting and fresh, because he has himself lighted on them, without the help of foreign suggestion.

The same principle applies to our dealing with the Sorrowful to a considerable extent. When we succeed in arresting their thoughts so as to fix them on one single text, we have not laboured in vain for their comfort. One text sunk in the mighty waters of their sorrow may be an anchor dropped. It was this that Cecil sought when he was watching with intense anxiety over a friend; ‘All I can do is to go from text to text like a bird from spray to spray.’ Many, however, from long experience in such cases, have found it good occasionally to do a little more, though still with the help of a text or portion of the Word. And at times they have found it useful to ask the sick or the sorrowful to ponder the text left with them, after their visitor is gone; and they speak of it at the next visit. The effect of your suggesting that possibly at next visit it may be referred to is this, the person keeps it in memory, and feels interested in it more than would otherwise have been the case.

About the Author
Andrew Bonar (1810-1892) ministered at Collace in Perthshire, and in Finnieston Free Church, Glasgow. He authored or edited several titles published by the Trust, including The Life of R. M. M'Cheyne, The Letters of Samuel Rutherford, and a commentary on Leviticus in the Geneva series.
The Visitor's Book of Texts: A Vital Tool for Pastoral Visitation
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