The Life & Theology of John Owen

This course will introduce the church to “the Prince of the Puritans,” who the Baptist minister Charles Spurgeon called “the most profound Divine who ever lived,” John Owen. In a series of five lectures, we will learn of the piety, suffering, and endurance of a Christian whose faithful legacy was forged through trial and loss. We will consider Owen’s conversion and ministry as a young pastor; his missionary zeal as a chaplain to Cromwell on the battlefields of Ireland; his reforms of Christian education as Vice Chancellor of Oxford; and the implications of his illegal pastoring at a secret house church once the government had outlawed congregational ministry. Owen was a prolific writer, so across these lessons we will engage many of his most beautiful and edifying works, and then, in a final lecture, think about how Christians have read Owen in the past and what we might learn from him today.