Preacher

Baxter decided in his teens to lay aside his youthful desire for "Reputation of Learning..." and concentrate on the study and application of the Scriptures. His thirst for understanding was primarily for his own spiritual growth, but he eventually sensed God's calling him to preach, which he pursued with his typical zeal. His parents, however, did not share his enthusiasm and he was sent to Ludlow Castle. In his eighteenth year, Mr. Wickstead had nearly persuaded him to ignore his calling and seek a position at the Court. He spent a month in London under the patronage of Sir Henry Herbert, but became disillusioned by the wordliness and debauchery at Court.

About this time, Baxter was called home quickly by the illness of his mother. She soon died and Richard resolved from that point to preach the gospel whenever and wherever possible. He would never again be turned aside.

On December 23, 1638 Baxter was ordained a deacon in the Church of England and chosen schoolmaster of Richard Foley's school at Dudley. He found the position most suitable because, in addition to his teaching, he "might also Preach up and down in Places that were most ignorant..."

When Baxter preached, the entire countryside would fill the once vacant chapel and crowd around the windows and doors to hear the young country preacher. So accustomed did the church at Dudley become to good preaching that, for years after Baxter's departure, the people of the town would still crowd the modest chapel to hear the Sunday sermon and weekly lectures.

Baxter's next opportunity to preach came at the town of Bridgnorth. He spent a year there teaching a very large congregation, but he was disappointed by the results. His sermons received great praise, but apparently little application by his hearers.

While Baxter was at Bridgnorth, the English Parliament passed a resolution to reform the clergy. Those ministers found guilty of "Insufficiency, false Doctrine, illegal innovations, or Scandal..." were to be removed. The town of Kidderminster presented a petition for the removal of their vicar and his assistants. The minister frequented taverns, was ignorant of "the very Substantial Articles of Christianity..." and only preached a few times each year. His poor preaching even "exposed him to laughter..." It was determined that the vicar would continue, but a lecturer would be appointed and supported with a small portion of the minister's living expenses.

Baxter was offered the position at Kidderminster and he eagerly accepted. He quickly learned that his serious, Biblical preaching was certainly "out of season" at Kidderminster, where mobs ridiculed and threatened him with violence. But, he would not be intimidated. Once, after preaching on the doctrine of man's sinful nature, the townspeople "railed" at him as he walked down the street, accusing him of teaching "that God hated, or loathed infants..." Baxter countered this abuse by opening up the Scriptures to his people, "with great patience and instruction:"

The next Lord's Day I cleared and confirmed it, and shewed them that if this were not true, their Infants had no need of Christ, of Baptism, or of the Renewing by the Holy Ghost. And I askt them whether they durst say that their Children were saved without a Saviour...and afterward they were ashamed and mute as fishes.

The most serious threat to Baxter came with the Civil War in 1642. The town of Kidderminster and the surrounding county were divided between loyalty to the King or the Parliament. Baxter found safety at the Governor's House in nearby Coventry, where he was invited to preach regularly to the garrison.

Many renowned ministers took commissions to serve as chaplains in the New Model Army (Parliamentary), but Baxter wanted no part of it. He would reflect years later, "So miserable were those bloody Days, in which he was most honourable, that could kill the most of his Enemies." However, when news reached him concerning the poor spiritual condition of the soldiers, the divisions caused by false teachers, and a growing attitude of rebellion toward all authority, Baxter resolved to serve as chaplain with Cromwell's forces. He willingly gave up his comfort and safety at Coventry, going into the field and seeking to retrieve those who had gone astray, having "their ears tickled."

The adversity of military life and long hours of work eventually overcame Baxter's poor health. He was forced to leave the army at about the time the war came to an end. Baxter returned to spend nearly fifteen years among the people of Kidderminster. He experienced the joy of watching nearly the entire town converted by the preaching of the Bible and the inner working of the Spirit of God.

Baxter's preaching usually bore much good and lasting fruit. His early success was the result of his ability to "convince and get within men..," regardless of their social or economic position. What was his secret? He was, as Paul directed, "ready in season and out of season" to preach.

Baxter likened a sermon to a meal, which would only cause others indigestion and discomfort if it was not properly prepared over time. A sermon or teaching must be meditated upon and believed before it is passed on to others with any conviction:

preach to yourselves the sermons which you study, before you preach them to others...When your minds are in a holy, heavenly frame, your people are likely to partake of the fruits of it...They will likely feel when you have been much with God: that which is most on your hearts, is like to be most in their ears.

His method of preparation involved hard work on his part, yet he knew all would come to naught without complete reliance on the work of the Holy Spirit. He spent hours in the Scriptures composing each message. But, even the most painstaking and lengthy study would amount to nothing, believed Baxter, without much "secret prayer and meditation." "Thence you must fetch the heavenly fire that must kindle your sacrifices..," he counseled others.

In the pulpit, Baxter preached with earnestness and urgency! He recalled his early Christian years and the kind of preaching which prevailed upon his own sluggish heart. It was "the plain and pressing downright Preacher, that onely seemed to me to be in good sadness [seriousness], and to make somewhat of it, and to speak with life, and light, and weight." Employing his guiding principle; "first light-then heat," he sought to shine the "light" of sound doctrine in their minds, then warm their hearts with passionate exhortation to obedience.

Baxter was an imposing figure in the pulpit at Kidderminster, standing tall and straight in his black gown, with an hourglass at his side. He read his sermons, over an hour long, from a manuscript. Baxter eschewed emotionalism and disapproved of jesting from the pulpit, yet he preached with great passion and there were traces of quiet wit in his sermons. A fellow Puritan described his intensity this way:

He had a moving pathos , and useful Acrimony in his words; neither did his Expressions want their Emphatical Accent, as the Matter did require. And when he spake of weighty Soul - Concerns, you might find his very Spirit Drench'd therein.

It was said that Baxter "talked in the pulpit with great freedom of another world, like one who had been there and was coming back as a sort of express from thence to make a report concerning it."He had the unique ability to speak effectively to both the simple and the intelligent. Yet, he would purposely speak over their heads on occasion as an incentive to learn and to remind them that he was the teacher.

Baxter's freedom to preach ended in 1662 with the Act of Uniformity. When the opportunity to publicly preach and teach ended, Baxter turned to writing. What appeared to be the final defeat of Puritanism and Baxter's influence as a public figure, was instead the beginning of his most effective and productive years as a writer. Baxter, ready to preach "in season and out of season," moved from the pulpit to the printing press to teach, reprove, rebuke and exhort.

Twenty-five years later, in 1687, the Declaration of Indulgence was passed allowing "non-conformists" to hold public meetings. Richard Baxter spent his last four years peacefully at Charterhouse Yard, where he assisted his good friend Matthew Sylvester. Although in his seventies, Baxter preached on Sunday mornings and at the Thursday lecture, usually to a full house. Sylvester was thrilled to work alongside a man of Baxter's reputation and learning, who humbly "stiled" himself Sylvester's assistant!

Sylvester remembered one occasion when Baxter forgot his notes on Hebrews 4:15. He went ahead, speaking for "an hour or so, just the same, or more effectively."

And when he came down from the Pulpit, he asked me, "If I was not tired." I said, "With what?" He said, "With his Extemporate Discourse." I told him, "That had he not declar'd it, I believe none could have discover'd it:" His reply to me was, "That he thought it very needful for a Minister to have a Body of Divinity in his head."

Finally, Baxter became too weak to preach in public, but he continued to conduct family worship until the very end. And even then, he would welcome all who came.