Puritans in the New World

In this brief clip from his teaching series A Survey of Church History, W. Robert Godfrey examines how the Puritans in New England sought to hasten the coming of Christ.

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Transcript:

The Puritans who came to New England, by-and-large, tended to have given up hope of great improvement in England, or at least they thought more rapid improvement could take place in the New World, and that the New World, many of them believed, could have a real role in redemptive history. And so they used language of the prophets about "an errand into the wilderness," or "a city set on a hill." They really believed that what they were going to do in the New World, as John Owen would put it, although he stayed in England, would hasten the coming of Christ. They believed that Christ before -- almost all of the Puritans who came to the New World were believers -- that Christ would glorify his church. They were looking forward to a great day of success for the gospel and for the church. And they believed that the crucial preparation for those days of glory was for Christ's church and Christ's people to be as faithful as they could in living before him, in believing in him, in worshiping him. And many of the Puritans who came to New England believed that New England was the place where that could really be done best.