They Knew Their God Volume Three, Edwin and Lillian Harvey

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They Knew Their God Vol. 3 begins with the fascinating story of the Frenchman, Marquis DeRenty, who was born in the early seventeenth century. He is followed by another Frenchman, Stephen Grellet, who was forced to seek refuge in America during the French Revolution and became a Quaker and worldwide traveling preacher. The third sketch presents the life of the Englishman Samuel Pearce, sometimes known as “the Brainerd of the Baptists.” Pearce is followed by the Methodist preacher from Yorkshire, John Smith, known as “The man with calloused knees.” The fifth sketch is short but moving and introduces the reader to Ann Cutler, who was born in Preston, England in the mid eighteenth century.

Her life of prayer influenced more than one prominent Methodist preacher even though she died at the young age of thirty-five. In the sixth sketch, we read of Uncle John Vassar, otherwise known as “God’s sheep Dog. John was a colporteur for the American Tract Society. In the next sketch we are taken back to England and the Salvation Army as we read of the devout, albeit somewhat eccentric George Railton. Railton is followed by the Scotsman John G. Govan, founder of the Faith Mission in Edinburgh, Scotland. Next, comes Oswald Chambers, whose devotional books make him practically a household word in many Christian homes in both the UK and America. His books still challenge, bless and sometimes shock the reader into a closer walk with Christ. He is followed by his wife, Gertrude, who, after her husband’s death at age forty-three, made sure that the legacy Oswald left in unpublished manuscripts, was made available to the Christian world. In the last three sketches of the book, we read of Evan Hopkins, the Anglican clergyman who became a well known writer and speaker at the famous Keswick convention; Mary Mozely, missionary to Africa, and Francis Asbury, the English born American bishop who did so much to establish Methodism in the New World.
—Trudy Harvey Tait.
This book, like its predecessors, is written by Edwin and Lillian Harvey, and is published by Harvey Christian Publishers. It is available on the Online Christian Bookstore.

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They Knew Their God Book Two, Edwin and Lillian Harvey

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They Knew Their God Vol. 2, like its predecessor, contains a wide variety of men and women who illustrate that knowing God is available to every Christian irrespective of nationality, gender, or religious affiliation. Unlike Volume One, however, the first sketch in this book was born in the late seventeenth century. He is Gerhard Terstegen, the German Pietist, mystic and hymn-writer. We then move into the eighteenth century in the next two sketches: two Americans—the Quaker John Woolman, and Methodist itinerant bishop, Elijan Hedding. The fourth sketch in this volume is about Robert Aitken, the Scotsman who became an Anglican minister and labored in Pendeen, a small town in Cornwall.

Phoebe Palmer, an American Methodist, comes next, succeeded by Robert Murray McCheyne, the well known Scottish Presbyterian preacher from Dundee. He is followed by his close friend, William Burns, who became a missionary in China. In the eighth sketch, we read about the Anglican poet and hymn-writer, Frances R. Havergal, and in the ninth, we span the seas and read of Pastor Hsi, the Chinese pastor and convert of David Hill, missionary in the China Inland Mission. Next comes George Watson, an American Methodist at the turn of the twentieth century. He is followed by Jessie Penn-Lewis, born in Wales and author of the helpful albeit somewhat controversial book: “War on the Saints.” The Three Garrat Sisters come next, who were born in Ireland and labored in South Africa for the Lord. The thirteenth sketch is about Englishman Paget Wilkes, who was co-founder with Barclay Buxton of the Japan Evangelistic Band. From Japan we turn to Latvia and read of Basil Malof, Baptist missionary to Russia, and then we turn back to America to the Quaker Thomas Kelly, the missionary martyrs, John and Betty Stam. The seventeenth sketch brings us once more to England and to George Henry Lang of the Christian Brethren.

And so we have the list of saints who knew their God. England, Germany, America, Latvia, Ireland, Russia, Japan, China, Africa—their lives span the world and embrace all peoples. Knowing God opens up a universe to those who will explore it, hand in hand with their God.

This volume is written by Edwin and Lillian Harvey and is available on the Online Christian Bookstore, made available by Harvey Christian Publishers.

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They Knew Their God Book One, Lillias Trotter, John Hyde, Robert Cleaver Chapman

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In each of the six-book series, They Knew Their God, the authors, Edwin and Lillian Harvey have been careful to include a wide variety of men and women to illustrate that knowing God is available to every Christian irrespective of nationality, gender, or religious affiliation. Generally, the sketches in each book are placed chronologically. There are some exceptions. Take for instance in the first of this series.

The opening sketch traces the spiritual journey of Nicholas of Basle who was born eighteen years after the subject of the second sketch, John Tauler, who received spiritual help from Nicholas and is therefore placed after him. These men lived before the reformation and were both Roman Catholics. In the third sketch we jump to the eighteenth century and read about Christmas Evans, the “One-eyed Preacher of Wales,” who was a Welsh Baptist. Then we have an English Methodist, William Bramwell, an American Methodist, “Mother Cobb,” Felix Neff, a member of the National Church of Switzerland. These last three were all born in the mid to late eighteenth century. Moving into the nineteenth century, we come to Robert Cleaver Chapman, a Christian Brethren from England, followed by “Holy Ann,” the “Irish Saint.” Next come the Englishman, Isaac Marsden and the American born, Alfred Cookman, both Methodists. These two Methodists are followed by two English ladies: Elizabeth Baxter and Lillias Trotter. Next come two Americans, John Hyde, a Presbyterian, and Samuel Logan Brengle, a well known officer in the Salvation Army. After Brengle comes Sister Eva, born in Germany and who founded a sisterhood at Friedenshort. Sammy Morris from Africa comes next, and then Iva Vennard, an American Methodist deaconess and educator. Last but not least, we have Johanna Veenstra, an American of Dutch descent, who was brought up in the Christian Reformed Church and gave her life for Christ in Africa.
And so the list comes to an end–eighteen saints, each very different from the other, who trod very different paths but reached the same destination: knowing God in an intimate way.—Trudy Harvey Tait.
They Knew Their God is published by Harvey Christian Publishers and is available in their online Christian Bookstore.

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The Christian’s Daily Challenge

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There are many daily reading books out there on the market right now. The Christian’s Daily Challenge by E. F. and L. Harvey is one of them. The authors, however, felt the need when this book was compiled, to produce a daily devotional that would prove a real challenge to readers to strive after a deeper devotional life with Christ.

There were several well accepted and well written daily reading books available back then in the 1950′s but none seemed to exactly fit this category. They were comforting and inspiring but The Christian’s Daily Challenge provoked the reader to godliness in a rather unique way. And the fact that this “provoking” is coming from a variety of voices, each echoing through the medium of its particular culture and era and, with its own peculiar denominational flavor, adds both variety and persuasion to the central message–”Go higher; aim further; dig deeper; never be satisfied with mediocrity in your Christian walk. God is there every moment to be your enabling and your “exceeding great reward.”
This daily devotional is available on Harvey Christian Publishers’ Online Christian Bookstore.

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Covetousness by Lillian Harvey and Edwin Robert Tait

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Covetousness has been termed “The sin very few ever confess.” In fact, that is the subtitle of the book Covetousness, written by Lillian Harvey and published by Harvey Christian Publishers. A few quotes from this book will give you an idea of its main thrust and purpose.
“The sin of the whole world is essentially the sin of Judas—men do not disbelieve their Christ; but they will sell Him.”
—Ruskin
“If money be not thy servant it will become thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth as it may be said to possess him.”—Charcon.
“It is not the fact that a man has riches which keeps him from the kingdom of Heaven, but the fact that the riches have him.”
—David Caird


“Let us make our giving in accordance with our earnings, lest God make our earnings in accordance with our giving.”
—Peter Marshall.
“I love poverty because Jesus Christ loved it. I love wealth because it gives me the means of assisting the wretched.
—Pascal.
“Let me hold lightly things of this earth;
Transient treasures, what are they worth?
Moths can corrupt them, rust can decay,
All their bright beauty fades in a day.
Let me hold lightly temporal things—
I, who am deathless, I, who wear wings!
Let me hold fast, Lord, things of the skies;
Quicken my vision, open my eyes!
Show me Thy riches, glory and grace,
Boundless as time is, endless as space…
Let me hold lightly things that are mine—
Lord, Thou dost give me all that is Thine!”
—Martha Snell Nicholson

Covetousness is now available in Harvey Christian Publishers’ Online Christian Bookstore.

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Hast Thou No Scar?

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Most Christians have heard of Amy Carmichael. As well as being a devoted missionary in India for many years, Amy was also a writer and poet. She writes out of her wealth of experience. In Royal Purposes, a small devotional of thirty-one readings and compiled by Edwin and Lillian Harvey, one of her many poems is included in the reading, “Scarred in Battle.”
Hast thou no scar?


No hidden scar on foot, or side, or hand?
I hear thee sung as mighty in the land,
I hear them hail thy bright, ascendant star;
Hast thou no scar?

Hast thou no wound:
Yet was I wounded by the archers, spent,
Leaned me against a tree to die, and rent
By ravening beasts that compassed me, I swooned;
Hast thou no wound?

No wound: No scar”
Yet, as the Master, shall the servant be,
And pierced are the feet that follow Me;
But thine are whole; can he have followed far
Who has not wound or scar?

Royal Purposes is published by Harvey Christian Publishers and available in their Online Christian Bookstore.

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Through the Door of Destitution—Royal Purposes

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The first beatitude, “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” is not exactly the kind of statement one hears on today’s media. To express one’s need, to acknowledge one’s lack—that does not seem the way to inherit anything, let alone a kingdom. Yet these words are Jesus’ words, our Lord and Master, God incarnate, Wisdom Incarnate, and they echo through the ages and knock at the doors of our hearts.


The book, Royal Purposes, compiled by Edwin and Lillian Harvey, is small—sixty-four pages in all, yet it has proved a blessing to many. It encourages all readers to take heart when suffering of any kind knocks at their door, for God has a purpose in suffering which, after all, enables us to more easily become “poor in spirit” and thus inherit the kingdom of heaven. On page thirty-three, in the reading entitled “Through the Door of Destitution,” the authors have included a poem by E. C. Priestley which encourages us all to enter through this “door.”
Only the beggared ask,
Only the weakened cling,
Only the joyless crave
Joy from the living spring.

Only the conquered yield,
Only the humbled pray,
Only the helpless trust
Jesus, the soul’s strong Stay.

Only the weary rest,
Only the seekers find,
Only the souls are blest
Who in the Savior hide.

This entry was posted in God, Prayer and tagged E. C. Priestley, Only the conquered yield, Only the helpless trust, Only the humbled pray by harveycp. Bookmark the permalink.

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Quotable quotes from The Christian’s Daily Challenge.

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I gave up all for Christ, and what have I found? I have found everything in Christ.
—John Calvin. (p. 92.)
It is easy to appear a Daniel in a country where there are no lions. (p. 141.
We need not make so much effort to defend the Bible as to practice it . p. 199.
To speak well, is to sound like a cymbal, but to do well, is to act like an angel.
—Phillips Brooks. (Ibid.)
Blessed is any weight, however overwhelming, which God has been so good as to fasten with His own hand upon our shoulders.
—F. W. Faber. (p. 218)


Prayer is the key to Heaven; the Spirit helps faith to turn the key.
—T. Watson. (p. 292)
I believe that if you and I were to heed the whispers of our Father, we should not need to many of His thunders.
—J. H. Evans. (p. 315)
Yesterday’s heretics often become today’s saints. (p. 328)
The secret of an unsatisfied life too often is an unsurrendered will.—Hudson Taylor. (p. 342)
Prayer is the touch of an infant—but on the arm of the Almighty.
—Thomas Scott. (p. 346)
The great question is not what you will get, but what you will become. The greatest wealth you ever can get will be in yourself.
—Horace Bushnell. (p. 372)

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When God Beats Time

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There’s a song that God is writing on the staff for you and me,
And its melody is sweeter than the songs of earth could be;
For the major and the minor of this song of life sublime
Bring us nearer home to Heaven—when God beats time….

There are “holds” and “rests” before us, and to pause it may be hard,
But we find a hidden meaning when we come to God’s retard”;
He alone can give expression, make the song of life sublime,
If we only mind the pauses—when God beats time.

There are chords of minor music that we may not understand,
In this song of life unfolding, written by the Master’s hand;
Yet how patiently He lingers till we catch the glory chime,
And the song is made the sweeter—when God beats time.

When at last the curtain’s lifted, and the choirs of Heaven stand
In the Hallelujah greeting to the happy, blood-washed band,
Then our sharpest “accidental” with the angel notes will rhyme
In the chorus of redemption—when God beats time.
—F. M. Lehman
Used by permission. Copyright property of the Nazarene Publishing House.

The above poem is taken from page 164 of The Christian’s Daily Challenge by E. & F. Harvey and published by Harvey Christian Publishers and available in their Online Christian Bookstore.

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Tribulation Worketh by G. D. Watson

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The book, Tribulation Worketh by G. D. Watson, is unique. It differs from his other books because it is a compilation of his writings on the subject of the blessings of tribulation—what suffering does for the soul. On the cover is a picture of a plowed field indicating that suffering plows the soul and prepares it for God’s sowing and harvesting. This book contains sixteen chapters, each taken from various other of Watson’s writings. It was compiled by Edwin and Lillian Harvey and has proved a blessing to many suffering saints. Pastors have used it in hospital visitation. It has only seventy-eight pages so is easily read. The book is introduced by the following poem:

“O break my heart; but break it as a field
Is by the plow up-broken for the corn;
O break it as the buds, by green leaf sealed,
Are, to unloose the golden blossom, torn;
Love would I offer unto Love’s great Master,
Set free the odor, break the alabaster.

“O break my heart; break it victorious God,
That life’s eternal well may flash abroad;
O let it break as when the captive trees,
Breaking cold bonds, regain their liberties;
And as thought’s sacred grove to life is springing
Be joys, like birds, their hope, Thy victory singing.”

Tribulation Worketh is available in Harvey Christian Publishers’ Online Christian Bookstore.

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