By Rev. Dr. Ed and
Janice Hird
In 1665, Richard and Margaret Baxter survived the Black
Plague in London where 15% of Londoners perished that summer. King Charles II and most wealthy people fled
London. The poor people were not allowed
to leave. Only a small number of London
pastors and doctors remained to cope with the overwhelming onslaught. Plague houses, quarantined by guards for 40
days, were marked with a red cross on the door with the words ‘Lord Have Mercy
Upon Us”. Richard commented: “The sense of approaching death so awakened both
preachers and hearers, that multitudes of young men and others were converted
to true repentance.”
Richard and Margaret, who had only been married three years
earlier, were a powerful team caring for the sick and leading many to
Christ. As a confirmed bachelor, 47-year-old
Richard had surprised many by marrying Margaret who was twenty years younger
than him. Because of his dedication to
renewing the Anglican Church, he, along with 2000 other Anglican clergy, were
ejected from their churches and forbidden to preach within ten miles of a local
town. As the 17th Century’
most visible pastor, Richard had been leading a spiritual revival in Kidderminster
with his 800-strong congregation of weavers.
Margaret, as an upper-class dilletante, was an unlikely convert. Richard observed that she had in her youth
been tempted to doubt the life to come and the truth of the Scripture. Margaret didn’t think much of Baxter or the
people of Kidderminster, merely attending church to humour her godly mother. But God reached her and changed her life. As a new Christian, she almost died from
tuberculosis, but the humble weavers prayed and fasted for her. God heard their prayers, giving her a
miraculous recovery.
As a wealthy heiress, Margaret loved to serve the poor and
invest in her husband’s ministry to the lost.
In a neglected part of London, she founded a free school where poor
children were taught and learned about Jesus.
In one rented facility, over 800 gathered to hear Richard preach.
Suddenly the building began to collapse. Margaret ran outside, immediately hiring
a carpenter to put an extra support in the building so that the congregants
would not die. It worked. The memory of this near disaster left
Margaret with nightmares. She was both
very fearful and very courageous simultaneously. Her father, Francis Charlton, Esquire, was a
wealthy leading justice of the peace.
One of the traumas of her early childhood was the demolition of her home
Apley Castle by Royalist troops in 1644, during the Civil War. Men were killed right in front of five year
old Margaret. Three times more, Margaret faced death, leaving her with PTSD
symptoms for the rest of her life.
Her husband, Richard, was often fined and then sent to jail
for preaching the gospel. When Richard
was thrown in prison, she cheerfully joined him there, bringing her own
bedding. After building a church
building for her husband, jealous neighbours had the visiting minister
arrested, thinking that they had captured her husband. After being forced ten miles out of town in
1669 for preaching the gospel, the Baxters had to live in a dilapidated farm where
“the coal smoke so filled the room that we were even suffocated with the stink.
And she had ever a great constriction of the lungs that could not bear smoke or
closeness.”
The Baxters entered marriage with their eyes open. Packer commented: “Vividly aware of each
other’s faults, they loved each other just the same, ever thankful for having
each other and ever eager to give to each other.” Marriage for them was more about spiritually
maturing than getting their own way. Richard commented “If God calls you to a
married life, expect…trouble…and make particular preparation for each
temptation, cross, and duty which you must expect. Think not that you are entering into a state
of mere [pure and unmixed] delight, lest it prove but a fool’s paradise to them.”
Richard wrote 168 books, many after his ejection from the
Kidderminster pulpit. Even though Baxter’s books were largely forgotten after
the Great Eviction of 1662, they were later rediscovered by John Wesley, William
Wilberforce, and most recently by Dr. JI Packer. Margaret, who spoke her mind, informed her
husband that he should have written less books, spending more time writing each
book. She also told him that because of
his prolific writing and extensive ministry, he was not spending enough time in
secret prayer with her. Margaret was a
passionate prayer warrior who often out-prayed her academic husband.
Richard, who suffered from chronic pain in his later years,
regretted how it sometimes affected his temper and communicativeness around
Margaret. He was convinced from age 20
that he would not be long for this life. So, he preached “as a dying man to
dying men.” Baxter’s physical ailments
included “a tubercular cough; frequent nosebleeds and bleeding from his
finger-ends; migraine headaches; inflamed eyes; all kinds of digestive
disorders; kidney stones and gallstones.” Because Margaret was very sensitive
to loud noise, Richard worked hard to modify his sometimes, hasty way of
speaking. He greatly loved and admired Margaret, saying that she was “a woman
of extraordinary acuteness of wit, solidity, and judgment, incredible prudence
and sagacity and sincere devotedness to God, and unusual strict obedience to
him...”
In their nineteenth year of marriage, Margaret took a turn
for the worse and died. The bloodletting
by doctors had only hastened her demise.
Richard was heartbroken. As part
of his grieving process, he wrote a book Breviate about his dear wife.
J.I. Packer believes that Baxter’s book (renamed Grief
Sanctified) can transform our marriages in the 21st century. The Baxter’s marriage represented a
commitment to covenant relationship that brings a course-correction to our
self-indulgent culture. Richard, in
grieving the loss of Margaret, focused on the goodness of God in time of tragedy.
Rather than being resentful and bitter he was grateful for the time that God
graciously gave him with his wife. They show us how to make it till death do us
part. God used the fire of the Baxters’
love to transform many lives for eternity. May we too, in this difficult time
of COVID-19, trust that the fire of God’s love will strengthen and revive our
families and marriages.
Rev. Dr. Ed and Janice Hird
Co-authors, Blue Sky novel
