Long before becoming the governor of Massachusetts, John Winthrop had a deep under-standing of God’s divine purposes for the colony. “We shall be a city set on a hill,” he said of Boston where the church was the center of life during those early years of the city’s history.
While en route to the New World on board the Arbella, Winthrop wrote the sermon “A Model of Christian Charity,” in which he outlined the purposes of God for New England. He described a harmonious Christian community whose laws and government would logically proceed from a godly and purposeful arrangement.
“The eyes of all people are upon us, so that if we deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause us to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword through the world.”
Winthrop set out clearly the revealed purposes of God and warned that their success or failure would depend on their dedication to the ideal community. Winthrop laid the foundation for a people yet to come. God Himself will raise up a new generation of young people who will be transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit.
- CHRISTIAN CHARITIE: A Modell hereof By John Winthrop
- A MODEL OF CHRISTIAN CHARITY: The modern language version
See also: The Boston Awakening
