Frank W. Boreham: March 3, 1871 – May 18, 1959

F.W. Boreham was born on March 3, 1871, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, England. As a boy, he was introduced to Christ by faithful, Christian parents who trained him in the Word and helped him to appreciate good reading. In Walking with the Giants, Warren Wiersbe devotes an entire chapter to Boreham’s life, revealing that young Frank’s father introduced him to “the vast treasures of biography,” that resulted in his being “hooked for life” (p. 154). At 16, he went to London to get a job, leading to his hearing Charles H. Spurgeon, Hudson Taylor, and F.B. Meyer preach and teach God’s Word. In 1891, he applied to Spurgeon’s Pastor’s College and was the last student that Spurgeon personally selected before his death on January 31, 1892 (p. 155). Ultimately, Boreham served in three churches: in New Zealand, Tasmania, and Australia. In addition to preaching, he wrote newspaper articles and books, publishing his first book, The Luggage of Life, in 1912. He died on May 18, 1959 in Melbourne, Victoria at the age of 88.

Wiersbe wants us to know that “Boreham was not an expositor of the Scriptures in the manner of Spurgeon or Maclaren, but he was a biblical preacher and writer who reached many people who perhaps would have turned away from the conventional sermonic approach. I am not suggesting that you imitate his style; I am suggesting that you get excited about the potential in the common things around you” (p. 158). In his final paragraph, Wiersbe challenges his readers: “If at first Boreham does not excite you, give him time. He grows on you. He has a way of touching the nerve centers of life and getting to that level of reality that too often we miss. Some may consider him sentimental; others may feel he is a relic of a vanished era. They are welcome to their opinions. But before you pass judgment, read him for yourself and read enough to give him a fair trial….There is something for everybody in a Boreham book because his writing touches on the unchanging essentials of life, not the passing accidentals; we need this emphasis today” (p. 159).

And so, may we introduce you to some of F.W. Boreham’s writings? Allow him to introduce you to John Wesley, John Bunyan, Martin Luther, John Knox, David Livingstone, Charles Spurgeon, William Wilberforce, John Newton, Blaise Pascal, Leo Tolstoy, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and many, many others whose lives were transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ and who continue to serve as godly models for modern believers. When the apostle Paul wrote to the Philippians, he exhorted them: “Join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us” (3:17). Boreham will introduce you to a library of lives who walked with God and who still speak, urging us to “lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us” in order that we may “run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1).

John Musselman, The Jackson Institute

Frank Boreham Essays