First Presbyterian Church of Warren, Ohio

HOME

OUR MINISTRY

WORSHIP

ADMINISTRATION

CALENDAR

ORGANIZATIONS

OUR HERITAGE

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

GET INVOLVED

SITE MAP

 
Pastor’s Message for July
 
John Witherspoon

John Witherspoon was born in Gifford, Scotland, about fifteen or twenty miles east southeast of Edinburgh, on February 15, 1723. He was the son of a Church of Scotland minister and, on his mother’s side, a descendant of John Knox, the founder of the
Church of Scotland.

He was well educated, earning both an M.A. and a divinity degree from the University of Edinburgh and a Doctor of Divinity from St. Andrews. While serving as a pastor in Scotland, he wrote three influential theological treatises.
In 1768 he accepted a call as the sixth President of the Presbyterian College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) and emigrated to the colonies with his wife and five children.

As President, Dr. Witherspoon required that all students studying for ministry, law or government take a course in Moral Philosophy, which he taught and in which he espoused not only Presbyterian moral values, but also limited government. Among the students who took that class, three became supreme court justices; thirty-four became judges; ten were cabinet ministers; twelve were members of the Continental Congress; twenty-eight became Senators; forty-nine were Congressmen; one was Vice-President (Aaron Burr), and one was President (James Madison). It would not be an overstatement to say that his influence was profound.

In 1776, he published a sermon entitled “The Dominion of Providence over the Passions of Men” concerning the need for independence. He was elected a representative from New Jersey to the Continental Congress and voted for independence. When questioned whether the country was ready, he famously replied that it “was not only ripe for the measure, but in danger of rotting for the want of it.”

On July 4, 1776, he became the only member of the clergy to sign the Declaration of Independence. He died in 1794 and is buried in Princeton Cemetery.

Happy Fourth to all of you and to all in the generations before us who saw in their Presbyterian Theology the need for freedom.

Pastor Rusty

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.



FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF WARREN

256 Mahoning Ave., NW  |  Warren, OH 44483  |  (phone) 330-393-1524  |  (fax) 330-393-1526  |  (e-mail) fpcwarren@hotmail.com