Joseph Parker's The People's Bible: Discourse on Holy Scripture (PDF Files).
Joseph Parker (1830 – 1902) was an English Congregational minister, born in Hexham, Northumberland.
He married Ann Nesbitt, daughter of William Nesbitt in 1851. He referred to her as "Annie, the soul I loved, the girl
that saved me, and made me a man" but she died in 1863.
In 1852 Parker wrote to Dr John Campbell, minister of Whitefield Tabernacle, Moorfields, London, for advice
as to entering the Congregational ministry, and after a short probation he became Campbell's assistant. From 1853
to 1858 he was pastor at Banbury. His next charge was at Cavendish Street, Manchester, where he rapidly made himself
felt as a power in English Nonconformity. While here he published a volume of lectures entitled Church Questions, and,
anonymously, Ecce Deus (1868), a work provoked by Seeley's Ecce Homo.
In 1869, he returned to London as minister of the Poultry church, founded by Thomas Goodwin. Almost at once he began
the scheme which resulted in the erection of the great City Temple in Holborn Viaduct. It cost £70,000, and was
opened on 19 May 1874. From this centre his influence spread far and wide. His stimulating and original sermons
made him one of the best known personalities of his time.
Parker was twice chairman of the London Congregational Board and twice of the Congregational Union of England and
Wales. In 1864, Parker married Emma Jane, daughter of Andrew Common JP, banker, of Sunderland. Her death, in
1899, was a blow from which he never fully recovered.
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