Saturday 14 January 2012

Jacques de la Fontaine


Extract for my forthcoming book on Jacques de la Fontaine:
The principle of suffering for the name of Christ was viewed as the greatest honour or title that any Christian can possess.  Early on, the family rejected the “de la” prefix to the surname, not because there is any reason to doubt their ancestral nobility, but “because it was full of vanity.” Empty man-made honours played no part in their life and thinking.  Further, all his sons had dedicated themselves to the ministry, and, at that time in France, ministers had the same privileges as the nobility.  Prefixes were therefore superfluous.  The Fontaine family knew what true honours were, and what constituted true nobility, and that conferred by the world did not come into it! 

We see in this family the driving force of correct principle when adhered to.  It provides perspective on life’s challenges, yes; but it also enables us to get other things into proper perspective and to see the inestimable honour it is to be chosen to suffer persecution for the name of Christ. What of titles of state!  What of academic achievements!  What of the wealth in this world!  What of a great ancestral background!  They mean little or nothing when compared with the honour of suffering reproach for the Saviour outside the camp.  “For what profit is it to a man to if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?  Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?” 

You can now get your copy by visiting Hazlett Lynch.

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