Archive for January, 2009

Dr. Haykin recently discovered and reviewed a book by Guy Chevreau, who had previously authored a book defending the Toronto Blessing movement, titled Vital Signs of a Healthy Church.  A Diagnostic.   To read the book review click here.  A list of other book reviews may be accessed here.

Posted by Steve Weaver, Research and Administrative Assistant to the Director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies, Dr. Michael A.G. Haykin.

What a shock to read of Richard John Neuhaus’ death. Like Dr. Russell Moore, I too will miss his lucid and pungent prose. And I too plead guilty to always turning to the back first when I read my monthly copy of First Things. There are four or five journals/magazines I have a subscription for—a couple of professional history journals—and then there is First Things. How often the journal has been an oasis for me. I thank God for Richard Neuhaus.

And do read the quote from Neuhaus that Dr. Moore includes in his appreciation.

When revival comes, the Spirit who brings it also—and always—comes as a Spirit of Truth. He brings heart renewal to God’s people—their eyes sparkle with fire and light—and he reforms theological thinking. Semper reformanda, the Spirit reforming us ongoingly, do we not confess that?

Take the revival among English and Welsh Calvinistic Baptists at the close of the “long” eighteenth century. In the wake of this dramatic renewal came a fresh evaluation of what constituted the parameters of the Calvinistic Baptist community. During the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries these parameters had been oriented around the concept of the church as a congregation of baptized believers and any missional component largely lost. Revival came to be linked to Baptist polity. This focus among Calvinistic Baptists on ecclesiological issues and their linking of spiritual vitality to church order, however, received a direct challenge from the Evangelical Revival. The participants of this revival, who knew themselves to be part of a genuine movement of the Spirit of God, were mainly interested in issues relating to salvation. Ecclesial matters often engendered unnecessary strife and, in the eyes of key individuals like George Whitefield, robbed those who disputed about them of God’s blessing.

By the end of the century many Calvinistic Baptists agreed. While they were not at all prepared to deny their commitment to Baptist polity, they were not willing to remain fettered by traditional patterns of Baptist thought about their identity. Retaining the basic structure of Baptist thinking about the church they added one critical ingredient drawn from the experience of the Evangelical Revival: the vital need for local Baptist churches to be centres of vigorous evangelism. There is no doubt that this amounted to a re-thinking of Baptist identity. From the perspective of these Baptists, Baptist congregations and their pastors were first of all Christians who needed to be concerned about the spread of the Gospel at home and abroad.

May we, the spiritual descendants of those brethren—oh what a joy to have men and women like Andrew Fuller and John Sutcliff, Samuel Pearce and Anne Steele, Benjamin Beddome and Benjamin Francis as our forebears!—not fail to learn the lessons they learned so well!

Oh to treasure the traditions these brothers and sisters have handed on to us, but a pox on traditionalism! This is not a contradiction: to love our traditions, but to want nothing to do with traditionalism. The latter loves the past becuase it is simply the past and thinks that things were always done better then. The former loves the traditions of the past for they are bearers of truth and we dare not lose that treasure.

Oh to be found faithful to the end of our days to the faith once for all delivered to the saints and which these brethren have handed on to us. But oh to avoid like the plague the aridity of traditionalism in second- and third-order theological truth, not daring to think new thoughts in these areas. Fuller and his friends were not so fearful.

May we be found faithful to their heritage. May we, like them, be found utterly passionate in our love for the Lord Jesus and his great kingdom—the only community of good and blessing that will last for all eternity—but God help us to know what must be done to be true to this passion in our day!

One of the deepest ironies of the Ancient World is that the Judaeo-Christian tradition, which has a manifest taboo about nakedity (outside of marriage), also has a deep respect for the body (it will be resurrected, for one), while Graeco-Roman paganism, which was shameless in its display of nudity, had a very low view of the worth of the body. The popular Greek saying sōma sēma, “the body is a tomb” well sums up this low view of the human body. In this respect, Gnosticism, with its overt hatred of bodily existence, is flat-out Hellenization. While orthodox Christianity, with its championing of corporeality, is proving its resistance to cultural accommodation on this issue.

It is amazing what some people can put to music. Listen to this by Brandon Milan.

Check this out on Michael Dewalt’s blog: i think my wife’s a calvinist

Enjoy!

But what category should I put this in?

Sweet Tea & Theology has the lyrics here: A Song For A Calvinist Wife.

Michael Ives is making a great offer on his blog:  West Port Experiment”.  He is offering a chance to win a free copy of John Mackay’s Thomas Chalmers: A Short Appreciation. For more information see below:

One main purpose of this blog is to  facilitate renewed interest in Thomas Chalmers, the great 19th century Scottish preacher, churchman, and social reformer.  I am convinced that he needs to be rediscovered again, especially in the place of his spiritual birth - the Reformed community.

As a small contribution to getting the word out, I’ve decided to make a special offer.  I am going to give away 5 copies of W.M. Mackay’s Thomas Chalmers: A Short Appreciation randomly to church leaders or those preparing for the ministry.  For the next two weeks, from today until January 21, anyone who would like to get a free copy can enter the drawing by e-mailing me (michael@reformedparish.com) with your name & e-mail address.  If you are selected, I’ll let you know on Jan. 22 and will then request your mailing address.

If you aren’t a church leader, feel free to check back in a week.  If I don’t get many responses, I’ll open it up to anyone.

Posted by Steve Weaver, Research and Administrative Assistant to the Director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies, Dr. Michael A.G. Haykin.

Nathan Finn has posted at Between the Times about a new issue of The Journal of Baptist Studies:

The 2008 edition of The Journal of Baptist Studies has now been published. JBS is an autonomous, peer-reviewed scholarly journal in Baptist history and historical theology that was launched in 2007. JBS is an online journal that is published once a year, normally in early December. JBS is part of a broader website titled Baptist Studies Online, which also includes Baptist primary sources, links to Baptist study centers and archival repositories, and announcements related to the field. Southeastern Seminary provides financial support for Baptist Studies Online and JBS.

The Table of Contents for the 2008 edition of JBS is listed below:

The Journal of Baptist Studies
Volume 2 (2008)

Editorial

Articles

“Service is Not Slavery: A Review of Recent Literature on Women in the Southern Baptist Convention”
By April Armstrong, pp. 2-15

“Southern Baptist Faith in Black and White after World War II: An Examination of Recent Monographic Literature”
By Edward R. Crowther, pp. 16-26

“The 1919 Statement of Belief and the Tradition of Confessional Boundaries for Southern Baptist Missionaries”
By Jeffrey R. Riddle, pp. 27-43

Book Reviews

Chute, Anthony L. A Piety Above the Common Standard: Jesse Mercer and Evangelistic Calvinism, by Steve Weaver

Flynt, Wayne. Alabama Baptists: Southern Baptists in the Heart of Dixie, by John A. Nixon

Nettles, Tom J. By His Grace and For His Glory: A Historical, Theological and Practical Study of the Doctrines of Grace in Baptist Life, by Tony Chute

Shurden, Walter B. Not An Easy Journey: Some Transitions in Baptist Life, by Nathan A. Finn

Stricklin, David. A Genealogy of Dissent: Southern Baptist Protest in the Twentieth Century, by Aaron Weaver

Thompson, James J. Jr. Tried as by Fire: Southern Baptists and the Religious Controversies of the 1920s, by Mark Rogers

Posted by Steve Weaver, Research and Administrative Assistant to the Director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies, Dr. Michael A.G. Haykin.

More from Basil Manly, Jr. This time a portion of one of his best sermons, that on what constitutes a call to the ministry:

“Now we need numbers in the Ministry. The plenteous, perishing harvest wails out a despairing cry for more laborers. But we need purity more than numbers; we need intelligence more than numbers; we need zeal more than numbers. Above all, we need consecrated men, men who have stood beneath the Cross, till their very souls are dyed with Jesus’ blood, and a love like his for perishing millions has been kindled within them.”

[A Call to the Ministry (Greenville, South Carolina: G.E. Elford’s Job Press, 1866), 16].

Blogging and doing history: it is obvious that I think the two are complementary to some degree and that those doing history should blog. But there is an ephemeral nature about blogging that is counter-productive to historical writing. We write to be read—and read by future generations and not simply our passing contemporaries. I just looked at some blog entries I posted three years ago this time of year—Jan 2006—and some of the references on the web I referred to no longer exist. As I said, blogging is too ephemeral a medium to make it the basis of lasting, influential history writing.

Exactly one hundred and fifty years ago, Basil Manly, Jr (1825-1892), one of the four founding faculty of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, entered upon what he came to consider his life’s great work, namely his teaching and mentoring students at Southern. Manly’s commitment to theological education can be gauged by words he had written in a letter to a leading Baptist layman in South Carolina, John B. O’Neall, in which he stated that the “cause of theological education is one dearer to me than almost any other and I esteem no sacrifice too great for its promotion.”

[Basil Manly, Letter to John B. O’Neall, September 13, 1856 (Manly Collection of Manuscripts, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary Archives)].

“No sacrifice too great”: O that I might share this conviction—yes, with due regard to other responsibilities in my life—but for those of us whom God has called to do theology and be involved in the mentoring of aspiring pastors—O may I have a due sense of the weightiness of this calling and its joy and its cost.

I dare not say it is the calling of callings—I only know that it is the path God has laid out for me. And may I be diligent this year in the duty of my calling.

PS My thanks to Dr Greg Wills for drawing my attention to this text.