Architect of Evangelicalism E-Book

Carl F. H. Henry

• Herausgeber: Lexham Press
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Serie: Best of Christianity Today
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 587

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

Discover the ongoing relevance of the essential evangelical.In recent years, the label "evangelical" has been distorted and its usefulness questioned. No one is better equipped to provide a clear understanding of evangelicalism than the late Carl F. H. Henry, the founding editor of Christianity Today and the most influential theologian of American evangelicalism in the twentieth century. While Billy Graham was preaching the gospel to stadiums full of people, Henry was working tirelessly to help Christians adopt a worldview that encompasses all of life. Architect of Evangelicalism helps us gain a better sense of the roots of American evangelicalism by giving us the best of Henry's Christianity Today essays on subjects such as what defines evangelicalism, what separates it from theological liberalism, what evangelical Christian education should look like, and how evangelicals should engage with society.

Leseprobe

ARCHITECT

Essential Essays of

OF

Carl F. H. Henry

EVANGELICALISM

Architect of Evangelicalism: Essential Essays of Carl F. H. Henry

Best of Christianity Today

Copyright 2019 Christianity Today International

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All rights reserved. You may use brief quotations from this resource in presentations, articles, and books. For all other uses, please write Lexham Press for permission. Email us at [email protected].

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the King James Version. Public domain.

Scripture quotations marked (RSV) are from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1952 [2nd edition, 1971] by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Print ISBN 9781683593362

Digital ISBN 9781683593379

Lexham Editorial: Elliot Ritzema, Danielle Thevenaz

Cover Design: Lydia Dahl

CONTENTS

Foreword by Mark Galli

Introduction by David S. Dockery

PART I: Defining Evangelicalism

1Evangelicals and Fundamentals (1957)

2The Evangelical Responsibility (1957)

3A Plea for Evangelical Unity (1961)

4Evangelicals in the Social Struggle (1965)

5Who Are the Evangelicals? (1972)

6Evangelicals and the Bible (1972)

7Evangelical Summertime? (1977)

8Evangelicals: Out of the Closet but Going Nowhere? (1980)

PART II: Evangelicals and Modern Theology

9Revelation and the Bible (1958)

10Yea, Hath God Said …? (1963)

11Liberalism in Transition (1963)

12Chaos in European Theology: The Deterioration of Barth’s Defenses (1964)

13A Reply to the God-Is-Dead Mavericks (1966)

14Where Is Modern Theology Going? (1968)

15Justification by Ignorance: A Neo-Protestant Motif? (1970)

16The Fortunes of Theology (1972)

PART III: Evangelicals and Education

17Christian Responsibility in Education (1957)

18The Need for a Christian University (1967)

19The Rationale for the Christian College (1971)

20Death of a Modern God (1971)

21Committing Seminaries to the Word (1976)

PART IV: Evangelicals and Society

22The Christian-Pagan West (1956)

23Human Rights in an Age of Tyranny (1957)

24Perspective for Social Action (1959)

25Has Anybody Seen “Erape”? (1960)

26The “New Morality” and Premarital Sex (1965)

27A Question of Identity (1971)

28Has Democracy a Future? (1974)

29Jesus and Political Justice (1974)

30The West at Midnight (1975)

31Evangelicals Jump on the Political Bandwagon (1980)

32Private Sins, Public Office (1988)

33The New Coalitions (1989)

Tribute by Timothy George: Inventing Evangelicalism

Conclusion: Confessions of an Editor (1968)

Subject Index

Scripture Index

Foreword

If there was ever a time for us to think along with Carl F. H. Henry, now is the time. In glancing through the contents of this book, I was frankly amazed at the number of times Henry touched on themes that we wrestle with today. What most interests me is his ongoing efforts to help evangelicals engage the public square and to do so in a way that was true to the complexity of pursuing justice and the truth of Scripture.

I came of age intellectually in what might be called the post-Henry years. That’s how it seemed to me at least, given the circle of evangelicals I was in. Henry was seen as a man for another time. He was too rationalistic. He drew lines a little finely. And he was too assured of himself.

What I’ve discovered in the last decade or so is this: He indeed was rationalistic, but given the Twitteresque and emotional way we carry on theological and political debate these days, we could use a jolting dose of rationalism again.

He was indeed a man for his own times, like all of us are. But unlike most of us, I believe the quality of his thought will bring wisdom to the later generations who take the trouble to read him.

He was indeed assured, and perhaps sometimes of himself. But what mostly bleeds through his words is a fierce devotion to Jesus Christ and biblical truth. Anyone who displays that type of passion is going to be accused of being “too assured” now and then.

When another Karl, Karl Barth, visited America in 1962, he spoke in Washington, DC. Carl Henry was in the audience, and during the question and answer session, he stood, identified himself, and asked a question. Henry relates the moment in his autobiography:

“The question, Dr. Barth, concerns the historical factuality of the resurrection of Jesus.” I pointed to the press table and noted the presence of leading reporters.… If these journalists had their present duties in the time of Jesus, I asked, was the resurrection of such a nature that covering some aspect of it would have fallen into their area of responsibility? “Was it news,” I asked, “in the sense that the man in the street understands news?”

Henry was trying to see if Barth was committed to the historicity of the resurrection.

I’m sure what was going through Barth’s mind was his previous interactions with editors of Christianity Today. Some questions had been submitted to Barth through Geoffrey Bromiley, translator of Barth’s Dogmatics, but Barth refused to answer their queries. He likened them to an inquisition, saying, “These people have already had their so-called orthodoxy for a long time. They are closed to anything else.”1

Henry continues,

Barth became angry. Pointing at me, and recalling my identification, he asked: “Did you say Christianity Today or Christianity Yesterday?” The audience—largely nonevangelical professors and clergy—roared with delight. When countered unexpectedly in this way, one often reaches for a Scripture verse. So I replied, assuredly out of biblical context, “Yesterday, today, and forever.”2

Carl Henry at his assured best!

To the degree that Henry was merely self-assured, he’d be the first to eschew pride. We live in a time, however, when some of the most fundamental truths of the gospel are questioned and doubted and debated afresh. If only there were more intellectuals of Henry’s caliber who had the assurance to affirm publicly and without shame the truth of the gospel yesterday, today, and forever.

Mark Galli

Editor in Chief, Christianity Today

Introduction

On December 7, 2003, Carl F. H. Henry, the intellectual giant of the evangelical movement, was called home by our Lord at the age of ninety. Born the eldest of eight children on January 22, 1913, to German immigrant parents in New York City, Henry’s life reflected much of broader American life in the twentieth century. Following high school, Henry was focused on a career in journalism. He served as a reporter for the New York Herald Tribune and the New York Daily News, and covered a section of Long Island for The New York Times.

It was through his experience as a journalist that he came in touch with the Oxford Group, and at twenty he encountered the truth of the Christian gospel and trusted in Jesus Christ. After he heard Wheaton College president J. Oliver Buswell deliver a persuasive defense of the Christian faith, he left his promising journalism career to enroll at Wheaton in 1935. While there, the young Henry made friends with Billy Graham and studied with philosopher Gordon Clark. He also met his future wife Helga Bender; they would marry in 1940 and have two children. Henry went on to complete his BA and MA at Wheaton, earn an MDiv and ThD at Northern Baptist Seminary, and later a PhD in philosophy with Edgar Brightman at Boston University.

Growing Influence and Christianity Today

After teaching from 1942 to 1947 at Northern Baptist Seminary, he was invited by visionaries Charles E. Fuller and Harold J. Ockenga to join the faculty of the new Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. Henry emerged as a key leader of the new seminary, serving as dean of the faculty and coordinator of the annual Rose Bowl Sunrise Service. In the same year he went to Fuller, Henry published his first significant book, The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism. The prophetic message of this work, combined with the new platform at Fuller, paved the way for Henry to become “the architect of evangelicalism.” The themes expounded in Uneasy Conscience proleptically pointed to the emphases that characterized Henry’s life and writings for the next several decades.

Less than a decade after his move to Pasadena, Henry in 1956 accepted the invitation to serve as founding editor of Christianity Today (CT). Henry’s background in journalism as well as his growing reputation as an academic leader and evangelical statesman made him the ideal person to lead the CT project as envisioned by Graham and Ockenga. From his post as editor, he solidified his leadership within American Christianity, climaxing with the chairmanship of the World Congress on Evangelism in Berlin in 1966.

This book represents the best of Henry’s contributions to the pages of CT, laying out themes that are also regularly found in the fifty books that Henry authored or edited. Throughout his writings, Henry convictionally articulated an unflinching commitment to the centrality of the gospel and the authority of Scripture while calling for serious engagement with the culture and the pressing issues of the day. Henry’s irenic spirit enabled him to interact with others in an engaging way while holding unapologetically to the truthfulness of historic Christianity.

Evangelical Distinctives

The nearly three dozen essays found in this volume represent in an exemplary fashion what can be called “the evangelical mind.” Part I offers eight essays that characterize various aspects of evangelicalism. Evangelicals are men and women who love Jesus Christ, love the Bible, and love the gospel message. Evangelicalism is a cross-denominational movement that emphasizes classical Protestant theology, which is best understood as a culturally engaged, historically shaped response to an empty and despairing mainline liberalism on the one hand and a doomed reactionary fundamentalism on the other. Evangelicals are heirs of the Reformation from the sixteenth century; of Puritanism and Pietism from the seventeenth century; of the eighteenth and nineteenth century revivalists and awakening movements; and particularly of the post-fundamentalists coming out of the twentieth century’s modernist-fundamentalist controversies. In the first section of this volume, readers will see how Henry time and again focused on central core beliefs, stressing the importance of cooperation, scholarship, and cultural engagement with an emphasis on confessional beliefs and Christian unity.

Part II focuses on evangelicals and modern theology. By the middle of the twentieth century mainline theology had lost its compass, if not its soul, while fundamentalism had grown hardline, harsh, and isolationist. Henry stressed the importance of biblical inerrancy and authority to counter the emptiness of liberalism while calling for Christian unity and cultural engagement as an alternative to the irrelevance of fundamentalism. In order to avoid errors on the left and the right, Henry, in his journalistic approach to doing theology, invited his readers to center and ground their beliefs in Jesus Christ.

Evangelicalism, claimed Henry, exemplifies both a historical meaning and a ministry connectedness, but it also includes a truth claim, a theologically and historically shaped meaning. In the pages of CT, Henry never tired of contending that evangelicalism is more than an intellectual assent to creedal formulas, as important as that may be. It is more than a reaction to error and certainly more than a call to return to the past.

We cannot and must not miss the fact that evangelicals have focused on the authoritative Scripture and the gospel, as made known in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Evangelicals believe that salvation is by God’s grace alone through faith in Jesus Christ. By grace believers are saved, kept, and empowered to live a life of service. At its heart, Henry maintained that evangelicalism is the affirmation of and genuine commitment to the central beliefs of orthodox Christianity, as these beliefs have been carefully and clearly articulated through the ages.

Evangelicalism in the World

Parts III and IV provide a vision for an evangelical educational model as well as a road map for faithful engagement with the culture. Henry rejected an anti-intellectual approach to the Christian faith. Rather, he prioritized the importance of the life of the mind, learning to think Christianly. He made a case for the place of rigorous academics, engaging all subject matter from the perspective of a Christian worldview. His vision for education displayed his own wide-ranging intellectual interests. Henry dreamed of a major evangelical research university in one of America’s major cities that would engage the arts, the sciences, the humanities, the social sciences, and professional programs from the vantage point of God’s natural and special revelation. He longed for the next generation to recognize that truth counts, that there is indeed a historic faithful orthodoxy to be confessed and proclaimed.

Henry, years before many other evangelicals, saw the importance of cultural engagement and social ethics. He used the pages of CT to become the leading voice on these important issues among the growing movement, always wanting to wed evangelism with calls for racial reconciliation and social justice. Bringing together commitments to Christian worldview, active service, and global evangelism, Henry in his day also challenged the views of communism, Marxism, and fascism. He insisted that the evangelical movement must not be only otherworldly, but must remain culturally engaged.

He was quick to remind readers, however, that such engagement cannot be this-worldly only, for service apart from the gospel, while certainly helpful, is ultimately insufficient. Thus, instead of withdrawing from the world in a separatistic or legalistic fashion, as had been the tendency of fundamentalism, evangelicalism must be engaged in cooperative and collaborative educational, missional, and ethical efforts. Indeed, Henry trumpeted the call for Christian unity and cooperation both in mission and in shared core beliefs. Simultaneously, he reminded everyone of the biblical pattern for purity, holiness, and faithful Christian living. His vision for the evangelical world could be characterized as “partly hoping, partly fearing,” as he lived between the tensions of his hopeful dreams and his fretful concerns for what he observed all around him.

Beyond the Christianity Today Years

Henry stepped down as CT editor in 1968 but continued to write a column called “Footnotes” between 1969 and 1977. The essays found throughout the pages of CT paved the way for Henry’smagnum opus, the six-volume God, Revelation, and Authority (1976–1983), which in many ways represents a portrait of the evangelical mind. In this work, Henry presented a magisterial defense of historic Christianity while framing the issues of truth, propositional revelation, authority, and hermeneutics in a way that encouraged the faith once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 3) to be passed on to succeeding generations.

After leaving CT, Henry also returned to teaching, first at Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He then served as lecturer-at-large for World Vision and Prison Fellowship, and was president of the Evangelical Theological Society and the American Theological Society. He delivered several of the most prestigious academic lectureships in the world, including the University of Edinburgh’s famous Rutherford Lectures in 1989. That same year, Henry co-chaired, with Kenneth Kantzer, the Evangelical Affirmations Conference. For years he was affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention and was for four decades a member of the Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, DC, though most of his innumerable involvements took place outside of Baptist life.

Yet Henry’s roles as author, editor, and lecturer only tell a portion of the story. Through his presence and leadership at key events throughout the second half of the twentieth century, cataloged by others as well as his own autobiographical reflections, Henry’s influence was immense. Not only by his public writings, but through his prolific correspondence and mentoring of younger leaders, he influenced a generation to think Christianly about all of life. His penetrating insights into matters of culture and society provided the intellectual muscle to wrestle with key issues and challenges facing both church and society.

I had the privilege to know and learn from Carl F. H. Henry. Those who knew him well found him to be a devout believer and faithful disciple of Jesus Christ. Those who met him for the first time often stood in awe of his giant intellect. But soon, almost without exception, they became more impressed with his humility and gracious spirit. The essays in this volume reflect well his intellectual prowess and his gracious and irenic spirit, modeling in an exemplary way the characteristics of evangelicalism’s intellectual and theological architect. Let us pray that the lessons available in this volume will serve well the evangelical movement in the twenty-first century as it struggles with similar issues and wrestles with the additional challenges of our day.

David S. Dockery

President, Trinity International University

and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

Part I

DEFINING EVANGELICALISM

Chapter 1

EVANGELICALS AND FUNDAMENTALS*

A number of circumstances have transpired that call for review of the terms evangelicalism and fundamentalism in relation to the present theological situation. Several opposing schools of thought vie for use of the term evangelical. Appropriation of the word by those who do not hold to its biblical and historic content has caused some hesitancy on the part of those who hold to the doctrines of revealed Christianity, as to its proper use. They fear misunderstanding of their theological position.

Complication also results from the diverse connotations surrounding the term fundamentalism in various countries. Fundamentalism has a different savor in England and Australia than in the United States and Canada. Further confusion has been caused by criticism of the “fundamentalism” of Billy Graham by liberal and neo-orthodox leaders and the censure of the “modernism” of Mr. Graham by some fundamentalists. All this semantic confusion calls for clarification.

A growing preference for the term evangelicalism has developed within recent years in circles that keep to traditional doctrines held to be fundamental to Christian faith. This choice finds root in several important facts: first, the word is scriptural and has a well-defined historical content; second, the alternate, fundamentalism, has narrower content and has acquired unbiblical accretions.

In the New Testament the Greek to euaggelion (the evangel) is translated gospel, glad tidings. After the death of Christ the term signified the history of Christ and is the title prefixed to each of the four narratives of his birth, doctrine, miracles, death, resurrection and ascension. Further, the evangel signified the Christian revelation and was applied to the system of doctrines, ordinances and laws instituted by Christ. The evangel indicated more than a proclamation of pardon through faith and included all the teachings of Christ. Thus in the commission recorded in Mark the apostles were instructed “to go into all the world, and preach the gospel (the evangel) to every creature.” That they were sent not only to proclaim pardon through Christ but to instruct men in all details of the Christian religion, is plain from the parallel passage in Matthew, “Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations … teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.” Moral precepts of the Sermon on the Mount must be included in the term evangel. Following biblical content, evangelicalism calls attention to the whole gospel as set forth in God’s Holy Word.

Historically, the term evangelical follows the biblical content. Webster’s New International Dictionary defines “evangelical” as “designating that party or school among the Protestants which holds that the essence of the gospel consists mainly in its doctrines of man’s sinful condition and the need of salvation, the revelation of God’s grace in Christ, the necessity of spiritual renovation and participation in the experience of redemption through faith.” In accord with this definition the evangelical follows in the succession of Augustine, Wycliffe, Luther, Calvin, Knox, Wesley, Whitefield, Spurgeon, Hodge, Walther, Moody, Kuyper, Warfield, Machen and men of like caliber. These men, for the most part, not only proclaimed the great doctrines which concerned with salvation, but made the evangel apply to the whole of life. Spiritual and moral renovation receive emphasis as well as justification by faith.

The term fundamentalism does not possess biblical background nor has it gained the rich and well-defined content that history has endowed on evangelicalism. By this statement we do not disparage the contribution fundamentalism has made to the cause of Christianity. In the early part of the twentieth century the movement fought firmly and courageously for scriptural theology and the historic faith. Unashamedly fundamentalism clung to the supernaturalness and uniqueness of Christ and to the authority and inspiration of Scripture. Those who decry fundamentalism little realize that some liberals now speak of the supernatural Christ and the neo-orthodox leader, Karl Barth, defends the virgin birth. However, the word fundamentalism has an inherent weakness in that it cannot be biblically defined, and has an unpleasant connotation that cannot be blamed on the originators of the movement.

Because fundamentalism cannot be biblically defined, it cannot authoritatively define what is fundamental and what is not fundamental to Christianity. History associates it with five points that have become the sine qua non of the movement: the infallibility of the Bible, Christ’s virgin birth, his substitutionary atonement, bodily resurrection and second coming. This reduction of vital doctrines has limited and circumscribed fundamentalism and reduced its effectiveness. The first World War caused some fundamentalists to focus their hope on the second coming and to exclude those who did not accept their interpretation. Unfortunately, extreme and weird prophetic interpretations became linked in the public mind with fundamentalism. The failure to employ the whole counsel of God in combating unbelief contributed to its ineffectiveness and placed the stamp of narrowness upon the name.

At the inception of the movement in 1910 fundamentalists gave a place to the intellect and made plans for the establishment of a Christian university and Christian colleges. Later, men of lesser vision opposed education and nurtured an anti-intellectual spirit. In the debate against evolution extreme ridicule and vituperative personal invectives, rather than logic, became the custom. The charge of obscurantism was not entirely unearned. Not only in the fight against evolution, but in opposition to other matters, fundamentalists became involved in abusive personal attacks, rather than using the sword of the Spirit. Unyielding individualism of its leaders and their dictatorial spirit did not help the cause of orthodox Christianity.

Concentration on a few points of doctrine to the exclusion of ethics has also brought fundamentalism under discredit. Impression was given that ethics need only involve a spirit of negation—abstinence from externals such as smoking and card-playing. The more subtle and dangerous sins of the spirit and mind received scant attention. Failure to develop a system of Christian ethics for all phases of life proved harmful. Fundamentalism neglected to give biblical emphasis on true holiness in living and love among the brethren. Squabbles between fundamentalist leaders on minor issues has given the movement an unwholesome reputation and has made the term synonymous with bitterness and pettiness of spirit.

In all fairness it must be stated that some accretions have been superimposed by unkindly and ignorant critics. Fanatic actions and teachings of fringe groups have been attributed to the whole. The handling of poisonous serpents by some sects (from a literalistic interpretation of Mark 16:18) has been cited as illustrating the literalism of fundamentalism. The dictation theory of inspiration has been unjustly foisted on the entire group. Unethical practices of some radio broadcasters have been cited to reflect the practice of all fundamentalists. These and many other unjust accusations have added to its unsavory reputation in the eyes of the public.

Evangelicals are turning away from the term fundamentalism not because of any inclination to disavow traditional fundamentals of the Christian faith, but are prompted by its inadequate scriptural content and its current earned and unearned disrepute. Moreover, the term lacks the appropriateness of the word evangelicalism. Scripture gives content to the evangel and not the exigency or crisis of the moment. The full-orbed gospel and the whole counsel of God comes to view in its classical meaning. It has a proud and noble succession in the history of the Christian church. While certain periods of history have obscured its true significance and foes have usurped its use, yet Scripture and history have made its import clear and its name dignified. Christians who hold to traditional fundamentals of Christianity would be guilty of grievous strategic error to accept a term not defined by Scripture and of doubtful connotation or to meekly yield the word evangelicalism to those who do not accept the content of the evangel revealed by Christ. Secular dictionaries, history and Scripture give strong witness that only those who maintain the fundamentals have the right to the term. In the midst of theological confusion evangelicals have a wonderful opportunity to live up to the scriptural and historical content of their name and proclaim the whole counsel of God.

Chapter 2

THE EVANGELICAL RESPONSIBILITY*

This appeared last in a series of articles published in June–July 1957 dealing with the question, “Dare We Renew the Modernist-Fundamentalist Controversy?” They were based on lectures Henry delivered at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary and Calvin College in May and June of that year and were later published under the titleEvangelical Responsibility in Contemporary Theology (Eerdmans, 1957).

A higher spirit to quicken and to fulfill the theological fortunes of this century will require more than the displacement of modernism, more than the revision of neo-orthodoxy, more than the revival of fundamentalism. Recovery of apostolic perspective and dedication of the evangelical movement to biblical realities are foundational to this hope.

Exalt Biblical Theology

Evangelical theology has nothing to fear, and much to gain, from aligning itself earnestly with the current plea for a return to biblical theology. To measure this moving front of creative theology sympathetically, to understand its concern and courage and to name its weaknesses without depreciating its strength will best preserve relevant theological interaction with the contemporary debate.

The evangelical movement must make its very own the passionate concern for the reality of special divine revelation, for a theology of the Word of God, for attentive hearing of the witness of the Bible, for a return to biblical theology.

Positive Preaching

Rededication to positive and triumphant preaching is the evangelical pulpit’s great need. The note of Christ’s lordship over this dark century, of the victory of Christianity, has been obscured. If it be evangelical, preaching must enforce the living communication of the changeless realities of divine redemption. The minister whose pulpit does not become the life-giving center of his community fails in his major mission. Perspective on Christianity’s current gains and final triumph will avoid a myopic and melancholy discipleship. The Christian pulpit must present the invisible and exalted Head of the body of Christ; linked to him this earthly colony of heaven moves to inevitable vindication and glory. The perplexing problems of our perverse social orders find their hopeful solution only in this regenerative union. Out of its spiritual power must spring the incentives to creative cultural contributions.

Enlarge Christian Living

The evangelical fellowship needs a fresh and pervading conception of the Christian life. Too long fundamentalists have swiftly referred the question, “What distinguishes Christian living?” to personal abstinence from dubious social externals. The Christian conscience, of course, will always need to justify outward behavior, in home, in vocation and in leisure. But Christian ethics probes deeper. It bares the invisible zone of personality wherein lurk pride, covetousness and hatred.

Unfortunately, fundamentalism minimized the exemplary Jesus in the sphere of personal ethics. The theme of Christ’s oneness with God was developed so exclusively in terms of his deity that the import of his dependence upon God for all human nature was lost. The manhood of Jesus is essentially one with ours; its uniqueness is in the zone of sinlessness, not of humanness. His uncompromised devotion and dependence upon God, his sustained relationship of mutual love, embodied the ideal pattern of human life in perfect fellowship with God. In view of his unbroken union with God, his humanity holds a central significance for all humanity.

In this light, a new importance attaches to the Nazarene’s learning of the Father’s will in the course of obedient dependence. His struggle with temptation to magnificent victory over all the assaults of evil, his exemplary trust, his unwavering reliance on God even in the darkest hours, his interior calm of soul, the wellspring of love that flowed from his being—in all these experiences Christ models for us an ideal spiritual relationship with God. In Jesus of Nazareth, God is fully resident; in God, Jesus is fully at home. He lives out the “rest in God” that actualizes the “abiding” to which we are called.

Another way in which evangelicals need to move beyond the fundamentalist ethic is in comprehending the whole of the moral law in fuller exposition of love for God and neighbor, and in the larger experience of the Holy Spirit in New Testament terms of ethical virtue. Often quite legalistically, and with an absoluteness beyond New Testament authority, fundamentalism’s doctrine of surrender, of rededication, has merely proscripted worldly practices, from which the believer was discouraged. Unemphasized, however, are the fruit of the Spirit and those many virtues which differentiate dedicated living in terms of biblical Christianity.

Social Concern

We need a new concern for the individual in the entirety of his Christian experience. He is a member of all life’s communities, of faith, of the family, of labor, of the state, of culture. Christianity is by no means the social gospel of modernism, but is nonetheless vibrant with social implications as a religion of redemptive transformation. To express and continue the vitality of the gospel message, marriage and the home, labor and economics, politics and the state, culture and the arts, in fact, every sphere of life, must evidence the lordship of Christ.

Obviously, the social application of Christian theology is no easy task. For one thing, fundamentalism fails to elaborate principles and programs of Christian social action because it fails to recognize the relevance of the gospel to the sociocultural sphere. Modernism defines Christian social imperatives in secular terms and uses the Church to reorganize unregenerate humanity. Its social sensitivity gave modernism no license to neglect the imperative of personal regeneration. Evangelistic and missionary priorities, on the other hand, gave fundamentalism no license to conceal the imperative of Christian social ethics. Despite the perils, no evasion of responsibility for meaningfully relating the gospel to the pressing problems of modern life is tolerable.

The divine life is a “being in love,” a social or a family fellowship in which personality expresses the outgoing, creative relationships of redemption. A worker by God’s creation, man sees vocation as a divinely entrusted stewardship by which to demonstrate love to God and service to man. As divinely ordained, the state declares God’s intention and the dignity of man’s responsibility for preserving justice and repressing iniquity in a sinful order. This world challenges man to interpret literature, art, music, and other media in reference to eternal order and values.

Approach to Science

Evangelical confidence in the ontological significance of reason makes possible a positive, courageous approach to science. For more than a century and a half modern philosophy has regrettably minimized the role of reason. Kant disjoined it from the spiritual world. Darwin naturalized and constricted it within the physical world. Dewey allowed it only a pragmatic or an instrumental role. These speculations took a heavy toll in Christian circles. A segment of evangelical Christianity nonetheless maintained its insistence upon the Logos as integral to the Godhead, the universe as a rational-purposive order, and man’s finite reason is related to the image of God.

Yet for more than a generation the evangelical attitude in scientific matters has been largely defensive. Evolutionary thought is met only obliquely. American fundamentalism often neglected scrutinizing its own position in the light of recent historical and scientific research. It even failed to buttress its convictions with rigorous theological supports.

Yet modernism, despite its eager pursuit of such revision, achieved no true correlation of Christianity and science. While modernism adjusted Christianity swiftly to the prevailing climate of technical conviction, its scientific respect was gained by a costly neglect of Christianity’s import to science.

Today a new mood pervades the scientific sphere. That mood may not fully validate the evangelical view of nature, but it does at least deflate the presuppositions on which the older liberalism built its bias against the miraculous. The evangelical movement is now given a strategic opportunity to transcend its hesitant attitude toward scientific endeavor, and to stress the realities of a rational, purposive universe that coheres in the Logos as the agent in creation, preservation, redemption, sanctification and judgment.

The ramifications of revelation and reason are wider, however, than science, for they embrace all the disciplines of learning. The evangelical attitude toward education itself is involved. The day has vanished when all the levels of learning, from primary to university, were in the service of God. Christianity cannot long thrive in an atmosphere in which mass education is allowed to repress and impugn Christian confidence and conviction. Christianity must not withdraw from the sphere of education, but must infuse it with new spirit and life. Christianity need evade neither truth nor fact, for it offers an adequate view of the universe in which we are driven daily to decision and duty. In answer to the present secular perspective in public education, shall evangelicals establish private Christian schools? Or shall they rather work for eternal verities within the present public school order or perhaps even pursue both courses? One fact is certain: evangelical neglect of education will imply the irrelevance of historic Christianity to the pressing problems of the contemporary academic world.

Doctrine of the Church

The evangelical movement needs also the sustained study of the New Testament doctrine of the Church and a greater concern for the unity of regenerate believers. Its program for reflecting the unity of the body of Christ in contemporary history is inadequate in several regards.

Evangelical discussions of the unity of the Church are shaped to protest the ecumenical framework as a compromise to be avoided. Ecumenical Christianity blesses a cooperation broader than the New Testament fellowship; it needs to be reminded that not all union is sacred—that the more inclusive the union, the greater the danger of compromising and secularizing its Christian integrity. By contrast, the evangelical movement easily restricts cooperation more narrowly than does the Bible. It must learn that not all separation is expressive of Christian unity. The principle of separation itself may acquire an objectionable form and content, related more to divisive temper than to theological fidelity. In the face of the inclusive church movement, the evangelical spirit reacts too much toward independency. Through refusal to cooperate with believers whose theological conservatism and dedication to Christ are beyond question, evangelical Christianity is in danger of divisiveness and disruptiveness.

Sound Doctrine and New Life

Evangelical insistence that the unity of the body of Christ requires a basic doctrinal agreement and a regenerate membership is sound. The ecumenical temperament encourages the breakdown of denominational barriers at too great a price whenever it minimizes doctrinal positions. Interdenominationalism in our century has sprung from a peculiar assortment of motives. Fundamentalists stimulated denominational desertion through discontent with theologically inclusive programs ventured by liberal leadership in the established denominations. Such was not in actuality an antithesis to denominationalism, since denominational tenets were not called into question. Indeed, most evangelicals prefer to support New Testament programs within their own denominational lines, allowing interdenominational cooperation to spring from multidenominational dedication to common evangelical priorities. The compromise of priorities in denominational circles, however, led to interdenominationalism at the expense of denominationalism and quickened the sense of an extradenominational unity based on common doctrine and faith.

The liberal interdenominational urge had a different motivation, namely, a virtual depreciation of denominationalism as unworthy sectarianism insofar as any fixed creedal positions are affirmed. This exaltation of the experiential unity of the Church through the disparagement of doctrinal soundness is the great peril of ecumenical ecclesiology today. Its constant danger is the elevation of the concern for unity above the concern for truth.

Precision in Beliefs

Evangelical emphasis on an indispensable doctrinal basis for Church unity needs, however, to be defined with greater precision. Such concern accounts for evangelical uneasiness over the creedal vagrancy of the World Council of Churches whose nebulous emphasis is only on “Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.” Since the evangelical movement includes churches that are both creedal and noncreedal in heritage, a specific creedal unity has not been elaborated, although common theological tenets are listed. This evangelical listing of a doctrinal minimum raises difficulties for creedal churches, inasmuch as they consider no article of faith dispensable. To Reformed churchmen, evangelical formulas often appear open to objectionable development. They prefer a strict creedal fellowship, a restriction that excludes progress toward the unity of diverse evangelical elements. The evangelical failure to fully elaborate essential doctrines has resulted in fragmentation by granting priority to secondary emphases (in such matters as eschatology). Evangelical Christianity has been slow to establish study conferences in biblical doctrine, to encourage mutual growth and understanding. Ironically, study sessions on theological issues are now often associated with movements whose doctrinal depth and concern are widely questioned. The significance of Christian doctrine, its dispensability or indispensability, its definition as witness or revelation, the elements identified respectively as core and periphery—these are issues on which evangelical Christianity must be vocal.

Fellowship of Disciples

Evangelical Christianity too frequently limits the term “evangelical” to those identified with a limited number of movements. This needlessly stresses a sense of Christian minority and discourages cooperation and communication with unenlisted evangelicals. But the tensions of American church history in this turbulent century cannot be automatically superimposed upon all world evangelical communities. Ecumenical leadership in the Federal Council of Churches and its successor, the National Council of Churches, failed to reflect the viewpoint of that considerable genuinely evangelical segment of its constituency. In the World Council of Churches, leaders on the Continent also have often found themselves theologically far to the right of American spokesmen, and have found American evangelicals in the World Council disappointingly unvocal. Long before the establishment of organizations like the World Evangelical Fellowship, many European churches have approached the World Council in quest of an enlarging evangelical fellowship. Evangelical world alternatives to inclusive movements arose after most large historic denominations were already enlisted in the World Council. Does evangelical loyalty within these committed denominations necessarily depend upon public repudiation of the World Council, and upon entrance instead into minority movements quite withdrawn from the stream of influential theological discussion? Even the National Association of Evangelicals in the United States must accept the absence of Southern Baptists and Missouri Lutherans, whose antipathy for theological inclusivism keeps these denominations also outside the National Council. The question that obviously remains, of course, is whether an evangelical who prefers identification with the broader movements can justify his participation, if he knows his own spiritual heritage, except in the capacity of a New Testament witness? Must not a silent evangelical in this climate always ask himself whether the silence which once perhaps was golden, now, through a dulling of love for truth and neighbor, has become as sounding brass or tinkling cymbal. Indeed, must not the evangelical always and everywhere address this question to himself in whatever association he is placed?

Lack of evangelical communication across the lines of inclusive and exclusive movements is not wholly due to the exclusivists. Ecumenical enthusiasts have encouraged neither fellowship nor conversation with exclusivist evangelicals. This coldness contributed needlessly to the fundamentalist suspicion of all outside their own constituency, and did little to mitigate the incivility that some fundamentalists reserved for such individuals. The unity of the believing Church requires communication between evangelicals on a basis of mutual tolerance and respect.

Concern for Unity

Unfortunately for the evangelical cause, the concern for the unity of the Church is now largely associated in the public mind with the inclusive vision. The failure of evangelicals to hear what the Spirit says in the New Testament to the churches has created the void now being filled by inclusivist conceptions of unity. The evangelical church needs with new earnestness to seek unity in its fragmenting environment, needs to reflect to the disunited world and to the disunited nations the sacred unity of the body of Christ.

Although evangelicals have criticized the broad basis of ecumenical merger and unity, they have achieved in their own ranks few mergers on the theological-spiritual level. Without conceding that denominationalism is evil or that health increases in proportion to the reduction of denominations, may there not be evidence that evangelical Christianity is over denominationalized? If doctrinal agreement enhances the deepest unity of believers, may we not expect progress in the elimination of unnecessary divisions by emphasizing the spiritual unity of the Church? Evangelical Christianity, if it takes seriously its own emphasis on the unity of the body, must show visible gains in demonstrating unity in church life.

Contemporary Christianity would gain if the discussion of ecclesiastical tolerance were set in a New Testament context. The scriptural respect for individual liberty in matters of religious belief must not obscure definite requirements for indentification with the body of Christian believers. The New Testament upholds specific doctrinal affirmations as indispensable to genuine Christian confession. In this biblical setting, divisiveness is depicted primarily as a theological question, not (as is usually the case today) as a matter of ecclesiastical attitude and relationship. The modernist tendency to link Christian love, tolerance and liberty with theological inclusivism is therefore discredited. Modernist pleas for religious tolerance and the caustic indictments of fundamentalist bigotry often were basically a strategic device for evading the question of doctrinal fidelity. This flaunting of tolerance, however, was discredited when inclusivist leaders suppressed or excluded evangelicals not sympathetic to the inclusive policy. The “tolerance plea” swiftly dismissed as divisive what was not clearly so in fact. Divisiveness meant disapproval of the inclusive policy, tolerance meant approval. But the New Testament does not support the view that devotion to Christian liberty and progress and to the peace and unity of Christ’s Church is measured by the devaluation of doctrine in deference to an inclusive fellowship. From the biblical point of view, doctrinal belief is a Christian imperative, not a matter of indifference.

Whenever it professes a genuine regard for the scriptural point of view, the inclusive movement is driven to soul-searching in respect to doctrinal latitude and its own propaganda for organic church union. Within the World Council, in contrast with the National Council, exists a forum from which this ambiguity can be challenged. Evangelicals in this movement, if they bear an evangelical witness, must constantly call the Commission on Faith and Order to judge the theological and ecclesiastical question from the standpoint of Scripture.

The fact must not be ignored, however, that different evangelical conceptions of the visible Church are prevalent. Although historically the Christian churches have all insisted upon a minimal theological assent for admission to membership, Reformed churches share Calvin’s view that even in the Church wheat and tares—professing and believing Christians—will dwell together until their final separation in the judgment. Baptist churches have traditionally placed greater emphasis on a regenerate membership and on a pure church. Even the disciplinary procedure of the more broadly conceived Reformed churches, however, considers church members flouting or indifferent to creedal standards as guilty as grave sin. Christian churches in the past stressed both a minimal requirement for membership and a maximal indulgence for avoidance of discipline or exclusion. But modernist leaders asserted the inevitability of doctrinal change. Heresy trials became an oddity in contemporary church history, not because of an absence of heresy, but because of the lack of zeal to prosecute heretics.

We dare not own any other authority over life and deed but the living God. We dare not own any other God than the righteous and merciful God revealed in Jesus Christ. We dare not own another Christ but Jesus of Nazareth, the Word become flesh who now by the Spirit is the exalted head of the body of believers. We dare not own any other Spirit than the Spirit who has breathed out Scripture through chosen men, that doubt may vanish about what God is saying to the Church and to the world. We dare not own any other Scripture than this Book. Let other men proclaim another god, another Christ, another spirit, another book or word—that is their privilege and their peril. But if once again the spiritual life of our world is to rise above the rubble of paganism into which it is now decaying, it will be only through the dynamic of revelation, regeneration, and redemption, through the sacred message which once brought hope. We have a task to do, a task of apostolic awesomeness; let us rise to the doing. The hour for rescue is distressingly late.

Chapter 3

A PLEA FOR EVANGELICAL UNITY*

By contrast with the unification plans of the ecumenical movement, evangelicals often claim to enjoy the true unity of the Spirit. In a basic sense this is true. Yet the world is not impressed by mere assertion. In fact, evangelicals often seem to be one of the most divided and divisive forces in the ecclesiastical world even in their internal dealings. Splits, suspicions, wordy campaigns are common features. Squabbling about less essential matters seems to absorb the energy that should go to working together on essentials. And the tragedy is that the world both needs and would unquestionably be impressed and affected by a genuine manifestation of unity in spirit, purpose, and action on the part of evangelicalism. Indeed, it might be argued that such a manifestation is the only finally valid and effective criticism of modern ecumenism.

What should be the motivation of such unity? We must beware of secondary motives which may be right in their place but which in themselves are not enough. It is insufficient merely to seek to oppose to ecumenism a true counterpart. It is insufficient merely to think in terms of the strengthening of a cause. It is insufficient merely to desire the construction of a solid front against blatantly hostile forces like communism, materialism, liberalism, or resurgent Hinduism or Islam. It is insufficient merely to aim at a more efficient or economical evangelistic, missionary, educational, or social thrust. It is insufficient only to desire the creation of a stronger ecclesiastical or theological bloc.

The only motive that will really avail is a biblical one. To put it simply, Christ wills and prays for the unity of his people. This does not have to mean unification. On the other hand, it certainly cannot mean the dialectic of spiritual unity in actual conflict. It means unity manifested in united purpose and action. It means acceptance of a common mind and task. As this is the will of Christ for us, it must surely be our own will for ourselves. “Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” is Paul’s injunction (Eph. 4:3). “Be at peace among yourselves” is his command (1 Thess. 5:13). “Be of the same mind one toward another” is the direction of the inerrant and infallible Word (Rom. 12:16). If this is God’s will, it must be also the will of the obedient disciple. No matter how loudly we proclaim our attachment to Scripture, we do it poor service, and gain ourselves little credence, if in our actions we flagrantly disregard the will of God therein revealed. Once the declared will of Jesus Christ is known, no other motive is needed. It is the delight and privilege of the sheep to hear and obey the Shepherd’s voice.

On what basis? Is this just an ideal to be sought? Does spiritual unity lie in a world of mysticism and abstraction? Is the Lord’s prayer for unity to be answered only in eternity? Does there run through the Bible a strain of Platonism, a rift between the ideal and the actual, which negates from the outset all attempts at manifestation of unity? If so, the manifest division of so many evangelicals might well be justifiable. God would be requiring the impossible—castles in the air without foundation.

In fact, however, there is no excuse. God has given us a solid basis. There is one God, one Christ, one Spirit. Faith into God means spiritual unity. There is thus one Bride, one Body. The members differ, whether in terms of individuals or churches. A uniform organization is not needed as the basis. But all are members of a Body which cannot but be one. There is one Word, one Baptism, one Cup. Externals may vary. The one Word may go forth in different tongues, the one Baptism or Cup may be administered under different rules of order. Even the one faith or doctrine may be expressed with some difference of formulation. Yet the Word of God is one and invariable. The Baptism and Cup of the Lord are the same. The One in whom faith is set never alters. Here in God, in the Word and work of God, is an unassailable basis of given unity. Here the people of God have to be one, whether they are prepared for it or not. Here the prayer of Jesus finds fulfillment in spite of our disobedience. Here we begin with what we are in the new life in Christ. Here we are enabled to be what we are, to put on the new man, to bring forth the fruit of the new life. Here we are given a solid and eternal basis on which to build.

But what are the prerequisites? The proper basis of unity is obviously the first. Apart from this, there can be only the fragile unity of common association and opinion. Are there any others? Secondarily, the unity of those who in the Spirit are building on this foundation implies at least three others. The unity must be that of those who do in fact look only to Jesus Christ and to none other. It must be a unity of those who follow the authoritative testimony to him in Holy Scripture. It must be a unity of those who are committed to the great task of world-wide evangelization which he has laid on his disciples.

Without a common looking to the Lord, a common confession of him as Savior, Lord, and God, a common knowledge of God in him, there is no building on the common basis and therefore no hope of unity. Faith in him, however, is not a leap in the dark. It is no blind or chance encounter. It is faith responding to a Word. And this Word is the authentic and authoritative record given concerning him. True faith in him is faith in the Jesus of Scripture who embraces both the so-called Jesus of history and the Christ of faith. It is faith enlightened and instructed and impelled by the written Word and its preaching and exposition. To the one basis belongs also the foundation of the apostles and prophets (Eph. 2:20). To build apart from Scripture is to build apart from Jesus Christ himself and therefore to destroy unity. Yet this faith is neither abstract nor ideal. It is busy and active. It is impelled as well as instructed. It is obedient. It accepts a task. It is given orders. It is endowed with the high privilege of ministry. It is given a Great Commission. Outside this Commission, we again pursue isolated and therefore divergent ends. We thus condemn ourselves to deviation and discord. The true faith which is loyal to the written Word, however, implies readiness for the Great Commission. The main prerequisites of unity in the Spirit are thus met.

What are the demands of unity? What does its manifestation require in us? How can we promote this expression of unity which is no mere matter of organization but our believing, living, and working together on a common basis? Some of the most urgent of these demands might be simply stated as follows:

It is demanded that we be oriented positively to the world-wide task of evangelism. There are subsidiary tasks of theology, pastoral care, discipline, and even administration. To make these autonomous, however, is to bring about that curving in on oneself which inevitably causes distortion and division. An unengaged force quickly becomes disaffected. Our vision is to be outward to the sin, ignorance, and error of the world. When energy is bent to this supreme task, there will be little to spare for inward wrangling. The converse is also true.

It is demanded that we be humble in relation to one another both in life and utterance. All that we have is received from God and through one another. All our truth is the truth of God’s Word. We cannot boast of any attainment of our own. We have nothing about which to be self-righteous, whether in respect of purity of life or superiority of understanding. The infallibility of Scripture does not guarantee our own private infallibilities. We are all learners and teachers in the school of Christ and the Spirit. To remember this is to be safeguarded against the pride of the fancied master or doctor, who not only has nothing to learn but also imagines that his task is to judge rather than to edify. True humility before the Lord and his Word is one of the most potent bulwarks against the division which only too often bears marks of human arbitrariness and obduracy.

It is demanded that rebuke and correction be given and received in a spirit of meekness and with a view to edification. Errors occur as well as sins. They are not to be ignored or glossed over. We are to grow in knowledge as well as in righteousness. But the occurrence of sin or error is not to be the occasion for a display of self-righteousness or rancor. The rebuke and correction undertaken should be in the spirit of mutual helpfulness and with a lively sense of personal frailty. Meekness is not weakness. On the other hand there is no strength in discourtesy, belligerence, or angry pride. If firmness is needed, it should be that of speaking the truth in love which will evoke a response of love.

Finally, it is demanded that we have the mind of Christ, which is the mind of mercy and of love. Paul has much to say concerning this in Ephesians 4. All evangelical Christians and leaders might do well to make this chapter a regular feature in their biblical reading with a view to making it a more prominent feature in their biblical practice. It is of special applicability in times of tension. It gives us a final thesis and poses a final question. The problem of unity is simply the problem of how biblical we really are. It is by our attainment of the mind of Christ and therefore the practical unity of the Spirit that we show to the world our obedience to the Word which we proclaim. But if so, how biblical are we when it comes to doing and not merely to talking? Is Ephesians 4 reflected unmistakably in our utterances and actions, in our personal and church relationships, in our contacts with the world without, in our pursuance of the Great Task with which we have been entrusted? If so, and to the measure that this is so, we shall indeed enjoy and manifest the unity which is of the Holy Ghost.

Chapter 4

EVANGELICALS IN THE SOCIAL STRUGGLE*

Evangelical Christianity today confronts a “new theology,” a “new evangelism,” and a “new morality,” each notably lacking in biblical content. A “new social ethics” has also emerged, and some ecumenical leaders mainly interested in politico-economic issues speak hopefully of a “new breed of evangelical” in this realm of activity. The red carpet rolls out when even a few evangelicals march at Selma, when they unite in organized picket protests and public demonstrations, when they join ecclesiastical pressure blocs on Capitol Hill or at the White House, or when they engineer resolutions on legislative matters through annual church meetings.

Since most evangelical churchmen traditionally have not mobilized their social concern in this way, non-evangelical sociologists are delighted over any and every such sign of apparent enlightenment. Moreover, they propagandize such church techniques as authentically Christian, and misrepresent evangelical non-participation as proof of social indifference in conservative Christian circles and as a lack of compassion. This favorite device of propagandists is effective among some evangelicals who desire to protect their genuine devotion to social concern from public misinterpretation. The claim that evangelicals as a whole are socially impotent, moreover, diverts attention from the long-range goals of social extremists by concentrating attention on existential involvement on an emergency basis.

That Christians are citizens of two worlds, that a divine mandate enjoins both their preaching of the Gospel and their promotion of social justice, that the lordship of Christ over all of life involves socio-cultural obligations, that Christians bear a political responsibility, are historic evangelical emphases. Evangelicals regard government and jurisprudence as strategic realms of vocational service to humanity. They stress that government exists for the sake of all citizens, not simply for certain favored groups, and that a just or good society preserves for all citizens equal rights before the law. This emphasis has equally critical implications for a society that seeks special privilege for one race above another and for any church that seeks partisan and sectarian benefits from government.

The heritage of evangelical Christianity includes both Jesus’ sermon on the mount and his delineation of the Good Samaritan, and Paul’s account of civil government as an agent of justice. Evangelical Christians recognized the moral claim of these scriptural elements long before Protestant liberalism distorted them into a rationalistic politico-economic perspective. The Evangelical Revival in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain attested the devotion of believers, not only to the observance of public statutes, but also to the vigorous promotion of just laws. The seventh Earl of Shaftesbury headed the movement in Parliament that led in 1807 to the abolition of slavery in the British Empire. As a result of his own conversion Wilberforce led great reform programs, including child-labor laws. The Evangelical Revival placed evangelicals in the forefront of humanitarian concerns, not only for an end to the slave trade, but also for child labor laws, prison reforms, improved factory labor conditions, and much else in the sphere of social justice. It was evangelical social concern, in fact, that preserved the shape of Anglo-Saxon society from tragic revolutionary onslaught. An eminent church historian writes: “No branch indeed of the Western Church can be refused the honor of having assisted in the progress of humane ideas, and non-Christians have participated largely in the work of diffusing the modern spirit of kindness; but the credit of the inception of the movement belongs without doubt to that form of Protestantism which is distinguished by the importance it attaches to the doctrine of the Atonement.… History shows that the thought of Christ on the Cross has been more potent than anything else in arousing a compassion for suffering and indignation at injustice.… The later Evangelicalism, which saw in the death of Christ the means of free salvation for fallen humanity, caused its adherents to take the front rank as champions of the weak.… Prison reform, the prohibition of the slave trade, the abolition of slavery, the Factory Acts, the protection of children, the crusade against cruelty to animals, are all the outcome of the great Evangelical revival of the eighteenth century. The humanitarian tendencies of the nineteenth century, which, it is but just to admit, all Christian communities have fostered, and which non-Christian philanthropists have vied with them in encouraging, are among the greatest triumphs of the power and influence of Christ” (F. J. Foakes-Jackson, “Christ in the Church: The Testimony of History,” in H. B. Swete,