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Pietism’s primary concern was to carry out the Reformation in the area of Christian living. Pietists felt that the theologians of the 16th and 17th centuries had used the insights and work of the Reformers to establish a solid doctrinal foundation. Now their task was to promote a continuing reformation in the life of the church, and the transformation of the world through the conversion and constant renewal of individuals.

Pietist writers took the Fall very seriously and assumed that the world, sin, the devil and the fallen nature of the unregenerate person were ever-present threats to the well-being of both individual and society. By his or her fallen nature the person is surely “lower than a worm,” yet because the Creator is good and Christ died to redeem humanity, the person is at the same time “nobler than the angels.”

Heinrich Mueller pointed out in his Heavenly Kiss of Love that humanity is indeed God’s “noblest creation” because not only is human nature united with God’s nature in Christ, but because it is so created that it can bear the marks of Christ. Thus, while humanity is totally depraved (that is, is totally incapable of attaining to salvation on its own), there is that within the person which can be “awakened,” although this awakening cannot occur apart from the activity of the Holy Spirit in the hearing of the Word of God.

The Pietists took seriously the significance of human emotion and the psyche. Emotionalism was, in fact, fostered to some degree by the introspective, psychologizing tendencies found in Pietism: Who am I? Am I truly a child of God? Am I living in a state of sin or grace? Am I backsliding? Why am I doing this? What are my feelings telling me? Thus while calling for godly lives, Pietist leaders in all walks of life were primarily concerned with the inner person, whose emotional/spiritual condition gave rise to, and was manifested in, those outward signs of godliness.

As the Pietist emphasis on heartfelt faith and right practice was at least in part a reaction to the perceived aridity and theological squabbling of scholasticism, so the Pietist emphasis on the personal, emotional and practical in preaching was a reaction against the practice of using the pulpit to flay one’s theological enemies and/or to display one’s erudition. The Pietists felt that knowledge of the biblical languages was absolutely essential for the pastor to prepare a meaningful sermon (Francke even encouraged laypersons to learn Greek and Hebrew in order to enhance their personal understanding of Scripture), but the point of preaching was to illumine and inspire the listener, not dazzle him or her with theological formulations and unknown languages. Some preachers went so far as to form small groups to discuss and reflect upon the sermon.

Pietist preaching was directed primarily at those within the Church. In the Church the Pietists tended to identify two basic groups: those who had been born and baptized into the Church yet had little or no true Christian commitment, and those who were born again, or converted. Thus we find two basic emphases in the Pietist pulpit: conversion, and piety or devotion.

The Pietists’ audience, then, was made up primarily of “Christianized” persons, people who for the most part were baptized, catechized, church attending folk. For the Pietists, Christian society was the new, but yet old, Israel. That is, as Israel was God’s people but did not follow God’s commands and eventually rejected the Messiah, so are those baptized into the new covenant also God’s people, but they are an errant, disobedient and unseeing people —until they are born again. Francke wrote that “There is a difference between Christians just as there was in the Jewish people,” that is, there were disciples, Pharisees and scribes, tax collectors and sinners. Yet all were “good Jews” and “true Israelites” until John the Baptizer came, called them to repentance and baptism, and made the essential, crucial differences apparent, thus spawning discord, faith, rejection, obedience, division—all manner of responses and consequences. This was exacerbated by Jesus’ preaching and is precisely what occurs in “Christian” society when “God’s Word is preached in earnest” (presumably by Pietists)— some become scoffers while others follow the light (that is, Pietist ways of thinking, believing and living). Thus one can be a Christian and a “child of the world” at the same time, or one can be a Christian and a “child of God” just, as the Jews were God’s people yet were still in a state of unrepentance, or were in obedient faithfulness—depending upon the nature of their response to John’s call to repentance or, later, to Jesus’ preaching. The sermon can be a decisive event in the lives of individuals and, through their changed lives, in Church and society.

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