Talking Sense About The Holy Spirit
With the Holy Spirit and With Fire, by Samuel M. Shoemaker (Harper, 1960, 127 pp., $2.50), is reviewed by Paul S. Rees, Vice-President at large, World Vision, Inc.
“So much real nonsense has been talked about the Holy Spirit by some people who scorn education, and so much is missing from churches that mention Him only theologically or preach about Him at one season of the year, that I think someone must try to talk sense about the Holy Spirit, avoiding the extremes of a pedestrian Christianity that leaves Him out of practical life, or of an excessive emphasis on experiences that seem merely strange or bizarre.”
With these candid words, snipped from the “Introduction,” the dynamic and dauntless minister of Pittsburgh’s Calvary Episcopal Church begins what must be at least his twelfth book. There is first a look at “Our Situation Today.” By and large, the world is not listening to the Church; nor will it listen until again, as in the New Testament beginning of it, the Church can speak with “a freshness, a stimulus, a shining sparkle.”
This leads to a discussion of “The Experience of the Holy Spirit,” an analysis that turns out to be primarily neither theological nor psychological, but practical. “The Christian experience of the Holy Spirit,” it is pointed out, holds “awesome power and cleansing judgment.” It holds more: the conviction of a Presence that can be relied on as Helper (Paraclete), the reality of guidance, the melting down of barriers between Christians, the creation of fellowship, and being used to bring others to faith in Christ as Saviour.
“Coming Into the Stream of the Spirit” is a chapter whose brevity belies its importance. Here an Episcopal minister, without conscious effort, finds certain affinities with all those “Deeper Life” movements (so variously named) that have arisen within the life of our Christian communions through the centuries.
“The New Reformation” that the book envisages as desirable will, on the one hand, recover an emphasis on the sacraments (an emphasis excessively deflated by the historic Reformers) and will, on the other, make room for “the freedom of the Spirit as He works beyond the borders of Church or Bible” (p. 64). By “beyond” the author means more than this reviewer finds it possible to concede, but he does not mean at all what some critics will he sure to assume that he means. That no real denigration of Scripture and Church is intended may be seen from the position clearly taken on another page: “I think that the experience of the Holy Spirit can grow individualistic and thin when pursued apart from constant absorption of the Word and constant immersion in the fellowship.”
In the chapter on “The Holy Spirit and Evangelism” the question from Paul Tillich (‘True communication of the Gospel means making possible a definite decision for or against it.’) is true enough, but one wonders about leaving the impression that Dr. Tillich is a safe interpreter of what the Gospel is in fact. The chapter sparkles with some first-rate suggestions for effective evangelistic preaching.
The freshness, candor, and verve that blow, gale-like at times, through the chapters on “The Holy Spirit and the Church” and “The Holy Spirit and the Layman” are not to be conveyed in a review such as this. The reader must feel their force for himself. This he will do, despite sentences here and there that he would like to recast to keep the truth in sharper biblical perspective.
PAUL S. REES
Criterion Of Love
Know Your Faith, by Nels F. S. Ferré (Harper, 1960, 125 pp., $2.50), is reviewed by Edward John Carnell, Professor of Ethics and Philosophy of Religion, Fuller Theological Seminary.
This is a model of concise writing. It is a summary of Ferré’s unremitting effort to define Christian theology from the perspective of self-giving love. “No book,” says Ferré, “has caused me more pain of authorship than this one.” I can understand why. The book breathes an authentic spirit of honesty and integrity.
Ferré is not easy to evaluate, however, for rather than using traditional theological language, he tends to coin expressions all his own. Sample: sanctification “denotes the process, sudden or gradual, whereby the person who has been saved in intention becomes saved in fact.” If a classical theologian has ever expressed the matter this way, I for one have never heard of him.
Since Ferré employs self-giving love as an all-encompassing criterion, he senses no necessity to be found by the exegetical limits of Scripture. He toys with the idea of human reincarnation; he argues for some sort of redemption for animals; and even in the heart of his Christology he does not seem to rise above traditional modelism. Still, he speaks with a candor that will disarm all but the most choleric reader. He attains rare heights when he develops the relation between our encounter with Christ and our fellowship with the saints.
We may disagree with Ferré; but at least he makes us earn our right to disagree. Ferré will have no truck with cheap faith.
EDWARD JOHN CARNELL
Fascinating Anthology
The Church and the Fine Arts, by Cynthia Pearl Maus (Harper, 1960, 902 pp., $6.95), is reviewed by Calvin D. Linton, Professor of English Literature and Dean of Columbian College, The George Washington University.
Anthologies would seem to be the easiest kind of book to produce. All one needs, after all, are scissors, paste, and copyright permission. But not so. Really good anthologies are notoriously rare. If, despite their diversity, they are to possess a true unity and a clear point of view, the anthologist must have a critical judgment which is at once broad and deep—broad enough to appreciate widely differing artistic purposes and effects, and deep enough to distinguish the truly excellent. Above all, he must hold criteria of admission which are rigorously defined and ruthlessly imposed.
This volume, while interesting, possibly useful, and astonishingly varied, is not, by these standards, a good anthology. Granted its vast purpose, it really could not be, for it sets out to cover (I quote the word) “the growth and development of the Church through nearly twenty centuries of Christian history, from the viewpoint of the four major fine arts: pictures, with their interpretations; poetry; stories; and music, in the form of hymns, canticles, and chants.” To do this, it calls on literally hundreds of authors.
Small wonder, then, that even with 900 pages available, less than two, on the average, can be devoted to each entry; small wonder that no single standard of taste can emerge. The poetry of John Milton joins that of Clarice White Luck and Walt Whitman; the prose of Erasmus shares space with that of Honomi Nagati; Raphael gives way to a photograph of the Kimpese Christian Institute in the Congo.
Fortunately, a sensible and consistent pattern of organization is used to channel this flood of droplets. Five different “specialists in the field of church history and the fine arts” handle the six major divisions: The Apostolic Church of the Palestinian Area; The Eastern Orthodox Church; The Roman Catholic Church; The Protestant Reformation in Europe; The Protestant Church in North America; and Christianity, A World-wide Religion. Within each section the sequence of entries is: Pictures, Poetry, Stories, and Music—the last given with music as well as words.
It is a fascinating volume to dip into. One cannot safely expect to find in it something particular in which he is interested, but he will usually be interested by something he did not expect to find.
CALVIN D. LINTON
Modes Of Thought
In the Twilight of Western Thought, by Herman Dooyeweerd (The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1960, 195 pp., $3.50), is reviewed by Gordon H. Clark, Professor of Philosophy, Butler University.
According to the author, all philosophers construct their different theories on the common ground of objective fact. These facts are not ordinary facts, such as the discovery of America or the sum of two numbers, but they are the “structural data” from which philosophy starts and to which it must conform. “One of the first structural data of human experience is the fundamental modal diversity of this experience.… My transcendental view of the mutual relation between the fundamental modes of experience is capable of verification by’ those who do not share my starting point” (p. 57).
These irreducible modes, which all philosophers must accept, seem to be 15 in number. “Our temporal empirical horizon has a numerical aspect, a spatial aspect, an aspect of extensive movement … followed by the economic, aesthetic, juridical, and moral aspects, and finally by the aspect of faith or belief” (pp. 7, 122).
The failure of other systems of philosophy, not only ancient pagan and modern secular philosophies but also the nominally Christian philosophies of Augustine and Aquinas, derives from their “absolutizing” of one or another of these fifteen modes.
For example, time has usurped faith, so that some ask whether the days of creation are 24-hour days or six geological ages. These days are neither the one nor the other, for “God’s creative deeds surpass the temporal order.… It was God’s will that the believing Jew should refer his six work days to the six divine creative acts … and it eliminates the scholastic dilemma concerning the exegesis of the six days of creation …” (pp. 150–151). Thus Scripture is not to be taken literally or univocally, for some of the Scripture is just legend (p. 68), but it is to be interpreted “analogically.” The analogical meaning apparently comes in a revelation. Creation, and presumably other parts of Christian belief, are not to be understood intellectually, but are revealed in our “heart.” This revelation “does not occur in any individualistic way, but in the ecumenical communion of the Holy Spirit …” (p. 186).
Not having had the same revelation as the author, the reviewer wonders whether the universe has had a finite past in astronomical time, or whether it is as eternal as God.
GORDON H. CLARK
Missions Classic
The Progress of World-Wide Missions, by Robert Hall Glover, revised and enlarged by J. Herbert Kane (Harper, 1960, $5), is reviewed by Harold Lindsell, Dean of the faculty, Fuller Theological Seminary.
This book, which was originally written by Robert Hall Glover, served a very useful purpose over many years as a textbook in the history of missions. It has needed revising for some time and the task has been undertaken by J. Herbert Kane of the Missions Department, Barrington College in Providence, Rhode Island.
The book has been brought up to date in the latter sections so that it has become usable once again for those who are interested in a history of missions. The statistical charts at the end of the book are helpful and the enlargement of the bibliography is all to the good. There are some titles which are missing, but in general there is a distinct improvement in the updating of the book.
The volume would be useful not only in college missions classes, but also for ministers who desire a source of reliable and easily obtained information about the various mission fields of the world.
HAROLD LINDSELL
Effective Preaching
Dynamic Preaching, by James W. Clarke (Revell, 1960, 128 pp., $2.50), is reviewed by Ben L. Rose, Professor of Pastoral Leadership and Homiletics, Union Theological Seminary (Virginia).
In the preface, the author correctly affirms that this is “not another work attempting to deal with the whole field of homiletics,” but it enforces three special truths. Belief in these truths, Dr. Clarke feels, is vital to effective Christian preaching.
The truths are: (1) “While the preaching of the Word is not the minister’s exclusive task, it is his supreme one”; (2) “The true and able Christian preacher is the most significant man in the community …”, and (3) “The bedrock on which Christian preaching builds is the devotional life of the minister.”
Each of the three sections of the book develops one of these three truths.
While little of the content is new, it is presented in a fresh and captivating style. The material is well organized and well illustrated, which makes the book easy to read.
The reviewer laid the book down with a new sense of gratitude for the glory of the task to which he had been called and with a new determination to hold himself with stricter discipline to his spiritual preparation.
Every preacher should read at least one book of this nature every year.
BEN L. ROSE
Medieval Song
The English Carol, by Erik Routley (Oxford, 1959, 272 pp., $5), is reviewed by F. R. Webber, Author of A History of Preaching.
To most Americans a carol suggests a picture of four singers and a fiddler, all dressed after the manner of Micawber, and standing before a British pub (the Boar’s Head or the Hare and Hounds), and all singing “God rest ye, merry gentlemen.” Dr. Routley, of Mansfield College, Oxford, assures us that the carol is much more than this. A carol is usually of Medieval origin, whereas a hymn is usually the product of the Reformation. A carol is not necessarily an act of praise to the Lord. It may be simply a joyous song of Christmas or Easter. This explains some of the curious things that came to us by way of England, such as “As Joseph was walking,” “God rest you, merry gentlemen,” “I saw three ships come sailing in,” and such German carols as “O Tannenbaum,” and “We gather ‘round the Christmas tree.” A carol may be seasonal, but it is not always especially religious.
Dr. Routley includes the history and the text of many carols. He tells us of the vehement efforts of the Puritans to suppress carol singing. The book contains several interesting illustrations, among which is one of Loughborough Pearson’s majestic Truro Cathedral, which is so hemmed in by other buildings that only its top is visible. It is not true, however, that the ancient church of St. Mary was demolished. Much of it stands intact, and forms the south aisle of the modern cathedral. Here the famous “Service of Nine Lessons and Carols” originated.
F. R. WEBBER
Togetherness For What?
The Social Sources of Church Unity, by Robert Lee (Abingdon, 1960, 238 pp., $4.50), is reviewed by Cary N. Weisiger, III, Pastor of Mt. Lebanon United Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Carrol M. Shanks, president of the Prudential Insurance Company of America, spoke recently in Pittsburgh at an annual brotherhood dinner of the National Conference of Christians and Jews. Citing the large-scale migration of Americans today as a cause of rootlessness, he said many “live on the surface of our society rather than in it.”
The reviewer cannot help putting the observation alongside of the thesis which Dr. Lee ably establishes in his book that social and cultural forces are thrusting unity upon us. Almost any pastor, except those in isolated pockets of rural and urban life, knows that new people in his parish area appraise him, his youth program, and his church’s location as decisive factors in the choice of a church home. Too often convenience, not conviction, brings new members. Probably most of us pastors soft pedal denominational distinctives to win new members. We build up a reserve of hearty welcomes. “Yes,” we say to the new Methodist family, “we need Methodist fire in our Presbyterian program”; or, “Lutheran solidity”; or, “Baptist loyalty.” Other appropriate flattery can be thought up as occasion requires.
Dr. Lee, Assistant Professor of Church and Community at Union Theological Seminary (New York), gives competent documentation of the reduction of old differences of race, section, and nation. The broadening of the middle class in the last generation and the standardizing of eating, dressing, and thinking habits have aided the centripetal tendency now manifested in church councils, mergers, reunions, community churches, and comity processes.
Dr. Lee is not disturbed by the resurgence of sectarianism (Assemblies of God, Church of the Nazarene), the renewal of fundamentalism (the National Association of Evangelicals), and the non-ecumenical Southern Baptist Convention. Such instances, by parallel tendency to the ecumenical movement or by resistance to social change, support his thesis.
So where are we going in our ecclesiastical togetherness? This is the big question provoked by Dr. Lee’s book and with which he does not pretend to deal. Is church unity a surface phenomenon of a people without depth of feeling? Will “common-core Protestantism” become so dogmatically diluted that it will be empty of real biblical and Christian content? Can we redeem the trend by bringing into it the strength of our best and most central denominational convictions? These questions clamor for consideration.
CARY N. WEISIGER, III
Evolution And Creation
Darwin, Evolution, and Creation, edited by Paul A. Zimmerman (Concordia, 1959, 231 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by Thomas H. Leith, Associate Professor of Science and Mathematics, Gordon College.
Here is a book to commend and condemn. It is to be commended as one of the most complete surveys available of all areas of the relationship of evolutionary thought to the Christian faith. Written by a group of Lutheran scholars, it is packed with the useful references, interesting facts, and thought-provoking ideas of the diligent student. There are competent articles on the past and present ideas of the origin and history of life, on the exegesis of Genesis chapters 1 and 2, on the presumed evidences for creation in nature, on the supposed evidences for evolution, on the age of the earth, and on the social and philosophical influences of Darwinism. It is to be condemned as not quite fair. The authors are opposed to much that they see in a century of evolutionary biology and its attendent philosophies. One may or may not agree with their conclusions, but the fallacious arguing they often use to get themselves there is thoroughly disagreeable. It leaves their claims often without valid demonstration.
Space forbids detailed analysis, but I shall review several widespread misconstructions. Perhaps the most glaring one is to argue that because evolution “has failed to achieve the absolute and factual” it is to be rejected. Apart from the fact that theories are never proven, this statement ignores their true role in science which is to synthesize data and suggest future experiments. Competitors who best achieve this gain the adherence of the majority of the scientific community. Evolutionary theories have survived this test for a century. Furthermore, disagreement on detail or unanswered problems does not provide grounds for rejecting a theory if no competitor can do as well. Some sort of evolution is the working hypothesis of almost all biologists, and there is no ground for a falling away.
Another fallacy presented is the thesis that nature provides a strong argument for creation as against “blind chance.” As expressed, the argument not only grossly misunderstands probability, but evidence for creation (logically impossible) is confused with arguments for design, and the whole ignores the quite unacceptable nature of the latter.
Then there is special pleading. Arguments generally used to defend evolution are criticized, but the genetic and paleontological case is mutilated by ignoring obvious disagreements with the critique presented. Again there is guilt by association. There are many examples which I could give here, but the final chapter on social Darwinism is most pertinent for discussion. Because of the gross philosophical, sociological, and theological ideas of varied evolutionists, the scientific thesis is rejected, and that this thesis in no way necessitates most of its misuse in the former ideas is forgotten. And again, the chapter on the age of the earth is one long fallacy of converse accident. One is asked to hold reservations about methods of age determination and dates obtained by taking unusual cases and precautionary statements in the literature and generalizing about them. This chapter is thoroughly misleading to the uninitiated, and I know no expert who would willingly accept its thrust.
Finally, although there is a most informative and thorough survey of pertinent biblical passages on the history of the world and the life on it, the writer so confuses the exegesis by an unconvincing literalness, an attempt to label those who differ as compromisers, a failure to see that even evolutionists believe in life reproducing “after its kind,” and a confusion of a scientific view of man as “nothing more” than animal with a necessary rejection of man as seen in Scripture, that he makes his whole position appear dubious.
This could have been a fine hook, and it still is useful, but it vitiates many of its possibilities with a coloring that can do little more than perpetuate the misunderstanding that has permeated 100 years of the dialectic.
THOMAS H. LEITH
Exposition On James
The Work of Faith, by Spiros Zodhiates (Eerdmans, 1960, 223 pp., $3.50), is reviewed by Walter W. Wessel, Professor of Biblical Literature, North American Baptist Seminary.
This is the first of three proposed expository volumes on the Epistle of James. The author is a Greek and prepared his studies under the auspices of the American Mission to Greeks.
The present volume contains 44 expositions on James 1:1–2:13. A warm devotional spirit pervades the treatment of the text. The author’s aim is to apply the message of James to practical life.
My basic objection to the book is its forced exegesis performed under the guise of a knowledge of the underlying Greek text. The author says, “As we scrutinize every word in the original Greek to get the utmost out of it we are really amazed at the discoveries we make” (p. 37). His amazement is shared by the reader when, for example, he categorically states that the lesson the Holy Spirit wishes to teach us in James 1:21 by the use of the word rhuparia, “filthiness” (a cognate of rhupos, “wax”), is that “sin in our lives is like having wax in our ears; it prevents the word of truth from reaching our hearts” (p. 105). Now this is an interesting idea and may have devotional value, but there is not a shred of evidence that rhuparia has anything to do with wax (cf. Arndt-Gingrich and Mayor’s rejection of this idea). There are all too many cases of such exegesis in the book.
WALTER W. WESSEL
Bishop Of Souls
Spencer Leeson: Shepherd, Teacher, and Friend. A Memoir by some of his Friends (SPCK, London, 1958, 149 pp., 15s. 6d.), is reviewed by Philip Edgcumbe Hughes, Editor of The Churchmen.
All who knew Spencer Leeson loved him and looked up to him, and to them this brief memoir will be more than welcome. It is indeed all too brief, even though it is intended to be a reminiscence rather than a biography. Yet this brevity must, in some measure at least, be attributed to the essential humility of Spencer Leeson, who, regarding the details of his life as of little moment, had purposely destroyed all records and letters in his possession so that the writing of a typical biography might not be possible. There must, however, be in existence many documents in the files of the institutions he served and letters written by him to others, which would afford material for a fuller study of this outstanding man.
After a disappointing start, the memoir gains momentum and presents a portrait of some warmth and vitality. The work of his life may perhaps best he described as pastoral, both in school-mastering—to which more than 20 years were devoted, notably as headmaster in turn of two great “public” schools, Merchant Taylors’ and Winchester—and in the final 10 years as Rector of St. Mary, Southampton, and Bishop of Peterborough successively. A notable feature of his excellent Bampton Lectures on Christian Education (1944) was the emphasis he laid on his conception of the teaching profession as a pastoral vocation, the chief task of which is to lead children to faith in Christ. His heart was that of a pastor, giving himself in affection and understanding to others.
In reply to a question concerning what he considered the three main qualities of a headmaster, he once said: “Spiritual leadership, intellectual distinction, and administrative ability—very definitely in that order.” Another thing he insisted on, as head of a school and as head of a diocese, was accessibility: “You must not become a distant inaccessible figure in an office,” he advised a young man about to become a headmaster. “If there is a danger of that, you must alter the whole organization of the school to prevent it.” Certainly no bishop was more accessible to his people than Spencer Leeson—concerned for the welfare of their souls, and respecting their dignity as persons, conscientious in the performance of his duties, entirely free from pomposity, loving and lovable, a true father in God to all. What a wonderful Archbishop of Canterbury he would have made! But it was not to be. As the present Archbishop says in his foreword to this book: “Because he was an enthusiast with a passionate devotion to his friends, to all under his care and to every good cause, he drove himself mercilessly to a premature end.… He changed little in his working life. From first to last he burned with the same bright and incandescent flame.”
PHILIP EDGCUMBE HUGHES
Baptist Evangelism
Basic Evangelism, by C. E. Autrey (Zondervan, 1959, 182 pp., $2.95), is reviewed by Faris D. Whitesell, Professor of Practical Theology, Northern Baptist Theological Seminary.
What is the secret of Southern Baptist expansion? The answer is evangelism, and here’s the book that outlines the theology, the principles, and the practices of Southern Baptist evangelism.
Written while he was occupying “the chair of fire,” the professorship of evangelism at Southwestern Baptist Seminary, Fort Worth, Dr. Autrey has since become director of evangelism for the Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, which means their number one man in evangelism.
Believing that a sound, scriptural theology is essential to vital evangelism, the author gives the details for planning and executing all major phases of local church evangelism. Not confusing evangelism with “do good” projects, Autrey says, “Evangelism is not everything we do. One might conceivably spend all his time doing good and never evangelize. Moral righteousness is not evangelism. One never evangelizes until he stands directly before the heart’s door of a sinner and clearly confronts him with the Gospel of Christ” (p. 27).
Everything about this book is good, but readers familiar with the literature of evangelism will find little that is new. The style is somewhat tame, lacking both fire and fervor, but the strength of the volume lies in its strong scriptural undergirding, its earnest tone, its clear handling of every idea, and its complete coverage of those tried and true evangelistic principles and methods that are rapidly making Southern Baptists the largest non-Catholic denomination in America.
FARIS D. WHITESELL
