Letters of Francis A. Schaeffer, Spiritual Reality in the Personal Life, edited by Lane T. Dennis (Crossway, 1985, 264 pp.; $15.95, cloth). Reviewed by R. Laird Harris, professor emeritus, Covenant Theological Seminary.
The legacy of the late Francis A. Schaeffer is well known both inside and outside evangelical circles:
First, his work at L’Abri, his “shelter” in Huemoz, Switzerland, with troubled young people during the sixties and after was phenomenal. And the work of the various L’Abri centers goes on.
Second, his 23 books, beginning with The God Who Is There in 1968, have been widely used and loved.
Now, a selection of his letters dealing with spiritual and doctrinal questions will extend and perpetuate the influence of this leader of God’s people. The editor worked extensively with Schaeffer and his wife, Edith, and was in a position to make a representative selection from an amazing corpus of 19,000 letters. The collection covers the areas of spiritual reality—its awakening, its part in daily life, and its place in marriage, family, and sexual relations. One may wonder what other types of letters were omitted. But for these we are grateful.
Separatism And Balance
I knew Francis Schaeffer as a fellow student, then as a fellow minister, and most of all as a Christian friend, right through to his death in 1984.
At first, Schaeffer was part of the separatist group that, under J. Gresham Machen, had left the Northern Presbyterian Church and Princeton Theological Seminary to form Westminster Seminary. In 1938 Schaeffer graduated from Faith Theological Seminary, which had broken off from Westminster, partly over the proper interpretation of personal Christian holiness. One of Faith’s slogans was “A Vital Spiritual Life.” Schaeffer himself had a voice in choosing this slogan.
In the 1950s, while remaining in the separatist movement, he distanced himself somewhat from this background. His letters refer to a soul-searching time in 1951, when he became aware that his orthodox theology was not enough. Personal devotional life was equally important, yet he had neglected it. During this period, he wrote his book True Spirtuality, although it was published much later (1972).
One may question whether Schaeffer was justified in his analysis of his brethren who were arguing for the theological purity of the church. He felt that old Princeton was too academic and speculative, even though B. B. Warfield, the old Princeton’s spokesman, had once likened being learned and being godly to the two legs of a soldier—both essential.
In his later letters, Schaeffer still emphasizes the need for orthodoxy in doctrine, and doctrinal purity in church organizations. But he beautifully joins with it the need for orthodoxy in practice. He declared in 1951 that he would “push and politick no more,” but in 1955 he did take part in difficult church decisions regarding efforts to modify the alleged extreme separatism in the American Council of Christian Churches.
In financing his ministry, as in orthodoxy, Schaeffer demonstrated the balance he so often recommended to others. He came to the position that L’Abri would not ask for money. Like the China Inland Mission (under which his father-in-law had served), Schaeffer committed all its needs to the Lord. He felt this was the real test of his work, but he did not insist that all ministries must use this method—only that the attitude of dependence upon the Lord is essential.
True And Powerful
However one feels about Schaeffer’s criticism of others, his positive presentation was true and powerful. His study of relativism and irrationalism in modern thought led him to write three early and vital books: The God Who Is There, Escape From Reason, and He Is There and He Is Not Silent. The great truth that the living God has revealed himself in redeeming love was the anchor that allowed him to speak positively to lost minds and hearts and sustained him in many difficulties and heavy labors. His letters refer often to this firm foundation.
But the greater thrust of his letters is personal. He repeatedly recommends True Spirituality. He insists that this is a fallen world and no one is perfect, but we have the presence and power of Christ by his Spirit. He argues that we should rely on God for daily guidance—but we should not place it on a par with or apart from biblical injunctions. We cannot expect too much in a fallen world. He says, “If one will accept only perfection or nothing, one always gets nothing.”
“Knowing the world is abnormal, and yet knowing that it is possible to bring our mistakes and sin under the work of Christ,” writes Schaeffer, “means that there is the possibility of living a life, in an unromantic and practical way, that has fullness and beauty—in spite of those scars.”
Schaeffer never tells his correspondents what they must do. Rather, he outlines the possibilities—always from the Bible—and urges them to go on in love to God and the people with whom they are concerned. There is good advice in these letters for those who face the same problems his correspondents did—especially marital and sexual problems. They will surely profit from Schaeffer’s wisdom.
An Excerpt
The Evil of Asceticism
“Dear Mrs. Berger: … I wish we could sit down and talk over a cup of tea for an hour or so.
It does seem to me that you are really caught in a legalism that by God’s grace you have got to break out of. The gospel is to give us freedom, not slavery.
… Christianity should give us a fullness of life in which the whole person is free before God. The idea that anything pleasurable is wrong really misses the point that God made the whole person and God means for the whole person to be fulfilled—not only in Heaven but in the present life.
Thus the Biblical teaching of morality is to be our standard. We are not to add to it, and anyone who tries to bind us with legalisms beyond the Bible is really doing Satan’s work and not God’s.…
Your salvation rests only upon whether you have accepted Christ as your Savior and nothing else. And Jesus is very plain that whosoever will may come.
… I hope all this is helpful. With warm personal greetings in the Lamb, Francis A. Schaeffer”
Philosophy of Education: Issues and Options, by Michael L. Peterson, (IVP, 1986, 200 pp.; $5.95, paper). Reviewed by Arthur F. Holmes, professor of philosophy at Wheaton College.
Michael Peterson, an Asbury College professor and author of Evil and the Christian God (Baker, 1982), has written the fifth volume in the Contours of Christian Philosophy series. Like previous volumes, Philosophy of Education aims primarily at introducing college students to a particular area of philosophy.
The author, who is also managing editor of Faith and Philosophy, the journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers, devotes about half of this book to traditional and contemporary philosophies of education, and half to constructive proposals from a Christian standpoint. The first half covers the usual fare in this field: idealism, naturalism, and neo-Thomism are the traditional approaches; experimentalism, existentialism, and philosophical analysis are the contemporary ones.
Everything is not simply lumped under one “secular humanism” rubric. Rather, Peterson carefully distinguishes and summarizes views before launching his critical comments. And he encourages the reader to learn from other views wherever they might legitimately contribute to Christian thought and practice.
Yet Peterson is alert to the influence of nontheistic presuppositions. He makes explicit the connections between a philosophical (or religious) world view and an educational philosophy, as well as the influence of educational philosophy on educational policy and practice. Consequently, the second half of the book, in which he develops his constructive proposals, starts by talking about the relationship of Christianity to metaphysics (especially the nature of personhood), to epistemology, and to ethical, aesthetic, and other values. Education is of the whole person—rational, moral, emotional, aesthetic, societal.
Hence, the importance Peterson attributes to liberal learning: “… nourishing a student on the major themes and great ideas of humankind helps her transcend the spatio-temporal boundaries inherent in most of practical life. It enables her to think not simply in terms of her immediate surroundings or needs, but in terms of the global situation in which we find ourselves. It sensitizes her to our moral obligations, religious aspirations, and the recurring problems of the race. It brings a more complete perspective to bear on practical decision and action.”
General education, the author insists, is not itself liberal education, but rather a means thereto. One key to truly Christian liberal education is humility, and humility is an outgrowth of Christian piety. The high calling of the teacher resembles that of the minister: More than text-books we need text-people (he cites Abraham Heschel), for they are the texts students read and never forget.
Curriculum And Reality
Because presuppositions matter, the Christian will want curriculum to conform to the nature of reality created by God, especially the nature of personhood. Likewise pedagogy will be influenced by one’s epistemology: It should take note of the Christian commitment to truth rather than relativism, and should place “a premium on the refined powers of intellect.” Value education in turn should recognize that we are morally responsible agents with objective norms, rather than being content to have students clarify their own relative values.
Chapters follow on issues in educational theory and practice; integration of faith and learning, liberal education versus vocational training, public versus private education, academic rights and freedoms, teaching versus indoctrination. This is standard and extremely important fare.
If those of us in Christian higher education say there is nothing new in all of this, we may be right; the volume is addressed to students, and every generation of students needs to hear it afresh, especially those taking education courses and those preparing to teach. But the book merits an even wider audience: parents, pastors, those teaching in our public schools, those in the Christian school movement, Christians everywhere who are concerned about education. Here is a primer to educate that concern, and educated concern is something evangelicals in today’s world greatly need.
Book Briefs
Gruesome Truth
The Woodland Hills Tragedy, by S. Rickley Christian (Crossway, 1985, 218 pp.; $6.95, paper).
Fetuses—16,433 of them—were boxed and stacked in the back yard of an elite California home. Journalist Christian admits his initial disgust. Yet, spurred on by a friend’s anguish over his aborted child, Christian begins piecing together details of the incident.
He discovers that industrial removal of aborted fetuses is not that unusual. In addition to the Medical Analytical Laboratory in Santa Monica (responsible for this gruesome collection), there is an infectious waste crematorium that handles abortion detritus located next door to Disneyland. Other firms specialize in autoclaving, or the high-pressure steaming of human remains into landfill.
Forty-three of the fetuses collected in lab director Malvin Weisberg’s back yard were late-term abortions performed after California’s legal limit. Yet neither Weisberg, nor the physicians responsible, were prosecuted. In fact, Christian finds abortion to be so institutionalized that at a local clinic that terminates 1,000 babies a month, a nurse claims she has “never yet seen a death.”
Important questions remain: Why did Weisberg store this horror in his back yard? And why weren’t he and the doctors who performed the late-term abortions prosecuted? Weisberg refused to be interviewed. For him, the case has been closed since 1982.
Christian’s research became a personal odyssey, each discovery shifting him closer to activism. The Woodland Hills Tragedy is a dynamic tool of prolife advocacy. When arguments fail, pass this book along. It says it all.
Obsession and Liberation
The Freedom We Crave: Addiction, the Human Condition, by William Lenters (Eerdmans, 1985, 177 pp.; $9.95, cloth).
William Lenters playfully suggests that religious fellowships ought to carry a government disclaimer warning of potential health damage, for an addict’s magical thinking and yearning for gratification can abuse religion as easily as alcohol.
Lenters, a certified addiction counselor and minister who has treated hundreds whose lives have gone awry, knows that addiction is not merely a drug or alcohol problem, but a people problem.
Lenters calls addiction “a circuitous route from pain to pleasure … an irrational impulse to spit in the wind of the real world.… magical thinking, self-justification … and the easy morality of convenience.” Romantic relationships, alcohol consumption, religious practice, fitness, food, and work can easily become full-blown obsessions.
Lenters does not simply study cause and result. He thrusts the cure at everyone, urging each dependent reader (which he claims all are to a degree) to take the first grudging steps from pain toward recovery. His goal is to counteract dependency with the power of God in Christ. To illustrate, he draws from C. S. Lewis, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, and biblical history to dramatize the necessity of “crossing a personal threshold of pain” before reaching a turning point.
Recovery involves humility, surrender, painful spiritual discipline, and final, total acceptance of responsibility. Lenters recognizes genetic preconditioning that popularly places alcoholism in a “disease” category, but still returns responsibility to the addict, despite the pain. “Pain can be seen as a gift,” Lenters writes. So, too, is Lenters’s book.
Book briefs by Cathy Luchetti.
