25: The Work of the Holy Spirit

The work of the Holy Spirit not only pervades the Scriptures from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22, but extends to every aspect of divine creation. Abraham Kuyper, the great Dutch theologian, summarized the work of the Holy Spirit in two significant propositions: “First, the work of the Holy Spirit is not confined to the elect and does not begin with their regeneration; but it touches every creation, animate and inanimate, and begins its operations in the elect at the very moment of their origin. Second, the proper work of the Holy Spirit in every creature consists in the quickening and sustaining of life with reference to his being and talents, and, in its highest sense, with reference to eternal life, which is his salvation” (The Work of the Holy Spirit, p. 46). From the standpoint of the importance of the person of the Spirit as the Third Person of the Godhead, from consideration of his extensive works as revealed in the Scriptures, and because the work of the Spirit is integral to every important undertaking of God, the work of the Holy Spirit is a pivotal doctrine of the Scriptures and of systematic theology, and its statement determines any system of theology of which it is a part.

Definition. The Nicene Creed as amended in A.D. 589 states the faith of the Church on the person and work of the Spirit in these words: “And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and Son together is worshipped and glorified.” In modern creeds such as the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Spirit of God is defined as one of the three persons of the Godhead “of one substance, power, and eternity” with the Father and Son. Even Karl Barth who avoids the word person in reference to the Trinity, states of the Spirit: “The Holy Ghost is God the Lord in the fullness of Deity, in the total sovereignty and condescension, in the complete hiddenness and revealedness of God” (The Holy Ghost and the Christian Life, p. 11). The personality, deity, procession, and divine attributes of the Holy Spirit are always affirmed in orthodox theology. As Charles Hodge expresses it: “Since the fourth century His true divinity has never been denied by those who admit His personality” (Systematic Theology, Vol. I, p. 527).

The work of the Holy Spirit therefore is the work of God. Every important undertaking of God is related in some way to the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Among the more prominent ministries of the Spirit are those of divine revelation, the inspiration of the Scriptures, the creation of the physical world, the conception of Christ, enablement for spiritual service, the impartation of eternal life to believers, indwelling and baptizing of the saints, miraculous works, the bestowal of spiritual gifts, and the revealing of prophecy.

The Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. Early in the first chapter of Genesis the Spirit of God is introduced as one who moves upon the face of the waters. John Owen in his classic work, A Discourse Concerning the Holy Spirit, states: “Without Him, all was a dead sea; a rude inform chaos; a confused heap covered with darkness: but by the moving of the Spirit of God upon it, He communicated a quickening prolific virtue” (p. 56). The work of the Spirit in creation seems to be related to its order as in Genesis 1:2, its design as in Job 26:13, its life as in Job 33:4 and Genesis 1:26, and the glory of creation as in Psalm 33:6 and Psalm 19:1.

The most important work of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament, however, is in relation to divine revelation and inspiration of the Scriptures. The revelation given to the prophets as well as that recorded in the Scriptures is traced to the Holy Spirit (2 Pet. 1:21; cf. 2 Sam. 23:2; Mic. 3:8). Frequently the writing of Scriptures themselves is attributed to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (2 Sam. 23:2, 3; Isa. 59:21; Matt. 22:42, 43; cf. Ps. 110:1; Mark 12:36; Acts 1:16; cf. Ps. 41:9; Acts 28:25; cf. Isa. 6:9, 10; Heb. 3:7; 10:15, 16). The Apostle Peter spoke of the Spirit of God as the origin of all prophecy in these words: “For no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit” (2 Pet. 1:21).

Important also in the Old Testament was the ministry of the Holy Spirit to man. In numerous cases specific enablement for some divine service is attributed to the Holy Spirit (Gen. 41:38; Exod. 28:3; 31:3; 35:30–35; Num. 11:17, 25; Judges 3:10; 6:34; 11:29; 13:25; 14:6, 19; 15:14; 1 Sam. 10:9, 10; 16:13; Dan. 4:8; 5:11–14). The indwelling ministry of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament in contrast to the New Testament, however, does not seem to be especially related to spiritual qualities, nor is it necessarily a gift to every believer. In some cases the indwelling of the Spirit was temporary (1 Sam. 16:14; Ps. 51:11). The Spirit of God was the source of wisdom, special skills, unusual physical strength, of miracles, and of divine revelation in the Old Testament.

The Holy Spirit’s Relation to Christ. The introduction of the ministry of the Holy Spirit in the New Testament is found in his relationship to the virgin birth of Christ. According to Luke 1:35, Christ was begotten of the Holy Spirit and filled with the Holy Spirit from the moment of conception (Isa. 11:2, 3; 42:1–4; 61:1, 2; John 3:34; cf. Luke 1:15). The ministry of the Holy Spirit to Christ at his baptism by John was not the beginning of this relationship, but rather its declaration. The public works of Christ such as his miracles were attributed to the Holy Spirit in Matthew 12:28 and Luke 4:14, 15, 18. By the Spirit, Christ was anointed to preach (Matt. 12:18–21; cf. Isa. 42:1–4; Luke 4:18–21; cf. Isa. 61:1, 2). Some evidence may be adduced that the Holy Spirit ministered to Christ in his sufferings and trials leading up to his crucifixion.

The Work of the Holy Spirit in Salvation. One of the major ministries of the Holy Spirit is related to the salvation of the lost. According to John 16:8, the Holy Spirit “when he is come, will convict the world in respect of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” The work of the Spirit enters inscrutably in the act of faith in Christ. When a soul enters into the sphere of salvation, he is born of the Spirit or regenerated (John 1:13; 3:3–7; Rom. 6:13; 2 Cor. 5:17; Eph. 2:5, 10; Titus 3:5; Jas. 1:18). The regeneration effected by the Holy Spirit results in the believer’s possessing a new nature, a new experience, and also a new safety in Christ.

The Indwelling of the Spirit. Prominent in the New Testament is the doctrine of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Christ had predicted in John 14:17 concerning the spirit of truth, “… We know him; for he abideth with you, and shall be in you.” This promise of the indwelling of the Spirit was fulfilled on Pentecost when the indwelling presence of the Spirit became the common possession of all believers. Hence, the possession of the Spirit is essential to salvation (Rom. 8:9; Jude 19). The presence of the Spirit is the seal of God until the day of redemption (Eph. 4:30; cf. Eph. 1:13; 2 Cor. 1:22).

The Baptism of the Spirit. Prophesied in the Gospels and occurring for the first time on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 1:5; cf. Acts 11:15–17), the baptism of the Spirit is defined in 1 Corinthians 12:13 as placing the new believer in the body of Christ. It should therefore not be confused with regeneration, the indwelling of the Spirit, or the filling of the Spirit.

The Filling of the Spirit. Important and vital is the ministry of the Spirit described as the filling of the Spirit. This important work is given to those who fulfill the conditions and is not to be confused with the ministries of the Spirit which are found in every Christian, such as those of regeneration, indwelling, baptism, and sealing of the Spirit. It is a work of the Spirit which may be bestowed repeatedly and also withdrawn. Practically all spiritual experience is related to this aspect of the work of the Spirit.

The basic requirement for the filling of the Spirit is given in Galatians 5:16: “Walk by the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” The power to overcome the sinfulness of the human nature is therefore attributed to the Holy Spirit. Walking by the Spirit implies a constant dependence upon and faith in the delivering power of the Spirit. Though sinless perfection is not promised the one filled by the Spirit, the control and divine grace represented by the experience transforms the life of the recipient. Instead of manifesting the works of the flesh, he produces the fruit of the Spirit: “Love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, self-control” (Gal. 5:22, 23).

Related to this satisfying experience are the commands: “Quench not the Spirit” (1 Thess. 5:19), meaning not to resist the Spirit of God, and: “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God” (Eph. 4:30), referring to a state of disobedience to God and failure to confess sin. The filling of the Spirit is characterized by an unhindering ministry of the Spirit of God to the believer permitting the work of the Holy Spirit in sanctifying (Rom. 15:16), teaching (John 16:12, 13; 1 Cor. 2:9–3:2), guiding (Rom. 8:14), giving assurance (Rom. 8:16), inspiring worship (Eph. 5:18–20), leading in prayer (Rom. 8:26), and empowering for service (John 7:38, 39). The varied gifts of the Spirit upon individual believers can be used to the full only when empowered by the Spirit of God.

Application. The secret of all spiritual power for the child of God lies in a proper relationship to the Holy Spirit of God. This is true for the novice as well as the mature saint, for those unusually gifted as well as those with moderate abilities. In the words of Paul: “We received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is from God; that we might know the things that were freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Spirit teacheth; combining spiritual things with spiritual words. Now the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually judged” (1 Cor. 2:12–14). In our modem sophisticated world, just as in its counterpart in Corinth, the power of the Spirit working in the heart of man is the difference between human wisdom and divine revelation, human weakness and divine power, carnality and spirituality. Every soul that is saved is born of the Spirit; every revival is a work of the Spirit; every spiritual truth is taught by the Spirit; every holy character is sanctified by the Spirit.

Bibliography: K. Barth, The Holy Ghost and the Christian Life; L. S. Chafer, Systematic Theology, Vol. VI; L. Gaussen, Theopneustia; A. Kuyper, The Work of the Holy Spirit; F. E. Marsh, Emblems of the Holy Spirit; J. Owen, A Discourse Concerning the Holy Spirit, from The Works of John Owen, William H. Goold, ed., 4 vols., Philadelphia, 1862; R. Pache, La Personne et l’Oeuvre de Saint-Esprit; W. H. G. Thomas, The Holy Spirit of God; J. F. Walvoord, The Holy Spirit.

President

Dallas Theological Seminary

Dallas, Texas

- More from John F. Walvoord

The Simple Gospel

L. Nelson Bell

THE SIMPLE GOSPEL

Jesus christ came into the world to redeem men from sin. His teaching, his methods, his death, and his resurrection comprise a message of God’s love and redeeming power against the backdrop of his certain judgment on sin and the unrepentant sinner.

The Gospel is the story of God’s mercy made available to men by faith. It is designed to meet the universal need of men everywhere. The Apostle Paul condensed to two sentences the essence of the Gospel: “Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures … and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.”

Why, then, is the Gospel being made so complicated today? Why do so many church members not have the foggiest notion of what the Gospel is? Why does the average churchgoer often leave a church service without either hearing or understanding the message?

There are millions of souls today who would say, if only they knew how, “Sir, we would see Jesus.”

Many Christians mourn, saying: “They have taken away the Lord.… and we know not where they have laid him.”

This article is being written in love, not in anger. It is also being written with the firm conviction that somewhere along the line the simplicity of the Gospel has been lost and replaced by a multiplicity of words, opinions, questions, denials, and subterfuges.

This is also to affirm that the “strong meat” of Christian doctrine is necessary for Christian growth and maturity and no Christian has the right to live on spiritual “milk” the remainder of his life.

Nevertheless, the theological world is so cluttered up by speculative theories, philosophical presuppositions, conditioned biases against the supernatural and the miraculous, and a preference for human reasoning at the expense of divine revelation that the man in the street (and often in the pew) finds himself denied the spiritual food he so desperately needs.

There are many reasons for the present situation but the writer neither knows them all nor is he competent to make more than superficial observations about them. It is our hope that this discussion may cause some heart searching and make some persons candidly look at their own ministry.

One of our problems is sophistication.

Scientific achievements and cultural advances tend to make us feel that man eventually, if not now, knows all the answers. Christianity, based in the primary event of two millenniums ago, often seems irrelevant to our advanced age, and as a result the simplicity of the Gospel is discarded for a more modern approach to man’s needs.

Another problem is just plain conceit.

Human pride has been man’s downfall again and again. It is something which God both hates and resists. Nevertheless we are still prone to think that we know man’s problems and their cure better than God himself, and in so doing the simple Gospel is discarded in favor of a far more complicated form of religion which counterfeits godliness while denying the power from which true godliness stems.

An intellectual pride which gives precedence to man’s opinions when they are at variance with divine revelation has only too often caused disaster to those who have so indulged and to others who have followed their leading.

In this connection we are all confronted with the temptations which the Apostle Paul faced and met so conclusively, namely, his refusal to preach with “excellency of speech or wisdom,” or with the “enticing words of man’s wisdom,” in order that his hearers should become people of faith in and by the power of God and not in the wisdom of men.

Closely related to this problem is the innate desire to appear erudite. It is wonderfully impressive to show by voluminous quotes that one is well-read. But many are the sermons that are full of quotations from men’s writings while devoid of quotations from Holy Writ.

The simplicity of the Gospel is also lost when more credence is given to those who warp or deny the Scriptures than to the Scriptures themselves. In so doing the innate power of the Word of God to pierce into the conscience of man is lost and in its place there is substituted the opinions of men which are popular today but discarded tomorrow.

There are in our generation a number of brilliant theologians and philosophers. Most of them have two things in common: they do not agree with each other’s opinions, but they do agree on the untrustworthiness of the Bible and are amazingly adept in contriving clever excuses for their position.

What is the victim? The simple Gospel message, and those who should hear it. Victims also are those who follow these men out into the maze of speculative thought.

The simple Gospel is also lost by the insistent demand for fruits where no root of faith has taken place in Christ, nor surrender in the individual life to the work of the Holy Spirit. Men are confused when they are told what to do as Christians but never told how to become Christians.

Furthermore, the Gospel is lost when we refuse to recognize man’s natural state as a sinner and his need of redemption and a new nature. Washing of the outside of the cup was a favorite pastime of the Pharisees in our Lord’s time. But he made it clear that what he requires is a new heart, cleansed by the blood of Calvary and empowered by the indwelling Holy Spirit.

And at the personal level we unquestionably obscure the Gospel when we become more concerned with the reformation of man than with his redemption—with the consequences of sin rather than sin itself.

Although the Gospel in all of its simplicity and beauty dates back to the Empty Tomb, neither its message nor man’s need have changed one whit in the ensuing years. Some of us are inclined to forget that Christ came not so much to preach the Gospel but that there might be a Gospel to preach. It is the Cross with its forgiveness and redemption and the Empty Tomb with its glorious home which continues to be the one thing needful.

Finally, we should be on guard lest we multiply words without knowledge, lest we speak peace when there is no peace, or interpose ourselves or others between the needy sinner and his willing Saviour.

There are depths of truth which none of us can fathom this side of eternity. There are implications inherent in the Christian faith which will continue to exhaust the minds and imaginations of reverent believers. There are many things which we see now only in part, as in a glass darkly. But among all these things the Gospel continues as a shining beacon. Why hide it? Why make it complicated?

- More from L. Nelson Bell

Eutychus and His Kin: January 5, 1962

Desk Calendar

This morning I cleared the litter on my desk into a carton and labeled it “Miscellaneous, 1961.” On the empty expanse of varnished oak I arranged my clock, lamp, and desk calendar. A new year is before me.

It begins with a brief interlude between holidays, conferences, conventions, and convocations; let us call it Winter Work Week. For a few short days we are out of Seasons. Barring blizzards, flu, and missiles, this is the season for getting the year’s work done.

First, to plan the week.

An engagement calendar is fascinating: square, regular pages, crisp and clean. It suggests days both ordered and open. Looking at the pile of fresh pages, I am ready to believe the formula for success: Plan your work and work your plan. The book offers no resistance as I plot a balanced pattern of achievement. Marshalled hours conquer the whole docket of unfinished business, with a reserve of leisure left for mopping up—triumph of intelligent planning.

Of course, it won’t work. Days aren’t like pages. They are lumpy and twisted. They recall the rueful warning of that bogus barbershop ballad: “Don’t go out in the wheatfield, mother; you’ll run against the grain.”

In short, the days are evil. But good or bad, they are measured better by heart beats than by clock ticks. Which brings me back to seasons. Commercialized holidays exploit the seasons of life, seasons we all know. The farmers’ almanac is more true to life than an executive’s desk book. The tides of our lives never rest. Days rush in with thunder, or ebb out in silence.

All the seasons God has set in his own power. The rainbow of his promise arches over every one. The cycles of nature, history, or my life are not meaningless. In the fullness of time the Lord of glory entered history. When his hour was come he finished salvation and redeemed all time for his people.

We can’t plan our own lives, even a week ahead. The time is His, not ours. We can only redeem the time he gives. Christian wisdom discerns in time His seasons of opportunity.

EUTYCHUS

Ministers And Mergers

I am deeply disturbed about the article “What Ministers Think of Mergers” (Nov. 24 issue) by Harold Lindsell. I am happy to note the very honest statement … where Mr. Lindsell recognizes that the group of ministers questioned might not be a good cross section. Being well acquainted with ministers in my own denomination and with many others, I feel this cannot be so.…

I think there is no question of the fact that at least 90 per cent and probably 97 per cent of the ministers in the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. will heartily back this plan to study the merger and do so with the understanding that we will do everything we can to make a merger come about.…

Admittedly we might have to change a few of our creeds, some that might well need changing, but is there not the possibility that our creeds can be richer and truer because of this merger with other churches?

MARION L. MOYES

Roanoke Presbyterian Church

Kansas City, Mo.

This quote is from Dr. Alfred Edersheim’s book, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah. It states (with reference to the Scripture “that they may be one”): “But while moral union rather than outward unity was in His view, our present ‘unhappy divisions,’ arising so often from willfulness and un-readiness to bear slight differences among ourselves … are so entirely contrary not only to the Christian, but even to the Jewish spirit, that we can only trace them to the heathen element in the Church.” …

Does not Dr. Edersheim, in essence, express the core of the problem?

WILLIAM H. SCHOBERT

Bankers Baptist Church

Hillsdale, Mich.

The “control” group is biased by definition and conclusions drawn from such comparisons are invalid on the face of it.

If the intent of the article is to represent a discussion of the points of view of some fraction of 150 ministers who responded on paper to some written questions, then the reporting would have been far more realistic and effective if both the discussion and conclusions had not been generalized to: “What Ministers Think of Mergers.”

JESSE W. MYERS

United Campus Christian Fellowship

University of Maryland

College Park, Md.

A word about the laity that said they were in favor of the merger of the Blake type—I would assume that they aren’t aware that this would mean a possible surrender of the episcopate. A better question to ask Episcopalians is, “Would you favor merger even if it meant the surrender of the episcopate?” I think the results would be decidely different.…

Certainly we can’t refuse to talk to anyone of unity, but it must be done in the light of the Catholic faith, which includes the episcopate.

RAY RANTAPAA

Lead, S. Dak.

Along with the episcopate goes belief in apostolic succession, which is something the Methodists profess to disbelieve.… The Methodists, indeed, have “bishops” but as administrative functionaries, not as followers in the apostles’ steps.

Articles such as Mr. Lindsell’s may make heartening reading for your subscribers, but merely ignoring obstacles is not going to hasten the cause of re-union. Norman, Okla.

JOHN VORNHOLT

Men’s attempts at world unity will always in the end fail. Christ alone, at His coming, will unite. Organized unity movements, however well arranged and impressive, do not really unite. The preaching of the Word under the power and influence of the Holy Spirit is God’s directive to his Church.… Unity of spirit alone is vital.

When He comes, He will unite those who are His, in East and West, in a manner beyond their wildest dreams.

GRIFFITH QUICK

Rhyddings Congregational Church

Swansea, Wales

In our community (as in many others we have heard of) a group of 18–24 of us meet together one nite a week for Bible study, hymn singing, discussion and prayer. We take turns sharing our homes, and have a rotating leadership in the host. Our group, which is composed of members of the faculty and staff at the Air Force Academy, at present is represented by the following denominational backgrounds: Lutheran, Congregationalist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Disciples, Southern Baptist, Salvation Army, Conservative Baptist and Plymouth Brethren.

This positive experiment in ecumenicity has not only increased our understanding of the Bible, but of the convictions and feelings of one another. During the past two and a half years we have come to realize as a result of this “koinonia,” that there is probably room within the non-legalistic framework of the New Testament for several kinds of worship services and church programs adaptable to the variety of needs and tastes of different people.

WILLIAM PATERSON, D.D.S.

USAF Academy Hospital

Air Force Academy, Colo.

Interview With Dr. Malik

I just read your interview with Dr. Charles Malik (Nov. 24 issue)—a great man, Christian at the heart and in the mind. He was discomfited at only one point … and that was in his failure to see or admit that the Roman branch of Catholicism is such a strong force in Mediterranean, Latin culture—it is in the warp and woof of it, hence the vulnerability of the people to Communism’s bait. They rebel against their religiously dominated culture; not at the theology so much as at the exploitation of their poor countries by an ecclesiastical system. Frankfort, Ind.

JOHN WAYE

In the sixteen years since the founding of the U.N., the following countries have been enslaved by the Communists: Czechoslovakia, Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, Roumania, Albania, Yugoslavia, North Korea, China, and Cuba. Apparently it is impossible to stand against this spreading malignancy while we are yoked to it in such an international agency.… We will never see justice done in the U.N. as long as it is opposed to Soviet interests. We have forgotten that a Russian veto blocked a U.N. investigation of the Hungarian people’s revolt against their Communist captors. Time and again the nations of the Free World have appeared to be more interested in winning the approval of these godless men than in seeking righteousness.

Though many fine and noble men have served in the U.N. working for a just peace, it is time for Christian realists to openly acknowledge that as it is presently organized, it is a tremendous detriment to the cause of justice and freedom.

FRANCES D. SWANN

Tyler, Texas

Malik’s answers should give many professing Christians food for thought and serious self-examination.

O. L. WILLSON

Monmouth, Ill.

Will someone of authority and honest insight please write an article on the Greek Orthodox Church. I thought it was a “dead church”; but Malik is anything but dead.

M. PAUL VAN HOUTEN

Hull Christian Reformed Church

Hugue, N.D.

Evangelical And Council

Regarding “New Delhi” (Nov. 10 issue): … Why aren’t “evangelicals” better represented in the NCC and the WCC? If they are not, it may be through default because of their lack of concern. Have you ever explored the possibility that Protestant evangelicals have not been willing to do the day-by-day service to the NCC or WCC which gives leadership in most church or inter-church groups? How often have they, I should say we, for I count myself as one with “evangelicals,” given up the minute some cherished pressure resolution was defeated in committee or on the floor of a denominational gathering?

R. EUGENE CROW

Director-of-Evangelism

Southern California Baptist Convention

Los Angeles, Cal.

Since when has the word “conservative” indicated the theological classification of a clergyman who does not subscribe to the doctrine of the total inerrancy of the Scriptures?

There is such confusion in terminology these days that words are taking on new meaning. And it is all a part of a passionate desire to be labeled anything but a fundamentalist. It would be a wonderful day in America if 74 per cent of her clergymen were fundamental and conservative in the true sense of the words.

ROY J. CLARK

Bethlehem Baptist Church

Cleveland, Ohio

Caught The Wrong Stage

May I draw your attention to an unfortunate misprint in my review of Keri Evans’ book, My Spiritual Pilgrimage from Philosophy to Faith (Nov. 10 issue). I do this because I regard the book as of such outstanding worth that I feel it should not be misrepresented.

The misprint runs as follows: “In establishing such he passed through three stages which he affirms should never be confused: awakening, conviction, and hesitancy.” In reality the point that he insists upon more than once is that the experiences never to be confused are: awakening, conviction and conversion. St. Paul’s Cathedral

COLIN C. KERR

Prebendary

London, England

The Context

In reply to the letter by Durrett Wagner (Nov. 10 issue) criticizing your editorial “No Academic License to Pervert Moral Standards”:

On March 16, 1960, an article by Dick Hutchinson and Dan Bures appeared in the Daily Illini of the University of Illinois. This article deplored, and quite justifiably, the “pre-determined ritual” of prolonged necking which occurred in the sorority houses on Saturday nights when the girls and their escorts returned after a date.… Hutchinson and Bures felt this was reducing the human personality to no more than a male or female sex unit. It was in response to this courageous article that Koch, a biology professor, wrote his letter to the editor.

Mr. Wagner’s remarks on Koch’s letter fail to take into account its attitudes toward the student article above in particular and toward society in general.

In the first place, Koch labels Hutchinson and Bures as discussing sexual problems with a “narrow-minded, if not entirely ignorant perspective.” Others come in for similar adjectives: “By far the more important hazard is that a public discussion of sex will offend the religious feelings of the leaders of our religious institutions.” …

Further on, he refers to the “hypocritical and downright inhumane moral standards engendered by a Christian code of ethics which was already decrepit in the days of Queen Victoria.” …

Mr. Wagner, ignoring the rest of Koch’s letter, based his comments upon the one sentence, which doubtless seems restrained by comparison with the above.…

RALPH C. SIDES

Tacoma, Wash.

Optimism Unwarranted

In the Sept. 25 issue, page 7, first column … it should read: C. S. Lewis’ The Pilgrim’s Regress, not Progress. Fairfax, Va.

MRS. TOM DODSON

Barth’s Critique of Modernism

Karl Barth’s theological education was that of a typical liberal. But early in his career he turned against modernism and became a leader in a new type of thought.

The chief and summary accusation Barth made against liberal theology was that it substituted man for God. Such a substitution entailed a particular notion of God, but also a particular notion of man; and Barth centered his attack on the notion of man. To explain Barth’s thought, it is necessary to grasp the motivation behind liberal theology.

From the time of his studies with Hermann, Barth regarded Schleiermacher as the greatest theological figure of the nineteenth century, and not without reason. Convinced of the value of Christianity, Schleiermacher wished to defend it against the onslaughts of the Enlightenment. At the same time he considered himself a modern man. The values of Christianity therefore must in some way be integrated with the advances of science and culture. To do so, he identified the kingdom of God with the progress of civilization. His theology borrowed its principles from contemporary science. Theology must be founded on a philosophy of religion, and echoing Kant, he founded religion on ethics. With a mixture of Kant and romanticism, Schleiermacher’s theology arises in a subjective religious feeling of total dependence. The Word, or intellectual truth, is a secondary matter. It is in feeling, in experience, in conduct that man has some sort of relation with God.

The Errors Of Modernism

For modernism the method of theology consists in taking the Church and its faith as part of the wider context of civilization in general. Dogmatics, in this view, derives its structure and its norms from the general laws of society and the universe. Therefore Schleiermacher—and on this point Bultmann still follows him—first shows the general anthropological possibility of reach, and then second, its historico-psychological realizability. As a result theology depends on borrowings from metaphysics, anthropology, ethics, and the philosophy of religion. Since by searching man can find God, a special revelation is unnecessary.

Barth in an interesting way notes the effect of modernism on the weekly sermon. It must not be thought that technical theories of theology have no repercussions in the daily life of the Church and its ministers. Modernistic anthropology produces a specific type of sermon.

For the modernist minister the sermon topic is tested philosophically for its epistemological, cosmic, or psychological content; or perhaps for its historical, political, or social content. Modernist preaching has no lack or criteria—all substitutes for the missing criterion of the Word of God. Modernism in its own way was concerned for the Church and wished to preserve the essential values of Christianity while discarding its historical husks. It had therefore its dogmatics. But it had lost the Reformation’s criterion. When, then, other criteria were seized upon to fill the empty place, these were regarded as a full and equal substitute, in a measure representing what had been lost. The theology of modernistic Protestantism had ceased to envisage any possibility of getting within sight of the Word of God as an entity distinct from Church proclamation. But this means that the modernist preacher is not preaching God; he is only preaching himself. He has put himself in the place of God. As Harnack very frankly told Barth in a conversation, the older dogmatics ought to be replaced by a personal confession of one who has attained the maturity and serenity of final convictions and spiritual certainties.

Man-Centered Religion

The point therefore at which Barth most obviously conflicts with modernism is anthropology. Does man or does he not have the natural ability to find out God by searching? The essential humanism of liberal theology can best be seen in its view of human nature. One of the tasks Schleiermacher set for himself was the defense of Christianity against the onslaughts of the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment had affected a supercilious disdain of history. Antiquity was spurned as all confusion and superstition. Against this contempt of history the liberals expressed a respect for history. The great men of antiquity, Jeremiah and Jesus, Paul and Luther, are our fellowmen; they have a common human nature. To be sure, as the Enlightenment too vigorously insisted, we must criticize them from our higher vantage point; but we must also esteem them as our comrades in our great endeavors. Thus by studying history appreciatively we may come to discern God’s revelation. History thus proves its truth to us as we come to experience and feel the truth in ourselves. Lessing in particular held that the inner truth of history is an entity thoroughly accessible to and apprenhensible by us; as to its presence we can be the judges in virtue of our feeling and experience. Therefore he appeals from Luther’s writings to Luther’s spirit, from the letter to the spirit of the Bible, from recounted miracles to constantly continuing miracle of religion itself. Thus Lessing asserted an immanent power in human nature by which is discerned the coincidence of revelation and history.

In a later section Barth puts the problem more explicitly. Are we to assert without reservation, he asks, that the question of the possibility of knowing the Word of God is a question of anthropology? Are we to enquire into what man in general and as such is or is not capable of in this respect? Is there a general truth with regard to man which would include his capacity for knowing the Word of God? We must put this question, says Barth, because an almost overwhelming development in the history of Protestant theology since the Reformation has led to an impressive affirmative answer throughout the entire movement described as modernist. Barth then traces a little post-reformation history. In its aversion from the scholastic nuda speculatio de Deo, post-reformation theology sided with Duns Scotus in regarding theology as a practical science and not as a theoretical science as Thomas had maintained. The object of theology was no longer the nature and will of God, but rather man in so far as he is led toward eternal blessedness. Turretin was perhaps exceptionally clear-sighted and was suspicious of such definitions. To guard against undesirable inferences he insisted that even so theology was concerned with God, God as revealed in Christ. But others did not see so clearly as Turretin. From the outset, Barth maintains, Protestant orthodoxy suffered from an excess rather than a defect in considering the religious subject. Under the influence of Renaissance interests, the later theologians began to shift their attention from a Supreme Being to man himself. This object, man, was then supposed to be understood through the general truths of anthropology, empirically discovered. Simultaneously natural theology revived, as the misgivings of the Reformers in this connection faded. By the eighteenth century theology had become the “science of religion.” Schleiermacher quite fundamentally connected this newly-discovered and independent reality of religion with a corresponding human possibility generally demonstrable on anthropological grounds, undertaking for the first time to interpret Christianity in the form of a concretely historical analysis of human existence along the lines of a general doctrine of man: to wit, man’s meeting with God to be regarded as a human religious experience historically and psychologically fixable; and this experience to be regarded as the realization of a religious potentiality in man generally demonstrable. These are the two cardinal propositions in the philosophy of religion in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The decisive one is naturally the second; to repeat, experience with God to be regarded as the realization of a religious potentiality in man generally demonstrable. Whether the actual anthropology adopted is that of Schleiermacher or one more congenial to contemporary consciousness, like that of Heidegger adopted by Bultmann, the result is still humanistic liberalism.

New Stress On Revelation

In this way Barth has shown that modernism is man-centered. Man’s knowledge of God, which upon examination turns out to be knowledge of himself, arises out of the ordinary resources of human nature. Barth’s thought, on the contrary, is God-centered, and the following material will explain his quite different epistemology. How can man come to know God? Barth’s answer is no analysis of the universe, history, or the human spirit. Barth’s answer is revelation.

The simplicity of revealed reality is not that of a repeated or general event like that of an event formulated in the law of causality. It is the simplicity, says Barth, of a definite, temporally-limited, unrepeated, and quite unrepeatable event. There is no anticipation or repetition of this event. The reality of revelation is not a determination of all history or of a part or section of history. It is history, this very definite history, which has not happened before and will never happen again, which happened once for all, not once in every age or once in many, but quite literally once for all.

An important implication of Barth’s stress on divine revelation is his reversal of the modernistic concepts of possibility and actuality. The liberal position is that we must judge the limits of divine revelation on the basis of what we determine to be possible on other grounds. A popular example is the account in 1 Samuel 15:3 where the author says that God commanded the extermination of the Amalekites. The modernist insists that this cannot have been a divine command because we know from our independent study of ethics that God could not possibly have given this command. Barth does not use this example, but his reply covers it. He says we must not desire to know a priori what goodness is, or to grumble if the world does not conform to it.

In his magnum opus Barth considers the concept of possibility in several different sections. He repeatedly condemns the liberalism of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries on the ground that it measured the actuality of divine revelation according to concepts of possibility that were no more than human constructs. By an examination of man’s own needs, the liberal theologian decided what God could and must do. His faith therefore was based on the cunning conclusion that God has made out his case in accordance with our well-founded convictions. The basic difference between this liberal theology and the theology of older Protestantism is that from some source or other, from some general knowledge of God and man, it is known beforehand, known a priori, what revelation must be, may be, and ought to be. But if a man grounds his recognition of revelation on such a human norm, says Barth, then what he recognizes has nothing to do with God’s revelation.

Barth’s argument is penetrating and the problem is profound. How can a man measure the limits of possibility? How can man predict what God will do? Are we to limit God’s possibilities by our studies in science or ethics? Such was the modernistic view. Barth writes, The same judge who is satisfied with God today may no longer be so tomorrow. It is presumption to claim the right to say Yes or No to God merely because we are satisfied or dissatisfied, merely because an identified revelation conforms to an arbitrary concept derived from ordinary experience. In such circumstances it is inevitable that even the most conscientious theology will prescribe for God what his revelation must be and how it must be handled. This view denies freedom to God. God is forced to conform to nonrevealed concepts—otherwise he would not be doing his duty to man! Does this not entail a superiority of man over God? As Feuerbach so clearly showed, this sort of theology creates God in man’s image and man is found to be worshiping himself.

The Personal God

Barth is obviously impressed with Feuerbach’s arguments. The logic of Schleiermacher and Hegel, though in the form of absolute idealism, leads inexorably to atheistic realism. This tendency is seen in the translation of scriptural terms into an abstract philosophic jargon, as if the latter but not the former grasped the real truth about God. Barth attacks every view that makes God an abstract neuter: ens perfectissimum, summum bonum, actus purus, primum movens. In these terms used by Thomas Aquinas and Hegelians alike, personality is obscured, and the doctrine of the Trinity becomes an insuperable difficulty. From these neuters follows the post-Hegelian attack against the personality of God.

What a person is, argues Barth, was now thought to be known from the knowledge of the self as person. Person is the individual manifestation of the spirit, its individualization, which as such is limited, but contingently necessary. How then could God be a person? How could God be limited? Every determination is a negation, said Hegel. To call an object a stone, an animal, or a person, is to say that it is not something else. But the Absolute is All. It can have no determinations, limitations, or negations. Therefore “God” as unlimited cannot be a person. Said D. F. Strauss, “Absolute personality is a non ens which we cannot even conceive.”

A further reason, perhaps a deeper reason, why these theologians could not attribute personality to God was that they ascribed it so vigorously to man. What does it matter that man is finite, if as a person he can conceive and describe the absolute spirit? Does not such a man fulfill the concept of a personal being? Is he not the true knowing and willing I? To know is to control. The infinite, the God who is subject to man’s control, obviously cannot be in any way unsettling, menacing, or critical, in spite of man’s finitude. Man the person is supreme in thought and definition over this infinite. God has become the content of human reason. To predicate personality of this content, that is, of God, would mean an end to the predicating subject. This predication could only be the recognition of something that precedes all human predication. It would be the end of the control under which the neutral infinite so comfortably contemplates and governs itself as man’s own infinite, realizing itself in the act of his finite personal being.

Naturally many attempts have been made to answer this Hegelian theology, but the weakness in all the modem vindications of the personality of God is that they have accepted the same premises. Personality is ascribed to God because the concept of person expresses what is truest and best in human existence.

Feuerbach had exposed the modern “God” as the postulation or deification of humanity. He had done so with unmistakable clarity. One must wonder how the later theologians, by their references to the longing of the human heart, the infinite value of human personality, its meaning in history, and their open projection of human self-consciousness into the transcendent, could so naïvely be exposed to Feuerbach’s arguments.

Thus Barth agrees with Feuerbach that liberal theology leads inevitably to atheistic realism; and Barth does not hesitate to call modernism “a damnable heresy.”

Evangelicals and Anglo-Catholics

Two disparate groups of Christians—Anglo-Catholics (including many middle-of-the-road Episcopalians as well as those who unabashedly wear the Anglo-Catholic label) and Evangelical Conservatives (including many who would also call themselves Fundamentalists and many Anglican Evangelicals) have much more in common than is generally realized, and might well develop a closer relationship.

The outward manifestations of these two traditions are so divergent and their points of difference so striking that their areas of agreement pass almost unnoticed.

Some Common Ground

Yet beneath their differences there is a strong bond of union based on things held in common. While the things that divide them are far from superficial and are incapable, at this time, of resolution, there is enough common ground that each group finds the theological climate of the other more hospitable than that of opposing camps within the same denomination.

Their first point of agreement is in holding to definite and fixed beliefs as contrasted with the relativist approach of their liberal brethren. Differing in convictions, they agree that convictions matter. Differing in their apprehension of truth, they agree that truth is a reality, not an illusion; it is fixed and not relative.

Leading out of this is a common suspicion of current ecumenical thought which seeks to minimize the importance of doctrine and unite Christendom on a least common denominator basis.

Both worship the God of the Bible—Jehovah of the Old Testament and the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ of the New—who are held to be one and the same. Neither has any sympathy for such speculations about God as those of Tillich, since they profess to know God by virtue of his self-revelation.

Both are Bible faiths. This is patently true of Evangelical Conservatism, and it is the basic Anglican position that nothing is to be held or taught except what is believed to be “concluded and proved by the Scriptures” (Book of Common Prayer, p. 542). That these two groups read the Bible differently and draw from it conflicting conclusions is of less importance than the fact that they acknowledge together one and the same repository of religious truth and oppose together both the Roman claim that tradition is of equal value therewith and the liberal viewpoint that gives to philosophical speculation, psychological insight, and popular acceptance the same authoritative position.

Both acknowledge the Bible to be the Word of God. They differ, to be sure, in their theories of inspiration. Conservatives generally hold it to be plenary and verbal, resulting in the belief that the Bible is utterly inerrant even, in details. Anglo-Catholics view inspiration as the faculty given to men to perceive and record God’s self-revelation and not as a guarantee against error in other than purely spiritual areas. There are also differences as to the extent to which textual and so-called higher criticism are to be accepted.

No major doctrinal differences need result from these different views of inspiration. That despite these differences the Bible is held to be the Word of God, as opposed to the contemporary concepts making it a repository of religious myth, a treasure house of good advice, or an acceptable philosophy of life, constitutes a solid bond of union.

Fact And Myth

Surprising as it may seem, they agree that certain biblical passages demand a symbolic rather than a literal interpretation. They disagree, to be sure, as to which passages are to be thus treated. Anglo-Catholics so regard many chapters of the Old Testament. Conservatives, on the other hand, so regard the New Testament language about the Eucharistic Food (Matt. 26:26–28), the Water of Baptism (John 3:5), the Apostolic Commission (John 20:19–23), and other incidents which given more literal construction form the basis of Catholic sacramental theology. It is not on the principle of literal versus figurative construction that they differ, but rather on the selection of particular passages to be treated in one manner or the other.

That the biblical record of Jesus’ earthly life is fact rather than myth is the position of both groups. The Virgin Birth, physical Resurrection, and bodily Ascension are held to be historic events, as are also the miracles of the Gospels. There is, admittedly, a difference of emphasis. Anglo-Catholics see the Virgin Birth as a necessary implication of the Incarnation and not so much as a prerequisite to it, as do most Conservatives. Nor are Anglo-Catholics willing, as are many Conservatives, to make the historicity of any particular miracle the test of Jesus’ Divinity. These differences in emphasis, however, are of less importance than the fundamental agreement as to the validity and integrity of the New Testament record.

Their Christological theologies are practically identical. Here again there is a difference in emphasis. Anglo-Catholics heavily underscore the Incarnation while Conservatives accent more strongly the Atonement. Both dogmas, however, are accepted by both groups. As to the eternal Lordship of the Risen and Ascended Christ, his presence among those who call on him, his office as Mediator, and his function as Judge, there is virtual agreement.

Regarding the person, nature, and office of the Holy Spirit they are also in almost complete accord. Their chief differences here relate to the manner of his manifestation.

Both are staunchly Trinitarian, and neither group is troubled by the philosophical difficulties felt by liberals concerning the Nicene formula.

More Common Shores

Eternal salvation is seen as the goal of man by both Anglo-Catholics and Evangelical Conservatives. They differ as to how this salvation is to be attained, but they are both emphatic that this, and not mere human betterment, is the end to which religion is directed. They use different language, but when the Anglo-Catholic talks of being conformed to the will of God and the Evangelical talks of being saved they are saying substantially the same thing.

Heaven and hell are realities to both of them, although they differ in the precise definitions of each. They are at one, however, in rejecting the notion that heaven is merely a perfected human society on earth, and also in rejecting the sentimental appeals on humanitarian grounds for the abolition of hell.

The relation of man to his God is conceived much the same, although the manifestations of that relationship differ. The sacramental life of the Anglo-Catholic, for example, can be roughly equated with the conversion, salvation, and sanctification experiences of the Evangelical. The emphasis of both is on personal religion as contrasted with the almost exclusively social emphasis of liberalism. Both admit, however, the social implications of their faith as corollaries to this main emphasis. On the whole Anglo-Catholics probably carry this to greater lengths than Evangelicals.

It is true that in their application as systems, in their traditional language, in their modes of worship, and in many of their theological concepts Anglo-Catholicism and Evangelical Conservatism are separated by a gulf so wide and so deep that resolution of their differences cannot now be envisioned. But it is also true that in that gulf between them there flows so strong a current of agreement on things that matter as to give them common shores. This latter fact provides the basis for the development of a higher degree of mutual understanding and respect than is at this time evidenced in their relationship.

Kenosis

Is this a God—

This tiny babe in cradle rude,

With bands of severed cloth entwined,

With oxen stalled?

These peasant folk of lowly mien,

These herdsmen, rough, unkempt,

This filthy straw, the stench, the grime—

Can this be God?

Is this a King—

This untaught Galilean

Doctrining his motley band?

What purpose the vile throng

Hailing a bibber of wine,

Fellow of sinners,

Transient prophet, wanting of wealth and home—

Can he be King?

Is this a Man—

This wretched form with visage marred,

Congealed in spittle and in blood,

Of garments ’reft?

Protracted joints and riven flesh The shape deform.

The frenzied mob a fiendish beast have surely killed—

Can it be a man?

From sacred lore

A lightning smites upon my soul,

As prophets call Thy Name

Above all names:

Immanuel, and

David’s Son, and

Paschal Lamb—

“My Saviour, and my God!”

W. RUSSELL OGDEN

A Parable of the Garden

Now for many years the ground brought forth good fruit. And a certain man cared for the ground and treated it with loving care. He watched the little plants break through the soil. He watered them and he fed them using the latest of methods. He loosened the soil. He watched for insects and worms and other pests ere they would destroy the plants growing in the garden. He rejoiced during the late spring and summer as the plants grew and became exceeding tall.

Never had he seen plants so tall and so vigorous. But alas the time of the harvest came and no fruit appeared. In its place on every branch only thistles grew.

This certain man thought carefully of his procedure. He had properly nourished these plants and watered them. He had loosened the soil. He had protected them, but surely in all these things something must have gone awry. And as he turned to his garden directive to seek further information he saw a package upon the shelf. And suddenly he cried with great distress, “Lo, though I have done all things, one thing have I not done. I neglected in my eagerness, to plant the seeds in the garden.”

And while the things which he did were good; because he left out the most important thing, all things were useless and the garden produced only weeds.

For many years the church had brought forth good fruit before the Lord God, producing Christians who stood humbly rejoicing in God’s great mercy made available through Jesus Christ and his Cross. And now a new generation of leaders was serving the church and they cared for many people within the church. They nourished them with education and seminars, and watered them with a Sunday coffee hour. They used the latest methods including the development of togetherness, oneness, and a sense of community. They loosened reserve by stationing “duty welcomers” at every exit on Sunday morning. They watched for the insects and worms and other pests of judgment, negativism, and individuality ere the flock would learn to think for itself or develop a guilt complex and thereby be destroyed. The leaders rejoiced as the people grew in good deeds and fellowship.

Never had they seen such active stimulated people. But alas came the harvest sinners still were lost.

The leaders of the church carefully reviewed their program. Surely they had fed the people. They had used the right techniques but surely in all these things something must have gone awry. As they turned to their denominational directives they saw a package on the shelf, “The Holy Bible.” And the leaders cried out in great distress, “Alas, though we have done all things, one thing we have not done. We neglected to preach Christ as Saviour and Lord.”

And while the things which they did were good, because they had left out the important thing, all things were useless.

Instability of Liberal Social Ethics

Frank Farrell

First in a Series: Peace and War

“For one brief day—Wednesday, January 27—Jesus Christ stood at the door of the United States senate and knocked.”

Thus spoke The Christian Century in 1926 (Feb. 18, p. 216), in connection with a cause then of crucial importance to its editors—the outlawry of war. But in so speaking, the Century was indulging in a practice common to exponents of liberal social ethics, and later to be rigorously condemned by neo-orthodox, no less than by conservative theologians, that of equating or confusing societal developments with the kingdom of God.

To undertake a study of liberal social ethics is to sense the vital nature of the subject for Protestant modernism in view of its tendency to elevate the ethical and minimize the doctrinal or theological.

And to undertake a study of twentieth-century American Protestant liberal ethics requires automatic tribute to the Century, since one almost inevitably turns to its pages for the one foremost continuing commentary on the social developments from this perspective. Historian Donald B. Meyer has named the Century “the greatest of all social gospel organs” (The Protestant Search for Political Realism, 1919–1941 [University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1960], p. 44). Its editor for some 40 years, Charles Clayton Morrison (who “refounded” the Century in 1908, that name having been adopted at the turn of the century by The Christian Oracle which was established in 1884), himself asserted: “… I think it will go without saying that The Christian Century did afford a unique leadership for this new movement of Christian faith” (Oct. 5, 1938, p. 1187). Indeed, Meyer attests that “by the mid-1920s it ranked as the leading voice of liberal Protestantism” (op. cit., p. 53).

To reflect the labyrinthine movement of liberal social ethics by recapitulating various causes for which the Century has stood at sundry times through the years is not to forget the diverse and often contradictory ethical viewpoints embraced within the modernist movement, for these tensions frequently came to light in Century editorials. And if various Century positions and viewpoints down through the years have contradicted one another (quite apart from changes in editorial personnel), one must recall the Century’s lack of any fixed epistemological framework based on “what the Bible says.” At the same time, it must be noted that the Century has never found an alternative durably satisfying to itself. But there seemed to be relatively little time devoted to the search, for theology was far from being the Century’s main preoccupation. It was often minimal. Indeed, at one time Morrison confessed repeated temptations to remove the Century from the religious field of journalism to the secular (op. cit., p. 1186). It is true, of course, that the Century became a formidable modernist weapon in the fight against fundamentalism, later to veer haltingly back toward the right with the expanding influence of neo-orthodoxy in ecumenical circles. But apart from ecumenism, the great issues repeatedly championed by the Century were in the social arena, rather than the theological, and these included as major relevant concerns anticapitalism, prohibition, and the abrogation of war (cf. Meyer, loc. cit).

In current perspective, Meyer’s description is a fateful one: “… for The Christian Century, the social gospel was in itself close to being the heart of the total evangel.” He adds: “Discussions of theology appeared now and then, but the Century’s specialty was not critical and systematic. Rather it was unremitting attention to Protestantism’s place in the national culture, and in fact to Protestantism as culture and as the national culture” (ibid.). By mid-century, The Christian Century, somewhat embarrassed with the optimistic connotations of its name (Jan. 4, 1950, p. 3), would note that the bright utopian promise of the social gospel had been largely stripped away “in the light of the revelations of man’s capacity for evil,” these revelations not being drawn from the Scriptures—where they were all the time—but rather from the 40 years following 1910 (Dec. 27, 1950, p. 1545). In 1937 an address of Morrison’s printed as an editorial reflected not only a society-oriented definition of the Church but also a keen awareness of the formidable challenge yet confronting the social gospel by secular society: “His [God’s] purpose in giving us the church, we can now see after the event, was to save society from the selfish egoism and demonic peril which inhere in both family and state and in every secular form of human organization” (May 12, p. 606). Indeed, in those years between the World Wars, Morrison’s personal energies centered most fully on the great international challenge presented by the issue of war and peace (see Meyer, loc. cit.). On this torturous problem, liberal social ethics has not spoken consistently, and this uncertainty through the years is vividly reflected in the pages of the Century.

The Peace That Never Came

In the optimistic era preceding World War I, even troubling to formulate a doctrine on war and peace, such as pacifism, seemed superfluous. In 1909 the Century observed, “Our thoughtful men all thank God that war is passing away” (Feb. 27, p. 3). In 1911 it was pointing to signs of the “near approach” of the “inevitable day” of “universal peace.” “The growth in the past 50 years has been immense. The next five years may bring a development which no one now can anticipate” (Apr. 6, p. 2). Ill-starred prophecy! Within three and a half years the world was at war.

The Century reaction to this turn of events: “War is sin” (a doctrine which would be changed for World War II); “War is butchery, war is murder, war is hell.” God was not to be thought of as being on either side—such a tribal God “is Hebraic and pagan, not Christian” (Sept. 10, 1914, p. 5).

But liberal optimism was not to be stopped in its tracks by world war. The same editorial continued: “It may fall out that this war is the cure of war” (ibid.). By the following month, optimism had grown. “Tomorrow, when this war is over, will be the greatest day for religion since the Christian era began.” Already seen were “evidences of the beginning of a vast spiritual reconstruction” (Oct. 29, 1914, p. 5).

Also seen were theological and ecumenical implications. “A new religion” was in prospect. Much that was “technically orthodox” would “fall away in the presence of the surging call of humanity for life, the life of God. The divisions amongst Christians will seem based on petty and contemptible differences.” A new incarnation was looked for: “… we may not doubt that the spirit of the creative and redeeming God is brooding over the chaos of the world and that He will bring to birth some child upon whose shoulders the social order of the future shall rest. Perhaps Christ will be born again!” (ibid.).

Pacifism And Tardy Reversal

On the question of possible American intervention, the Century counseled: “The world needs our neutrality far more than either side needs our partisanship.… Let America keep out of it” (Sept. 17, 1914, p. 13). This particular war was to be deplored. “Our hearts revolt at it because there is no worthwhile moral issue at stake. It is a mad war, an irrational war, a hysterical and frenzied slaughter.” It “is unspeakably evil and only evil.” It was seen turning back those movements which had been “making for a new humanity, a new social order” (Oct. 8, 1914, p. 5).

A pacifist stand seemed indicated when the Century said: “… the pacifist sentiment in America is unorganized.… It needs a religious organ … for it is essentially a religious sentiment. It is not too late for the Disciples of Christ to consecrate themselves to this providentially arranged opportunity” (Dec. 2, 1915, p. 3). (The Century originated as a Disciples publication.) But in answer to criticism, it replied, “The Christian Century does not accept the Tolstoyan doctrine of non-resistance” (Dec. 30, 1915, p. 7).

When the United States finally entered the war, the Century supported the move, promptly dropping any pacifist tendencies—with a vengeance: “We have deliberated while those who have become our allies have been fighting our battles.… Though war is a mighty evil, there are some evils even worse.” Punishment of the disturber of the peace was in view: “the democracies of the world” are “ranged in alliance against the outstanding exponent of militarism” (Apr. 12, 1917, p. 5). “The church will fail of its duty in these trying days if it does not coöperate with the state in the task of freeing our world from despotism” (May 10, 1917, p. 6). “The church alone can overcome the enemies of our country.” “… We do not need to apologize for war as a method of settling international disputes” (Aug. 9, 1917, p. 5). “We are having to treat Germany as a sinning entity” (Dec. 17, 1917, p. 7). “Odious as a holy war may seem to our minds, there is one thing worse, and that is an unholy war.” “Some would tell us that the mind of Christ demands our laying down our arms at the feet of a pagan force.… It seems to us that the religious spirit leads us to combine true patriotism and true religion in an effort to conquer the spiritual enemies of the race” (Aug. 9, 1917, p. 5). “Mere pacifism as a policy is impotent and stupid. Non-resistance in the abstract is impotent and stupid.… But Jesus, the constructive Pacifist and active Non-resistor, releases vast spiritual energies in the souls of men.… The still recalcitrant pacifists … disregard the concrete situation.…” “What is right in a given situation depends partly on the situation” (Dec. 13, 1917, pp. 6 f.). “We now believe that the war is being waged in behalf of the right of nations to live under democracy unmolested by strong militaristic nations” (Sept. 27, 1917, p. 5). There was a social duty involved in answering the draft to serve in an “unselfish war” (Dec. 27, 1917, p. 6).

Of course, oversimplification in the fervor of patriotic war effort was nothing new. But within a brief period the Century had embraced the “just war” theory in place of its earlier assessment of “mad war” and “frenzied slaughter.”

Cheering Government Regulation

Alongside this theory, emphasis was laid upon the “compensations of war”—“the social, economic and political benefits” (Nov. 1, 1917, p. 5). The wealth was being redistributed (ibid.); U. S. “pagan monopolists” were being curbed. “The peace which prevailed before this war was just as barbarous and unchristian as the war itself”: “The preventable industrial accidents, the ruthless slaughter of infants who died for lack of ice and milk, the exploitation of women …” (Sept. 6, 1917, p. 5). The inevitable wartime socialist drift was cheered on: “The principle of government interference in the domestic and industrial economies of the people was never carried so far or so systematically as now, and it is probable that the use of the principle for social well-being will be extended rather than restricted after the war” (Dec. 27, 1917, p. 7). “Never has … [the social] gospel been able to find men’s minds so filled with social things as it finds them now …” (Sept. 12, 1918, p. 8).

Post-War Crusade Against War

After such excesses of optimism, disillusion had to set in. Originally favoring a tough peace, the Century by late 1919 denounced the Treaty of Versailles terms as “punitive, vindictive, terrorizing. They look to the impossible end of permanently maiming Germany. They are not redemptive, and they are therefore not Christian” (Sept. 18, p. 6). By 1922 the Century was seriously questioning its wartime counsel. “… It is increasingly clear that war is a great and terrible wrong … that even its by-products, over which wartime orators talked so eloquently, are either illusory or vicious.… We are not quite sure that the great objectives were gained.” There was admission that the pacifists may have been right, and regret was expressed concerning one-sided criticism of Germany. Christ’s teachings, it was affirmed, had not been taken seriously. “… War is a crime.” “… We know that all the defenses we have made for ourselves as apologists for war are nothing worth. The cultivation of the war spirit was the definite and profitable business of a whole company of diplomatists, politicians, profiteers and militarists.…” Yet there was heart for some injudicious optimism: “The bravery and picturesqueness of military affairs have departed never to return.” Christian men could never again justify war or “count it a duty to go to war in any cause” (May 4, pp. 549 f.).

The old liberal optimism, having repented of its misplaced confidence in war, hovered for a time over Geneva. “The League of Nations idea is the extension to international relationships of the idea of the Kingdom of God as a world order of good will. From the Christian point of view it is hard to see how anyone can oppose it” (Sept. 25, 1919, p. 7). But the Century, in contrast to the overwhelming weight of U. S. Protestant opinion, did come to oppose the League—because of its power to apply sanctions (Jan. 28, 1926, pp. 104–106; cf. Robert Moats Miller, American Protestantism and Social Issues, 1919–1939 [The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 1958], pp. 319–324). The Century saw “two plans of world organization,” the League and the outlawry of war (Apr. 9, 1925, p. 466). Its sympathies lay with the latter. “In the judgment of those who advocate an organization of the world on the basis of the outlawry of war, it was a sound instinct that kept the United States from joining the league of nations [sic].” “We will not undertake commitments that involve us in advance in Europe’s military controversies.… The American national morality is sound. Its idealism has suffered severe shock and strain. It trusted once in war to end war, but it will never be enticed into such moral folly again” (Mar. 19, 1925, p. 371).

Century editor Morrison would become one of the principal advocates of the outlawry of war movement in the United States. Early in 1924 the Century urged the churches to outlaw war without waiting upon the state, asked them to withdraw “spiritual sanction” from war (Jan. 31, pp. 134 f.).

At one point the Century favored entering the Permanent Court for International Justice (July 16, 1925, pp. 914 f.), but when the Court made no provision for outlawry of war, the Century spoke of its “worthlessness as an instrument of world peace” (Jan. 14, 1926, p. 40) and sharply criticized the Federal Council of Churches for “artificially” creating “passionate churchly interest” in U. S. adherence to the Court (Jan. 7, 1926, p. 9). The Century did not consider its stands on the League and World Court as isolationist, but rather as internationalist. Outlawry of war embodied the true internationalism. Idaho’s Senator William E. Borah fought U. S. participation in League and Court but led the outlawry forces in the Senate. The Century described him as “the most internationally-minded statesman in Washington,” representing “the most truly Christian internationalism” to be found in Congress (Jan. 7, 1926, p. 15). The Century’s internationalism spoke with an optimistic American accent: “With hands thus clean of any spoil and with motives unsuspected of selfish ambition, America is foreordained to leadership in world-embracing crusade to abolish war” (Dec. 11, 1924, p. 1590). The Century did turn from Borah to the extent of supporting U. S. adherence to the Court, though there would later be misgivings (Feb. 4, 1926, pp. 136 f.; Jan. 31, 1940, p. 136).

Banishing War On Paper

In 1928 the Century hailed as “the most important event in modem history” the U. S. offer to join with France in preparing a treaty for the renunciation of war to be presented to all the nations for universal adoption. “… The fact that America has defined the issue between peace and war in simple, unambiguous terms and has chosen peace, spells the doom of war. Its doom may be imminent, or it may be deferred for a generation, but it is inexorable.… If Christ were standing among us it would be like him to say, I see Satan falling as lightning from heaven!” (Jan. 19, 1928 p. 70).

Morrison had written a book on The Outlawry of War which was being extensively advertised in Century pages. And when on August 27, 1928, the Pact of Paris, also called the Kellogg-Briand Pact, was signed by the United States and 14 other nations, he exulted in Paris: “Today international war was banished from civilization” (italics his). He also warned: “The moral chaos that would ensue upon a major violation of this treaty would be worse than the devastation of war itself” (Sept. 6, 1928, p. 1070).

The U. S. Senate ratified the treaty on January 15, 1929, and the Century predicted: “… we can, perhaps within a generation, recreate the psychology of the world so that the age-old presupposition of war as inevitable and glorious shall disappear from men’s thoughts and the presupposition of peace shall be firmly established in its place …” (Jan. 24, p. 99).

The task now was to create “a patriotic conscience which will make sure that the stars and stripes shall never be dishonored by being carried to a battlefield again” (Mar. 28, 1929, p. 415). “Under the new law of the land, the pacifist is the patriot.… The militarist … is the seditious person” (Sept. 2, 1931, p. 1086). But the treaty even before its adoption had been interpreted as to permit defensive wars, and the U. S. Senate so understood it, though no formal reservations were attached. Eventually the treaty was approved by almost all the nations, though in some cases with important reservations.

During this period realist Reinhold Niebuhr, who was very skeptical about outlawry of war, had some pertinent things to say even in the pages of the Century about liberal optimism: “I would say that the Barthian theologians are very sensitive to the iniquities of the present social system and that in this critical attitude they are measurably superior to the liberal theologians who frequently indulge the illusion that the League of Nations, or the latest bank merger, or the last humanitarian campaign are proofs of the immanent realization of the new heaven and the new earth” (July 15, 1931, p. 924).

The Century charged ex-President Coolidge with cynicism when he asserted the need for an adequate army and navy to maintain peace (Apr. 11, 1929, p. 477). The September 2, 1931, issue gave assurances concerning the Kellogg Pact: “… the pact is young.… But it will grow—it will grow!” (p. 1086).

That very month Japan struck at Manchuria. By December the Century charged, in face of Japanese denial, that Japan had broken her pledge as signatory to the Kellogg Pact: “Japan has dishonored her pledge, broken international law, and thus branded herself as a criminal among the nations.” It was expected that if the League failed to solve the Manchuria crisis, the U. S. or another power would “call the powers into conference under the Kellogg pact.” “Mr. Hoover and Mr. Stimson can be counted on to see that the most solemn treaty ever signed by the nations shall not become a scrap of paper” (Dec. 2, pp. 1510 f.).

Here was unintended prophecy, for “a scrap of paper” was what the Pact was fast becoming. Historians have pointed out that a fundamental weakness of the Pact was that it provided no special machinery to enforce its provisions, but rather relied upon the machinery already established by the League. Secretary of State Frank Kellogg himself had declared that “the only enforcement behind the pact is the public opinion of the people.”

But the Century saw sanctions, or the use of force, as the weakness of the League, even while noting that for Wilson this was its heart (Dec. 23, 1931, p. 1617). In contrast, the journal called for “sanctions of peace” and the testing of their effectiveness. Japan should be charged before the World Court with violation of the Pact and recognition withheld from any attempt to annex Manchuria (Jan. 13, 1932, pp. 50 f.).

The League was castigated for hesitancy in rendering a verdict against Japan in face of Japan’s threat to withdraw from the League. In view of the Century’s later stand in favor of “universalizing” United Nations membership (see Aug. 4, 1954, p. 919), the earlier argument is particularly interesting: “Of course any withdrawal by Japan from the league would, ostensibly, weaken the importance of that organization. But if the league is to be kept outwardly imposing while inwardly it compounds with crime, its days as a servant of genuine international justice and good faith are numbered” (Jan. 18, 1933, p. 77). When the League did rule against Japan and Japan walked out, the Century verdict was: the League “saved its soul” and “its life” (Mar. 8, p. 321).

An editorial noting the fifth anniversary of the Kellogg Pact was titled, “Peace, Where There Is No Peace.” The “twin gods of capitalism and absolute national sovereignty” perhaps stood in the way (Aug. 23, 1933, p. 1055). In 1934 an editorial titled “Detach America from the Next World War!” pointed to the ineffectuality of covenants, pacts, and conferences due to lack of the necessary degree of “stability, responsibility and honor on the part of the various nations” (Mar. 28, p. 411). In 1935 the entire peace structure, including the Pact, was declared irrelevant and impotent. Britain had “disregarded” the Pact, Secretary of State Cordell Hull had “betrayed” it. Yet if there was any hope left for the peace system, it would have to be found in the Pact rather than the League, which was “vitiatedby the provision for the military enforcement of peace” (Sept. 11, pp. 1135 ff.).

It was a poignant hope. In point of fact, the Kellogg Pact had no observable deterrent effect upon the aggressions in Manchuria and later in China proper, nor upon Mussolini’s invasion of Ethiopia, nor upon German-Italian intervention in Spain, nor on the other aggressions which at last culminated in World War II.

The liberal dream, its high confidence placed in the passage of a law, had drifted from the biblical doctrines of man and sin—and salvation as well. But it could not escape them. On these enduring realities, the dream shattered.

- More from Frank Farrell

An Anchor for the Lonely Crowd

Moses was a man without a country. He led Israel toward Canaan, but himself died east of the border. He was also a man without a home, an adopted waif brought up in the palace of Egypt. Yet he was no lonely, lost twentieth-century man, his destiny and origin unknown. Unlike many of our contemporaries, he did not regard the universe as unfriendly, hostile to those values for which a man lives. Toward life he developed no Promethean defiance, that inverted despair currently called “the courage to be.” Without home, without country, he lived nonetheless without despair.

It was not because his life was an unbroken pleasantry that he escaped the withering despair of loneliness and futility. He was saved from these because he knew God was his creator, his friend and home. He also knew that when his pilgrimage was ended he would by the mercy of God turn again home. God was his home. “Thou art our dwelling place.… Before the mountains were brought forth or ever thou hadst formed the world.…” In later echo, Our hearts are restless O God, until they rest in thee.

Creation means that God is the true home of man’s spirit. When man loses this knowledge, he is a lost man, unable to take bearings to determine where he is, or where he should go.

With the loss of this knowledge, man also loses the knowledge of self. Not knowing of whom he is the son, he knows not who he is. Like Socrates, he thinks himself now divine, now demonic. Estranged from his father, he is stranger to himself.

That God is creator means also that beyond the universe is a reality rightly called Father; that behind all the loneliness of lost man is a transcendent, seeking love. By creating the world, God reveals that he is fatherly, an out-going, self-giving God, who willed that there be another alongside him, with whom he wills to share his divine existence and life, his divine joy and beatitude. Knowing that he was created to participate in the life of God, man regards existence as an expression of the mercy of God. Existence is no longer a curse, the universe unfriendly. The child knowing his origin declares, “This is my Father’s world,” and sings, “It is good to be here, it is great to be alive, and the best is yet to be!”

Until recently, Western man believed that God was his Creator. Americans still do when speaking of their inalienable rights. But matters have changed. Ever since Western man accepted the evolutionistic contention that man has no father save a biological process, or accepted the contention of existentialism that man’s only father is a Nothingness which, quite without any ascertainable reason, hurled him into existence, the mood of Western man has changed. He has become a stranger to himself, nameless (as Kafka’s Mr. K.), without relatives. He has lost God as Father, the universe as something friendly, life as meaningful. Gone is the sense of well-being; gone the conviction that life is good. The “just being here” no longer calls for gratitude, but for courage. The search for “togetherness” is the anguished cry of the lonely crowd. Modern man has become a spiritual orphan. No longer able to obtain meaning and purpose by reference to a transcendent father, he looks for it within himself, but is horrified by what he sees. Aided by depth psychology, he discovers that he is surrounded by an irrational menace, for in the abyss of his own mind he sees the same dark menace that threatens him in the outside universe. Filled with terror, he knows not that his Freudian desire to flee and return to the womb is his nostalgia for God, the homesickness of his spirit for its origin.

Many have believed in the divine origin of man and his world, while rejecting the Christian faith. If this doctrine is not central, nonetheless it is basic to the Christian faith, and stands therefore first in the Apostles’ Creed. It is so basic that neither the Cross nor the Resurrection have meaning without it, for the Cross means the end of the old creation, and the Resurrection means the regeneration of all things, the recreation of the old into a new heaven and a new earth.

Indeed the doctrine of creation is so basic as to be the indispensable foundation for any tolerable, viable human existence. The proof of this is being spelled out in the progressive disintegration of the spirit and life of modern, homeless man. When the truth of this is clearly seen, the Church will speak about God the Father, Almighty, maker of heaven and earth with a new relevance to today’s growing crowd of lonely men, to its lost and nameless, to its homeless and hopeless men.

For the Prodigal Son “came to himself” only when he remembered his father.

Review of Current Religious Thought: December 22, 1961

G. W. Berkouwer

One of the crucial problems that confronts the Church today and always is the relationship between theology and Church. Theology has always had a profound influence upon the Church. From the lecturn of the academy by way of the pulpit of the Church, all sorts of theological ideas have shaped the life of congregations. Religious liberalism arose first in theology and then by way of the preachers entered the life stream of the family of God. I recall the case of a Dutch professor who became convinced that the universe was shut up in a cause-effect system of natural law which was unbreakable. In such a world, he insisted, miracles were impossible. Hence, he told his students that, if they were to be honest men, they would frankly tell the congregations they served that Jesus Christ did not arise from the dead. Theology and Church.…

It is understandable, then, that we encounter the notion here and there that theology in the scientific sense can only be a hindrance to the faith of the Church. Theology is a subtle stumbling block, it is said, to the simple believer. Besides, theology always threatens to rule over the Church. Germany, as we all know, is the scene of much discussion about the demythologizing program spurred by Rudolph Bultmann. The New Testament, claims Bultmann, is dominated by a mythical view of the world in which the stories of the incarnation, the ascension, the resurrection, and the return of Jesus Christ are at home. But even as we all reject the mythical world view of the Bible, we must reject these stories that go with it. Who cannot see that this discussion is far more than an academic game. The heart of God’s Church is involved here.

Once again, then, is not scientific theology a danger which the Church would do well to avoid?

If we concluded that the Church would be well served to set itself apart from theology we would be making a great error. There is an undeniable and perhaps unavoidable relationship between the Church and scientific theological work. Consider, for, example, the fact that we have the Bible available to all only because scientific theologians have been busy translating it from original languages. In the light of only this single instance, the Church has reason to thank God for theology.

But, one may ask, does not theology make the matters of faith needlessly difficult and complicated? Is not the heavy theological discussion of our day in conflict with the words of Jesus: “I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes” (Matt. 11:25)? The New English Bible has it: “for hiding these things from the learned and wise and revealing them to the simple.”

Well, is theology a threat to the simplicity of faith? Is it the aim of theology to discover a deeper knowledge than simple faith? We must be careful at this point, for if this is so, theology runs the risk of pretension and pride. It would then apparently know more than the simple faith and stand closer to the Kingdom than faith stands. Theologians would be the elite, and simple Christians would be second-class citizens of the Kingdom. Happily this notion of theology’s task is a false one.

Theology’s task is not to reason out the mysteries of faith. True, there have been theologians who have gone this way and have created a kind of special gnostic elite for their kind who then stood a rung above the mass of simple believers. But there is another path for theology. It is the path of service. Theology does not stand above simple faith; it only seeks seriously to study the Word of God in order to serve the congregation.

In service lies the only right relationship for theology to sustain the Church. Theology was never meant to rule the mind of the Church. It was always meant to serve it. For my way of thinking, theology never seeks a knowledge of the things of faith that transcends the faith of the common people. Theology never seeks to unravel mysteries. The Gospel does not become a matter of science for the theologians while it remains a matter of simple belief for others.

There are scholars who devote their entire lives to the Scriptures only to criticize them. The scientific knowledge of such scholars has, of course, nothing to do with simple faith. But genuine Christian theology is always occupied with the task of bringing the treasures of the message of God’s Word to light. One need only look casually at the Great Bible Word Book edited by G. Kittel to see that such a work is the fruit only of enormous theological study. Of this scientific activity, great good has come. For the work here mentioned has to do with the meaning of the words of the New Testament, and from it the message of the Bible can be made cleaerer. This can only serve the Church.

He who supposes that study is not essential will fall sooner or later—and sooner than he realizes—into mere repetition. And when the preacher merely repeats, he has stopped getting at the depths of the Word in his preaching. A great and pious theologian once said: the preacher who does not study is not converted. What he meant was that the preacher has got to keep listening to the Word and one listens well only through persistent and intensive study.

The need for theological study stems from the nature of the Word of God. The Word comes indeed as the Vox Dei, but it comes only through the Vox humana. Hence, it beckons the preacher and the theologian to constant study so that these words which came as the Word in human languages now very ancient can become meaningful and fresh in the present. Thus, we must be critical of every theology which does not really listen humbly to the Scriptures and which sets itself a step higher than the people in the pew. But we ought to be thankful for every theology that has not stopped listening and that seeks, through its listening, to serve the Church.

This theology will have great respect for the mysteries of the faith. Just as thousands of humble men have labored in faith so that the words of the Bible could be translated into the languages of the world, so the theologians of the Church will seek in their way to serve. Theology stands beside the Church to serve it by keeping the true light shining and deflecting the false shadows that have fallen and that shall fall over the Church in the form of faith-crippling heresies.

The Church must prize theology and not reject it. But theology must deserve its place of humble service by keeping its relations with the Church correct. Both theology and Church must listen to the Word and pray to the Lord as theology serves the Church and the Church serves the world.

- More from G. W. Berkouwer

Give Today

25: The Work of the Holy Spirit

The Simple Gospel

THE SIMPLE GOSPEL

Eutychus and His Kin: January 5, 1962

Desk Calendar

Ministers And Mergers

Interview With Dr. Malik

Evangelical And Council

Caught The Wrong Stage

The Context

Optimism Unwarranted

More Questions on Barth’s Views

Dr. Clark’s questions:

Dr. Klooster’s Questions:

Dr. Van Til’s Questions:

Barth’s Critique of Modernism

The Errors Of Modernism

Man-Centered Religion

New Stress On Revelation

The Personal God

Evangelicals and Anglo-Catholics

Some Common Ground

Fact And Myth

More Common Shores

A Parable of the Garden

Instability of Liberal Social Ethics

The Peace That Never Came

Pacifism And Tardy Reversal

Cheering Government Regulation

Post-War Crusade Against War

Banishing War On Paper

An Anchor for the Lonely Crowd

Review of Current Religious Thought: December 22, 1961

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THE SIMPLE GOSPEL

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Desk Calendar

Ministers And Mergers

Interview With Dr. Malik

Evangelical And Council

Caught The Wrong Stage

The Context

Optimism Unwarranted

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Dr. Clark’s questions:

Dr. Klooster’s Questions:

Dr. Van Til’s Questions:

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The Errors Of Modernism

Man-Centered Religion

New Stress On Revelation

The Personal God

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Some Common Ground

Fact And Myth

More Common Shores

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The Peace That Never Came

Pacifism And Tardy Reversal

Cheering Government Regulation

Post-War Crusade Against War

Banishing War On Paper

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