On The Spiritual Value of Historic Christian Texts

By Ryan Patrick Hoselton

Until recently, I doubted the merit of meditating on historic Christian writings. I can easily absorb these texts out of intellectual interest, but when it comes to growing spiritually, I reach for the Bible or contemporary devotional writings. However, my attitude has changed after being challenged to spend a month meditating daily on a collection of historic Christian texts. Here are three of my thoughts on why this exercise is enormously valuable to Christians today.

First, the Holy Spirit’s work in the lives of believers is atemporal. He produces spiritual fruits and gifting in every Christian no matter what era he or she inhabits. Thus, to take for granted that Christians today can offer superior resources for spiritual growth and that texts from the past are outdated and irrelevant is to undermine the Spirit’s work throughout history. This posture is also proud and self-righteous because it rests the criteria and source for vital spirituality in one’s culture rather than in the Spirit’s work.

Second, studying historic Christian texts can emend abuses in spirituality today. If a believer limited his or her devotional resources to a particular period, he or she will inevitably adopt the damaging principles and practices of that era. The reason why men like John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards, and Andrew Fuller offered such excellent and discerning spiritual insight is because they drew heavily from past writings to correct the errors of their day. Meditating on historic devotional texts also helps believers today to avoid imitating the mistakes of previous generations.

Third, meditating on historic Christian texts is beneficial as a companion to studying Scripture because the believer can observe how others have reflected on the Word of God and put it into practice. God designed the church to learn from each other—Paul exhorted the members to actively be “teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom” (Col. 3.16). Each individual believer, even though he or she may study and meditate on Scripture tirelessly day and night, needs the example and instruction of others. This cycle of mutual learning and growing should extend beyond one’s local and temporal church body to the church in other ages. Christians from the past have valuable lessons on how to interpret and apply Scripture in worship and action for believers today.

God has provided ample resources for the church to grow in holiness and love. Of course no text compares to the Scriptures to “train yourself for godliness” and correct false thinking and practices (1 Tim. 4.7). But God also uses the example of godly men and women of the past to encourage Christians today, and we would greatly benefit to imitate them as they imitated Christ.

__________________

Ryan Patrick Hoselton is pursuing a ThM at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He lives in Louisville, KY with his wife Jaclyn, and they are expecting their first child in August.

Why read an obscure Baptist pastor from the seventeenth century—Abraham Cheare?

By Michael A.G. Haykin

The history of the Baptists’ reception of their own past is a fascinating one in its own right. Most of the Baptist works of the seventeenth century were never reprinted and consequently a significant amount of their thought was obscure to their eighteenth-century heirs. To be sure, there was a certain amount of reflection on the past by eighteenth-century authors like Thomas Crosby (1683–c.1751) and Joseph Ivimey (1773–1834), but it was the Victorian Baptists who really began to delve into Baptist history and that for a variety of reasons: the Victorians in general were fascinated by the past; in England this exploration of Baptist history was linked to the realization of the strength of the Nonconformist cause and became a vehicle to express Baptist pride; while, in America it was used by many to prove (or disprove) the theology of Landmarkism. Then came the twentieth century, which was probably the worst of all centuries for remembering the past. After World War I the ambience in the west was increasingly one in which the past was seen as old lumber to be discarded to make way for new perspectives, in the very same way that Victorian Gothic buildings were being leveled to make way for Art Deco and postmodernist structures. Even in the renaissance of interest in the Puritans that has been taking place in the past fifty years, both in regard to academic scholarship and to popular literature, it seems that the Baptists have been forgotten. Nearly all of the Puritan figures who are being studied or read are either Presbyterians or Congregationalists. With the exception of the celebrated John Bunyan (1628–1688) and to a lesser degree, Hanserd Knollys (1599–1691), William Kiffin (1616–1701) and Benjamin Keach (1640–1704), the Baptists of the seventeenth century have been largely forgotten. Thankfully this is changing, however, as Baptist scholars are rediscovering their forebears. And among these forebears is the subject of this post, Abraham Cheare (1626–1668).

Why should an early twenty-first-century Christian take the time to learn about Abraham Cheare and read his writings? Well, first of all, suffering for religious beliefs, as he did for eight years till it killed him, is not foreign to the modern world. Around the world, there are numerous contexts where religious toleration is all but non-existent and men and woman have to count the cost if they wish to be public about their convictions. And increasingly in the west an intolerant cultural elite are targeting the Church and seeking to muzzle Christian witness. Here then, Cheare can help us enormously, for Cheare was a Puritan and after 1660, when the Anglican state church sought to extirpate Puritanism, Cheare and many others knew first-hand what it was to suffer for Christ’s sake. His example and writings in this regard are tremendously helpful for Christians undergoing the same today.

Then, Cheare, above all things, sought to be guided by the Scriptures, not simply when it came to church polity but in all of his life. His life and writings exemplify what “being biblical” looks like. In this regard, then, he is a quintessential Puritan, for Puritanism was above all things a movement that sought to be Word-centered. Modern-day Christians would not cross every ‘t’ and dot every ‘i’ the way Cheare does; but his passion to be found living in accord with the Scriptures is certainly worthy of imitation.

And simply reading the past for its own sake is important, for there we see God at work. To quote Richard Baxter, the Puritan contemporary of Cheare: “[T]he writing of church-history is the duty of all ages, because God’s works are to be known, as well as his Word… He that knoweth not what state the church and world is in, and hath been in, in former ages, and what God hath been doing in the world, and how error and sin have been resisting him, and with what success, doth want much to the completing of his knowledge.”[1]

---

[1] The Life of Faith in The Practical Works of the Rev. Richard Baxter, ed. William Orme (London: James Duncan, 1830), 12:364.

___________________

Michael A.G. Haykin is the director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies. He also serves as Professor of Church History and Biblical Spirituality at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Dr. Haykin and his wife Alison have two grown children, Victoria and Nigel.

Prayer: Common Ground for Origen of Alexandria and Fuller of Kettering

By Dustin W. Benge

Throughout church history men have written treatises on the subject of prayer using the Lord’s Prayer (Matt 6:9–13) as a framework to shape their pastoral instruction. Perhaps no connection could be made between early church father, Origen of Alexandria (184/185–253/254) and Andrew Fuller (1754–1815), except they both gave insightful expositions on the Lord’s Prayer.

Origen’s treatise on prayer (De Oratione) reads more as a practical pastoral handbook than a major theological treatise. Origen gave a beautiful interpretation of the opening address of the Lord’s Prayer, “Our Father, who art in heaven.” Origen believed a Christian could not proceed with the following petitions and requests contained within the Lord’s Prayer until this opening phrase is rightly understood. Origen pointed out that the Old Testament does not know the name “Father” as an alternative for God, in the Christian sense of a steady and changeless adoption.^[1] Only those who have received the spirit of adoption can recite the prayer rightly. Therefore, the entire life of a believer should consist in lifting up prayers that contain, “Our Father who art in heaven,” because the conduct of every believer should be heavenly, not worldly. Origen explained:

Let us not suppose that the Scriptures teach us to say “Our Father” at any appointed time of prayer. Rather, if we understand the earlier discussion of praying “constantly” (1 Thess 5:17), let our whole life be a constant prayer in which we say “Our Father in heaven” and let us keep our commonwealth (Phil 3:20) not in any way on earth, but in every way in heaven, the throne of God, because the kingdom of God is established in all those who bear the image of Man from heaven (1 Cor 15:49) and have thus become heavenly.^[2]

Like Origen, Fuller began his exegesis of the Lord’s Prayer by establishing that prayer must be dependent upon the character of the one to whom we are allowed to draw near, namely, “Our Father.” The recognition of God as “Our Father” implies that sinners have become “adopted alien[s] put among the children.”^[3] Those adopted into God’s family can therefore rightly approach God as their Father but it must, as Fuller clarifies, be through a Mediator. Fully consistent with the Messianic age, Christ set himself within the context of the prayer as the One through which the Christian must come if he or she is to approach God as “Father.” Fuller states, “The encouragement contained in this tender appellation is inexpressible. The love, the care, the pity, which it comprehends, and the filial confidence which it inspires, must, if we are not wanting to ourselves, render prayer as a most blessed exercise.”^[4]

Origen and Fuller arrive at the same conclusion. They both see the phrase, “Our Father,” as the affirmation within the Lord’s Prayer that anchors the proceeding requests and brings great confidence within the one praying. Understanding God as “our Father” is the gift that causes the joy of prayer to be realized.

---

                ^[1] On Prayer (De Oratione) (Coptic Orthodox Church Network).

                ^[2] Origen, “On Prayer,” 125.

                ^[3] The Complete Works of Andrew Fuller, 1:578.

                ^[4] The Complete Works of Andrew Fuller, 1:578.

________________________

Dustin W. Benge (Ph.D. Candidate, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) serves as Associate Pastor and Pastor for Family Ministries at Christ Fellowship Baptist Church in Mobile, AL. Dustin is a junior fellow of the Andrew Fuller Center and lives with his wife, Molli, in Mobile.

A Mirror for the Soul

By Dustin W. Benge

The revival of interest in Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) in recent years has brought his Resolutions to a new generation of readers. The Edwards Resolutions have been printed on tee-shirts, been the subject of ministry conferences, and have been read by many preachers desiring somehow to emulate the life and ministry of their author. However, Edwards was not the only preacher of the 18th century to have a list of maxims against which he regularly measured his life and heart. In fact, such lists for personal self-examination were common practice among ministers and other Christians.

Like Edwards, fellow 18th century revivalist and preacher, George Whitefield (1714–1750) also composed a list of criteria, which he used each night as a basis of judging himself on his actions during the day. Whitefield’s smaller list^[1] (to be compared with the 70 Resolutions of Edwards) seems to be much more manageable for the contemporary Christian to use as a mirror into their own soul.

The list is,

Have I,

1. Been fervent in private prayer?
2. Used stated hours of prayer?
3. Used prayer every hour?
4. After or before every deliberate conversation or action, considered how it might tend to God’s glory?
5. After any pleasure, immediately given thanks?
6. Planned business for the day?
7. Been simple and recollected in everything?
8. Been zealous in undertaking and active in doing what good I could?
9. Been meek, cheerful, affable in everything I said or did?
10. Been proud, vain, unchaste, or enviable of others?
11. Recollected in eating and drinking? Thankful? Temperate in sleep?
12. Taken time for giving thanks according to Law’s rules? (William Law)^[2]
13. Been diligent in studies?
14. Thought or spoken unkindly of anyone?
15. Confessed all sins?

---

^[1] Arnold Dallimore, George Whitefield: The Life and Times of the Great Evangelist of the 18th Century Revival, Vol. 1, (Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1995), 80.

^[2] To read the list of William Law, visit: http://img.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic_pdf.php?topic_id=12062&forum=34

________________________

Dustin W. Benge (Ph.D. Candidate, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) serves as Associate Pastor and Pastor for Family Ministries at Christ Fellowship Baptist Church in Mobile, AL. Dustin is a junior fellow of the Andrew Fuller Center and lives with his wife, Molli, in Mobile.

Learn Your Religion from the Bible

By Evan D. Burns

In a sermon entitled, “On an Intimate and Practical Acquaintance with the Word of God,” Andrew Fuller meditated deeply on the piety exemplified in Ezra 7:10—“Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.”  Fuller made four outstanding observations about Ezra’s character, which Fuller strongly commended for Christian imitation.  Here is what he gleaned so exquisitely from one verse:

1.  SEEK THE LAW, or will, of God
   1. Seek it.
   2. Seek it at the fountain-head.
   3. Seek the will of God in every part of the Bible.
   4. Seek it perseveringly.
2. PREPARE YOUR HEART to seek the law of the Lord
3. KEEP THE LAW.
   1. Dread nothing more than recommending that to your people to which you do not attend yourself.
   2. More is expected from you than from others.
   3. You will attend to practical preaching.
   4. Attend not only to such duties as fall under the eye of man, but walk with God—in your family, and in your closet.
4. TEACH in Israel the statutes and judgments of God.
   1. Let Christ and his apostles be your examples.
   2. Give every part of the truth its due proportion.
   3. Dare to teach unwelcome truths.
   4. Give Scriptural proof of what you teach.
   5. Consider yourself as standing engaged to teach all that hear you—rich and poor, young and old, godly and ungodly.
   6. Teach privately as well as publicly.[1]

One of the most perceptive and potent points Fuller argued from this verse was the preeminence of seeking the will of God in the Bible alone.  Under the first point, Fuller contended:

Seek it at the fountain-head.—You feel, I doubt not, a great esteem for many of your brethren now living, and admire the writings of some who are now no more; and you will read their productions with attention and pleasure. But whatever excellence your brethren possess, it is all borrowed; and it is mingled with error. Learn your religion from the Bible. Let that be your decisive rule. Adopt not a body of sentiments, or even a single sentiment, solely on the authority of any man—however great, however respected. Dare to think for yourself. Human compositions are fallible. But the Scriptures were written by men who wrote as they were inspired by the Holy Spirit. Human writings on religion resemble preaching—they are useful only so far as they illustrate the Scriptures, and induce us to search them for ourselves.^[2]

---

 [1]Andrew Gunton Fuller, The Complete Works of Andrew Fuller, Volume 1: Memoirs, Sermons, Etc., ed. Joseph Belcher (Harrisonburg, VA: Sprinkle Publications, 1988), 483-486.

^[2]The Complete Works, 1: 483.

____________________

Evan D. Burns (Ph.D. Candidate, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) is on faculty at Asia Biblical Theological Seminary, and he lives in Thailand with his wife and twin sons.  They are missionaries with Training Leaders International.

Treatment of the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit within Reformed Confessions: Poor or Pervasive?

By Dustin Bruce

The Puritans and broader Reformed orthodoxy have long been considered a movement intensely interested in the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. This concern for pneumatology, inherited from John Calvin, led Geoffrey Nuttall to declare, “the doctrine (of the Holy Spirit), with its manifold implications, received a more thorough and detailed consideration from the Puritans of seventeenth-century England than it has received at any other time in Christian history.”[1] Considering the significance placed on the person and work of the Spirit within Puritan and Reformed orthodox thought, it may surprise some that no chapter specifically on the Holy Spirit was included in major confessional statements, such as the Westminster Confession of Faith.

Yet, the lack of a chapter dedicated solely to the Holy Spirit does not reveal a lack of interest in the topic. Commenting specifically on the charge that the Westminster Confession of Faith lacked an emphasis on the Holy Spirit, B.B. Warfield stated, “The sole reason why it does not give a chapter to this subject, however, is because it prefers to give nine chapters to it…”[2] Though Warfield’s analysis rings true and much mention is made of the Holy Spirit and his work throughout Reformed orthodox confessions, the lack of a designated chapter does require greater analysis on the part of the reader if one wants to discover the full scope of a confession’s treatment of the doctrine.

The past year has witnessed the publication of two helpful guides on the doctrine of pneumatology within the Reformed confessions. First, a chapter entitled “The Holy Spirit in the Westminster Standards” by Joseph Morecraft III has been published within a helpful larger volume, The Beauty and Glory of the Holy Spirit, edited by Joel R. Beeke and Joseph Pipa Jr.[3] More substantially, Yuzo Adhinarta has published his fine doctoral dissertation, completed at Calvin Theological Seminary, as The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit in the Major Reformed Confessions and Catechisms of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. In his own words, Adhinarta’s work, “attempts to explore and provide a systematic account of the person and some aspects of the work of the Holy Spirit as presented in the major Reformed confessions and catechisms of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.”[4]

I encourage you to pick up both worthy volumes, but Adhinarta’s work is one that any scholar interested in Reformed orthodox pneumatology must consult.

---

[1] Geoffrey F. Nuttall, The Holy Spirit in Puritan Faith and Experience, 3rd ed. (Chicago: University Of Chicago Press, 1992), xxviii.

[2] Benjamin B. Warfield, “Introductory Note” in Abraham Kuyper, Concise Works of the Holy Spirit, 1900 ed., AMG Concise Series (Chattanooga: TN: AMG Publishers, 2009), xxvii.

[3] Joseph Morecraft III, “The Holy Spirit in the Westminster Standards,” in Joel R. Beeke and Joesph A. Pipa, Jr., eds., The Beauty and Glory of the Holy Spirit (Reformation Heritage Books, 2012).

[4] Yuzo Adhinarta, The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit in the Major Reformed Confessions and Catechisms of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Carlisle, UK: Langham Partnership International, 2012), 2.

_____________________________

Dustin Bruce lives in Louisville, KY where he is pursuing a PhD in Biblical Spirituality at Southern Seminary. He is a graduate of Auburn University and Southwestern Seminary. Dustin and his wife, Whitney, originally hail from Alabama.

Two Recent Books by AFCBS Junior Fellow Dustin Benge

By Steve Weaver

Dustin Benge, one of the contributors to this blog (and Junior Fellow of the Andrew Fuller Center), has recently published two books featuring devotional selections from the writings of two of the greatest theologians in the history of the church. Benge's first book provided daily devotions from the sermons of Jonathan Edwards and was published by Reformation Heritage Books (sample pages here). Don Whitney (Associate Professor of Biblical Spirituality at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) has said the following about this volume.

"Few Christian writers could be mentioned in the same breath with Jonathan Edwards when it comes to heart-stirring devotional writing that is theologically rock-solid. Dustin Benge has done the church a great service by compiling these God-glorifying, Christ-exalting, Gospel-centered, soul-enriching excerpts from some of Edwards’s magnificent, but lesser-known sermons. Read edifying passages from Edwards like this every day for awhile, and you’ll be the better for it."

A second work by Benge, which was also published by Reformation Heritage Books, provides a selection of 150 prayers by John Calvin (sample pages here). These prayers were previously only available in Calvin's voluminous Old Testament commentaries. Benge has now made these prayers accessible to a new generation through his diligent efforts. Steven J. Lawson, author of The Expository Genius of John Calvin, had this to say about the volume.

 “Dustin Benge has done the church a great service by compiling this generous selection of prayers by the great Genevan Reformer, John Calvin. Extracted from his luminous Old Testament Commentaries, these fervent intercessions reveal the warm piety that accompanied this theological genius. Calvin’s personal logo was an open hand, holding a heart, extended upward to God with the words, ‘My heart I offer to Thee, Lord, promptly and sincerely.’ This book clearly demonstrates such singular devotion to God. Here is Calvin’s high doxology, arising upward from his high theology. And here is his exaltation of God, ascending from sound exegesis and exposition. By reading these prayers, I have no doubt but that your own heart will be likewise inflamed.”

You can listen to an MP3 lecture by Benge on the prayers of John Calvin which was delivered at an AFCBS mini-conference a couple of years ago. You can read Benge's continuing reflections on biblical spirituality at the new blog "Tinkers & Saints" which he maintains along with fellow AFCBS contributor and Junior Fellow Dustin Bruce.

____________________________

Steve Weaver serves as a research assistant to the director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies and a junior fellow of the Center. He also serves as senior pastor of Farmdale Baptist Church in Frankfort, KY. Steve and his wife Gretta have six children between the ages of 2 and 13.

Recommending Priscilla Wong on Anne Steele

In September of 2011, with the kind help of Rev. Malcolm Watts, I made the trek on a rainy Sunday from Salisbury, England, to the nearby village of Broughton, Hampshire. The latter is a village situated roughly mid-way between Salisbury and Winchester. I was looking for a house, a chapel, and a grave. All were associated with Anne Steele (1717–78), the daughter of William Steele, the pastor of the Calvinistic Baptist chapel in Broughton. We soon found the Baptist chapel in Broughton easily enough. Sadly, it has been closed. The house where she lived, known as “Grandfathers,” in Rookery Lane, was more difficult to find, but eventually it was located. Her grave took even longer, as it is to be found in the Anglican parish church—somewhat unusual as she was a Baptist. Anne was converted in 1732 and baptized the same year. She grew to be a woman of deep piety, genuine cheerfulness and blessed with a mind hungry for knowledge. She never married, although there were two proposals of marriage—one from none other than the Baptist pastor and hymn-writer Benjamin Beddome (1717–95). Anne, however, made a conscious choice to remain single.

Anne’s singleness gave her the time to devote herself to poetry and hymn-writing, a gift with which the Lord had richly blessed her. About ten years before her death, sixty-two of her hymns were published in a Baptist hymnal entitled A Collection of Hymns Adapted to Public Worship (1769), whose editors were John Ash and Caleb Evans. This hymnal gave her hymns a wide circulation throughout Baptist circles, and, in time, her hymns became as well known in Baptist circles and beyond as those of Isaac Watts, John Newton, or William Cowper. They played a part in revitalizing areas of the Calvinistic Baptist cause throughout England.

In the past few areas a number of studies of Steele have appeared, of which the latest is Priscilla Wong’s Anne Steele and her Spiritual Vision (Reformation Heritage Books, 2012). This is a slim volume, but it provides the interested reader with a great overview of some of the central spiritual themes of Anne’s hymns. Warmly recommended.

Another New Book by Dr. Haykin: Joy Unspeakable and Full of Glory: the Piety of Samuel and Sarah Pearce

Joy Unspeakable and Full of Glory: the Piety of Samuel and Sarah Pearce (Joshua Press, 2012). Pearce was described by his friend Andrew Fuller as another Brainerd. He was one of the intimate circle of friends that included Fuller, John Sutcliff and William Carey. This book examines the piety of Samuel and his wife Sarah through their letters.

From the Publisher: Joshua Press

Classics of Reformed spirituality series

Series editor: Michael A.G. Haykin

Samuel Pearce, a young eighteenth-century English pastor, was described by his friend and biographer Andrew Fuller as “another Brainerd”—a referenceto the celebrated American missionary David Brainerd. Pastor of Cannon Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, England, during the tumultuous 1790s, and a close friend of pioneer missionary William Carey, Pearce played a key role in the early days of the Baptist Missionary Society. In the providence of God he died at just thirty-three, but in the eyes of many of his contemporaries, he seemed to have condensed a lifetime of holy and joyful ministry into a single decade.

His marriage to Sarah Hopkins was one of deep love and mutual respect, and she joined him in his passion for the salvation of sinners—both at home and abroad. Through excerpts from Samuel and Sarah’s letters and writings, we are given a window into their rich spiritual life and living piety.

SPECS

• ISBN 978-1894400480
• Binding Paperback
• Page count 248 (i-xviii + 230)
• Width 5.5"
• Height 8.5"
• Spine .625"

Posted by Steve Weaver, Research Assistant to the Director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies, Dr. Michael A.G. Haykin.

William Carey: radical disciple—meaning?

Here is a thought-provoking quote about William Carey from Howard Norrish’s article “The Great Century” in Mike Barnett with Robin Martin, eds., Discovering the Mission of God: Best Missional Practices for the 21st Century (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2012), 270: “Carey believed in radical discipleship and was committed to a biblical worldview.” I am interested in unpacking the first claim about Carey: “radical discipleship.” What did this mean exactly for Carey?

The seminary and piety: a surrejoinder

If we define a faithful minister of the Word along the lines of Acts 6, a man devoted to the Word and prayer, it seems to me that in the twentieth century faithful orthodox seminaries have done fairly well in training men in one half of this equation: the Word. But what of the other? Well, I think many leaders in former generations expected these things to be caught by osmosis even though Jesus responded positively to the disciples’ request that he teach them how to pray. Spirituality needs to be “taught” and handed on. And while all professors in a seminary need to approach their specific subjects with an answerable spiritual frame, it is not wrong for some to focus on spirituality. Given the fact that spirituality and spiritual formation are increasingly huge engagements for both our larger cultural “moment” and within the boundaries of the Church, it is not unrealistic to ask certain men to specialize in the praxis of spirituality and the history of biblical spirituality.

As an historian, I feel the latter is very important: during the course of the twentieth century for a variety of reasons many of those who loved the Scriptures as the inerrant Word of God and faithfully upheld biblical orthodoxy failed to pass on the rich piety of their forebears in the Reformation, Puritan, Pietist and early Evangelical traditions. And surely this is one of the reasons why certain communities within the broad stream of twentieth-century English-speaking Evangelicalism became enamoured of the Spirit and talked as if they were the first to discover him since the Pentecost: they looked around and saw a tradition that seemed to have little place for piety, experience, and dare I say it, rapture (no I am not talking about an eschatological item!). Incidentally, here is where a man whom Carl has been writing about in recent days, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, is so helpful: his balance of Word and Spirit is admirable (re other matters Carl has raised about the Doctor, this is not the place to go into those, though I agree with Carl that the recent collection of essays on the Doctor is by and large a welcome addition to the books on that remarkable servant of God).

Maybe, I need to take up Carl’s offer and we can do a book together on this subject of the seminary and piety—and maybe Dr Lucas, if he is so inclined, could also be involved!

Spiritual formation and the modern seminary

One of the classic introductions to theological studies is B.B. Warfield’s The Religious Life of Theological Students, where his primary concern is to argue for the necessity of personal piety in the life of those studying at a theological seminary. He expects that the seminary be a place of piety, where piety is inculcated and where the students experience what we call today “spiritual formation.” Reading my dear friend Carl Trueman’s recent post at reformation21 on “Witsius, Character and Cleaning Rosters” I was honestly surprised to find the following remarks in which he clearly disagrees with his distinguished Presbyterian forebear:

“I find the whole notion of ‘spiritual formation’ within seminaries to be somewhat problematic: seminaries impart knowledge and skills which are essential for ministry and which cannot be acquired with like ease in a practical mentoring situation; they also provide a context for developing important and useful friendships which will last a lifetime; but they cannot really engage in spiritual formation in any deep way.”

Trueman argues that this is because seminaries are not centers where the means of grace like the Lord’s Supper and the preaching of the Word are observed:

“Certainly, the professor can and should strive to model Christian behaviour; but the real, deep, lasting spiritual formation for ministerial candidates takes place in a church context just as it does for every other Christian. The church is where the word is preached, the sacraments administered and discipling takes place.”

To be sure, seminaries are not churches and I agree wholeheartedly that as such a seminary is not the place where baptism (albeit Carl and I differ somewhat about this ordinance/sacrament) and the Lord’s Supper are carried out. But surely the Word is preached at Westminster? What does Carl expect should happen as that Word is heard by students there? And surely the lifelong friendships formed are a central means of grace in the lives of the students—or maybe my dear brother has forgotten the way that our Evangelical (or should I say Reformed?!) forebears prized friendship as a means of grace? And would he disagree that part of the seminary professor’s role is to mentor the students (or some at least) under his care? Surely seminaries are places where more than places where “knowledge and skills which are essential for ministry” are imparted? If this is all our idea of a seminary, I would not be surprised if the long-term result were a hall of dry orthodoxy!

I am sorry, I think I shall stick with the perspective of B.B. Warfield, or one of my favorite models, D.A. McGregor (1847–1890), professor of systematic theology at and then principal of Toronto Baptist College. A former student said of his teaching: “He not only thought out the…doctrines upon which he lectured, but he felt their power, and falling tears often evinced his emotion while he spoke of some particular aspect of the truth. This made us all feel that we had before us not only a theological professor but also a Christian man whose life was swayed by the great principles about which he spoke… He not only made us see the truth, but he made us feel its power and perceive its beauty.” Were not lectures like this a rich vehicle of spiritual formation?

In fine, spiritual formation is a vital part of what should be happening at the seminary as well as the local church.

"Spotty spirituality"

Today, I was able to spend some time at the University of British Columbia campus with my wife and daughter—and no surprise, bookstores occupied much of the day: the UBC bookstore where my daughter found a goldmine of Loeb classics, and Regent College Bookstore, which is an absolutely awesome place. I found a new book on William Wilberforce and his wife Barbara Spooner by Anne Stott, and also a fresh translation of Athanasius’ letters to Serapion and Didymus the Blind’s On the Holy Spirit. I also picked up the latest Crux magazine that has an article on A. Fuller by Keith Grant. I also picked up The Regent World, 24, no.1 (Winter 2012),where, on p.6, in an advertisement for a pastors’ conference entitled “Overflow—Spiritual Rhythms and Practices that Draw from Christ’s Fullness” (featuring Bruce Himdmarsh, Darrell Johnson and Susan Phillips), mention is made of pastors, due to demands on their time, being reduced “to a spotty spirituality and to sporadic fullness.” The phrase “spotty spirituality” is “spot-on” as a way of describing a leading affliction of Christian leadership in our day. Hopefully, what we are also doing at Southern in our programs on biblical spirituality will help diminish this affliction.