04.29.06
The Southern Presbyterian Review
Durning the years 1845 to 1847 leading Presbyterians in the Southern States of America became increasingly concerned that their opprtunity to express their views in the leading theological journal of the day -The Princeton Review, edited by Charles Hodge – was being ‘muzzled.’ As a result, a determination grew among them to establish a journal of their own. This gave birth in 1847 to ‘The Southern Presbyterian Review’ which was published quarterly from 1847 until 1885.
In the years 1847 to 1864 the Review was published by a group of ministers headed up by James Henley Thornwell. Jack P. Maddex, Jr. in an article entitled “Southern Presbyterian Review,” in The Conservative Press in Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century America, ed. Ronald Lora and William Henry Longton (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1999), draws attention to the content of the Review throughout this period.
The Thornwell years saw the Review presenting “not a detached theology but a comprehensive worldview, interpreting the entire cosmos in terms of Calvinist theology… Articles about philosophy, science, history, literature, and social thought stood in the Review alongside articles about doctrine, biblical studies, church government, and current religious developments. Applying the same analytical method to all subjects, the writers sought to discern the same providential logic in all aspects of reality…”
Sadly today Church magazines and theological journals are often very narrow in the range of subjects they treat and the areas of life they apply the truth of God to. We can learn from the men of Thornwell’s generation who aimed at a Calvinistic view of the whole of life and sought to instruct others in it.
G.B
04.26.06
Piety and Learning
The Puritans – whom we regard as one of the holiest group of people since the New Testament period – are an excellent example of the harmony between true learning and Christian piety:
“The great Puritans [as opposed to the fanatics on the fringes of Puritanism, such as the Fifth Monarchists] were men of outstanding intellectual power and spiritual insight, in whom the mental habits fostered by sober scholarship were linked with a flaming zeal for God and a minute acquaintance with the human heart.” (J.I. Packer, ‘Puritan Papers Vol. 1’)
“Both in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the leaders of the Puritans were among the foremost of their age in learning and intellectual force. They were for the most part, university men, and for culture and refinement of taste had no need to fear comparison with their opponents in either church or state” (John Brown, ‘The English Puritans’)
G.M.
Testimony to Exclusive Psalmody (2), by Henry Cooke
Cooke continues describing his own expereince with regard to Psalmody.
“Now, while I set not up my own convictions as a rule or measure of the consciences of others, I cannot fail to pity those who can find, as they assert, so little of Christ in the inspired psalmody of the Bible, that they must seek and employ an uninspired psalmody as exhibiting Him more fully. Our Lord Himself found Himself in the psalms – (Luke xxiv. 44, 45) – and thereby “opened His disciples’ understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures.” Surely what was the clearest light to their eyes, should be light to ours. And, truly, I believe, there is one view of Christ – and that not the least important to the tired and troubled believer – that can be discovered in the Book of Psalms – I mean His inward life. No eye-witness of the outward man – though an inspired evangelist – could penetrate the heart. But the Spirit who “searcheth the deep things of God”, has, in the psalms, laid open the inmost thoughts, sorrows, and conflicts of our Lord. The Evangelists faithfully and intelligently depict the sinless Man; the psalms alone lay open the heart of “the Man of sorrows.” The most pious productions of uninspired men are a shallow stream – the Psalms an unfathomable and shoreless ocean.
In conclusion, I beg to record, that two things confirmed my decision in favour of the exclusive use of inspired psalmody in public worship. First, the Biblical Psalms being inspired by the Holy Ghost (2 Tim. iii. 16; 1 Peter i. 21), in using them, there can be no error. Secondly, though in uninspired sacred poetry I had discovered many beauties and other excellencies, I never had discovered any compilations which I could pronounce free from serious doctrinal errors. This I perceived to be especially the case with not a few of the Paraphrases and Hymns, authorized by the Church of Scotland. If a doctrinal error be, at all times, dangerous, how much more when it is stereotyped in the devotions of the sanctuary!”
Part Two
G.B
Part One
04.25.06
Testimony to Exclusive Psalmody (1), by Henry Cooke
In Belfast city cetre stands a statue commonly known as ‘The Black Man.’ Apart from this title, little is known of him in our generation. But that statue is of the Rev. Henry Cooke, stalwart of the faith, who defended the Orthodox doctrine of the Trininty in the Presbyterian Church of Ireland in the 19th century against the inroads of Arianism. Cooke also loved the psalms and in a later debate within his Church, having previously favoured the introduction of uninspired hymns into the worship of God, he became convinced of the principle of Exclusive psalmody. With this conviction he wrote a preface to a book called ‘The True Psalmody’ and we will serialise this preface over the next few days.
“Having been requested to write a Preface to a reprint, in Ireland, of an American treatise on the Psalmody of Christian worship, I have most cheerfully complied ; – partly on account of the importance of the subject – partly on account of the talent displayed in the work – and partly that, by a detail of my own experience, I may add my humble testimony to a great principle.
My earliest recollection of family and public psalmody is that of the exclusive use of the English version of the Biblical Psalms, authorised by the Reformed Church of Scotland. In our Presbyterian Churches, so far as my knowledge extends, others were unknown. When I entered the ministry, in 1807, the Scottish selection of Paraphrases and Hymns had come into partial use; and influenced by the feeling in their favour, I was gradually led to adopt them. The principle of their use once adopted, the way to others was opened to an unlimited extent; for, if these paraphrases and hymns be good for public worship, it follows that others may be as good, or better. Accordingly, at one time of my ministry, I dedicated both time and pains to selecting, from all accessible sources, an additional volume, with an essay, embodying a defence of its use in private or in public worship. I need scarcely add, that I believed my arguments – which were partly original, and partly derivative – to be unanswerable.
I shall now detail, and as briefly as may be, the circumstances that first led me to doubt, and finally to reject my former conclusions.
Having been appointed to a short missionary tour, I left my home in good health, but was suddenly taken ill, and, during a month, was unable to return; and it was when “wearisome nights were appointed to me, and tossings to and fro until the dawning of the day,” that, in frequent solitude, I was thrown, almost entirely, on the resources of memory. But with that faculty God had sufficiently endowed me; and the psalms committed in school-boy days, and paraphrases and hymns of riper years, presented ready subjects of meditation. And it was then, that, all unexpectedly, yet irresistibly, it was impressed upon me, by experience and feeling, that the most celebrated hymns of uninspired men were, like Job’s friends, “miserable comforters,” when compared with the experience of Christ, in the days of humiliation of which the Book of Psalms is the true prophetic picture.”
G.B
Part Two
04.24.06
Pragmatism or Principle in Christian Education (2)
Accepting that Christian Education is indeed a Biblical Requirement not an option does not mean that we have been delivered from our tendency to pragmatism over principle in relation to this subject. Take for instance the question of who should be responsible for this Christian Education. To this we will receive a variety of answers. Perhaps the most popular will be that the Church must take on the Education of our Children. But is this a pragmatic conclusion or one founded on Biblical Principle?
R. L Dabney highlighting the trend in his day toward pragmatic reasoning in Church and State turns to the Subject of Education to make his point. ‘Or in Church affairs; one good brother proposes, that the Church shall take into its own official hand, the business of education, and imbue it properly with the Christian element. Another brother objects that to educate is not the divinely appointed function of a church. ‘Why’ asks the first ‘don’t you admit that all education ought to be Christian education?’ ‘Oh yes’ says the respondent; ‘but it is the function of Christian parents; combining if necessary; but as parents, not as presbyters.’ ‘What of that?’ says the first; ‘our church schools are very good things: very harmless things as yet: and where is the difference between a combination of certain men as Christian parents, to make and govern a certain sort of school, and a combination of the same men as presbyters to make the same sort of school?’ ‘There is the difference of the principle involved,’ it is answered; ‘and it is never safe to admit a false principle.’ ‘Pshaw.’ says the first; ‘that is nothing but one of your ‘abstractions.’ (Discussions Vol. 4 ‘Secular’, p.47 Sprinkle)
Part Two
G.B
Part One
04.20.06
God: The Foundation of Science
Modern science is happy to speak of natural laws that are observable in the universe. However, the concept of law implies imposition by a sovereign authority and the obligation of obedience of all that is subject to that authority. When this is applied to the idea of ‘natural laws’ governing the behaviour of created things it presumes an intelligent Governor of the universe who ordinarily governs according to those laws. But the existence of this intelligent and sovereign Universal Governor is quite contrary to a naturalistic worldview. For example, Darwinian evolutionary theory reduces all reality to the level of the material, to physical objects behaving randomly according to chance. There is no room for God. Yet to be consistent, the evolutionist must also reject the concept of ‘natural laws’ as contrary to his worldview.
Furthermore, if there is no all knowing God who has revealed himself to man, and all that does exist is therefore finite and fallible, how can there be knowledge and truth? Truth is something that is known certainly, but even that which a finite, fallible being thinks he knows is subject to error. So without an omniscient God, ‘truth’ is unattainable and irrelevant. In addition, without a revelation from this God man can have no true knowledge for there is no other sure foundation by which man can know truth and thus he can know nothing for certain.
So if knowledge is impossible, truth unattainable, and ‘natural laws’ non-existent for man without God he must also abandon his claim to be performing true scientific investigation. There can be no ‘science’ without laws and knowledge, but there can be no laws and knowledge without the sovereign God who has revealed Himself to man.
G.B
04.19.06
Education and the Bible
A Christian ‘philosophy of education, methodology, and curriculum’ according to James B Rose ‘is predicated upon the capacity of the individual to search the Scriptures for the Biblical principles of a subject, deduce inferences justly from Bible doctrine, expound these truths to the student through the subject, and record how these principles were applied to daily life and living.’
So the teacher must first acknowledge that the Bible has something to say about the subject. This is often were we face our first difficulty as Christians often imagine that the Bible only has something to say on ’spiritual’ subjects while education is a ’secular’ issue. Next, the teacher must himself have a determination to find out precisely what the Bible says. Here we face our second problem, the reason we think the Bible has nothing to say about a subject like maths is that we have never looked to see if it has. Thirdly, it is not enough that the teacher himself know, or that he merely disseminate information to the pupil, his goal is to shape the worldview of those under his tuition and impact their behaviour by the application of the Bible to the whole of life.
G.B
04.17.06
When are we Justified?
One point of contention that has been debated among Reformed Theologians is the question of eternal justification. To put more simply, is a sinner Justified in eternity upon his election or in time when he believes the gospel? We believe the latter is the position taught in Scripture. Again Obadiah Grew addresses this question in his work previously cited.
‘QUESTION. But are we not justified in God’s decree before we believe?
ANSWER. We were elected to be justified, yes, but to be justified by faith, and not before. We were redeemed before we believed. Our faith gives nothing to the value of Christ’s ransom with God; but it’s faith that makes this ransom to be mine.’
G.B
04.14.06
Imputed Righteousness and Union with Christ
On Christ’s righteousness imputed to a sinner in Justification the puritan Obadiah Grew asks how can the righteousness of another be made our righteousness? His answer in short is through Union with Christ.
‘A man’s capacity for such propriety in Christ’s righteousness is union with Him. Christ’s taking our nature into union with Him was His capacity to take our sins and condemnation on himself; and His taking our persons into union is our capacity to have that interest in His righteousness so as to be made the righteousness of God in Him.’
G.B.
04.07.06
Dabney and True Liberty
We hear much today about human rights and the liberty of the individual. Indeed we have a European Court of Human Rights set up to adjudicate on such issues and any small observation of the rulings of this body must appear startling even to those who might call themselves liberal. However, individual liberty will only be achieved through slavery to the law of God. Therefore the Psalmist concluded ‘And I will walk at liberty for I seek thy precepts.’ Ps 119:45. This holds true not only for the individual but for families, Churches and nations. It was this liberty that R L Dabney commended to the Students of Hampden Sidney College on June 15 1882.
‘Our fathers valued liberty, but the liberty for which they contended was each person’s privilege to do those things and those only to which God’s law and Providence gave him a moral right. The liberty of nature which your modern asserts is absolute license; the privilege of doing whatever a corrupt will craves, except as this license is curbed by a voluntary ’social contract.’ The fathers of our country (America) could have adopted the sublime words of Melville: Lex Rex, The Law is king.’
G.B
Pragmatism or Principle in Christian Education (1)
Over the last two years it has been my great privilege to preach the Word of God in a variety of places in the Highlands, Islands and Lowlands of Scotland. In fellowship with Christians I consciously brought up the subject of Christian Education, endeavouring to promote the need for this in the British Isles. I was amazed and discouraged with the response this received. I would bring a number of Biblical reasons showing the need for Christian Education and on many occasions would receive a number of pragmatic arguments in favour of the status quo. In all my travels, and among all the people I spoke to, not one person who opposed my proposition offered a Biblical reason to support their case. This is not surprising in itself because no such Biblical reason exists. The surprising thing is that this did not immediately lead to the conclusion I was aiming at.
Christian Education is a biblical requirement not an option. That our Children be brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord (Eph 6:4) means much more than that they attend Sunday School and memorise a few Bible texts, or even that family worship is kept in the home. It requires an education in every subject area from a Christian perspective in order to provide our children with a Christian world and life view (2Cor 10:5). The pragmatic arguments referred to above favour State education by a humanist curriculum. The Biblical Principle is that such a curriculum is the antithesis of a Christian worldview (Rom 8:7).
Part One
G.B
Part Two
