The Wittenberg Door: March 2011

Today in Church History: J. Gresham Machen, Presbytery of New Brunswick (PCUSA)

On March 29, 1935, the Presbytery of New Brunswick of the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. suspended J. Gresham Machen from the ministry.

After the previous General Assembly ordered Machen and other members of the Independent Board for Presbyterian Foreign Missions to resign their positions, the New Brunswick Presbytery was swift to charge Machen with disobeying the mandate of the General Assembly and advocating rebellion in the church. Insisting that the charges were purely administrative, the Presbytery ruled out of order all of Machen's arguments regarding the doctrinal soundness of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions. Machen and other IBPFM members appealed to the 1936 General Assembly where the verdicts were sustained and the convictions upheld, setting the stage for the formation of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.

John Muether

Labels: History

Jane Russell : Pro-Life Advocate

Earlier this month, screen legend Jane Russell was laid to rest. Featured in such classic films as Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), The Paleface (1948), and Son of Paleface (1952), Russell is best remembered for her first film, The Outlaw (1943), which launched her into stardom. But what most people didn’t know—what I didn’t know—is that she was a Christian, and that she was very active in the Pro-Life movement. Russell’s daughter-in-law provides a moving account of Ms. Russell’s true passion over at LifeSiteNews.com. Here’s some excerpts . . .

But according to Waterfield, Jane’s true legacy lies in her deep devotion to the Bible as a born-again Christian, and her tenacity living out that faith as a pro-life advocate following a tragic botched abortion at the age of eighteen. . . .
Russell’s story began in the San Fernando Valley of Southern California where she grew up as the eldest and only girl in a deeply Christian family of five children. The loss of a child - Jane’s older brother, who died at 18 months old - was what inspired her own mother’s zeal for reading the Bible, a hunger she passed on to her daughter.
The death of a child would also later exert a powerful effect on Jane’s life: when the eighteen-year-old star was already well on her way to a successful career in film, an illegal abortion took the life of her unborn child, and left her unable to bear children ever again.
According to Waterfield, the young Jane already “felt horrible” about the moral evil committed in the abortion, which was so badly botched she nearly died. “She knew it was wrong,” she said. “But she as a young teenager, she felt she was trapped and her career starting to take off, and it was an inconvenience, and she thought that was the best solution, knowing all along that it wasn’t.” . . .
Jane carried on, she said, bearing courageously the responsibility of an abortion that wound up giving her “a heart for children,” particularly those who were difficult to place in adoptions, such as older and disabled children. Russell was to found the World Adoption International Fund (WAIF) in 1955. According to Waterfield, through Russell’s efforts at adoption advocacy, she helped find a place for over 40,000 children in permanent homes who may otherwise never have found them.

You can read the entire article here.

HT: Pro-Existence

Labels: Abortion, History

Notable Quote: John Brown of Wamphray

John Brown of Wamphray (1610-1679) on finding our life in Christ:

Live up then to the gospel, and so be sure of it, and be safe in it. I mean, let Christ live in thee as they all, and cast all thy are and cumber on him; draw all they necessities out of him; and undertake all they duties in him; be strong in him, and in the power of his might; let him be they counselor, condutor, leader, teacer, captain, commander, light life, strength, and all so shall thou stand and have ause to glory, even in thine infirmities, for thou shalt find the power of Christ resting upon thee, and thou shalt have cause to say, therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reporaches, in necessities, in persecution, in distresses for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.

Christ: the Way, the Truth, and the Life

Labels: Quotes

Today in Church History: Ned B. Stonehouse

In 1902, within the space of three days, Paul Woolley (March 16) and Ned B. Stonehouse (March 19) were born.

The two would meet as students at Princeton Theological Seminary, and they would join J. Gresham Machen in the founding of Westminster Theological Seminary in 1929. There they enjoyed over thirty years of fruitful service as part of the original faculty at Westminster Theological Seminary (Stonehouse in New Testament and Woolley in Church History). Both men numbered among the 34 constituting ministerial members of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in 1936.

Each man also contributed toward the development of a greater historical consciousness within the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Stonehouse's 1954 book, J. Gresham Machen: A Biographical Memoir, was for many Orthodox Presbyterians their introduction to the life of Machen and the founding of the OPC. The OPC General Assembly acknowledged Woolley's gifts to the church by appointing him as the denomination's first historian, in 1974.

John Muether

Labels: History

Today in Church History: Paul Woolley

In 1902, within the space of three days, Paul Woolley (March 16) and Ned B. Stonehouse (March 19) were born.

The two would meet as students at Princeton Theological Seminary, and they would join J. Gresham Machen in the founding of Westminster Theological Seminary in 1929. There they enjoyed over thirty years of fruitful service as part of the original faculty at Westminster Theological Seminary (Stonehouse in New Testament and Woolley in Church History). Both men numbered among the 34 constituting ministerial members of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in 1936.

Each man also contributed toward the development of a greater historical consciousness within the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Stonehouse's 1954 book, J. Gresham Machen: A Biographical Memoir, was for many Orthodox Presbyterians their introduction to the life of Machen and the founding of the OPC. The OPC General Assembly acknowledged Woolley's gifts to the church by appointing him as the denomination's first historian, in 1974.

--John Muether

Labels: History

Why Do Some Ministers Wear Robes?

Ever wonder why some Protestant ministers wear robes when preaching? Dr. C. Matthew McMahon answers that question over at A Puritans Mind in an article title Why a Genevan Robe?

. . . it surrounds a need for the preacher and congregation to be reminded, constantly, that the office of the minister is to be regarded with a submissive attention to his work as the preacher of God’s Word. There is a great difference between John Calvin asking his congregation to listen respectably to “John Calvin”, and listening heartily to the Word of God. . . .
When the minister of the Word of God stands in the pulpit while wearing a Genevan Robe, such an act demonstrates that “something is going on here that is eminently different” than normal. There is a more profound affect on the congregation to listen to the Word of God rather than the man, or how good the man looks, or whether his pants are creased well. The purpose is to detract from the person of the preacher, and to emphasize the office of the minister. The Genevan Robe is not worn to make him more prestigious than the rest of the blood-bought saints that come to corporate worship, nor is it to set him above the congregation in any way. Rather, the Genevan Robe reminds the congregation that he is “set apart” to work as a mouthpiece for the Word of God preached during worship. . . .

Labels: Doctrine of the Church

Today in Church History: Charles G. Finney

On March 13, 1836, Charles G. Finney resigned as pastor of the Second Free Presbyterian Church in New York City, and announced his intention to demit the ministry of the Presbyterian Church and to transfer his ordination to the Congregational Church.

When asked at his licensure exam in 1823 whether he subscribed to the Westminster Confession of Faith, Finney responded, "I had not examined it - This made no part of my study." During his tenure as a Presbyterian minister he rarely attended Presbytery meetings and his opposition to Presbyterian theology and polity grew. Eventually he became the favorite target of Old School opponents of the Second Great Awakening. He left the church a year before the Old School-New School division, disdainfully suggesting that "no doubt there is a jubilee in hell every year about the time of meeting of the General Assembly."

John Muether

Labels: History

Notable Quote: Herman Bavinck

In the Scriptures . . .

God daily comes to his people, not from afar but nearby. In it he reveals himself, from day to day, to believers in the fullness of his truth and grace. Through it he works his miracles of compassion and faithfulness. Scripture is the ongoing rapport between heaven and earth, between Christ and his church, between God and his children. It does not just tie us to the past; it binds us to the living Lord in the heavens. It is the living voice God.
Herman Bavinck (1854-1921), Reformed Dogmatics: Prolegomena

Labels: Doctrine of Scripture, Quotes

Today in Church History: Gilbert Tennent

On March 8, 1740, Gilbert Tennent preached his fiery sermon, “The Danger of an Unconverted Ministry,” in Nottingham, Pa.

This leader of New Side Presbyterians decried opponents of revival in scathing terms. He argued that the antirevivalists proved they were unregenerate by their opposition to the Awakening. They were “wicked men,” “being greedy of filthy lucre,” were “guided by the devil,” and “their discourse was cold and sapless.” Tennent went on to add that if one did not receive spiritual nourishment from one’s church, one could “lawfully go, and that most frequently, where he gets the most good to his precious soul.”

New Side and Old Side Presbyterians would divide in 1741 over controversies related to confessional subscription, itinerancy, and theological education. In 1758 a more irenic Gilbert Tennent would be elected moderator of the reunited church, and he would eventually express regret over the rhetoric of his famous sermon.

John Muether

Labels: History

A Sober Assessment of Reformational Drinking

A number of years ago I had the privilege of introducing the Charlton-Heston-looking Rev. Jim West at a conference on Pentecostalism shortly after he published his book, The Glorious Foundation of Christ: The Missing Clincher argument in the Tongues’ Debate. (Speaking as an ex-Pentecostal, I highly recommend this book.)

Before his “tongues” book, Rev. West published a fine treatise titled Drinking With Calvin and Luther! In the book, Rev. West, Professor of Pastoral Theology at City Seminary in Sacramento California, provides not only the theological underpinnings of alcohol’s use, but he also traces its use from the Reformation, to the founding of America, through Spurgeon’s time and beyond. (He also provides a nifty, and funny, beer review.)

In an article penned for Modern Reformation magazine, Rev. West discusses the Reformers' view of alcohol, which includes their condemnation of the un-Biblical practice of churches replacing the wine with some other drink. Here’s how the article begins . . .

Protestant reflection on the consumption of alcohol has undergone a dramatic transformation since the Reformation. Whether this change stems from the rise of pietism or the triumph of middle-class morality, contemporary evangelical ideas about alcohol are at odds with the views of the Protestant reformers. Attending to the reformers' ideas, then, is important not only for those who would claim to be their heirs but also for a good understanding of what the Bible teaches about alcohol.

You can read the entire article here. You can also purchase Rev. West’s books here.

Labels: Gifts of God

Notable Quotes: Francis Turretin

Francis Turretin (1623 – 1687) on natural law . . .

Orthodox Reformed theologians affirm that there is a natural law, not arising from a voluntary contract of law of society, but from a divine obligation being impressed by God upon the conscience of man in his very creation, on which the difference between right and wrong founded and which contains the practical principles of immovable truth (such as: “God should be worshipped,” “parents honored,” “we should live virtuously,” “injure no one,” “do to others what we would wish them to do to us” and the like). Also that so many remains and evidences of this law are still left in our nature (although it has been in different ways corrupted and obscured by sine) that there is no mortal who cannot feel its force either more or less.
Institutes of Elenctic Theology

Labels: Quotes

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Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Today in Church History: J. Gresham Machen, Presbytery of New Brunswick (PCUSA)