Jul
24
Book Review: Here I Stand
Filed Under Books, Christian History | Leave a Comment
I admit a lifelong aversion to all things historical and biographical. Whether it was a bad history teacher in high school or my own generational arrogance I cannot say. However, Hebrews 11 is having its way with me. I am growing in my appreciation of biography and history as I read more of it, especially as it relates to the history of the church. Despite my aversion to all things historic, I have known from very early on in my Christian growth that I should spend time at some point studying the life of Martin Luther. If you are a Protestant of any flavor, there is no excuse for not knowing at least a cursory amount of information on the universally recognized father of the Reformation. It was this growing love for history combined with a nagging guilt of Luther ignorance that lead me to read Here I Stand: A life of Martin Luther, by Roland Bainton.
I was pleasantly surprised with this book. Bad writers can ruin good history with relative ease. The life of Martin Luther is fascinating history. Bainton’s scholarship and writing style provides just the right setting to highlight the life of Luther in a way that avoids being cumbersome while at the same time providing rich depth. I read this book a chapter at a time over the course of a month, frequently finding myself sad to reach the end of a chapter and anxious to begin the next. Someone looking for an intricate scholarly analysis of Luther would find this book wanting but for the average minister or lay person, Bainton provides pleasurable readability.
Anybody who knows anything about Martin Luther knows that Luther had a propensity for being highly opinionated on a number of topics. His opinions have caused varying responses in people, some of whom rightly understand Luther’s historical context and some who do not. Luther’s vitriol poses difficulty for the biographer. Bainton handles Luther’s peculiar personality exceptionally well. He shows the very real internal struggles in Luther’s life that lead to the growth of this theology. He aptly shows the corruption of the Roman Catholic church to which Luther responded. There are places were Bainton openly confesses that Luther was overly sensitive and outright grumpy. At other times Bainton takes time to explain why a particular aggressive comment of Luther’s was justified in light of the ecclesiastical context of 16th century Germany and Europe.
I also appreciated Bainton’s decision to handle some parts of Luther’s life in chronological order while dealing with other issues on a topical basis. The book is mainly split in that order. The first half covers the chronology of Luther’s conflict with the Roman Catholic church. The latter part of the book deals with various themes in Luther’s life including the effect of his theology on marriage, state, and church.
I found three parts of this book especially interesting. First, I found Bainton’s portrayal of Luther to rightly show Luther’s desire to reform the church based on the Bible. I have heard Luther spoken of as a hot-headed reactionary who hated the church and wanted to start over based on his own ego-maniacal views of the Bible. Over and over again, through Luther’s own words and Bainton’s analysis you see Luther’s desire for the church to be built upon and nourished by the Word of God. It is for this cause that Luther was willing to fight, write, preach, and die. Secondly, Bainton did an excellent job describing the oddity of Luther’s depression. Luther is known commonly as a man who struggled with severe depression. What is odd about his depression is Luther’s enormous output in the midst of his darkest days. The most common symptom of depression is inactivity and withdrawal. Luther fought his depression with extreme exertion and a strong grasp on the Word of God. Certainly there is wisdom here for those who struggle with the darkness of depression. Lastly, I especially enjoyed the look at Luther’s marriage which Bainton provides. Luther’s profound effect on the Christian family may not even now be fully explored. To read the anecdotes of Martin and Katie’s marriage are at times humorous and other times profoundly meaningful and challenging. Many a mighty theologian has been shown to be an imbecile in his own home; for Luther this was not the case.
I cannot end my review without saying, “This book has pictures!” Let’s be honest, we really never make it past kindergarten. A good book should have pictures in it. Bainton has included in his biography over 100 illustrations of woodcuts taken from Luther’s own time. It was a pleasure to read the history as well as to see the art, sometimes beautiful sometimes satricial, that grew out of the conflicts in which Luther found himself.
In conclusion, I lay upon you the same guilt I felt before reading this book. Every Protestant should study the life of Martin Luther. He is the father of the Reformation. Given this mandate, the church is in desperate need of a good, readable biography, universally appealing to layman and minister alike. Bainton has provided the church with such a book. You are under obligation to read this book. It will do your soul good. And who knows when the church will again have need of men with the courage of Luther? This book serves Christian training that the church might find us ready should she need defending again.
Jun
1
Tuberculosis and David Brainerd
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With all the talk about tuberculosis, my thoughts have been drawn to the life of David Brainerd. What is the connection between the disease and this preeminent American missionary? Well, Brainerd died of tuberculosis. Not only did he die of that disease but he spent the last 19 months of his life in the home of Jonathan Edwards. Brainerd was nursed by Edwards own 17 year old daughter, Jerusha. No doubt, the time spent with Brainerd left a deep impression on Edwards. Edwards said of Brainerd’s stay with his family,
I would not conclude my observations on the merciful circumstances of Mr. Brainerd’s death, without acknowledging with thankfulness, the gracious dispensation of Providence to me and my family, in so ordering that he (though the ordinary place of his abode was more than two hundred miles distant) should be brought to my house, in his last sickness, and should die here. So that we had opportunity for much acquaintance and conversation with him, to show him kindness in such circumstance, to see his dying behavior, to hear his dying speeches, to receive his dying counsels, and to have the benefit of his dying prayers.
If it were not for Brainerd’s disease and the ensuing stay in the Edward’s home, Jonathan Edwards may not have been lead
to publish The Life and Diary of the Rev. David Brainerd. Many a missionary claim that book as the primary instrument that God used in calling them to missions.
So, as tuberculosis makes headlines, take a moment to think back on the brevity of life, the great commission, service to our God, the sweetness of the gospel, and the lives of holy men and women who have preceded us.
For a short piece on the life of David Brainerd, I heartily recommend John Piper’s biographical essay on Brainerd.
May
25
Conflict and Apologetics
Filed Under Apologetics, Books, Christian History | Leave a Comment
I’ve been following with some interest Carl Trueman’s recent push to get more people reading and appreciating the early church fathers. You can find his Ref21 posts on patristics here, here, and here. You can also read an interview with Trueman in three parts (part 1, part 2, part 3). These posts resonated with something I had heard Dr. Peter Jones talk about at the Twin Lakes Fellowship. He was advocating the view that our current culture is very much like the culture that surrounded the birth of the church in the New Testament. With Trueman and Jones carrying on a convesation in my head, I decided to relieve some cognitive dissonance and pick up volume one of the Ante-Nicene Fathers set.
I read the first two letters in the book. The first was The First Letter of Clement and the second was The Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus. What did I discover? Well, of course, that Trueman and Jones were both very correct. The letters were incredibly encouraging and helpful for modern ministry.
The Fist Letter of Clement was a letter from Clement to the church at Corinth. Clement probably knew Paul. He rose to leadership in the church before the first century. As a part of his shepherding of the churches he wrote a letter to the church at Corinth. What was this letter about? It was an encouragement to handle disagreement in the church. He confronts conflict within the body of Christ with a sweeping discussion of basic theology ranging from creation to redemption. Listen to Clement speaking about the redemption we have in Christ:
Let us look steadfastly to the blood of Christ, and see how precious that blood is to God, which, having been shed for our salvation, has set the grace of repentance before the whole world. Let us turn to every age that has passed, and learn that, from generation to generation, the Lord has granted a place of repentance to all such as would be converted unto Him.
What wisdom is here! What does a church in conflict need to hear? They need to hear about the blood of Jesus calling all to repentance.
The Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus was written by an early disciple to a man named Diognetus. It serves as a proto-apologetic for the Christian faith. The author compares the emptiness of Paganism and Judaism to the fullness found in Jesus Christ. Much like Clement, the author of this letter grounds his apologetic in the glorious gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
He Himself took on Him the burden of our iniquities, He gave His own Son as a ransom for us, the holy One for transgressors, the blameless One for the wicked, the righteous One for the unrighteous, the incorruptible One for the corruptible, the immortal One for them that are mortal. For what other thing was capable of covering our sins than His righteousness? By what other one was it possible that we, the wicked and ungodly, could be justified, than by the only Son of God? O sweet exchange! O unsearchable operation! O benefits surpassing all expectation! That the wickedness of many should be hid in a single righteous One, that the righteousness of One should justify many transgressors!
I don’t plan to end my reading of the early church fathers here. But what I have sound far has been encouraging and surprising. Our problems are the same. How do we handle conflict within the church? How do we preach Jesus to the lost world? And so our solution is the same as well. Proclaim a crucified, risen Savior who alone is able to purge from sin, bring about repentance, and build his church.
May
8
Tomb of Herod the Great found?
Filed Under Bible, Christian History, Christmas | Leave a Comment
According to Haaretz.com, archaeologists from Hebrew University in Jerusalem have discovered the tomb site of Herod the Great–the Herod whom Rome allowed to ‘rule’ the province of Judaea from 74 BC to ~4 BC. This is the same Herod who appears in Matthew and Luke’s narratives of the birth of Jesus and instigator of the infant massacre at Bethlehem. Herod the Great is also famous for his ambitious expansion of the Temple in Jerusalem.
As for the tomb discovery, Professor Ehud Netzer has been digging since 1972 around a site known as Herodium, about 7 miles outside of Jerusalem and destroyed by the Romans in AD 71, acting on the belief that first-century Jewish historian Josephus was reliable in his detailed account of the funeral and burial of Herod. But it was not until this spring that his team found the ruins of a distinctively lavish (albeit empty) sarcophagus at Herodium.
Two additional interesting notes about Herod the Great:
- His ancestors were Edomites and not Jews. In his grandfather’s time, the Maccabeans conquered Idumea (home of the remnant of the Edomites) and compelled them to convert to Judaism. Although Herod surely would have seen himself as Jewish, conservative, observant Jews in his day would likely have viewed him as more Hellenistic than Jewish.
- You might scratch your head at the fact that Herod’s death is listed as ~4 BC. But wasn’t Jesus born in 1 AD? Not so fast, my friend. Our current numbering system for years was adopted in Western Europe in 8th century and was based on work by a 6th century monk named Dionysus Exiguus, who lived in Rome. Dionysus miscalculated a few things, and our best guesses are that Jesus was born between 6 BC and 4 BC.
Apr
17
Historian Alwyn Ruddock may have discovered evidence of the oldest church building on the North American continent. North America’s oldest church may lie beneath the town of Carbonear, on the eastern coast of Newfoundland. Ruddock’s research centers on a 1498 voyage of English explorer John Cabot. Accompanying him on the voyage was a group of five or so Italian friars, led by one Fra Giovanni Antonio Carbonaro. It seems that Cabot’s voyage continued down the eastern coast to the Caribbean (this is new information as well!), but without the Italian friars, who apparently stayed behind to establish a religious colony in Newfoundland.
As with all intriguing discoveries, there is a catch: Ms. Ruddock died in late 2005 and left specific instructions in her will that her papers be destroyed. Among the destroyed items were her 40 years of research on the Cabot expedition of 1498, which was almost ready for publication. Other historians are trying to piece together as much as they can of Ruddock’s work. An interesting portal into this story is available at LiveScience.com.
Feb
15
B.B. Warfield on activity and spiritual strength
Filed Under Christian History, Prayer, The Church | 1 Comment
On October 4, 1911, Dr. B.B. Warfield was called upon to address seminary students at Princeton. He challenged them to both learning and piety. He called them to faithfulness in public worship and private devotion. His conclusion is a timely reminder to twenty-first century Christians:
Activity, of course, is good: surely in the cause of the Lord we should run and not be weary. But not when it is substituted for inner religious strength. . . . In the tendencies of our modern life, which all make for ceaseless . . . activity, have a care that it does not become your case; or that your case–even now–may not have at least some resemblance to it. Do you pray? How much do you pray? How much do you love to pray? What place in your life does the ’still hour’ alone with God take?
I am sure that if you once get a true glimpse of what the ministry of the cross is, and of what you, as men preparing for this ministry, should be, you will pray, ‘Lord who is sufficient for these things?’ Your heart will cry, ‘Lord, make me sufficient for these things.’ Old Cotton Mather wrote a great little book once to serve as a guide to students for the ministry. The not very happy title which he gave it is Manductio ad Ministerium. But by a stroke of genius he added a sub-title which is more significant: The angels preparing to sound the trumpets. That is what Cotton Mather calls you, students for the ministry: the angels preparing to sound the trumpets! Take the name to yourselves, and live up to it. Give your days and nights to living up to it! And then, perhaps, when you come to sound the trumpets the note will be pure and clear and strong, and perchance may pierce even to the grave and wake the dead.”
From “The Religious Life of Theological Students,” in The Princeton Theology: 1812-1921, edited by Mark Noll, pp. 266-267.