Over the last 23 years that I have been writing this paper, and the last 50 years that I have been connected with Christian ministry, many things have come and gone and many things have changed.\u00a0 If I think of the men I\u2019ve known, heard, sat under, or known about, you might say that I\u2019ve had access to over a hundred years of first-hand knowledge of Christian history.\u00a0 I was born in 1950 but most of the men who taught me in my college days or early ministry days were born around 1900-1920.\u00a0 Two men who influenced my life greatly, Noel Smith and R.V. Clearwaters, were both born in 1900.\u00a0 My pastor, John Rawlings lived 99 years from 1914 to 2013.\u00a0 When you spend your life around men whose lives spanned over a century of time, you can learn a lot if you\u2019ll listen.<\/p>\n
If the apostle Paul had to confess, \u201cI count not myself to have apprehended\u201d (Phil. 3:13) then who are we to think we know much at all?\u00a0 However, everyone observes the things that happen within that 100+ years of their lifetime.\u00a0 In the Christian ministry, not to mention all the various fields of learning, there is more than a person can observe and comprehend.\u00a0 Yet in that ministry, especially over the last 100 years, things have changed faster than any other 100 years.<\/p>\n
This last month I read some\u00a0 books that speak directly to the last 100 years of Christian ministry.\u00a0 Four of those are reviewed in this issue.\u00a0 I\u2019ve read books, articles, and papers like these all of my life, sometimes as assignments and often out of my own interest.\u00a0 I appreciate the men and women who write our \u201ccontemporary history\u201d because they are trying hard to warn and encourage us in the days in which we minister.\u00a0 Sometimes the information is not very complimentary to ministry but more often it is enlightening and encouraging.\u00a0 However, we live in perilous times and these could very well be the last generations before the Lord returns.\u00a0 If so, warnings and exhortations are needed.\u00a0 The lessons we should be learning ought to be passed on to our people so that they will be able to stand in the evil day.<\/p>\n
Positive observations<\/span><\/p>\n I always am encouraged by our Baptist and fundamental history.\u00a0 I have read of the history of the Southern Baptist Convention, of the General Association of Regular Baptist Churches, of the Baptist Bible Fellowship, and others, and have been encouraged by them all.\u00a0 I have also read The Fundamentals and the history of how those writings came to be.\u00a0 This month I enjoyed reading the history of Winona Lake and the great Bible Conferences with Moody, Sunday, and Chapman; the singing of Homer Rodeheaver, and the planting of the Grace Brethren churches there with Alva McClain.\u00a0 I was encouraged by the writings of J.M. Frost and E.Y. Mullins in the early days of the Southern Baptists before liberalism took its heavy toll.\u00a0 The twentieth century was blessed because of these great movements that spread Christianity across our country.<\/p>\n The Fundamentals<\/span>.\u00a0 In 1909 two laymen set aside a large sum of money to be used to produce what came to be known as The Fundamentals.\u00a0 The first editors were A.C. Dixon and R.A. Torrey.\u00a0 These writing included men such as W.H. Griffith Thomas, Sir Robert Anderson, James M. Gray, A.T. Pierson, B.B. Warfield, C.I. Scofield, Thomas Spurgeon, C.T. Stud, E.Y. Mullins, and Bishop Ryle of England.\u00a0 Regardless of what one thinks of fundamentalists today, we were given a great start to the twentieth century by the writing of these men.\u00a0 In fact, the average Christian reader today might have trouble keeping up with the scholarship displayed there.\u00a0 The fundamentalist movement has been a bedrock of orthodoxy, evangelism, and preaching for the last 100 years and has blessed the churches greatly.<\/p>\n Evangelism.<\/span>\u00a0 Fundamental Baptists, early evangelicals, and various orthodox movements have been criticized a lot these days for their aggressive evangelism.\u00a0 It is not uncommon to read someone criticizing soul winning, invitations, door to door canvassing, and the like by finding some abusive example as if that were the norm.\u00a0 The truth is, American Christianity would be in much deeper trouble today if it were not for the evangelism done by fundamentalists and others throughout the last century.\u00a0 Billy Sunday is a poster boy of such criticism and I\u2019m sure that he deserves some of it.\u00a0 But until I also have been responsible for half a million professions of faith, I doubt I will be too critical.<\/p>\n Church planting<\/span>.\u00a0\u00a0 The large cities of our country today are in great need of another generation of church planters.\u00a0 It takes only three generations in the churches to find them either dying, growing unorthodox, or cold and lifeless.\u00a0 We can all recount good churches of our childhood that don\u2019t even exist today.\u00a0 Whether it was the pioneering Methodists and Baptists or the Southern Baptists whose goal was to plant a church in every county seat, steeples were erected across the country and the gospel was preached in cities and small towns.\u00a0 Church planting is, however, an ongoing movement.\u00a0 It must continue in every generation.<\/p>\n Missions<\/span>.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know if the whole church age has ever seen as much money and personnel given to the cause of foreign missions as America saw in the twentieth century.\u00a0 It is amazing to think that such a century of war and depression could also produce industrialization and agriculture enough to raise millions upon millions of dollars to send the gospel of Jesus Christ around the world.\u00a0 Many missionaries I knew were American veterans who returned to the land of their service to preach to the people they once fought.\u00a0 The Philippines, China, Japan, Korea, North Africa, Germany, and now Russia are great examples.\u00a0 Where would these people be today without America\u2019s missionary effort?<\/p>\n Colleges and seminaries<\/span>.\u00a0 To support and maintain the evangelism, church planting, and missions of the last hundred years, the Bible college and seminary movement sprang up all over the country.\u00a0 Sure, good schools often take a turn for the worse or even disappear, but still much good has been done by thousands of graduates from a variety of schools.\u00a0 Perhaps D.L. Moody made it popular and acceptable with Moody Bible Institute, but then there were others:\u00a0 Dallas, Talbot, Fuller, Southern, Wheaton, Grace, Grand Rapids, Cedarville, which stayed by the stuff for many years.\u00a0 Then those of our own fundamental Baptist persuasion such as\u00a0 BBC, Faith, Central, and their offshoots have faithfully trained ministry-minded young people for generations.\u00a0 These schools have been responsible for thousands of souls being saved and churches being planted.\u00a0 The benefit to America in the last century is immeasurable.<\/p>\n Negative observations<\/span><\/p>\n One cannot help but see the negative trends in our recent history.\u00a0 Some are obvious to all, such as the afore-mentioned liberalism in the SBC, or the worldliness in colleges such as Wheaton and others.\u00a0 Some negatives are not seen as negatives at all to many people in ministry.\u00a0 So these are my observations from being in and around a lot of conservative movements, schools, and churches over the last fifty to sixty years.<\/p>\n Misplaced loyalties<\/span>.\u00a0 I am one who treasures loyalties.\u00a0 We are all loyal to our families in good times and bad.\u00a0 We are loyal to our churches because they are God\u2019s people and the church is His institution.\u00a0 We are loyal to God\u2019s Word because it is the absolute Truth in a world of untruth.\u00a0 In order to propagate these divine institutions we need human institutions for various reasons.\u00a0 Schools, boards, conventions and associations, camps, retreats, etc., are tools we use to build the ministry.\u00a0 Over the last century these have come and gone in their usefulness.\u00a0 Some are short-lived and some remain throughout the century.\u00a0 Some are slowly compromising or becoming worldly.\u00a0 I guess it is that human nature of loyalty that makes separation hard to do.\u00a0 Yet there have been many circumstances over the last 100 years where people have become more loyal to an organization than to the Word of God.\u00a0 Sometimes it is a matter of personal conviction of one and not another, and sometimes it is a matter of position that one is not willing to forgo.\u00a0 But separation is a Biblical doctrine and sometimes God\u2019s people need to walk away from an organization that has left its Biblical foundation.<\/p>\n Need for success<\/span>.\u00a0 We are glad for great men and women.\u00a0 I have mentioned a few positively in this article.\u00a0 We are also glad for churches and schools and agencies that have been successful in our lifetime.\u00a0 Success, however, should not be measured by the praise of men but by faithfulness to God.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think great men ever wanted to be great.\u00a0 In fact, I\u2019m sure of it.\u00a0 Great men (and women) wanted to be men of God and God used them in great ways so we call them great.\u00a0 I doubt that William Carey went to India to be great, or that Fanny Crosby wrote songs so that 100 years later we could praise her for them.\u00a0 But I fear that we want to be great.\u00a0 We \u201cbuild\u201d churches and schools.\u00a0 We teach young people how to be great.\u00a0 We reward one another when we become great.\u00a0 We even create greatness by award and eulogy.\u00a0 This is difficult to say.\u00a0 It is not wrong to recognize and thank people for their service.\u00a0 But I think you know what I mean about a phenomenon that we\u2019ve observed in our lifetime.\u00a0 I watched someone on television being praised for a record number of \u201clikes\u201d she got on Facebook.\u00a0 I hope that can never be applied to Christianity.<\/p>\n Pragmatism<\/span>.\u00a0 Pragmatism and methodology can be good or bad.\u00a0 America has become what it has become because it could always figure out a way to get things done, whether agriculture, industry, military, education, etc.\u00a0 These things have been debated throughout the twentieth century among various ministries.\u00a0 Yet sometimes these discussions are reduced to unhelpful absurdities.\u00a0 Do padded seats help our services?\u00a0 Is air conditioning better?\u00a0 Is amplification helpful to the sermon.\u00a0 Well, of course.\u00a0 But be absurd to the other extreme.\u00a0 Would giving away one hundred dollar bills increase professions of faith?\u00a0 Would indecency help promote youth activities?\u00a0 Would free beer increase attendance at the rescue mission?\u00a0 These are methodologies too.\u00a0 Yet the crossing of the line in the gray areas has grown with almost no objections.\u00a0 I cannot believe that candy on church buses is the same thing as a Christian rock concert when it comes to acceptable methodology.<\/p>\n Worldliness<\/span>.\u00a0 Or should I say the lack of godliness?\u00a0 Here too Christians differ to various degrees, but the last century has no doubt seen the church become much more comfortable in the world.\u00a0 This is true in the believer\u2019s personal life and in the church as well.\u00a0 One could trace the changes made in church covenants in the last 100 years, or the standards for students at Christian colleges, or the rules for kids at youth camps, and it might be surprising how far we\u2019ve come.\u00a0 But we say, time and culture change and what was once unacceptable is no longer so today.\u00a0 And I\u2019m sure that is true.\u00a0 But is that the way we evaluate worldliness?\u00a0 Are we only supposed to be a few steps behind the world but going in the same direction?\u00a0 In a world of entertainment, selfishness, immorality, and profanity, it is not acceptable to be on the same path but only lagging a few steps behind.<\/p>\n Coldness.<\/span>\u00a0 Having closed the twentieth century and begun the twenty first, are we more enthusiastic for the things of God and His ministry than our forefathers?\u00a0 The great irony here might be that they preached the coming of Christ and the need for aggressive evangelism because the time was short.\u00a0 Yet we are now closer to His coming than they were but we don\u2019t seem to have the same concern.\u00a0 We have fewer church services, not more.\u00a0 We have all but eliminated the gospel invitation.\u00a0 We don\u2019t seem to be the kind of soul winners or evangelistic people as those a generation ago.\u00a0 Perhaps our evangelistic concern is being manifested in different ways, but I\u2019m not convinced they are as good as before.<\/p>\n I remember the term \u201cpre-evangelism\u201d being used a while ago.\u00a0 It was a term that meant that rather than actually giving out the gospel per se, we should work more on tilling the ground, and planting and watering rather than actually reaping the newly converted soul.\u00a0 Of course this must be done also.\u00a0 But it seems as though 99% of all evangelism has become pre-evangelism, and if everything is pre-evangelism, nothing is evangelism.\u00a0 I remember when, in the name of Evangelicals and Catholics Together, we evangelized all Catholics simply by calling them born again Christians (I called it re-definition evangelism).\u00a0 I\u2019m sure our missionaries in Catholic countries wished we had done that before they spent all they had.\u00a0 I\u2019m simply saying that we have become busier but not more evangelistic.\u00a0 We have many programs, activities, concerts, etc., but these have taken the place of evangelism, they are not simply new ways of doing the same thing.<\/p>\n Three suggestions<\/span><\/p>\n Let me conclude with three suggestions, or prayers, for fundamental Baptists who live in the twenty first century.<\/p>\n Love the brethren.\u00a0 This Biblical admonition should be taken two ways.\u00a0 First we need to love our Christian neighbor, that is, the person who is there.\u00a0 It is never right to be unchristian toward anyone, but especially another Christian.\u00a0 God\u2019s children are our brothers and sisters.\u00a0 Secondly, we should love the idea of brethren.\u00a0 We should actually desire to be the epitome of what a Christian ought to be, and then be that Christian.\u00a0 This is the best kind of life we can live on God\u2019s earth.\u00a0 If we truly love the \u201cbrotherhood,\u201d\u00a0 then we love what we believe and will become a reflection of the same.<\/p>\n Love the church.\u00a0 The local church of the New Testament is what we see going on in the New Testament.\u00a0 This group of believers that gather each Lord\u2019s day is the best group of people we could ever be around.\u00a0 What we do when we gather is what we need to be doing and what the world needs to see.\u00a0 I often say to my people, we don\u2019t gather together to worship, we\u2019re worshipers who gather together.\u00a0 I don\u2019t say that to belittle worship but to emphasize how precious this gathering together is.\u00a0 There should be no greater priority for the believer.<\/p>\n Love the ordinances.\u00a0 God gave us two object lessons to observe faithfully.\u00a0 When we see these we are seeing the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.\u00a0 We are seeing the very work He came to do which reminds us of Him and our faith in Him.\u00a0 They can\u2019t be done with extra human instrument.\u00a0 They are simple but profound, they are plain but beautiful, mysterious but revealing.\u00a0 We can preach no greater sermon than these.<\/p>\n And So . . .<\/b><\/p>\n I\u2019ve made these personal evaluations both positive and negative.\u00a0 We have much to be thankful for over the last 100 years in our Baptist history and also in evangelical history.\u00a0 Christianity has been good for America.\u00a0 We also have things we need to be careful about.\u00a0 Some of these things we will differ over and practice according to our own conscience, but we must not go the way of the world.\u00a0 God has given us a plain Word to follow and we will be judged by that Word.<\/p>\n Finally, we need to love the very faith we profess.\u00a0 If we do we will desire to know what God has said and we will find our joy and fulfillment in doing that.\u00a0 We will add to our faith virtue and to our virtue knowledge.\u00a0 These things will end with brotherly kindness and love, \u201cFor if these things be in you and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ\u201d (2 Pet. 1:5-11).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Over the last 23 years that I have been writing this paper, and the last 50 years that I have been connected with Christian ministry, many things have come and gone and many things have changed.\u00a0 If I think of the men I\u2019ve known, heard, sat under, or known about, you might say that I\u2019ve 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