Michael Haykin, professor of church history at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, writes ...
Near the beginning of the funeral sermon that John Ryland, Jr. (1753-1825) preached for Andrew Fuller in 1815, Ryland described Fuller as “perhaps the most judicious and able theological writer that ever belonged to our [i.e. the Calvinistic Baptist] denomination.” Although Fuller was Ryland’s closest friend and confidant, his judgment is by no means skewed. Joseph Belcher, the editor of the final edition of Fuller’s collected works, believed that his works would “go down to posterity side by side with the immortal works of the elder president Edwards [i.e. Jonathan Edwards, Sr.],” while Charles Haddon Spurgeon once described Fuller as “the greatest theologian” of his century. What contributed to these judgments, which this writer wholeheartedly endorses?
Well, first of all, there is the fact that Fuller penned the definitive response to High Calvinism that had crippled his fellow Baptists in The Gospel Worthy of All Acceptation (first edition, 1785). A preliminary draft of this work was written by 1778. In what was roughly its final form it was completed by 1781. Two editions of the work were published in Fuller’s lifetime. The first edition, published in Northampton in 1785, was subtitled The Obligations of Men Fully to Credit, and Cordially to Approve, Whatever God Makes Known, Wherein is Considered the Nature of Faith in Christ, and the Duty of Those where the Gospel Comes in that Matter. The second edition, which appeared in 1801, was more simply subtitled The Duty of Sinners to Believe in Jesus Christ, a subtitle which well expressed the overall theme of the book. There were substantial differences between it and the second edition (1801), which Fuller freely admitted and which primarily related to the doctrine of particular redemption. The work’s major theme remained unaltered, however: ‘faith in Christ is the duty of all men who hear, or have opportunity to hear, the gospel’. This epoch-making book sought to be faithful to the central emphases of historic Calvinism while at the same time attempting to leave preachers with no alternative but to drive home to their hearers the universal obligations of repentance and faith.
With regard to Fuller’s own ministry, the book was a key factor in determining the shape of that ministry in the years to come. For instance, it led directly to Fuller’s whole-hearted involvement in the formation of the Baptist Missionary Society in October 1792 and the subsequent sending of the Society’s most famous missionary, William Carey (1761-1834), to India in 1793. Fuller also served as secretary of this society until his death in 1815. The work of the mission consumed an enormous amount of Fuller’s time as he regularly toured the country, representing the mission and raising funds. On average he was away from home three months of the year. Between 1798 and 1813, moreover, he made five lengthy trips to Scotland for the mission as well as undertaking journeys to Wales and Ireland (1804). He also carried on an extensive correspondence on the mission’s behalf.
Fuller’s commitment to the Baptist Missionary Society was not only rooted in his missionary theology but also in his deep friendship with Carey. Fuller later compared the sending of Carey to India as the lowering of him into a deep gold-mine. Fuller and his close friends, Sutcliff and Ryland, had pledged themselves to ‘hold the ropes’ as long as Carey lived. No wonder, Carey would say of Fuller: “I loved him.”
His demolition of High Calvinism revealed Fuller to be an indefatigable and fearless Baptist theologian and minister, characteristics revealed in other vital areas of theological debate. In 1793 he issued an extensive refutation of the Socinianism of Joseph Priestley (1733-1804)—The Calvinistic and Socinian Systems examined and Compared, as to their Moral Tendency. Due to the vigorous campaigning of Priestley, Socinianism, which denied the Trinity and the deity of Christ, had become the leading form of heterodoxy within English Dissent in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. Fuller’s rebuttal of Socinianism well displays the Christocentric nature of eighteneth-century Evangelical thought. Fuller ably showed that the early Church made the divine dignity and glory of Christ’s person ‘their darling theme’.
In 1800 Fuller published The Gospel Its Own Witness, the definitive eighteenth-century Baptist response to Deism, in particular that of the popularizer Thomas Paine (1737-1809). This work was one of the most popular of Fuller’s books, going through three editions by 1802 and being reprinted a number of times in the next thirty years. William Wilberforce (1759-1833), who admired Fuller as a theologian and who once graphically described him as ‘the very picture of a blacksmith’, considered it to be the most important of all of Fuller’s writings. The work has two parts. In the first, Fuller compares and contrasts the moral effects of Christianity with those of Deism. The second part of the book aims to demonstrate the divine origin of Christianity from the general consistency of the Scriptures.
Yet another vital controversy in which Fuller engaged was that with the Sandemanians, the followers of Robert Sandeman (1718-1771), who distinguished themselves from other eighteenth-century Evangelicals by a predominantly intellectualist view of faith. They became known for their cardinal theological tenet that saving faith is ‘bare belief of the bare truth’. In a genuine desire to exalt the utter freeness of God’s salvation, Sandeman had sought to remove any vestige of human reasoning, willing or desiring in the matter of saving faith.
In his Strictures on Sandemanianism (1810) Fuller makes a couple of telling points. First, if faith does concern only the mind, then there would be no way to distinguish genuine Christianity from nominal Christianity. A nominal Christian mentally assents to the truths of Christianity, but those truths do not grip the heart and re-orient his or her affections. Then, knowledge of Christ is a distinct type of knowledge. Knowing him, for instance, involves far more than knowing certain things about him, such as the fact of his virgin birth or the details of his crucifixion. It involves a desire for fellowship with him and a delight in his presence.
But Fuller was far more than an apologist and mission secretary. Alongside his apologetic works, Fuller exercised a significant pastoral ministry at Kettering. During his thirty-three years at Kettering, from 1782 to 1815, the membership of the church more than doubled (from 88 to 174) and the number of ‘hearers’ was often over a thousand, necessitating several additions to the church building. Perusal of his vast correspondence—today housed in the Angus Library, Regent’s Park College, the University of Oxford—reveals that Fuller was first and foremost a pastor. And though he did not always succeed, he constantly sought to ensure that his many other responsibilities did not encroach upon those related to the pastorate.
One other of Fuller’s literary works deserves mention. His Memoirs of the Rev. Samuel Pearce (1800) recount the life of his close friend, Samuel Pearce (1766-1799) of Birmingham. In some ways modeled after Jonathan Edwards’ life of David Brainerd, it recounted the life of one whom Fuller regarded as a model of Evangelical spirituality. Through the medium of Fuller’s book Pearce’s extraordinary passion for Christ—which led to his being labeled the ‘seraphic Pearce’ by contemporaries—and his zeal for missions had a powerful impact on his generation.
Fuller had remarkable stores of physical and mental energy that allowed him to accomplish all that he did. But it was not without cost to his body. What he called a ‘paralytic stroke’ in 1793 left him rarely free of severe headaches for the rest of his life. And in his last fifteen years he was rarely well. Taken seriously ill in September 1814, his health began to seriously decline. By the spring of the following year he was dying. He preached for the last time at Kettering on 2 April 1815 and died 7 May. He was 62.
His funeral was attended by an immense crowd which one estimate put at 2,000 persons. At Fuller’s request, his old friend, John Ryland, preached the funeral sermon. Based on Romans 8:10, it included a brief account of Fuller’s final days and the following declaration made by Fuller in his last letter to Ryland. ‘I have preached and written much against the abuse of the doctrine of grace’, Fuller wrote, ‘but that doctrine is all my salvation and all my desire. I have no other hope than from salvation by mere sovereign, efficacious grace through the atonement of my Lord and Saviour’.
The importance of his theological achievements was noted during and after his life. The College of New Jersey (1798) and Yale (1805) awarded him a DD, both of which he declined to accept. As has been noted, Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892) did not hesitate to describe Fuller as ‘the greatest theologian’ of his century, while A. H. Newman (1852-1933) said that ‘his influence on American Baptists’ was ‘incalculable’. Without a doubt, he was the greatest theologian of the late eighteenth-century transatlantic Baptist community.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
ON READING ANDREW FULLER
Thursday, February 19, 2009
ON THE TONGUE
Helpful thoughts from a leading Irish biblical scholar:
The tongue is much more than what we actually say out loud. In fact actual speech is probably only a small percentage of the use of the tongue. We cannot think without formulating thoughts in words, we cannot plan without describing to ourselves step by step what we intend to do; we cannot imagine without painting a word-picture before our inward eyes; we cannot write a letter or a book without talking it through our mind on to the paper; we cannot resent without fuelling the fires of resentment in words addressed to ourselves; we cannot feel sorry for ourselves without listening to the self-pitying voice which tell us how hard done by we are. But if our tongue were so well under control that it refused to formulate the words of self-pity, the images of lustfulness, the thoughts of anger and resentment, then these things are cut down before they have a chance to live: the master-switch has deprived them of any power to switch on that side of our lives. It is in this way that if anyone does not stumble in word , he is a perfect man able also to bridle the whole body.
(from Alec Motyer, The Message of James, IVP)
Sunday, February 15, 2009
RELIGIOUS DISCRIMINATION IN UK
Growing evidence suggests that Christians are facing increasing discrimination in UK schools and health sector.
Over the last couple of weeks, media in the UK has highlighted a disturbing trend: increasing opposition to the articulation of Christian faith by public servants. A Christian nurse drew fire when offering to pray for a patient (here); and it was later revealed that NHS employees would be sacked if they discussed religion with patients (here). More recently it has become clear that teachers can be sacked if they discuss their own faith (and thereby fail to promote equality and diversity in the classroom) (here).
But now children in schools have been drawn into the fray: a primary school receptionist may be sacked after her daugher spoke to a school friend about heaven and hell. Read all about it here.
Friday, February 13, 2009
HOW WE THINK OF OURSELVES
Scripture speaks of God’s people in the language of saints. We do not. Scripture speaks of Christians as a family. We do not. Why is there such a difference between the way the Biblical writers describe us and the way that we describe ourselves?
Business people who attend assertiveness classes are taught about the important power of positive thinking. They learn the danger of negativity and especially the depressing consequences of working in an environment in which their status is constantly undermined. If someone keeps talking you down, sooner or later you’ll feel yourself on the ground.
The problem is that this kind of negativity has invaded the church – and we have unwittingly endorsed it. But modern Christians now talk themselves down. Older writers followed the Biblical example and kept their descriptions of Christians high – for these people, Christians were ‘saints’, and with respect to one another, we were to be ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’. But, by and large, we’ve abandoned the terms. We’re prepared to think of ourselves as something less than ‘saints’. We’re prepared to treat one another as something less than brothers and sisters. We’ve forgotten the metaphors and abandoned the power of Biblical thinking.
The metaphors are vitally important, because how we describe ourselves ultimately impacts how we behave. Think about it – how we describe ourselves is vitally important to who we believe we are; how we describe ourselves is basic to what we think about ourselves; how we think about ourselves is basic to the way we act.
Isn’t that the reason we have forgotten the Biblical identities we possess? We are reluctant to call each other ‘brother’ or ‘sister’ because we’re not prepared to act as if we were each other’s brother or sister. We are reluctant to call ourselves ‘saints’ because we’d rather not live under the expectations that name involves.
But these terms are important. Bible writers in both testaments use the term ‘saints’ to emphasise that God’s people are his ‘holy ones’. The New Testament epistles constantly reiterate that these saints have been brought into a family relationship with their heavenly Father, and hence with one another.
Thomas Goodwin has something vital to say about our forgotten metaphors. We should keep on calling ourselves ‘saints’, he writes, ‘that the reality of the true religion be not lowered (as it is) by avoiding this title, which in these times is out of use; but it is [out of use] because true holiness is out of fashion’ (Works vol. I, page 11).
Let’s recover the metaphors. Let’s embrace our identity as ‘saints’. Let’s embrace one another as the brothers and sisters of the family of God.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
SAVE OUR MISSIONARIES!
Aontas - the national association of evangelical churches in Ireland - has begun a campaign to protect the status of non-EU Christian workers in Ireland.
As many of you are aware the Government, in the middle of 2007, changed the procedures by which they allow missionaries to come into the country. Up until then people from non-EU countries had their visas stamped annually as a matter of course, subject only to Garda clearance. The change means that volunteer workers can now only stay in the country for a maximum of three years, this is having a profound affect on the Missionaries concerned and upon the churches they are working with.
To fully appreciate the affects of these changes please consider the following facts:
Churches Planted by Non-EU Missionaries 48 – 23% 34% of New Churches
Churches with significant Non-EU Missionary Involvement 57 – 27%
These figures are taken from research conducted by Aontas in early 2007 – listing evangelical churches from among Church of Ireland, Methodist, Presbyterian, Reformed Presbyterian, Baptist Association, Independent Baptist, Independent evangelicals, Brethren, and Pentecostals.
Towns with no churches:-
Number of Towns of a population of 15,000 or more with no Evangelical Witness – 17
Number of Towns of a population of 7,500 or more with no Evangelical Witness – 49
We are asking you to urgently visit or write your TDs and Senators in your area. We have prepared a briefing document which will help you prepare for the meeting. It is of vital importance that this is done in the next three weeks. New legislation is presently making it way thought the houses of the Oireachtas. The Senate is presently considering the bill, hence the reason we are asking you to visit both TDs and Senators.
Can I ask that if you have a particularly close relationship with any of the politicians, or if you know someone who does, can you please use your influence now for the good of the Kingdom.
Can we also ask that churches mobilise as many people as possible to visit with, or write to, their politicians.
Kind regards in Christ
____________________________
Paudge Mulvihill
Aontas’ Hon. Secretary
Thursday, February 5, 2009
CONSTITUTION OF NEW CHURCH
Arann Reformed Baptist Fellowship will formally constitute on Saturday 28 Februrary 2009, d.v.
An email from Mark Fitzpatrick ...
Dear Friends,
It is with great joy we invite you to join with us as we constitute as a Reformed and Evangelical Church. As many of you will know we have been meeting together on the Lord’s day since May ’07. The meeting for the purpose of Constituting will be held in the St John’s GAA Club, Ballinteer, Dublin 16 {Exit 13 off the M50}. For further help with directions see www.sermonaudio.com/arann. Time: 3pm, Saturday 28th February 2009
Pastor Malcolm Watts of Salisbury will Chair and preach at this meeting.
There will be light refreshments served after the meeting.
Please let us know if you plan to attend.
