Among those who rediscovered the power of Puritan faith and piety in the 20th Century, the name of J. I. Packer stands out prominently. This week, we read Ian Hamilton’s editorial ‘The Essential Packer’, and proceed to the first portion of a probing article from Packer on ‘Puritan Evangelism’.
Featured Content:
– ‘The Essential J.I. Packer’, Ian Hamilton, editorial of Banner of Truth Magazine Issue 685, October 2020.
– ‘Puritan Evangelism’, J. I. Packer, Banner of Truth Magazine Issue 4, February 1957.
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[Music] welcome to the banner of Truth magazine podcast where each week we bring you selected content from the magazine for your encouragement and [Music] edification this week on the podcast we’ll hear something about and then something from the late much respected J Packer our first piece from former magazine editor Ian Hamilton is from the 685 issue of the magazine which came out in October 2020 it is entitled The Essential ji [Music] Packer the death of ji Packer on the 11th of July 2020 marked the passing of an Evangelical era Jim Packer along with fellow Anglican Alec Matia stood for all that is best in anglicanism its reformed and Puritan Heritage its robust Fidelity to the truth of Holy Scripture and its commitment to Preparing men theologically and pastorally for the work of the ministry both men were noted first for their Godly piety and then for their scholarly Endeavors on behalf of the kingdom of God later in the magazine you will read a fuller reflective obituary of this faithful man of God my purpose in this editorial is to direct you to the essential Packer the following passage highlights what I think is the essential Packer Dr Packer did not teach and preach and write as an academic he was a scholar but in the best Puritan tradition a tradition he loved he was a pastor scholar he never forgot that his calling was not simply to equip men to be rightly taught but above all to inspire them to cultivate communion with God a communion that would impregnate their Ministries with a tinure of Heaven peka wrote The Following quote when Christians meet they talk to each other about their Christian work and Christian interests their Christian acquaintances the state of the churches and the problems of theology but rarely of their daily experience of God modern Christian books and magazines contain much about Christian doctrine Christian standards problems of Christian conduct techniques of Christian service but little about the inner realities of fellowship with God our sermons contain much sound Doctrine but little relating to the converse between the soul and the Savior we do not spend much time alone or together in dwelling on The Wonder of the fact that God and sinners have communion at all no we just take that for granted and give our minds to other matters thus we make it plain that communion with God is a small thing to us unquote these are stinging but true words Jesus said that eternal life was to know God and himself John 173 this was why he spent the greater part of his Farewell discourse John 14-17 unpacking for his disciples the multiplex reality of God and in so doing acquainting them with their vast and glorious gospel privileges Jim Packer should be remembered with with thankfulness to God for his gracious life and commitment to what the Puritans called experimental or experiential piety it would be remiss however not to mention one episode in his life which to a greater or lesser degree brought consternation even bewilderment to his spiritual and Theological friends in 1994 Packer along with some leading Evangelical figures and Roman Catholic theologians co-signed the statement evangelicals and Catholics together this joint statement on the doctrine of justification maintained that evangelicals and Roman Catholics essentially though from different perspectives held to the same doctrine of justification that Paca should have signed this statement is bewildering the Roman doctrine of justification in 1994 was exactly what it was when defined by the Council of Trent 1545 to 1563 during the sixth session the council issued a decree stating that if anyone saith that the Justice received is not preserved and also increased before God through good works but that the said works are merely the fruits and signs of justification obtained but not a cause of the increase thereof let him be anathema for Rome justification is God’s ongoing process of making a person new and good in order for the grace of justification to grow we must obey God’s commands the council also decided that justification can be lost by certain sins and that no man can be sure that he will be finally saved in this light it is bewildering that Dr Packer should have signed this ECT statement it was a huge error an error that marred his Evangelical Legacy James inel Pacer’s writings and he wrote much will long be treasured by Christians who desire to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ like few others of his conservative Evangelical contemporaries Packa wrote with a Clarity and conciseness that made his writings accessible to chrisan from all educational backgrounds perhaps he will be best remembered for his knowing god originally written as occasional articles for the Evangelical magazine knowing god became a publishing phenomenon when published in book form in 1973 it is thought that nearly 2 million copies have been sold clearly the title and the contents have resonated with successive generations of Christians my guess is that Jim Packer would have been more than satisfied that his name was indelibly associated with the highest of all Christian callings to know God and Jesus Christ whom he sent John 17:3 no greater epito could any man have he knew God and spent his life encouraging others to know him [Music] also [Music] our next selection Puritan evangelism comes from the pen of ji Packa himself and takes us back to Issue four of the banner of Truth magazine which was published in February 1957 because of the length of pac’s piece we’ll spread it across two weeks here then is part one where Paca introduces us to the phenomenon that he calls modern evangelism [Music] in the report of the archbishop’s committee on evangelism published in 1945 under the title towards the conversion of England the work of evangelism is conveniently defined as follows so to present Christ Jesus in the power of the holy spirit that men shall come to put their trust in God through him to accept him as their Savior and serve him as their King in Fellowship of his church did the Puritans tackle the task of evangelism at all at first sight it might seem not they agreed with Calvin in regarding the evangelists mentioned in the New Testament as an order of assistance to the apostles now extinct and as for Missions Crusades and campaigns they knew neither the name nor the thing but we must not be misled into supposing that evangelism was not one of their chief concerns it was many of them were outstandingly successful as preachers to the unconverted Richard Baxter the Apostle of kidderminster is perhaps the only one of these that is widely remembered today but in contemporary records it is common to read statements like this of Hugh Clark he begat many sons and daughters unto God or this of John Cotton the presence of the Lord crowning his labors with the conversion of many Souls moreover it was the Puritans who invented Evangelistic literature one has only to think of Baxter’s classic call to the unconverted and Joseph elain’s alarm to the unconverted which were Pioneer Works in this class of writing and the elaborate practical handling of the the subject of conversion in puritan books was regarded by the rest of the 17th century Protestant world as something of unique value it have been one of the glories of the Protestant religion that it revived the doctrine of saving conversion and of the new creature brought forth thereby but in a more eminent manner God hath cast the honor hereof upon the ministers and preachers of this nation who were renowned abroad for their more accurate search into and discoveries hereof this is from Goodwin and ny’s preface to Thomas hooker’s the application of redemption 1656 the truth is that two distinct conceptions and types of evangelism have been developed in Protestant Christendom during the course of its history we may call them the Puritan type and the modern type today we are so accustomed to evangelism of of the modern type that we scarcely recognize the other as evangelism at all in order that we may fully grasp the character of the Puritan type of evangelism I shall here set it in contrast with the modern type which has so largely superseded it at the present time let us begin therefore by characterizing evangelism of the modern type it seems to presuppose a conception of the life of the local church as an alter ating cycle of converting and edifying evangelism almost takes on the character of a periodical recruiting campaign it is an extraordinary and occasional activity additional and auxiliary to the regular functioning of the local congregation special Gatherings of a special sort are arranged and special preachers are commonly secured to conduct them often they are called meetings rather than services in any case they are thought of as something distinct in some way from the regular public worship of God in the meetings everything is directly aimed at securing from the unconverted an immediate conscious decisive Act of Faith In Christ at the close of the meeting those who have responded or wish to do so are asked to come to the front or raise a hand or something similar as an act of public testimony to their new resolutions this it is claimed is good for those who do it since it helps to make their decision definite and it has the further advantage of making them declare themselves so that they may be contacted individually by personal workers such persons May then be advised and drafted forthwith into local churches as converts this type of of evangelism was invented by Charles G Finny in the 1820s he introduced the protracted meeting or as we should call it the Intensive Evangelistic campaign and the anxious seat a front Pew left vacant where at the end of the meeting the anxious may come and be addressed particularly to quote finny and sometimes be conversed with individually at the end of his sermon he would say there is the anxious seat come out and avow determination to be on the Lord’s Side see his revivals of religion especially chapter 14 these were finny’s much opposed new measures now finny was a clear-headed and self-confessed pelagian in his doctrine of man and this is the reason why his new measures were evolved finny denied that Fallen man is totally unable to repent believe or do anything spiritually good without Grace and affirmed instead that all men have plener ability to turn to God at any time man is a rebel but is perfectly free at any time to lay down his arms in surrender accordingly the whole work of the spirit of God in conversion is to present vividly to man’s mind reasons for making this surrender that is to say the spirit’s work is confined to moral persuasion man is always free to reject this persuasion Sinners can go to hell in spite of God but the stronger the persuasion is the more likely it is to succeed in the breaking down of man’s resistance every means therefore of increasing the force and vividness with which the truth impinged on the mind the most Frenzy excitement the most harrowing emotionalism the most nerve-wracking commotion in Evangelistic meetings was a right and proper means of evangelism finny gave expression to this principle in the first of his lectures on revivals of religion quote to expect to promote religion without excitements is unphilosophical and absurd until there is sufficient religious principle in the world to put down irreligious excitements it is in vain to try to promote religion except by counteracting excitements there must be excitement sufficient to wake up the dormant moral Powers unquote and since every man if he will only Rouse up his dormant moral powers can at any time yield to God and become a Christian it is the evangelist’s work and Duty always to preach for immediate decision to tell men that it is their duty to come to Christ that instant and to use all means such as the rousing appeal and the anxious seat for persuading them to do so I tried to shut them up he says of a typical Mission sermon to present faith and repentance as the thing which God required of them present and instant acceptance of his will present and instant acceptance of Christ that is from his autobiography page 64 it is hardly too much to say that finny regarded Evangelistic preaching as a battle of wills between himself and his hearers in which it was his responsibility to bring them to Breaking Point now if Finn’s doctrine of the natural state of sinful man is right then his Evangelistic methods must be judged right or also for as he often insisted the new measures were means well adapted to what he held to be the end in View and as BB Warfield commented it is in such practices that a pelagian system naturally expresses itself if it seeks to become aggressively Evangelistic but if finny’s view of man is wrong then his methods as we shall see must be judged disastrous and this is an issue of the first importance at the present time for it is phine methods modified and adapted which characterize most evangelism today we do not suggest that all who use them are pelagians but we do raise the question whether the use of such methods is consistent with any other Doctrine than Fin’s and we shall try to show that if finny’s Doctrine is rejected then such methods must be judged inappropriate and indeed detrimental to the real work of evangelism it may be said that results justify their use but the truth is that the majority of Finn’s converts backslid and fell away and so it seems have the majority of those since finny’s day whose decision has been secured by the use of such methods most modern evangelists seem to have given up expecting more than a small percentage of their converts to survive it is not at all obvious that results justify such methods we shall suggest later that they have a natural tendency to produce such a crop of false converts as has in fact resulted from their use that then was Pacer’s outlining of the nature of modern evangelism do tune in next Monday for the second part of the article where Paca points the way to the healthier path pursued by the Puritans a path which honors the Bible’s Revelation by looking to God alone for the Salvation he has provided through Christ and by the power of the holy [Music] spirit thank you for listening to the banner of Truth magazine podcast to subscribe to the magazine in print or digital formats or both see the show notes or visit Banner of truth.or [Music] RG