Multicultural Ministry Matters

Were there no sin, there would be no war. Were there no world sin, there would be no world war. War makes at least one contribution to human salvation—it is sin’s apocalypse. It reveals the greatness and the awfulness of evil, and corrects that light and easy conception of it which had come to mark culture and belittle redemption. This war’s revelation of human wickedness may perhaps do something to relieve us of a comely and aesthetic type of religion which is rounded, not on a salvation, but on the divine excellence of that glorious creature man, and on the facilities for his evolution. It may recall us to the estimate of him presented by the very existence of Christianity as a religion, which declares his one need to be redemption. P. T. Forsyth, The Justification of God , Adelaide: New Creation Publications, 1988 [London, Independent Press, 1917], page 19. The demonic is absolutely essential in understanding Jesus’ interpretation of the picture of sin and of humanity’s need for the...

Here's a couple more quotable quotes from P. T. Forsyth. On Church and Mission: [T]he minister’s effect upon missions will depend in the long run upon the kind of Gospel he preaches – not to his own people only, but, as the trustee and representative of his Church, to his age. After all it is not the missionaries, nor the ministers, nor the people that are to convert the world. It is the Gospel, and our certainty of it. Revelation Old and New :53. On Presbyterianism: It was Calvinism alone, or that side of the Reformation, that mostly made the Puritans. And the unalloyed outcome of such Puritanism was Presbyterianism. Faith, Freedom and the Future : 46-47

Calvinism strongly affirms that God chooses us before we choose him. The only reason we decide to follow Christ, to trust him for our forgiveness, is that God works in us to humble us, give us a sense of our sin, and make Christ attractive to us. This is the famous Calvinist doctrine of Predestination. Calvinism therefore destroys freedom. Predestination inevitably leads to a depressing, destructive, life-denying fatalism. God decides who’s going to be saved and who’s not; it’s all his choice in the end. So what’s the point of doing evangelism, or any other human activity at all? We’re just toys in the hands of the cosmic vivisectionist (pardon the mixed metaphor...). Right? Not according to P. T. Forsyth. ----- What was it that made the tremendous strength of Calvinism? What makes some form of Calvinism indispensable and immortal? It was this: that it cared more to secure the freedom of God than of man. That is what it found in the Cross. That is why it has been the greatest contribut...

ORRIGHT! This is the best thing I've learned in Hobart! And I don't think anything's gonna top it...! Those of you who are my Facebook friends (yeah, I'm on there as well...) know that P. T. Forsyth is my hero. He's a little-known, under-appreciated, Scottish-born, German-trained, early-twentieth century English Congregationalist minister. He trained for ministry in the late 19th century, when theological Liberalism was all the rage. At that time, sin, judgement, Christ's death as atonement, etc, were all dismissed as "outdated notions". In his early days, he was a thoroughgoing Liberal. Nevertheless, as he did ministry and read the Bible, he became convinced that God was holy, and that he, P. T. Forsyth, was a sinner - a rebel against this most holy God. And he became convinced that the only way of being reconciled to this most holy God was through Christ's mighty act of atonement - the cross. It was a change of attitude that can only be described...