The Forgotten Henry | Tim Brister

The Quotable Henry: The Love of God

Tim Brister — July 21, 2013 — Leave a comment

Previous on The Quotable Henry:
* On Civic Engagement
* The Calling of the Church
* Having An Evangelical Worldview

“The believer’s personal debt of love to God and his passion for the lost impel him, so that Christian activity transcends the antithesis of spiritual and social service.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, “Perspective for Social Action Part II,” Christianity Today 3 (February 2, 1959): 16.

“Whenever love triumphs at the expense of holiness, whenever love takes the priority over righteousness, we have moved outside the scriptural orbit.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, Aspects of Christian Social Ethics (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 169.

“Christian holiness issues no license for the ecstatic enjoyment of the vision of God as a merely private option; rather, it insists that love of God reflects itself in love for neighbor, and enlists men of piety as sacrificial servants of their fellows.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, “Perspective for Social Action Part II,” Christianity Today 3 (February 2, 1959): 16.

“He who withholds love from another because he considers him unworthy removes himself from the love God manifests to us in the gift and death of Christ while we were yet sinners, yea, actually enemies of God.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, “Perspective for Social Action Part II,” Christianity Today 3 (February 2, 1959): 16.

“The compassionate factor in the Christian social thrust, with its eye on the value of the individual, delivers social service from its impersonal tendency to deal with the people as merely so many cases or illustrations of a given complex of circumstances. Social compassion thus holds status as a prime motive and duty of the Church.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, “Perspective for Social Action Part II,” Christianity Today 3 (February 2, 1959): 16.

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The Quotable Henry: Having An Evangelical Worldview

Tim Brister — July 14, 2013 — Leave a comment

Previously quoted:

* On Civic Engagement
* The Calling of the Church

“[Christianity] rejects the charge that the Fundamentalist ideology logically involves an indifference to social evils, and presses the contention that the non-evangelical ideology involves an essential inability to right the world order. It is discerning anew that an assault on global evils is not only consistent with, but rather demanded by, its proper world-life view.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1947), 40.

“When we turn to the religion of the Bible, we find a lively interest in both the individual and in society, indeed in God’s righteous will for his whole creation. The God of revelation wishes to etch his law upon every last human heart. He seeks a righteous society and seeks to extend His holy purposes throughout the cosmos.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, “The Tensions Between Evangelism and the Christian Demand for Social Justice,” Fides et historia 2 (Spring 1972): 4.

“The message of divine creation and redemption thus comprehends both the individual life in its private growth and the redeemed man in all his social and cultural life. The awareness of biblical revelation as relevant to the whole of life grants contemporary civilization the living prospect of a rationally satisfying explanation of human aspirations and problems.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, Evangelical Responsibility in Contemporary Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1957), 65.

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The Quotable Henry: The Calling of the Church

Tim Brister — July 7, 2013 — 1 Comment

Previously:
* On Civic Engagement

The Calling of the Church

“If the new man is eclipsed in present daily life, and the new society is but a future vision, then contemporary alternatives to the Truth will rush in to fill the yawning gap of a plummeting world. Like a street corner observer, the church will be only watching the passing parade instead of leading and directing the rescue.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, “The New Man and the New Society” in God, Revelation, and Authority: God Who Speaks and Shows. vol. IV (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1979), 541.

“The church which bears his name is already called, now, to challenge and contain powers of evil: as the living Body of its living head the church is now to resist the Evil One, not to indict rampant injustices and support the afflicted and oppressed, now to sensitize moral conscience against wrong and for the right, now to exhibit the purpose of God in a new life and a new community while it proclaims the revealed truth and will of God.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, “Good News for the Oppressed” in God, Revelation, and Authority: God Who Speaks and Shows. vol. IV (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1979), 545-46.

“As never before the church needs to exercise her total witness to the world in the context of the truth of revelation and of the reality of redemption.”

– Carl F. H. Henry, A Plea for Evangelical Demonstration (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1971), 123.

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While in seminary, I devoted over a year of research on the uneasy conscience of Carl F.H. Henry. During that time, I believe I photocopied every journal and magazine article authored by Henry regarding social reform and cultural engagement. This “side project” was one of the most rewarding theological explorations as I came to appreciate the careful and robust thinking of this man with such an uneasy conscience. In fact, I became convinced that Henry, during this life and work, developed the most comprehensive theological framework for social justice and cultural engagement from an evangelical perspective.

Given that 2013 is the 100th anniversary of his birth, I’d like to post Henry in his own words from some of the research I gathered, which, at one time was to be turned into The Forgotten Henry (a book-length project). In any case, I hope this series of quotes from Carl Henry will prove insightful to contemporary issues and serve as pathways into further exploration of his thought on these important matters.

Henry on Civic Engagement

“Christian duty in the social order does not stop with warnings. The Christian prays daily, and out to work daily, for God’s will to be done on earth, as in heaven. As a citizen of two worlds he will engage actively wherever possible in the struggle for social righteousness to the full limit of personal ability and competence.”

Carl F. H. Henry, A Plea for Evangelical Demonstration (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1971), 122.

“In and through its evangelistic mission to the world, the church is to enunciate and implement the revealed principles that God addresses to the human race by exemplary Christian leadership to the whole realm of public affairs.”

Carl F. H. Henry, “Good News for the Oppressed” in God, Revelation, and Authority: God Who Speaks and Shows. vol. IV (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1979), 551.

“Evangelical Christians cannot deny or by-pass engagement in the areas of political and social science nor dare they neglect the training of leaders in public affairs who engage in social criticism from an authentically biblical perspective. Simply to say that evangelicals must become more socially involved provides little perceptive guidance if the implementing of solutions is forfeited to nonevangelicals. Christians must speak not as outside or of peripheral to the movements of human transformation, but as central participants and agents in it.”

Carl F. H. Henry, “Good News for the Oppressed” in God, Revelation, and Authority: God Who Speaks and Shows. vol. IV (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1979), 553.

Happy 100th Birthday, Carl F.H. Henry!

Tim Brister — January 22, 2013 — Leave a comment

Today marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Carl F.H. Henry. While in seminary, I don’t think there was another theologian who influenced me more. In my free time, I spent dozens of hours collecting all of Henry’s work in journals, magazines, and books in hopes of one day doing advanced studies on his uneasy conscience for the 21st century.

In one of my classes, Fundamentalism & Evangelicalism, I wrote a paper called “Surgeon for Social Change: Carl F.H. Henry and the New Evangelical Conscience. It was the beginning of my exploration of this man’s legacy of thought. I thought in honor of his 100th birthday, I’d post it here on my blog for those interested in reading it.

Thanks, Carl Henry, for your incredible mind, and even more, your uneasy conscience.

» Surgeon for Social Change – Carl F. H. Henry and the New Evangelical Conscience

In The Forgotten Henry 100th Birthday Anniversary, Carl F.H. Henry, Carl Henry, Uneasy Conscience

Archives For The Forgotten Henry

The Quotable Henry: Having An Evangelical Worldview

The Quotable Henry: The Calling of the Church

The Calling of the Church

The Quotable Henry: On Civic Engagement

Henry on Civic Engagement

Happy 100th Birthday, Carl F.H. Henry!

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