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God's Renaissance ManGOD'S RENAISSANCE MAN When Abraham Kuyper was invited to lecture at Princeton Seminary in 1898 he chose the somewhat uninspiring title, 'Lectures on Calvinism'. The college allotted him an hour per session. He insisted on 90 minutes. He went on for two hours. Yet his audience remained spellbound throughout the 10-day course. Would that we had an Abraham Kuyper to deliver the same material in this country today - for the material is as relevant now as then and more appropriate to the UK even than to the USA. (That it is available in print is already a providence: and a measure of the value set upon this particular summary is the suggestion that the Stone lectures be purchased with it, preferably in the order 'Kuyper first and then McGoldrick'!).(1) Not that Kuyper was without mistakes. He wasn't - and McGoldrick is careful to clarify these, as well as the misrepresentations of sincere but misguided followers. But Kuyper was pointing in the right direction. And for that reason alone is worth reading. For what Kuyper believed passionately in 1898 was that a humanistic world-view had been unleashed upon formerly Christian Europe (and America) which had the power to destroy all that was precious in its heritage: and that only the Reformation view of truth, best represented by the Reformed faith, was able to withstand and reverse it. Has anything changed? Ironically, yes. A century after the Stone Lectures, Western society declines rapidly into meaninglessness and barbarism. Therefore, the possibility of mounting a powerful intellectual and cultural challenge against modernism and post-modernism (the second merely a logical extension of the first let it be carefully said), with the truth of God's revealed Word has enlarged since Kuyper's day. Sadly, however, evangelicalism has become more ignorant of her earlier reformed heritage, has failed to grasp its scope and power and opted instead for traditionalism, pietistic and formalised preaching, or religious hype. Or worse still, has belittled it intellectually in the name of contemporaneity and modern scholarship. So she remains ineffectual in dealing with the challenges of a post-Christian culture. 'The hungry sheep look upwards and still they are not fed' as John Roberts, the historian, put it in the mid-80s. The Dutch experience, of course, is very different from our own. Kuyper formed a new political party called The Anti-Revolutionary Party (against the humanistic social ideas of the French Revolutionary era). He also spearheaded what was called the 'Doleantie', a separation from the State church. He poured his energies into Christian papers and journals. He founded a separate Christian university, the Free University of Amsterdam. As Prime Minister between 1901 and 1905 he introduced legislation to provide state support for church schools. None of which, he would have been the first to insist, needs slavishly to be applied within alternative political and social contexts. Does this make the study of Kuyper a waste of time? By no means. Only a fresh recovery of the glory of Christian Truth can spur us to appropriate action in the present. And Kuyper is as great a stimulus to godly thought and action as can be found within the past 200 years whether one agrees with him or not, never coldly academic, always, like Calvin, reflecting an ardent love of Christ and devotion to prayer. With that in mind, a more felicitous title than Renaissance Man (with its humanistic connotations) could surely have been chosen by the publishers: and the author disappoints at times with a lack of Kuyper's fizz and sparkle. The bibliography, however, is a delight and deserves special commendation. Ranald Macaulay(1) Available as 'The Crown of Christian Heritage' from L'Abri Fellowship, Manor House, Greatham, GU33 6HF, fax: 01420 538 432, email: L_AbriUK@compuserve.com © Evangelicals Now - October 2000 |