Books

I first encountered the term “High Calvinism” when I read Lewis Chafer’s systematic theology. This term is a bit old-fashioned now, of course. If someone is a “High Calvinist,” it means he’s very Reformed in his soteriology. This surely described R.C. Sproul!

In a book entitled Willing to Believe: Understanding the Role of the Human Will in Salvation, Sproul provided a short historical theology of this topic by examining nine different theologians and their soteriological positions. In this excerpt, Sproul frames one part of this important issue:¹

This classic issue between Augustinian theology and all forms of semi-Pelagianism focuses on one aspect of the order of salvation (ordo salutis): What is the relationship between regeneration and faith? Is regeneration a monergistic or synergistic work? Must a person first exercise faith in order to be born again? Or must rebirth occur before a person is able to exercise faith? Another way to state the question is this: Is the grace of regeneration operative or cooperative?

Wycliffe Bible Translators is the largest and most influential evangelical mission of all time. Its ability to draw support from left-leaning evangelicals (and even some mainline churches) all the way down the spectrum to some fundamentalists is unique.

Because Wycliffe translates the Bible with a belief in its power to change lives, Bible-believing Christians of various stripes are enthusiastic about the end product: New Testaments (and sometimes entire Bibles) in the heart-languages of remote and not-so-remote people groups — be they large groups or small.

Wycliffe and its sister organization, Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL), have been part of a two-pronged approach with an unusually complicated relationship between them.
Like many monumental movements of the early and mid twentieth century, strong — sometimes overly strong — leaders can be found at the epicenter. Wycliffe/SIL ‘s epicenter was mission founder Cameron Townsend. Boone spends a lot of time discussing Townsend and his creative — albeit unorthodox — leadership.

Boone Aldridge, a true scholar in the realm of missions and himself part of Wycliffe, understands the organization like perhaps no one else on planet earth. He has immersed himself in the organization’s history — while also mastering the perspectives and movements within the evangelical world during Wycliffe’s history.

His extensive research might lead one to conclude that Aldridge traveled in time and actually witnessed all this history. 

David Beale, a longtime professor of historical theology at BJU Seminary, published his two-volume Historical Theology In-Depth in 2013. This is an outstanding work, and every pastor and interested Christian should use it as the “go to” text for a foundational explanation of key themes in historical theology.

It doesn’t cover everything, of course. Instead, it hits some high points of historical theology by way of 57 different essays and four detailed appendices over the course of its two volumes. The essays are roughly chronological, written at the introductory level and include helpful bibliographies and extensive citations throughout.

Volume One

The first volume begins with a summary introduction to the early church fathers (1), followed by extensive chapters on major patristic figures (2-8). Beale then moves to the Greek apologists with explanation of their worldview (9), then to a discussion of Christian apologists such as Justin, Irenaeus and others (10-13). He discusses Neo-Platonism (14), Origen and his hermeneutical school (15), Tertullian and Latin Christianity in general (16), then Cyprian and his incipient episcopal ecclesiology (17).