DO WE STILL VALUE LIFE? REMEMBERING C. EVERETT KOOP

C. Everett Koop

As we reflect on the passing of C. Everett Koop who passed away today (Feb. 25th, 2013), at the age of 96, it is probably best to remember him first as a gifted Christian physician who lovingly cared for so many children and was instrumental in the growth of pediatric surgery we know today. Long before he collaborated with Dr. Schaeffer on Whatever Happened to the Human Race? or became the Surgeon General under Ronald Reagan's administration, Dr. Koop was on the front lines of care for children. His skill in this area is what providentially would bring him into contact with the Schaeffers.

In 1946 Koop established the pediatric surgical division at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. It was the first in Philadelphia and only the second of it's type in America. It was also in Schaeffer's home town.

The Schaeffers who likewise had an interest in children had founded their work called Children for Christ just three years earlier in 1943. In 1947 Schaeffer would be asked by the Independent Board of Presbyterian Foreign Missions to tour post-war Europe to determine the state of children and the condition of the church.  The following year, in 1948,  the Schaeffer's were called to be missionaries to Europe. After accepting this call, Francis would travel for six months in the United States lecturing on his discoveries in regard to the state of the church in Europe. This time away from the family was a period of trial and hardship for Edith with various difficulties. One of which was that their daughter Priscilla had contracted a rare ailment that the doctor they were seeing was unable to diagnose. As the story goes, Priscilla was waiting to be x-rayed when a young pediatric surgeon "who had a specialist knowledge of mesenteric adenitis" happened to spot her and notice she had recognizable symptoms. He arranged to have her appendix removed the following day, which cured her ailment. That young surgeon was C. Everett Koop.

During Priscilla's treatment Dr. Koop was impressed with the Schaeffers and their visible faith and he mentioned to Edith that he had just become a Christian. Edith at some point gave Dr. Koop a message from Priscilla from Francis, so as he wheeled Priscilla's cart into the operating area he read aloud the telegram: "Dear Priscilla, Remember underneath are the everlasting arms. Love Daddy." Now, this all might sound quite unusual for a surgeon to do such a thing, but it shows us two things. Firstly, that there was an immediate connection between Dr. Koop and the Schaeffers, but also that Dr. Koop had a true love for children and his work.

This seemingly chance meeting speaks of providence at work. The fact that the Schaeffer's met Dr. Koop just months away from their move to Europe, and a short time after his conversion and that he had just the right knowledge of Priscilla's ailment is cause for reflection. The fact that this providence would eventually unite two great minds in both friendship and significant subjects of life is very significant. Not surprisingly Dr. Schaeffer and Dr. Koop would become close and a long friendship would begin.

Uniting In The Cause of Life
Most notably and against perhaps Dr. Koop and Francis Schaeffer's wishes the cause of life has been most often reduced to abortion alone. While abortion is no small matter and should not be in any way minimized, yet what both men were interested in was not a single issue of abortion alone, but life. The reality was that the secular humanistic worldview was challenging life itself on may fronts. This conception most definitely includes both abortion, euthanasia, but also the loss of the high view of man and human dignity.

"If man is not made in the image of God, nothing then stands in the way of inhumanity. There is no good reason why mankind should be perceived as special. Human life is cheapened. We can see this in many of the major issues being debated in our society today: abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, the increase of child abuse and violence of all kinds, pornography (and its particular kinds of violence as evidenced in sadomasochism), the routine torture of political prisoners in many parts of the world, the crime explosion, and the random violence which surrounds us.

In communist countries, where materialism and humanistic thinking have been dominant for over several generations, a low view of people has been standard for years. This is apparent not only in the early legislation about abortion but also in the thousands of political prisoners who have been systematically oppressed, tortured, and killed as part of the very fabric of communism. Now, however, as humanism dominates the West, we have a low view of mankind in the West as well. Let us consider some more of the direct and indirect results that this low view of people has brought into our society in the noncommunist world." ~ Schaeffer, Whatever Happened to the Human Race?

Yet instead of acknowledging this, the culture attacked the person rather than the core argument, much to Schaeffer's lament:

"For example, all you have to do is to consider the way the media treated Dr. C. Everett Koop. Dr. Koop is one of the foremost pediatric surgeons in the United States, and among other honors, he was given the highest honor of the French government for his pioneering work in pediatric surgery. But when he was nominated for the position of Surgeon General, he was attacked by the secular media with total disregard for objective reporting — and with total disregard for his brilliant humanitarian record as a surgeon. Those in the media holding the humanist world view could not tolerate Dr. Koop’s voice to be heard — they could not tolerate his articulate defense of the sanctity of human life to be expressed." ~ Schaeffer, A Christian Manifesto

Do we still value life?
Now is as good a time as any to remember what Dr. Koop and Dr. Schaeffer were striving for. For the church and culture to wake up and sees the cultural monolith that advances on every front... advancing a cause that will always be inhuman and always jeopardize life and human dignity. Today, we must ourselves find ways to speak around the political marginalization that has marginalized us much as those who are being put to death. Our compassion must be evident and our message must not fail to sound, as life depends upon it. 

SCHAEFFER 101 - #1 True Spirituality

Perhaps the most significant contribution of Francis Schaeffer is his teachings on spirituality. While one might say that his teachings in these areas are not new in the scope of the history of the Christian faith, his emphasis and way of saying things are revolutionary.

His work entitled "True Spirituality" explores the very basics of Christian spirituality to more significant aspects of Christian living and practice. Yet what is most significant is that when we read the singular work in the context of his collective works we begin to understand how far reaching the concept is. It is not that Schaeffer is just laying out an isolated concept of spiritual practice but a basis for a living a personal, relational and cultural organic apologetic. In simple words, he is applying the historic Christian position on spirituality against the prevailing  secular worldview. 

Born Out of Crisis

In the forward, Schaeffer mentions that if it were not for the findings of True Spirituality, there would not have been a L’Abri. Although Dr. Schaeffer writes in True Spirituality that the crisis was in 1951 and 52, his wife, Edith, wrote that Schaeffer was actually referring to 1948 - 1950 in The Tapestry. Colin Duriez, author of Francis Schaeffer an Authentic Life, makes the following observation: "Both sets of dates, the original and Edith's amendment, point to the period of crisis being extensive, It strongly seems that the onset of their exposure to the life in Europe, leaving behind the “parochialism” (Edith's words) of their prior American experience, is a major context of the crisis."  (footer pg. 89)

 The best dating perhaps in light of Schaeffer's articles and history is perhaps 1948 to early 1951. One thing seems to be clear and that is that during the early winter months of 1951, Schaeffer would begin to go through the pinnacle of his spiritual crisis. As a result of this crisis, Schaeffer recognized that something was deeply wrong and he carefully reconsidered his Christian commitment and the priorities of life. By June of that year in an issue of The Sunday School Times carried Schaeffer’s article entitled, “The Secret of Power and the Enjoyment of the Lord” which would begin to indicate the spirituality born out of Schaeffer’s spiritual struggles. When reading this work one can see elements of both The Mark Of A Christian as well as various thoughts that are now found in True Spirituality. It is important to note the connection between these two works. Schaeffer often described his works as a wheel with True Spirituality at the center. However, it is quite conceivable that the concepts conveyed so strongly in The Mark of a Christian and the earlier The Secret of Power and the Enjoyment of the Lord which focus so heavily on the proper balance of truth and love indicate to us that the concept itself is perhaps the axle on which that wheel rest.


Origins of Writings

Schaeffer emerged from this experience with a new certainty about his faith, a new emphasis on sanctification and the work of the Holy Spirit, and a new direction in his life which would unfold over the next four years and beyond. This crisis would be the catalyst for the studies he writes for various lectures in 1953-54. In 1954 the Schaeffers returned to the US with the family on furlough, and Fran began an extensive speaking and traveling schedule. Schaeffer traveled across the country speaking 346 times during 515 days, sometimes three times a day, about the deeper spiritual life. Several of the sermons that he developed during this time are now found in the book No Little People. These titles include, “The Lord’s Work in the Lord’s Way,” “It is Difficult to walk in Mud and Not Get Dirty” (we believe this is probably the source for his lecture called “Walking Through The Mud”), and his classic, “Ash Heap Lives,” which was the title of the prior-published British version of  No Little People. Yet of the sermons specifically relating to True Spirituality, there was his illustration of “The Two Chairs,” which was an illustration Schaeffer used quite often, and shows up in different forms in his work Death in the City, as well as True Spirituality. Another message, closely related was “Living in the Supernatural Now,” which is the subject of chapter 5 of True Spirituality. Yet perhaps the most significant of the talks during this period was the development of a series of talks for a summer Bible camp in Dakota. Schaeffer seemed to have had a brainstorm of thought on spirituality and stayed up for many hours, night after night, preparing a series of talks which he called “Sanctification I, II, III, IV, V,” which he delivered from July 5th through the 12th. These it seemed would finally form the full corpus of True Spirituality, the study that for him would change everything (See The Tapestry, pg. 387).

Substantial Results

Much of Schaeffer’s personal tension in spirituality was over the matter of what he calls “reality.” He had seen so much ugliness, both in life, the struggle against Liberalism, and the separatist movement, which had left him cold. He was not seeing the “reality” of the Christian life or it’s practical application for everyday life.

Out of Schaeffer's findings came his general realization focused on the nature of the teachings of scripture as “True-Truth,” touching every aspect of life, and loving God enough not to covet against Him and one’s neighbor. His prescription for spirituality is realized in the concept of a real “moment-by-moment” relationship with God that produces substantial healing in relationships and champions the life of prayer. Note that his "moment-by-moment" spirituality is in direct contrast to Existentialism's emphasis on living in the moment to define one's own existence. Rather, Schaeffer is taking the truth of the notion of living in the moment but correcting it to it's earlier Biblical understanding of living before the God who is there, before a watching world, praying without ceasing and taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ in the ongoing relational aspect of sanctification. He champions the idea of substantial victory in this life, not exhaustive, but substantial victory in relationships, our church, our government and total culture. The Lordship of Christ in the whole of life.

This is why I often say that Schaeffer has constantly and consistently led me in his writings to be bowed before the feet of Christ. Very few writers have inspired as much devotion in the whole of my person and as many areas of life to Christ Lordship as Schaeffer. This very fact alone is the most significant reason why we do this. We are exceedingly thankful.

THE BASIS OF SCHAEFFER'S APOLOGETIC ON THE RAZOR SWIFT

One of the things we are quite passionate about is Schaeffer's apologetic. Not as an academic exercise, but as a real way that the "man on the street" can reach out effectively to others around him or her in "the watching world."

We will be joining The Razor Swift and talking about how Schaeffer spoke to people and the method he used. What we will describe however, is not some mechanical approach, but rather a way of personally directing people to consider their worldview in an honest way. Join us this Wednesday, February 13th at 5 pm Pacific, 6 pm Mountain, 7 pm Central, 8 pm Eastern. Here is the call in number: (714) 242-5180.

Listen to internet radio with Minister Grok on Blog Talk Radio

The show will be live and hosted on Grok Radio at:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/grok558?ie8c=0

Please note: We are mindful that we will be representing Schaeffer's method and this is why we will be carefully presenting his position using his own words and diagrams and elaborating on them. We will use a couple of helpful diagrams we have made from the analysis of Schaeffer's descriptions as well. If you would like to read ahead, you can read over the documents here and then have them ready when you listen to the interview: https://sites.google.com/site/francisschaefferstudies/ (Note: These documents are subject to change before the show.)

Grok Radio:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/grok558?ie8c=0

The Facebook event is here if you would like to invite others:
https://www.facebook.com/events/501010623279210/?ref=ts&fref=ts


You can "like" Razor Swift here on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Razor-Swift-Research-Group/212047468812649?ref=hl

To find out more about Razor Swift, visit their website:
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NEW ACQUISITION! CONGRESS ON THE BIBLE PRESS PHOTO

Newly Acquired Press Photo

From time to time francisschaefferstudies.org acquires materials related to Francis Schaeffer, Edith Schaeffer or L'Abri from public vendors in order to archive and study the history behind them. In the past we have acquired a copy of Schaeffer's Wheaton Lectures, numerous books and videos (some in other languages), audio-recordings and photos. We will be doing a series of blog post on various findings in the coming new year. However, we wanted to take a moment and  tell you about a special photo we just recently acquired.

This is a photo of Francis Schaeffer giving a keynote address at the "Congress on the Bible," which met in San Diego March 3-6, 1982. The event was sponsored by the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy. According to the inscription, "Schaeffer strongly affirmed the importance of Christians' holding to confidence in the complete trustworthiness of the Bible. He added, however, that they must also be willing to accept the Bible's authority in all areas of their lives."

The picture is a wonderful glimpse into the history of Schaeffer's speaking career. It is a 5X7 black and white photo, and here he is pictured with his glasses and an ascot with his trademark chin-beard.

The  conference itself was a "convocation concerned with the power of God's inerrant Word: God's Word affirmed, understood and applied in such a way that the individual, the Church, the community and the world will be transformed." according to the ICBI information on the event.

The content of Schaeffer's lecture entitled What Difference Does Inerrancy Make? can now be found in volume 4 of Schaeffer's complete works as Appendix B to The Church at the End of the Twentieth Century.
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Schaeffer was one of the first major and popular Christian teachers to raise awareness on the need for a more public response affirming Biblical Inerrancy. Jason and I spoke with Dr. Norman Geisler, who was on the advisory board with others such as R.C. Sproul, John Gerstner, Greg Bahnsen, at the last ISCA conference where he affirmed as much, crediting Schaeffer's influence on Biblical Inerrancy and apologetics. Both ICBI and ISCA and The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, which Schaeffer signed along with Packer, Boice, Sproul and Henry to name a few, owe a debt to Schaeffer's influence. Schaeffer's ability to bring into the forefront of discussion for the "man on the street" the deeply important concepts around vital issues such as Biblical Inerrancy, has had significant results that are still being felt today. Furthermore, this picture shows that Schaeffer was not consumed with merely politics in the latter years of his life, but that he was working on multiple fronts with many, many others to try to halt, or at least postpone the monolithic advancement of secular humanist thought in our culture.

Yet, we should see something else when we look at this picture. We should see a "real" human being, not one built up by hype or accolades, but one with frailty, but nevertheless drive. Schaeffer was diagnosed with cancer in 1978, by 1982 when this picture was taken, the greater health struggles were already apparent and upon him. Edith notes in her Family Letters (See: Dear Family, pg 339) that Fran was already feeling heavy fatigue in the fall of 1981 where he was regularly speaking and wrapping up writing on A Christian Manifesto. Fran was further wrapping up his writing career and was preparing to release or had already released his Complete Works in 1982 which would only be followed by a publication of a speech he made in Washington D.C. in May of 1982 (almost two years exactly before his death), published in 1983 with other contributors as Who Is For Peace? and his final work The Great Evangelical Disaster published in 1984. Several other works would be published in different forms posthumously (Who is for Peace, The Trilogy, The Finished Work of Christ and Corruption vs. True Spirituality... see our "Works Spreadsheet" for more information on these).

Schaeffer knew he was making a significant contribution in an important time and knew very well his time was nearly up. David Malone of Wheaton College mentions that "Schaeffer felt that he had accomplished more in the last five years of his life than he had in all the years before he had cancer." One can only speculate that the cancer became just another form of fuel for him, to further do and say what God had called him to. When one is confronted with a life or death experience, very often what results is a clarity about what is really important (I mention this from experience). In the end, what I see in this photo is simply a thoughtful man speaking with conviction. Just what you might expect to see of a man like Schaeffer, and that to me, says it all. However, it makes me ask myself a question... "What would you do if you knew your time was limited?"

Dan Guinn

ON THE RAZOR SWIFT - WED. DEC. 19TH 2012

This Wednesday, Dec. 19th, 7 PM Central, we'll be on The Razor Swift, an edgy Internet-radio show that seeks to "open hearts and minds through the platform of apologetics" and desires to approach "issues from a different perspective... than just preaching to the choir in the Christianese dialect." The Razor Swift further states that they, "maintain that faith and reason mustn’t necessarily be at odds with each other."
(We can identify with that!)

Now before you get too comfortable, The Razor Swift is not EVEN your daddy's apologetics show... they deal with both the typical and the fringe, so it's likely that if you listen to other shows you could have a "close encounter" with a show on aliens or discussion about whether a Christian can consult a Yogi or not. So with that, we have to say that we both find the show interesting (as in... "They really went there?") and we also want to state that "the views expressed on the show may not necessarily be the views of francisschaefferstudies.org."

Now nevertheless, despite the disclaimer, one should not forget that there is something very much in line with Schaeffer here...open discussion in the public square on nearly any topic imaginable! The new public square is on-line, and blog-radio is a hot bed. So while subjects may touch the extreme on The Razor Swift at times, we have been asked to give some input on why Schaeffer's works might be helpful, and you know we can't wait to answer that question!

Join us for what is sure to be an enriching and entertaining show!

Check out the facebook event here.

The show will be hosted on Grok Radio at:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/grok558 OR LISTEN BELOW!

Listen to internet radio with Minister Grok on Blog Talk Radio

Call in number: (714) 242-5180

Free Downloads for Callers:

Schaeffer's Apologetic Handout 1
Schaeffer's Apologetic Handout 2
Schaeffer's Apologetic Handout 3

The Works of Francis & Edith Schaeffer Spreadsheet

NEWS: NEW SOCIAL LANDING PAGE!

Francis Schaeffer Studies launches it's new social landing page! We are currently upgrading our site, and the social page will serve as our new landing page in the interim. (Note: You can still get to the old site if you need to by clicking on the link in the top menu.)

The social landing page is the beginnings of a special social media dashboard that allows you to easily follow us on your favorite social media without having to search for us on these separate sites. You can easily watch many of our YouTube channel video play-list, read the most recent blog post, and follow our Twitter post straight from the page. Likewise, you can will find the links you need to join us on Facebook and Google+ if you haven't already. In the future we are planning even more ways for interaction that are sure enhance your experience on francisschaefferstudies.org.

In the new site we will release a more extensive Schaeffer database and interactive features that will allow you to interact around the works. We would appreciate your prayers, while we work on these changes in the next year. We've very excited to release this first step in the process.

Providence!
Dan

THE FRANCIS SCHAEFFER COLLECTION 2012

In May of this year (2012, as of the writing of this post), we visited The Francis Schaeffer Collection at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary and interviewed Dr. Bruce A. Little (Director, Custodian) and Dr. Bill Youngmark (Archivist) about the collection. It's taken some time, and there were a lot of details that needed to be worked out, in addition to production difficulties that needed to be overcome. Yet we are finally able to release the video, an interview-based documentary, on the Francis Schaeffer Collection at SEBTS. We were granted special access to the collection to report on the ongoing work and we are very excited and relieved to finally show it to you. 

While at the collection we also collected footage for our documentary on the Schaeffer's Wheaton Lectures which is another project we are working on. We hope to follow up this collection video in the future when we check back with Dr. Little for additional details and findings. 

Please note that Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary (SEBTS) has custodianship of the Francis Schaeffer Collection which is owned by the Francis A. Schaeffer Foundation of which Udo Middelmann is the president. As part of the contract between the Schaeffer Foundation and SEBTS, the seminary will digitize the collection after which a copy of the digitized material will be given for study purposes to the Schaeffer Foundation study program in Gryon, Switzerland and the Hill House in Austin, Texas.

RARE INTERVIEW: SCHAEFFER ON ACCOMMODATION, 1981

Editor’s Note: We’re talking today with David Leigh, the author of Presupposing: How to Defend the Faith - The Methods of Francis A. Schaeffer and Cornelius Van Til. Recently Rev. Leigh shared with FrancisSchaefferStudies.org a rare published interview he conducted with Francis Schaeffer in 1981. Download the Interview here.

Can you give us a bit of information about your background and how you came to interview Schaeffer in 1981?

It's funny for me to look back on this interview and see how green I was in those days as a writer, editor, and novice Schaeffer initiate. The publication, Commonlife: A Magazine Concerning Church Reform, was the product of a ministry in north-central Ohio, then called Grace Haven Fellowship, which was greatly influenced at the time by L'Abri. Despite my poor editing and interviewing skills, I was the magazine’s editor. I was fresh out of college, worked part-time on the magazine staff, and part-time on the campus ministry team. The director there had been to the Swiss L'Abri and knew Francis. So when we heard about L'Abri having a conference in Rochester he sent me to meet and interview Francis, Edith, Ranald, and Udo. The magazine had a tiny audience of less than 2000 readers and was principally aimed at a circle of house churches that called themselves the Assembly of Covenant Churches.

From the article we can see this interview took place after Schaeffer's A Christian Manifesto was released. Edith released her book, The Tapestry, in 1981 as well. Also, I understand that at this time Schaeffer was working on the compiling of his complete works. Can you add to this information a little about the historical context of this interview?

Francis actually announced the publication of his collected works at this conference. I was there when he explained he’d been working on reviewing and updating his works. He lamented that he wished he could update some of the language to be more inclusive, but that it was too massive an undertaking to thoroughly revise so many volumes.

Schaeffer had been diagnosed with lymphoma in 1978. How did his health seem at this time?

At that time he appeared healthy and in good spirits. As you can see from the picture I took of him, he had even put on some weight.

I will never forget the lunch I had with Francis and Edith in preparation for the interview. We were standing in line at the cafeteria of the school where the conference took place. Edith chirped in: “Fran! We forgot our name tags! They won’t feed us without our name tags!”

“Edith,” Francis replied, with an air of assurance and authority, “they will feed us. We’re the reason all these people are here!”

“But Fran!” she shot back, “These cafeteria workers don’t know that. They don’t know us from a hole in the ground.”

“Edith,” he said, raising his squeaky voice, “if they don’t know us from a hole in the ground then there’s no hope, no hope!”

We laughed and, sure enough, the cafeteria workers posed no problem to getting our food.

We sat down to eat and Edith noticed Francis wasn’t eating everything on his tray. No doubt his cancer treatments were affecting his appetite.

“Fran!” she exclaimed. “The doctor says you have to eat!”

“Edith!” he said. “Will you let me do it my way!”

What was your impression of Schaeffer upon talking to him in person?

They were both so real and down to earth! It was amazing to me that I could feel so instantly comfortable with these famous authors I’d admired for so long from afar. As you can see by the conversation at lunch, they were sometimes comical and they possessed a great sense of humor; they were very real people.

A month or two later, when the Schaeffers were back in Switzerland and I was preparing an excerpt from one of Edith’s books to run in Commonlife, I needed to ask Edith a question. My publisher gave me a phone number to call and I dialed it expecting to talk with an admin, a secretary, or some kind of housekeeper. Francis picked up the phone! Here I was on an international call with the man I considered a living legend, and I had to say, “Hi Francis … is Edith home?”

Francis was again as down to earth and authentic as it gets. He explained to me that Edith was up in the mountains working on her next book. “We have a cabin up there,” he explained. “Whenever one of us is writing, we find it’s best to go there away from telephones and interruptions.” Then he made a remark I will never forget, because it hit me as an aspiring writer.

“Ironically,” he said, “we’ve found we have to remove ourselves from the Christian life in order to write about it.”

We laughed. We both knew that one does not stop being a Christian by seeking solitude. But I understood what he meant. The inference was that without Christian community the Christian life is incomplete. That is how they lived.

In the interview, Schaeffer seems chiefly concerned with Evangelical "accommodation" across the board, where the church has failed to stand on issues from scripture to politics, to human life. Noting the accommodation in the crisis in the Liberal/Modernist controversies of the 30s, he saw it still at work in the 1980s. Do you think he would be stronger on this point today?

Personally, I think he’d say we’ve lost ground in many ways today. He was indeed concerned about the compromise of Christian truth and values. But in my opinion he was just as concerned about Evangelicals falling short in regards to love—balanced love that confronts as readily as it comforts. He saw loving, Christian community as a kind of apologetic in itself that couldn’t be replaced by intellectual arguments—not that arguments didn’t have an important place. But I think he’d be concerned about the state of community in Evangelical churches today as much as our role in the broader world community. I also suspect he would lament the lack of intellectual development or progress among so many of those who have waved the Evangelical banner in politics over the past few years, and the reduction of that word to a political term in the minds of so many Americans today.

With regards to the abortion issue, I have a friend, Christa March, who is the founding president of Teen Mother Choices International. She tells me that TCMI is the only international Christian organization that works specifically with Evangelical churches in providing teenage moms assistance in keeping and raising their babies. I think Francis would weep with Christa over the lack of love-in-action ministries like this one. I think he would say being pro-life is more than being pro-birth and that Evangelicals still have a long way to go with regards to making this kind of biblical compassion the norm of our communities.

In spite of the accommodation that Schaeffer saw, his prescription seemed to convey a theme that was a regular part of his works, indicating a constant need for truth and love. He noted that in the 1930s, there was a failure to love in the midst of controversy. He states, "If you believe these things are true, then truth brings confrontation and it must be with love. And the separatists forgot the love part and it wiped us out. We've paid a price for 30 years for that. But while if you leave out the love you lose, and you are not what you should be in the world, on the other hand if you forget that truth brings confrontation it is equally destructive. So I think this is the real problem." How important do you think Schaeffer's emphasis on truth and love is today, 31 years after this interview?

I think it is more critical than ever. It seems to me we keep repeating the same mistakes. Our infighting and our partisanships in the political arena, in the blogosphere, and on social networking websites, for example, make us a spectacle for skeptics to use against the gospel. Our accommodation to secular political philosophies and agendas divides us, mitigating against the love we should have for each other, and therefore keeping us unprepared for effectively reaching those who don’t know Christ. How can we lovingly confront an atheist or a Muslim or any unbeliever when we have yet to learn how to treat each other as Christians in ways that bear fruit? As a result, we come across as hostile to each other and we have not begun to love our unsaved neighbors because we let worldly political passions get in the way.

Francis knew well how stinging the criticism of fellow believers could be—even before Facebook! As I outline in my book, Presupposing, Schaeffer struggled continually with criticism, even from Christians in his own denomination and tradition, men like Cornelius Van Til, whom he respected and whose insights he sought. He kept trying to build bridges, not burn them down. Even so, early in his ministry he realized he would have to go forward at times regardless of how others might try to knock him down, even if it meant going it alone at times.

You asked Schaeffer about the Moral Majority, and although he felt they were "coming from the right side" and were "providing a good mentality" he did not agree with everything they had said and done at that time, and he did feel that there were some shortfalls in the area of balance. Do you think Schaeffer was seeing the limitations of the movement even though it was just two years old at the time?

I think he knew better than to give blind allegiance to any political movement. I have always admired his earlier position of being a selective cobelligerent in matters of social action with regards to potential allies we might find in the political arena. It seemed to me, though, that he felt the options were limited at that time. If there was any hesitation on Schaeffer’s part when it came to becoming identified with the Moral Majority, I think this too flowed from the logical outworking of the foundations he’d laid in his earlier works.

Schaeffer's statement, "you are not a New Testament church if there isn't community" is rather moving. He seems to take a good deal of time and labor to carefully define what he means by this. How important do you think this concept was to him?
 
Part of that emphasis in this interview was because the magazine that sent me had a strong interest in intentional Christian community. But then, I’ve never seen Francis be less than passionate about any of his convictions.

One of the things so amazing about L’Abri in those days was that it offered a living model for how Christians might live in biblical community. Some groups that sought to imitate L’Abri had been part of a Jesus Movement mentality that sometimes experimented with communal practices bordering on—and sometimes crossing the line into—being communes. He didn’t want to be mistaken as endorsing that. Yet, he lamented the lack of biblical community in the mainstream churches. Many “doctrinally correct” churches lacked love between members, let alone love for the lost. As in all his convictions, Francis stressed a radical balance that carefully traversed an isthmus between errors.

Schaeffer, although seeing a lot of despair coming through the 60s, sees a good degree of hope in the 80s. Yet he also has some reservations about a dominant question on his mind. He seems to be asking, "Will Christians actually do anything about the understanding and comprehension they have gained in the Christian worldview? Will they truly act upon it? Has Christianity been stirred sufficiently?" Here again we seem to be seeing some of the near "prophetic" perspective that Schaeffer had. How did this aspect of the interview strike you?

How it struck me then and how it strikes me now are quite different. At the time I was a wide-eyed 21-year-old kid who couldn’t believe he was talking with Francis Schaeffer. If I hadn’t taken a tape recorder, I doubt I’d have remembered key parts of the interview ten minutes after it was over. Nor do I think I fully understood everything he was saying while he was talking.

Looking back, however, I think Schaeffer would say I was no exception when it came to the church’s deficient understanding of how it should be involved in the world. Like me, the church had a long way to go in comprehending our needed role in social justice and political action. I think we all still have a long way to go. After all, we have an investment in not understanding, as it seemingly let’s us off the hook and allows us to remain either uninvolved or involved in the wrong things.

What saddens me most, and what I suspect would sadden him, is that the church today rarely seems to be speaking prophetically to the politics of the world. We are shaped by, rather than shaping, the political arena. Instead of being selective about whom we become cobelligerents with (and when), so many Christians uncritically embrace the political rhetoric of the right and the left, allowing themselves to be shaped and swept up in unloving behavior rooted in partisanship and worldly philosophies. I think Schaeffer would urge us instead to start from and be guided by the scriptural principles of a thoroughly Christian worldview, rather than swallowing secular ideologies whole or in part and then baptizing them as “Evangelical.”

What do you think we should take away from this interview with Schaeffer?

Let’s get back to being the New Testament church. Let’s stop compromising and accommodating to fit in politically or culturally. Let’s get back to binding truth to love, and faith to practice.

FALL CLASS STARTING! WHO IS WATCHING?

francisschaefferstudies.org is excited to announce it's fall class on The Church Before The Watching World, starting this Sunday, Sept. 2nd at Redeemer Presbyterian Church. As you may have noticed we are still working steadily on the video of our spring class of The Mark Of A Christian, so you may see video being released of both through the end of the year and early into spring. We will also be working on filming of some earlier class material that has not yet been recorded that we will start releasing before the end of the year in honor of the Francis Schaeffer Centennial! So be on the lookout for that.

The Church Before The Watching World continues to expand on the concepts we explored in our spring class, but in greater depth and a broader subject base. Schaeffer had numerous works on the subject of the church, starting with his third work Death In The City. Yet in 1970-71 he published three significant works on the church: The Church At The End Of The Twentieth Century, The Mark Of A Christian, and The Church Before The Watching World. It is telling that in 1971 he also published his landmark work on spirituality, True Spirituality. There is no doubt that the connection between True Spirituality and Schaeffer's Ecclesiology is significant.

Schaeffer published his final work, The Great Evangelical Disaster, in 1984. What subject did he choose? His last message was to the church. Therein he indicates a dissatisfaction that the Biblical principles he had spent his entire life teaching had still gone largely unheeded by the church. With this study we seek to go back and look at what he was trying to communicate earlier on. 

As with all of our classes, the desire is to encourage others to read Schaeffer's works for themselves and provide a means for others to pass the works of Schaeffer on to the next generation. Please keep us in your prayers as we further expand this mission.     

WHAT IS FRANCIS SCHAEFFER STUDIES?

Occasionally in our work we find that people sometimes may be confused or have questions about who we are and what we do, so we feel that from time to time it is important that we review what we are about. The following will help explain our guiding principles: 

What is Francis Schaeffer Studies?

• francisschaefferstudies.org is a fan site founded in 2011 to promote the study of the works of Francis and Edith Schaeffer.
• FSS was founded to assist in passing the works of Francis & Edith Schaeffer to the next generation and make their thought and teaching more accessible for general inquiry.
• FSS is a service to the Francis Schaeffer and L’Abri community. We both promote and serve by creating web content such as social media promotions, graphics and videos.

How do you promote the works of Francis & Edith Schaeffer?

• We create studies around their works.
• We film classes on their works.
• We promote their works through our website by providing a reference for all of their books.
• We promote their works on social media such as Facebook by providing both a discussion group and fan pages, Twitter, YouTube, and our blog.
• We produce content and materials such as graphics, promotional and documentary videos and other web related projects for other Schaeffer related ministries and promote them.
• We occasionally have events to this end.

What are your affiliations?

• Most of us are members of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Overland Park, KS and thus submit to the guidance and leadership of our pastors and elders. All of the classes on Schaeffer’s works are filmed at Redeemer unless otherwise noted.
• We must clarify that we are NOT a part of L'Abri or in any way officially associated with the estate of Francis Schaeffer or the ministry of L'Abri International. However, we are in contact with L'Abri and do seek their guidance and input in regard to the site. In accordance with Eph. 5:21, "submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ," we humbly submit to the insight and guidance of the L'Abri leadership for the cause of Christ, and properly respecting the legacy of Francis & Edith Schaeffer. We feel very strongly about this, as we believe in many respects the "real work" is going on in the various locations of L'Abri throughout the world, where the various Biblical principles taught by Schaeffer are daily being put into practice. Many, many people have been transformed by the witness of L'Abri, as it's workers invite people to come and live with them and experience Christian community. It is our aim to simply promote and share these teachings and provide a free service to L'Abri and the Francis Schaeffer community.
• THE FRANCIS SCHAEFFER COLLECTION? Recently, as of this writing we have been doing a lot of work in regard to the Francis Schaeffer Collection. We are not officially connected with the L. Russ Bush Center for Faith & Culture or Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, The Francis Schaeffer Foundation, or Hill House. All of our work has been done under the guidance and direction of Dr. Bruce A. Little to freely promote the collection and the importance these materials are to the next generation of scholars.
• We are likewise not officially associated with any other Schaeffer related ministry, even though we might actively promote them.

How are you funded?

• At this time we are funded by our own out of pocket money and by prayer.
• Since we are web, graphic, and video professionals, we do all of the work in-house and at our own time and expense, if any is required.
• In the two years of service God has provided by sometimes providentially giving paid work for businesses or other ministries to us personally which we have then appropriated to the most immediate need. One example of this is when Dan needed his copy of the complete works of Francis Schaeffer. He prayed and God provided a web job at just the right time that paid for the amount needed. As we have learned from the L’Abri example, God provides what we need.

Why are you doing this?

• Firstly, because we believe scripture instructs us to remember our leaders. Here are our three guiding verses:
• Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith. (Hebrews 13:7 ESV)
• Further instruction in this role of “imitating their faith”:
• Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. (Philippians 3:17 ESV)
• Paul instructs as to why we should imitate him:
• Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ. Now I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I delivered them to you. (1 Corinthians 11:1-2 ESV)
• Secondly, we are doing this because Francis and Edith’s works are so important. There are numerous reasons that we could state here, but in short, it is because their works teach these important points and more:
• an emphasis on the inerrancy of scripture
• the Biblical emphasis on the dignity of mankind
• an understanding of true-truth and substantial truth for life and godliness
• a moment-by-moment spirituality that brings reality in the Christian walk
• an intellectual apologetic that engages both the heart and the mind
• the belief in honest answers to honest questions
• the call to a life of prayer
• a proper Christian worldview and worldview thinking
• a cultural apologetic that engages culture and informs the mind
• the application of Biblical truth to the whole of life, even government
• and last but not least, the final apologetic, the practice and balance of living out an observable love toward true Christians without compromise as a demonstration to a watching world, and standing for Biblical truth without compromise in the midst of a post-Christian culture.

 

Where can I find Francis Schaeffer Studies?

• Our main web site francisschaefferstudies.org
• On facebook:
• Our facebook fan page: http://www.facebook.com/francisschaefferstudies
• Our facebook fan page dedicated to Edith: http://www.facebook.com/Edith.Rachel.Merritt.Seville.Schaeffer
• Our facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/groups/francisschaefferstudies/
• Dan's personal page: http://www.facebook.com/dan.guinn
• On Twitter: http://twitter.com/studyschaeffer
• On Google Plus: https://plus.google.com/b/112699455648301251198/112699455648301251198/posts
• On YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/schaefferstudies
• On GodTube: http://www.godtube.com/schaefferstudies
• On vimeo: http://vimeo.com/channels/229491
• On flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/67742561@N02/