June 7, 2023 Show with Dr. Gregory Edward Reynolds on “Your Father’s L’Abri: Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer”

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This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this seventh day of

June, 2023.

I am thrilled to have back as a returning guest today, Dr. Gregory

Edward Reynolds.

I know that the listeners in the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio audience, especially

those that are Orthodox Presbyterian, will immediately recognize that name.

He is an author and an ordained minister and church planter in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church

denomination.

And today we are going to be addressing his latest book, Your Father's Libri,

Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron

Sharpens Iron Radio, Dr. Gregory Reynolds.

Thank you, Chris.

It's great to be with you again.

And for the sake of our listeners who may be unfamiliar with the Orthodox Presbyterian Church denomination, why don't you

let our listeners know briefly something about that fine body of believers.

Well, we grew back during the 20s.

There was a great battle in the large Presbyterian Church, the PCUSA,

over everything about the supernatural reality of the Christian faith, the Bible, Christ,

the resurrection, historical resurrection, and all those sorts of things.

They were referred to as the fundamentals, but those are the basic apostles' creed truths

that the Bible clearly teaches.

And so out of that battle, J. Gresson Machen very bravely led a

small group, I was not alive at that point, but of us who desire to

continue a true Presbyterianism which is faithful to Scripture and

to the Reformed tradition of understanding what the Bible says, the system of doctrine taught in it.

Well, if anybody is interested in finding out more about this

fine denomination, perhaps you want to find out what congregations

in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church may be near where you live or near where loved

ones of yours live, just go to opc .org, opc .org, opc for

Orthodox Presbyterian Church, that's opc .org.

Well now we are going to be entering into our discussion on your book, Your Father's

Libri, Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer.

Francis Schaeffer is one of the great heroes of the Christian faith

for many who are Reformed and even outside of the Reformed faith.

And his voice, I believe, needs to be heard today more than

any other decade of the Christian faith, I think.

Let's hear from you first of all, who was Francis Schaeffer and when and where was

he born and raised, and in what religion, if any, was he raised?

Yes, and so he was, Francis Schaeffer was born in 1912 on January 30th, and

he was born in Germantown, Pennsylvania into a working class family, a father German, a

mother was English, and he was someone who had, I think he had

a vague religious upbringing, it was perhaps Lutheran, I'm forgetting the details of

that.

But at one point in his, as a young man, while he was still living at home, he helped a

white Russian count learn English.

What an interesting relationship that must have been.

And it got him to reading some serious philosophy, and as he went through and read

Ovid, he read the Bible, so he was kind of scratching at the surface of a

classical education.

And he became a believer by going to a Billy Zioli

tent meeting back in 1930.

And so he was converted, apparently, on August 19th of 1930, and then in his diary,

not long after that, about 10 days, he wrote that all truth is

from the Bible.

So he had come under a real conviction of his own sin, his need of a Savior, and

his need of the guidance of the Word of God.

Now, who was Billy Zioli?

Is that the name you mentioned?

Yes.

Well, he is more famous in Schaeffer's life, apart from the tent meeting, the

revivalist meeting that he went to in 1930, as the person

largely responsible for getting the Schaeffers involved in the film,

the two films, actually.

Certainly the first one, Well, How Shall We Then Live?, that would have been in the

70s.

And that's when he would be well known.

I don't really know much about him, except he was a real revivalist.

I don't think he was Reformed in his theology, but he was

probably then a fundamentalist and maybe later on, more of an evangelical.

Yes, I think that this is a reminder to we who are Reformed, that although

we should never stop being, we should never stop critically

examining all theologies, especially those that claim to be Christian,

and we must be very clear when we believe they are in error and are not

according to the inerrant God -breathed scriptures.

But at the same time, we have to be more hesitant than we often are to be overly

critical and especially condemnatory towards those that do not agree with us

lockstep, because God has used men, as you have even given

proof to that fact, he has used men outside of our Reformed camp to not only

save sinners, but to save sinners that would eventually become Reformed heroes.

That's true, Chris, and it reminds me that the Lord so often uses a crooked stick to

get done what he wants to accomplish.

And I can say that as a minister of the Word, even though I have that wonderful theology of the

Reformation, I'm also a crooked stick.

I'm an imperfect human being, and that he uses imperfect human beings to bring people to himself is

remarkable, and it's a testimony to the supernatural realities that Schaeffer

really held firmly to.

And how did you first discover Francis Schaeffer?

Well, actually, I have my testimony, if anyone's interested, was printed,

published by Christianity Today back in May of 2021.

They have a feature at the end of their monthly magazine called The Testimony, and I give

much more detail there.

But I had become a Christian by reading the book of Jonah, and I did have some gospel

truth in my background late in my high school life through my mom and my uncle,

who was a Gideon.

And so I did have something to recall, but I realized in the midst of the

counterculture the emptiness of what we believed.

It was kind of a mixture of American idealism and Eastern mysticism,

and it came to a dead end.

And I think the drug deaths of Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix

back in 1971 really kind of rocked my hippie counterculture world.

And so I started, when I became a believer, I just got down on my knees and asked God to forgive my sins and

lead me.

And I went to my mother's fundamentalist church in Manchester, New Hampshire.

I would drive home from, drive up from Cambridge, Massachusetts to Manchester.

And there was a dear family there, their name was The Darlings.

They ran a local business, and they were perceptive enough in that fundamentalist environment to give me

the church at the end of the 20th century.

And I actually have that book here with me, and I just wanted to quickly read the

table of contents to show you why this would have appealed to me, because nobody else,

I mean nobody that I knew or had heard of or was being introduced to in the Bible

-believing world was addressing these things.

So here's the contents.

The Roots of the Student Revolution.

So there he's understanding where I was coming from.

The International Student Revolution.

The Church in a Dying Culture.

Form and Freedom in the Church.

The Practice of Community and Freedom.

The Threat of Silence.

Modern Man and the Manipulator.

And then Revolutionary Christianity.

He also has an appendix.

The Mark of the Christian, and I've noticed in looking through my library of his books that the Mark of the Christian

is there as an appendix in quite a number of them.

But he was someone who was addressing the world out of which I had come as a

very new believer.

And I would say it was not maybe a month after my conversion that The Darlings put that book in my

hands, and I read everything that he'd written up to that point.

I think there were four or five different books that he had written, and The God Who Is There, Escape

from Reason, and The Death of Culture, and I think

there was another one too on ecology.

And so those, I read them very rapidly and wrote a letter to the Schaffers and

asked them if I could come, and they said, sure, come on over, and that's exactly what I did.

Praise God.

And did Francis Schaffer, during his years as a public figure, go through

any notable changes in his own theology, his worldview, and his approach to and

focus on ministry?

Yes, that's a very interesting question, and an important one, I think, in evaluating both the strengths and

weaknesses of Francis Schaffer.

I actually take the position of Barry

Hankins, who looks at his life in terms of three phases.

Now Schaffer himself would say, I never changed, but there are three phases of his ministry.

The first was his fundamentalist phase in the 30s and the 40s, and I mean, that was the

Christianity into which he was converted, and so it was natural for him to become

associated with the fundamentalist movement, very much separatistic,

and he had a very narrow view of the Christian life.

And it wasn't until he was in Europe doing work for the

Foreign Missions Board, it was an independent Foreign Missions Board.

He was doing work for them in Europe, and he came to kind of a crisis in his life.

Bill Edgar has a wonderful article on the Desiring God website called

His Hayloft Experience, and he really went back and questioned all

of his fundamental beliefs as a Christian, and really wrestled with the Lord

for quite some period, a period of time.

Mrs. Schaffer was quite anxious during that period, but he came out really believing

firmly that all he had believed was true, but there had been a lack of supernatural

reality and love in his life.

And so that really changed everything for him, and it opened him

to begin the ministry several years later called Le Brie, which is French for shelter,

and he began really with his eldest daughter bringing back students from university, I think in

Lausanne and elsewhere, to discuss Christian faith, and he found that

that very informal atmosphere of his own home, he was able to articulate

answers to the questions that the students had in a way that brought a number of them to Christ,

and that was the beginning of that phase.

So then the Le Brie, European Le Brie phase, where he was an evangelist

and really came to understand the counterculture and some of the questions my generation of

baby boomers were asking during our student days.

And then in 78, when he got into the filmmaking phase,

he came back to America, of course, because he had to go to the Mayo Clinic for treatments for his cancer,

and his son Frankie had kind of talked him into doing film, and

he got very much involved in the American context as a culture warrior.

And so there was a definite switch.

Now I think Hankins would say, and I pretty much agree with him, that underlying

all of that there was definitely, even in his understanding of culture and art, which I deeply

appreciated, there was still a fundamentalist strain in his way of thinking, and I

think that's true.

But there were definitely those three distinct phases in his life.

Now, when you said earlier that he, while reexamining

his fundamentalism, two of the things he found lacking in his life were the supernatural

and love.

When you say he was lacking supernaturally, are you speaking of his

recognition of the supernatural in his life at that time?

Yes, exactly.

I think that what, and of course, the most practical revelation

of that need was prayer.

So he realized, I think, that prayer and the belief that God works in

history, that He works through us, that He guides us and gives us wisdom through His Word, that

sense of God being present in his ministry and working through him

to encourage others and bring them to faith, that's what he meant

by supernatural reality.

And don't you think that we who are Reformed can learn a great lesson from that?

Because it's not just our fundamentalist brothers and sisters who may be

going through that in their lives, a lack of a recognition of the supernatural, but it seems very

often we who are Reformed operate in that way.

Yes, we do tend, because of our native sinfulness, to depend upon ourselves

and our own wisdom, even if it's just we think Christianly.

But if we don't depend on God to use us and to form us, not just to use us to help others,

but to form us after the image of His Son, if we don't have that trust and dependence,

we won't make much progress in the Christian life.

Now, how did Schaeffer stand out as a unique voice for the Christian

faith amongst his contemporaries in ministry during the most prominent years as a public figure?

Well, I think that he became—it was interesting, I think it was Time magazine in 1960 somehow

got a hold of his ministry, they found out about it, and called him an evangelical intellectual.

And I think while he was a brilliant man in his own right, I mean, he was magna

cum laude from Hampton -Sydney College, he was a very bright

man, he was not—it's odd that he would be a public intellectual, because he really

didn't have the kinds of academic training that most public intellectuals have.

And so what he would say of himself is that he was a voice for the gospel that was

speaking the truth in love and seeking to reach out to a

wide swath of human beings.

I think his unique voice, especially at the beginning of his ministry, was certainly

with baby boomers, with my generation in the counterculture, and of course that

attracted many others as his ministry grew and became a worldwide

phenomenon.

Well, at the height of his ministry, would there have been a

label that Schaeffer most prominently used to identify himself?

You were speaking earlier when describing him that there was a point when he would have

most identified himself as a fundamentalist and so on, so was there a specific label of

his preference that he eventually landed on?

Well, I think he would say that he was an evangelist, and I saw him in action, of course, having lived

at LaBrie for six months, I saw him in action many times, a man of—he had great

compassion, and he really knew how to connect with people

and to—he paid attention to them.

Nothing distracted him when he was talking to you personally, and since I got to live in his

chalet at Les Malaise, there in Waymo, in the midst of the community of LaBrie,

I got chances to talk with him personally, and he always—he was never condescending, he

was always very personable, a very compassionate man.

So I think he would call himself an evangelist.

Now he was an unusual, unique evangelist, as one of my chapters in the book is titled,

and unique because he had a unique connection with

Christians coming out of the modern culture in which we lived.

And I'm going to give our listeners our email address in the event that they have questions of their own

that they would like to ask of Dr. Reynolds about our theme

today, Your Father's LaBrie Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer.

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And as far as Dr.

Schaeffer's harshest criticisms of evangelical Christianity

at large, what were some of those?

Well, I would say that the lack of love, which he detected in

himself, first of all, and in those that he was associated with, like Carl MacIntyre

in his fundamentalist period at the beginning of his ministry for a couple of decades, the lack

of love, I would say, would be a main theme.

Now, near the end of his life, in one of the last books that he wrote, had to do with a

lack of faithfulness to the Bible.

And of course, he saw neo -evangelicalism compromising the Bible, but he also understood that

fundamentalists had a way of adding to the Bible, adding rules such as

forbidding alcoholic beverages or adult beverages, forbidding the smoking of

tobacco or playing cards, those sorts of things.

He felt that they added to the Bible, but also, by doing that, failed to pay attention

to other things in the Bible, particularly what he always liked to refer to as the final

apologetic in the high priestly prayer of Jesus in the Gospel of John,

where basically Jesus prays for those that he

is calling out of the world into his kingdom, and prays that their love for one another would be

something that would be noted by the world.

And so, a lack of that, he would say, detracts in a serious way from

our evangelistic communication of the Gospel.

And so, a lack of love and a lack of faithfulness to the Bible in its entirety,

I think also a lack of cultural awareness.

And it's interesting, you know, Tim Keller just went to be with the Lord in New York City.

We were actually there when he left this world, and we were

with people who were members of his church.

And as I followed his ministry over the years, the thing that is unique about him is that he was

able to connect with professional, highly educated professional and very secular

people in New York City.

And so, there was that unique niche.

Now, his ministry went far beyond that, but there was that niche which he addressed

that nobody else was really communicating and connecting with, and that's what

Schaeffer did.

And he did it partly through cultural awareness.

For example, in my own background, I was raised with a

love of classical music, of opera, and of art.

And in the fundamentalism that my mom became a Christian in, there was a disdain for

that largely.

And so, I had been to architectural school, was starting a career in architecture, and none of those things were

appreciated.

Well, Schaeffer appreciated all of those things and encouraged understanding,

appreciating, and even enjoying many dimensions of culture.

And so, that was something that was definitely lacking in fundamentalism.

Not so much in evangelicalism, but definitely in fundamentalism.

And I think having gotten to know quite a number of

fundamentalists over the years and developing close friendships with them, I think that

there is a public persona that a lot of fundamentalists have that have a

disdain for the arts and so on that is not so much a part of

their personal lives.

I've gotten to know fundamentalists that have really fallen in love

with secular Celtic music and

Broadway show tunes and all that kind of a thing, and perhaps even opera and so

on.

So, I think some of that is they're doing what they think they're supposed to be doing in the sight

of their colleagues and friends in fundamentalist ministry.

Well, that is true, and I know that, I know a fundamentalist, a very famous fundamentalist leader who I won't mention,

a long, long time ago, but would disdain the drinking of alcoholic beverages.

But when he was in Europe buying art, he would drink wine with his friends

and colleagues there.

So, the thing is, you didn't have to be a hypocrite with Schaeffer, because

he understood what legalism was.

And also, I will say this, that my mom's experience in her first church, which was a fundamentalist conservative

Baptist church, there were lovely people there.

They were people who were very sincere, and they were real serious believers.

But they also told my mom that her love of opera was sinful, and that her love of architecture we had

designed and built our own house in New Hampshire was also worldly.

And so, those things were very difficult for my mom to hear.

And Hidden Art by Edith Schaeffer, which I came to discover early on in my time there at

LaBrie, ended up really being a tremendous source of

liberty for my mom.

That's interesting, architecture.

That's a new one for me.

I had no idea that there was an abhorrence of architecture by fundamentalists.

Well, I wouldn't say generally that there's an abhorrence, but I would say that if you're

too interested in cultural things, you're probably being worldly.

And my mom certainly understood that.

I think she felt that the women that came to her Bible study, or that came to do a Bible study in her

home, felt that that was worldly.

So I think, too, that fundamentalism today has probably changed quite a bit from what it

was back in the late 60s, early 70s, when I became a Christian.

But they still exist, though.

I know some pretty hardcore fundamentalists, who I love and enjoy their fellowship, but

just disagree with some of the extreme criticisms they have and extreme forms of

separation that they have.

But isn't it interesting what you were speaking about?

Being in love with the world of art and so on is typically

amongst many fundamentalists viewed as a strong negative thing to be rebuked, that

Bob Jones University has one of the largest collections of religious art in the world.

Yes, that is true, and they also have their wonderful Shakespearean theater.

And so there's some funny contradictions there.

And we see that in the Christian world, and we realize

when we point out those weaknesses in our fundamentalist brethren,

that we also have our own weaknesses.

Well, we are going to our first commercial break.

If you have a question for Dr. Greg Reynolds about his experience at LaBrie,

about Francis Schaeffer as an individual, as a Christian hero

of the faith, just send in your questions to ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, ChrisArnzen at gmail

.com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

As always, give us your first name at least.

Your city and state and your country of residence.

We'll be right back with Greg Reynolds right after these messages from our sponsors.

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We are now back with my guest today, Dr. Greg Reynolds.

We are discussing his latest book, Your Father's Libre, Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer.

And our email address, if you have a question, is chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com.

And before I go to any listener questions, I wanted to ask the flip side

of the question that I asked you before the break.

I asked you what Dr. Schaeffer's harshest criticisms of evangelical Christianity at large

were, but who were his own harshest critics, those that most vociferously

criticized Francis Schaeffer during his heyday?

Well, perhaps just prior to his heyday, Chris, he actually had an encounter

with Karl Barth.

And because he was very favorable to the work of Cornelius Van Til, who was a professor of

apologetics at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, he

strongly disagreed with Barth.

And Barth, in turn, basically said, You don't know what you're talking about.

You really don't understand my theology.

And so that was, I think, the first really strong critic.

Now, later in his life, when he encountered people like George Marsden, who was an

evangelical church historian of some note, and Mark Knoll would be another.

These are people that I know, have known throughout my ministry, and

read with much appreciation.

And they had some, I think, serious and legitimate criticisms of his work, particularly

in the Christian Manifesto, which was really, I think Marsden said it was more of a culture war

tract than it was serious history.

And they pointed out a number of real mistakes in his historical

accuracy, as well as his application of it to American life and politics in

particular.

So he had critics that I think I would not favor.

On the other hand, he had some critics that I think had some legitimate concerns.

The Marsden and Knoll criticisms were very much, let's say, loving criticisms,

because they believed that he had a wonderful ministry, and they appreciated the strengths of

Schaeffer and his ability to address, especially the baby boom generation with the gospel,

and also his commitment to the Word of God and to true Christian

doctrine.

But those were critics, and he certainly had many more along the way.

Now, was Barth correct in his criticism that Dr. Schaeffer was not

rightly understanding Neo -Orthodoxy, or more specifically, Barth's own theology?

Or do you think that Schaeffer was closer to being correct in his assessment than

Barth was willing to admit?

Well, how much of his theology?

Because Barth was voluminous and detailed and also deeply intellectual in his writing,

and so I doubt that Schaeffer read lots of Barth.

But Schaeffer knew enough about Barth through Van Til to know that his doctrine of Scripture

was seriously wrong.

And so I would agree 100 with Schaeffer in terms of assessing Barth's doctrine of Scripture

as being simply very subjective and not the orthodox view that the

Bible is, from beginning to end, infallible and inerrant.

Well, let's go to some of our listener questions.

We have Seth in Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, who says, Greetings, gentlemen.

As someone who has yet to read anything by Francis Schaeffer, which of his writings would you recommend

first reading?

Oh, good question.

I would say, actually, so if you want to understand, for me, the church at the end of the

20th century, of course, which was my first read, that introduced me to the broad

structure of Schaeffer's thought and to the different themes that, to me, coming out of the

counterculture, were extremely important and which no one else was saying.

Now, having said that, I would actually say that reading a biography,

and I would recommend the Bill Edgar biography of Schaeffer, which

focuses on true spirituality, which has been one of Schaeffer's most

popular books.

I would recommend starting by reading Bill Edgar's book,

and hold on one second, and I'll get the title of that.

And while you're doing that, I'll announce our e -mail address again.

If anybody wants to join us with a question, it's ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S

-A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence, and have you found that title?

Yes, and so it would be Schaeffer and the Christian Life, Countercultural Spirituality by William Edgar.

It's a crossway publication in 2013.

It should be readily available on the Internet.

Well, thank you, Seth.

And if you could give me your full mailing address in Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, you have won a free

copy of your father's Libri, Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer, compliments of my guest

today, Dr. Gregory Edward Reynolds, and also compliments of Cumberland Valley Bible Book

Service, cvbbs .com, who will ship that book out to you at no cost to you or to

Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

We have a mutual friend of both of ours, Dr. Reynolds, who has submitted a question, someone with whom

I recently enjoyed two wonderful opportunities of

fellowship, once over lunch and then once at a worship service of

the Haven, an Orthodox Presbyterian congregation in Deer Park, Long Island, New

York.

Our mutual dear friend for many years, Dr. Pastor Bill Shishko,

has submitted two questions to you.

And the two questions are, first he says, thank you for your

book and your interview.

A couple of questions from items in your book.

The second and third stages of Francis Schaeffer's ministry have been called the

Bohemian Schaeffer and the Bourgeois Schaeffer.

You note that you preferred the Bohemian Schaeffer, as I do.

Well, I can't even think of a way of saying somebody is bourgeois without it being a pejorative

or an insult.

But develop those differences in why you prefer the Bohemian Schaeffer.

Yeah, I think that actually comes from those titles or those labels come from Ken Myers,

who is, of course, Mars Hill Audio editor and interviewer.

And I like those.

Of course, I've added that before the Bohemian Schaeffer, which was

what I would say is the middle Schaeffer was the fundamentalist Schaeffer.

And I don't think Ken would actually disagree with that.

But he focuses on the difference between the Bohemian and the bourgeois.

And what's interesting about those, as I thought about that a lot this afternoon once again, is

that they have so much to do, and this is a big Ken Myers theme, with the

environment.

He's in Europe, and it's a very different environment politically and ethically

and intellectually than America.

And I think, though, the environment, and especially the Christians that he was connected with, and in Europe,

it was pretty barren.

So he was very much alone in Europe, whereas when he came back to the United States,

the culture warriors really caught his attention.

There's probably something of that always there in Schaeffer.

For example, in his critique of art, it always seemed that he wanted a message.

He wanted to analyze the message of the art.

And there's not always a message in art, not certainly one that can be easily

put into words.

And so I've learned to enjoy art in a sense for art's sake.

Now, not to say that there isn't a message.

I remember the Francis Bacon painting, and I'm forgetting the name of it.

It's on the cover of Ruckmacher's book about art.

And his critique of art is that clearly he is distorting the image of a

pope that was based on a Renaissance painting and showing kind of the despair of

modern people, and also just the lack of humanity.

And I met Francis Schaeffer in a pub in Soho on the way back from L 'Abri, and I can attest to the

fact that he was a man who was deeply depressed, deeply sad.

He was a tragic figure, and he painted that way.

So there was a message there, a message of despair in his painting.

But I think sometimes Schaeffer's view that there always had to be a Christian basis for everything,

it really didn't fully come to grips with

common grace, what we understand as common grace, that God blesses unbelievers because they're made in

his image with many virtues, with gifts, with creativity, with all kinds of wonderful

things, even though at root everyone is born a rebel.

But on the other side of that, so for me, coming to the bohemian Schaeffer, he

wasn't really a bohemian, but the goatee and the knickers, you know,

he could relate to my generation of hippies, which were often bohemian, by the way,

and not in a good way.

But the bohemian Schaeffer could relate to us.

He had compassion for us, and he really understood many of our concerns, as I read from the

title, from the contents of the church at the end of the 20th century.

And so then when he became a culture warrior, the bourgeois Schaeffer,

really kind of more like a working -class populist instinct, which partly comes from his background, I think,

as a young person, he really became a culture warrior and got

involved with politics in a way that he had particularly not wanted to be

involved with when he was in Europe during what I would think of as the heyday,

as the best part of his ministry.

Of course, he was probably even better known in the last phase of his ministry,

which Ken Myers calls his bourgeois phase.

Now, as I said earlier, I think that I've never heard anyone called bourgeois

without it being an intended insult.

In my mind, that immediately conjures up materialism and

conventional attitudes, just being a part of the status quo.

Am I misreading the intention of that term, bourgeois?

No, not at all.

I think the way you described it would be our common understanding of that word.

Remember that in communism, bourgeois is a critique of capitalism.

And of course, Schaeffer would say that peace and prosperity are sort of

the goal of American bourgeois culture, and he critiqued that from Europe.

And then when he came here, I think he was always against materialism.

Let me be clear about that.

But at the same time, he maybe wasn't as critical of the religious right as

he should have been because of that.

But you're right.

And Ken Myers definitely didn't mean it as a compliment to say that that was his phase, because I think

Ken and my dear friend Bill Shishko and I would all very much agree that the

most beneficial Schaeffer was the bohemian, was the European

evangelist Schaeffer.

And we have a second question from Pastor Bill Shishko that I will read after we return from our midway break.

Please be patient, folks.

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Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer, I just have a couple of very important announcements to make.

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well, no matter where in the world you live, I have extensive lists spanning the globe of biblically

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That's also the email address where you can send in a question to Dr. Gregory Edward Reynolds on his book,

Your Father's Libre, Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer.

That's chrisorensen at gmail .com.

And going back to the second question of our listener, Pastor Bill Shishko of The

Haven in Deer Park, Long Island, he says, you also note that when you and a

friend were remodeling the Schaeffer bedroom in their slash your chalet,

there was simply a board for his desk, very few books, and a lot of magazines.

What would we infer from that regarding Dr. Schaeffer's intellectual status and development?

You also make the point that Schaeffer was a student, but not a scholar in the popular sense of the

word.

From your experience at Libre, how do you believe Schaeffer developed

the academic scholarly concepts that he developed in his books?

Yeah, good question, Bill.

And greetings, by the way, there on Long Island.

We miss being near enough to get together frequently.

When you look at his intellectual development, it's important to remember that he did graduate

magna cum laude from Hampton -Sydney College, which was a classical, true classical

education.

It would have had ancient languages and history and all kinds of good things,

including some good theology.

And so he had an intellectual background in that classical education.

But it was startling to us.

The house had a number of bookcases full of books, that Les Malaise, the chalet.

But at the same time, he had simply a blotter, a desk blotter that he would set on the corner of their double

bed with his Bible and paper and pen.

And so it was kind of startling to us because we thought, wow, how does this guy come up with all these things?

But I think he was a thinker who was constantly combing popular culture,

magazines, newspapers.

I never saw him actually reading a book.

And some have criticized him for that.

I would not because he was extremely bright and had an uncanny knack.

I think it was Bill Edgar in his lovely book that pointed this out.

And he spent a lot of time there at Labrie and really knew the Schaeffers quite well.

And he said Schaeffer had an uncanny knack for being able to look out at the culture

and read the different popular things in the culture and pick out what

would be useful in his understanding of the culture and then communicating that to the people

in the culture.

And so I think it wasn't a lack of intellectual ability.

He had that training.

But in the time that I met him, now remember that in the early 70s, I was there in

1971 and into early 72, Labrie had already existed since

1955.

And so how much he had read in those early years when he wasn't in demand as a speaker and an

author, I have no way of knowing.

But he certainly was well -informed on so many things.

But not at an academic level.

He made some mistakes when it came to history and getting some of the facts of the Enlightenment

and the Renaissance straight.

Well, thank you, my dear friend, Pastor Bill Shishko.

And I know that you have said in your question that you already have a

copy of the book.

You have technically won a copy.

If you would like to give it to someone that you know and love, let me know, or let me know

also if you want me to just pass this on to another listener.

And you can email that to me at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

I want to plug this fine church that I loved visiting and where

I loved worshiping recently, The Haven in Comac,

Long Island, New York.

And that website is thehavenli .com.

Thehavenli .com.

We have an anonymous listener who says, Some of

my charismatic friends are trying to claim Francis Schaeffer as their own.

Was he at any time in his life a charismatic?

What was his view of the charismatic phenomenon?

And I did happen to see him one time, interviewed by notorious word -of -faith

Pentecostal Pat Robertson on the 700 Club.

And I was wondering if that was just because he was taking advantage of an opportunity to speak

what he believed in front of a large audience.

Perhaps if you could silent that phone, that would be great.

Yes, so he had a...

Schaeffer had a little booklet called Super Spirituality.

And it wasn't just a critique of the charismatic movement, but it was a critique of

anything above and beyond, let's say, the ordinary Christian life that we see depicted in the Bible

and particularly in the New Testament.

And so he was definitely not favorable to the charismatic theology and the

idea of these extra gifts that were really unique to the apostolic

era in verifying the authenticity of the apostolic message.

But on the other hand, it's not surprising that he would have talked with people and even be interviewed

by a charismatic because he was a friend of all who claimed the

name of Christ as their Savior and Lord.

And so I'm not surprised that he would be open to such an interview, but he definitely was not

favorable.

And I would recommend that little booklet, Super Spirituality, because I think it's a pretty insightful

book.

Well, Anonymous, give us your full name and your full

address so we can have CVBBS .com ship that book out to

you, the book we have been addressing, Your Father's Libre, and obviously we will not divulge your identity

over the air.

So just send us an email with that information, and CVBBS .com will ship that book out

to you.

Let's see here.

We have another listener question.

The listener says, How ecumenical was

Francis Schaeffer?

Did he cross the line in ecumenism into dangerous areas of fellowship with Roman

Catholics and Eastern Orthodox, or did he always hold that element of his separatism

intact?

Well, I wouldn't call his commitment to Bible -believing, let's say,

Orthodox Christian churches that believe in the historic Christian faith as separatism.

So separatism is a much narrower view.

Separatism basically says my church is the only true church.

I'm putting that in a kind of sloganesque fashion, but that's separatism.

Separatism is we among Christians, we're the only really true serious Christians.

That's what fundamentalism does.

Schaeffer, on the other hand, believed that the circle was drawn around true

churches that had the Word of God.

They preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

They believed in the Trinity, the Incarnation, the historic crucifixion and resurrection.

And so he would draw the line there.

He did not go beyond that, however, and while he would be willing to talk to basically anyone, including

a Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, he would not, I believe

from all I remember reading, include those within the

pale of orthodoxy.

Now tell us more about how LaBrie may have changed

anything about your own theology, your worldview, and your walk with Christ.

Yes, good question, Chris.

I remember a very young Christian.

I became a Christian in February of 1971, began reading his books a month or so later,

and went there in August.

So I was a freshly minted believer, and I was really open to all kinds of

new input from faithful Christians.

I think one of the interesting things besides the fact that he was the only one that was

giving a true community, which remember for hippies who like to live in communes, that was huge.

And so seeing a true community as opposed to one that I had lived in in Oregon, which was not,

that was enlightening.

And so that was a change in my life, very refreshing.

And then also the element of creativity.

But the most important thing that happened to me along with those things was that as I became a

proctor, as a helper after I did my student three months, I was then

a proctor and was just basically would guide people as to what the resources in Farrell House were and how

they could access them.

I happened to sit next to C .H. Spurgeon.

Not literally, of course, but I sat next to his Metropolitan Tabernacle

pulpit and the Park Street pulpit.

And so there are these 40 or 50 volumes of sermons.

And so one day I went, wow, this is interesting.

I think I'll pick one of these out and see if I can read a sermon and see what it's about.

And so somewhere in Jeremiah he had written a sermon or preached a sermon that was printed

on the sovereignty of God.

And I read that sermon and I went, wow, this is just powerful biblical truth.

Comforting, encouraging, and in every way a tremendous blessing.

Right next to those sermons was something by Ian Murray called the Forgotten

Spurgeon.

And that was my introduction to biblical Calvinism.

And so that was something that was a huge step forward for me

in the Christian life.

Schaeffer, I believe, was a confessional and he was a Calvinist in his theology,

but he never used those labels.

And I think it was in some ways I could see it as a weakness.

On the other hand, I understand it because the legalism and fundamentalism that he came

out of in the Bible Presbyterian Church under Carl MacIntyre's leadership

was notorious for using shibboleths.

And so he tried to stay away from what he would have thought as kind of shibboleths, and so he didn't

use those terms.

Now, it was a weakness in that I had to discover these by sitting next to Spurgeon's

sermons and Ian Murray's wonderful book about Spurgeon and his Calvinism.

But at the same time, that was a tremendous, I mean, there was a wonderful library there in the Farrell House,

and I was exposed to some wonderful biblical truth.

Did Carl MacIntyre's camp within Presbyterianism, the

fundamentalist wing, did they view Schaeffer in any harsh way as a traitor or

as someone in an extreme sense an apostate?

How did they view him after he seemed to drift into a

different mindset when it came to an approach to the Christian life?

You know, I don't have a lot of details on that, and someone like George Marsden or Mark Knoll would be able to

fill you in on the details of that.

But I can say definitely that the fundamentalists were not happy with him.

Carl MacIntyre was not happy with him when he made this switch and really

began to see the weaknesses in his own life as a fundamentalist minister and then try

to correct those by really repenting and becoming a more loving

human being.

Oh, wow.

That's something interesting because I know some very strict fundamentalists who

still greatly admire Carl MacIntyre.

So that's interesting that he made some kind of a profession of repentance towards—.

No, I didn't say that MacIntyre did.

It was Schaeffer.

Oh, okay.

Of his own separatism and own fundamentalism.

Oh, I see.

Okay.

I'm not also saying that fundamentalists don't have any love, but he saw the kind of

lovelessness of a kind of rigid view of things that would not be

very compassionate towards those that disagreed.

Now explain the title of your book, Your Father's Libri.

Whenever I hear a similar description,

it's usually something like—it's announcing something exciting,

new, and refreshing and different than something that may be old, worn

out, and boring, like this is not your grandmother's fried chicken or this is not

your father's Baptist church or that kind of a thing.

But you have said this is your father's libri.

Explain that.

Right.

Yeah, that's an excellent question.

It comes really—I think Molly Worthen wrote an article called Not Your

Father's Libri in Christianity Today of March 2008.

And she was picking up on what then would have been an ad on television that was widely

broadcast, Not Your Father's Oldsmobile.

And of course, who wants your father's Oldsmobile?

We want something sporty and cool.

And so that was, I think, the impetus of her title.

She was really reporting, however, on the libri of that era, which is many decades

beyond the libri that I knew.

And it was a little bit discouraging because I think there are some questionable things there in terms of

commitment to the Bible as the infallible, inerrant word of God and things of that nature.

I don't know enough about it to really comment, and I don't want to give the present libri a bad name, but

I did want to give the old libri a good name.

And so that's why I chose to write that article in Ordained Servant, which I'm

the editor of for the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, and it's basically written for church officers.

And so I thought it would be good to look back at that, and I used that as a

platform to really reflect on the value of the ministry of Schaeffer

and that wonderful community that I enjoyed so much.

Now, did Schaeffer have heroes in the faith of his own that helped to shape

the man he became?

Yes, he often referred to Machen, so he definitely liked Machen.

And I think one of my friends, I think this was John Mether, who was a former historian for the OPC,

reminded me that Edith Schaeffer made him read

the book on Christianity and liberalism that was one of Schaeffer's, I mean, one of Machen's

most famous books coming out in, well, just 100 years ago in 1923.

And so in order to get to marry her, he had to read Machen.

And he fell in love with Machen's theology and writing, and so Machen was

definitely a mentor.

Van Til was a mentor, even though they had some disagreements about their fundamental

understanding of the nature of apologetics.

And he, on his reading list of recommended books, The Defense of the Faith was

something that Schaeffer strongly recommended.

And of course, Van Til's critique, very penetrating and detailed critique of

Karl Barth and his neoliberalism was something that

influenced Schaeffer quite a bit and got him into trouble with Karl Barth himself.

And then Calvin, he often referred to Calvin, I think at Westminster Theological Seminary, before

he left for faith, Dr. Macrae was someone

that had been a mentor.

And then back in his fundamentalist days, of course, MacIntyre was a mentor.

And I think I wouldn't want to forget that I'm sure he learned many good things from him, apart

from the fundamentalist attitude, which he came to reject in his Hayloft experience.

We have Susan Margaret in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, who wants to know, what

specific church, if any, did Francis Schaeffer belong to?

Well, he had been in his fundamentalist days, he had three different churches.

One of them, interestingly, is now an Orthodox Presbyterian church in Grove City, Pennsylvania,

where you have Grove City College.

So that church is in the OPC, and Schaeffer was a pastor there for a number of

years.

So he was a pastor for quite a few years before he went to Europe in order

to spread Sunday School material among Bible -believing churches in Europe.

And so that was his church affiliation.

But then it would have been the Bible Presbyterian Church, which, by the way, is a church that has

changed quite a bit since MacIntyre's day, and the OPC actually has

a... we're in conversation with them, and I think that's a very healthy thing.

Now, when I was at LaBrie, I became a member of their international church.

I think it was called Reforme.

I think it was a French title.

But it was his church there, and he did...

I had to go and sit before their session and answer questions about my Christian faith,

and I became a member of that church while I was there at LaBrie

in the fall of 1971.

If anybody in our audience is getting very nervous about the Bible Presbyterian denomination

because of its association with Carl MacIntyre and perhaps his overly rigid

separatist views, I do have to mention that there's a wonderful brother I know personally who is

pastoring in that denomination, Kevin Backus, who is a pastor at the Bible Presbyterian Church of

Grand Island, New York.

So I wanted to give him a plug, and his website is BiblePres

.org, BiblePres .org.

Going back to the question that a

listener earlier on, I think it was Seth in Hummlestown, Pennsylvania, wanted book recommendations.

We have CJ in Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, who wants any documentary recommendations on

Francis Schaeffer, if there are any.

You know, I don't have a lot of knowledge about that, except that several years ago, I went on YouTube

and just punched in LaBrie and Schaeffer and came up with all kinds of things.

And there were several.

I don't have the titles at my command, but there were several that were really wonderful documentaries

of LaBrie.

So I would just recommend going to YouTube and just search LaBrie.

And that's L -apostrophe -A -B -R -I.

Yes, a French word for shelter.

Well, it seems that there might be warrant for a

movie about Francis Schaeffer that could be somewhat of a reformed answer

to the movie The Jesus Revolution, the film

about how Chuck Smith of Calvary Chapel was used of God to lead

many in the hippie movement to salvation.

Perhaps this could be a reformed version of that when you consider LaBrie.

And what you were saying earlier, that it was a wonderful magnet for

people like yourself who were in that hippie movement.

Yes, that would be a wonderful thing.

It's interesting that Schaeffer himself was quite

cautious, and he was really wary of going into film until

Frankie, his son, likes to be called Frank now, not Frankie, but he talked him into

doing that for the two films that he did, one with Frank and the other with

Everett Koop, who was then Surgeon General of the United States.

Yes, I had a privilege of meeting Dr. Koop at the 10th Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia

many years ago when I was in attendance at the Philadelphia Conference on Reformed Theology, and was

quite honored to be introduced to him.

Speaking of Frank Schaeffer, I remember he had converted to

Eastern Orthodoxy, and I think the last I heard he was an agnostic.

Is that still the case?

Well, Frank, he would call himself, I think, a believing

atheist or something.

It's an oxymoron to say the least, and I think he kind of revels in being oxymoronic.

But he's a very bright guy, a very gifted guy.

He's crazy for God.

However, I agree with Oz Guinness, and we've corresponded on this topic

many years ago when Guinness wrote a critique of that

book for Books and Culture, which now sadly no longer exists.

Just saying things about your famous parents that are negative is, for

me, not called for.

I just think it lacked basic ethical sensibilities.

He has a kind of chip on his shoulder, which is sad, but I believe that in trying to sympathize

with him being born into a family where his dad was so famous, and I think he

probably, because they were so busy during the heart of when he was growing up as a young man, he was

probably neglected to some degree, and I think that he never knew an

ordinary, healthy, local church, and that's a sad thing.

And when I look at my own Christian life and development, I realize how very, very important the local

church is.

It's essential.

It's not something that's optional for the Christian.

Frank never had that, and when I used to ride around on his little scooter with him, and I skied with

him and ate fondue with him, he could

be very enjoyable.

And so it's kind of a sad story, and I'm hoping at some point maybe to be able to get to meet him,

because someone in our church out in Dover, New Hampshire actually lives quite close to him.

Oh, well, where there's life, there's hope, as they say.

And we have to go to our final break right now.

It'll be a lot more brief than the other breaks, but if you do have the intention to

send in a question, I would do it immediately because we are rapidly running out of time.

Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence.

And I'd like to remind my guest, Dr. Reynolds, to please mute yourself during the break.

And we'll be right back.

Don't go away.

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We are now back with my guest, Dr. Greg Reynolds, and the conclusion

of our discussion of your Father's Libri Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer.

And I'd like you to let our listeners know some of the most

substantial reasons why Christians should acquaint themselves with Francis Schaeffer, in

addition to why they should acquaint themselves with your book.

And please list some other books that will best aid our listeners in that endeavor.

Yes, I think I would sum up in two words the value of

Schaeffer, thoughtful Christianity.

There was no one that was as thoughtful as him that I knew of back when I began to read him and

be influenced by him.

But I would like to, I ended the book purposefully with Bill Edgar's,

my review of his book, and he gives six wonderful reasons,

strengths of the ministry and the legacy of Schaeffer, and they're these.

And this is on the last page, 97.

He loved his family, number one.

Number two, he was passionate about serving the Lord.

Number three, cultural interests and pursuits are an important part of life.

Four, he had an uncanny ability to look deeply into a person's heart in order to carry

out the principles of presuppositional apologetics in actual practice.

Five, his greatest spiritual rediscovery was the present value of the blood of Christ.

And six, he cared very deeply about human beings.

And I think that nicely sums up the tremendous value of Schaeffer.

And while some would have criticized him, of course, for not being a deep scholar and making some historical

mistakes and that kind of thing, what he did for us all, and this is something Oz Guinness has been very

eloquent in repeating over the years, is he got us to see the value of thinking, the value of being

curious about culture, about the world as God's world, and that he has given

to us as a gift, even including fallen culture.

There are so many things there to understand, and this in turn helps us to

be faithful in spreading the gospel to every kind of person in the world.

Now, you've obviously already mentioned the tiny handful of

things that you were criticizing Schaeffer over,

like the unintentional misrepresentation of certain historic

events and so on.

But what disagreements, if any, did you have with Schaeffer over his theology or his approach to ministry and

worldview?

Well, I think I mentioned two of them briefly.

One of them was his ecclesiology.

I think he was Presbyterian, but he would have been more in the new school rather than the old

school Presbyterianism.

And OPC has tended in its history to be very much old school Presbyterian, that is to say,

working not to be changed by the cultural situation that one is ministering in and trying to spread the

gospel in.

So I think he was not real strong in his ecclesiology.

I don't think I ever heard him very infrequently at least mention Presbyterianism

or the Reformed faith.

And I mentioned why I think I can understand that, because of the fundamentalist use of shibboleths.

And then the other thing was he had no real doctrine of common grace, though he oftentimes

spoke and acted as if he had a doctrine of common grace.

But he certainly didn't make it explicit, and one could come to the conclusion that there had to be a Christian

base for everything.

And of course, that was one of the ways in which he became a culture warrior when it came to

American politics.

But having said that, I'm amazed at how prescient he was in

realizing that relativism was a huge problem.

And back in the day, very few people were talking about that.

But ethical relativism, that there's no absolute truth, that there are no meta

-narratives.

It's all a matter of cultural relativity and ethical relativity.

And the second thing is he understood the tendency towards dehumanization.

And when it came to his whatever happened to the human race, whatever weaknesses there may have been in terms of that

video, the great strength of it was that he saw in the abortion war

a tremendous devaluation of our humanity as made in God's image.

And these were two very, very important themes that run through all of his writings.

Well, I just want to thank you so much for being a superb guest to discuss a very important

Christian figure from history that, as I said before, needs to be heard and

read and studied more than ever before, in my opinion.

And I know that you could get your book on Amazon.

And that book, again, is Your Father's Libri, Reflections on the Ministry of Francis Schaeffer.

You can also get it through Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com, cvbbs

.com.

If they don't have it in stock when you contact them, they will order it for you.

And make sure you mention Chris Arns and Avonio Sharpe and Zion Radio since they are a sponsor of this program.

I want to also remind our listeners of the three day event that I am helping to

orchestrate.

September 15th, 16th and 17th in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, alongside with

my friend Pastor Joel St. and the Mid -Atlantic Reformation Society.

We have invited Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries to conduct the three day conference.

I am still working on a debate to be a part of that three day conference.

That has not yet 100 % been accomplished.

So please keep me in your prayers about that.

And also keep those dates open on your calendar.

That's Friday, Saturday, Sunday, September 15th, 16th and 17th.

And I also want you, if you have any other contact information other than the

General Orthodox Presbyterian Church website, opc .org, do you have any other contact information

that you care to share, Dr. Reynolds?

No, I think you already mentioned the opc .org, and it's a great website.

I've been working on that for the last several decades and helped develop the various variations of

our site now.

We're very much attuned to mobile media, to smartphones and that sort of thing.

It's a content -rich website, and anyone who goes there can find all kinds of

information, and the Q &A section will answer questions that you might have.

And thank you, Chris, for having me on.

It was really a privilege and a great pleasure to share this time with you.

Amen.

And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior

than you are a sinner.