Carl F. H. Henry on the Holy Spirit (Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology)

Jesse M. Payne, Jesse M Payne

• Publisher: Lexham Press
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781683594871
• eBook ISBN: 9781683594888
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Denominations

Recover evangelicalism's foundations by returning to its architect.

None doubt the influence of Carl F. H. Henry, the "theological architect" of contemporary evangelicalism. Through his prolific writing and editorial role in Christianity Today,Henry is known for addressing contemporary theology, individual and social ethics, and cultural criticism. But he has been critiqued for an underdeveloped pneumatology.

In Carl F. H. Henry on The Holy Spirit, Jesse M. Payne argues that Henry cannot truly be understood apart from his mature pneumatology. The Spirit plays a vital role in three major areas of Henry's theology: revelation, ecclesiology, and ethics. These seemingly disparate topics are tied together by his view of a Spirit--inspired Bible ordering a Spirit--enlivened body composed of Spirit--filled believers.

Readers will gain a more holistic view of Henry, the role of the Spirit in his life and thought, and early neo--evangelical theology.

1

CARL F. H. HENRY ON … THE HOLY SPIRIT?

In the January 30, 1961, issue of Christianity Today, editor Carl F. H. Henry devoted a section to what he feared was a growing neglect of the Holy Spirit in modern theology. He wrote, “In twentieth century Christianity the Holy Spirit is still a displaced person.… Whenever the Church makes the Spirit of God a refugee, the Church—not the Spirit—becomes the vagabond.”1 He was convinced that inattention to the Spirit would result in believers wandering helplessly throughout a lost world. Six years later, in the pages of the same magazine, Henry reiterated that the church is ever-dependent upon the Lord and Life-Giver, the Holy Spirit:

If the Church is stricken today, it is not the soul that is dying. The Spirit is alive. There may yet be healing. There may yet be resurrection. It will depend on whether the churches really want this outpouring of the Holy Spirit in our day. Do we? Or do we merely want to get along as we have always done?2

Henry posed questions like these consistently to thousands of readers throughout his tenure at Christianity Today (1956–1968). He devoted the entire January 4, 1963, issue to the Spirit, along with numerous other articles and editorials throughout his twelve years at the helm. Further, he addressed the topic of the Holy Spirit in academic works such as Christian Personal Ethics and the six-volume God, Revelation and Authority, as well as in journal articles, monographs, and unpublished documents and correspondence. Henry was tapping into an evangelical impulse toward the Spirit that had characterized the movement since its earliest days,3 but since had seemed to dissipate in the haze of modernism.

But the Holy Spirit was never a subject of mere academic inquiry for Henry. He had a deep desire for the ongoing presence of the Spirit of God. In his 1986 autobiography, Henry recalled his own dependence upon the Spirit throughout his decades of ministry:

I have always been open to some so-called mystical aspects of the Christian life … when God becomes my God, when divine revelation penetrates not only the mind but rather the whole self, when the Spirit personally illumines the believer, dynamic fellowship with God opens possibilities of spiritual guidance in which the Holy Spirit personalizes and applies the biblical revelation individually to and in a redeemed and renewed life.4

Henry recognized that the Spirit was not only vital for personal growth, but for kingdom growth, too. Though remembered as an ambitious institutional builder, Henry maintained that, apart from the Spirit, evangelicalism’s efforts would amass to nothing:

It is a truism—though one we continually need to learn—that there can be no effective Christian work apart from the empowering of the Holy Spirit. We can build congregations. We can supply impressive buildings. We can accomplish organization. We can promote and finance activity on a scale unprecedented, and we can harness new and effective instruments. Ministers and workers can even have the most detailed kind of training. But the fact remains that the work of regeneration is still the work of the sovereign Spirit, and a genuine reviving of Christian life, vigor, and evangelism may be expected only as the Holy Ghost gives life and power to all that we bring for his service.5

Throughout his career, Henry returned to the present reality of the Spirit and the need for Christians to remain utterly dependent upon him in the interim between Pentecost and Parousia. Nothing of eternal consequence was possible without the Spirit’s power and blessing.

QUESTIONS OF HENRY AND PNEUMATOLOGY

This book offers a critical examination of the pneumatological thought of Carl F. H. Henry, the “theological architect” of the twentieth-century neo-evangelical movement,6 and undoubtedly one who left a lasting imprint on American evangelicalism.7 The broad research questions this book will seek to answer are: How does Carl F. H. Henry approach pneumatology throughout his writings? Is his thought developed? If so, in what way(s)? Further, are those who conclude that he had a weak pneumatology justified in doing so? Specifically, this book will argue that despite criticism that he possessed an underdeveloped pneumatology, Carl F. H. Henry understood the Holy Spirit to play a vital role in three key areas: revelation, ecclesiology, and ethics. In this, he believed that a Spirit-inspired Bible (revelation) would order a Spirit-enlivened body (ecclesiology) composed of Spirit-filled believers (ethics). Though revelation, ecclesiology, and ethics are at times treated in separate theological categories, sometimes with little relationship between them, Henry saw pneumatology as a thread uniting them together.

This chapter will give a preliminary overview of the research questions at hand. First, two rationales for the usefulness of this study will be provided. A defense will be given as to why Carl F. H. Henry, despite the sea of published literature devoted to his work, is worthy of further examination. Then, a case will be made as to why Henry’s pneumatology in particular, despite the many topics he addressed, deserves greater attention and exploration. Following these rationales, a brief survey of the literature surrounding Henry’s pneumatological views will be presented. Finally, the chapter will conclude with an overview of the book’s argumentation and methodology.

WHY CARL F. H. HENRY?

The researcher of Carl F. H. Henry should be warned: there is (seemingly) no end to the writing of books, articles, and dissertations on Henry. As a key figure in twentieth-century American Protestantism, Henry has been evaluated by a wide range of scholars. If Henry is evangelicalism’s theological Michelangelo, he certainly has a fair number of both admirers and detractors.8

Despite the broad recognition of Henry’s thought and importance (even among those who disagree with his conclusions), there is much to be done in understanding and applying his theological program and entrusting it to a new generation. Timothy George’s 2004 prediction that “a new generation of evangelicals … will still find [Henry] worthy of serious attention in the future” is coming to fruition.9 Multiple volumes over the last fifteen years have emerged commending Henry as a figure deserving further attention, four of which are recognized below.

Gregory Thornbury, in his Recovering Classic Evangelicalism: Applying the Wisdom and Vision of Carl F. H. Henry, believes Henry to be “a key to evangelicalism’s past” and may “be a cipher to its future.”10 He argues that issues important to Henry remain important today, and that re-engaging Henry will assist evangelicals in retrieving the best that evangelicalism has to offer in order to recover from its theological deterioration.

Essential Evangelicalism: The Enduring Influence of Carl F. H. Henry, edited by Matthew J. Hall and Owen Strachan, gives five reasons Henry is worth engaging today: he provided a model of orthodox engagement with an unorthodox world; he can give young evangelicals a framework for navigating secularism; he articulated a vision for gospel-centered social justice; he modeled evangelical ecumenism framed by confessional identity; and he understood theology and evangelism to be inseparable.11 The editors “freshly commend Henry’s work” because his vision and depth offer a strong foundation for contemporary evangelicals.12 They acknowledge the current situation and hope that a new generation might change it:

Carl Henry is a distant reality for many modern Christians. Perhaps we should amend that: to a good many folks, he is unknown. He is recognized primarily among scholars, seminarians, and some pastors. Those who are aware of Henry know him to be a formidable theologian, a sometimes impenetrable writer, and an evangelical-at-large of the postwar twentieth century.… Henry was all these things. But he was more: a tireless evangelist, an incurable optimist, a gifted administrator, a loving father, a devoted husband, a fierce opponent, an eternal journalist, an unstoppable hatcher-of-grand-schemes, a Sunday school teacher.13

In pushing readers to delve into Henry’s work at a new clip, the editors think “that one could profitably set down with Henry and spend a very long time following his trail of thought.”14 I have taken them up on the suggestion.

G. Wright Doyle, in his Carl Henry: Theologian for All Seasons, sees tremendous value in reengaging Henry’s voice, especially because he has been neglected and misinterpreted over the previous few decades.15 Doyle notes that recent monographs by Alister McGrath, John Frame, Scott Oliphant, and Douglas Kelly, all addressing issues Henry did before them, relegate him to footnotes or ignore him altogether.16 Further, he laments that the 2007 Dictionary of Major Biblical Interpreters failed to include Henry anywhere in its index.17 He desires to see a new generation of evangelicals recapture Henry’s vision and apply it to the contemporary world.

Finally, Richard Mouw’s foreword to the 2003 republication of Henry’s 1947 The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism is instructive regarding Henry’s aptness to speak to contemporary challenges (and, by extension, the value of reengaging his thought today). Mouw argues that Henry’s clarion call in The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism needs to be heard anew:

It must also be said that [Henry’s] actual suggestions as to what is required in a well-formed biblical orthodoxy continue to ring true for many of us. While there is much to celebrate in the success of evangelicalism in recent years—both in grassroots ministries and in scholarly contributions—there are also reasons to worry a bit about tendencies in all sectors of contemporary evangelical life to dilute the proclamation of the Gospel, as well as to negotiate too-easy settlements between evangelical thought and various manifestations of “postmodern” culture. Carl Henry’s antidote to the deviations from biblical truth in the 1940s speaks also to our own day.18

Mouw believes that “the agenda Henry laid out in [The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism] still deserves sustained attention.”19

Beyond the works devoted to Henry’s theological thought, others focus on him as a vital figure in the story of modern evangelicalism. Henry’s importance to the broader narrative of American evangelicalism is well captured by Owen Strachan’s Awakening the Evangelical Mind: An Intellectual History of the Neo-Evangelical Movement, Joel Carpenter’s Revive Us Again: The Reawakening of American Fundamentalism, and Barry Hankins’s Uneasy in Babylon: Southern Baptist Conservatives and American Culture.20 These demonstrate that to understand modern evangelicalism, one must have a familiarity with Carl Henry—another rationale for investigating his theological views. Further, Albert Mohler’s 2001 chapter on Henry in Theologians of the Baptist Tradition and Bob Patterson’s 1983 Carl F. H. Henry both give attention to Henry’s place in American evangelicalism.21 Mohler sees Henry as virtually an institution unto himself, and believes Henry “represented the intellectual and cognitive defense of evangelical truth so central to the evangelical movement.”22 D. A. Carson understands Henry as a “towering figure” who is perennially relevant for evangelical thought.23 Charles Colson argued Henry’s work needed further attention, as he believed that “when the history of the evangelical movement is finally written, Carl Henry will emerge as its dominant figure.”24 John Woodbridge captures well the role Henry played in the formation of evangelicalism and why he remains a figure of ongoing relevance:

Indeed, what contours would the evangelical movement have assumed if Henry had not lent the considerable force of his mind and personality to its shaping and advocacy?… To recount the story of the creation of Christianity Today (1956) without rehearsing the pivotal role Carl F. H. Henry played as the founding editor is difficult to imagine. To suppose that a number of world congresses on evangelism would have been held without the impetus he gave to them is likewise difficult to contemplate. To believe that the hundreds of evangelical leaders who attended the Evangelical Affirmations conference in 1989 would have done so if chairpersons other than Dr. Henry and Dr. Kenneth Kantzer had extended the invitation seems fanciful. Indeed, to review the history of the evangelical movement during the last half-century almost ineluctably draws one to assess Dr. Henry’s place in history.25

Overall, these volumes, while disagreeing at points, all resound with a common refrain: Carl F. H. Henry still speaks to modern issues and challenges in evangelicalism. In many ways, Henry not only speaks to them, but anticipated them decades in advance. Car...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• Chapter 1: Carl F. H. Henry on … the Holy Spirit?
• Chapter 2: Carl F. H. Henry’s Pneumatology (Contours and Context)
• Chapter 3: A Spirit-Inspired Bible (Pneumatology and Revelation)
• Chapter 4: A Spirit-Enlivened Body (Pneumatology and Ecclesiology)
• Chapter 5: A Spirit-Filled Believer (Pneumatology and Ethics)
• Conclusion: Carl F. H. Henry as a Theologian of the Spirit
• Bibliography
• Subject / Author Index
• Scripture Index
• Old Testament