What Happens when a Great Teacher Demonstrates Great Scholarship?

In 2003, I attended a summer session at Regents in Vancouver to take a class taught by J.I. Packer titled “A History of Anglican Theology.” At that time Packer was one of the most read Evangelicals not just in the Anglican Church, but in the worldwide Evangelical community. The class was profound.

Why this is important? You would think being an English Evangelical that the class would have been presented with a strong bias toward his theological viewpoint. However, Dr. Packer was a prolific teacher and writer because he was first a great scholar. On each section from pre-Reformation to the modern era, his remarks were balanced and insightful. He would describe the theme or movement and talk about each’s strengths and weaknesses. One special delight was his knowledge of the good Puritan spiritual guides and writers which I learned about at my seminary by the Cliff Notes.

There were three areas in which he showed special prescience and a reconciling grace to those who you might think, given his Calvinistic theology, he would not.

For example, in covering the Oxford Movement which the evangelical English Bishop Ryle reviled, Packer was at moments very understanding. He saw their commitment to the scholarship of the early church fathers, the holiness of their lives, and the loving commitment of their early sacrificial ministry to the urban poor of the 19^th century. Many of the early Oxford movement leaders were dedicated to ministry among the working classes during the rise of the industrial revolution. Some were even Christian socialists.

Another important area for me was his appreciation for the Charismatic Movement, often much maligned by English Evangelicals. His book on Romans, Keeping in Step with the Spirit is a tour de force on this very topic and carefully points out what the movement got right.

I want to mention what he said at the end about the Liberal/Progressive Movement because it speaks to our current situation. What follows is a summary of his comments from my notes which I still revisit regularly.

First, the strength: Packer said this. Liberalism’s great strength and contribution to the Church is that essentially it is not so much a theological movement as a protest movement. The protest is over what is wrong in the Church and in society. And he underscored “there are always things in the status quo that need to be highlighted, criticized, and even reformed!” He mentioned several examples of this.

Second, the weakness: Packer pointed out that while liberals are often right on the mark in the protest and criticism, they are often the weakest on the ability to say what should be done, even at times unrealistic in their prescriptions. His final summary comment was “We need their voice, but I have NO idea what they would possible do if they end up running the Church!” Well, now we know.

When liberal/progressives got the leadership and power of the Church’s structure, what did they do? They used it to accomplish their ends at the expense of their fellow brothers and sisters in Christ who do not believe in their theology or agendas, but who are still legitimately Anglicans. This attitude, of course, fractured the Anglican Church in North America. 

Those of us who remain in TEC and who speak on behalf of classical Anglicanism and the inclusive theological and ecumenical nature of our historic faith keep facing this issue of power over and over.

The important issues of social justice, racism, and gender equality have become for many of those who run things the imposition of shame and guilt to control the agenda of our community of faith. What would the Jesus of the Cross say about this? Alas, we know.

The Gospel writers are unanimous on the topic. Jesus declared, “MY KINGDOM IS NOT OF THIS WORLD!” Jesus would not allow his disciples to use power to accomplish God’s reign of love. That is why he is the Prince of Peace and the incarnation of God’s love. And it is why Jesus of the New Testament remains such a captivating person to millions of people even outside of the Church, His way is the way of love and as one of his disciple’s wrote “love does not insist on its own way.” 

Many progressives like to say, “Love Wins.” Ultimately this is the message of the resurrection, but love wins most fully when it has no power and does not command others. This is why no matter how many times progressives repeat that we are a Church of inclusiveness and diversity, their words sound hollow. We now know that the words "inclusive and diverse" are code words for "people who agree with us." This is a long way from the simple invitation that was placed outside of Episcopal Congregations for over 100 years. These gracious words were "The Episcopal Church Welcomes You."