This Day in Presbyterian History: (Death of Charles Erdman)

It was at the momentous Syracuse, N.Y. meeting of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A. where Dr. J. Gresham Machen was officially defrocked from the ministry of that denomination. That action in turn then prompted the founding of what was to become the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Also in attendance at that General Assembly in Syracuse was one of Machen’s many adversaries, Dr. Charles R. Erdman, a man who was by all accounts staunchly evangelical. Yet he found himself in opposition to the course taken by Dr. Machen— he found himself siding with those very men who took a decidedly modernist and unbelieving approach to the Scriptures.

The Syracuse Herald gave some coverage of Dr. Erdman’s visit to his birthplace in Fayetteville, NY that year, noting:

“Dr. Erdman was born in Fayetteville, where his father was a Presbyterian minister, but when he was three weeks old, his parents moved to another charge.

“In spite of the short time Dr. Erdman was a resident of the Onandaga County village, however, he has frequently visited his birthplace and this week, before the adjournment of the General Assembly which he is attending, he will again visit his birthplace, he said Saturday.

“Dr. Erdman’s father, the Rev. William Jacob Erdman, preached in the same church, and lived in the same manse as did the father of Grover Cleveland, former President of the United States. His youngest daughter is the wife of Francis Grover Cleveland, son of the late former President.

“The greater part of Dr. Erdman’s boyhood was passed in Jamestown. He also lived in Chicago where his father was pastor of Dwight L. Moody’s church. He was graduated from Princeton University in 1886 and from Princeton Seminary in 1891. He holds [honorary] doctor’s degrees from Wooster College, Princeton University and Davidson College.

“For six years following his ordination in 1891 he was pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Overbook, Pa. Then he became pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Germantown, Pa., where he remained until 1906 when he became a Princeton professor.

“He became a member of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions in 1906 and in 1926 was elected as president, an office he still holds. He was elected moderator of the Presbyterian General Assembly in 1925. In the same year he was moderator of the New Brunswick Presbytery. In 1910 he was a delegate tot he World Missionary Conference in Edinburgh and in 1922 to the National Christian Council in Shanghai.

“He is the author of many books, including The Ruling Elder, Sunday Afternoon with a Railroad Man, Coming to the Communion, Within the Gates of the Far East, The Return of Christ, The Lord We Love, The Spirit of Christ, The Life of D.L. Moody, and expositions of most of the books of the New Testament.

“Dr. Erdman’s wife was Miss Estelle Pardee of Germantown, daugher of a widely-known coal operator. His son, the Rev. Calvin Pardee Erdman, also a Presbyterian minister, has preached in Hawaii and California….

“The Erdmans have a summer home at Saranac Lake.”

Embedded in that newspaper account are a few clues for the observant reader as to why Dr. Erdman found himself an opponent of Machen. Erdman had become attached to the denominational board of foreign missions, and Machen had been critical of that Board for fielding missionaries who held low views of Scripture. Moreover, Erdman’s personal and family connection to D.L. Moody might indicate a faith and a theology that was more generally evangelical and less confessional or Reformed in nature. Politics may also have had a part. Like Grover Cleveland, Dr. Erdman may have been a Democrat, whereas J. Gresham Machen was decidedly libertarian in his views and more of a political free-thinker.

Words to Live By: Why some men make the decisions they do is often a puzzle beyond our understanding. In pondering this point, we realize how much we must seek to live humbly in the fear of the Lord, for there are times when it takes a clear head and a resolute faith if we are to stand fast on the sure counsel of God’s Word. Too many of us are shaped by our associations, much more so than we realize. Seek instead to be shaped by the Word of God. Live each day as honestly as possible, confessing your sin, repenting and seeking the Lord’s mercy and grace.   

Through the Scriptures: Psalms 85 – 87

Through the Standards:  Justifying faith, in the Confession

WCF 14:1
“The grace of faith, whereby the elect are enabled to believe to the saving of their souls, is the work of the Spirit of Christ in their hearts, and is ordinarily wrought by the ministry of  the Word, by which also, and by the administration of the sacraments, and prayer, it is increased and strengthened.”

Image source : News clipping from among the scrapbooks in the Rev. Henry G. Welbon manuscript collection.

This Day in Presbyterian History: 

We Thank God  on Every Remembrance of You

When Professor John Murray retired from Westminster to return to his beloved land of Scotland, he attended for the last time the General Assembly of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in 1966.  The delegates there gave a memorial to him which captured the man and his ministry perfectly when it simply quoted the Pauline expression, “We thank God on every remembrance of you.”  That said it all to their fellow minister.

Fast forward in your mind nine years to the Free Church of Creich in Scotland and its small cemetery where the remains of John Murray were being buried in 1975.  Five hundred people from all over the world had gathered to hear the memorial messages.  A prince of Israel  had indeed fallen on May 8, 1975.

Between these two events, John Murray had served his country in World War I,  where he had fought with the famous Black Watch regiment.  The loss of his eye came from that time of military service.

Education included the M.A. degree from Glasglow University in 1923.  Then his ministerial degree (the older ThB) and Th.M. came from Princeton Theological Seminary in the United States.  Returning to Scotland at New College at Edinburgh University, he returned to Princeton Seminary at a pivotal year, namely, 1929.   That year, Princeton’s Board of Trustees was reorganized and Westminster Theological Seminary was begun.  John Murray joined the faculty of Westminster Seminary.

From that time until his retirement in 1966, hundreds of students sat under this “saintly scholar.”  He really equipped the student saints to go forth and minister the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ on a sound foundation of Biblical truth.  John Murray also capsulized that same Biblical truth in several books he wrote.  It might be interesting to sum up those books, which this contributor used all during his pastoral ministry.

Church officers in our Reformed churches  would do well to have a firm understanding of both Christian Baptism, and Divorce.   Both of course would be profitable to the Christian in the pew as well.   All those with the gift of evangelism, as well as Evangelism teams going out weekly, must have an understanding of the book Redemption Accomplish and Applied.  In fact, all Christians should read this book.  Then Principles of Conduct are a reminder of the Christian life.  If any book of the Bible is a “must” book to consider the themes of sin, salvation, sanctification, sovereign election, and service, the book of Romans fills those themes perfectly.  And Murray’s commentary on The Epistle to the Romans is just what is needed to comprehend the great apostle’s words and thoughts.

After John Murray retired in 1966, after having lived 68 years as a bachelor, he took a younger Scottish wife, Miss Valerie Knowlton on December 7, 1967.  Two children would be born to the union.

Words to Live By: John Murray had many “children of the faith” in his years in teaching in this Reformed school of the prophets.  Let them remember him in their current ministries as they pass on what they have heard to others also who will be able to teach still others in the history of the church.

Through the Scriptures: Psalms 82 – 84

Through the Standards:  Relation of saving faith and repentance to God’s will regarding our salvation

WLC 153 — “What does God require of us, that we may escape his wrath and curse due to us by reason of the transgression of the law?
A.  That we may escape the wrath and curse of God due to us by reason of the transgression of the law, he requires of us repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ, and the diligent use of the outward means whereby Christ communicates to us the benefits of his mediation.”

WSC 85 — “What does God require of us, that we may escape his wrath and curse due to us for sin?
A.  To escape the wrath and curse of God due to us for sin, God requires of us faith in Jesus Christ, repentance unto life, with the diligent use of all the outward means whereby Christ communicates to us the benefits of redemption.”

This Day in Presbyterian History :

In the early years of the second World War, the Japanese invasion of China forced missionaries from the Chinese field, including medical missionary L. Nelson Bell. Returning to the States, Bell found his Southern Presbyterian denomination in spiritual decline and slowly falling over into modernism and unbelief. As Dr. Bell settled in the Asheville, N.C. area, he joined with other like-minded men who had been discussing the denomination’s problems and who, since 1936, had been planning to establish a magazine as a voice for sound Biblical principles.

May 2, 1942 marks the first issue of The Southern Presbyterian Journal. Authors for that first issue included Dr. William Childs Robinson, Rev. E. Edwin Paulson, Rev. Robert F. Campbell, General Douglas MacArthur, Rev. Samuel McPheeters Glasgow, Rev. D.S. Gage and Rev. Daniel Iverson.

William Childs Robinson wrote the lead article, in which he set out four “banners” or defining principles of historic Presbyterianism, principles which had been formerly emulated among Southern Presbyterians. These four banners were loyalty to Christ as King, the Bible as the Word of God written, the Westminster Standards as an expression of sound doctrine, and lastly, the banner of the Great Commission. These were the values that the new magazine espoused as it sought to call the denomination back to faithfulness.

For forty-five years, the Journal faithfully proclaimed these values. In 1959, L. Nelson Bell stepped down as editor and was succeeded by Dr. G. Aiken Taylor. At that same time, the word Southern was dropped from the magazine’s name, reflecting Dr. Taylor’s wider focus on the breadth of conservative American Presbyterianism. And within a few more years, The Presbyterian Journal was increasingly involved in the events leading up to the formation of the Presbyterian Church in America, in December of 1973. The Presbyterian Journal continued on for another fourteen years, finally closing with the March 18, 1987 issue.

Click here to download a PDF file of that first issue of The Southern Presbyterian Journal.

Words to Live By: In the opening editorial of that issue, L. Nelson Bell wrote:

The civilization of which we are a part is perched precariously on the edge of an abyss. This is obvious to all, whether in or outside of the Church. The tragedy is that, in part, the Christian Church is to blame.
It is to blame in so far as it has left its God-given task of preaching the Gospel of salvation from sin through the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is to blame in so far as it has turned from faith in, and the preaching of, the Bible as truly and wholly the Word of God, condoning preaching and teaching calculated to question or destroy this precious faith.
It is to blame where it has substituted for the Gospel of redemption a programme of social reform.
It is to blame to the extent to which it has stepped out of its spiritual role, to meddle as the Church, in political and economic matters and affairs of State.
It is to blame where, as has so often been the case, the Gospel message has been diluted and made pleasant to the taste of unregenerate man; denying the fact of, and the heinousness of sin, and the certain doom of the unrepentant sinner.
But despite these failures of the Church, a return to a faithful ministry of the Truth can yet, by the power of the Holy Spirit, provide the spiritual and moral stamina which is essential for world stabilization. To this spiritual awakening and revival THE JOURNAL is dedicated.

Through the Scriptures: Psalms 64 – 66

Through the Standards:  Sanctification: Its nature, extent, and result

WSC 35 — “What is sanctification?
A. Sanctification is the work of God’s free grace, whereby we are renewed, in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin, and live unto righteousness.”