This Day in Presbyterian History

“EVERY ONE OF YOU.”

[The following passage is taken from one of the most wonderful gospel discourses on record, the beautiful and powerful sermon of John Bunyan, entitled “The Jerusalem Sinner Saved.”]

So far off was Peter from making an objection against one of them that by a particular clause in his exhortation, he endeavours that NOT ONE OF THEM MAY ESCAPE THE SALVATION OFFERED. “Repent,” saith he, “and be baptized everyone of you.” I shut out NEVER A ONE OF YOU; for I am commanded by my Lord to deal with you, as it were, one by one, by the word of His Salvation ….

Objection.–But I was one of them that plotted to take away his life. May I be saved by him?
Peter.–EVERY ONE OF YOU.

Objection–But I was one of them that bare false witness against Him. Is there grace for me ?
Peter.–EVERY ONE OF YOU.

Objection–But I was one of them that cried out, Crucify Him, Crucify Him; and desired that Barabbas, the murderer, might live, rather than Him. What will become of me, think you?
Peter.–I am to preach repentance and remission of sins TO EVERY ONE OF YOU, says Peter.

Objection–But I was one of them that did spit in His face when He stood before His accusers. I also was one that mocked Him when in anguish He hanged bleeding on the tree. Is there room for me ?
Peter.–FOR EVERY ONE OF YOU, says Peter.

Objection–But I was one of them that in His extremity said, give Him gall and vinegar to drink. Why may not I expect
the same when anguish and guilt is upon me?
Peter.–Repent of these your wickednesses, and here is remission of sins FOR EVERY ONE OF YOU.

Objection–But I railed on Him, I reviled Him, I hated Him, I rejoiced to see Him mocked at by others. Can there be hopes for me?
Peter.-There is FOR EVERY ONE OF YOU. “Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the
remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.”

Oh! what a blessed” EVERY ONE OF YOU” is here! How willing was Peter, and the Lord Jesus, by his ministry, to catch these murderers with the word of the gospel, that they might be made monuments of the grace of God! How unwilling, I say, was He that any of these should escape the hand of mercy ! Yea, what an amazing wonder it is to think that, above all the world and above everybody in it, these should have the first offer of mercy ~
“BEGINNING at Jerusalem.”

The following appears on the pages of THE PRESBYTERIAN in 1937. There is no obvious association with any adjoining articles. If the editor had any ulterior motive in adding this brief quote, it was perhaps in reflection on the recent departure of conservatives from the PCUSA, since none of those who left were able to leave with their congregational property. Maybe it was intended as a reflection on their plight. Maybe it was just an editor’s filler. Either way, it is a thought provoking quote.

CANON LIDDON ON PROPERTY
[The Presbyterian, 107.13 (1 April 1937): 18.]

“Property is not an arbitrary and vicious product of an effete civilization; it is an outcome of forces which are always at work in human nature and life; it is a formation, it is a deposit which human industry is always accumulating; it is an original result of the terms on which men, at once industrious men and free men, live together as members of society. It has its duties, no doubt, as it has its rights. Its duties are not merely matters of choice, any more than its rights are matters of sentiment; but if property is in any sense imperiled, if communism is ever destined to get the upper hand in this our modern Europe, it will be because the holders of property have thought only or chiefly of its rights and have forgotten its duties. Nevertheless, while its rights may for high moral purposes be surrendered voluntarily, they are rights which may be retained and insisted on, and they cannot be violated without doing violence to the very nature of things, without, in Christian language, breaking the eighth commandment of the Decalogue.”

—Canon Henry P. Liddon, in a sermon preached at St. Paul’s, London, April 2, 1882.

Gordon Haddon Clark was born on August 31, 1902, the only son of the Rev. David Scott Clark and Elizabeth Haddon Clark. Gordon’s father had graduated in 1887 from Princeton Theological Seminary and after pastoring two other Philadelphia area churches, was now pastor of Bethel Presbyterian Church at the time of Gordon’s birth. The Rev. D.S. Clark remained as the pastor of Bethel until the time of his death in 1939 and so Gordon was truly “brought up in the shadow of the Bethel Presbyterian Church.”

Gordon Clark profited immensely both from the Christian home in which he was raised and also from the superior educational system of his day. At home, he was taught the Westminster Shorter Catechism by his father and he took full advantage of access to his father’s library, familiarizing himself with the writiings of Calvin, Warfield and Hodge. At school, though only enrolled in a vocational high school, he was given an extensive education which included both Latin and French.

He went on to graduate from the University of Pennsylvania in 1924 with a Bachelor’s degree, and again graduated from the same institution in 1929 with a Ph.D. in philosophy. In March of 1929 he married Ruth Schmidt, his wife of 48 years and to this marriage two children were born, Lois Antoinette and Nancy Elizabeth. Upon graduation, Dr. Clark took a position as Instructor of Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania from 1929 to 1936. Additional study at the Sorbonne in Paris took place during these same years. From 1936 to 1944 he served as Professor of Philosophy at Wheaton College in Wheaton, IL. 

On August 9, 1944 Dr. Clark was ordained into the ministry of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church by the Presbytery of Philadelphia. He served as Stated Supply at the Trinity OPC Church of Cincinnati, OH while also working as Professor of Philosophy at Butler University. While remaining in his post at Butler until 1973, he left the OPC and was received on October 14, 1948 by the Presbytery of Indiana of the United Presbyterian Church of North America (UPCNA). From 1958 to 1965 he pastored the First UPCNA Church of Indianapolis, IN, which church soon moved with him to affiliate with the Reformed Presbyterian Church in North America, General Synod, Dr. Clark having been received by the Western Presbytery of the RPCNA, GS on October 29, 1957.

The RPCNA,GS was a very small denomination, but Dr. Clark was one of several men responsible for significant growth in the denomination during the 1950’s. He later supported the move to merge the RPCNA,GS with the Bible Presbyterian Church, Columbus Synod. This latter group was the larger wing of the 1956 division of the Bible Presbyterian Church, originally formed in 1937 in division from the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In 1961 the Columbus Synod renamed itself the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, holding this name from 1961 until the 1965 union with the RPCNA,GS. The resulting denomination was now know as the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod (RPCES).

[Later, when the RPCES merged in 1982 with the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), Clark choose not to join the PCA, but instead transferred his ministerial credentials into the unaffiliated Covenant Presbytery. That transfer occurred on 14 May 1983, and his ministerial affiliation remained there until his death.]

During all of this ecclesiastical activity, Dr. Clark continued in his position as Professor of Philosophy at Butler University, working there until 1973. It was during his tenure at Butler that some of his best works were written and published. Thales to Dewey [1957] remains an important college-level introduction to philosophy. Other titles written during this same period include A Christian View of Men and Things [1952]; Religion, Reason and Revelation [1961]; Karl Barth’s Theological Method [1963]; What Do Presbyterians Believe? [1965] and Biblical Predestination [1969].

In 1974 Dr. Clark finally left Indianapolis and Butler University, having served there as Chairman of the Department of Philosophy from 1945 until his retirement in 1973. With the start of the 1974 academic year, he begin teaching at Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, GA. He remained there for ten years, while also teaching during the summers at the Sangre de Cristo Seminary in Westcliffe, CO and intermittently at the Reformed Episcopal Seminary in Philadelphia, PA.

The Rev. Dr. Gordon Haddon Clark died on April 9, 1985, after a brief serious illness. Dr. Clark’s wife, Ruth, had died in 1977, preceding Dr. Clark by some 9 years. At the time of his death, Dr. Clark was survived by his two daughters and their husbands, 12 grandchildren and one great grand-daughter. Funeral services for Dr. Clark were held on April 11, 1985 at the Sangre de Cristo Church in Westcliffe, CO.

Dr. Clark was the author of over 33 books and numerous articles and had been a founder of the Evangelical Theological Society. When discussion began in 1980 towards the union of the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod (RPCES) and the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), Dr. Clark found himself an opponent of that merger, perhaps in part because the plan also entailed the simultaneous union of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. While the OPC did not come into the merger, the 1982 joining and receiving of the RPCES into the PCA left Dr. Clark with the decision to be dismissed by the Tennessee Valley Presbytery of the PCA on September 11, 1982. He was received by the unaffiliated Covenant Presbytery in May, 1983.

First Historian of the Associate Presbyterian Church

James Patterson Miller, the son of Hugh and Mary (Patterson) Miller, was born at King’s Creek, in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, on August 1st, 1792. His father, while he was not directly involved in the legendary Whiskey Rebellion, did apparently permit his house to serve as a refuge for some of those who were caught up in that affair. While James was still a young child at that time, he clearly remembered seeing two men in his home who, when visitors approached, would retreat to the upper loft and draw the ladder up behind them. His mother was sincere in her Christian faith and from his birth, prayed that the Lord would use James in the ministry of the Gospel.

James was educated at Jefferson College and graduated there in 1818. His studies were threatened when his mother died of dysentery and both he and his younger brother nearly died as well. In the years following graduation, he worked as a teacher, taking charge of several different academies, first in Virginia, and later in Ohio. Along the way he managed to secure some of his theological education, intending to become a pastor. but James also had a keen interest in politics. For a time he worked as editor of a political newspaper, but when his wife died in 1824, that loss made him realize his life’s purpose, and he was finally licensed to preach the very next year.

Miller was ordained in 1827 by the Presbytery of Muskingum, of the Associate Presbyterian Church. Initially he was installed as a home missionary, and a year later received a call to serve a congregation in Argyle, Washington county, New York. For twenty-one years he faithfully served this church.

One biographer notes that “Mr. Miller was a close and diligent student of the Bible in the original languages. He preferred to go to the fountain-head to find out exactly the mind of the Spirit, rather than trust any translation. Both himself and some of his children were in the habit of using the Greek Testament in family worship.”

Throughout his ministry, Rev. Miller exhibited a deep interest in missions, and at the advanced age of 59, he resigned his charge, preached his farewell sermon to a weeping congregation, and departed for the Oregon Territory. There in a small village of Albany, Oregon, where no church could be found and where the Sabbath was never recognized as a day of rest, Rev. Miller set about to establish a church. By 1853, a small congregation was meeting regularly. Miller preached his last sermon on April 2, 1854, speaking on the glories of Christ’s kingdom. Two days later, he made a trip to Portland, and on the return trip, on April 8th, the boiler of the steamboat exploded and Miller was killed instantly by a piece of iron hitting his head. Sadly, his wife and one of his children were present to witness the tragedy.

In 1839, Rev. Miller had compiled what must apparently be the earliest written history of the Associate Presbyterian Church, titled Biographical Sketches and Sermons of some of the First Ministers of the Associate Church in America. The Associate Church began in the American colonies in 1754, and then in 1858 it merged with the northern branch of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church to form the United Presbyterian Church of North America.

Words to Live By:
From the historical introduction to Rev. Miller’s Biographical Sketches, the following short quote seems pertinent to our larger purpose on this blog :

“But if the members of any society [i.e, denomination] are unacquainted with the particular history of their own body, they are in a great measure disqualified for discharging their duties as members. Every parent in the whole nation of Israel was required to explain to his children, the meaning and design of every historical monument that was erected to perpetuate any of God’s mercies wrought for that people. That parent in Israel, who could not do so, was incapable of performing his duty to his children, whose right it was to be instructed in the use and design of those things. Yea, he was incapable of discharging his duty to God, who required him thus to instruct his children.”

For Further Study:
Rev. Miller’s work, Biographical Sketches, can be found on the Internet, here.

Stand Still and See the Salvation of God.

Asa Hillyer was born in Sheffield, Massachusetts, on April 6, 1763. His father was a physician, who served in the army during the Revolutionary War, with young Asa attending by his side in the later years of the War.

Asa entered Yale in 1782, graduating in 1786 at the age of twenty-three. He prepared for the ministry under the guidance of the Rev. Dr. Buell of East Hampton, and completed his studies with Dr. Livingston of the Reformed Dutch Church in New York.

Licensed to preach by the Old Presbytery of Suffolk, Long Island in 1788, he was appointed to supply churches in Connecticut. In 1798, the General Assembly appointed him a missionary to the northern part of Pennsylvania and the western section of New York. His travels lasted for nine weeks and covered some nine hundred miles, preaching almost every day. He was the first minister to ever preach in the region that is now Auburn, New York.

In 1801, Rev. Hillyer was called to serve the First Presbyterian Church in Orange, New Jersey. At that time, this was one of the largest and most influential churches in the State. Hillyer’s ministry was well-received by the congregation, and he remained their pastor for thirty years. In 1833, he resigned his charge and devoted his remaining years to serving as pulpit supply for other churches in the region and to visitation. The Rev. Asa Hillyer died on the evening of August 28th, 1840.

The Rev. James Hoyt wrote a history of this church, titled “The Mountain Society:” A History of the First Presbyterian Church, Orange, N.J. (New York, 1860), and in this history, a full chapter is devoted to Rev. Hillyer’s thirty years as pastor. Among the facets of this chapter, it is notable that there were three marked occasions of revival during Hillyer’s years, 1807-08, 1816-17, and 1832. Of the first of these revivals, there is this striking description of the times prior to the revival:

“But it may not be improper to remark here, that for some time previous to this, everything around assumed a gloomy aspect in regard to evangelical piety. All meetings for prayer except the first Monday in the month, were relinquished. Gambling, horse-racing, intemperance, and dissipation of every kind, threatened all social order with destruction. A moral society had been established for two years, the object of which was the suppression of vice and immorality; but no human effort was able to withstand the torrent of vice which threatened us on every side. At the same time the exertions of Christians were paralyzed; the wise were sleeping with the foolish. This state of things alarmed a few praying people; they agreed to resume a prayer-meeting which had, for the first time in forty years, been relinquished the spring before. This took place about the latter part of July. For a number of weeks not more than twelve or fourteen persons attended; but such fervent and earnest wrestling with God I never witnessed. They prayed as though they saw their children and neighbors standing on the verge of destruction, and that, without an immediate interposition of almighty grace, they were lost for ever.”

“Then in 1807, began a great revival of religion in the town. Ninety-seven joined the church in one day, and about two hundred in all. Fifty, or more, were gathered at Bloomfield.”

“It was soon perceived that our public assemblies were unusually solemn, but no special impression appeared to be made until the third Sabbath in September. In the morning the assembly was addressed on the awful solemnity of a future judgment; and, in the afternoon, from these words: Choose you this day whom ye will serve. This was a day long to be remembered. Such solemnity had not been seen for many years, and many date their first impressions from that day.”

Two things seem remarkable about this account. First, there was the prevailing sinfulness of the wider society in those years. And second, unlike the typical characteristics of a Second Great Awakening “revival”, this occasion was marked by a great solemnity and lack of excitement or passions. Further on in the account, we read that “No attempt was made to work upon the passions…The assembly was unusually solemn. Numbers were evidently pricked to the heart. Their tears, which they made great exertion to conceal, betrayed an awakened conscience…No disturbance was made. All retired in solemn silence.”

Then these last words seem particularly indicative of what we might expect of a true time of revival:

“One evening, after the benediction had been pronounced, the whole assembly stood in solid column. Scarcely an individual moved from his place. Such evidences of deep and heart-felt sorrow I never witnessed before, on any occasion. While all stood in solemn silence, there seemed a great appearance of solemnity than during any part of the previous exercises. Sometimes it seemed we had only to stand still and see the salvation of God. It seemed, indeed, that the Lord was there, and that He gave us an example of His immediate work upon the conscience and heart.

Words to Live By:
If God is going to bring a great turning from sin, it must and can only be His work. It will not be brought about by emotional antics or other man-made contrivances. For our part, may we be earnest in prayerfully waiting upon Him.

Stand in awe, and sin not; commune with your own heart upon your bed, and be still. Selah.
Offer the sacrifices of righteousness, and put your trust in the LORD.
(Ps. 4:4-5, KJV)