Dr. Jackson, over on Ichabod, has posted some additional quotes from Dr. C. P. Krauth that are definitely worth reading. One of them I had planned to post on Monday! (and perhaps I still will...).
But more than just the quotes, Dr. Jackson provides a brief overview of the situation in the eastern Synods that Krauth was addressing as he sought to return them to Confessional standing. This is important to know. Similar to the problem of pop-church Evangelicalism, which surrounds and attacks Lutherans today, the eastern Lutherans had been ravaged by the revivalism that surrounded them. Dr. John Williamson Nevin, a German Reformed theologian of the Mercersburg school and contemporary of Krauth, describes the movement active in 1844, which was first advocated by Charles Finney, by its title: the system of "New Measures" -- of which the "Anxious Bench" was a prominent aspect. Today's version of these "New Measures" is the Church Growth Movement. Nevin's essay, The Anxious Bench, is worth a read for background and comparison purposes, and can be obtained online, here. It can be purchased in book form, along with his essay Antichrist, and the sermon Catholic Unity, here.
Anyway, to quote briefly from Ichabod:
- Krauth and others led the Eastern Lutherans back to the Book of Concord, after S. S. Schmucker and others bewitched the General Synod over revivalism and American Lutheranism. The General Synod pioneered:
- 1. Dropping the liturgy.
2. Turning the Sacraments into ordinances (no efficacy of the Word).
3. Holding revivals.
4. Practicing unionism with the Reformed.
To learn more about Charles Porterfield Krauth, one can read about his life and work in the essay, Charles Porterfield Krauth: The American Chemnitz, by Rev. David Jay Webber (ELS).
Enjoy!
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