Robert Moffat

Some time ago, I was asked why, if I had already read the Bible, I would want to read it again, not just once, but over and over, as long as I live? Obviously, this question came from an unbeliever. But I’m afraid many Christians feel little need for repeated readings of God’s Word. Many who have professed faith for years still have portions of their Bibles that remain unread.

Robert Moffat (1795–1883), Scottish missionary to Africa, would have been bewildered by such attitudes. Moffat dedicated his life to bringing the gospel to the Bechuana tribes of South Africa. Much of that time was spent in translating the entire Old and New Testaments into Sechuana (the native language). Yet, near the end of his life, he still felt inadequate in his knowledge of Scripture. In a letter to Mary, his wife, he wrote:

It was only yesterday, after laying down the Bible, that I wondered what kind of a mind I would have had if I had not the Book of God, the Book containing the astounding idea of ‘from everlasting to everlasting’, the development of all that is worth knowing . . . One would think, that as I have critically, and, I think, devoutly read and examined every verse, every word in the Bible, some a score of times over, I should not require to open the pages of that unspeakable and blessed Book. Alas, for the human memory! I read the Bible today with that same feeling I ever did, like the hungry seeking food, the thirsty when seeking drink, the bewildered when seeking counsel and the mourner when seeking comfort. Don’t you believe all this? For alas, I read it sometimes as a formal thing, though my heart condemns afterwards . . . I am yet astonished at my own ignorance of the Bible!

—Robert Moffat, quoted in Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (Banner of Truth, 2006), 266–267.

Our generation is not the first to doubt the sufficiency of Scripture to change lives. In Robert Moffat’s day, many believed that civilization needed to precede the gospel. Moffat and other pioneer missionaries challenged and disproved that theory. In 1816, Moffat was formally commissioned as a missionary of London Missionary Society and was sent to South Africa. Twenty-six years later, he could testify to the power of the gospel to transform lives.

‘It is now demonstrated,’ [wrote Moffat] in 1842, ‘that the Gospel can transform these aceldamas [fields of blood], these dens of crime, weeping and woe, into abodes of purity, happiness, and love . . . We are warranted to expect, from what has already occurred, great and glorious results.’ A moral improvement in society in general is not needed to prepare the way for spiritual success. On this point Moffat wrote:

Much has been said about civilizing savages before attempting to evangelize them. This is a theory which has gained extensive prevalence among the wise men of this world, but we have never yet seen a practical demonstration of its truth. We ourselves are convinced that evangelization must precede civilization. It is very easy in a country of high refinement to speculate on what might be done among rude and savage men, but the Christian missionary, the only experimentalist, has invariably found that to make the fruit good the tree must first be made good. Nothing less than the power of Divine grace can reform the hearts of savages, after which the mind is susceptible of those instructions which teach them to adorn the gospel they profess.

   This lesson needs to be remembered wherever the moral decay of society tempts Christians to suppose the plain preaching of the gospel cannot meet the situation. Moffat was certain that only one source is adequate to answer the effects of sin upon society, whether these are among ‘barbarians’ or ‘the civilized nations of Europe’: ‘Nothing but the Bible can save man from his woes.’

—Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (Banner of Truth, 2006), 269–270.

We will take a momentary break from our holiday frivolity to bring you a final installment from Iain Murray’s Spurgeon v. Hyper-Calvinism. We will return tomorrow with more pointless drivel.

The last of four “Lessons from the Conflict” with the Hyper-Calvinists of Spurgeon’s day is that doctrine not kept in perspective can become a master rather than a servant. Iain Murray writes:

The final conclusion has to be that when Calvinism ceases to be evangelistic, when it becomes more concerned with theory than with the salvation of men and women, when the acceptance of doctrines seems to become more important than acceptance of Christ, then it is a system going to seed and it will invariably lose its attractive power. As we have seen, in his early ministries Spurgeon was opposed by those who believed that the Hyper-Calvinism of such eighteenth century-Baptists as John Gill represented the purest Christianity under heaven. That interpretation of history he knew to be wrong, not simply because it fell short of Scripture, but because its effect was to reduce endeavors for the conversion of sinners. ‘During the pastorate of my venerated predecessor, Dr. Gill, this Church, instead of increasing, gradually decreased . . . But mark this, from the day when Fuller, Carey, Sutcliffe, and others, met together to send out missionaries to India the sun began to dawn on a gracious revival which is not over yet.’
   In this connection it is noteworthy that just as renewed understanding of the free offer of the gospel led to the age of overseas missions in England it did also – by different means – in Scotland. As James Walker writes, Boston and the Morrow men ‘entered fully into the missionary spirit of the Bible’ and ‘were able to see that Calvinistic doctrine is inconsistent with world-conquering aspirations and efforts.’ Robert Moffat, Scots pioneer missionary in South Africa, was one of the outstanding results of this rediscovery. A Calvinist who made the Shorter Catechism of the Westminster Assembly one of the first publications of the infant missions press at Kuruman, Moffat had no hesitation in writing as follows in 1834:
   ‘I see nothing in the world worth looking after if it has not a direct reference to the gory and extension of the Redeemer’s kingdom; and were we always able to have a lively view of the myriads of who are descending into the horrible pit, our zeal would be proportionate. Much depends on us who have received the ministry of reconciliation, assured that God our Savior willeth the salvation of all.’
   To say this is not to deny that there have been preachers of Hyper-Calvinistic views whose preaching has been used In the conversion of many. Spurgeon was thankful for such men as John Warburton and John Kernshaw, men whose Christ-centeredness often enabled them to rise above their system. But in the hands of the general run of men who regarded Hyper-Calvinism as scriptural he believed the tendency of the preaching was inevitably injurious. By distorting and exaggerating truth the system misrepresented vital doctrines and made them offensive instead of appealing to the wider Christian world. He was convinced that the truths called Calvinistic would never be more widely received among the churches if the impression was allowed to prevail that these truths inhibited earnest evangelism, as they commonly did where Hyper-Calvinism became the accepted tradition. ‘I have seen,’ he says, ‘to my inexpressible grief, the doctrines of grace made a huge stone to be rolled at the mouth of the dead sepulcher of a dead Christ.’
   Hyper-Calvinism still exists today but what is needed far more than a renewed controversy on the subject is living evidence that the doctrines of grace are harmonious with true evangelistic preaching. The ministries of such men as Whitefield, Spurgeon, and, more recently, Lloyd-Jones, proved that more than a thousand books could ever do. Such preaching can only come from a baptism of new and deeper devotion to Christ. Much more than a change of opinion is needed. Spurgeon labored all his ministry for purity of doctrine but his final word was always this:
   ‘What is doctrine after all but the throne whereon Christ sitteth, and when the throne is vacant what is the throne to us? Doctrines are the shovel and tongs for the altar, while Christ is the sacrifice smoking thereon. Doctrines are Christ’s garments; verily they smell of myrrh, and cassia, and aloes out of the ivory places, whereby they make us glad, but it is not the garments we care for as much as the person, the very person, of our Lord Jesus Christ.’

—Iain Murray, Spurgeon v. Hyper-Calvinism (Banner of Truth, 2002), 120–122.