GREAT CHRISTIAN PERSONALITIES...2 Dear Student Welcome to the course on Great Christian Personalities. You are about to embark on an exciting journey where you will study the lives

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NCMI

TRAINING MANUAL

GREAT CHRISTIAN PERSONALITIES

By MALCOLM BLACK

This document may be duplicated whole, or in part, in any form (written, visual, electronic or audio) without express written permission, providing it is not used for commercial purposes.

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Dear Student Welcome to the course on Great Christian Personalities. You are about to embark on an exciting journey where you will study the lives of 20 great men and women used by God. The textbook we will be using for this course is "70 Great Christians Changing the World” written by Geoffrey Hanks. The characters not discussed in this textbook are Martin Luther King Jnr., Huldrych (Uldrich) Zwingli and Charles Finney, but you will find notes on these personalities in this workbook. The 20 personalities that you will study are: 1. William Tyndale 2. George Whitefield 3. Hudson Taylor 4. Huldrych (Uldrich) Zwingli (in workbook) 5. John Knox 6. Charles Finney (in workbook) 7. John Bunyan 8. Gladys Aylward 9. John Wyclif 10. William Carey 11. Richard Wurmbrand 12. Martin Luther King Jnr. (in workbook) 13. Sadhu Sundar Singh 14. William Booth 15. William Wilberforce 16. Corrie ten Boom 17. Watchman Nee 18. Martyn Lloyd-Jones 19. Billy Graham 20. Charles Spurgeon Enjoy the course. Remember that it is what you put into it that determines what you get out of it. Yours in His service MALCOLM BLACK

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ASSIGNMENT SCHEDULE

ASSIGNMENT 1 1. Give a short summary in point form on each of the following personalities:

William Tyndale; George Whitefield; and Hudson Taylor, noting in particular:

The influences on their ministry;

The influences of their ministry;

What did they do for the Kingdom?

And include a brief character sketch. (±300 words per personality)

(60 marks) 2. Draw up a comparison between the following two personalities, looking for

similarities and opposites in both character and ministry methods: Huldrych (Uldrich) Zwingli and John Knox

(±500 words) (40 marks)

ASSIGNMENT 2 1. Give a short summary in point form on each of the following personalities:

Charles Finney; John Bunyan; and Gladys Aylward, noting in particular:






similarities and opposites in both character and ministry methods:

John Wyclif and William Carey. (±500 words)

(40 marks)

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ASSIGNMENT 3

1. Give a short summary in point form on each of the following personalities: Richard Wurmbrand; Martin Luther King Jnr.; and Sadhu Sundar Singh, noting in particular:






similarities and opposites in both character and ministry methods: William Booth and William Wilberforce


ASSIGNMENT 4 1. Give a short summary in point form on each of the following personalities: Corrie

ten Boom; Watchman Nee; and Martyn Lloyd-Jones, noting in particular:






similarities and opposites in both character and ministry methods:

Billy Graham and Charles Spurgeon (±500 words)

(40 marks)

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ASSIGNMENT 5

1. Now that you have studied the 20 personalities listed on page 1 of the workbook, fill in the names and birth dates on the time line.

(25 marks) 2. Howard Gardner in his book "Leading Minds" has said: "It is important that a

leader be a good story-teller, but equally crucial that the leader embody that story in his or her life"; i.e. you must live out your message. He also says: "A leader is an individual who significantly affects the thoughts, feelings and/or behaviours of a significant number of individuals."

Use examples from the 20 personalities studied to discuss these statements.


3. Max du Preez in his book "Leadership is an Art " says: "The art of leadership is

liberating people to do what is required of them in the most effective and humane way possible"; i.e. leaders open doors for maturity and ministry for others.



4. Tom Marshall in his book, "Understanding Leadership" says: "People do not

generally follow visions or dreams or schemes or ideas, they follow leaders. Therefore leaders, even if they have the right goals, that make contact with the aspirations of the people, need something more. They also have to be effective persuaders and relationship builders."



ASSIGNMENT 6

Dudley Daniel has said that we need new breed leaders to possess the land, men like Joshua and Caleb. In his manual, "Leading the Church, New Breed Leadership, Biblical Leadership Part 2 " (page 20 - 27 of the Workbook) he has said that 3 things are needed to possess our inheritance: a) The Right Administration

Incorporating shared, anointed and co-operative leadership.

b) The Right Strategy

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Understanding what you are to accomplish, what you are up against and what you will need for the task.

c) The Right Attitude

A willingness to go; and Confidence in God.


(±1200 words; i.e. 400 for (a), 400 for (b) and 400 for (c)) (25 marks for (a); 25 marks for (b); 25 marks for (c))

d) Having studied the Great Christian Personalities above, have a look at your own

life.

What have been the influences on your ministry and vision?

What are your character strengths and weaknesses?

How do you think your strengths can best be used in the body of Christ to help usher in God’s Kingdom?

What can you do to overcome weaknesses and to improve on the areas God has called you to?

(400 words for (d)) (25 marks)

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NOTES

MARTIN LUTHER KING JNR. (1929 – 1968)

Taken from

THE WORDS OF MARTIN LUTHER KING SELECTED BY

CORETTA SCOTT KING PUBLISHED BY FOUNT PAPERBACKS, LONDON, 1985

INTRODUCTION

By Coretta Scott King My husband, Martin Luther King, Jr., was a man who had hoped to be a Baptist preacher to a large, Southern, urban congregation. Instead, by the time he died in 1968, he had led millions of people into shattering forever the Southern system of segregation of the races. He had fashioned a mass black electorate that eliminated overt racism from political campaigns and accumulated political power for blacks beyond any they had ever possessed in the United States. Above all, he brought a new and higher dimension of human dignity to black people's lives. I met Martin in Boston in 1952, when he was twenty-three years old. I had grown up in rural Alabama, attended Antioch College in Ohio, and was studying music at the New England Conservatory. Martin was working toward a doctor of philosophy degree at Boston University. Before coming to Boston, Martin had earned a B.A. in sociology from Morehouse College in Atlanta and a B.D. from Crozer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania. His father, Reverend Martin Luther King, Sr., a sharecropper's son, was pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. His mother, Alberta Williams King, was a minister's daughter. Martin felt a deeply serious call to ministry when he was a seventeen-year-old junior at Morehouse. At the age of eighteen he was ordained and made an assistant pastor at Ebenezer Church. I thought I did not want to marry a minister, but Martin was an unusual person. He was such a good man. If he ever did something a little wrong, or committed a selfish act, his conscience devoured him. At the same time he was so alive and so much fun to be with. He had a strength that he imparted to me and others that he met. Martin always had a deep commitment to helping his fellow human beings. He told me that the turning point in his thinking about how to reconcile Christian pacifism with getting things done came while he was at the seminary, when he learned about the revered Indian leader, Mahatma Gandhi. Martin later wrote in Stride Toward Freedom: "Gandhi was probably the first person in

history to lift the love ethic of Jesus above mere interaction between individuals to a powerful and effective social force on a large scale.... It was in his Gandhian emphasis on love and non-violence that I discovered the method for social reform that I had been seeking for so many months." Martin and I were married in 1953. The next year, Martin took up his first pastorate, at the Dexter Avenue Church in Montgomery, Alabama. We moved back to the South, which was still

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the totally segregated society into which we had been born. In 1954 the United States Supreme Court ruled that separate educational facilities for black and white children were unequal and unconstitutional. Further court decisions requiring school integration produced violent reactions in the South. White Citizens Councils sprang up in attempts to nullify the court's decisions, and the Ku Klux Klan got out its sheets and hoods and paraded and set crosses on fire. All public facilities continued to be forcibly segregated. High taxes at the voting polling places prevented most blacks from being able to cast their ballots. In Montgomery, some of the most degrading facets of segregation were the rules of the Montgomery City Bus Lines. Blacks were required to sit and stand at the rear of the buses, even if there were empty seats in the front section, which was reserved for whites. Furthermore, blacks had to pay their fares at the front of the bus, get off and walk to the rear to reboard through the back door. Drivers often pulled off and left them after they had paid their fares. On December 1, 1955, Mrs. Rosa Parks, a woman highly respected in the black community, boarded a bus to return home after her day's work as a seamstress in a downtown department store. She sat down in the first row behind the section reserved for whites. Soon the bus driver ordered Mrs. Parks to give up her seat to a boarding white man and stand farther back in the bus. When she quietly and tiredly refused, the driver got off the bus to get a policeman, who arrested her. At the courthouse, Mrs. Parks called her friend, E.D. Nixon, who came down and signed a bail bond for her. Mr. Nixon phoned Martin and me the next day to describe the incident and to urge a boycott of the buses. "It's the only way to make the white folks see that we will not take this sort of thing any longer," he said. Martin agreed and offered the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church as a meeting place. Over forty leaders from all segments of the black community came to the meeting. They formed the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), elected Martin president, and organized a boycott starting on December 5. For over a year, the fifty thousand black people in Montgomery walked and car-pooled to their jobs, schools, and churches. The white city leadership decided to find excuses to arrest blacks when they saw that the boycott was really working. One day, after picking up three passengers at a parking lot car-pool station, Martin was followed by a motorcycle cop. He obeyed all the traffic rules scrupulously, but when he let off his passengers the cop ordered him out of his car and arrested him for going 30 miles per hour in a 25-mile-per-hour zone. At the city jail he was thrown into a segregated, dingy cell with other black protestors. News of Martin's arrest spread quickly, and after many blacks gathered outside the jail, he was fingerprinted and released on his own recognizance. We began getting death threats and abusive phone calls. One night, while Martin was at an MIA mass rally, I was at home with a friend and our first child, two-month-old Yolanda, when a bomb hit our front porch and exploded. Alerted by the threats, we had rushed to the back of the house instead of the front when we heard the thud of the bomb, and fortunately no one was hurt. Such arrests and acts of violence only consolidated the boycotters and raised enthusiasm for our nonviolent protest movement. We realized the movement was more than local; it was a surge toward a national, even international, assertion of the individual's right to freedom and self-respect. It led to the Supreme Court's affirmation that Alabama's laws requiring segregation on buses were unconstitutional. On December 21, 1956, Montgomery's buses were peacefully integrated. As I wrote later in my book, My Life with Martin Luther King, Jr., "Montgomery was the soil in which the seed of a new theory of social action took root. Black people had found in nonviolent direct action a militant method that avoided violence but achieved dramatic confrontation, which electrified and educated the whole nation.... Without hatred or abjectly bending their knees, the

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demand for freedom emerged in strength and dignity. Black people had been waiting for this, and instinctively they seized the new method and opened a new era of social change." Martin was now a hero to America's black people. Shortly after the boycott, Time magazine ran

a cover story on Martin, calling him "the scholarly Negro Baptist minister who in little more than a year has risen from nowhere to become one of the nation's remarkable leaders of men." Inspired by the Montgomery bus victory, movements sprang up in other cities. Martin thought all these activities should be coordinated to have the broadest good effect. After a series of meetings, the first of which was held at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, we helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in 1957. Martin was elected president. From the first, the SCLC was church oriented in leadership and membership and in the concept of nonviolence. Martin did not call for disobedience of all laws, only for disobedience of unjust laws. He always believed in the supremacy of a higher moral law. Between 1957 and 1959, Martin commuted between Montgomery and SCLC headquarters in Atlanta. He was invited to preach and lecture throughout the country. We visited Ghana in 1957, attending that nation's independence celebration as guests of Kwame Nkrumah, and in 1959 went on a pilgrimage to India to better understand Gandhi's nonviolent philosophy; there we were received by Prime Minister Nehru. Toward the end of 1959, Martin realized he had to devote full time and effort to the civil rights struggle, and so in 1960 we left our wonderful Dexter congregation and moved to Atlanta, where Martin became copastor with his father of the Ebenezer Baptist Church. Demonstrations were continuing throughout the South with some successes. There were sit-ins to desegregate lunch counters and restaurants. The first group of Freedom Riders, black and white people organized by the Congress for Racial Equality to protest segregation on interstate buses, left Washington, D.C., by Greyhound on May 4, 1961. SCLC backed the Freedom Rides, and Martin served as chairman of their coordinating committee. Ten days later the first bus was burned outside of Anniston, Alabama. A white mob beat the Riders when they arrived in Birmingham. They were arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, and spent two months in Parchman Penitentiary. But the Freedom Rides continued. In Birmingham, one of the most segregated cities in the country, George Wallace pledged at his inauguration as governor, "Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!" Eugene ("Bull") Connor was Birmingham's Director of Public Safety and relied on brute force against Negroes and peaceful demonstrators. He ordered the use of police dogs and fire hoses against children who were marching in a peaceful protest. SCLC decided to join the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights in a massive campaign against segregation in Birmingham. Protests started in April 1963, with lunch-counter sit-ins. After city officials obtained an Alabama state court injunction against the demonstrators, Martin and other leaders determined to defy the injunction. On Good Friday they set off from church, marching peacefully. Bull Connor ordered them all arrested. Martin used the time in prison to write his now-famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail," in which he explained to a group of white clergymen publicly critical of his activities the necessity for peaceful protest to bring about social change. While Martin was held incommunicado in jail, President John Kennedy and Attorney General Robert Kennedy helped me find out what was going on. They directed public attention to the Birmingham situation, which finally culminated in a real victory for the movement when white city officials and merchants sat down with black leaders to hammer out a settlement. Peaceful integration came because militant nonviolence forced negotiation and agreement.

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After Birmingham, nearly a thousand cities became engulfed in protests against segregation. This encouraged us to join in organizing a march on Washington to dramatize the need for new federal legislation to integrate blacks completely into American society. On August 28, 1963, we participated in a mass rally with 250,000 people who had traveled from all over the country to Washington, D.C. Martin delivered his "I Have A Dream" speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and afterward President Kennedy met with the leaders of the march. Martin wrote about that day in Why We Can't Wait : "As television beamed the image of this

extraordinary gathering across the border oceans, everyone who believed in man's capacity to better himself had a moment of inspiration and confidence in the future of the human race. And every dedicated American could be proud that a dynamic experience of democracy in his nation's capital has been made visible to the world." In October 1964, we learned that Martin had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. He and I were overcome with pride and joy and a tremendous feeling of responsibility. This was not just a prize for civil rights but for contributing to world peace. Martin said in his acceptance speech in Oslo, "I feel as though this prize has been given to me for something that really has not yet

been achieved. It is a commission to go out and work even harder for the things in which we believe." Martin divided the $54,000 prize among SCLC, Congress of Racial Equality, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, NAACP, National Council of Negro Women, and the American Foundation on Nonviolence. By the summer of 1965, President Johnson, with the support of the civil rights community and its allies, had pushed through Congress and signed into law the long-awaited Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts, which finally put the federal government behind integration. But many of the urban ghettos in the North were erupting in violence. Many Americans were also disturbed by their country's drawn-out involvement in the Vietnam war. In 1965 Martin made a statement: "I'm not going to sit by and see war escalated without saying anything about it. It is worthless to talk about integration if there is no world to integrate. The war in Vietnam must be stopped." In 1966 he agreed to serve as cochairman of Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam. In 1968 Martin was deeply involved in organizing a Poor People's Campaign to demonstrate in a mass way for economic as well as civil rights, which he had always considered dependant upon each other. He went to Memphis, Tennessee, to lead six thousand protestors on a march in support of striking sanitation workers. On April 4, while Martin stood talking on the second floor balcony of his Memphis motel room, a sniper shot and killed him. He was thirty-nine years old.

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HULDRYCH (ULDRICH) ZWINGLI

Taken from

REVIVAL WRITTEN BY WINKIE PRATNEY

PUBLISHED BY HUNTINGTON HOUSE PUBLISHERS

Huldrych Zwingli 1484-1531

Zwingli, "the most rational and unsuccessful of the reformers," was born January 1, 1484, in a little, gabled house in the mountain village of Wildhaus, Switzerland. He was the third child of a family of eight sons and two daughters. His father was a shepherd and chief magistrate of the city, his uncle the village priest. It was a time of great discovery: when Zwingli was eight, Columbus set sail and reached the Bahamas; when he was ten, Leonardo Da Vinci drew a flying machine; and by the time he was seventeen, music was printed for the first time in moveable type. His Bern humanist education in Latin, dialectics, and music (he played six instruments) did not bring a deep spiritual experience like Luther's. Early in his life, faith to him was little more than an intellectual encounter, and he was not averse to amorous encounters with village women, like his barber's daughter. Freedom of Conscience In 1519, at thirty-five, he moved to Zurich, assuming a new position as the people's priest. Then, in 1522, following a close call with plague and "hovering for weeks between life and death," he became "overwhelmed with a sense of God's mercy and majesty." Now much more Christ-dependent, he admitted that "religion took its rise when God called a runaway man back to himself; otherwise that man would have been a desert forever." His first famous sermon, 'On the Choice and Free Use of Foods," made the eating of meat at Lent a matter of conscience, underscoring this further great Reformation contribution of what Robert Dale called "the right of every man to listen for himself to the voice of God" (Fry and Arnold, "Reclaiming Reformation Day," Christianity Today, 22 October 1982, p. 36). Zwingli was certainly not a gifted speaker; he couldn't see too well, and he had a soft voice; yet Gordon Rupp says of him "...his preaching is the secret of his dominance of the great city, and not all his actions in the councils could match it. It is something with few parallels (Calvin, Knox, Latimer) - continuous Biblical exposition adjusted to the practical needs of each changing day in a community small enough for everybody to be known and where all the effective city leadership sat under the Word; ... scriptural preaching went on here, first of all the cities of Switzerland" (Twenty Centuries of Great Preaching. Vol. 2. Pp. 77-91). It was marked by "ample scholarship, simplicity, conviction and fervor." His short sight and weak voice could not have distracted too much the hearer; who felt during one message as if he had been "lifted up by the hair and suspended in space!"

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Sixty-seven Theses Zwingli did not stop with freedom of conscience on foods. In 1953 he published his Sixty-seven Theses, a summary of his doctrines, presenting his case for reform before the council, people, and town leaders of Zurich. In subsequent meetings he opposed many other common church practices, including transubstantiation, papal authority, saint worship, pilgrimages, purgatory, statues, fasts, and the Mass itself. As in Luther's case, this did not help him to win friars and influence governments. Attempts were made on his life; rumors spread about him. As with Luther some opposition to him was certainly just. Zwingli, like Luther, felt that complete religious freedom would lead to anarchy and approved restrictive measures which he earlier would have considered tyrannous. Opposition While they accomplished an amazing amount of good in God's kingdom, neither of the two Reformers got on with each other. "To Zwingli the will of God rather than Luther's way of salvation was the central fact of theology. To Luther the Christian life was one of freedom in forgiven sonship, to Zwingli the Christian life was conformity to the will of God as set forth in the Bible (Walker, A History of the Christian Church, p. 363). In a meeting with Luther over the nature of the communion table elements, the two reformers reached no agreement; Luther refused to clasp hands with him as a brother in Christ. Disappointed, Zwingli returned to Zurich. Increasingly isolated and drawn into war, Zwingli, along with thirty other pastors, finally lost his life; his enemies cut his body into four pieces and tossed them into a fire. Luther's sad comment was, "Live by the sword, die by the sword." But none among the German-speaking Swiss ever attained his powerful influence. What can we learn from Zwingli of benefit to our time? People need to hear the Word of God practically applied to life in all its aspects; Christian faith is no mere pietism but something powerful and effective in all levels of Society. Put simply, preaching can change a nation. If a Zwingli, hampered as he was by inaccurate theology, inadequate gifts, hindering legalism and a past of shaky character could affect the world, so can anyone. So, in the providence of God, can you and I.

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CHARLES FINNEY

Taken from

REVIVAL WRITTEN BY WINKIE PRATNEY

PUBLISHED BY HUNTINGTON HOUSE PUBLISHERS

Charles Finney (1792-1875)

"When he opened his mouth, he was aiming a gun. When he spoke the bombardment began. The effects of his speaking were almost unparalleled in modern history. Over half a million people were converted through his ministry ... in an age when there were no amplifiers or mass communications. He spearheaded a revival which literally altered the course of history" (Miller, Charles Finney, cover). Finney was born the year after Wesley died. Thus, the revival events of his life became the link from the Great Awakening of one century to the Second Great Awakening of the next. The Harvard professor Perry Miller wrote, "Charles Grandison Finney led America out of the eighteenth century" (Finney, The Heart of Truth, cover). His Early Life A tall (6'2"), impressively blue-eyed young frontiersman from a totally non-Christian farming family, Charles was the seventh child of Sylvester and Rebecca Finney. He was a musical, gently mocking pagan. Most available sketches and pictures (taken near the end of his life) do not do him justice. Surviving portraits rarely catch his irrepressible sense of humor, his zest for life, or his rugged and athletic build. He was apparently deeply attractive and personable. Why else would his new wife not mind waiting for months when revivals repeatedly broke out on his way to take her home after the wedding? Their deeply moving love for each other is recorded in his private letters. Yet following her death Finney was able to marry again, and even again! An expert marksman, sailor, and athlete, "when he was twenty he excelled every man and boy he met in every species of toil or sport. No man could throw him, no man could knock his hat off, no man could run faster, jump further, leap higher or throw a ball with greater force and precision" (Edman, Finney Lives On, pp. 25-26). Though he regularly attended the gentle Dr. George Gale's Presbyterian church, he scorned prayer meetings because he "never saw any of their prayers answered." Nevertheless he played cello, directed the choir, and was in love with Lydia Root Andrews, one of the pretty young Christian girls who visited there (later his first and deeply loved wife). Charles was then studying to be a lawyer. Reading Blackstone's Law Commentaries (then the ultimate authority on the subject), he was struck by this Christian's constant reference to the Bible as the basis for all civic and moral law. He obtained a copy and began to study it seriously. Perhaps of all the great evangelists and revivalists, Finney's

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originality and distinction owes much to the fresh approach he took, confronted for the first time by the truth of Scripture which he believed to be God's Word. Finney's Conversion He later noted:

I often said to myself, "If these things are really taught in the Bible, I must be an infidel." But the more I read my Bible the more clearly I saw that these things were not found there upon any fair principles of interpretation such as would be admitted in a court of justice.... But the Spirit of God conducted me through the darkness and delivered me from the labyrinth and fog of a false philosophy, and set my feet upon the rock of truth - as I trust." (Finney, from the Preface, Systematic Theology, p. x)

His conversion reads like something from the book of Acts. Under deep conviction from the Scripture and dealt the Holy Spirit, he vowed one October Sunday evening in the Fall of 1821 to "settle the question of my soul's salvation at once, that if it were possible I would make my peace with God" (Finney, Autobiography, p. 12). For the next two days, his conviction increased, but he could not pray or weep. He felt if he could be alone and cry out aloud to God something might happen. Tuesday evening, he became so nervous he felt if he did not cry out he would sink into hell, but he survived until morning. Setting out for work, he was suddenly confronted by an "inward voice" that riveted him to the spot in front of his office: "What are you waiting for? Did you not promise to give your heart to God? What are you trying to do - work out a righteousness of your own?" The whole essence of conversion opened to him there in what he called "a marvellous manner": the finished work of Christ, the need to give up his sins and submit to His righteousness. The voice continued, "Will you accept it, now, today?" Finney vowed, "Yes; I will accept it today or I will die in the attempt" (Finney, Autobiography, p. 15). Conviction of Sin Sneaking away over the hill to a small forest where he liked to take walks, avoiding anyone who might ask him what he was doing, the young lawyer fought a battle with his pride. Several times he tried to pray, but rustling leaves stopped him cold; he thought someone was coming and would see him trying to talk to God. Finally, near despair, thinking he had rashly vowed and that his hardheartedness had grieved away the Holy Spirit, he had a sudden revelation of his pride:

An overwhelming sense of my wickedness in being ashamed to have a human being see me on my knees before God took such powerful possession of me that I cried at the top of my voice ... I would not leave that place if all men on earth and all the devils in hell surrounded me.... The sin appeared awful, infinite. It broke me down before the Lord. (Finney, Autobiography, p. 17)

Just then a Scripture verse seemed to "drop into his mind with a flood of light": "Then shall you go and pray to Me and I will hearken to you. Then shall you seek Me and find

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Me when you search for me with all your heart" (Jer. 29:13). It came to Finney with a flood of revelation, though he did not recall ever having read it. It shifted faith for him from the intellect to the choice. He knew that a God who could not lie had spoken to him and that his vow would be heard. Quietly, walking back towards the village, he was filled with such a sense of peace that it "seemed all nature listened." He realized it was noon. Many hours had passed without any conscious sense of the passage of time. A Manifestation of Jesus Back at his office, his boss, Judge Wright , had gone to lunch. He took down his bass viol and began to play and sing some hymns: "But as soon as I began to sing these sacred words, I began to weep. It seemed as if my heart were all liquid; my feelings were in such a state that I could not hear my own voice in singing without causing my sensibility to overflow ... I tried to suppress my tears, but could not" (Finney, Autobiography, p. 20). All that afternoon, filled with a profound sense of tenderness, sweetness, and peace, he helped Judge Wright relocate their office. The work finished, he bade his employer goodnight. "I had accompanied him to the door; and as I closed the door and turned around my heart seemed to be liquid within me. All my feelings seemed to rise and flow out and the utterance of my heart was: 'I want to pour out my whole soul to God'" (Finney, Autobiography, p. 21). He rushed into a back room of the office to pray. Then it happened:

There was no fire, no light in the room; nevertheless it appeared to me as if it were perfectly light. As I went in and shut the door after me, it seemed as if I met the Lord Jesus Christ face to face. It did not occur to me then, nor did it for some time afterward, that it was a

wholly mental state. On the contrary, it seemed to me that I saw Him as I would see any other man. He said nothing, but looked at me in such a manner as to break me down right at His feet...it seemed to me a reality that He stood before me and I fell down at His feet and poured out my soul to Him. I wept aloud like a child, and made such confessions as I could with a choked utterance. It seemed to me that I bathed His feet with my tears, and yet I had no distinct impression that I touched Him. (Finney, Autobiography, p. 21)

Baptized in the Holy Spirit For a long time, Finney continued in this state. Eventually he broke off the interview and returned to the front office, where the fire had nearly burned out. As he was about to take a seat by the fire, he received, in his own words,

a mighty baptism of the Holy Ghost. Without any expectation of it, without ever having the thought in my mind that there was any such thing for me, without any recollection that I had ever heard the thing mentioned by any person in the world, the Holy Spirit descended on me in a manner that seemed to go through me, body and soul. I could feel the impression, like a wave of electricity, going through and through me. Indeed, I could not express it any other way. It seemed like the very breath of God. I can recall distinctly that it seemed to fan me like immense wings.

No words can express the wonderful love that was shed abroad in my heart. I wept aloud with joy and love; and I do not know but I should say, I literally bellowed out the unutterable

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gushings of my heart. These waves came over me and over me and over me, one after the

other until I recollect I cried out "I shall die if these waves continue to pass over me." I said, "Lord I cannot bear any more; yet I had no fear of death" (Finney, Autobiography, p. 22).

Later, a church choir member knocked on his door. He found him loudly weeping and asked if he was sick or in pain. Eventually able to speak, Finney said, "No, but so happy that I cannot live." The Beginning of a Powerful Ministry The following morning, with the sunrise, his baptism of power and love returned, and with it a call to the ministry. From that day on, Finney realized it was goodbye to his legal profession. He launched out on a life of fire and power such as few have paralleled in Christian history. Like all other men of God, he had his faults. He was sometimes extravagant and emotive in language. So careful to bring glory to God, he attacked anything that seemed in any way to him to harbor an attitude of resistance to God's Spirit. Later, analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of his own earlier ministry, he felt he had been too apt to teach and inform before bringing people up to their known obligation to submit to Christ. This he found did not encourage his faith but could lead to a cynical, fault-finding, rationalistic spirit in converts. In later years he put more stress on the power of the Holy Spirit and the simplicity of trust in Christ as the key to all victory and perseverance in ministry. Some estimate that over 80 percent of his converts during the revivals stayed true to Christ without ever backsliding, an awesome testimony to the power of a pure life and an urgent message of holiness.... Even his enemies and detractors admitted the awesome way God used him. They attributed it to his prayer life, the sovereignty of God, or the mood of the times while decrying the obvious implications of a theology and experience that helped break the back of a religious fatalism that had dominated the land. Finney's Uniqueness Three things stand out in Finney's astonishing life; his willingness to change, his deep and loving devotional life and prayer, and his radical message of practical and immediate holiness. "Denounced by clergy and secularist alike for his innovations in evangelism, he was intolerably ahead of his time. One preacher (Lyman Beecher) threatened to oppose him with cannon if he dared venture into his parish" (Finney, The Heart of Truth, cover). (Beecher later relented and extended an invitation to Finney.)

"Swinging above your heads are two distorted figures suspended on ropes. At the touch of the torch they leap into flames and the crowd screams in sheer delight. Sound like a scene from a lynching...a race riot? Not at all. It is a religious gathering. The charred creatures

smouldering in the air represent the public's expression of opposition to the preaching and praying of America's greatest evangelistic team. Charles Grandison Finney and his partner-in-prayer, Father (Daniel) Nash, have just been burned in effigy. Preachers and pew-warmers alike joined forces against the two men who did more to spearhead revival

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than any other pair in American history....Finney became so incredibly alive that

everywhere he went life leaped from him to others like flames in a fire-storm. It is impossible to read about this man without being shaken. (Basil Miller; Charles Finney - A Biography, cover)

Charles Finney (among the twenty-three million Americans and forty thousand ministers of his time) was unquestionably the most impressive religious revolutionary that America has ever produced. When he first gave a public account of his own conversion, the tumult began. A fellow lawyer left the meeting with the comment, "He is in earnest ... but he is deranged ..." When he stood up to preach his first revival messages in the backwoods regions of New York, startling chaos ensued. One man came to the meeting with a pistol, intent on killing the speaker of the evening. Instead he fell to the floor and was soundly saved. Everywhere he went for some forty years, the tumult spread. (Finney, Finney on Revival, cover)

His Works Go Marching On It would be true to say that his life and writings influenced more people towards revival and social reform than any other preacher of the last century. "His convictions were born in the fires of revival and shaped by a keen lawyer's mind committed to the full authority of the Bible. So effective were his theological writings that they have been the impetus for revivals around the world since his death" (S.E. Shalhemer, ed., Finney on Revival, cover). Many of his materials go into reprint generation after generation, sourcing new desires for holy awakening in each one. There is his biography, a deeply moving account of his ministry; Reflections on Revivals, a succinct analysis of his early mistakes and dangers in revival ministry; Lectures to Professing Christians and Sermons on Gospel Themes (re-arranged and re-issued under various titles) are powerful attacks on compromise and counterfeit conversion. Many sermons from the Oberlin Evangelist, a "Jesus Paper" he edited during revival, have been republished with titles like "The Promise of the Spirit" and "Principles of Victory." V. Raymond Edman, a past president of Wheaton College, said, "In all my reading on revival I have found nothing to be the equal of Finney's Lectures on Revival. They constitute lessons that God's servant learned in days when tens of thousands came to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus. I have found nothing more heart-searching, more pungent and powerful and more satisfying than these messages by Finney" (Edman, from the Preface, Finney Lives On). "No other book on the subject has been so mightily used of God. It has been translated into many languages and circulated around the world..." (Preface, Lectures on Revivals of Religion). Finney's life spanned two mighty periods of American and British Christian history, the First and Second Great Awakenings; wearing out two of his three wives, radical to the last, he passed away peacefully on Sunday in Oberlin, August 16, 1875. Written on his tombstone is the Scripture summary of his life as his memorial: "The Lord be with us as He was with our fathers; let us not fail nor forsake Him."

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Taken from

LEADING THE CHURCH NEW BREED LEADERSHIP

BIBLICAL LEADERSHIP PART 2 WRITTEN BY DUDLEY DANIEL

Chapter 1 POSSESSING THE LAND - NEW BREED LEADERSHIP Joshua 1 - 23 Jos 1:1-5 "After the death of Moses the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses' assistant. "Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them - to the Israelites. I will give you every place where you set your foot, as I promised Moses. Your territory will extend from the desert to Lebanon, and from the great river, the Euphrates - all the Hittite country - to the Great Sea on the west. No-one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you..." 1. WHAT WE GET SAVED "INTO" IS FAR MORE IMPORTANT THAN WHAT WE

GET SAVED "OUT OF"!

What we get saved "into" is of far more importance than what we get saved "out of"! No matter how bad our "past" has been, our "future" down here on earth can be glorious if we find a local church that is radical and yet relevant, "kingdom" and yet kind, aggressive yet not arrogant, powerful yet not proud, or more simply, "Word-based". All of us know that God is going to have to raise up a totally different "generation" of believers, in order to present to His Son a "bride", without spot, wrinkle or blemish. This "different generation" has had different "tags" applied, all seeking to describe, and challenge people towards, what God desires in His end-time church. Some of those tags are - a Joshua Generation; Davidic Deliverers with Davidic Domination; Gideon Gladiators; Moses Motivators; New Breed; etc.

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From the beginning, the Gospel (Good News) has been a "going" not "gathering", "sending" not "staying" message and therefore lifestyle. The early church lived a "reaching-out" lifestyle. Abraham was sent, and went! Gen 12:1-14; Gal 3:6-9. Jesus went! Jn 4:34. The apostles "went". The word "sent" is used approximately 30 times in the New Testament. Today's church has, by and large, turned the message into a "coming" - come to my church, "gathering", or "staying" message. "Now that you are saved stop mixing with the heathen" - and the result of that kind of lifestyle is an ineffective and irrelevant church. No matter how dynamic our conversion, if we settle in a "gathering", "staying" church, our lives and ministries will be far less effective than they could have been.

2. THE ONLY WAY TO FULFIL THE GREAT COMMISSION IS TO PLANT NEW TESTAMENT CHURCHES IN EVERY VILLAGE, TOWN AND CITY OF EVERY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD (MATT 28:18-20). The "mandate" of the church is to "go into all the world." The "mission" is to "disciple all nations." The five "keys" to discipling nations is -

radical converts trained, equipped and commissioned key leaders operating as a team planting and establishing New Testament churches with the new converts planting bases from which to operate taking cities (areas) for Jesus through spiritual warfare

The "models" of churches that we presently have are "pastoral" which ends up

more concerned about the "bleating of the sheep" than God's voice and Word; "priestly" which normally ends up so spiritual and other-worldly that they don't amount to much here on earth; the "phantom" church, comprising of hurt, disillusioned and cynical believers whose main reason for fellowship is to discuss their hurts and criticise those who are at least attempting to do something for Jesus Christ, and the "prophetic" - those who see, prepare for and become the

future.

3. THE NEW ADMINISTRATION SUITABLE FOR THE KINGDOM OF GOD (Matt 9:16,17)

The "Old Wineskin" is the inflexible church structure that we find in so many churches today, while the New Wineskin is the flexible, adaptable structure that is willing to let go of the past, traditions that aren't biblical, strategies, structures and methods that are no longer valid. The "new wine" is the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:1-4, 13, 15 and Eph 5:18,19), the truth He is restoring and adding to the church (Jn 16:12-14, 14-26), His creativity and fuller expression as the church moves towards maturity. Today's "new wineskins" may be an old one by tomorrow! It

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will be if we don't remain open and flexible. Don't just reject things you don't understand. Test them against the Word, as you "lean on the Spirit" to help you.

A. BREAKING CAMP Deut 1 gives us a number of important lessons and principles regarding this "new breed" leadership. 1. POSSESSING OUR INHERITANCE (DEUT 1:1-8)

Attitudes must be changed In order to possess our inheritance (take the land) attitudes must be changed (see verses 6,7). They had become "settlers" or "maintainers"

and were no longer "pioneers" breaking new ground. This "siege" or "laager" mentality must continually be broken in our lives. Many of us keep "slipping" back into a "maintenance mode." Far too many of God's leaders have settled down into the false belief that their inheritance is their local church. All of their planning, strategizing, dreaming, praying, effort and energy is directed solely at "their church". They can't see anything beyond it. Deut 1:6,7 says "..advance...go to all the neighbouring peoples...mountains ...foothills... Negev...coast, etc..." Our inheritance is far more than our local church. It is "the nations". It is far more than even a single country! Gen 12:1-3 "...all nations will be blessed through you", the seed of Abraham. Ps 2:8 urges "ask of Me and I will give you the nations for your inheritance". Matt 28:18-20 "...Therefore go and make disciples of all nations..." Acts 1:8 "...and you shall be My witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth..." Action is demanded With these glorious prospects, promises and opportunities, action is demanded Deut 1:7-8. They all “knew about” their inheritance, but forty years later still hadn’t “possessed” it! We will only begin to “possess” it as we move out, break camp, stop going around the same old mountain, and “advance” – reach out further into God’s purposes (field) for us. 2 Cor 10:13-16 is clear that we will only possess more as we begin to succeed in each new place that we “break camp.” “We … will confine our boasting to the field God has assigned to us, a field that reaches even to you. We are not going too far in our boasting, as would be the case if we had not come to you with the gospel of Christ … Our hope is that, as your faith continues to grow, our area of activity among you will greatly expand, so that we can preach the gospel in regions beyond you”. We must reach out further afield, succeed there and then reach out even further. This must become both vision and lifestyle. We can’t just restrict ourselves to our small locality forever, we must go beyond, but we also can’t run around “doing” things everywhere if what we are doing isn’t working in the last place we worked.

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2. THINGS WE NEED IN ORDER TO POSSESS OUR INHERITANCE

2.1 Deut 1:9-18 reveals three vital “ingredients” needed. The first is the RIGHT ADMINISTRATION (vs 9-18) and this incorporates shared,

anointed and co-operative leadership.

Shared leadership Shared leadership (vs 9-15) – no one-man show. Carrying the leadership, its burden and responsibility on your own, will eventually destroy you (vs 9-12). Leadership can be extremely stressful at times. Paul gives us some honest insights into the stress factor in his letters to the Corinthian church. Carefully reflect on 1 Cor 4:9-13; 2 Cor 1:8-11; 6:3-13. Added to the stress factor is the problem of getting wounded as a leader. 2 Cor 2:1-5; 10:1-11:1,7-33. The stress we have to carry and the wounds we may receive must all be viewed in the light of eternity (2 Cor 4:16-18). God's desire is to spread (share) the burden and responsibility of leadership. (Deut 1:15-17; Nu 11:1-17). The leaders must also desire and be willing to see this workload shared (Deut 1:12,13; Nu 11:29,30). To desire is not enough, we must "give" some of it away. Deut 1:13,39; Nu 11:16-17 give us some of the qualifications for leadership we must look for in those we invite to come alongside us. They must be wise, understanding, respected, anointed, innocent and "naive" and known to you. Anointed leaders Another vital factor regarding the right administration is anointed leaders (Deut 1:15; Nu 11:17). It is essential for "new breed" leaders to be anointed because they are to be "deliverer leaders" - bringing deliverance to God's people in every area of living. Moses delivered Israel out of Egypt; Joshua delivered them into the Promised Land. Isaiah 61:1-4 and its New Testament parallel, Luke 4:18,19, confirm this. Isaiah 42:1-9 gives us a good picture of "new breed" leadership. It firstly reveals what God will do for them, namely "uphold", "delight in", "put His Spirit upon", "take hold of his hand" (sustain, strengthen, guide and lift him up when he falls), "keep" (protect and provide for) him, "making him a covenant leader", and "a light", and, praise God, do "new things" for him (vs 9). It then tells us what His servant must do and must not do: Never operate out of frustration (vs 2). We may become

frustrated at times but we should never allow ourselves to operate

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out of frustration. Frustration disqualified Moses and Aaron from remaining "new breed" leaders (Nu 20:1-13). Frustration is an expression of unbelief (Nu 20:12).

Never operate harshly (vs 2,3). In Nu 20:2-12,24, Moses and

Aaron's harshness was seen by God as an expression of rebellion. Tragically, Aaron's anointing is passed on to his son, Eliezer (Nu 20:26), and Moses' anointing to Joshua (Nu 27:12-23). Here, that frustration is viewed as "disobedience" (Nu 27:14). Moses then prays for a "new breed leader" (Nu 27:15-17).

He is to be: God-appointed. "May the Lord...appoint..." Not self-appointed.

Look at Paul's testimony in 1 Cor 1:1; 2Cor 1:1; Gal 1:1; Eph 1:1; Col 1:1; 1 Tim 1:1.

A Ruler. "...appoint a man over this community". 'New breed

leaders' must be willing to exercise authority (1 Tim 5:17,18; 1 Thess 5:12). Ruling demands commanding from time to time. Is 55:4 "see, I have made him a... leader and commander of peoples..." Moses commanded, Deut 33:4. Jesus commanded, Matt 14:19; 28:20. Paul commanded, 2 Thess 3:4,6; 1 Thess 4:11. And so did Peter, Acts 10:48.

An example: Nu 27:17 "...to go out before them..." 1 Pet 5:1-3 speaks of leaders "...being an example to the flock..." "New breed" leaders will be an example by their speech and lifestyle, in their giving, faithfulness, in the gifts of the Spirit, servanthood, prayer, praise, family life and flexibility (a willingness to change and be stretched), to name a few. One Who Will Lead Them, taking them into God's purposes, showing them how to enter in. Nu 27:17 "...one who will lead them out" (see also Is 55:4). A Motivator Nu 27:17 "...go in before them..." These leaders will, by their lifestyle and faith, motivate people to reverence and honour God, appreciate His people - the church - praise and worship, to witness and win souls, be inconvenienced, sacrificial, etc. It is interesting to note the meaning of the names Joshua - "Jehovah is salvation" and Eliezer - "whom God aids". They minister as a team, Nu 27:21-23. God's salvation and deliverance, His healing grace, mercy and forgiveness are to come through the power of the Holy Spirit, not humanistic zeal or effort. One of the saddest and most discouraging portions of scripture to me is found in Deut, chapters 23 - 28. Moses can see, but can't

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possess the Promised Land. To sum up, frustration and harshness are seen by God as: - an expression of unbelief (Nu 20:12) - rebellion (Nu 20:24) - disobedience (Nu 27:14) - dishonouring God as holy (Nu 27:14; 20:12) Is 42:3 implies what God's servant must do - be gentle, an encourager, faithful, bringing justice and never give up until the task is complete. Co-operative and Submissive Leaders

A third vital factor regarding the Right Administration is co-operative and submissive leaders, who recognise God's chain of command. Deut 1:17 declares that those who Moses was to "appoint to have authority..." were to be co-operative and impartial and know when to submit to Moses. Far too many leaders are still pursuing "their vision." They require people to surrender their personal visions to the overall vision of their church when they join, but won't surrender their own to the overall vision of our corporateness. Both in your local church and in our corporate apostolic vision, "more than one vision spells Di-vision!" While some leaders keep running off to other parts of the world, or persist in making other involvements their priorities, the people become confused, don't know what to get involved in, or to what to put their energy, finances or prayers into.

2.2 RIGHT STRATEGY

The second vital 'ingredient' needed to enable us to possess our inheritance is the right strategy (Deut 1:19-26). This involves four things, namely, to examine the task, understand what you hope to accomplish, understand what you are up against and what you will need. Let's take a brief look at each of these. Examine the task (Deut 1:22)

We need a "report", that is, detailed knowledge of what we are undertaking to do. Joshua understood this truth (See Joshua 2:1-24). Nehemiah also used this as part of his strategy (Neh 1:1-4; 2:11-15). It is worth noting how Nehemiah asked questions about the state of the City of Jerusalem (Neh 1:1-4). He then went to Jerusalem to examine for himself (Neh 2:11-15). We, too, need to know as much as we can about the task. Understand what you are to accomplish

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When I was leaving South Africa to relocate in Australia, I asked myself the following questions:- Why? Because God said so and because of the accessibility of the Far East from Australia. What? What was the purpose of my relocation? To establish NT churches in Australia and in South East Asia. How? By establishing a base in Australia, recruiting co-labourers, building

according to the New Testament. When? When the people we relate to in South Africa were ready for it. When we had enough other team members, etc. Understand what you are up against.

This would include natural obstacles as well as supernatural opposition. Who is going to resist you? What spirits control those areas? Regarding our move to Adelaide I identified "ruling" spirits that I knew would oppose us. The spirits are religion, apathy, poverty and rebellion. Understand what you will need. Manpower - how many people? What gifting, maturity level, etc? What strategy for war? What strategies for establishing a bulk-head or base? Regarding Singapore, we needed a "key" leader before we could go in and therefore had to wait until God revealed this man to us. In Hong Kong we had "key" families so we started with them.

2.3 RIGHT ATTITUDE, A WILLINGNESS TO GO AND A CONFIDENCE IN GOD (Deut 1:26-46)

The third vital "ingredient" is a right attitude, a willingness to go and a confidence in God. Knowing what God wants, even having a strategy is not enough. We must "move", start to embrace the vision by beginning to truly, realistically become involved. Too many of us "stay at home" burying our heads in the "hole" of "our church". We can't see beyond "our church". Others begin to become involved in and around Southern Africa. Still a few others go off to other parts of the world on "hit" and "miss" excursions. But how many are truly involving themselves in our corporate vision? What about joining us when we plant a church? Familiarising yourself with the task? What about "freeing" yourself to relocate if God were to speak to you?

Become one of those who have an unshakeable confidence, unwavering faith in God's ability and faithfulness. Look at the response of so many who were to go in and "possess the land" in Deut 1:25-40, in spite of the

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"good report" of verse 25! Grumbling (vs 27), unbelief (vs 28,32), fear and intimidation (vs 28,29). All of this was regarded by God as an unwillingness to go, and rebellion (vs 26). And they were all by-passed! (vs 34-40).

Documents

GREAT CHRISTIAN PERSONALITIES...2 Dear Student Welcome to the course on Great Christian Personalities. You are about to embark on an exciting journey where you will study the lives