Here’s this week’s inspirational delve into the past by Paul James-Griffiths of Christian Heritage Edinburgh. Paul writes, “Before I write about individual missionaries who went abroad from Scotland, I must mention about Dr Chalmers, whose sharp mind was mightily used by God for the purpose of shaping a Christian worldview in the evangelical Scottish movement of the 19th century. I hope you find this article challenging.”
Revd Dr Thomas Chalmers (1780-1847),
Edinburgh Theological Seminary, photo by Paul James-Griffiths
We have already met Dr Chalmers in Week 161, as God’s Strategist, but this time we will be focusing on his vital part in shaping a Christian worldview among the churches and students, preparing them for world mission. If Revd Dr John Erskine had been God’s catalyst to pioneer a prayer movement for global revival and awakening, God’s strategist for world mission was Revd Dr Thomas Chalmers. Chalmers seemed to have the necessary mind to think like a general when it came to church and mission. He realised that our task is not just to preach the gospel to the nations and pioneer churches, but to make disciples in those nations who will transform whole cultures with biblical values, like yeast spreading through the dough.
Chalmers inspired many churches and his students, whilst he was a professor at both St Andrews University and at the New College, (now belonging to the University of Edinburgh), where he was its first Principal. Chalmers trained a generation of evangelicals to think about the world in a Christian way. What is the biblical view on education, economy, art, science, healthcare, society, politics and other important issues? Chalmers was equally at home discussing the impact of the Christian, Blaise Pascal, on mathematics, as he was proposing a Christian-based philosophy of economy. In 1834 he was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, showing his love of science, and he engaged with influential thinkers of the nation with his work, On Political Economy in Connexion with the Moral State and Moral Prospects (1832).
Chalmers was convinced that the Scottish church should develop a biblical worldview, so that the whole culture would be leavened with Christian values. An extraordinary evangelical movement broke out with him spearheading it. Evangelicals, casting aside the lofty and deadening effects of moderatism, pressed on, getting their hands dirty at the coalface of humanity. Christians could be found pioneering in science, medicine, healthcare, nursing, education, the economy, abolition of slavery, votes for women, and care for the poor, reaching out to the most down-trodden in society. In this period, Chalmers wrote that “There never was an age of the world in which a more effective machinery for conversion was, in the shape of schools and Bibles and missionaries, put into operation.”
If Edinburgh became a model for city transformation, then it also became a model for training up missionaries for world mission. Hundreds of men and women went from training colleges in Edinburgh, St Andrews, and in other cities, to India, Asia, Africa, South America and elsewhere, to spread the gospel of Christ, plant churches, and establish a Christian worldview that would in turn transform many nations, resulting in education systems, universities, hospitals, social reforms, and much more. In the next weeks we shall focus on some of these missionaries and the impact they had in the cultural transformation of nations.
“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations” (Matthew 28:19, NKJV).
(JB writes: Thomas Chalmers is is my 3rd cousin 2x removed of husband of sister-in-law of 7th cousin 3x removed)