Charles Grandison Finney

Charles G. Finney

Charles Grandison Finney (August 29, 1792 – August 16, 1875), often called "America's foremost revivalist," was a major leader of the Second Great Awakening in America, which had a great impact on the social history of the United States.

Life and theology

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Born in Warren, Connecticut as the youngest of seven children, Finney had humble beginnings. His parents were farmers and Finney himself never attended college. However, his six foot three inch stature, piercing blue eyes, musical skill, and leadership abilities gained him good standing in his community. He studied as an apprentice to become a lawyer, but after a dramatic conversion experience in Adams, New York at the age of 29, Finney became a minister in the Presbyterian Church. Finney moved to New York City in 1832 where he pastored the Free Presbyterian Chatham Street Chapel and later founded and pastored the Broadway Tabernacle, known today as Broadway United Church of Christ ^[1]. Finney's logical, clear presentation of his Gospel message reached thousands and promised renewing power and the love of Jesus. Some historians estimate his preaching led to the conversion of over 500,000 people.

Finney was known for his innovations in preaching and conducting religious meetings, such as allowing women to pray in public and the development of the "anxious bench," a place where those considering becoming Christians could come to receive prayer. Finney was also known for his use of extemporaneous preaching.

In addition to being a successful Christian evangelist, Finney was involved with the abolitionist movement and frequently denounced slavery from the pulpit. Beginning in the 1830s, he denied communion to slaveholders in his churches. Prior to his conversion, he had been (as most lawyers of the time were) a Freemason, but became a staunch opponent of Masonry, and wrote an extensive book attacking it, entitled "The Character, Claims, and Practical Workings of Freemasonry".

In 1835, he moved to Ohio where he would become a professor, and later President of Oberlin College from 1851 – 1866. Oberlin was a major cultivation ground for the early movement to end slavery, and among the first American colleges to coeducate blacks and women with white men.

Finney's place in the social history of the United States

As a new nation, the United States was undergoing massive social flux during the 19th century, and this period birthed quite a large number of independent, trans-denominational religious movements such as Mormonism(1830) as well as Millerism (1830's and beyond) and its offshoots the Jehovah's Witnesses (1870), and the Seventh-day Adventist Church (1863). The nation's westward expansion brought about untold opportunities and a readiness to dispense with old thinking, an attitude that influenced people's religious understanding.

What Finney managed to achieve was to be the most successful religious revivalist during this period, and in this particular area. While groups such as the Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons and Seventh-day Adventists became closed and exclusivist, Finney was widely admired and influential amongst more mainstream Christians. Finney never started his own denomination or church, and never claimed any form of special prophetic leadership that elevated himself above other evangelists and revivalists.

More flexible Christian denominations, such as the Baptists and Methodists, were able to draw many of Finney's converts into their churches while more established denominations, such as the Presbyterians, were not as successful.

Finney's theology

Finney was a primary influence on the "revival" style of theology which emerged in the 19th century. Though coming from a Calvinistic background, Finney rejected several tenets of "Old Divinity" Calvinism which he felt were unbiblical and counter to evangelism and Christian mission.

Finney's theology was opposed to Calvinism, as can be read in his masterwork Religious Revivals. In this work, he holds that salvation is bent on a human's will to repent and not forced on people against their will by God. ^[2]

The rejection of Calvinism was not total. In his Systematic Theology, Finney fully embraced the Calvinist doctrine of the "Perseverance of the Saints." although he remarks in that work that "I have felt greater hesitancy in forming and expressing my views upon this [Perseverance of the saints], than upon almost any other question in theology"^[3] At the same time, he took the presence of unrepented sin in the life of a professing Christian as evidence that they must immediately repent or be lost. Support for this position comes from Peter's treatment of the baptized Simon (see Acts 8) and Paul's instruction of discipline to the Corinthian Church (see 1 Corinthians 5). This type of teaching underscores the strong emphasis on personal holiness found in Finney's writings.

While some theologians have attempted to associate Finney with Pelagian thought, it is important to note that Finney strongly affirmed salvation by faith, not by works or by obedience.^{[4] [5]}. Finney affirmed, however, that works were the evidence of faith. The presence of sin thus evinced that a person never had saving faith.

There are also questions over Finney's understanding of the meaning of Jesus' death on the Cross. His view is complex.

Besides making Christ's death the centerpiece of justification rather than Christ's obedience, Finney's understanding of the atonement was that it satisfied "public justice" and that it opened up the way for God to pardon people of their sin. This was the view of the disciples of Jonathan Edwards' followers, the so-called New Divinity which was popular at that time period. In this view, Christ's death satisfied public justice rather than retributive justice. As Finney put it, it was not a "commercial transaction." This view, typically known as the governmental view or moral government view, differs from the Calvinistic view where Jesus' sufferings equal the amount of suffering that Christians would experience in hell, i.e., instead of "paying" off a debt we owe, the atonement made it possible for sinners to be pardoned without weakening the effect of the Law of God against sin.

Works

• The Complete Works of Charles Finney
• The Character, Claims and Practical Workings of Freemasonry
• Holy for a Reason, Set Apart for a Purpose Diggory Press ISBN 978-1846857416
• Lectures on Revivals of Religion
• Lectures to Professing Christians

References

1. ^ Broadway United Church of Christ
2. ^ "Charles Grandison Finney" at Electronic Oberlin Group
3. ^ "Perseverance of the Saints"
4. ^ "Just By Faith"
5. ^ Charles G. Finney, "Letters to Professing Christians Lecture VI: Sanctification By Faith", 1837 []

External links

• A biography of Charles Finney by G. Frederick Wright (Holiness perspective; supportive)
• A Vindication of the Methods and Results of Charles Finney's Ministry (Revivalist perspective; supportive; answers many traditional Old School Calvinist critiques)
• Charles Grandison Finney: New York Revivalism in the 1820-1830s by John H. Martin
• Articles on Finney (conservative Calvinist perspective; critical)
• How Charles Finney's Theology Ravaged the Evangelical Movement (conservative Calvinist perspective; critical)
• The Oberlin Heritage Center-Local history museum and historical society of Oberlin, OH, where Finney lived and worked for decades.
• Finney's Lectures on Theology by Charles Hodge (conservative Calvinist perspective; critical)

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