The Smell of Sawdust

I'm coming to appreciate the helpful and urbane writings of Richard Mouw, President of Fuller Seminary. I met Richard Mouw at the General Assembly in 2006. Since then I've read several of his books. Last week I picked up "The Smell of Sawdust," which bears the subtitle 'What Evangelicals Can Learn from Their Fundamentalist Heritage.' This well-written little book, with many autobiographical details, pays tribute to the Fundamentalism in which Mouw was raised.
During the Fundamentalist/Modernist controversy of the early decades of the twentieth century, those who held to a traditional, orthodox form of Protestant Christianity rallied around five fundamentals:
- the Virgin Birth of Jesus;
- His full divinity;
- the blood sacrifice of His atoning work;
- the bodily resurrection of Jesus;
- the hope of His Second Coming.
As a Reformed evangelical, Mouw holds firmly to these beliefs. He also looks back, wistfully, to the pietism that produced such intense personal devotion. He remembers, with affection, the smell of the sawdust trail, the excitement of the tent meeting where evangelists preached, with absolute conviction, for decisions for Christ. Mouw also acknowledges the fairness of some of the criticisms commonly leveled against revivalist Fundamentalism - that it was anti-intellectual, otherworldly, and separatistic in spirit. Nevertheless, Mouw also asserts the value of a call to personal conviction. If Fundamentalism laid too much emphasis upon the self and not enough upon social responsibility, too much upon emotion and not enough upon the intellect, then at least some Christians today are guilty of exactly the opposite.
Mouw wends his way through many of the subjects on which traditional Fundamentalists and Fuller-type evangelicals tend to disagree. He deals with Roman Catholicism, Dispensationalism, Evangelism, Israel, and political involvement. For almost all, Mouw has both a telling anecdote and a quotation from a hymn. He has a very relaxed, non-threatening, engaging style. He could be passing the time of day with you, perhaps sitting in a rocker on a porch, cradling a cup of coffee. He does his level best to present every position in the best possible light, even when he disagrees. He tries to understand why Christians disagree. For example, the chapter on Catholicism explains the tension between an emphasis upon conversion and an emphasis upon the enduring community of the church. Mouw's irenic spirit certainly gives an excellent illustration of how we may enter into respectful, constructive dialog with those with whom we disagree. He is not threatened by argument; neither is he ashamed of the convictions that are dear to him.
Towards the end of the book, Mouw admits that what he really longs for, in his recollection of his Fundamentalist upbringing, is the recovery of a second naivete. He is not interested in attempting to recover the first naivete, which is ignorant of the questions. Rather, he wants to develop a second naivete - a simple faith that sees, beyond the questions, an uncomplicated relationship with the God who calls us to be His own. This faith is not afraid to stand up to Bill Maher's anti-religious ranting and to answer, not with the cultic obscurantism of Fundamentalism, or the thinly-veiled nihilism of Protestant liberalism, but with confidence in the revelation of God in Jesus Christ.
Richard Mouw is a Presbyterian. His book reminds me of the urgent task that Presbyterian evangelicals must embrace. It is our responsibility to state and reclaim the essential tenets that lie at the heart of the Reformed faith, not in order that we might slip back into Billy Sunday Fundamentalism, but so that we might be able to express, in clear and compelling ways, those simple yet profound truths that make us who we are.