Does Agnes Sanford offer something for Post-Christian Europe?

I am blessed to share with you about my just released book, Agnes Sanford and Her Companions: The Assault on Cessationism and the Coming of the Charismatic Renewal (Wipf and Stock, 2015).

Last Wednesday, just after I had received a copy from the publisher, I spent most of the day in prayer of thanksgiving over the completion of this work. During this last year I had encountered numerous blocks and unexpected obstacles to its completion, as in the inexplicable loss of files, and even the entire text, and lastly, the index had to be redone completely. My Facebook friends prayed me through every obstacle.

Like most authors, I asked the Lord to grant this book much success, not only in this country, but overseas. I recalled to the Lord that very dear saint, and great prayer warrior, while praying for me, spontaneously prayed for the success of this book overseas. As I prayed I kept getting the word and image of Germany. This was strange as I had not had the least thought of a German audience as I was writing this work. I merely wanted to tell the story of Mrs. Agnes Sanford, and the people around her, and how she in particular was a theological innovator (in the best sense of the word). For instance, she developed the ministry of inner healing, and went on to write the first theology of nature miracles – as in stilling storms, etc. Nature miracles have been well recorded throughout the literature of the saints and heroes of the Church, but Agnes was the first person ever to write a book on how to pray effectively for this.[1]

Back to the Germany connection. I wondered if the impression I was getting was from the Lord or from a subconscious wish. I messaged a German Facebook friend who is also a distinguished German Pentecostal pastor and scholar. He knew about the book, and messaged me back agreeing that there was indeed an anointing on the book to do a work in Germany. Hallelujah!

I then began to consider, why would this work, about the wife of an Episcopal priest and rector, who was born in China, and who spent all of her adult live in the United States, be of special interest to German Christians?

First, it is necessary to consider that the spiritual life and vitality of the German Churches is at a very low point, as in the rest of Europe. Germany is the birthplace of the Reformation, but also the birthplace of so called higher-criticism which denied the supernatural in the Bible and made the miracles to be pious myths (Rudolf Bultmann, and his followers, etc.). That form of hermeneutical disaster and apostasy is still very influential in Europe and Germany. Not surprising, Sunday church attendance in Europe is between 15 and 5 percent of the population.

Back in 1908 the Protestant pastors in Germany met to decide what to do about the craziness coming from America and the Azusa St. revival – Pentecostalism. They decided they wanted nothing to do with it and denounced the whole movement as a delusion and heresy. As a result, any form of Pentecostal and charismatic expression has been very limited in Germany until very recent decades.[2] There is some Holy Spirit movement now, as Europeans, including Germans, are getting increasingly nervous about the Muslim penetration of Europe and are open to anything that will counter it.

With this in mind, there are certain aspects of Agnes Sanford and Her Companions that may be particularly attractive to German Christians. First, among her “companions” was Prof. Glen Clark, who founded the Camps Furthest Out (CFO). This was an anti-cessationist parachurch ministry dating from the 1930 – yes, there were such things back then.[3] Several of the major works of Prof. Clark were translated into German and widely circulated in the 1950s and 1960s. Thus, my coverage of his achievements in effective prayer and healing will resonate with some older Germans, and his translated works could be easily reprinted.

The second factor is perhaps more significant. The Pentecostal spirituality that came out of the CFO, with Agnes Sanford and Glenn Clark as their spiritual leaders, was grounded in Church history and classical piety to a greater degree than classical Pentecostalism. For instance, the daily routine of the CFO camps were patterned in imitation of the famous devotional classic, The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence.

The CFO camps were filled and empowered with the gifts of the Spirit, but less exuberant in manifestations than classical Pentecostal groups. This was because the CFO and the OSL (Order of St. Luke, the other parachurch group that Mrs. Sanford operated in and taught) were made up of mainline Christians who regularly worshiped at their traditional churches. The OSL was predominantly Episcopalian, and Mrs. Sanford herself was a loyal Episcopalian. This was before the fall into apostasy of the Episcopal Church in recent decades. Mrs. Sanford’s spirituality was Spirit-filled, but also deeply sacramental. For instance, the first inner healings were Holy Communion intercessions on behalf of others that had their origins in Medieval Catholic practice. Only later did visualizations become part of inner healing.

It may well be that many German Christians will be very attracted to the theology of Agnes Sanford and the whole OSL/CFO form of spirituality. It is fully Spirit-filled, but more restrained than classical Pentecostalism.[4] Mrs. Sanford’s combination of Spirit-filled worship and ministry with the liturgical and sacramental elements of traditional Christianity may be very attractive to whole swaths of the German Christian public who are in Lutheran and Presbyterian churches. For the same reasons Agnes Sanford and Her Companions may be attractive to the large numbers of German Catholics.

Lastly, let me suggest a further reason why Agnes Sanford and Her Companions would be attractive to the German public. It is that I deal extensively with the issue of science and Christianity. For instance, the false claim that Mary Baker Eddy’s Christian Science was really scientific. On the positive side I show that “Lady Wisdom” of Proverbs proclaimed a methodology of gathering and reproofing information that was a form of proto-science. That is it had the foundational elements of modern science. Further, that Agnes Sanford and Glenn Clark used this proto-science, the methodology of Lady Wisdom to probe, test and establish effective healing and prayer ministries. I contrast this with the liberal seminaries and modern theologians, who in spite of claiming to be modern, used medieval guild methodology to repeat prejudices and do data avoidance against the evidence of the resurgent healing ministries. All of this would be very attractive to the German public, which is highly literate and well educated scientifically.

Now all of this is speculative. Time will tell. But I ask your prayers that the Lord would indeed use Agnes Sanford and her Companions to make spiritual breakthroughs in Germany and lift that nation out of its spiritual dryness and its suspicion of Pentecostalism.

You may purchase Agnes Sanford and Her Companions at a discount from the publisher via this link: http://wipfandstock.com/agnes-sanford-and-her-companions.html

Notes

[1] Agnes Sanford, Creation Waits (Plainsfield: Logos International, 1978). For a brief history of nature miracles in the Church, and how they continue today, see my blog posting: “Is Calming tornadoes a Christian Ministry?” Anglican Pentecostal. Posted June 1, 2013. http://anglicalpentecostal.blogspot.com/2013/06/is-calming-tornados-christian-ministry.html

[2] One wonders if many of the tragedies of German history in the Twentieth Century would have been avoided had the German churches embraced, rather than rejected, Pentecostalism.

[3] I published a major article on Professor Clark and the CFO over a decade ago. “Glenn Clark’s Camps Furthers Out; the Schoolhouse of the Charismatic Renewal,” Pneuma, 25 No. 2 (Fall, 2003), 265-288. In Agnes Sanford and Her Companions, this was expanded and upgraded.

[4] I am not criticizing the Pentecostals – I enjoy the exuberance of a pure Pentecostal revival. I have had my wife say to me, “Now don’t go wild tonight.” i.e. don’t dance in the isles and run around shouting hallelujah, which I am prone to do.