Darrow Miller and Friends

A Prophet for Our Generation?

SchaefferI have often said that the man who mentored me, Francis Schaeffer, was a prophet in our generation. Fifty years ago, he spoke very clearly about where we were as a church and as a culture. He correctly predicted the future.

Schaeffer was not a prophet in the sense of a seer, but a prophet in the sense that he understood the times. He was a prophet who understood the power of ideas. To use Richard Weaver’s phrase, Schaeffer understood that “Ideas have consequences!”  He understood that when the underpinnings of a nation are destroyed the nation will inevitably fall. When a tree is severed from its roots, the tree will die.

The things occurring in Europe and North America (the United States and Canada) should not surprise anyone. They are the direct result of the church slowly and perhaps unwittingly abandoning her roots. They naturally follow the tide of Western intellectuals proudly abandoning their history and the Judeo-Christian worldview that made the West the West.

A prophet who understood the power of ideas

Death in the CityIn his book Death in the City, written a half century ago (1969), Schaeffer said:

I am amazed at the evangelical leaders who have been taken by surprise at the changes that have come in our culture in the last few years. We should have predicted them. There’s bound to be death in the city once men turn away from the base upon which our culture was built. … Do you think our country can remain as it has been, after it has thrown away the Christian base? Do not be foolish. Jeremiah would have looked at you and said, “You do not have the correct perspective. You should be crying.”

This was written 50 years ago. Today many of us are mourning our losses. But we should have known. Ideas have consequences!

For more reflections on Schaeffer as a prophet read Andrée Seu Peterson’s excellent piece in World Magazine, “When Habit Will No Longer Do.”

Things will not get better simply by praying. We do need to repent (2 Chronicles 7:14), to cry out to God for forgiveness and for his restoration of our nations. As Andrée Seu Peterson reminds us, we must be “individually grounded in the Word of God, in prayer, and obedience.”

pablo (1)Then we need to do the hard work of consciously rebuilding the foundation upon which the West was built. Wishful thinking will not serve. It will require “out thinking” the contemporary thought leaders of the West, challenging their assumptions and conclusions. This seed must be germinated in the church, by the average Christian beginning to think again as a Christian, and Christian thought leaders invading the gates of the city  to relay Biblical truth as foundational to every sector of society.

– Darrow Miller

 

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About 
Darrow is co-founder of the Disciple Nations Alliance and a featured author and teacher. For over 30 years, Darrow has been a popular conference speaker on topics that include Christianity and culture, apologetics, worldview, poverty, and the dignity of women. From 1981 to 2007 Darrow served with Food for the Hungry International (now FH association), and from 1994 as Vice President. Before joining FH, Darrow spent three years on staff at L’Abri Fellowship in Switzerland where he was discipled by Francis Schaeffer. He also served as a student pastor at Northern Arizona University and two years as a pastor of Sherman Street Fellowship in urban Denver, CO. In addition to earning his Master’s degree in Adult Education from Arizona State University, Darrow pursued graduate studies in philosophy, theology, Christian apologetics, biblical studies, and missions in the United States, Israel, and Switzerland. Darrow has authored numerous studies, articles, Bible studies and books, including Discipling Nations: The Power of Truth to Transform Culture (YWAM Publishing, 1998), Nurturing the Nations: Reclaiming the Dignity of Women for Building Healthy Cultures (InterVarsity Press, 2008), LifeWork: A Biblical Theology for What You Do Every Day (YWAM, 2009), Rethinking Social Justice: Restoring Biblical Compassion (YWAM, 2015), and more. These resources along with links to free e-books, podcasts, online training programs and more can be found at Disciple Nations Alliance (https://disciplenations.org).
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