山道期刊

Didache: A Forgotten Christian Treasure

Nathan K. NG

Protestants generally do not acknowledge the importance of Christian tradition. In the nineteenth century, western Protestant missionaries passed this attitude to the Chinese churches they built. Although the relationship between the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant communities has improved substantially in recent decades, ecclesiastical history is still an underdeveloped subject in the Chinese Christian circle. This article seeks to demonstrate the importance of historical study by focusing on a study of the Didache.

The Didache is a controversial and problematic document. A lot of scholarly discussions have been expended on it. At the same time, it is one of the oldest extra-biblical materials we have from the early church. The value of this literature is undeniable. By examining several passages of the Didache, the author seeks to explain how it provides insight and knowledge of biblical exegesis, early Christian life, and church administration. All these are very helpful in resolving modern ecclesiastical problems.

The Reformation in the Sixteenth Century Europe:
A Reminder for the Present Day Hong Kong

LI Kwong Sang

The Reformation in Sixteenth Century Europe is commonly perceived as a schism in the history of the Western Church. In the eyes of Chinese Protestants, on the other hand, it was a restoration movement that led the Church of Christ back to the right track. Modern scholarship underscores the significance of the Reformation and the relevance of Martin Luther’s writings for subsequent generations. To the extend that the Reformation becomes more widely regarded as a liberation and re-evangelization movement, Luther becomes more recognized as a witness of Jesus Christ and a prophet for His Church.

Christians can certainly find inspiration to deal with the problems facing Hong Kong from the teachings of Luther. This article intends to introduce Luther’s four writings, written during the 1520s, for their information and reflection value. Readers may find similarities with Hong Kong’s situation, advice for its predicament, or even challenges in his article, “Whether One May Flee from a Deadly Plague,” written in 1527. The other three articles (“Concerning the Order of Public Worship,” “An Order of Mass and Communion for the Church at Wittenberg,” and “The German Mass and Order of Service”) concern worship and liturgical reform. They were written between 1523 and 1526.

They give us a glimpse of how Luther viewed his liturgical reforms and how he introduced the changes to the believers with theological, evangelical and critical reverence. All four articles illustrate the implication and application of Luther’s rediscovered gospel, the doctrine of justification by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. On the one hand, faith and freedom in Christ are lifted. On the other hand, love and Christian obligation to one’s neighbor are emphasized. As such, the characteristics of Luther’s theology (biblical, christological, dialectical, paradoxical, pastoral, and the like) are revealed.

“In a higher world it is otherwise; but …”:
John Henry Newman and the Meaning of History

Paul PARVIS

“In a higher world it is otherwise; but here below to live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often.” So wrote John Henry Newman in An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine—a book which may be seen as an attempt to recover a pattern of meaning in the history of the Church.

Ecclesiastical history as created by Eusebius of Caesarea presupposed (1) that the meaning of Church history is transparent—plain for all to see—and (2) that truth is one and invariant while error is shifting and fissiparous, so change is always a threat. Broadly speaking, that myth continued to be the dominant model of Church history until the nineteenth century among both Catholics and Protestants. And it was essentially the view which Newman and his friends still maintained in the heady, early days of the Oxford Movement. Newman’s increasing disenchantment with that view can be traced in his preface to the Library of Fathers translation of Cyril of Jerusalem (1838), in his account in the Apologia of the terrible vision that briefly opened during the Long Vac of 1839, and in his last University Sermon, which affirms that it is heresy that is static and without development, while life is a sign of authenticity. These insights find expression in the Essay on Development. The passage I have quoted in the title of this article lies at the heart of the Catholic view of Church history. In it Newman rejects a negative evaluation of change by engaging self-consciously with two key texts — Pusey’s preface to the first volume of the Library of Fathers and Vincent’s Commonitorium.

If we follow Newman, we cannot look to the past—at least not in any straightforward sense—for the answers to theological questions, and that for two, inter-connected reasons: the past is not the end of the road—no theological question is ever finally over and done with—and history itself points ahead: it points us back to the Church in which we live and whose faith we are trying to understand.

History is not a locus of revelation. But it is the locus of the faithful articulation of the content of revelation. This articulation is not a mechanical process nor is it automatic, and while authoritative, it is never exhaustive. We never come to the end of the exploration: “there are,” as Newman says, “no words, ever so clear, but require an interpretation.”

In terms of the great triad of theological virtues—faith, hope, and love—we can say that if the historical process with which we are concerned lies between revelation and the fulness of knowledge, then its study lies somewhere between faith and the fulness of charity that is realized only in the Kingdom. The characteristic virtue of the historian, then, is hope—a hope which is willing to grapple with the disparate data of human experience and which looks confidently ahead to a time when it will all make sense.

They give us a glimpse of how Luther viewed his liturgical reforms and how he introduced the changes to the believers with theological, evangelical and critical reverence. All four articles illustrate the implication and application of Luther’s rediscovered gospel, the doctrine of justification by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. On the one hand, faith and freedom in Christ are lifted. On the other hand, love and Christian obligation to one’s neighbor are emphasized. As such, the characteristics of Luther’s theology (biblical, christological, dialectical, paradoxical, pastoral, and the like) are revealed.

Lessons from Baptist History

E. Glenn HINSON

This article draws lessons from the experience that Baptist went through in the course of their history. These are as follows: (1) Neglecting history is costly. (2) Basic principles such as freedom of faith are worth risking one’s life for. (3) Women deserve more recognition for their contributions to the Church than they have normally received. (4) The principle of voluntarism in religion is a key to the vitality of Christianity in the United States. (5) Baptist congregationalism has made them vulnerable to prevailing social pressures. (6) “Life’s interruptions often turn out to be God’s opportunities.”

Discussions on Contextualization and Evangelization in Modern Chinese Churches

LEUNG Ka Lun

This paper reviews discussions on the contextualization of Chinese churches in the last century. The writer argues that the task of evangelizing China that foreign missionaries and native pastors launched in the past could not be regarded as a failure. They have achieved significant successes in adapting the Christian faith to Chinese culture. There is no ground for asserting that insensitivity to contextualization was the main reason why China has not been successfully evangelized. People who bring this charge against the whole enterprise of evangelizing China in the past centuries usually have a political agenda to save Chinese culture as they perceive it.

A Perspective of Hong Kong Christian Churches Development in the Last Fifty Years

LEE Chee Kong

In the last fifty years, Christian churches in Hong Kong have undergone obvious changes and adaptations in order to catch up with the steps and needs of the rapidly evolving society. The churches gradually established their own hierarchies and systems that enable multi-functional developments. The developments of local churches in the second half of the twentieth century can be divided into four major periods. In each period of time, the churches had a particular concern which reflects the needs of the society of Hong Kong at that moment.

1. Physical Concern — period for refugees relief (1950-1960);
2. Intellectual Concern — period for establishing educational systems (1961-1975);
3. Spiritual Concern — period for theological education (1976-1983);
4. Holistic Concern — period for setting up multi-functional developments (1984-2000)

These four major concerns reflect how the churches reacted to the social needs of different times and the allocation of resources to support the society. On the other hand, Hong Kong churches never gave up their duties of evangelistic out-reach and offering people holistic salvation.

Since the 1950s, the society of Hong Kong has faced different kinds of problems; the government itself has its own barriers on implementing policies and has created various obstacles. Local churches found themselves with the role of providing services to fulfill social needs in different situations. The churches provided services based on physical, intellectual, spiritual and holistic concerns to individual members of the society. It reflected how the churches firmly followed biblical teachings.

Fifty years ago, the local churches were still suffering from serious shortage of resources and were dependent on support from overseas Christian bodies. Now, most churches are not only self-sustained, but are also able to carry out worldwide missionary works. It also witnesses to the fact that God’s blessing has come to this place.