J. I. Packer and the Evangelical Future

D. Bruce Hindmarsh describes Packer’s habit of retrieving riches from the past for the purpose of renewing the present as “the Robin Hood character of [his] public ministry.” Following the example of C. S. Lewis, who made an impression upon Packer during his days as a student at Oxford, this “retrieval and renewal” model rejects chronological snobbery in favor of timeless wisdom. Thus, during the same years that Catholic ressourcement theologians were digging into their past, Packer began raiding the castles of seventeenth-century Puritans, redistributing their riches to the impoverished masses of evangelicals. The wealth of Packer’s redistribution is fully on display in an appendix containing a comprehensive bibliography of his written works, beginning in July of 1952.
Reformed Theology. The doctrines of grace are central to Packer’s mind, beginning with his exegetical method, which is particularly sensitive to covenantal impulses in the canon. Accordingly, in Packer’s view, “the Old Testament should be read through the hermeneutical spectacles that Paul (Romans and Galatians), Luke (Gospel and Acts), Matthew, and the writer to the Hebrews provide.” Read the rest HERE