Believing
Sermons by Horton Davies
edited by John Booty and Marie-Hélène Davies
BELIEVING
Sermons by Horton Davies
Copyright © 2007 Marie-Hélène Davies. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf & Stock, 199 W. 8th Ave., Eugene, OR 97401.
ISBN 10: 1-55635-071-6
ISBN 13: 978-1-55635-071-9
EISBN 13: 978-1-4982-7610-8
Manufactured in the U.S.A.
acknowledgments
I want to thank Ted Lewis, from Wipf and Stock Publishers for agreeing readily to publish theological and doctrinal sermons from my late husband. I also want to express my gratitude to John Booty, the first graduate student of my husband in Princeton, who guided me as to the choice and order of the present sermons, wrote the major part of the introduction and is ready to assist me for another volume. He and his wife greeted me to their home and have been a moral as well as an intellectual support. And I thank Princeton University, without whose technology I would still be typing the sermon corpus as well as the Princeton Religion Department whose door has always been open and whose warmth has provided a steady support.
To all, Horton would have been grateful, yet not surprised for he knew their boundless compassion.
foreword
What a very rich career Horton Davies had! Born in Wales of devout parents in 1916, he graduated from Edinburgh University, served in London during the Blitz, worked for several years in South Africa during the dark days of apartheid, and then moved to a teaching post at Princeton University. That is the skeleton of a remarkable ministry which enabled him to produce 35 learned books on a variety of issues. Although I never had the privilege of meeting him, his death in 2004 came as a sadness to me, because his writings were so well known that it was as if I had lost a good friend.
What I especially valued in Professor Davies was the seamlessness of his faith and academic work. Such was his commitment to the Christian faith, that it was never for him a dull and boring subject for intellectual enquiry. His faith was real and he tackled every topic and task with passionate interest.
Passion, indeed, runs like a golden thread through this collection of addresses. As I read the sermons in draft form I found myself reflecting on the difference between a great deal of modern preaching and the focus and themes of Horton’s addresses. Listening these days, in retirement, to the preaching of others I confess with dismay that so many sermons lack theological and intellectual depth, so many preachers lack passion and—this is the most worrying part—so many addresses seem to spring from hasty preparation, lacking in reflection.
None of that will be found in this anthology. Here we find addresses that are well prepared and aimed at intelligent people. Horton acknowledges the doubts and difficulties of modern people and he seeks to speak to his fellow men and women in terms and in a language that they will understand. He drew upon a well-stocked mind and, from a vast knowledge of literature and the experience of life, was able to inform and entertain his listeners. Perhaps it was the influence of his skill as a teacher that led to such a fierce commitment to connecting with others. Whether this is so or not, it is impossible to read any one of his addresses without knowing what his intention was in preaching it. With rigor he attempted to draw his listeners to a decision.
Indeed, this stress on communication made his preaching ‘evangelical’ in the best way that noble word is understood. Not for him fundamentalism, because his love of learning and commitment to truth, did not allow him to submit to superficial conclusions. However, neither was he a vague liberal to whom all forms of knowledge are provisional. He believed, and believed passionately; and such believing in the truth of the Christian faith was nourished by scholarship and by a life-long faith in his Lord. He called people to personal commitment.
Is such preaching dated these days? Preaching that is relevant has to be localised and contemporary. From that perspective Horton’s preaching has to be read in the light of his time, just as we have to read Augustine’s sermons in the same way. But that does not mean that great sermons are dated, if, by that, we mean that they are no longer meaningful for our time. Horton’s addresses have much to contribute to our thinking today. I am convinced that our contemporaries will respond positively to carefully crafted addresses, honed by deep knowledge of the faith and reason.
Horton Davies, who died in 2004 at the great age of 88, stands in a great tradition of eminent Welsh preachers who have graced the pulpit. This anthology is a not only a tribute to a great teacher but also a vivid example of a great one at work.
George Carey
Lord Carey of Clifton
103rd Archbishop of Canterbury, 1991–2002
introduction
Background
Horton Davies was Putnam Professor of Religion at Princeton University where his teaching was focused on the history and liturgics of Christianity. It was in relation to his interest in and knowledge of the Western church that he considered the art of preaching. Beginning with his Oxford University doctoral dissertation, “The Worship of the English Puritans,” published in 1948, Davies demonstrated his acute understanding of the Free Church tradition of Christian worship in England, especially at its beginnings in the 16th and 17th centuries. Chapter 12 considers Puritan preaching as central to the tradition. He wrote:
The importance of preaching consisted in the fact that it was the declaration by the preacher of the revelation of God, confirmed in the hearts of the believers by the interior testimony of the Holy Spirit. (Page 182)
This declaration was rooted in a theological base which included the awareness of “the great abyss that separated God from man.” It was of infinite importance that “God should cross that abyss and speak to the Christian through the sermon,” rather than that the Christian “should traverse it in prayer or praise” (Page 183).
For the 16th century Reform Theologians, such as Peter Martyr Vermigli, the sacraments were the “invisible words of God,” serving in dramatic form, as it were, but for many the preaching of the Word of God was preeminent, not in place of the sacraments but as with ingredients of the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
Nevertheless the Puritan emphasis was on the sermon and the preacher. Davies wrote: “The preacher was the man of God, the prophet, who declared to the congregation the ‘mystery’ of the Gospel, unfolding the whole plan of salvation, under compulsion to bring men to the parting of the ways that lead to salvation or damnation” (Page 185). For the Puritan “the exposition and discussion of the Scripture” was “the outstanding feature of their worship” (Page 190).
Beyond and beneath Davies’s study of Puritan worship is the Free Church tradition, with its influence on his understanding of preaching, was the example of his father, the Reverend David Dorian Marlais Davies, who for more than fifty years served congregations
