Presenting: The Gospel Preached by the Apostles: New edition of Elhanan Winchester's discourse on particular and general redemption and salvation
I'm happy to present a new edition of Elhanan Winchester's discourse on particular and general redemption and salvation.
The book is available at Amazon here for only $10.
My foreword to the book:
Elhanan Winchester (1751-1797) was an American Baptist preacher and a founder of the Society of Universal Baptists and the United States General Convention of Universalists.
Winchester lived in a time where philosophical and theological rationalism questioned classical trinitarian orthodoxy. Against rationalism Winchester defended the traditional belief in the divinity of Jesus and his resurrection. Moreover, Winchester’s biblical studies led him to embrace the doctrine of the final restoration or “apokatastasis” of all things – a doctrine that was originally defended by Church fathers such as Origen and Gregory of Nyssa, but was now enjoying prominence in continental radical pietism as well as parts of English theology.
Drawing on Georg Klein-Nicolai’s book The Everlasting Gospel in particular, Winchester saw the belief in universal reconciliation as reconciling the major conflicting opinions on divine and human freedom, and the extent of the atonement. Believing that Jesus died for all human beings, Winchester simultaneously affirmed, that all for whom Jesus died will eventually be saved. In many of his sermons Winchester argues that both Calvinism and Arminianism are only partly right – but put together they form the complete gospel of universal reconciliation.
The Gospel Preached by The Apostles is a discourse originally presented at the Chapel in Glass-House Yard in London in 1788. The full title was The Gospel Preached by the Apostles and Especially St. Paul Being a Discourse, Chiefly Drawn From His Writings, Proving That This great Apostle held, and taught, both Particular and General Redemption and Salvation. As indicated by the title, Winchester’s main point in the discourse, was to prove that Paul taught a doctrine of particular as well as general atonement and redemption: Christ died for the elect in particular, but for all in general.
Winchester, dealing with the most important passages in the letters of Paul and John, shows that the atonement has a universal scope. Christ has died in order to reconcile all things to God, but this reconciliation begins in the elect as the first fruits. God has chosen a peculiar people, says Winchester, that through their means, others may be brought to the knowledge and obedience of the truth.
In this way Winchester reinterprets the doctrines of election and predestination in a missional framework. The elect are not chosen at the expense of others, but for the sake of others. Election and predestination does not preclude universal salvation, but gives universal salvation its historical dynamics, so to speak.
It is, perhaps, especially this part of Winchester’s discourse that is still relevant today. Soteriological universalism should not lead to missional indifference. On the contrary, it is exactly because Christ is the savior of all, that the Church has been given the task of proclaiming the gospel for all. Winchester’s work is republished here with the hope that it can be inspirational in this task.
The book is available at Amazon here for only $10.
My foreword to the book:
Elhanan Winchester (1751-1797) was an American Baptist preacher and a founder of the Society of Universal Baptists and the United States General Convention of Universalists.
Winchester lived in a time where philosophical and theological rationalism questioned classical trinitarian orthodoxy. Against rationalism Winchester defended the traditional belief in the divinity of Jesus and his resurrection. Moreover, Winchester’s biblical studies led him to embrace the doctrine of the final restoration or “apokatastasis” of all things – a doctrine that was originally defended by Church fathers such as Origen and Gregory of Nyssa, but was now enjoying prominence in continental radical pietism as well as parts of English theology.
Drawing on Georg Klein-Nicolai’s book The Everlasting Gospel in particular, Winchester saw the belief in universal reconciliation as reconciling the major conflicting opinions on divine and human freedom, and the extent of the atonement. Believing that Jesus died for all human beings, Winchester simultaneously affirmed, that all for whom Jesus died will eventually be saved. In many of his sermons Winchester argues that both Calvinism and Arminianism are only partly right – but put together they form the complete gospel of universal reconciliation.
The Gospel Preached by The Apostles is a discourse originally presented at the Chapel in Glass-House Yard in London in 1788. The full title was The Gospel Preached by the Apostles and Especially St. Paul Being a Discourse, Chiefly Drawn From His Writings, Proving That This great Apostle held, and taught, both Particular and General Redemption and Salvation. As indicated by the title, Winchester’s main point in the discourse, was to prove that Paul taught a doctrine of particular as well as general atonement and redemption: Christ died for the elect in particular, but for all in general.
Winchester, dealing with the most important passages in the letters of Paul and John, shows that the atonement has a universal scope. Christ has died in order to reconcile all things to God, but this reconciliation begins in the elect as the first fruits. God has chosen a peculiar people, says Winchester, that through their means, others may be brought to the knowledge and obedience of the truth.
In this way Winchester reinterprets the doctrines of election and predestination in a missional framework. The elect are not chosen at the expense of others, but for the sake of others. Election and predestination does not preclude universal salvation, but gives universal salvation its historical dynamics, so to speak.
It is, perhaps, especially this part of Winchester’s discourse that is still relevant today. Soteriological universalism should not lead to missional indifference. On the contrary, it is exactly because Christ is the savior of all, that the Church has been given the task of proclaiming the gospel for all. Winchester’s work is republished here with the hope that it can be inspirational in this task.
