Robert Charles Sproul (/sproʊl/SPROHL; February 13, 1939 – December 14, 2017) was an American Reformedtheologian, Christian apologist, and ordained pastor in the Presbyterian Church in America. He was the founder and chairman of Ligonier Ministries,[a] and could be heard daily on the Renewing Your Mind radio broadcast in the United States and internationally. Under Sproul's direction, Ligonier Ministries produced the Ligonier Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, which would eventually grow into the 1978 Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy. Along with Norman Geisler, Sproul was one of the chief architects of the statement.[4][5] Sproul has been described as "the greatest and most influential proponent of the recovery of Reformed theology in the last century."[6][7][8]
Education and personal life
Sproul was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, as the second child of Robert Cecil Sproul, an accountant and a veteran of World War II and his wife, Mayre Ann Sproul (née Yardis).[9][10] Sproul was an avid supporter of the Pittsburgh Steelers and Pittsburgh Pirates as a youth, and at the age of 15, he had to drop out from high school athletics in order to support his family.[10]
Having become a Christian in 1957, Sproul met with his childhood minister to share his conversion. During the meeting, the minister stated, "If you believe in the resurrection of Christ, you're a damn fool!" stunning Sproul, left wrestling with "feelings of betrayal."[11]
One of Sproul's mentors was John H. Gerstner, being one of his professors at Pittsburgh-Xenia Theological Seminary. The two of them, along with Arthur Lindsley, another of Gerstner's students, co-authored the book Classical Apologetics in 1984. Sproul's ministry, Ligonier Ministries, made recordings of Gerstner teaching various courses on theology and the Bible. John M. Frame records that Gerstner was Sproul's "main intellectual influence."[13]
Sproul recalls encountering theological opposition inside a liberal environment[b] during his early studies:
When I was a seminary student... I was selected to preach the senior sermon before the whole student body, the whole faculty, and also the presbytery who met there that day. And I preached that day on sin, and I made reference to some of the definitions of sin that we had learned at seminary: that sin, you know, was existential, inauthentic existence, or sin was some kind of neurosis... And I said, you know, we may be neurotic, and we may be doing everything that we know how to destroy what authenticity of existence we may have, but... the meaning of sin, as [Scripture and] our own confession says,[c] is that it's "any want of conformity to, or transgression of, the law of God."[14]... Well, the student body that was largely liberal... congratulated me, and they were very positive. I go make my way to the back of the church, and the dean of the institution comes up to me, and he's irate. [He physically threw me up against a wall and accused me of distorting the Bible.][15]... So I went straight upstairs to Dr. Gerstner's office, who was my mentor, and I said, Dr. Gerstner, did I distort the truth of God? [I was so upset, I was shaking.][16] And he looked at me, and he said,... "Every Christian in heaven from Paul to B. B. Warfield is rejoicing at the sermon that you preached in this house today."... I was so relieved to hear his evaluation.[17]
Gerstner convinced Sproul to study under G. C. Berkouwer at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (Free University of Amsterdam) in Holland, where he initiated study in 1964.[18] Sproul was granted leave in 1965 due to his wife's second pregnancy and mother's illness (during which he was appointed to teach philosophy at Westminster College), and later resumed study at distance. He returned to Holland in 1969 to receive a doctorandus degree.
He married Vesta Voorhis in 1960 and had two children, Sherrie Dorotiak and Robert Craig Sproul.[9]
Working alongside figures such as Bill Bright and Jim Boice, Sproul served as president of the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (ICBI) from 1977 till 1979.[20]
Sproul was an advocate of Calvinism in his many print, audio, and video publications, and advocated the Thomistic (classical) approaches to Christian apologetics, less common among Reformed apologists, most of whom prefer presuppositionalism.[citation needed] A dominant theme in his Renewing Your Mind lessons is the holiness and sovereignty of God. Sproul taught that headcovering should be practiced in churches as the ordinance is "rooted and grounded in creation".[24][25]
Sproul was a critic of postmodern philosophy. Having examined the effects of relativism on Western society, Sproul considered the 21st century to be "the most narcissistic generation in the history of the human race."[26]
In 1996, Sproul gave a lecture on irresistible grace, titled Divine Sovereignty and Man’s Helplessness. During a Q & A session, he misattributed to Jonathan Edwards an analogy regarding the "holy rape of the soul," claiming that "some people are violently offended by that language—I think it's the most graphic and descriptive term I can think of, to how I was redeemed," taking into consideration theological themes surrounding total depravity and being in a state of spiritual death prior to conversion.[d] With regard to the terminology "rape", a key topic in debate between Arminian and Reformed theologians is the hermeneutic employed to understand the meaning and strength of the verb "draws" (Greek helkysē) in John 6:44, where Jesus states, "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day."[27] Sproul first uses the analogy in his 1984 novel Johnny Come Home,[e] where Scooter, the main character, designed to be a "composite of John Guest, Jim Boice, and [himself],"[29] converts to Christianity in "a docile submission to the holy rape of the soul."[30][f] Sproul also uses the analogy in his 1989 teaching series A Shattered Image,[32] where discussing the Pelagian controversy, Sproul states that "the only way you will ever choose Christ is if God melts your heart, if God softens that stone cold recalcitrant heart, if God the Holy Spirit rapes your soul and puts in you a desire for Christ."[33] By 2002, Sproul had abandoned the analogy for a revised perspective:
The person that God, the Holy Spirit, draws to Jesus comes to Jesus, not because he's raped, not because he's coerced, not because he's dragged, kicking and screaming against his will, but because God, the Holy Spirit, in that act of effectual drawing, changes the heart of the person. Where that person previously was blind to the things of God, now the scales of the eyes have been removed, and that which was unpleasant to the soul now is shown to be sweet, attractive, and something that is altogether desirable. So the heavenly drawing of God is one by which God changes the attitude or the inner disposition of the soul of the person so that when the Father draws them to His Son, they come to His Son.[34]
At the 2008 Together for the Gospel biennial conference, Sproul gave a sermon titled The Curse Motif of the Atonement.[35] The sermon details the theological significance of the crucifixion of Jesus from an expository perspective. The sermon contains some content originally presented in his 1995 teaching series The Atonement of Jesus. Tim Challies, who attended the conference, recounts that "there is no doubt this was one of the most earnest, one of the most solemn sermons ever heard by that audience. I was there that day, I can tell you, there was a holy hush over that room as we were all forced to consider the sheer horror of what Jesus Christ endured on our behalf."[36]Kevin DeYoung praised it as "one of the best sermons I’ve ever heard."[37]
Health and death
On April 18, 2015, Sproul suffered a stroke and was admitted to a hospital.[38] Five days later, on April 23, Sproul went home from the hospital, suffering no ill effects. He was, however, diagnosed with a diabetic condition "that [would] be addressed through diet and regular medical attention."[38]
Sproul had long suffered from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease,[citation needed] and was hospitalized on December 2, 2017, because of difficulty breathing, the result of an apparent infection, an “exacerbation of his emphysema due to the flu” (“not pneumonia”).[39][better source needed] After a twelve-day period of intermittent fever, and sedation and ventilator-assisted breathing, with effort given to restore his respiratory function, Sproul died on December 14, 2017 (at age 78).[39][40][41]
Publications
Some of Sproul's best-known books are The Holiness of God, Essential Truths of the Christian Faith, and What Is Reformed Theology? He is also well known for Chosen by God, a book about predestination and the sovereignty of God.[42]
Through Ligonier Ministries and the Renewing Your Mind radio program and conferences, Sproul generated numerous audio and video lectures on the subjects of history of philosophy, theology, Bible study, apologetics, intelligent design, and Christian living. In addition, Sproul wrote more than 100 books and many articles for evangelical publications.[43] He signed the 1978 Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, which affirmed the traditional view of Biblical inerrancy, and he wrote a commentary on that document titled Explaining Inerrancy. He also served as the general editor[44] of the Reformation Study Bible (ISBN0-87552-643-8), which has appeared in several editions and was also known as the New Geneva Study Bible. In addition, Sproul was executive editor of Tabletalk magazine.[45]
Truths We Confess: A Layman's Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith Volume 3: The State, The Family, The Church, and Last Things (2007) ISBN978-1596380417
Truths We Confess: A Layman's Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith Volume 2: Salvation and the Christian Life (2007) ISBN9781596380400
Truths We Confess: A Layman's Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith Volume 1: The Triune God (2006) ISBN9781596380394
Following Christ (1991) ISBN978-0842359375 combination of previously published booklets titled: Who Is Jesus? (1983), Ethics and the Christian (1983), God's Will and the Christian (1984), and Effective Prayer (1984).
God's Inerrant Word: An International Symposium on the Trustworthiness of Scripture (1974) Contributor
The Intimate Marriage (1975 as Discovering the Intimate Marriage; revised 1986 and 2003) ISBN978-0875527086
If There's a God, Why Are There Atheists? (1974 as The Psychology of Atheism; revised 1988, 1997, and 2018) ISBN978-1527101050
What We Believe: Understanding and Confessing the Apostle's Creed (1973 as The Symbol: An Exposition of the Apostle's Creed; revised 1982 as Basic Training, 1998 as Renewing Your Mind, and 2015 as What We Believe) ISBN978-0801018473
^Ligonier Ministries is named for the Ligonier Valley just outside Pittsburgh, where the ministry started as a study center for college and seminary students, having been inspired by L'Abri.
^A recording of the lecture was released by Ligonier Ministries on cassette tape. On total depravity and spiritual death, see Romans 2:14–16, Romans 3:9–20, and Ephesians 2:1–10.
^This was later republished in 1988 as Thy Brother's Keeper.[28]
^This description was criticised in the foreword to Grace for All: The Arminian Dynamics of Salvation, edited by Clark H. Pinnock and John D. Wagner.[31]
^Taylor, Justin (December 14, 2017). "R. C. Sproul (1939–2017)". The Gospel Coalition. Archived from the original on July 21, 2024. Retrieved July 21, 2024.
^"Train Wreck". Ligonier Ministries. Retrieved September 26, 2024.
^Barth, Paul J. (July 15, 2019). "Head Coverings in Worship?". Purely Presbyterian. Retrieved April 10, 2022. R.C. Sproul writes, "The wearing of fabric head coverings in worship was universally the practice of Christian women until the twentieth century." Incidentally, I remember talking with my mother some years back, and she told me that when she went to church as a little girl, she and her sister wore hats to church. And she was not Presbyterian – that was the case across all American Christianity. "What happened?" Sproul asks, "Did we suddenly find some biblical truth to which the saints for thousands of years were blind? Or were our biblical views of women gradually eroded by the modern feminist movement that has infiltrated the Church of Jesus Christ which is 'the pillar and ground of the truth' (1 Tim. 3:15)?"
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