Arno C. Gaebelein

Arno Clemens Gaebelein (August 27, 1861 – December, 1945) was a Methodist minister in the United States. He was a prominent teacher and conference speaker. He was also the father of educator and philosopher of Christian education Frank E. Gaebelein.

Arno C. Gaebelein.

Career

Being a dispensationalist, he was a developer of the movement in its early days. Two of his books, Revelation, an Analysis and Exposition and Current Events in the Light of the Bible explain the dispensationalist view of eschatology.

Gaebelein did not support the Christian Zionists in their alliance with the Zionist Organisation. In a 1905 speech, he stated:

Zionism is not the divinely promised restoration of Israel... Zionism is not the fulfillment of the large number of predictions found in the Old Testament Scriptures, which relates to Israel's return to the land. Indeed, Zionism has very little use of argument from the Word of God. It is rather a political and philanthropic undertaking. Instead of coming together before God, calling upon His name, trusting Him, that He is able to perform what He has so often promised, they speak about their riches, their influence, their Colonial Bank, and court the favor of the Sultan. The great movement is one of unbelief and confidence in themselves instead of God's eternal purposes.[1]

In 1899, Gaebelein left the Methodist Episcopal Church because of its theological liberalism.[2] George Marsden notes that he was one of the early fundamentalist leaders to advocate ecclesiastical separation.[3]

Gaebelein was an advocate of gap creationism.[4] He also was the editor of Our Hope, a Christian periodical, for a number of years, and was a close assistant to Dr. C. I. Scofield on his monumental work, the Scofield Reference Bible.

The Principles of the Hope of Israel Moment

In the Nov-Dec 1896 issue of "Our Hope" one of the best statements of Hebrew Christians (Messianic Jews) was written under the heading, The Principles of the Hope of Israel Moment.

"The Hope of Israel Movement aims to bring the fullness of the gospel of Jesus Christ to His brethren according to the flesh. We hold that Scriptural – not Talmudic or Rabbinical, still less Reformed – Judaism is as much as divine revelation as Christianity. The canon of the New Testament has no higher Divine authority than has that of the Old. Neither is complete without the other. Salvation is from the Jews, John iv:22. And the gospel is “to the Jew first,” Rom. i:18. The Jew is not a Gentile. The term “proselyte,” therefore, can never apply to the Jew. The promises of God are Israel’s Rom. ix:4, 5. Gentile believers are the real “proselytes,” once far off, now made nigh, Eph. Ii:12, 13. The root of God’s good olive tree, Israel, bears us; not we the root, Rom. xi:17, 18. To “proselyte” the Jew, then, is to ignore and to reverse the Divine order.

The Jew has no need whatever of the organizations or instutitions of historical (i.e. Gentile and denominational) Christianity. All he needs is personal, saving faith in his own Jewish Messiah, the Christ of God, nothing more. And all that was Divinely given him through Moses he has full liberty to retain and uphold as far as possible when he becomes a believer in Jesus Christ. This to us clearly follows from these Scriptual considerations: 1. Abraham – the Divine pattern of the true Jew, as well as of the believing Gentile, Rom. iv:11, 12 – received circumcision as an everlasting covenant after he had believed God unto ustification, Gen. xvii:9-14. God Himself added circumcision to Abraham’s faith. And thus Paul writes: “Is any man called being circumcised? Let him not become uncircumcised,” I Cor. Vii:18. This was the ruling of the apostle to the Gentiles in all the churches. (Compare Ezek. xliv:7, 9) 2. The natural seed of Jacob shall not cease to be a nation before the Lord forever, Jerem. xxx:11, xxxi:35, 37; xlvi:28; Rom. xi:1, 29. This is God’s eternal purpose and the secret of Israel’s preservation. Even so at this present times – through the gospel – a remnant of the nation is being saved, according to the election of grace, Rom. xi:5. These saved Jews, to be a true remnant, should not surrender any of the Divinely appointed marks of the nation Israel. They should not be taught to un-Jew themselves. 3. The Lord Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God. (Israel’s national election). Rom. xv:8. He came not to destroy, but to fulfill, the law. Jewish disciples of Christ, by the word of the Lord Himself, should not be taught to break or disregard one of these least commandments, Matt. v:17, 19. They should walk and live even as He lived among His own people, i.e. as true, conforming Jews (barring, of course, mere traditions of the elders and the commandments of men), 1 John ii:6. 4. On and from the day of Pentecost myriads of Jewish believers were by the Holy Spirit baptized into fellowship with the glorified Christ. He did not cause or direct either the apostles or other Jewish believers to “forsake Moses.” Apostolic teaching and practice throughout the New Testament only show Jewish Christians “walking orderly and keeping the law.” Acts ii:46, 47; iii:1; vi:7; x:9; (chap. Xv:28, 29 by implication, clearly makes observance of all the laws and ordinances of Moses for Jewish believers a matter pleasing to the Holy Ghost); xvi:3; xviii:18; xx:16; xxi:17-26; xxiii:1; xxv:8.

5. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is also Son of Abraham and the Son of David. He is at once Head over all things to the church (built up of Jews and Gentiles), and the rightful and coming heir of David’s throne, which He will restore and occupy at His return from heaven, Luke i:32, 33; Acts xv:16; iii:21. Jesus has not surrendered or forfeited His distinctive claim to the throne of His (Jewish) ancestor, David, by ascending on high and becoming the glorified Head of His body, the church. No more should Jewish believers in Christ, being living members of His body, be made or taught to surrender anything which is Divinely ordered and appointed for Israel as God’s and Christ’s age-lasting and peculiar people."

Works
  • Revelation, and Analysis and Exposition
  • Current Events in the Light of the Bible
  • The Annotated Bible, a commentary on the Old and New Testaments which Gaebelein described as a 'Bible study course'.[5]
  • The Harmony of the Prophetic Word, a key to old testament prophecy concerning things to come. (1903)
  • The Prophet Daniel (1911)
  • The Jewish Question (1912)
  • Christ and Glory (1918)
  • The Healing Question (1925)
  • The Christ We Know (1927)
  • The Conflict of the Ages: The Mystery of Lawlessness: Its Origin, Historic Development and Coming Defeat (1933)
  • The History of the Scofield Reference Bible (1943)
  • The Prophet Ezekiel: an analytical Exposition (1972)
  • Meat In Due Season (nd)

References
  1. Merkley, Paul Charles, The politics of Christian Zionism, 1891–1948.
  2. Pierard, Richard V. (1999). "Gaebelein, A(rno) C(lemens)". Biographical Dictionary of Christian Missions. Eerdmans. p. 233. Retrieved 13 December 2015.
  3. Marsden, George M. (2006). Fundamentalism and American Culture. Oxford University Press. p. 127. Retrieved 13 December 2015.
  4. McIver, Thomas Allen. (1989). Creationism: Intellectual Origins, Cultural Context, and Theoretical Diversity. University of California, Los Angeles.
  5. Gaebelein's Annotated Bible on Genesis 1, accessed 19 December 2015
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