Southern Baptist Hero

957 Words2 Pages

On January 22, 1913, Carl F. H. Henry was born to immigrant parents in New York City. His parents, Karl and Joanna Heinrich, were young German immigrants to the United States. His parents changed the family name because of the anti-German sentiment produced by World War I.

Carl Henry was the oldest of eight children. The Henry family lived a typical immigrant family life with hard-working parents but little luxuries. Carl took many part-time jobs to supplement the family’s income. Carl’s mother was Roman Catholic by family tradition and his father a Lutheran: however, there was little evidence of religion in the Henry household.

Carl Henry’s early educational experiences were received in the public school system. It was evident as a high school student that Carl was destined for a career in journalism. Henry graduated in the midst of the Great Depression and quickly became a working reporter. Early reports were seen in the New York Herald Tribune and the New York Daily News. He later became editor of The Smithtown Star, a weekly paper on Long Island, and covered a large section of Long Island for The New York Times.

It was through his newspaper experience that Henry was put into contact with a devout Christian woman, Mildred Christy. Henry used Christ’s name as a curse word and Mildred responded, “Carl, I'd rather you slap my face than take the name of my best Friend in vain." At the age of twenty, Carl Henry was confronted with the gospel and became a believer.

In 1935, after receiving a call to Christian service, Henry left his newspaper career and enrolled in Wheaton College. It was here that he formed friendships with individuals such as Billy Graham and Harold Lindsell. More importantly, however, was his intr...

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...rd of God. He concentrated strongly on revelation, God, and religious authority. In regard to revelation, Henry defined Jesus as “the personal incarnation of God in the flesh,” the climax of revelation, in whom “the source and content of revelation converge and coincide.”

In 1999, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary established the Carl F. H. Henry Institute for Evangelical Engagement. The Center is designed to serve as a think-tank for evangelical engagement with the pressing issues of the day.

E. G. Homrighausen of Princeton Theological Seminary stands, perhaps, as the voice of the Christian world in regards to the life of Carl Henry. He stated, “Henry has championed evangelical Christianity with clarity of language, comprehensiveness of scholarship, clarity of mind, and vigor of spirit.” Baptists and their fellow evangelicals stand in his debt.

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