Francis August Schaeffer (1912 - 1984)

Born 30 Jan 1912 in Germantown, Pennsylvania, United States

Died 15 May 1984 at age 72 in Rochester, Olmsted, Minnesota, United States

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Biography

Francis Schaeffer was a Christian apologist and, with his wife Edith, the founder of L'Abri in Switzerland, a place where people could find answers to their questions about God and the Christian faith. "At the heart of all of Schaeffer’s teaching was his basic conviction about the unchanging truth of God’s Word. This foundation led him to relate all that he taught to the creation, fall, and redemption framework of biblical teaching."^[1]

He was born in 1912 to Franz A. Schaeffer III and Bessie Williamson.^[2] He became a Christian at age 17 after reading the Bible for the first time.^[3] After graduating from college in 1935, he married Edith Seville, the daughter of missionary parents who had been with the China Inland Mission founded by Hudson Taylor. He went on to graduate from Faith Theological Seminary in 1938 and afterwards pastored several churches. ^[2]

Francis and Edith were the parents of: Priscilla (Sandri), Susan (Macaulay), Deborah (Middelmann) and Frank Schaeffer.^[4] In 1948 the family moved to Switzerland as missionaries.^[2]

In 1950 Schaeffer visited Karl Barth. "There he asked Barth, 'Did God create the world?' Barth answered, 'God created the world in the first century a.d.' Francis gestured out the window to the forested hillside and asked, 'This world?' Barth replied, 'This world does not matter.' This was a signal moment for Schaeffer, confirming that modern thought presumed that religious truth and material truth consisted of two separate realities. He spent the rest of his life dissenting from this view, insisting that 'Christianity speaks of true truth.'"^[5]

In 1955, Francis and Edith resigned as missionaries and opened their home to people seeking answers to their questions and practical demonstration of Christian care. ^[6] The ministry they founded was called L'Abri. Francis taught that Biblical Christianity is true, and that there is sufficient evidence to know it is true. Although in his autobiography "Crazy for God," son Frank accuses his father of keeping up a façade of conviction of his faith especially during his later years, biographer Colin Duriez says, "Francis Schaeffer was always open about his personal struggles and failings - this was the secret of his strength as a pastor and as a counselor. He emphatically did not divorce his inner and public life."^[7]

Francis developed cancer in the seventies and moved to Rochester, Minnesota near the Mayo Clinic for treatment.

He passed away in 1984 and was buried at Oakwood Cemetery, Rochester, Olmsted County, Minnesota. His Find a Grave memorial is here.

Books and Films

• The God Who Is There; Speaking Historic Christianity into the Twentieth Century. Downers Grove, IL. : Inter-varsity Press, 1968
• Escape From Reason.
• Death in the City. London, Intervarsity Press, 1969.
• Pollution and the Death of Man. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 1970.
• True Spirituality. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 1971.
• He is There and He Is Not Silent. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 1972.
• Genesis in Space and Time,
• No Final Conflict.
• Joshua and the Flow of Biblical History. Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1975.
• How Should We Then Live. Old Tappan, NJ : F. H. Revell Co., 1976.
• A Christian Manifesto. Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1981
• Back to Freedom and Dignity. Westchester, IL; Crossway Books, 1982.
• Who is for Peace. Nashville: Nelson, 1983.
• The Great Evangelical Disaster. Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1984.
• Letters of Francis A. Schaeffer. Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1985.
• The Church at the End of the Twentieth Century. Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1994.

Sources

1. ↑ Francis Schaeffer: The Man and HIs Message. Posted on "The Thistle," October 24, 2012 by Covenant Seminary
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2} Wikipedia contributors."Francis Schaeffer." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Accessed 22 Sept 2017.
3. ↑ 10 Things You Should Know about Francis Schaeffer
4. ↑ Schaeffer, Frank. Crazy for God. New York, Carroll & Graf, 2007.
5. ↑ Christianity Today. 3 March 1997
6. ↑ http://www.labri.org/history.html
7. ↑ [1]

• "Find A Grave Index," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVV6-WHZ3 : 13 December 2015), Francis August Schaeffer, 1984; Burial, Rochester, Olmsted, Minnesota, United States of America, Oakwood Cemetery; citing record ID 14504249, Find a Grave, http://www.findagrave.com.
• "Minnesota Death Index, 1908-2002," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:V44Z-SWB : 4 December 2014), Francis August Schaeffer, 15 May 1984; from "Minnesota Death Index, 1908-2002," database, Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com : 2001); citing Olmsted, Minnesota, record 2146108, certificate number 012641, Minnesota Department of Health, Minneapolis.
• "New York, New York Passenger and Crew Lists, 1909, 1925-1957," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2452-ZVX : 3 October 2015), Francis August Schaeffer, 1947; citing Immigration, New York City, New York, United States, NARA microfilm publication T715 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).
• "United States Census, 1930," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XH72-XCR : accessed 19 September 2017), Francis A Schaeffer in household of Francis A Schaeffer, Philadelphia (Districts 0501-0750), Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) ED 631, sheet 18A, line 12, family 279, NARA microfilm publication T626 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2002), roll 2105; FHL microfilm 2,341,839.
• "United States Census, 1940," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:KQNQ-TMX : accessed 19 September 2017), Francis A Schaeffer, Ward 2, Grove City, Grove City Borough, Mercer, Pennsylvania, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) 43-31, sheet 10A, line 21, family 204, Sixteenth Census of the United States, 1940, NARA digital publication T627. Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790 - 2007, RG 29. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2012, roll 3571.
• "United States, GenealogyBank Obituaries, 1980-2014," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVPG-FNDR : 13 September 2016), Reverend Francis A Schaeffer 4th, Pennsylvania, United States, 17 May 1984; from "Recent Newspaper Obituaries (1977 - Today)," database, GenealogyBank.com (http://www.genealogybank.com : 2014); citing Philadelphia Inquirer, The, born-digital text.

See also:

• [http://www.contra-mundum.org/cm/features/02_schaeffer.pdf Francis Schaeffer's Philosophy of History. William H. Burnside, Contra Mundum, No. 2, 1992
• "A Christian Manifesto"
• Who Then was Francis Schaeffer? Udo Middleman, President, Francis A. Schaeffer Foundation