Knox Presbyterian Church, Toronto, is one
of Canada's best-known congregations, and Christians from various
denominations, in the city and further afield, give thanks to God for its
evangelical life and ministry. This year the congregation celebrates the
one hundred and seventy-fifth anniversary of its founding. Not many
organizations in our country celebrate a centennial, let alone are well on
the way to mark the second century. So historically Knox is in a rare
league.
We have much for which to give thanks to God in the foundations of Knox.
In 1820 the Church of Scotland, which included most Scottish
Presbyterians, was just beginning to emerge from what has been known as
'the reign of Moderatism,' in which a cold religion of moralistic
self-effort had in many parishes largely taken the place of the gospel of
God's saving grace in Jesus Christ.
But
in the person of the Rev. James Harris, Knox's first minister, we had a
representative of the Seceders, who had left the Church of Scotland in the
preceding century under the leadership of the Erskine brothers in protest
against the declining standards of faith and life. Mr. Harris was also an
Irishman, which reminds us that early Toronto was a multicultural place,
more like today than all the intervening generations. The great Scottish
migration to Ontario was not to begin until well into the 1820s, and then
would run throughout the rest of the nineteenth century and into the
twentieth, so shaping Knox that some claim to Scottish ancestry would
become almost a prerequisite of acceptance. But it was not so in the
beginning, and the best example of this is Jesse Ketchum, Harris'
father-in-law, exceedingly generous benefactor of Knox, and one of the
greatest philanthropists that Toronto has ever known. Ketchum was an
American and a Methodist, but found his spiritual home in Knox.
By the late 1820s and early 1830s the Evangelicals were beginning to
replace the Moderates as the dominant and most dynamic section of the
Church of Scotland, and among the increasing number of immigrants to
Toronto were many who had thus been brought into a living relationship
with Jesus Christ. They usually attended St. Andrew's on King Street, the
second Presbyterian congregation in the city, and which was in connection
with the Church of Scotland. But when the struggle in Scotland between
Moderates and Evangelicals reached its climax in the formation of the Free
Church in Scotland in 1843, (frequently referred to as the Great
Disruption), there were many Presbyterians in Toronto and throughout
British North America who wished to identify themselves with this
movement. Included was the congregation of Knox, with a large minority
from St. Andrew's. They immediately set about planning
a new building on the Knox lot at Queen and
Yonge, and set about calling a new minister. Knox has been blessed in
having many of its ministers with the gift of leadership, but none more
than Robert Burns who was inducted in 1845.
Burns
was a theological heavy-weight who taught at the newly-founded
Knox College while also
pastoring the congregation. He was in addition a man of missionary vision.
For many years in Scotland he had served as the secretary of the Glasgow
Colonial Society which sought to send Evangelical ministers to the
colonies. When he came to Toronto he roamed not only Canada West, as
Ontario was then called, but the Maritimes as well. With his vision,
energy and entrepreneurial skill he established many new Free Church
congregations, several of which still bear his name, helping the
denomination to achieve remarkable church growth. Burns naturally drew
around himself many able Christians, none more prominent than the father
and son team of journalist, Peter and George Brown. They established a
paper to support the Free Church known as the Banner, which would
eventually become the Record, the precursor of today's periodical
of the same name. They also founded the Globe newspaper, making
it the voice of much of Ontario on political, economic, social and moral
issues, one of the results being that George became a leading Father of
Confederation.
Burns'
successor was the equally Scottish Alexander Topp who was called from
Edinburgh in 1858 after Knox had experienced one of its not infrequent
lengthy vacancies. Not the heroic pioneer leader that was Burns, he was a
leader nonetheless. Under his gentler but firm and solid leadership Knox
grew, while he became a key denominational figure, being convener of the
union committee for the Free Church which resulted in the pan-Presbyterian
union of 1875. Just prior to his retirement in 1879 he had a hand in
organizing the overseas missionary work of the denomination, whose first
missionary was the Rev. George Leslie Mackay of Taiwan, grandfather of
Anna, Isabel and Margaret, all active in Knox for so many years.
Knox was surely guided in the choice of its next minister, who would serve
from 1880 to 1900.
Henry
Martyn Parsons did not fit the mold, as an American pastoring a
Presbyterian congregation in Buffalo. But he was exactly what Knox needed.
A big man in every way, he had to set the pattern of how Knox would
respond to the theological shift that would begin to take place in
worldwide Protestantism during the 1880s and '90s. This new approach would
seek to keep Jesus Christ central, but it would argue that the Bible did
not give us abiding statements about God and his salvation, but rather it
contained insights into God's activity which might well change as newer
and supposedly richer understanding would come about. This was a confusing
period for many, since how could those who sought to honor Christ be
moving in an unhelpful direction. Parsons was not confused. He saw the
need of Bible preaching in the congregation, and his work became a model
for many others. He sat on the Board of Knox College where he let his
desires and concerns be known. He also was one of the key figures in the
founding of Toronto (now Ontario) Bible College, which he saw as a centre
of basic biblical orthodoxy. So he linked commitment to the denominational
with involvement in and exposure to the parachurch. His ministry at Knox
coincided with the burgeoning period of Canadian overseas missions and he
was thoroughly involved. He had a major part in Jonathan Goforth
(click for sermon audio by Kevin Livingston), perhaps
the greatest of all Canadian missionaries, going with his wife to China
under the Presbyterian Board, where their ministry of evangelism and
revival was without parallel. Parsons was also deeply involved in bringing
the China Inland Mission (now OMF) to Toronto, and thus also aligning Knox
with the new transdenominational 'faith' missions. He was a prominent
speaker at the Bible and Prophetic conferences which were springing up
throughout North America, particularly in the one at Niagara-on-the-Lake,
and where many discovered a new depth and richness in Scripture. He also
nurtured a body of laymen in Knox who gave much leadership in the
transdenominational home mission world which was appearing in Toronto in
the 1890s and which was represented by the Yonge St. Mission, the Toronto
City Mission and a host of other evangelistic and compassionate
organizations.
The next minister was
A.
B. Winchester, who served from 1901 to 1920, and who united the
characteristics of the Scots who had preceded him with the emphases of
Parsons. A native of Aberdeen, he had hoped to go to China with Hudson
Taylor and the CIM, but he was turned down for health reasons. A period of
service at the Chinese Presbyterian Church in Victoria prepared him for
Toronto. In a day when orthodox theological conviction and spiritual life
were declining together, Winchester was a glorious exception. I once
remember Herbert Powell, a long-time elder of Knox, telling me that when
Winchester got into the pulpit, opened his Bible and began to preach, it
was as if heaven was opened. How blest Knox has been, in darkening days,
to have had such ministry. Winchester not only exalted Christ in his
preaching ministry at home, but was well known as a Bible teacher across
North America. He also had some remarkable people around him, such as John
McNicol, long-term principal of Toronto Bible College, who served as both
elder and assistant, and Sir Mortimer Clark, leading Toronto lawyer,
Lieutenant-Governor of the Province, clerk of Session, Chairman of the
Board of Knox College and President of the Bible League, which sought to
keep before the Christian community the need and reasons for believing in
a fully inspired Bible. A pleasant memory is the day when Charles Hargrave,
senior elder of Knox for many years, and a pressman at the Toronto
Star, whose daughters Ruth and Lillian are actively with us, told me
how Sir Mortimer had recruited him to assist in the Sunday morning gospel
service at the General Hospital, a ministry which Mr. Hargrave was to
continue for decades. And it was during the Winchester ministry that
our present building was erected on Spadina
Avenue.
Following Winchester was another Scot,
J.
G. Inkster, 1921-1939, who had been ministering in Canada for some years.
He sought to maintain all the strands developed by his predecessors, and
like Alexander Topp was heavily involved in denominational affairs. He
took a lead in seeking to resist the movement for Church Union which would
form the United Church of Canada in 1925, believing that such a position
was a reaffirmation of orthodox and evangelical truth. Appropriately, the
first action of the Continuing Presbyterians, as they were frequently
called, was a prayer meeting conducted by Inkster at Knox on the night of
June 10. 1925. The numbers at Knox grew remarkably during his ministry,
and in spite of his assiduous pastoral visitation and denominational
involvement he also gave time to many other Christian ministries, being
remembered, for example, as the primary author of the fine Statement of
Faith of the Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship.
The Scottish contingent continued with the induction of the very youthful
T.
Christie Innis in 1939, when he had not yet reached his thirtieth
birthday. He was greatly interested in ministry to students, but his
interest in literature ministry led him to the USA in 1944. Knox might
have had a Canadian minister, since it extended a call to Charles Ferguson
Ball, minister of Bethany Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, often called
the Wanamaker Church after the great Christian department store owner.
Ball had grown up in Winnipeg, was married to a daughter of John
Bellingham, the beloved superintendent of Elim Chapel in that city, and
his parents had moved west from Stratford, Ontario. However, he turned
down the call. Another lengthy vacancy occurred before
Robert
Barr arrived from South Africa who would serve for only six years. A
gentle and poetic soul, who radiated the personal knowledge of Christ, he
was responsible for bringing to Knox some of the outstanding British
preachers of the post-war world and for launching the outreach of radio
ministry.
After another long vacancy
William
Fitch arrived from Scotland in 1955, fresh from the leadership of the
committee of the Billy Graham crusade in Glasgow's Kelvin Hall. In many
ways he was a new Robert Burns, so like his fellow Scot from the Glasgow
area who had arrived 110 years before. He was a great preacher, whose
expositions gave positive evidence of his doctorate in biblical studies.
In his evangelistic zeal he sought to reach the students of the University
for Christ. He sought to follow the model of British ministers such as
John Stott in London, who made a church alongside a university into a
student centre, without in any way neglecting the rest of the
congregation. He also continued the stress on missions and most of the
Knox missionaries whose pictures are on the north wall of the Winchester
Room went out under his ministry. In the later years of his ministry Fitch
was far from well, and retired in early 1972.
Into this situation in 1974 came a new minister,
J.
Glyn Owen. A Welshman who had ministered in Ireland and England, his
preaching ministry attracted many young people who had come to Christ in
the counter-culture Jesus Movement, and who were longing for solid
biblical teaching. The multiculturalism of early Knox once again began to
be very much in evidence. Owen was greatly appreciated as a pastoral
counselor, while his loyal associate George Lowe went graciously in and
out among the congregation, and in a special long-range way became pastor
to the missionaries. Upon Owen's retirement in the mid-1980s there was an
extended vacancy, after which
Mariano
Di Gangi was called. American born and trained, he had ministered in
Canada with great effectiveness at St. Enoch Church, Hamilton, during the
1950s, where his leadership of the Board of Evangelism and Social Action
of the Presbyterian Church in Canada caused him to be appreciated in many
sections of the denomination. After a period at Tenth Presbyterian,
Philadelphia, he was Canadian Director of the Bible and Medical Missionary
Fellowship. All of this expertise and experience he brought to Knox, until
ill health caused him to retire in 1992. After a three year vacancy
Dr.
John Vissers was inducted in 1995. The first Canadian-born minister of
Knox in 175 years, he brought many of the qualities that have
characterized ministers of Knox. He is theologically knowledgeable, having
a doctorate in the field, and a deep commitment to orthodox, evangelical
faith. He is a leader, and although young, is perhaps more respected by
evangelicals in the Presbyterian Church than any other individual. He is
concerned about the students and young people at our door. He is committed
to the denomination and is concerned about its renewal. His task is to
lead Knox into culturally relevant and spiritually powerful ministry as we
move toward the next century.
addendum -- In the summer of 1999, Dr. John Vissers accepted the
call as principal of the
Presbyterian
College in Montreal. The service of induction for our current senior
minister, Dr. J. Kevin Livingston, was held on June 25, 2000. Click
here for more info on Rev Kev...
Etching of Knox Church Spadina by artist
Owen Staples, 1866-1949
