JAMES HALL BROOKES

by Timothy Demy

 

 

Life and Ministry

 

From James Brookes's (1837–1897) Presby-terian pulpit in St. Louis, his participation in the annual Niagara Bible Conference, and his prolific pen which produced religious best-sellers, he became an early and nationally recognized proponent of dispensational premillennialism in the United States.  He was born in Pulaski, Tennessee, the son of a Presbyterian minister.  His father died of cholera when he was still a child, and he was raised by his mother.  After attending Stephenson Academy in Ashewood, Tennessee and working as a country schoolmaster, he matriculated as a junior into Miami University in Oxford, Ohio in 1851.  Upon graduation in 1853, he entered Princeton Theological Seminary.  His studies lasted less than a year due to an unexpected call to serve as pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Dayton, Ohio.  He was ordained by the presbytery in Oxford on April 20, 1854, and twelve days later married Susan Oliver, with whom he had fallen in love during his college years.

 

An extremely popular preacher and pastor, he received a call in February 1858 to pastor the Second Presbyterian Church in St. Louis and six years later accepted a call to the Sixteenth and Walnut Street Church (later the Washington and Compton Avenue Presbyterian Church). He remained pastor of this church until entering an emeritus status in 1894. Brookes served as commissioner to the General Assembly in 1857, 1880, and 1893, and was stated clerk of the Missouri Synod in 1874.

 

It was largely through his writings and conference ministry that Brookes gained national recognition. In the early 1870s he published Maranatha, a massive volume on eschatology that was to become one of his most popular works.  In 1875, he began to edit a monthly periodical called The Truth or Testimony for Christ, which became a widely circulated and influential premillennial publication.  He was a regular speaker at Bible conferences, YMCA meetings, and prophecy conferences, and in 1875 was one of the founders and president of an annual conference that eventually became known as the Niagara Bible Conference.

 

Throughout his life Brookes was an influential leader, pastor, and Bible teacher.  Through his efforts, premillennialism and dispensationalism were widely disseminated across denominational boundaries within conservative Protestantism.  His most visible disciple was C. I. Scofield, later editor of the Scofield Reference Bible, to whom Brookes introduced dispensationalism and through whom he had his greatest influence.  Brookes died on Easter morning, April 18, 1897, leaving a written and pastoral legacy of compassion, dedication, and proclamation.

 

Eschatology

 

Brookes was one of the first prominent ministers in the United States to teach the pretribulational rapture. One of the most significant and fervent students of prophecy of his era, he can rightly be considered the father of American pretribulationism.  In an 1896 article in The Truth, "How I Became a Premillennialist,” Brookes claimed that he came to his premillennial eschatology through his own reading and study of Revelation and Daniel after entering the pastorate and after many years of the neglect of prophecy.  This independent study, along with some influence in the years after the Civil War from Plymouth Brethren, provided the historical background for his beliefs.  Brookes denied that he was the direct recipient of Plymouth Brethren eschatology, although he did acknowledge an appreciation of their eschatological enthusiasm. As early as 1871, Brookes was publishing and teaching views similar to dispensationalism.   By 1874 his system was well developed.

 

Well versed in the eschatological options within premillennialism, Brookes argued against both a partial rapture theory and posttribulationism.  He refused to set dates for the Rapture and held to a strong doctrine of the Lord's return and imminence.  He was very much aware of the charge by uninformed critics that dispensationalists taught more than one way of salvation and adamantly rebutted it in writing.  "It is needless to remind any ordinary reader of the sacred Scriptures that from the opening verses of Genesis, down to Malachi, the Spirit is brought into view in creation, providence, and redemption, and that all who are saved were quickened into life through His divine power and grace, as they are now" (Israel and the Church, 38).  g