tourists. A special ministry began to spring up to international teenage girls boarding at nearby schools.
They came to the welcoming chalet and watched as the Schaeffer family prayed and studied the Bible.
Soon many of them began asking questions, questions that Dr. Schaeffer listened to carefully and with
respect, answering them honestly from the Bible. Many of the girls began to turn to Christ, and the
Schaeffers caught a glimpse of a vision—a place where people searching for truth could come and be at
home. However, a complication arose. The Schaeffers lived in a Catholic canton, one of
Switzerland’s 22 provinces, some of which are Catholic and some Protestant. The Catholic leaders in
their region had been watching their Christian activity and issued an edict ordering them to leave the
country for two years. Through a series of remarkable events, however (involving everyone from the
postman to the Swiss President), the Schaeffers instead ended up on a new mountain, with a much
bigger home, belonging fully to them and more accessible to travelers. They decided to dub Chalet
Melezes “L’Abri,” meaning “shelter.” Even before finding L’Abri, the Schaeffers believed God had
given them a special ministry, and a commissioning passage of Scripture:
And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the
Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall
be exalted above all hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many
people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of
the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his
ways, and we will walk in his paths.
Like the founding Pietist Spener, Schaeffer wanted to invite people into his home to study
God’s word in a closer relational context. Like another Pietist, Count Zinzendorf, he opened his
property to people needing shelter and seeking truth. Schaeffer similarly stressed the need for the Holy
Spirit’s loving presence. Schaeffer, however, stretched beyond merely a warm personal Pietism to
address emergent philosophies and social concerns of the wider culture. According to Larry Snyder,
Director of the Minnesota branch of L’Abri, the evangelical Christians of that day were increasingly
pulling back from the intellectual and physical world, and withdrawing into a narrow religious emphasis,
“a very narrow emphasis in the sense that the rest of culture didn’t come into the lordship of Christ.”
Schaeffer wanted to engage seekers where they were and sought to understand their culture and
worldview. This was very unusual for evangelicals in that day and age, who, says Snyder, “didn’t know
how to deal with some of these questions that were being lobbed their way” from German criticism and
secular culture, and were therefore in full retreat.
But while Schaeffer engaged mentally and doctrinally with every comer, a large part of his hope
at L’Abri was to be a living model to the Christian church that love was needed together with truth. In
1951, before founding L’Abri, Schaeffer was confronted by apostate churches on one hand, and the
hard-hearted orthodox churches of the time on the other. The latter especially troubled him, being
withing the true church. Biographer Louis Parkhurst says:
He was…concerned about the lack of love that was so apparent in
many of the orthodox Christian churches he knew. Too many people
had developed a hard, inflexible attitude in their standing for the truth.
Too much of true Bible-believing Christianity had become unloving and
hateful, and he was personally disturbed about the reality of Christianity,
if this was the result of it.
These people “seemed to him extremely unloving,” said Joe Morrell, Assistant Director at the
Boston L’Abri. “He was working with people who had all the right answers, but…the truth was not
being offered in love.” Schaeffer searched his own heart and “realized a lack of love in his life.” His
own faith came to a crisis in 1950-51, and he spent many hours reading the Bible, praying, and thinking
in the hayloft of the chalet they were renting at the time. He came at last to a firm conviction of the solid,
real truth of the Gospel, and also of the need for both truth and love to be modeled in real, daily life. He
desired to live an incarnate example of the way the Christian life and message should be lived: with truth
and love. J.I Packer says:
Schaeffer perceived the need to live truth as well as think it, and to
demonstrate to the world through the transformed lifestyle of believing
groups that…“the Personal-Infinite God is really there in our
generation.” Hence the emergence of the parent L’Abri in Huemoz,
Switzerland, and of the satellite L’Abris around the Western
world…..Ordinarily truth and love must combine for effective
evangelism and nurture. The testimony of twenty years is that in the
world of L’Abri they do, and lives have been transformed as a
result.…Christian credibility, [Schaeffer] saw, requires that truth be not
merely defended, but practiced; not just debated, but done. The
knowledge that God’s truth was being done at L’Abri sustained his
boldness as he called for that same truth to be done elsewhere.
Schaeffer did make that bold call. He challenged Christians of the day who were complacent
about abortion. He wrote firmly and gently about the truth of Christianity—the truth as evident in
history, in culture, in the arts, in philosophy, and in our daily lives, through the word and Spirit of God.
He urged people to stop crawling into their shells, but come out and understand the culture they were in,
to contextualize the eternal truths of Christ into the postmodern world. He himself listened to Marxists,
Zen Buddhists, agnostics, and doubters who traveled to question him and listen, and through God’s
working in Schaeffer thousands came to faith, one by one, individual by individual.
And Schaeffer had the prophetic role as well to great men—he mentored Chuck Colson in his
early days, influenced Attorney General C. Everett Koop, Cal Thomas, Os Guinness, and many others.
Schaeffer was a prophet for his generation who reminded everyone of the actual reality of God and His
love, shaped Christian worldviews and responses, and influences evangelical methods of outreach
apologetics and contextualization into the present day. The Assistant Director of L’Abri Canada, Mark
Ryan, writes:
Francis Schaeffer was extraordinarily influential in at least two ways: First
he put apologetics back on the map. Of course apologetics as a theoretical
discipline was very much present (just think of all the intramural debates
going on between Schaeffer’s peers—Cornelius Van Til, J. Oliver Buswell,
Edward John Carnell, Gordon Clark, et.al); but Schaeffer actually DID
apologetics and he ENCOURAGED and ENABLED others to do it as
well. The growth of worldview thinking and the application of the Lordship
of Christ to all areas of life that are having a mini-renaissance now, are
really happening on the back of Schaeffer’s work. Second, Schaeffer
changed the church in terms of the way it thought about social
involvement.
L’Abri and its branches are a living model God brought into place to demonstrate to the Church
the need for hospitality, truth with love, and the importance of relationship in evangelism. Perhaps
certain mission organizations today, with their emphasis on relational evangelism and contextualization,
owe much more to Schaeffer and L’Abri than they know.
* * * *
Now let us examine nine themes of classic church and mission renewal and compare Schaeffer and
L’Abri to the model. The model would usually describe such persons or marvelous movements as the
Great Awakening, Martin Luther, or the Chinese House Church Movement. Does Schaeffer and his
work fit into the renewal model as well?
IV. NINE THEMES OF RENEWAL IN SCHAEFFER AND L’ABRI
1. Movements of renewal and/or mission normally arise on the periphery of the institutional
church.
A tiny village of chalets scattered across a lonely mountain top in the Alps would qualify by most
standards as a place on the periphery. This was where the Schaeffers lived and where L’Abri was
born. It was in the solitude of a chalet hayloft on one of these mountain tops that Schaeffer wrestled
with God for the blessing of knowing what is real and true. It was in another old chalet, badly in need of
remodeling and repairs that L’Abri was born.
Schaeffer himself would be an unlikely man to shape the Church. His parents were non-
Christians, simple-minded, and by modern standards, peasants. Schaeffer himself was not imposing or
handsome. Although some of his works met with great success in the Church, others of his articles
were shunned or ridiculed. For instance, after his time of doubt and prayer in the hayloft, Schaeffer
wrote a series of talks pleading for Christians to realize the absolute necessity of speaking the truth in
love and of relying on God’s power, not our own. Perhaps it is a sign of those times that these simple
statements “stirred a controversy.” There were suggestions that perhaps he should not stay in
Switzerland as a missionary. Others viewed him as an agitator. And even later in life, after having
achieved so much, he was still on the periphery in many ways. L’Abri Canada’s Mark Ryan writes:
In the mid to late 1980’s when Schaeffer turned to focus more on the
poor state of the evangelical church, it seems that people got off the
Schaeffer band-wagon pretty quickly. Lots of pastors and church
groups who had used and reused the “How Shall We Then Live” series
and other materials didn’t like being critiqued. A number of Christian
academics turned to scrutinizing and criticizing Schaeffer’s
historiography and apologetic method….Thus at this end, Schaeffer’s
impact was blunted quite considerably.
Schaeffer, as most prophets of old, went against the current, and thus was never “in power.”
He always spoke from the periphery, an outsider in many respects, exhorting, teaching, and at times
even warning against uncaring hearts, sin, or corrupt societal practices: “The broken-hearted scorn that
marked his manner on these occasions made one think of Jeremiah,” Packer says.
2. The redemptive purpose of God has normally been worked out through the use of two
different structures, congregational and mission structures (called modalities and sodalities by
Ralph Winter).
Schaeffer was first, and perhaps foremost, a pastor. He pastored three churches in America
before being sent as a missionary to Europe. And, in fact, Schaeffer founded both congregational and
mission structures. One of the first mission or para-church structures he helped found was “Children for
Christ,” a Bible teaching outreach for children. He was also involved less directly in helping Faith
Seminary as it opened in 1937. Later, he was sent as missionary to Europe by the Independent Board.
Besides involvement in many other para-church organizations, he at last also founded L’Abri, a place of
refuge for seekers, Christians, agnostics, and people disillusioned with the traditional church to find
answers about Truth.
But Schaeffer never planned for L’Abri to take the place of a church. Minnesota L’Abri’s
Director Larry Snyder says “I don’t think anybody at L’Abri wants it to be a big institution. Schaeffer
was very much for the church. We want [students] to get involved with a local evangelical church, use
their gifts, get involved in a locality where they’re working, where they’re living.”
In fact, Schaeffer also started a church, the “International Church, Presbyterian, Reformé” to
care for the congregational needs of English speaking seekers who came to L’Abri. Later a few sister
branches also opened in Milan, Ealing, Greatham, and Wimbledon. Biographer Louis Parkhurst says,
“These congregations are separate from L’Abri, but work with L’Abri. L’Abri is not a church, but
many have found that after becoming Christians at L’Abri, they needed a church home until they could
find a Bible-believing church wherever they would settle later.” Schaeffer was involved in and
respected both congregational and mission structures.
3. Mission movements normally grow out of movements of renewal.
Schaeffer’s own personal renewal is a clear example of this principle. Schaeffer’s own faith and
life, as we have seen, reached a crisis point shortly after moving to Europe. He was discouraged and
troubled by the loveless attitudes he was seeing even among orthodox Evangelical Christians of the day.
As he struggled and prayed, he “went back to scripture…claiming the work of Christ in the present.”
From this time of inward renewal of assurance and grace, the L’Abri shelter was a “natural outgrowth,”
says Boston L’Abri’s Joe Morrell. Schaeffer and his family were just “trying to literally put their money
where their mouth was and live by faith.”
The experience also affected his writing work and theology. “What he learned from that time
was later incorporated into his books The Church Before the Watching World and True
Spirituality,” says Parkhurst. Through this, L’Abri Canada’s Mark Ryan writes,
the Schaeffers and L’Abri have helped people to view themselves as
missionaries into their own cultures. Through thinking world-viewishly
about life and truth, people have become aware of the vast differences
that exist domestically and not just abroad.
In addition, Ryan points out that Schaeffer’s thoughts really pushed the Evangelical churches’ to reach
out to others in social involvement:
His writings and work related to political issues and issues of social
justice (race, abortion, environment, etc.) really forced the evangelical
church to abandon the reigning dichotomy, i.e. Liberals do social work,
Evangelicals preach the gospel. I see this again and again as I speak
with healthcare professionals, politicians, academics, etc., all who are
where they are now as a result of some encouragement from Schaeffer.
He was saying “Get involved” when evangelicalism was, by and large,
saying, “Flee the world—it’s going to end soon anyway.”
4. The ways in which the mission is carried out will be influenced, both positively and negatively,
by the historical context. Thus it is important to understand that context.
Understanding the context that people came from was huge for Schaeffer. In one sense, he is
one of the pioneers of modern contextualization and awareness of culture for the purpose of
evangelization. “With his gift of empathy he listened to and dialogued with the modern secular world as
it expressed itself in literature and art,” says J.I. Packer, “which most evangelicals were too cocooned in
their own subculture to do.” L’Abri Mark Ryan, although he expressed doubt about the wideness of
Schaeffer’s impact on missions, still writes that “Schaeffer and L’Abri have injected a more thoughtful or
worldviewish approach of communicating the gospel into contemporary missions….I know scores of
missionaries who have dropped in on various L’Abri branches around the world looking for assistance
in answering specific questions, in thinking about the interplay between theology and culture…”
“Schaeffer…was a sensitive man of God,” says Packer, “who sought to minister the everlasting gospel
to twentieth-century people, showing what it means in our time to believe it, to think it through, and to
live it out.”
Schaeffer learned about culture and context by listening carefully to the people who were in it.
It is interesting to hear his wife Edith’s description of the culturally diverse people they had in their home
and whom he learned to understand by talking to:
He has talked to existentialists, logical positivists, Hindus, Buddhists,
liberal Protestants, liberal Roman Catholics, Reformed Jews and
atheistic Jews, Muslims, members of occult cults, and people of a wide
variety of religions and philosophies, as well as atheists of a variety of
types. He has talked to brilliant professors, brilliant students, and
brilliant drop-outs! He has talked to beatniks, hippies, drug addicts,
homosexuals and psychologically disturbed people. He has talked to
Africans, Indians, Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, South Americans,
people from the islands of the sea, from Australia and New Zealand and
from all the European countries as well as from America and
Canada….
Schaeffer also wrote extensively on the historical context of our present postmodern culture,
most famously in the book titled, “How Shall We Then Live?” The book surveys the philosophical and
artistic movements of Western culture from classical times to the present to give Christians a deeper
understanding of the relative and despairing pagan culture into which God has sent us.
5. New mission movements are normally triggered by a key leader, who has gone deeper in his
communion with God, felt the heartbeat of God for the world, and looked at the church and
world differently from his/her contemporaries.
If the reader is not already convinced that Schaeffer fits this mold, a few well-placed quotes
should tie the knot. Writer Andree Seu says of Schaeffer: “He has one song in all his books—of a
Personal God who is there and who is not silent and who makes this place a personal place and gives
my life meaning—and I love the way he sings it.”
Os Guinness says a great insight of Schaeffer’s is the realization that we are reaching not
cultures, but individual people, individuals with their own brokenness, struggles and searchings.
Mark Ryan from L’Abri Canada says it was “his incredibly relational approach to listening to
people and answering them…his patience with people, and his ability to see down into the real issue. I
thank he was uniquely gifted at reaching back into his theology and into the Christian story and bringing
to bear those points most relevant on the topic under discussion, whatever it was.”
Finally, the inimitable J.I Packer simply describes him like this: “Francis Schaeffer, the little
Presbyterian pastor who saw so much more of what he was looking at and agonized over it so much
more tenderly than the rest of us do.”
6. New mission movements have usually involved theological breakthroughs, that is the
discovery or re-discovery of an aspect of the Gospel that has been forgotten or ignored
by the broader church.
As we’ve already seen, Schaeffer made renewed emphases on the actual reality of God’s literal
truth and on the need for relationship and love in communicating that truth. But two further points from
the Bible that he brought to light, according to Boston L’Abri Assistant Director Joe Morrell, were that
1) we need to rely on Christ’s merit and grace in daily present, in each living moment. Otherwise we
depreciate His work. And, 2) that “hospitality…[is] a very important concept in the Bible. Opening a
door, coming into a family, not being threatened by strangers…sometimes churches can seem very
prudish when dealing with sinners.”
These were two of Schaeffer’s many emphases on topics that had been forgotten or ignored in
his day.
7. Movements of mission and renewal usually involve recontextualized forms of spirituality and
communication, normally in the form of small face to face groups, in addition to new methods of
communication, new music, etc.
Like Spener, Francis Schaeffer valued small groups and individual attention. The L’Abri
centers are built with this in mind. The largest center today, the same original chalet and surrounding
villas in the Alps, is set up to have a maximum of 30 people at a time. The Boston L’Abri takes only 15
students at a time. It was important to the L’Abri workers to be able to spend quality attention on each
student who came.
The methods of communicating the truth are novel as well, reminiscent in some ways of ancient
monastic life (perhaps we could name it “Protestant Evangelical Monasticism). Community, personal
study, group discussion, and relational communication are emphasized over the more traditional
classroom atmosphere. At the centers, students can choose a topic of study, such as the existence of
God. For half of each day, they will listen to recordings and read books on the subject by themselves.
For the other half of the day they will do manual labor, reminiscent of the early simple monastic orders
(and also of the Biblical admonition to “work with your own hands” ). Meal times are special times for
discussion with L’Abri staff and other students, and extended conversations are encouraged. Special
tutoring and one-on-one discussion sessions are also common.
Besides Schaeffer’s novel adaptation of small group life to L’Abri’s ministry and teaching needs,
Schaeffer’s language itself was also adapted to his audience. His phrasing and vocabulary is sometimes
complex, and yet contextualized to reach especially the seekers he had met. “He found that his
particular use of language really communicated to those who were asking the questions. Many of his
questioners had steeped themselves in modern philosophical and theological thought, ending in
despair….Dr. Schaeffer’s application of the Bible’s answers in his special terminology reached some
people who had been untouched by other language.”
In addition to his contextualization to language, Dr. Schaeffer also made films expressing his
philosophies. This is probably an especially appropriate means of communicating to today’s generation.
8. Such movements normally discover and implement the need for new methods of selecting and
training leaders, more grassroots, less elitist and institutionalized.
At L’Abri, workers and assistants are often culled from the students themselves. If a students
show special promise or desire, they may apply to join the staff on a temporary basis as helpers—after
completing at least one term as students. After each term the permanent staff decide whether it would
be best for a helper to continue for another term. After two to four such terms, it is possible for the
helper to become a permanent worker. This depends on 1) a need for another worker, 2) timing and
the Lord’s will, and 3) the unanimous approval of the permanent workers. Joe Morrell told me that
“anyone who confessed the name of Christ and was really attempting to follow the word of God and
apply it to their lives really would be someone who was welcome.” Denominations don’t seem to
matter particularly. According to the L’Abri website, for instance, Mark Ryan at L’Abri Canada holds
degrees from “the Australian College of Theology (Anglican), Covenant Theological Seminary
(Presbyterian), Emmaus Bible College (Christian Brethren), Harvest Bible College (Assembly of God),
the Presbyterian Theological College (Presbyterian) and Trinity Theological Seminary (Non-
denominational).” As far as could be ascertained, however, a person does not have to be highly
educated or ordained to become a leader at L’Abri, though by the nature of the work a quick mind can
be helpful.
And L’Abri itself (or themselves) does not particularly desire to expand beyond the eight study
centers currently established in Switzerland, Holland, Sweden, England, Korea, United States, and
Canada. Morrell says, “I don’t think anybody at L’Abri wants it to be a big institution.” Instead they
emphasize the congregational Church. (L’Abri workers attend their own church outside of L’Abri.)
Morrell says that they are a para-church organization, and goes so far as to say “there may even be a
time when L’Abri would be no longer necessary,” because churches will have finally got the message of
relationship and hospitality, leaving L’Abri as useless as an old leg cast.
9. Ease of distributing information from one place to another aids the spread of movements from
place to place and stimulates new movements.
As an international organization aimed at international seekers, L’Abri naturally makes use of
many ways to distribute information easily from place to place. One place is the internet, where L’Abri
has a complete and well-accomplished website at <www.labri.org>. The website contains profiles
of most staff members, locations, histories, maps and directions, and contact information.
Another key way to spread information easily to many people is the L’Abri use of cassette
tapes (and now mp3’s also). Messages, sermons and lectures from Francis Schaeffer and many other
thinkers are available for listening in audio libraries at each L’Abri. This forms a large part of student
instruction.
Also, Schaeffer’s films from the late 1970’s and early 1980’s gained a wide audience and were
especially popular in churches as a means to disseminate his thoughts.
Last but not least is the old fashioned book. Schaeffer’s books have sold over 3 million copies,
and continue to be consulted around the world by Christians and seekers who are looking for the Truth.
V. CONCLUSION
Like the effects of the Pietists before him, Schaeffer’s fervent beliefs and legacy of L’Abri will
probably continue to shape Christian generations to come. Hopefully we can follow in the footsteps of
this saint, as he followed in the footsteps of His Lord. And hopefully we can learn the lessons he
wanted to model in L’Abri: teaching the truth in love, seeking to understand others doctrine and culture,
contextualizing the gospel message to grab the hearts of our hearers, and always being hospitable, in
heart and home, to welcome lost sheep with Jesus’ welcome.
Bibliography
Burson, Scott R., and Jerry L. Walls. C.S.Lewis and Francis Schaeffer: Lessons for a New
Century from the Most Influential Apologists of Our Time. Downers Grove, IL.:
InterVarsity Press, 1998.
Herrell, Marte, contributor. Editorial essay collection, “Give Me Shelter: Memories of L’Abri.” World
Magazine, March 26, 2005.
L’Abri Online. 2005. <www.labri.org> (26 July 2005).
Lovelace, Richard F. Dynamics of Spiritual Life: An Evangelical Theology of Renewal. Downers
Grove, IL.: InterVarsity Press, 1979.
Olasky, Marvin. “Schaeffer Revisited.” World Magazine, February 12, 2005.
Parkhurst, Louis Gifford Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message. Wheaton: Tyndale
House, 1985.
Ruegsegger, Ronald W., ed. Reflections on Francis Schaeffer. Grand Rapids: Academie Books,
1986.
Schaeffer, Edith. L’Abri. Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1970.
Seu, Andree. “Personality Profile.” World Magazine, March 26, 2005.
Snyder, Howard A. Signs of the Spirit: How God Reshapes the Church. Grand Rapids: Academie
Books, 1989.
Veith, Gene Edward. “Taking the Roof Off.” World Magazine, March 26, 2005.
Addendum Sources: Research Interviews
Telephone Interviews:
Larry Snyder. Director, Rochester, Minnesota L’Abri. July 28, 2005.
Joe Morrell. Assistant Director, Southborough, Massachusetts L’Abri. July 27, 2005.
Email Interview:
Mark Ryan. Assistant Director, Bowen Island, B.C., Canadian L’Abri. July 26-28, 2005.
J.I. Packer, quoted in the foreward of Reflections on Francis Schaeffer, Ronald W. Ruegsegger, ed. (Grand
Rapids: Academie Books, 1986), 7.
Marte Herrell, quoted in the editorial, “Give Me Shelter: Memories of L’Abri,” World Magazine <online:
www.worldmag.com>, March 26, 2005.
Marte Herrell, quoted in the editorial, “Give Me Shelter: Memories of L’Abri,” World Magazine <online:
www.worldmag.com>, March 26, 2005.
Ibid.
Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1985), 27.
Ibid, 28.
Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1985), 33-
34.
Isaiah 2:2, quoted in Edith Schaeffer’s L’Abri. Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1969, 76.
From a personal telephone interview with this author. (Larry Snyder. Director, Rochester, Minnesota L’Abri.
July 28, 2005.)
Ibid.
Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1985), 69-
70.
From a personal telephone interview with this author. (Joe Morrell. Assistant Director, Boston L’Abri. July 27,
2005.)
Ibid.
J.I. Packer, quoted in the foreward of Reflections on Francis Schaeffer, Ronald W. Ruegsegger, ed. (Grand
Rapids: Academie Books, 1986), 14-15.
From a personal email to this author. (Mark Ryan. Assistant Director, Canada, Bowen Island L’Abri. July 28,
2005.)
Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1985), 75.
From a personal email to this author. (Mark Ryan. Assistant Director, Canada, Bowen Island L’Abri. July 28,
2005.)
J.I. Packer, quoted in the foreward of Reflections on Francis Schaeffer, Ronald W. Ruegsegger, ed. (Grand
Rapids: Academie Books, 1986), 14.
From a personal telephone interview with this author. (Larry Snyder. Director, Rochester, Minnesota L’Abri.
July 28, 2005.)
Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1985), 73.
From a personal telephone interview with this author. (Joe Morrell. Assistant Director, Boston L’Abri. July 27,
2005.)
Ibid.
Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1985), 70.
From a personal email to this author. (Mark Ryan. Assistant Director, Canada, Bowen Island L’Abri. July 28,
2005.)
J.I. Packer, quoted in the foreward of Reflections on Francis Schaeffer, Ronald W. Ruegsegger, ed. (Grand
Rapids: Academie Books, 1986), 9.
From a personal email to this author. (Mark Ryan. Assistant Director, Canada, Bowen Island L’Abri. July 28,
2005.)
J.I. Packer, quoted in the foreward of Reflections on Francis Schaeffer, Ronald W. Ruegsegger, ed. (Grand
Rapids: Academie Books, 1986), 15.
Edith Schaeffer, L’Abri (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1970), 227.
Andree Seu, “Personality Profile,” World Magazine, March 26, 2005.
Quoted in “Taking the Roof Off,” by Gene Edward Veith. World Magazine, March 26, 2005.
From a personal email to this author. (Mark Ryan. Assistant Director, Canada, Bowen Island L’Abri. July 28,
2005.)
J.I. Packer, quoted in the foreward of Reflections on Francis Schaeffer, Ronald W. Ruegsegger, ed. (Grand
Rapids: Academie Books, 1986), 17.
1 Thessalonians 4:11
Louis Gifford Parkhurst, Jr. Francis Schaeffer: The Man and His Message (Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1985), 19.
From a personal telephone interview with this author. (Joe Morrell. Assistant Director, Boston L’Abri. July 27,
2005.)
L’Abri Online, 2005, <http://www.labri.org/canada/profiles.html> (26 July 2005).
From a personal telephone interview with this author. (Joe Morrell. Assistant Director, Boston L’Abri. July 27,
2005.)
Ibid.
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