Fifty years after his death B. B. Warfield’s witness remains a powerful influence in main-stream Christianity simply because no successor has attained to his eminence as a biblical theologian. In his years at Princeton, 1886-1921, he was unquestionably the best-known opponent of the rationalism and anti-supernaturalism which threatened the life of the Church in the 20th Century; for him a non-miraculous Christianity was no Christianity at all. But with his breadth of vision Warfield also saw the danger of false claims to the possession of miraculous gifts — claims which have repeatedly been made both by the Church of Rome and by groups within Protestantism. That the apostles possessed special divine gifts, and that they could be conferred by their hands, is plain; so also is it plain, argues the author, that the claimants to the same charismata since the apostolic age have never been genuine.
Warfield’s argument is a bold one, it is marked by erudition and penetration, and is too important to be passed over in the contemporary discussion on whether the full range of extraordinary spiritual gifts of New Testament times should be known today. The issue at stake is not small. For Warfield it is nothing less than the uniqueness and finality of apostolic Christianity. Given the apostolic faith, and the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven, the Church needs no more than she has ever possessed since Pentecost. To counterfeit miracles she must not turn aside.