Author

THOMAS CROMWELL

My first real encounter with Jesus came when I was 13. I can’t remember the circumstances exactly, but I was in nature when I experienced an overwhelming spiritual embrace that was both comforting and challenging. The comforting part was to feel absolutely certain of the existence of a Divine acknowledgment of my existence; the challenging part was the companion realization that this was a call for me to dedicate my life to serving God and humanity. That call has continued to echo in my heart and mind ever since.

At the time I was living with my family in a Bruderhof community on an estate outside London that had been converted to accommodate dozens of families. We lived together without owning a thing as individuals or families. All property was held in common in imitation of the way the very first Christians pooled their resources (see Acts 2:44). As children we attended school on the premises, and as adults we worked together in communal businesses.

The Bruderhof was established as a Christian community in Germany in 1920. It was intended to offer a radical alternative to a world of conflicts that was still recovering from the First World War. Growing up I had few theological notions beyond a concept of Jesus as a savior who was somehow one with God, the Creator. In retrospect, the Bruderhof was somewhat Quaker-like in emphasizing listening to the voice of conscience as the basis for practicing a virtuous life.

Beyond reading from the Bible, the Bruderhof looked in particular to the writings of its founder, a German by the name of Eberhard Arnold, as well as several Anabaptist authors, notably Jakob Hutter and Peter Riedemann, the founders of the Hutterite communities that were transplanted from Europe to North America in the 1870s, where they thrive to this day. Some of the other sources were Christian Socialists, including the Swiss theologians Jakob Kutter and Leonhard Ragaz as well as Christoph Blumhardt, a German theologian who was active in the Marxism-based Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) at the end of the 19th century.

An overarching belief of the Bruderhof is that the Sermon on the Mount should be the basis for a Christian life that can best be practiced in communal living. As a result members are held to a very high moral standard, on par with life in a monastic order. As with all human institutions, fallen nature can damage or even destroy the best intentions, but for me the Bruderhof has continued to represent a noble effort to translate the ideals of Christianity into a life of dedication to Jesus.

I thought the Bruderhof would be my own destiny, but when I moved away to study I encountered some equally devout Christians who were members of various denominations I knew nothing about. I began what would become a life-long practice of listening to people of faith in an effort to understand the basis for their beliefs and practices, and studying their scriptures to the same end. This started within the world of Christian sects and denominations, but later included Muslims, Jews and believers in Asian spiritual traditions.

The most important modern Christian for me was C.S. Lewis. What attracted me to his writing was his ability to take Christian ideals and translate them into the real world of our experience. In his books like The Screwtape Letters and The Great Divorce, Lewis brought the contest between good and evil alive. His theology was embedded in his storytelling, but also elaborated in his apologetic works, such as Mere Christianity.

This learning process stimulated questions. Above all, I wanted to know what the best way would be for me to fulfill my teenage commitment to serve Jesus and God. The moral imperatives of the Sermon on the Mount were clear, but what was I supposed to do with my life? How could I best invest my time and energy to fulfill my purpose as a Christian? I found no answer in the writings of Lewis or any other source that I explored.

Like most Anabaptists, Bruderhof members are pacifists, and I thought anti-war activism might be my calling. On reflection, however, I realized that wars are the product of conflicts within people, and thus there could be no end to conflicts without resolving their root cause in fallen human nature.

The Bruderhof tried to address this dilemma by withdrawing from secular society. But this was no longer a solution that appealed to me. I wanted to know God’s purpose for all people, regardless of their religion or race. And I wanted to know God’s plan for the world after Jesus was crucified and in the present moment. In other words, I wanted to understand the Divine Providence for the world and how I could be part of it.

The answer would come through a former member of the Bruderhof who invited me to visit a group she was living with called the Unified Family. The members were followers of a Korean religious leader called Sun M. Moon. I found their teaching challenging but intriguing. The ideas they shared shed a whole new light on what I had learned from the Bible, and provided a clear set of answers to many of my questions.

That was more than 50 years ago. Over the intervening decades, I have had the chance to encounter a very wide variety of religious beliefs and practices in various parts of the world, from Orthodox monks on Mount Athos to Sufis performing dhikr on a public street in Omdurman beneath the sweltering Sudanese sun and Orthodox Jews celebrating a traditional wedding in Israel. I have learned that while no two people share completely identical beliefs—and therefore religions will never achieve perfect agreement on theological matters—all people of faith and good will who become mature in their thinking and faith can learn to live in harmony with one another.

Furthermore, I have learned that the purpose of our Creator as manifest in the Divine Providence embraces all people, irrespective of any differences imposed by race, religion or nationality. I believe that all good people must band together to confront and defeat the forces that would do away with all religion and destroy the very fabric of moral societies everywhere, societies that are built by loving families working together to create virtuous communities. The common enemy of all people of faith and good will are those who deny the existence of God and intrinsic human goodness, and seek to impose a materialist alternative to the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.

Where does Jesus fit in this picture? He continues to be the most consequential person in history. Because of his purity and great intimacy with our heavenly Father, he established the way we must go to fulfill God’s providence. If we look beyond our personal interest in being saved from our sinful nature by Christ, we will come to understand his pivotal role in history and what we need to do to help him hasten the final fulfillment of the Divine Providence.

I hope this book helps with that understanding. Its contents represent my personal thinking and perspective alone, informed by the influences mentioned above. Its final form has benefitted significantly from the input of a long-time friend and collaborator, David James.

Thomas Cromwell
Washington, DC
December 2022

Other works by Thomas Cromwell

East West Publishing
Review for
Triumph of Good
"I have just read one of the most sobering yet optimistic books of my life. This work answers the burning questions many of us are asking: How do we stop this wonderful planet from swiftly collapsing into an earthly Hell?" - Trevor Loudon, The Epoch Times Commentary
The Triumph of Good - Divine Providence, The Cain-Abel Paradigm, And the End of Marxism
Why Ukraine Must Win by Thomas Cromwell