J. Gresham Machen (1881- 1937)

John Gresham Machen was an American Presbyterian theologian and fundamentalist leader.

John was the founder of the Westminster Theological Seminary (WTS) (1929) in Philadelphia. He was also one of the founders of theOrthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC) (1936).

John was born into a prominent family in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. Some time in his youth he came to a personal faith in Christ but there was no dramatic conversion experience. On 4 th January 1896 he publicly professed his faith and became a member off the Flanklin Street Presbyterian Church…

He studied at John Hopkins University, Princeton Theological Seminary and the universities at Marburg and Gottingen in Germany.

John taught at Princeton Seminary from 1906 until he left in 1929. In his book Christianity and Liberalism (1923) he had criticized liberal Protestantism as being unbiblical and unhistorical and struggled to preserve the conservative character of the Princeton Theological Seminary.

He left Princeton after the school was reorganized and adopted a more accepting attitude towards liberal Protestantism.

His fight for Christianity cost him a great deal. Not only did he lose his position at Princeton, but his church also declared him guilty of insubordination and stripped him of his credentials as a minister. ( History WTS)

1929 John founded a new school - Westminster Theological Seminary.
He took with him senior faculty members of Princeton and some bright scholars.

WTS soon became, and still is, one of the most highly regarded Christian reformed institutes in the world, with commitment to the Word of God.
(Read last paragraph of ‘History’)

The Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC) was founded on 11th June 1936. It was originally called Presbyterian Church of America but following a threat of a lawsuit it had to change its name in 1939. OPC has slowly grown to over 30,000 members with over 300 churches. John was one of its founders and was its first Moderator

John Gresham Machen, who died from pneumonia on New Year’s Day 1937, was a major theological voice in support of conservative Christianity.

Machen left the prestige of Princeton to stand for the truth of the Bible. He knew that theological compromise would harm the spiritual power of the church. (History WTS)

Sources
Banner of the Truth UK
Britannica Online Encyclopedia
History Westminster Theological Seminary (WTS)
Orthodox Presbyterian Church