Page 5839 – Christianity Today (2024)

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Inside 475 Riverside Drive

The Liberalization of American Protestantism, by Henry J. Pratt (Wayne State University, 1972, 303 pp., $15.95), is reviewed by David E. Kucharsky, managing editor, CHRISTIANITY TODAY.

The title is somewhat misleading. Don’t expect a study of American Protestantism, except as it relates to the National Council of Churches, because the NCC is what this book is really about. Pratt, an able political scientist, explores the means by which this voluntary organization has tried to achieve its social objectives. By “liberalization” he refers primarily to the NCC’s substitution of political activism and support of increasing government intervention for its original approach, namely, education in a broad sense.

Generally speaking, the book presents a fairly accurate and penetrating analysis—indeed, an unusually candid interpretation—of the NCC.

Unfortunately, Pratt as a political scientist does not correlate developments in the NCC with theological changes that have influenced NCC member communions. The result is that the reader does not get the whole story, and he is not told why the NCC concentrates on some social issues to the neglect of others (except to be told that “the NCC is generally passive, allowing external events to order its priorities”).

Despite all the NCC’s propagandizing for politically liberal causes, however, most of its staff and budget are still occupied with matters quite unrelated to politics. Pratt surely knows this; yet he gives the reader the impression that little other than lobbying goes on at 475 Riverside Drive.

Conservatives owe it to themselves to read this book, for it tells how a minority element seized and continues to hold control of the NCC. The impotency of conservative churchmen, Pratt concludes, “is partially attributable to the skill of council leaders in countering criticism and isolating opponents.”

Pratt purports to be dispassionate, but he could not suppress the inclination to describe the NCC’s increasing pressure on government as a progressive trend. Unfortunately, however, for the church to try to tell the state what to do is nothing new. The methodology is more sophisticated today, but the practice is an old one, and one that has been held in some disrepute.

In The Journals

Four denominations in the Wesleyan tradition (Nazarenes, Brethren in Christ, Free Methodists, and Wesleyan Church) now jointly sponsor The Preacher’s Magazine. Other evangelical ministers and theological libraries should consider subscribing. (2923 Troost Ave., Kansas City, Mo. 64109; $2/year, monthly.)

Down Under continues to provide stimulating articles by evangelicals in Interchange. The latest issue, number 11, looks at “War and Christian Responsibility,” asks whether science is a contemporary god, asks the meaning of “the body of Christ,” and three other topics. (Room 1, 2nd Floor, 405–11 Sussex St., Sydney 2000, Australia; U. S. $4 for 4 issues.)

NEWLY PUBLISHED

Orthodoxy, by G. K. Chesterton (Doubleday, 160 pp., $1.25 pb). Reprint of a splendid, wonderfully refreshing piece of Christian apologetics, by one of the most brilliant Catholic literary figures of this century. Should never have gone out of print.

From Parent to Child About Sex, by Wilson W. Grant, M.D. (Zondervan, 183 pp., $3.95, $1.95 pb). Helps Christian parents lead children toward healthy sexuality. Competent, practical, highly readable treatment of what to say and when to say it, from infancy to late teens.

The Soul Afire: Revelations of the Mystics, edited by H. A. Reinhold (Doubleday, 480 pp., $1.95 pb). A well-arranged, extensive collection; primarily of writing by Christian mystics, but including related Scripture and poetry. Mysticism, an attempt through contemplation and self-surrender to order one’s self totally with God and to “know” him beyond earthly knowledge, has provided rich devotional insights. An excellent book.

A Survey of Bible Doctrine, by Charles Caldwell Ryrie (Moody, 191 pp., $2.25 pb). Simple introduction to topics such as God, the inspiration of Scripture, the Holy Spirit, angels, man, the Church, prophecy. By the professor of systematic theology at Dallas Seminary.

Dedicated Poverty, by Philip F. Mulhern (Alba House, 246 pp., $5.95). A Dominican scholar presents a well documented discussion of positions regarding voluntary poverty in Scripture and throughout church history. Recommends statements of Vatican II that regard poverty as an effective sign of voluntary Christian commitment.

Do and Tell: Engagement Evangelism in the 70’s, by Gabriel Fackre (Eerdmans, 106 pp., $1.45 pb), and Evangelism For Today’s Church, by Leslie Woodson (Zondervan, 159 pp., $1.25 pb). Both center on what’s needed in contemporary America. Fackre is a United Church seminary professor who prescribes social action along with telling the story of God’s actions to an experience-oriented culture. Woodson is a Methodist pastor who clearly maps out steps for a church to take in performing its most important mission.

You and Youth, by Lawrence O. Richards (Moody, 128 pp., $1.95 pb). Focuses on understanding and meeting needs of teenagers; emphasizes student-teacher communication with chapters on developing attitudes toward Scripture, class structuring, and how to encourage response to God. Very helpful, practical guidelines.

Your Mind Matters, by John R. W. Stott (Inter-Varsity, 64 pp., $.95 pb). Another good book by the well-known preacher and author. Shows clearly the indispensable place of the intellect in the Christian’s life. Very timely.

Genesis to Deuteronomy, by C. H. Mackintosh (Loizeaux, 912 pp., $10.95). Originally published in six volumes nearly a century ago, this widely acclaimed devotional commentary has been continuously in print. It is now newly typeset into one convenient easy-to-read volume, and will undoubtedly continue to be much in demand.

Will All the King’s Men, by James Olthuis et al. (Wedge [229 College St., Toronto 2B, Ontario], 255 pp., $3.95 pb). A unified group of seven essays by six men. The body of Christ, the “ecclesia,” exists not only for collective worship but also for all community functions, such as political, economic, juridical. Restricting the modern “church” to collective worship limits mutual support among Christians and prevents significant influence on the culture of our age.

The Person of Christ: The Son of God and the Word of God in the Setting of John’s Gospel, by Brash Bonsall (Christian Literature Crusade [201 Church Road, London, S.E. 19, England], 256 pp., £1.75, £1.05 pb). An engagingly readable and yet highly learned treatment of the relation between Jesus Christ and the Word of God; offers an astonishing wealth of historical detail and psychological insight. An unusual offering, with something to interest everyone, from a versatile evangelical.

Hegel’s Dialectical Method, by William Young (Craig, 135 pp., $4.95 pb). Hegel’s dialectic has influenced theology tremendously: most recent theologians are either molded by it or in reaction against it. Likewise, Hegelian thought dominates political theory, thanks to his Marxist successors. Young offers an amazingly clear and brief explanation of this exceedingly difficult thinker.

Raising Your Child, Not by Force, But by Love, by Sidney D. Craig (Westminster, 190 pp., $5.95), and The Future of the Family, edited by Louise Kapp Howe (Simon and Schuster, 378 pp., $8.95). Craig approaches child-rearing with the Golden Rule in mind. He treads a fine line between permissiveness and responsible firmness; his ideas are well worth considering. Howe’s collection of essays considers the various trends in American families. While the essays ignore the biblical approach, the volume helps the Christian parent know the influences alive today.

Hereafter, by David Winter (Harold Shaw [Box 567, Wheaton, Ill. 60187], 91 pp., $1.25 pb). A very helpful booklet giving biblical perspectives about death, heaven, and eternal life.

Successful Biblical Youth Work, by Elmer L. Towns (Impact [1625 Broadway, Nashville, Tennessee 37202], 375 pp., $5.95). An updated version of Successful Youth Work with twelve new chapters discussing identity crisis in teens and other aspects of a church youth ministry. Intended as a textbook.

How to Be a Winning Loser, by Jim Macholtz (Warner, 112 pp., $2.50 pb). Discussions on all aspects of sports, plus sections of the New Testament paraphrased for the athlete. Points to Christian values in competition and is aimed at teen-agers.

The Reformation of Journalism: A Christian Approach to Mass Communication, by Jon R. Kennedy (Craig, 144 pp., $2.95 pb). Argues that the essential function for the Christian journalist is to proclaim the total message of Christ, including its social implications, to all segments of society. To do so he must stand apart from the world order such as in new Christian institutions, e.g., schools, political parties, and especially newspapers.

A Symposium on Creation: IV, edited by Donald Patten (Baker, 159 pp., $2.95). Eight essays from creationist perspectives on such topics as instinct, blood, flood traditions, and botany.

Right With God, by John Blanchard (Tyndale, 137 pp., $1.25 pb). Written for the “genuine seeker” after God. Outlines basic principles on God, man, the Bible, and the solution for man’s sin and separation from God. Adequate, but there are other books of this character that are better.

This Fellow Jesus, by Louis Cassels (Warner, 93 pp., $.95 pb). Jesus’ life and teachings as reported in the Gospels engagingly summarized in contemporary language for interested inquirers.

The Wheelbarrow and the Comrade, by Irene Hanson (Moody, 187 pp., $3.95). A Presbyterian missionary who was “adopted” by a Chinese family and traveled by wheelbarrow teaching throughout Shantung province reminisces about twenty-five years in her beloved China.

Out! In the Name of Jesus, by Pat Brooks (Creation House, 238 pp., $4.95). A book based on the author’s experiences in confronting and ending demonic possessions. Easy reading. Some points of doctrine are arguable.

Shalom: The Search For a Peaceable City, by Jack Stotts (Abingdon, 224 pp., $5.95). A major treatment of theological, sociological, and symbolic aspects of peace as reality and as concept. The author, who teaches ethics at McCormick, draws heavily on biblical and patristic material as well as on modern theologians, but does not develop a distinctively biblical approach.

Amos the Prophet: The Man and His Background, by Hans Walter Wolff, (Fortress, 100 pp., $2.95 pb). This well documented, scholarly investigation of the cultural and literary background of the Old Testament prophet is a useful tool for the discerning advanced student.

The Letter and the Spirit, by Robert Kahn (Word, 94 pp., $2.95). Rabbi Kahn explains many of the Old Testament laws and principles (in such areas as business, sex, personal relations, and ecology). Easy and enlightening reading on a portion of the Bible that few Christians have really studied. Highly recommended.

The Soul, the Pill, and the Fetus, by John Pelt (Dorrance [1809 Callowhill St., Philadelphia, Pa. 19130], 130 pp., $4.95). Beginning with the biblical view of man as a unity, an evangelical theologian gives a balanced and compassionate treatment, coming out clearly for a distinctively Christian stand in personal morality and for the right of the unborn to life. Well documented and comprehensive.

Ecclesial Cybernetics, by Patrick Granfield (Macmillan, 280 pp., $8.95). Applies cybernetic analysis to the Catholic Church, advocating more democratic procedures at each level of interaction.

Revival Fires in Canada, by Kurt Koch (Kregel, 102 pp., $1 pb). An interesting, chatty account of recent revival activity in various portions of Canada. Includes some of the background and some general principles on evaluating and participating in revivals.

Translation and Exposition of the Epistle of Jude, by George Lawlor (Presbyterian and Reformed, 151 pp., $3.95 pb). A New Testament professor at the Baptists’ Cedarville College in Ohio offers a thorough, scholarly commentary.

An Introduction to the Baptists, by Erroll Hulse (Carey Publications [5, Fairford Close, Haywards Heath, Sussex, England], 118 pp., 75 pence pb). Worldwide survey from the sixteenth century to the present of one of the largest Christian movements. Focuses on key individuals. Written by a leader in the current attempt to revive moderate “Calvinism” among Baptists.

Jesus Spells Freedom, by Michael Green (Inter-Varsity, 126 pp., $1.50 pb). A smoothly written, easily understandable book written primarily for collegian and adult. Outlines frivolous, modern use of the term “freedom” (of love, of thought, etc.) and shows how true freedom is grounded in a belief in Jesus Christ. It won’t “win” souls, but the book should provoke serious thinking among non-Christians while building up Christians.

An Urban Strategy For South America, by Roger S. Greenway (Baker, 282 pp., $4.95 pb). A study of biblical patterns of missions, considered in a framework of recent South American social and population trends. Highlights the best ideas used (most often by the younger, more aggressive Pentecostal churches). The author’s smooth style, objectivity, extensive research, and experience (several years as a missionary in Ceylon and Mexico; now Latin American area secretary of the Christian Reformed Church) combine to produce a very valuable book—both to the layman and to the missions expert; the observations are applicable far beyond South America.

Lamps Are For Lighting, by Louise A. Catton (Eerdmans, 123 pp., $2.45 pb). A biographical history showing how two Baptists, Helen Montgomery and Lucy Peabody, pioneered the interdenominational women’s foreign-missions movement at the turn of the century. An inspiring example of female achievement.

Between Hammer and Sickle, by Michael Wurmbrand (Tyndale, 172 pp., $1.95 pb). The son of the Jewish-Christian evangelist (formerly of Romania and now head of “Jesus to the Communist World” mission) tells his own life story. He echoes his father’s plea for Christians imprisoned in Communist lands.

The Responsible Campus: Toward a New Identity for the Church-related College, by Charles S. McCoy (United Methodist Board of Education [Box 871, Nashville, Tenn. 37202], 168 pp., n.p., pb). Of interest to leaders of denominational colleges.

The Prophet Ezekiel, by Arno Gaebelein (Loizeaux, 346 pp., $4.25). A long-out-of-print work by a leading Bible teacher early in this century is again available.

Don’t Call Me Preacher, by Phil Barnhart (Eerdmans, 188 pp., $1.95 pb). A white minister’s candid reflections on problems of personal growth relating to racial tension, economic injustice, and church renewal in a downtown Atlanta neighborhood. Moving.

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Tournier: Physician To The Whole Person

The Christian Psychology of Paul Tournier, by Gary R. Collins (Baker, 1973, 222 pp., $4.95), is reviewed by Glenn R. Wittig, reference librarian, Speer Library, Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, New Jersey.

This is the first full-length study of the Swiss physician who has become the exemplar of Christian counselors. Gary Collins, chairman of the Division of Pastoral Psychology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, based his evaluation on an extensive study of Tournier’s books as well as on interviews with the doctor and with close friends and associates of his during a six-month stay in Geneva.

Collins had three goals: (1) to “describe Tournier to those who have never met him” through a sketch of the man (but not a full-length biography); (2) to identify, organize, and summarize the basic ideas in Tournier’s thought; (3) to evaluate Tournier’s thought and work.

This is a straightforward, fair analysis of Tournier. Collins examines the psychology, theology, methodology, and practical wisdom of this complexly simple medical practitioner. He extracts ideas from Tournier’s casebook-style writings, places them in context, and assesses their value. Yet the degree to which he achieves his three goals varies.

The biographical portion is sketched in very briefly and sometimes rather vaguely. The main points are presented—the early death of both of Tournier’s parents and his upbringing by an aunt and uncle, his education and marriage, the influence of his association with the Oxford Group, the decision to embark upon what is now known as the “medicine of the whole person”—but a number of the influential personalities in Tournier’s life (e.g., Jan van Walré de Bordes, a Dutch official in the League of Nations; Frank N. D. Buchman, founder of the Oxford Group; and Alphonse Maeder and Jean de Rougement, cofounders with Tournier of the “Bossey Group”) are not identified by name. Collins’s imprecision at this point is not easy to understand.

On the other hand, his explication of the background of each of Tournier’s books is lucid and informative. He offers considerable new material here.

The main strength of Collins’s work lies in its middle portion. Here the sorting and analysis of continuing themes and diverse ideas occurs, and Collins shows a thorough mastery of Tournier’s thought. He notes Tournier’s views of man’s psychological nature, including his development, personality, and motivation. He categorizes Tournier’s beliefs about God, the role of Scripture, man and his salvation, the Church, the Christian life. In the chapter on methodology he deals with Tournier as a counselor, writer, and lecturer. And he presents a miscellany of topics—e.g., the single life, marriage, sex, work, and society—under the heading “The Practical Wisdom of Tournier.”

Possibly the most valuable chapter in the book is the one devoted to Tournier’s continuing attempt to integrate psychology and religion. Collins’s handling sets the matter in bold relief.

The author’s respect and admiration for his subject do not prevent him from noting gaps and weaknesses, such as Tournier’s conception of instincts, his avoidance of the subject of hell, and his tendency toward a universalistic interpretation of salvation.

The detailed presentation of Tournier’s thought is the forte of this study. Yet Collins’s success in presenting this material is blunted to the extent that he fails to pursue far enough some of the issues he so perceptively notes. He raises some legitimate questions but does not follow through to find answers.

Several lesser criticisms: there is less evidence of information gathered from interviews and friends than I expected; and while the work is heavily documented with references to Tournier’s books, periodical articles and secondary material were only slightly used.

Collins writes in a free and easy style similar to that of his subject. While the biographical portion is weak, his analysis of Tournier’s thought and work is a valuable contribution. (An article by Collins on Tournier begins on page 7 of this issue.)

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A Religious History of the American People, by Sydney E. Ahlstrom (Yale, 1972, 1,158 pp., $19.50), is reviewed by Erling Jorstad, professor of history and American studies, St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota.

In CHRISTIANITY TODAY’s report on significant books of 1972 (March 2, 1973, issue), the reviewer chose the Ahlstrom history as “the most significant book of church history to appear” that year. I would go beyond that to say the book is among the most significant to appear in several years. If nothing else, it is the largest single-volume history of American religion—1,096 pages of text—and it has the most complete up-to-date bibliography now available. Last month it was honored with the prestigious National Book Award as 1972’s winner in the area of philosophy and religion. It belongs in the library of every minister and congregation from Adventist to Zionist.

Sydney Ahlstrom, a professor of both American history and modern church history, and former chairman of the American Studies program at Yale, is ideally suited to produce such a history. He draws on this broad background to contribute what is a major breakthrough in the study of American religious history. He is convinced that on the basis of the rapid and deep-rooted changes that have taken place in American religious life in the 1960s, changes that he believes are more than temporary fads, it is time to take a long, hard look at the origins of religion in America to gain some perspective for the future.

Ahlstrom’s principal argument is that the 1960s “have marked a new state in the long development of American religious history,” and that this state could virtually eliminate traditional religious elements in American life. But the momentum of the 1960s, he concludes, could also be understood by Americans as a great opportunity to draw on “the profounder elements of their traditions,” there to find new sources of strength and confidence to vindicate “the idealism which has been so fundamental an element in the country’s past.”

So this is no old-fashioned history limited to describing just what happened, no straightforward fact-by-fact narrative, no denomination-by-denomination chronology, no eclectic, encyclopedic compilation of facts set into a narrative framework. It is, the author hopes, a resource that can help Americans find their bearings again after the storms of what he calls “the Turbulent Sixties.”

Yet having made this goal clear, the author follows the most strict and careful methods of traditional scholarly research, analysis, and exposition. He admits to having spent “a decade of his life” on this task, and the results of such labor are everywhere evident. He has worked through both the old master historians (e.g., Charles Andrews, George Bancroft) and the most recent scholarship, including the religious implications of the Beatles. He even has a sprightly little section on the Two Seed in the Spirit Predestinarian Baptists. He wisely avoids quibbling with fellow workers in the field such as Handy, Hudson, Marty, and Mead, yet shows his familiarity with their work. He openly acknowledges that he draws heavily on the standard secondary works. But it is evident in his chapters on theology that he has sifted his own way through the primary sources. In short, his scholarship is almost impeccable.

That established, it is necessary to say next that Ahlstrom’s book is a landmark for several reasons. It is the culmination of a trend among historians in this field to break out of the older scope of subject matter, the practice made by prominent W. W. Sweet of writing church history as denominational history. Ahlstrom vastly expands the boundaries of the field to include all important religious phenomena and groups, not just the Christian and Judaic traditions within American history.

He breaks new ground, next, in fulfilling one of the aims he sets forward in his preamble: to see American religious history in the “larger frame of world history.” This he does admirably, especially in the first section, drawing from the salient aspects of medieval and modern European history to show its influence on American religious life.

He next gives extensive attention to the many religious movements outside the mainstream of his subject; his last few chapters are a tour de force in the difficult field of writing contemporary history, as he explains the rise of the Orthodox churches, Christian Science, New Thought, Theosophy, Rosicrucianism, the occult, and such religions of the East as Vedanta, Bahai, and Buddhism. In each section, his discussion is a straightforward exposition of the group’s rise, its principal teachings, and its place in the general cultural setting of American life.

Finally, Ahlstrom’s book is a landmark methodologically because he carefully draws from a wide variety of sources—demographic, economic, political, and psychological, as well as the familiar social, ecclesiastical, and theological data of earlier historians. His work in the interdisciplinary field of American studies helped prepare him for showing clearly how intertwined these subjects are for religious history.

Ahlstrom has overcome perhaps the most difficult problem of all: dealing with theological and ethical issues while at the same time keeping the narrative moving ahead with careful attention to chronological sequence. He does this by using two kinds of chapters, fast-paced narratives and then rounded, in-depth analyses of the decisive theological or social issues. Both types of chapters are reminiscent of classroom lectures: an introductory definition of the topic, an exposition of the chief issues involved, a brief and appetizing use of primary source to give flavor to the narrative, and a summary showing what changes took place and how they fit into the larger picture. The theological chapters are models of lucid, critical scholarship, taking up in some detail such complex issues as the Half Way Covenant, Jonathan Edwards’s theology, the Enlightenment, the “Communitarian Impulse,” and many others. I was especially impressed with the chapters on romanticism, immigration, and nativism; they are interdisciplinary history at its best.

Ahlstrom is also the first in this field to give serious attention to the religious ideas of the native Americans, rather than considering them only as subjects for missionaries or trigger-happy militia. A further impression is that the author shows remarkable familiarity with the peculiar problems created by the widely varying kinds of ecclesiastical polity among the many denominations. He seems at home discussing church government battles among both the tiny and the giant church bodies.

In scope, sources of information, clarity and achievement of purpose, and judiciousness of judgment, then, this book sets standards those in the future must use as their criteria for model scholarship. I reluctantly bring up some areas of disagreement, doing so not only because a reviewer is supposed to but because the author invites commentators to call attention to his hidden presuppositions and unexamined major premises.

I would have appreciated a more thorough discussion of a phase of American religious life outlined briefly by Robert T. Handy in his recent anthology, Religion in the American Experience, when he mentioned that in their haste and need to attract supporters American churches did not take the time to educate their people seriously in their particular traditions and histories. As a result many denominations today find far more serious controversy within the denominations than against other denominations. Followers of one or another style of piety feel more comfortable with like-minded believers in other bodies than with their own—hence internal conflict, such as witnessed today by Catholics, southern Presbyterians, and Missouri Lutherans. A closer explanation of this phenomenon would be of great help.

In view of the author’s firm grasp of American social history, I wish he had given us a deeper discussion of the many problems facing the churches that made their programs so difficult to achieve. For instance, what effects have the automobile, the explosion of professional sports, and the growing secularization of Sunday had on religious life within the churches?

A few more quibbles, Ahlstrom could have used better sources of information on the National Association of Evangelicals than Gasper’s history; the works by Erickson and Shelley on new evangelicalism are more reliable and helpful. And Oscar Handlin’s heralded work The Uprooted has not stood up well under careful examination by specialists. Perhaps four pages of discussion of Ralph Waldo Emerson is too much, when compared to the space given to others such as Bushnell and Rauschenbusch.

More of the theological turmoil and pluralism of mainline American Protestantism would have been clarified had the author more fully discussed the battles within the major seminaries. Some attention is given to the best-known struggles, but we find only brief reference to the warfare over the historical-critical method, an issue that is still very alive and bothersome today. This becomes evident when in discussing the modernist-fundamentalist controversy of the 1920s Ahlstrom concludes that Machen’s Christianity and Liberalism “even after a half-century remains the chief theological ornament of American Fundamentalism.” The choice of the word “ornament” is regrettable, for its suggests that the book is only that. The works of the new evangelicals such as Henry, Ramm, and Carnell are representative of the heirs of Machen, but these are not discussed.

These comments should in no way discourage the reader from studying this enormously learned work. Ahlstrom has shown great courage and prepared himself for many criticisms such as those I just made by being willing to involve himself in the whole range of American religious history, just about as controversial a field as one can imagine. By covering the entire subject he leaves himself open to criticism on specific topics. But by his patient study, his careful organization, and his attention to detail and to the larger pattern he has provided us with a perspective by which we can fulfill his purpose for this volume: to use it and learn from it so we can draw from the more profound elements in our moral religious history to “vindicate the idealism” that is so vital a part of the religious history of the American people. (See editorial, page 29.)

Eutychus

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Theology On Wheels

Many charges have been brought against the Jesuits in their long and tumultuous history. But the most nefarious deed ever perpetrated by one of their members has so far escaped condemnation.

In 1678 Ferdinand Verbiest, a Jesuit missionary to China, built the first working model of an automobile.

Verbiest could not possibly have realized the demonic nature of his invention. How could he know that the triumph of his toy would suppress truth, subvert honesty, and promote idolatry?

If he had had any idea of the impact of the automobile, surely he would have done posterity the service of revising the horsey Scriptures. The Psalmist could say: “Do not behave like the automobile, unreasoning creatures whose course must be checked with power steering.” (Ps. 32:9). The Prophet Isaiah could more relevantly admonish: “Shame upon those who go down to Detroit for help and rely on armored cars, putting their trust in tanks many in number …” (Isa. 31:1).

The moral effect of the automobile can hardly be overstated. The conscientious Christian who believes that his yes should mean yes and his no should mean no suspends that morality upon entering an auto dealer’s showroom.

With steady eye he will assure the salesman that the gasping heap of metal and glass parked outside—which will pass everything on the road except a gas pump—yields an economical eighteen miles to the gallon.

The salesman, not to be outdone in this fiction contest, will assure the buyer he’s taking a personal loss since his commission is going to come to about seventy-five cents an hour for his time.

And think of how many young men succumb to the incessant advertising that promises them they too will be like the gods if only they possess the XL 442. Bowing the knee to the great, gleaming, bechromed, oil-drooling, rubber-footed, two-ton Baal, the modern youth will dedicate himself to possessing one—however briefly—by hook or by crook.

Too often it won’t be by hook. I understand that a large proportion of car thievery is done by teen-agers who know they can’t get away with it but who feel irresistably drawn by the sense of power that comes when they have three hundred odd horsepower under foot.

One of the automobile’s most insidious effects can be seen in many ministers. Put mild-mannered Reverend Clark Kent behind the wheel of his Spitfire Eight and he becomes Super Andretti, chuckling over his reputation for “driving like Jehu.”

If they ever reinstate the Inquisition, I shall be the first in line to lay my case against Ferdinand Verbiest, S.J.

EUTYCHUS V

CAVALIER COVERAGE

I rejoiced to see the cover of the issue (March 30) which arrived in my mailbox several days ago, because, I reasoned, it might represent a sober reflection on Bangkok a couple of months later. I was deeply distressed by what I found, simply a continuation—in greater detail and somewhat greater depth—of the kind of cavalier, superficial, and parochial “impatient waving of the hand” (Arthur Glasser) that you did earlier with regard to the Bangkok meeting.

I am an evangelical serving in the mission agency of a conciliar church. I shared the anguish of Donald McGavran over Uppsala. I worked hard within my own denomination and in ecumenical circles to see that something would happen at Bangkok which would give greater representation to the understanding of the faith that I have. I was invited by Thomas Wieser to write one of the commentaries on the collection of testimonies. That surprised me. Other things surprised me too, notably the number of conservative evangelicals who were invited to Bangkok and related prior meetings. I spoke with many of them, counseled with some, and met with them afterwards to find out what happened. Over and over again I got the word that the direction in which the ecumenical movement was going at Geneva and at Uppsala had been in a very real way changed. Accepting the biblical view of the church as composed of wheat and tares, I rejoiced. I do not ask for perfection. Conversion will be slow, but we pray for it. In the meantime we learn from others as well and learn new ways of understanding a basically evangelical faith.

You do us evangelicals in the conciliar churches a real disservice by arrogating to yourselves the title of the evangelical witness and publishing your narrow-minded views as if they represent all the evangelicals in the world. I think at this time a distinction needs to be made between conservative evangelicals and hidebound ones.

ALFRED C. KRASS

Consultant on Evangelism

United Church Board for World Ministries

New York, N. Y.

Peter Beyerhaus’s article on “The Theology of Salvation in Bangkok” states in the concluding paragraph that it was “predictable” what the conference would come up with. His article strikes me as a somewhat strained effort to validate his own negative expectations … [and it] sets back the cause of constructive dialogue between Christians.… It is filled with insinuations about sinister plots, insidious schemes, and conspiracies by card-carrying ecumenical ecclesiocrats across the world, who allegedly took all of us unaware souls at Bangkok for a “sensitivity training” ride straight into secular theology. We were brainwashed, claims Beyerhaus, by the “shrewdest of psychological techniques,” as anonymous “sensitizers” infiltrated our small-group meetings. Such statements make me wonder how silly we can get in our uncreative encounters between Christians.

Beyerhaus mentions the great number of participants at Bangkok whose biblical convictions are very much intact. The conference model was designed to give an opportunity for their witness to be freely expressed in numerous contexts, and to me that was indeed a hopeful sign. I personally regret that there wasn’t more celebration of “Salvation Today” at Bangkok. The work of the Holy Spirit, I know, is not a matter of our techniques and designs, but our procedures do often stand in the way of experiencing the power of the Lord.

I am involved with “evangelicals” and “ecumenicals” in the planning of several Key 73 events. The design of those conferences is somewhat similar to the one used at Bangkok. At least in America we seem to be beyond the point of seeing all group-dynamics techniques as the enemies of grace.

A large number of “ecumenicals” and “evangelicals” are quite prepared to struggle together with the questions and challenges of mission today. In my judgment, Peter Beyerhaus’s suggestion that a representative convocation for frank discussion of the issues be sponsored by the World Council of Churches has merit. If the World Council has no interest in this, perhaps some other group does. That dialogue between people of living faith should be our first order of business.

ISAAC C. ROTTENBERG

Secretary for Program Interpretation

Reformed Church in America

New York, N. Y.

Congratulations on the splendid article “Dateline: Bangkok.” This is reporting at its best. I want you to know how much I appreciate it.

ROBERT C. SAVAGE

Dalton Baptist Church

Muskegon, Mich.

U.E. ANSWERS

I was very distressed when I read the allegations and innuendos contained in your April 13 article, “Underground Evangelism: The Rumors That Won’t Go Away.” I appreciate your second article, April 27, “Underground Evangelism: The Other Side,” which does clear the air somewhat. However, given the opportunity, we could have provided the necessary answers and documentation for the first article, making the second article unnecessary. The brevity of the second article as opposed to the length of the first article (two columns on one page as opposed to seven columns on four pages) leaves many allegations unanswered, even though we supplied the information for you. I will mention only a few.

Sergei Kourdakov did not receive $2,600 for expenses in October as you stated. This money was paid directly to printers, airlines, motels, etc., and Sergei did not receive one penny of it. Also, Sergei did not “drop out of sight” in Canada and “emerge a few weeks later in the United States in Underground Evangelism’s employ.” The facts are: In May Sergei began a series of public meetings across Canada, and his itinerary was well distributed even to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. He came to the United States late in July for Underground Evangelism’s well publicized Winona Lake Conference. It really does not lessen the credibility of his testimony that “he was fed a stream of information on religious life in the Soviet Union.” Sergei’s knowledge of the church in Russia would be limited by necessity to those activities in which he personally participated: the persecution of the church.

Even though the findings of the coroner showed that the alcohol content in Sergei’s bloodstream was extremely small, and even though medical tests on the girl show that no sex act had occurred, we definitely do not approve of the activities of that New Year’s weekend. However, we do not believe this one occasion should have the effect of canceling Sergei’s challenging testimony. Sergei had made tremendous progress in his short Christian life. Those who discredit him would do well to exercise something of the same grace toward Sergei that God has shed in their own lives.

Space does not permit me to answer, in detail, every allegation in the article. Suffice it to say, there is nothing in the article which cannot be answered. I urge those who have questions to direct them to us. After examining our answers and documentations, you are free to arrive at your own conclusions, of course.

I do not believe CHRISTIANITY TODAY intentionally tried to harm the Lord’s work, but rather was the victim of misinformation. Unfortunately, rumors, like feathers in a wind, cannot be gathered again after they are scattered. Sadly, those who will suffer most from these rumors are those who are already suffering so much: the believers in Communist lands.

L. JOE BASS

President

Underground Evangelism International Glendale, Ill.

The article … is in my estimation what is commonly called yellow journalism. It had the markings of being unresearched, unfactual, generalized with innuendo, tantamount to a smear.… Mr. Plowman stated that Canadian Mounted Police reportedly located two brothers of Sergei Kourdakov. I challenge him to bring forth definite proof. He also quotes Congressman Landgrebe and others as to imply that their words are accepted fact, while at the same time statements by UE sources are “alleged” or implied as untrustworthy. The episode of Sergei Kourdakov leading up to his death is brought out to the barest degree only for the purpose of sensationalizing.… I realize that the coroner ruled the death as accidental. Perhaps this is true. I will not impugn the integrity of the official findings. At the same time, since all men are open to mistakes, it is entirely possible that a mistake could have been made in this case. Whatever the case, CHRISTIANITY TODAY is remarkably naïve in apparently underestimating the ability of the murderous KGB in assassination techniques. The spring issue of American Mercury would take some issue since this reliable magazine reports that Sergei was assassinated.

CHARLES HIGGS

Louisville, Ky.

As a former editor of Underground Evangelism Magazine, with fairly extensive knowledge of Underground Evangelism’s activities, I am amazed that a journal commanding the respect of the theological world would besmirch in such a libelous manner not only the excellent work of Underground Evangelism is doing but also the name of its brilliant young founder, the Reverend L. Joe Bass. To me this is a very shattering experience.

EVA JORDAN BLAIR

Glendale, Calif.

CHRISTIANITY TODAY is to be commended for courage. No doubt there was editorial agonizing as to whether to become involved in the unpleasant business of the sad death of Sergei Kourdakov and the general modus operandi of Underground Evangelism. There is a time for responsible Christians to finally in love and restraint speak out against unethical practices when they are rampant in a Christian organization. There is a cost involved in this kind of love. Thank you for paying it.

MYRNA GRANT

Wheaton, Ill.

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William A. Holt

Page 5839 – Christianity Today (9)

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When I was an atheist, proud of my unbelief and convinced that man must take hold of his own destiny, nothing shook my conviction more than the contrast between Christians and non-Christians.

My wife and I lived with our new baby boy in a mid-western college town, prosperous, middle-class, and clean. One Southern Baptist church served this community of 50,000. The church was young and vibrantly alive. Perhaps it was easier in those days, in that church, to grow in grace and in knowledge; in any case the people were doing so, responding joyfully to new challenges.

Nearby was the university, another growing institution. New dormitories were springing up every semester as the student body increased by hundreds, then by thousands. Here were large research laboratories, mountains of books, grandiose plans for future expansion. But something was wrong. Within my department, English, and within many others, I saw no evidence that any of my unbelieving acquaintances were growing better, happier, or more emotionally stable. On the contrary, all I could see was slow stagnation or rapid decline. Perhaps I was hypercritical, but I was looking for something to back up my belief in man’s power to control his own life.

Therefore I was dismayed when I witnessed a long departmental squabble ending in violent hatred and a much-publicized lawsuit. Several times I was embarrassed for both parties when I saw graduate students mercilessly browbeaten by professors for daring to debate minor issues in class. I was appalled as I watched brilliant scholars sinking deeper and deeper into an alcoholic daze until they hardly recognized their students or colleagues. I observed that every regrettable incident left scars on personalities, and that atheists and agnostics (a solid majority of the graduate students) often left worse persons than when they entered. Every intellectual gain seemed to be overbalanced by a spiritual loss.

Yet across town, in a modest building that the university would have been ashamed to use, men and women were changing in the opposite direction. I didn’t want to admit this, but the evidence was before my eyes. My wife, a faithful Christian with a quiet confidence that I would one day come to share her faith, wanted me by her side at church, so I went—to watch and criticize. Unfortunately for my atheism, I was committed to honesty.

The pastor, a young man recently out of seminary, occasionally misused or mispronounced a word, or hesitated in the middle of a sentence. But he seemed to improve every Sunday. Besides, he seemed better informed in a variety of fields than my professors were, and he certainly communicated better than most of them.

He and his wife seemed to keep growing closer together instead of further apart. His young son and daughter were the best behaved, yet seemingly the happiest children I had ever met. Gradually I began to await his messages eagerly, for I was learning about Christianity, learning from a man so careful with his facts, so scholarly in his approach, and yet so filled with enthusiasm for his subject that I felt I was in the presence of a real teacher for the first time. I hungered to know the secret of such growth, such awareness, such abundant life.

Much easier to criticize, at least at first, were my Sunday-school teachers. The class for young married couples was taught by a husband and wife about forty years old who had just stepped out of obscurity and rededicated their lives to Christ. To an ambitious graduate student like me, both seemed profoundly ignorant. But how they worked! Each Sunday one of them had a stack of notes drawn from several sources. Stumbling over every hard name, going always too fast or too slowly, clumsily attempting to use visual aids, they sweated through every presentation. I would often raise critical problems in class and laugh inwardly as they struggled for answers. Their simple, factual questions I would answer with arrogant ease, and I would criticize them to my wife afterward for not getting down to what I considered the important issues.

Yet before my eyes they were transformed, and criticism died on my lips. Through hard study and harder practice they became first-rate teachers, always prepared, always enthusiastic, always ready to listen as well as to speak. They looked more at the class, less at their notes. Their voices became firmer. They showed a loving concern for everyone in the class. Within one year they were conducting classes better than were many of my professors.

But others in the church were not growing. One member in particular became my target when I could no longer criticize my teachers. He was a slow-moving, gentle young man who seemed devoid of talent or real intelligence. He sang tenor in the choir and was usually off key. He tried to talk with me sometimes, and he seemed to have read all the wrong books and to have misinterpreted them besides. His enthusiasm for church struck me as childish. I suppose I was grasping at straws, trying to hold on to my belief that Christianity is a delusion and that Christians, however sincere, are nothing but ordinary people. Here, at least, was one person who showed every sign of being ordinary and staying that way.

But my attempts to protect my unbelief proved futile. Many factors, including the regular prayers of the very people I had been so harshly judging and the steadfast, loving witness of my wife, entered into my conversion, but at least on the surface nothing affected me more powerfully than watching Christians in action. If indeed any men or women seemed fit to take hold of their destiny and remake the world, these were the ones. Yet they had no such intention. Like little children, they knelt before God and asked his guidance. On April 23, 1967, I trusted Christ as Saviour and Lord.

That same year I took my family away to another community to accept a teaching position. Within the next year my wife and I felt an irresistible call to full-time Christian service, and we left our new community for theological seminary. Invited back to our first home church to preach an evening sermon and be licensed before departing for Texas, I was amazed to see on the platform the young man whom I had thought so unpromising, so unaffected by his Christianity. For several months now he had been performing every week as a featured soloist, accompanying himself on the guitar and singing hymns he had composed. His voice was now smooth and even, and he handled his guitar expertly. The words were simple but intense. As the last chord died away in the silence of the darkened church, and I rose to preach, I noticed in a side pew one of my former atheist friends, watching intently.

George M. Marsden is associate professor of history at Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has the Ph.D. (Yale University) and has written “The Evangelical Mind and the New School Presbyterian Experience.”

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Leonard I. Sweet

Page 5839 – Christianity Today (11)

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Of all the books in the New Testament, the Book of Revelation elicits the most varied responses from within the Christian community. Radicals use it as part of their revolutionary rhetoric; liberals treat it as an elaborate pipe-dream (or should I say a mushroom-induced hallucination); scientific rationalists haughtily dismiss it; while evangelicals alone seem to rejoice in its promise for the future. The most common response in recent years, however, has been benign neglect, or worse yet, indifference.

Perhaps the daily threats of nuclear holocaust, ecological collapse, catastrophic over-population, and genetic genocide have bludgeoned our sensitivities about the future into a comatose state. The old classroom distinction between the responses of two sets of trapped people to an uncontrollable fire—moviegoers frantically scurrying toward the door of their only escape, and the resigned submission of sailors in a sinking submarine to impending destruction—illustrates the critical role that hope and promise play in determining our perceptions of the future. Without any hope for the ultimate salvation of the historical process, man no longer dares or cares to think about the future.

Christians may find themselves reflecting this attitude. They may fail to remind the world that their philosophy of history includes not only forgiveness for the past and salvation in the present but also the biblical promise of total fulfillment in the future. To the extent that they do this, they are rejecting their peculiar heritage as Christians. Concern for the future has been a constant in the history of Christianity, as Christian men and women, inspired by apocalyptic passages in the Old Testament, the apocalypses in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and the Book of Revelation, have anxiously awaited Christ’s return and anticipated the millennial kingdom.

All this is familiar to us. Less understood, however, has been the profound impact that the biblical image of the future has exerted on history and the extent to which what we mistakenly label “secular” history has been fashioned by the vision of a future millennium, especially as outlined in the Revelation of Saint John.

At certain times in history, millennial sentiment has spread to exercise a formative sway over diverse social movements and over broad sections of society. Among the periods and events that come to mind are the year 1000 A.D.; the crusades; the plague years, such as 1348, when even Petrarch was convinced that “the end of the world is at hand”; the monastic movements inspired by Abbott Joachim of Fiore in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; the early periods of exploration and Franciscan colonization of the New World; Lollardy and the Radical Reformation (specifically Thomas Müntzer and Münster); Queen Elizabeth’s apocalyptic assessment (shared by many of her subjects, such as John Foxe) that her reign was set in “these last and worst days of the world”; the English, French, and American Revolutions, and revolutionary periods in general; and nineteenth-century American reform movements. Increasingly, secular historians are realizing that millennialism cannot be dismissed, as a recent biographer tried to do, as “a certain hysteria, indicative of some mental unbalance.” Rather, a spirit of millennialism and concern for examining the future through the spectacles of the Book of Revelation have signified, not isolation from the mainstream of history, but total immersion in it.

A case in point is that of a much neglected abbot named Joachim of Fiore (ca. 1150–1202), who developed a philosophy of history that was to dominate Europe until the advent of Marxism. Even such modern philosophers of history as Comte, Lessing, Fichte, Hegel, Schelling, and Marx himself have been found to have Joachite underpinnings, and the secularized Joachite undertones in the phrase “the Third Reich” have not escaped attention. Joachim’s predictions (based on Revelation) of an imminent third and final dispensation of the Holy Spirit were so influential that in 1215, when Frederick II was given the imperial crown of the Roman Empire, he was perceived (and perceived himself) as the predicted Emperor of the Last Days who would liberate the Holy Sepulchre and prepare the way for the second coming and the millennial reign of Christ (see Norman Cohn, The Pursuit of the Millennium, 2nd ed., 1961, p. 103).

A similar mission largely motivated Christopher Columbus, a fact that most historians have ignored. In his little-known Book of Prophecies, Columbus related his commission as a “Christ bearer” (Christoferens) to free Jerusalem from the Muslims and to diffuse the Gospel throughout the world in order to pave the way for the millennium. In addressing Prince John, Columbus revealed his role in this cosmic drama: “God made me the messenger of the new heaven and the new earth, of which He spoke in the Apocalypse by Saint John, after having spoken of it by the mouth of Isaiah; and He showed me the spot where to find it.” It should not surprise us, then, that in a ship emblazoned with crosses on the sails and “in the name of Jesus,” Columbus embarked on what was in many ways the last of the crusades, invoking Joachim of Fiore as his patron in the expected evangelization of the world and, inadvertently, in the discovery of the Americas. As Mircea Eliade has recently admitted, it was in a “messianic and apocalyptic atmosphere” that “the transoceanic expeditions and the geographic discoveries that radically shook and transformed western Europe took place.”

But to appreciate fully the influence that millennialism in general and Revelation in particular have exerted on history, we must turn to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Within the past few years, various historians have mined an amazingly rich quarry of millennialism in the allegedly “communistic” ideal of Digger Gerrard Winstanley; in the poetry of the mystic William Blake, who was inspired by such millennialist movements as Joachism, seventeenth-century Muggletonianism, and Swedenborgianism; in the history of the struggle of women for emancipation from the shackles of Kinder, Küche, und Kirche, begun in earnest during this period; in the sophisticated thought of John Milton; in the political and historical writings of Thomas Hobbes; and in the ideological apologists and actors in the English Revolution, including the indomitable Oliver Cromwell and the New Model Army.

Equally fascinating is the fashionable attention given to Revelation during this period. Sir Isaac Newton, who spent more time ruminating on biblical prophecies than on scientific experiments, argued in his posthumously published commentary on Daniel and Revelation that to repudiate these prophecies was to reject the entire Christian religion and tradition. (The only conspicuous dissenters from Newton’s observation would have been the early Martin Luther and John Calvin, who found the Book of Revelation too elusive for intelligible exposition.)

This connection between science and Revelation was the norm for the seventeenth century. John Napier, whose commentary on Revelation went through at least twenty-three editions by 1700 and numerous translations, attempted to translate scriptural mathematics into scientific calculus. In so doing he invented logarithms, which he proceeded to use to compute the date of the Parousia—between 1688 and 1700. The scientist and mathematician William Whitson, Newton’s successor as professor of mathematics at Cambridge, was expelled in 1710 as a result of his Arian efforts to resurrect primitive Christianity, in his mind a necessary preparation for Christ’s second coming. And William Oughtred, the inventor of the symbol x and “the greatest mathematician of his day,” according to Christopher Hill, spent many hours hovering over the Book of Revelation, trying to decipher the date of Christ’s return. So did other mathematicians, such as John Pell and Robert Boyle.

But of all the English commentators on Revelation (King James I included), Joseph Mede—botanist, anatomist, mathematician, astronomer, pre-cursor of Cambridge Platonism, and tutor of Milton—wielded the greatest influence through his Clavis Apocalyptic (1627). The relevance of this work so intrigued a committee of the British House of Commons during the English Civil Wars that they ordered it to be translated in 1643 under virtually official auspices. In fact, to Thomas Twisse, the Presbyterian divine and prolocutor of Parliament’s Assembly of Divines, the merging of expanding scientific knowledge and an expanding world by means of navigation and commerce were harbingers of the millennium. And Roger Bacon’s assertion that modern science contained the seeds for the eventual flowering of the millennium was shared by many Englishmen; they felt that both science and biblical prophecy were supplemental ways of getting to know God and his plans, purposes, and lessons for mankind.

The significance of all this is that millennialism, defined as a belief in and quest for an imminent period of total, ultimate, collective salvation and peace, has not been the preserve of fringe groups in history, but has pervaded the spirit of many ages and many leaders, both spiritual and secular. And although evangelical Christians cannot share Friedrich Engels’s estimation of the Revelation of Saint John as “worth more than all the rest of the New Testament put together,” we ought at least to be aware of the immense historical importance attached to this reportedly “least read book in the New Testament” and to the entire subject of millennialism.

George M. Marsden is associate professor of history at Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has the Ph.D. (Yale University) and has written “The Evangelical Mind and the New School Presbyterian Experience.”

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Gary R. Collins

Page 5839 – Christianity Today (13)

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On May 12 the Swiss physician and counselor Paul Tournier celebrates his seventy-fifth birthday. Widely known because of his fifteen practical and jargon-free books on psychology and Christianity, Tournier recently published another that bears the interesting title Learn to Grow Old. This is essentially an autobiography in which he describes his present life, analyzes the problems of old people, reaffirms his Christian commitment, and tells something of his past.

Tournier was born in Geneva, the son of a pastor who served for many years at St. Peter’s Cathedral, where Calvin had preached and taught three centuries earlier. Although he learned about Calvinistic theology as a young boy and committed his life to Christ after hearing an evangelistic sermon when he was eleven, Tournier grew up as a lonely orphan who had very little interest in spiritual matters. As a young man he read the Institutes and was involved in church work, but his religion was cold, impersonal, and not very satisfying.

Then in 1932, several years after his graduation from medical school, Tournier went to a meeting of the Oxford Group and learned both to talk with others about his insecurities and to spend an hour every day in quiet meditation before God. Slowly the young doctor’s aloofness toward people began to change. He started treating his patients as persons rather than as cases, and within a few years he had become a respected counselor, though he had never aspired to this kind of work and had never taken a formal course in psychiatry or psychology.

As his life work changed, Tournier began to keep a record of his experiences and observations, and this record formed the basis of his first book. Friends urged him not to publish the manuscript, and he had some difficulty finding a publisher; but when The Healing of Persons finally appeared in French shortly before World War II, it was well received and went on to become probably the most popular and widely read of Tournier’s writings.

Approaching seventy-five, Tournier has been alert, perceptive, witty, and deeply interested in people. He is a humble man with a strong Christian commitment, and he seems both surprised and embarrassed by the acclaim that comes his way. A sensitive person himself, he makes a real effort to avoid disappointing or harming anyone. He shows great tolerance in his dealings with people and a willingness to accept all persons as equal.

Tournier is not without his critics, however, and his books have aroused condemnation as well as admiration. The very characteristics that make Tournier’s writing style so attractive to many of his followers—lack of technical jargon, practicality, non-systematic format, abundance of case histories, frequent references to himself—cause others, including many professional counselors, to dismiss him as an eccentric physician who writes rambling books about an unworkable religion. Some still criticize Tournier for his lack of psychiatric training, though he is well read in the psychological literature. Despite his lack of training, his writings now appear in eleven languages and have influenced literally thousands of people. So perceptively does Tournier analyze the needs of modern man that few can read his books without finding themselves and their problems discussed somewhere.

Tournier’s success as a counselor and writer has resulted, at least in part, from characteristics he has developed over the years. Psychological research has shown that counseling effectiveness depends more on what the counselor is than on what he does, and people who know Paul Tournier realize that he is an unusual man. His life radiates:

a deep concern for other people;

a willingness to listen patiently to others, without jumping to premature conclusions;

an intense desire to yield himself completely to God and to seek divine leading in everything he does;

a respect for the Scriptures and a continual effort to understand how the Word of God can have a practical relevance for one’s daily and professional life;

a concern for society’s ills accompanied by a conviction that the elimination of social injustice requires a transformation of individual men;

a healthful respect for science, but a respect tempered by the realization that science alone cannot understand and change the universe or mankind;

a bold willingness to give witness to what he believes and to urge others to submit to Christ;

an awesome awareness of the power of sin, the existence of the devil, and the divine influence of the Holy Spirit in men’s lives; and

an honesty about his own spiritual struggles.

Many of the people who read Tournier’s books and are helped by them wonder where this self-educated “psychologist” stands theologically. Tournier does little to shed light on this question. He avoids using theological jargon that might give a clue to his position. He claims to know nothing about theology, and apart from calling himself a Calvinist he does not align himself with any theological camp. He knew Brunner in the Oxford Group, was greatly influenced by Buber, has long admired the writings of Barth, and greatly respects the ministry of Billy Graham, but he would not closely align himself with any of these men.

In his books, articles, and lectures, Tournier often stresses the importance of the Bible, the sinfulness of man, and the substitutionary atonement of Christ. A strong believer in the sovereignty of God, he also believes that God forgives, loves unconditionally, and is personally interested in even the smallest details of our lives. He wants social change but believes that this can come only after individual men first yield their lives to Christ. Becoming a Christian does not free men from all the trials and anxieties of life, Tournier believes, but commitment to Christ does give them a new purpose and enables them to experience life as an “adventure.”

Despite these orthodox views, Tournier’s informal and non-systematic theology has elements that would raise questions for those who maintain a high view of Scripture. He describes himself as having “a personal evangelistic faith completely subject to the authority of the Bible” (The Person Reborn, p. 98), but he never says whether this biblical authority is the Word of God or whether it merely contains God’s Word. Quite probably a distinction like this has never occurred to him. It is also difficult to determine whether Tournier identifies all of the Bible as true and historical or thinks that accounts of such events as the expulsion from Eden and the tribulations of Job are poetic myths that teach us about God but are not to be taken literally (Guilt and Grace, p. 212; A Place For You, p. 50). Questions like these are important for theologians, but apparently they do not concern Tournier very much. He describes himself as a layman who knows nothing about theology and is primarily interested in discovering how the Bible can give practical answers to the problems of men.

In Guilt and Grace there is evidence that Tournier is a universalist who thinks that evangelism consists of telling men they have all been redeemed already. “I don’t know if hell exists,” he said during one of my recent conversations with him. “I much prefer to stress God’s love and forgiveness rather than God’s wrath.” It is easy to understand why a sensitive counselor would want to shy away from a theological issue that stimulates despondency and fear in emotionally troubled people. Surely it would be better, however, if Tournier could acknowledge the reality of divine punishment and then set this alongside the parallel truth that a living God has provided a way for men to be liberated from their sin and freed from the reality of a future hell.

Tournier states his convictions with boldness, but when he disagrees with someone he is never cynical or vindictive. When the Oxford Group changed its name and emphasis to become Moral Rearmament following World War II, Tournier felt he had to resign even though he was widely criticized for his decision. Later he established an informal group for the study of medicine and theology, a group that still holds annual conferences in Europe. Tournier likes to think of this as one of the first examples of ecumenical cooperation. Although he is still an active member of the Calvinistic “National Protestant Church of Geneva,” he nevertheless enjoys contact with Catholics, Muslims, Seventh-day Adventists, and other non-Calvinists. Regrettably, however, Tournier has bent over backward to cooperate with those who hold non-biblical views. His extreme tolerance of the opinions of others coupled with his vagueness on some important theological issues has led people from a variety of religious backgrounds to claim that Tournier is at one with them. Tournier himself makes no comment.

Only the most devoted followers of a prolific writer like Tournier could agree with everything he writes, but this should in no way be allowed to distract from appreciation of his wisdom, the depth of his understanding, and his influence in the lives of innumerable people around the world. Paul Tournier is the bestknown and most widely respected of Christian counselors. The example of his own life and the practical insights that radiate from his books will continue to encourage and help people all over the world, long after he puts down his pen for the last time.

At seventy-five, Tournier can look back on a life that has been rich and productive, but he also looks forward to a better life that is yet to come. “In my childhood,” he once wrote,

I had already come to know God, quite naïvely, of course; nevertheless, I thank God for those who led me to him. Yet it took a revolutionary experience in order for this knowledge to go beyond the abstract nature of a few ideas about God, however right those ideas might have been. I had to meet him in the full activity of adulthood, through dialogue with inspired men. They put my life, my home, and my medical work, under the light of God. Ever since, Jesus Christ has become my unseen companion of every day, the witness of all my successes and all my failures, the confidant of my rejoicings and my times of sadness. It is in this life shared with him that the knowledge of God is continuously strengthened and sharpened. All that I can hope, when my time for action will be over, is that I may yet go further in the riches of this knowledge. Doubtless, the abundance of life is not attained here below. Yet it begins here.… I know that beyond the winter of death I shall see God face to face, and understand fully, even as I have been fully understood, from before my birth [The Seasons of Life, p. 62].

George M. Marsden is associate professor of history at Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has the Ph.D. (Yale University) and has written “The Evangelical Mind and the New School Presbyterian Experience.”

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Gary Hardaway

Page 5839 – Christianity Today (15)

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Four decades ago Aldous Huxley wrote his classic forecast of human history, Brave New World, in which Western civilization had become a hideous assembly line producing bottled babies whose physical, mental, and emotional characteristics were precisely controlled throughout their lives. In the plastic but highly contented society that resulted, personality and individuality had ceased to be.

Huxley, observing the state of scientific technology in the thirties, estimated that this world of biological engineering would emerge around the year 2500. He was drastically mistaken. In May, 1971, an article appeared in Look magazine entitled “Taking Life Into Our Own Hands: The Test Tube Baby Is Coming.” Referring to Brave New World, the writer said:

Now more than fifty printings later, passages from the book read like paragraphs from the daily newspaper.… Doctors have already removed human eggs, have fertilized them and incubated them in the lab. Now it is possible to implant a tiny embryo in the womb and create a new life.

Science has translated the fantasies of yesterday into the actualities of today. And just as Huxley predicted, what science has made possible, man plans to use in an amoral manner. Our generation faces an evil that no previous generation has faced. It is the two-headed monster of an astoundingly capable scientific machine in the hands of professionals with a blank conscience.

Dr. Francis Schaeffer, the brilliant modern Christian thinker, warned us in 1970,

Whoever achieves political or cultural power in the future will have at his disposal manipulations that no totalitarian ruler in the past has ever had. None of these are only future; they all exist today waiting to be used by the coming manipulators [The Church at the End of the Twentieth Century, Inter-Varsity, 1970, p. 91].

As if to underscore the truth of Dr. Schaeffer’s warning, two outstanding intellectuals have since stepped forward to put forth some frightening proposals. Dr. Francis Crick, winner of a Nobel prize for his work in unraveling some of the genetic mysteries of DNA, suggested the following to a group of scientists in St. Louis in March, 1971: “Some group of people should decide that some people should have more children and some should have fewer.” He went on to say, “I don’t think you’re going to solve all these problems just by tinkering with the genetic material.… I think really there should be some thinking if we’re to take this new view of looking at man.” Dr. Crick seems to anticipate:

1. The dictatorship of an intellectual elite who decide who should be born and who the parents should be.

2. Systematic tampering with genetic materials, i.e., programmed babies.

3. “A new view of looking at man.”

What is this new view? It seems to be elimination of the idea that man is an individual, that man has personality, inalienable rights, and essential worth.

Crick is no lone voice in the wilderness. Dr. B. F. Skinner, Harvard’s distinguished champion of behavioristic psychology, writes in his latest book, Beyond Freedom and Dignity, “To man as man we readily say, ‘Good riddance.’ We must delegate the control of the population to specialists.” Skinner believes that freedom and dignity are harmful ideas that have created all kinds of social problems. They must be abandoned; man must be placed in the hands of specialists who will predetermine his characteristics, restructure society, and guide human history from now on.

The philosophical thrust that started with humanism in the fifteenth century has now reached its logical destination. It began with the idea that man is the measure of himself, in fact, of all things. In accepting this it necessarily denied the idea of inspired revelation, absolute truth, and universal moral law. Rabelais, the famed satirist and irreverent Benedictine monk, expressed this leap in the inscription he placed on the gate of his lay abbey (open to both sexes), Abbaye de Theleme: “Do What You Like.”

Rabelais’s agreeable command makes sense if there is no God who watches and weighs the actions of men. The unpleasant fact that some men like to enslave and exploit others may be regrettable, especially to the victims, but in no sense can it be “wrong.” When man is the measure of all things, then right and wrong becomes a matter of taste, of personal choice. We can select our actions as we choose our wardrobe.

Through the centuries between the humanists and today’s builders of the Brave New World, Western culture has tried to preserve the values of right and wrong, the dignity of man, law rather than anarchy; but one central unanswered question has haunted that effort: What authority guarantees the validity of those values?

It cannot be God, for the universe of the humanist and later the rationalist is a closed machine. All knowledge must flow from carefully checked sensory perception or verifiable experimentation. Since God does not seem to have mass or a visible wave pattern, he can’t be there. Of course, the ideals of freedom and man’s inherent worth don’t show up on the spectrograph either. And with God discredited, his so-called Holy Word cannot be used to support such concepts.

What is left? The eighteenth century answered, “Reason.” Reason will lead men to understand themselves and their environment. Once man understands nature’s laws, he will conform to them in order to secure for himself the greatest possible comfort and well-being. Societies will see the golden dawn of magnificent enlightenment as they stride down the path of reason. But whose reason shall we follow? That of Jesus? Marx? Hitler? Our own?

This last option sounds attractive to those who believe man is basically good. It inspired Rousseau to write, “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.” He believed that the great evil resides not in man’s heart but in civilization itself, its restraints, its laws, its institutions. Rousseau worked out his theory of social contract, giving his disciples criteria by which to decide whether to allow themselves to be governed or not. He tried exceedingly hard to define good government, which men should follow, and evil, which they should reject. However, he utterly failed to find an authority for these definitions other than himself. Reason ends with an appeal to blind faith in one more man.

The doctrine of Rousseau, Montesquieu, and Diderot helped to blaze the trail of the eighteenth century in France. These thinkers foresaw the French Revolution, but they failed to see its logical climax, the Reign of Terror. Thirty years after Rousseau’s call to faith, Robespierre mounted the rostrum of the French Convention and, following his own reason, declared a new creed: “Terror is nothing else than justice, prompt, secure, and inflexible. It is … an emanation of virtue.” The kind of reason that inspired the struggle for liberty died on the guillotine.

England provides a sharp contrast. Fired by national revival led by John Wesley and George Whitefield, England moved into the nineteenth century examining its conscience by the light of Holy Scripture. Thus William Wilberforce could climax his plea to end the African slave trade with this ringing claim:

There is a principle above everything that is political; and when I reflect on the command which says: Thou shalt not commit murder, believing the authority to be Divine, how can I dare to set up any reasonings of my own against it? What is there in this life that should make any man contradict the dictates of his conscience, the principles of justice, the laws of religion and of God? [an address delivered to the House of Commons, May 12, 1789].

Wilberforce could appeal to absolute principles of justice because he had the Word of God in his heart. Man’s dignity, rights, and essential worth rest solely on the revealed fact that God created man in his own image.

In tragic contrast to the man with the Bible, twentieth-century man, the heir of five centuries of humanism, rationalism, enlightenment, determinism, and existentialism, stands in an abyss of despair. Philosophy has given up the search for a firm basis on which to build him a morality. Behavioristic psychology defines him as a complex biological machine, nothing more. He looks out into a cold, dark, ugly universe without purpose and shrieks in the knowledge that he has no worth. And so the Skinners, the Cricks, the genetic engineers, the creators of test-tube babies, and the purveyors of unlimited abortion have arrived at the logical conclusion of Western history, the end of the road to which their secular wisdom inevitably leads.

No, not quite the end. The New Testament previews the end in these devastating terms: “God sends upon them … the full force of evil’s delusion, so that they put their faith in an utter fraud” (2 Thess. 2:11, Phillips). The Big Lie and the Great Liar may indeed be waiting in the wings of the final decades of this century.

How shall we react? If we allow the trend of events to paralyze us with dread, Christ will be invisible to our generation. The Body of Christ must not lie down and play dead. The warfare rages on, and the command “Fight the good fight of faith” has not been stricken from the combat manual.

Moreover, we have great news for the man in the street. Modern science tells him he is an accidental arrangement of molecules, but the Word of God proclaims he is crowned with glory and honor. He bears not only the influence of heredity and environment but the very image of God. He has potential for magnificence.

The enemy has established strongholds in the minds of men. By many subtle methods he manipulates their attitudes and their opinions. He uses books, magazines, movies, plays, TV, radio. He uses people in science, business, labor, politics, education, and, of course, religion. He plants deceptive fantasies and fake philosophies in men’s brains, designing these ideas to appeal to man’s pride and lust and yet not offend his conscience. His purpose is to overthrow every trace of God’s authority.

The brand of Christianity that dismisses man’s mind as irrelevant in the process of salvation actually forfeits the war. Man’s mind is the battlefield. He cannot be saved until at least one idea is crushed: the idea that he can live independently of or apathetically toward God. He must recognize God’s right to be God over all the universe, especially himself. That is why Paul declared, “We persuade men”:

The very weapons we use are not those of human warfare but powerful in God’s warfare for the destruction of the enemy’s strongholds. Our battle is to bring down every deceptive fantasy and every imposing defense that men erect against the true knowledge of God. We even fight to capture every thought [2 Cor. 10:3–5, Phillips].

John Bunyan conveys the nature of the battle in the vivid scenes of Pilgrim’s Progress. The city of Man-soul, once ruled by Emmanuel, has fallen to Diabolus. The evil king cannot kill Mr. Conscience, so he chains him deep in the bowels of the city dungeon. Under Emmanuel’s leadership Captain Conviction leads an assault on Ear-Gate and stirs the sleeping Mr. Conscience to shout so loudly that the entire city mobilizes to overthrow the usurper.

We assault men’s darkened minds and enslaved consciences through personal witness. Undoubtedly the Holy Spirit brings innumerable people to God through person-to-person sharing of Christ. He captures their thoughts when we wield the truth in love. “We can enlighten men only because we can give them knowledge of the glory of God as we see it in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor. 4:6, Phillips).

Furthermore, when we demonstrate love and unity among ourselves before the watching world we batter the gates of hell to pieces. Real fellowship is so rare in the office, the factory, the country club, the fraternity, the bowling team, that when the worldly onlooker sees it among us he is likely to conclude that Christianity is real. Jesus prayed this amazing prayer: “I in them and you in me, that they may grow complete into one, so that the world may realize that you sent me” (John 17:21, Phillips).

Truth, love, and visible unity are powerful weapons that God has placed in our hands and expects all of us to use dynamically in personal and corporate witness. But as we befriend the children of this age, we must emphasize the doctrine of man’s infinite worth and personify its breathtaking implications of love, joy, and purpose.

Beyond these basic duties, some of us Christian warriors need to step into the arena of cultural life and tackle the difficult job of presenting truth to modern man through secular media. Our culture still gives room to effective spokesmen for Christ. One bitter November night my wife and I, along with several hundred other people, stood in line for forty-five minutes to buy tickets to the movie The Cross and the Switchblade. Night after night the theater was jammed.

Christianity needs more film producers who can bring the crowds through the turnstiles to see gripping sagas of Christian experience. It needs a few dozen highly skilled writing craftsmen who will launch out beyond the limits of the Christian market and determine to become the John Bunyans and C. S. Lewises of this generation.

Why concede the mass media to Satan? Why default all the university chairs of philosophy, psychology, and social science to men dedicated to secular myths? Why not invade these and other privileged sanctuaries of the opposing forces? The religion departments of the major news magazines seem like a strategic target for sharp reporters who can focus national attention on the remarkable events of spiritual significance happening in our time. The vocal minorities of Christian congressmen, astronauts, athletes, and scientists who make a strong case for biblical Christianity need reinforcements—the more the mightier.

In June, 1971, Jesus made the cover of Time magazine. Our world must remain Jesus-conscious. Not only his name but his personality, his words, and most of all his mission deserve unquenched publicity. The destroyers of man do not control the avenues to men’s minds—yet. Their ideas must compete with ours in the market places of our time. We face two alternatives: invade these secular domains or lose them by default.

Almost immediately after Winston Churchill presented his program of “blood, sweat, toil, and tears” to his threatened nation, France fell, and Britain’s future looked utterly dismal. Churchill again challenged his people not to despair but to fight:

If we fail, then the whole world … will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age, made more sinister and perhaps more protracted by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will say, “This was their finest hour” [address to the House of Commons, June 18, 1940].

A greater menace and a more perverted science dare us to cringe at their fierceness, but God has not given us the spirit of fear. He encourages us to be strong and to destroy the tempo of decadence. Let us rejoice that God has chosen us to represent him at this moment of history. Let us confront the Brave New World with a braver Church, a Church filled with a passion to finish its career in a blaze of glory to God. With “blood, sweat, toil, and tears” and with spiritual weapons let us recruit great numbers of the uncommitted to Christ. With his Spirit’s power let us conduct ourselves with such distinction that God’s eternal record books will declare of the Church at the end of the twentieth century, “This was their finest hour.”

George M. Marsden is associate professor of history at Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has the Ph.D. (Yale University) and has written “The Evangelical Mind and the New School Presbyterian Experience.”

    • More fromGary Hardaway

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Speaking at an Easter sunrise service at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland brought me into contact with a number of military persons. I had dinner in the home of a retired colonel, a West Point graduate whose two sons also graduated from West Point. What struck me was their commitment to Christ and their zeal for a positive witness in the armed forces. It is good to be reminded that there are thousands of fine Christians in the military serving God and the nation around the world.

My son John’s engagement to Stephanie Larson of Minneapolis was announced recently. Their wedding this summer will be a milestone in the lives of friend wife and myself: we will have no more unmarried children (and no more college expenses!). As I wrote this we are awaiting also the imminent arrival of a third grandchild to crown our blessings. All this led me to reflect that the story of Ruth and Boaz comes from the period of Judges, which was characterized by savagery, lust, strife, and lawlessness. But the Book of Ruth is marked by love and marriage, the birth of babies, simple faith, and the tilling of the land: the common activities of ordinary people as they lived and died quietly amid the turbulence of their age. It still has a familiar sound, doesn’t it?

Samuel F. Rowen

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Especially within the realm of evangelical missions, many eyes are turned toward a fast-growing educational phenomenon: the extension seminary, more properly “theological education by extension” (TEE), a sort of class-less approach to learning. In TEE, the student can stay at home—and on the job—with self-study materials and occasional contacts with his teacher. Denominations and missions are spared the costs of expensive school facilities and resident faculties. Churches need not suffer even the temporary loss of effective workers.

Rarely has a basic alteration of institutional modes moved so rapidly, hop-scotching its way completely around the world. Where TEE has touched, enrollments in theological education have skyrocketed. More importantly, according to some of its chief proponents, the educational experiences have taken on a fresh relevance to the needs of the Church.

TEE began ten years ago in the Presbyterian Seminary in Guatemala. Two engineers-turned-missionary-educators, Ralph Winter (now at Fuller Seminary) and Jim Emery, teed off with five extension students. Extension, a monthly newsletter reporting TEE developments worldwide, recently listed 9,030 extension students studying in 742 centers throughout Latin America. The largest program reported is that of the Presbyterian Seminary of Brazil, which involves 3,000 students.

Dr. John Sinclair, who oversees Latin American work for the United Presbyterian Church, thinks TEE has helped to open up an improved relationship between his denomination and the Presbyterian Church in Guatemala.

In January, 1971, extension programs began in five centers throughout India. By last November, there were twelve centers, and enrollment had jumped from 120 to 250. Similar organizations exist in Singapore, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Africa. The Theological Education Fund of the World Council of Churches has budgeted $245,000 for TEE projects. This is equal to the amount it designated for all other types of experiments in theological education. A major reason for the Fund’s interest in TEE is its financial viability in the third world.

One feature of TEE programs has been the use of programmed instruction. Extension students must have self-instructional materials that they can handle on their own between periodic contacts with the teacher. Opinions vary on the value and use of programmed materials but responsible research is going on. For instance, Lois McKinney, a Baptist missionary in Brazil, has just completed research under a Ford Foundation grant related to her studies in ethno-pedogogy. Such research may resolve some of the questions, especially those related to the cross-cultural transformation of instructional materials.

Although TEE has been primarily a third-world phenomenon, it is of increasing interest to North American theological educators. Several conferences to discuss the implications of TEE for North America are in the works. Wheaton College has included TEE in its summer graduate program, attracting not only missionaries but teachers from North American schools. Fuller Seminary has plans for four extension centers this fall.

Two factors suggest that the interest in TEE will not soon subside—a renewed interest in a theologically literate laity and the need for an effective continuing-education program for the professional ministry.

The search for more effective educational alternatives is not limited to theological education. The U. S. government is investing substantially in research on “non-formal” modes of education. TEE provides rome of the best examples of what is meant by non-formal educational programs, and Lois McKinney’s studies are part of the governmental research project. In a meeting in Penang, Malaysia, for ministers of education of ten Southeastern Asian nations, Dr. Ted Ward of the Institute for International Education at Michigan State University gave a paper on “Effective Learning in Non-Formal Modes.” Ward, an evangelical, has been a strong advocate of TEE and has conducted workshops for missionaries in Africa and Latin America.

Participants at a TEE seminar two months ago in São Paulo, Brazil, were told there are 60,000 functioning pastors in Latin America with no theological training. For most of them, TEE is their—and the churches’—best hope for a remedy.

Some see TEE as a fad or have taken a wait-and-see stance. Ward feels the fad stage is past. “Educational fads usually show signs of mortification and have peculiar odors within three or four years,” he says. “Aside from some setbacks related to overselling and some very responsible hesitation in certain countries, there are no real signs that the extension idea will die the death of a fad.”

The disciples of TEE vigorously promote their faith. Some of the difficulties of the early days are being remedied by the reorganization programs. In January, fifty-three delegates met in Medellin, Colombia, and formed the Latin American Association on Institutions and Theological Seminaries by Extension (ALISTE). In so doing they dismantled previous structures geared chiefly to the production of programmed textbooks. In Singapore, a filmstrip, “TEE Could Be the Answer,” is helping to push the extension idea in Asia.

Experts see two problems that may impede TEE expansion. The willingness to change does not always include an enlightened view of how change occurs, they caution; there is a danger of substituting one pattern for another without really coming to grips with the breadth of the problems underlying theological education. The second problem they cite is the cultural insensitivity that often underlies the exportation of institutional forms.

At the Brazilian seminar, sponsored by the Evangelical Association for Extension Theological Training in Brazil, a number of tough questions were discussed, including:

How are the dynamics of the classroom (group dynamics) maintained with only one hour of group study per week? How are music (voice) and speech (preaching) taught? Can extension training replace intensive, full-time reflection, in-depth research, with only marginal study time that may take up to ten years to complete? What happens to honest discussion, ethics by example, and lapidacao (knocking off the rough corners)?

In the long run, the central question facing TEE is whether the change to extension modes will be merely a movement from one rigid system to another. The advocates of TEE admit the danger. But they think TEE offers the most promise for breaking the mono-cultural death grip that has held back theological education in the third world.

A LOAN FROM PETER TO PAUL?

The eighty-five-year-old founder and president of the Home Echo nursing home in Columbus, Ohio, withdrew $45,000 of the home’s money from the bank and donated it to Rising Star Missionary Baptist Church. But the nursing home trustees knew nothing about the transaction. They are threatening, consequently, to charge Mrs. Carrie Stewart, the president, with criminal embezzlement, and several have asked for her dismissal.

It seems that not only did she obtain the money from the bank without the signature of a co-signer as required by the corporation’s by-laws, but she also could not give reasons for the withdrawal except that “it was to feed the poor and needy.”

Pastor T. R. Gasten of Rising Star maintains that the money was given to “the poor and hungry in Mississippi and North Carolina.” But no specifics or records have emerged regarding the gift or its disbursement.

Mrs. Stewart claims that she only borrowed the money and intends to pay it back.

Theology Down Under

The difficulty of theological training in the Southwest Pacific was recently highlighted by an eighty-five-page report from the Australian and New Zealand Society for Theological Studies. The five-year-old society, an ecumenical fellowship that includes a large Roman Catholic segment, was organized to support serious theological inquiry and to promote development of theological studies in Australian universities.

Denominational conflicts and ecclesiastical pressures operative when the universities were founded there more than a century ago resulted in statutes excluding formal religious disciplines from the official curricula. Several schools offer some biblical-type subjects in their liberal arts, history, or Semitic studies departments, but enrollments are low, and clergymen say the courses do not prepare a student for the parish ministry. Each of the churches has therefore founded its own theological colleges that prepare men for denominationally accredited ordination. These, in the main, require university entrance standards but—unlike their U. S. counterparts—have no power to confer recognized degrees, a practice reserved for the state universities.

The Australian College of Theology, an Anglican school, and the interdenominational Melbourne College of Divinity offer external examinations in theology in the “University of London” correspondence tradition. These appear to have little status, however, outside the churches.

The society’s report found there were 2,374 theological students in Australia, New Zealand, and the near Pacific Islands, with a full-time faculty of 264 and 154 part-time teachers. Anglican students numbered 363 in eleven schools, Presbyterians 274 in four, Methodists 203 in six, and Baptists 156 in six. Lutherans, Congregationalists, Reformed, and Churches of Christ enrolled a total of 209 students in nine other schools. More than 1,100 were enrolled in Catholic schools.

There now appears to be a real move toward improvement. Many of the students in the denominational theological colleges are taking concurrent or postgraduate secular university degrees, and some church-sponsored residential halls have been established at or near universities.

There is also a plan to establish a department of “religious studies” at the Australian National University, in Canberra, the capital. Because of Australia’s location, this university has a vital interest in the political, commercial, and cultural elements of Southeast Asian societies. The plan is to set up a department that, while centering on the Judaeo-Christian tradition in religion, will give greater attention to Buddhism, Islam, and other Southeast Asian religious interests. The liberal thrust of its approach can be seen in an extract from the foundation committee report: “No member of the [religious studies] department, either staff or student, shall be expected to share or not to share any particular religious belief or belief in religion in general.”

“Undoubtedly a very small and questionable beginning,” comments an informal observer. “But it is at last evident that the climate is favorable to a more academically respectable development of theological training than before.”

Evangelicals meanwhile remain concerned that the ecumenical thrust that has reduced university hesitancy may result also in a further crippling of conservative theological perspective.

CRAIG SKINNER

Extending The Seminary

Presbyterian churches in Birmingham, Alabama, have come up with an idea to plug the gap in theological education for clergymen and church workers lacking seminary training. Last fall they launched the Birmingham Extension Seminary for Theological Education, and now dozens of degree students—many of them college graduates—are enrolled.

“It’s just what I’ve been waiting for,” commented a black Cumberland Presbyterian minister with ten years of experience. “I have had to hold a secular job all of my years in the ministry, and still do. I have been dreaming of this all my life. God sent it.”

Classes, held on weekends, are taught by four volunteers, all Presbyterian ministers, and a visiting seminary professor (paid for by a low tuition fee). Covenant Seminary in St. Louis approves credits offered by the school, and three more seminaries are expected to do likewise. One church provides classrooms, another operates a library, and still another runs a bookstore for the extension students.

Missouri Synod: Stacked Deck?

Another entry in the simmering dispute between Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) president Jacob A. O. Preus, an advocate of biblical inerrancy, and the majority of the Concordia Seminary faculty is the LCMS Commission on Theology and Church Relations (CTCR). After studying the first of a two-part declaration of faith by the faculty, the commission rejected the document as “not correctly representing the issues under debate in our synod,” and said it would tend to “confuse rather than edify the church.” The CTCR also charged that when the statement does touch on issues at stake (the inspiration, inerrancy, and authority of the Bible), it departs from what is considered by the commission a “Lutheran position.”

This month at the seminary in St. Louis, the majority faction dismissed CTCR findings because the commission allegedly did not substantiate its charges and refused to discuss the theological positions set forth in the faculty document. There were also angry murmurings that the commission was stacked in favor of arch-foe Preus.

The CTCR reports on theological issues in the Missouri Synod, and, though it has no policy-making power, critics agree its views are respected in many LCMS churches. Several CTCR members are appointed by the synod president, some are elected by the synodical convention, and others represent LCMS seminaries.

In a related decision, the commission will recommend to the upcoming New Orleans convention that the synod reject any method of biblical interpretation that deprives Scripture of divine authority.

Meanwhile, Crossroads, a lay-clergy alliance, claims it has received more than 190,000 individual endorsements of its call for Preus’s reelection at the New Orleans convention.

Methodists: For Free Flow

The United Methodist Church’s powerful global ministries board adopted positions on several important issues at its annual meeting last month. In one, the agency committed itself to Key 73, calling on United Methodist congregations to develop evangelism programs that are “faithful to the full gospel of Jesus Christ.”

Stating it deplored “mounting efforts of governments” to control reporting and analysis of the mass media around the world, the board pledged itself to “a free flow of information about our own activities.” It also endorsed a National Council of Churches resolution calling on the U. S. government to be generous in providing relief and reconstruction in Indochina, and through one of its units voted $597,000 for Indochina aid.

Records show the board spent more than $42 million in 1972, including $17.4 million for overseas missions and $11.5 million for national missions.

Sentenced By Soviets

In the Soviet town of Osipovichi, Belorussia, two dissident Baptist leaders were recently sent to labor camps on charges of violating Soviet laws on the separation of church and state and failing to register their congregation. Pastor Lazar Sotnichenko was sentenced to five years at hard labor and lay minister Mikhail Dernovich to two years.

A Young Communist daily reported their trial and church-in-the-home activities. Police searches were said to have uncovered religious material smuggled in from Paris and Brussels and the secretly printed Reform Baptist (Initsiativniki) magazines Fraternal Leaflet and Salvation Messenger. Other seized items included tapes of gospel broadcasts in Russian, songbooks, religious poetry, sermons, and copybooks filled with Bible passages written by Russian Baptist teen-agers. Copies of appeals to the United Nations protesting religious persecutions were also confiscated.

ANGELO COSMIDES

Just Between Jews

Despite attempts at conciliation, the conflict over evangelism of Jews is still on, in both the United States and Israel.

In Portland, Oregon, rabbis say the Jewish community is “tense” over recent efforts by youthful Jews for Jesus to witness during and after synagogue services. Police were called to two synagogues to remove the Christians, who, rabbis claim, interrupted services by shouting, waving hands, and distributing tracts. A spokesman for the Christians said they did not intend to interrupt, but he admitted there were expressions of praise—as at a Jesus rally.

Washington, D. C., area Jews denounced as “trickery” a “Purim” party sponsored by a mission. (Purim is a Jewish feast traditionally dating from the days when Esther saved the Jews from genocide.) The party, held by Beth Sar Shalom (House of the Prince of Peace), an American Board of Missions to the Jews front, included a play based on the story of Esther along with an explanation of Jesus as the Messiah. Rabbi Balfour Brickner of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations denounced such use of “the trappings of Judaism.” The Hebrew Christians replied that they are still Jews, celebrating Jewish holidays with deeper understanding because they are “fulfilled” by Jesus.

Similar hostility and protest caused cancelation of a half-hour television program in New York City. WPIX-TV cut the program shortly before airing after Jewish leaders, who were given a preview of the show, complained to the station management. The program, also sponsored by Beth Sar Shalom and titled “Jews for Jesus,” featured talk-show host Les Crane interviewing Jewish followers of Jesus.

In North Carolina a TV series entitled “Ben Israel” is upsetting Jewish viewers. One rabbi said he tells protestors simply to turn the program off if they don’t like it. Hosted by Jewish evangelist Arthur Katz, the weekly half-hour program features Katz and guests discussing faith in Jesus. Officials at WRDU-TV in Durham say the program is causing “quite a stir,” with letters and telephone calls running six to one against the show. Ten segments have been shown so far, and Katz is hoping to syndicate the program.

A leading Jewish newspaper, The Jewish Post and Opinion, editorialized that it’s time for Jews to increase proselytizing efforts among Christians. Such a campaign would give confidence to Jews about their own faith as well as win Christians to Judaism, it said. Moishe Rosen, a California Jews for Jesus spokesman, said Jews may be surprised to find no resistance among evangelicals to proselytizing efforts. “If Judaism became a missionary religion, it could lead to a better understanding between Jews and Christians, resulting in mutual respect,” said Rosen. Christians, he added, would welcome increased information on their Jewish roots, “which would serve to buttress and strengthen their own beliefs in Christ. Furthermore, where the law is preached, the grace of Christ abounds.”

The Post and Opinion has already gained an aura of notoriety in the Jewish community by running the controversial “Smiling Jews” ad sponsored by the American Board of Missions to the Jews. The result: a flood of mail, mostly in outraged opposition to the ad and the newspaper’s decision to run it. Editor Gabriel Cohen, hit by numerous cancelations, says he published the ad to show the maturity of the Jewish people and their ability to resist evangelism. As a sop, he later published a free “Jews for Judaism” ad.

In Israel, meanwhile, it was announced that a Boston rabbinical court annulled the “conversion” to Judaism of evangelism activist Carol “Shira” Lindsay, daughter of a Texas evangelist. The court said she failed to tell the rabbis that she believed in Jesus. Israeli authorities can now withdraw her visa issued under the “Law of Return,” which grants immediate Israeli citizenship to Jews. To expel her, the government presumably must take her to court. If that happens it will be the first time in Israeli history that a Jewish immigrant’s status is challenged.

Delegates to the recent “World Bible Conference” in Israel issued a protest to Prime Minister Golda Meir over what it called “periodic pressure” against missionaries and “discrimination against Christians Jews seeking to become Israeli citizens.” The 350 signatories also called on the United States to curtail economic and military aid to states that practice “subtle forms of religious intolerance.”

Religion In Transit

Many church leaders and church groups are publicly protesting the Nixon administration’s proposed 1974 budget cutbacks affecting a variety of social programs.

Toronto journalist Allen Spraggett and Canon William V. Rauscher of New Jersey assert in a new book that the late spiritual medium Arthur Ford cheated in that 1967 séance when the late Bishop James A. Pike believed he communicated with his dead son. The authors say Ford had researched details in lives of some of Pike’s deceased friends.

The annual Interreligious Film Awards, sponsored by the nation’s major Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish bodies, went to The Emigrants, a film somewhat critical of Christianity, and Sounder, about rural blacks.

Safeway Stores, the target of recent boycotts and consumer suits, has filed a $150 million libel suit against farm labor organizer Cesar Chavez, the Interfaith Committee to Aid Farm Workers, and others. Safeway, charging legal and economic harassment, cited statements allegedly distributed by religious and union groups.

Christian Heritage College and its Institute for Creation Research directed by Henry M. Morris has moved from San Diego to a former Catholic college campus in the suburbs.

The staid 2,000-member St. Mark’s Episcopal Church of Glendale, California, reported a “joyous spiritual revival” with hundreds gathered at the altar, during the visit of a sixty-volunteer lay witness team.

Christian Broadcasting Network began operating its fourth television station this month: Channel 33 in Dallas. CBN own stations in Atlanta, Boston, and Portsmouth, Virginia, and has commercial affiliates in nine other cities.

Campus Crusade for Christ has launched The Agape Movement, aimed at recruiting 100,000 persons by 1980 for international Christian service. Agape will combine witness with social work. The initial project involves training 1,000 with medical and agricultural skills to serve in South Korea.

Personalia

Astronaut-turned-evangelist James B. Irwin, 43, was temporarily grounded by a heart attack that he suffered while playing handball at an Air Force base in Colorado.

Archbishop Ieronymos, primate of the Orthodox Church of Greece since 1967, resigned, suffering from ill health and from intense criticism on several fronts (one being the hierarchy). The church’s ruling body, however, refused to accept the resignation and gave him a three-month sick leave instead.

Atlanta Baptist pastor Martin Luther King, Sr., who was recently named Clergyman of the Year by the National Conference of Christians and Jews, took his hate-no-man message on a tour of Israel.

Evangelist Oral Roberts is the latest name churchman to be elected to a major corporation’s board of directors (Oklahoma Natural Gas).

Marjoe Gortner, 28, filmdom’s famed ex-evangelist, walked out of an NBC television studio in Chicago without making a scheduled appearance on a popular late-night show. Sources say he didn’t want to talk religion with copanelists Robert Schroy, head of Chicago’s Jesus Rally, and Jews for Jesus leader Moishe Rosen.

Charles Mellis has retired as Missionary Aviation Fellowship’s president; veteran MAF pilot and leader Charles Bennett succeeds him.

National Council of Churches executive John E. Biersdorf was appointed director of the Institute for Advanced Pastoral Studies, succeeding the learning center’s founder, Reuel L. Howe, who has retired. The center recently got a $195,000 grant from the Lilly foundation.

Well-known World War II bombardier Jacob DeShazer, 60, a Free Methodist missionary to Japan (he was converted in a Japanese POW camp after getting shot down in the memorable Doolittle raids) and a critic of the U. S. role in Indochina, has come out for amnesty for draft-dodgers. In a Detroit Free Press interview, he also said that he had advised his three sons to go to Canada to evade the draft but that they served anyway, and one took part in B-52 raids on North Viet Nam.

World Scene

The fourth Islamic Foreign Ministers conference, a twenty-five nation meeting in Libya, heard Libya’s Mansour Le Kekhia charge that “the four million Muslims in the Philippines are facing collective genocide by [President Ferdinand] Marcos and his Christian terrorist gang, in implementation of a plan that was organized after the Pope’s visit to Manila in 1970.” Philippine officials denied the allegation.

Wading into the furor over Sex and Confession, a book by an Italian couple who tape-recorded responses of priests to fake confessions, Pope Paul VI ordered the automatic excommunication of anyone who breaks the secrecy of the confessional booth with a tape recorder.

Chiong-hui Hwang, former moderator of the 200,000-member Presbyterian Church in Taiwan and now director of the World Council of Churches’ Theological Education Fund, announced a campaign led by Christians to achieve self-determination for the Taiwanese. (The 12 million native Formosans are under martial rule of the Nationalist Chinese, representing two million refugees and descendants.)

Pastor Patrick Krieling of the Dutch Reformed Church, Wellington, South Africa, will not be able to live in the parsonage because it has always been used by whites and he is “coloured.” Trustees will build him a new house.

Swedish Pentecostal missionaries in Burundi in central Africa may be in for trouble from the government. The ruling Watusi (Tutsi) tribe apparently resents missionary help given to refugee Hutu tribe members. The Tutsis killed more than 100,000 Hutus last year. Meantime, strife between Hutus and Tutsis in neighboring Rwanda has left hundreds of Christian families homeless.

In 1967, Albania proclaimed itself the world’s first atheist state and declared every religious practice a crime. Today the church is virtually non-existent there, concedes the Vatican. The background of Albania’s 2.2 million population is said to be 70 per cent Muslim, 20 per cent Orthodox, and 10 per cent Catholic.

An Italian military court jailed seven Jehovah’s Witnesses for refusing military service. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union blocked a move of the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva to secure universal recognition for rights of conscientious objectors. Explained a Communist official: “Under the Soviet constitution, it is the sacred duty for every Soviet citizen to protect the nation, hence to do military service.”

Spanish radio stations are said to be quietly dropping evangelical programs.

The Assemblies of God has 3.8 million members and adherents in the ninety-two countries where its foreign missionaries serve—a one-year increase of 10.7 per cent (100 per cent in the past six years). There are 25,579 AOG churches and outstations manned by 1,087 missionaries and nearly 19,000 national workers.

About 50,000 South Korean servicemen have been baptized in the past two years, and hundreds of chaplains and pastors are engaged in follow-up. An estimated 25 per cent of the nation’s armed forces personnel are professing believers, compared to between 10 and 13 per cent of the population.

Partnership Mission’s Rochunga Pudiate affirms that as many as 1,000 letters a day are pouring into the New Delhi office in response to a well-publicized campaign in which the Living New Testament is being mailed to India’s 1.2 million telephone subscribers. Reports of conversions number into the hundreds, he says.

Archbishop Ralph Dean of the Anglican Church of Canada, former executive officer of the worldwide Anglican Communion, warned that unless the World Council of Churches moves away from policies that equate salvation with social justice it will lose the backing of “a lot of conservative churches” (including entire denominations).

Brazilian newspapers say Rome is concerned about Protestant growth in Brazil. Despite the importing of 1,200 priests from Holland alone and the shortage of pastors in many Protestant churches, there are now more Protestant pastors than priests, say the papers.

Visiting missionaries found that the Christian church at Chali in southern Sudan had more than tripled in size since 1964, when the government ousted all missionaries. There are now 1,100 baptized believers, up from 310, and eight centers have been opened, led by youths who were schoolboys when the missionaries left.

    • More fromSamuel F. Rowen
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