Prayer Time: Get A Pencil
Our assistant pastor has our congregation well trained. For years he has had the unenviable task of making announcements and promoting programs at the most incommunicable times: at the start of a service, just before a meal, or as we’re loading the bus. Our people just aren’t ready to listen at those times.
But I wonder if the reason they aren’t prepared to listen is because they know they will get a repeat of those same announcements during his next prayer. Take last Sunday’s invocation, for example:
“Dear Lord, we thank thee for our fine Sunday school attendance of 274 on this, the first week in our growth campaign, even though we have seven families on vacation and four members hospitalized, as noted in the back of your, uh, our bulletin. We ask your blessings on this service, and on our stewardship banquet this evening at 6 P.M. in the fellowship hall, 5:30 for those bringing cupcakes. What a joy it is to be here on this last Sunday before Millie and I leave on vacation to visit her sister and brother-in-law in Buffalo next week. Give us traveling mercies so that we may return to regular office hours next Wednesday at 9 A.M., and guide Brother Smith as he leads my Tuesday night Bible study at the regular time in room 102. Now give us all willing ears to hear the pastor’s message this morning, and to take notes, if we feel led, with the paper and pencils provided in the pews in front of us. Amen.”
Like I said, the pastor has the congregation well trained. They know that when someone is “praying,” that is the time to listen to announcements and critique the speaker.
Did I say “well trained”? Let’s say “trained.”
EUTYCHUS
Us Against Them
In sharp, quick strokes Vernon Grounds [“A Call to Respect God’s Image,” Apr. 5] has skillfully dissected the beast Demogoguery, which stalks pulpits and the national airwaves under the guise of a courageous religious uprising. Grounds exposes the twitching nerves of this unjust rhetoric: Destructive attacks that stereotype and dehumanize the people we oppose.
Unfortunately, many youthful believers think uncompromising rhetoric demands an “us against them” name-calling discourse. I witness this every fall semester while teaching freshmen composition.
JAMES VINCENT
Moody Bible Institute
Chicago, Ill.
Vernon Grounds’s unfortunate efforts to place the “Religious Right” on the same moral plane as Hitler and the KKK places him in the very camp he so self-righteously condemns.
ROBERT PETERS
New York, N.Y.
Hooray! for the message in Vernon Grounds’s editorial. Our goal is to save, not alienate; we are ambassadors, not terrorists. Thank you, Dr. Grounds, for your timely and practical call to honor the image of God in us.
REV. PHIL LUNDY
Bethel Baptist Church
Tillamook, Oreg.
There is no scriptural basis for Grounds’s thesis that Hitler, or any one of us, is “made in God’s image.” Genesis is clear that God originally created man in his own image, and that it is likely that had our first parents not rebelled and disobeyed God’s Word, their children would have continued to be born in God’s image. But note Genesis 5:1 and then 5:3. The original image was forfeited by the first Adam.
HADDON MACDAVID
San Diego, Calif.
All humans were “created” in God’s image (which image was marred by the Fall), but are not “fathered” by him except in rebirth.
The Scriptures do not teach hate, only separation. We can support good causes, but not align ourselves with unbelievers to obtain goals, for then we are no longer obeying Scripture. We should not equate our country, or our faith, with the vocal minority.
G. D. KRAGEN
Santa Rosa, Calif.
Grounds states, “granted that our government has not been guilty of atrocities as ghastly as Hitler’s Holocaust.” What do we call 1.5 million aborted (murdered) babies a year—more humane and less atrocious?
REV. MATTHEW SUSSANO
Bethel Assembly of God
Bath, N.Y.
History provides the gory illustrations to what happens when my beliefs are “holy” and yours are “satanic.” I then fall victim to my own idolatry of myself.
REV. ROB CALDERHEAD
St. Paul’s United Methodist Church
Coronado, Calif.
Name-calling proves nothing and does not answer to or even acknowledge the very real convictions of those with whom we disagree. In regard to the issue of abortion (legalized), the use of the term prolife to describe those who are against it directly implies that those who are in favor of freedom of choice on this issue are somehow against life or perhaps abhor “life.” Isn’t this a form of labeling and caricaturizing, even if it is unspoken?
CHRISTINE CHURCHILL
Portland, Oreg.
A Cheap Shot
In “The Supreme Court’s Changing Stance on Religious Freedom” (Insight, Apr. 19), Samuel Ericsson covers a range of issues, including the widely attacked school prayer decisions. But Ericsson’s accurate statement is negated by the accompanying Stayskal cartoon. Stayskal has made a specialty of such cheap shots—drawing cartoons that are clever but unscrupulous, since they distort the facts and principles of the cases alluded to. Ericsson, it seems, giveth understanding—at least to a degree—but Stayskal taketh it away.
STAN LICHTENSTEIN
Bethesda, Md.
Valuable Legal Aid
Thank you for the article about our legal status, entitled “Prolonged Legal Battle Forces Research Organization into Federal Bankruptcy Court” [News, April 5]. I am concerned that your readers not misunderstand the valuable service that attorney Michael J. Woodruff has rendered on behalf of Spiritual Counterfeits Project in our defense of the libel suit brought by Witness Lee and the local church. Woodruff has been our attorney for over 10 years. As SCP’s lead attorney in the Lee case, he gave us a reduced rate for his legal services, and worked many hours on his own time.
He stayed with us as long as he possibly could, right up to the eve of trial. The SCP staff and board have the highest admiration and respect for Michael—for the massive amount and quality of work he did.
REV. DAVID BROOKS
Spiritual Counterfeits Project
Berkeley, Calif.
The problem with SCP is that they judged the local church based on agnostic psychology and Western traditions, not by Scripture. All true Christians look defective in the world’s view.
MARGARET BELL
Living Streams Ministry
Anaheim, Calif.
Your article about SCP said that “CRI could be the next organization to be sued,” and that “SCP’s conclusions on the local church are similar to those of CRI founder and director Walter Martin, as expressed in the book The New Cults.” It needs to be noted that Dr. Martin’s analysis appears in the teachings of Witness Lee. Like SCP, Dr. Martin maintains that the local church is Christian, not cultic, although some teachings are criticized as unbiblical. While the possibility of a suit against us cannot be ruled out, CRI does not expect such a suit.
ROBERT M. BOWMAN, JR.
Christian Research Institute
San Juan Capistrano, Calif.
Somebody Else Said It
In “Leading Evangelical Scholars Trade Their Latest Insights” [Apr. 19] about the Wheaton conference, most of the words attributed to me were from a part of my paper in which I was quoting economist James Gwartney of the economics department at Florida State University. It is important that (1) Gwartney himself know that I made it clear I was quoting him; and (2) anyone who has seen Gwartney’s unpublished paper know that the mistake was an unintentional error on the part of a reporter and the record is now straight.
RONALD NASH
Western Kentucky University
Bowling Green, Ky.
Love For The Land
Praise the Lord! Paul Brand has spoken [“A Handful of Mud,” Apr. 19]. This article has the heart of the message we need to hear. The “graven image” in the background of your cover illustration points to the fact that most of us have no love of the land, only of money.
PAUL M. SHOGER
Oswego Prairie
United Methodist Church
Oswego, Ill.
We evangelicals spend most of our time on theological and social issues but rarely discuss environmental ones.
JON MILLER
Dallas, Tex.
Paul Brand’s “handful of mud” put together a study on planetary destruction from defoliation and soil erosion without once mentioning a very basic factor: overbreeding by both humans and livestock that is pushing us to the brink of suicide. He is right in saying that our view of trees as “timber” and not an essential part of the life cycle borders on blasphemy. I just returned from a periodic tour of several southeastern states, and the “slash and burn” mentality that I saw during years of service in Asia and Africa was everywhere evident.
HARVEY LESTER SPERRY
Greenwood, S.C.
Brand alleges that soil erosion and related problems are the fault of free enterprise and a runaway profit system. Both he and Philip Yancey suggest that such travesties might be solved by a modern application of the Jubilee laws. But those big corporate landgrabs have little to do with free enterprise. They could not take place in a truly free market. The great agribusiness corporations are fascistic, statist enterprises that have been receiving billions of dollars in federal support since the 1960s. These destructive, overstuffed giants can be broken down, not by granting the central government even more control, but by turning to a genuinely free market that has no room for corporate welfare. Does CHRISTIANITY TODAY have the prophetic courage to demand that we get the greedy, oppressive fat cats off the dole? The Jubilee was never intended to be applied outside of Israel, and no proponent of the idea has ever exegetically demonstrated otherwise.
DAVID CHILTON
Institute for Christian Economics
Tyler, Tex.
Does The Percentage Fall Short?
Your editorial, “Within Our Reach” [Apr. 19], is excellent. It is encouraging to see in print anything confirming my own perception that we now have the momentum. There is a major fallacy, however. You note that 58 percent of Americans now oppose most elective abortions and conclude that “… Americans now clearly have it in their power to pass legislation outlawing the vast majority of abortions.” Sadly, that is not true. It takes two-thirds of both houses of Congress and the legislatures of three-fourths of the states to pass a constitutional amendment, and unless the Supreme Court reverses itself, it will take a constitutional amendment to protect the lives of most unborn children. Fifty-eight percent is not sufficient.
THOMAS O. ALDERMAN
Eugene, Oreg.
The idea that a fetus is a person, and so an eternal soul, from the moment of conception is a religious belief, and is not shared by the majority of our citizens. Most of us—Jews, Protestants and a good many Roman Catholics—believe that we are given personhood at birth when we can live on our own as individuals, or at the earliest from the time of “viability” when the fetus can live on its own if born or removed prematurely.
J. E. SMITH
Minneapolis, Minn.
Is abortion more reprehensible to God than birth control?
ORVILLE RUTSCHMAN
Hesston, Kans.
Are We The Salieris?
Your review of Amadeus [“How Odd of God,” Apr. 19] is interesting but strange. It tries to compare Christ and his glorious free gift of salvation to the movie Mozart and his gift of music. Then, it works hard to create a perverted half-gospel message out of Salieri’s jealous attempt to steal Mozart’s requiem mass.
In the arts, the church is unhappy that it runs so far behind the world. And so we copy the world, or else we take their works and appropriate them by inserting gospel meanings. Does this situation make them the true and gifted sons of God, and us the envious Salieris?
SUE MULTANEN
Salem, Oreg.
Fleshly endowments such as Mozart’s brilliance were a blessing for unfallen Adam, but they are handicaps for fallen man. The “mystery” is not why some are blessed with beauty or brilliance, but why some are cursed with them.
JESS SCHILLING
San Antonio, Tex.
Rarely have I seen a more informative, interpretive, and inspiring review of a movie than the one you did on Amadeus.
RICHARD H. SCHNEIDER
Guideposts
New York, N.Y.
Motivations For Childlessness
Robert Roberts is too hard on those who have chosen childlessness [“Children: Who Needs Them?”]. How is a child to be compared with ample time for Bible study, ample time alone with God in prayer, or thorough devotion to one’s task as a missionary/teacher/evangelist? I have two children, and I find that the allocation of time among equally worthy activities is my biggest problem. As with many other things, the motive for childlessness is more important than childlessness itself. There are some who have the condition forced upon them by their inability to conceive. There are some who have heard a different calling from their Creator.
CYNTHIA JOHNSON
Kingsport, Tenn.
Manifesting Unity
I commend CHRISTIANITY TODAY for the establishment of the Christianity Today Institute [“The Christian as Citizen,” special section, Apr. 19]. I look forward to coverage of future institute proceedings. Amid the increasing polarization along political and theological lines in evangelicalism, the institute will serve a much-needed function of promoting discussion and consensus building in the Christian community. By bringing together those who share a common faith but who differ in their response to God’s norms for justice, righteousness, and peace in this world, we may discover that the body of Christ needs each one of us, that each has an important role. We may also discover that we differ less than we had imagined. Above all, it is an opportunity to manifest to our society the unity to which the apostle Paul calls us.
STEPHEN A. WEST
Raleigh, N.C.
The supplement section, “The Christian as Citizen,” was very timely, practical, and written with clarity. Thank you.
REV. DICK ROBINSON
address not given
When Jim Wallis cut the pages about the poor from the Bible, he must not have read them, as God gives some very specific principles in his Word concerning the poor. Both the Old and New Testament state the same fair principle. If one is without work, one can find much volunteer work to do until employed.
MRS. JAY HUGHES
Pendleton, Oreg.
Sojourners’ concern for the poor is definitely a biblical position. However, their emphasis on the economically poor, their view that the rich cause poverty by exploiting the poor, and the redistribution of wealth as the remedy for the poor are all political positions, and happen to be the same that Marxism holds. Jesus Christ never once changed a person’s economic condition.
GREG BROWN
Colorado Springs, Colo.
It was exciting to read the discussion about church and state. That issue challenged all of us to consider different points of view. Politically opposed evangelicals need to learn from each other. Perhaps your inclusion of Jim Wallis will challenge the narrowness of Sojourners magazine to follow suit.
REV. THOMAS A. KRAGT
Community Reformed Church
Lafayette, Ind.
I am discouraged to discover that there are no women listed as Fellows or Resource Scholars for the Christianity Today Institute. Surely there must be women who are qualified to speak to the issues of the day. There are many persons who are concerned about the lack of women’s representation in discussions of spiritual matters.
SUSAN T. MCCOUBRIE
Inver Grove Heights, Minn.
We agree with Packer and Henry that pluralism is not a mere expedient in a world of many religions and differentiated cultures. We take it to be a principle that is derived from the biblical teaching that the Creator God has established the norms for all of man’s responsibilities in every area of life—mathematical, physical, political, and ethical.
This principle of autonomous, but interrelated, spheres of life, under God, can be maintained, however, only if we recognize no dualism of “the secular and the spiritual.” We may not adopt the nontheistic vocabulary with its implications that some things do not belong to God, but to Caesar.
ARTHUR DAVIES
Holland, Mich.
Many thanks for inaugurating the Christianity Today Institute with the stimulating view of church and state.
HENRY DAVID GRAY
Congregational Journal
South Pasadena, Calif.
Letters are welcome. Brevity is preferred; only a selection can be published. All are subject to condensation. Write to Eutychus, CHRISTIANITY TODAY, 465 Gundersen Drive, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188.
