The Bottom Line
Tim Stafford’s cover article “Franchising Hope” [May 18] was, as usual, well-written and comprehensive. But it left me with more unanswered questions about the “Christian psychology” debate than I had before reading it.
Two issues trouble me. The first is the idea that Christians have to go to a therapy center to experience “more church than anywhere else.” Instead of our churches providing that haven (or sanctuary) from the attacks of the Devil, the world, and even our own fleshly natures, they are now places where problems are created and compounded.
The Christian psychology industry seems to want us to believe we need them to help us interpret what life means, how to get along with family, friends, and co-workers. (Where does that leave Scripture, the Holy Spirit, and the fellowship of the saints?) Are they saying we should replace the church with Christian therapy centers?
The second issue deals with motives and big bucks. If the bottom line of therapy centers is profit, can the work truly be of God? There are monumental opportunities for anyone who desires to help people deal with serious emotional and psychological issues. Is there any way the for-profit Christian therapy centers can provide services for the problems of the needy and poor of the inner city? Or is profit really the only bottom line in this industry?
Curtis Viles, Pastor
John Day, Oreg.
The Church Enquirer
I was standing in line at the supermarket check-out counter, bereft of the fourth fruit of the Spirit, when the National Enquirer shouted at me: “Elvis Does Show in Vegas—Gets Standing Ovation.”
As the minutes ticked by, I finally gave in. I scanned the article and discovered that a video of Elvis had played at some hole-in-the-wall Las Vegas baron the anniversary of his birthday. The audience on the tape had given the King a standing ovation. This is the stuff of which tabloid headlines are made.
Ashamed of my literary slumming, I tried to be philosophical as I shoved the magazine back in the rack. You have to give those editors credit, I thought. They do get people interested in their articles. I wish people were half as eager to read our church newsletter as they are that junk. And with that, a new—albeit brief—era in First Church journalism was born.
I rushed home and headlined the pastor’s front-page comments, “Church Facing Bankruptcy.” Of course, what the pastor had said was that Ed and Don’s Car Wash, which sits directly across from the church, was going out of business. He was encouraging prayers for the employees and their families.
I quickly got the hang of this new art form.
“Secretary Admits She Was Hooked on Pastor”: the pastor and his secretary had locked bumpers while simultaneously backing out of their parking spaces.
“Drugs Found in Choir Director’s Closet”: he left a bottle of Tylenol, which he had purchased just before choir practice.
Without a doubt my best effort was “Elvis Discovered in Church Basement.” The janitor found a rare, old poster of Presley, no doubt used as a prop for a sermon on the evils of rock and roll delivered to a 1950s youth group.
Next thing I knew, the church newsletter was attracting more attention than a UFO at the Super Bowl. Not only were people reading it from cover to cover, I got phone calls and comments like never before. Unfortunately, one of them was from the chairman of the church board. He suggested one more headline: “Chairman Fires Newsletter Editor.”
EUTYCHUS
Treatment-center patients and staff imply the fellowship of the church is inferior. Yet the more settled but enduring ties within a congregation last over decades. The intensity of feelings found during two or three weeks in a hospital cannot be sustained outside that largely artificial environment. (Youth have found their time at summer camp more intense than regular Sunday mornings and evenings. Should we turn the church into a summer camp?) Life cannot be lived perpetually on the most intense edge of one’s feelings. The enthusiasts at Corinth made this error. Why duplicate it?
Pastor Michael L. Welch
First Christian Church
Rocky Mount, N.C.
How can we sing “Oh, victory in Jesus, My Savior forever,” yet seek victory over sin and self through the mediation of a psychiatrist? Jesus won that victory for us.
Hazel Spotts
Haskell, Okla.
Macarthur Sees “Root” Cause
I respectfully disagree with the review of three books by John MacArthur [“MacArthur’s Crusade,” Books, May 18]. In my opinion, MacArthur is right on target, especially in The Gospel According to Jesus and The Sufficiency of Christ. In both books the author addresses what I believe to be the root cause of many of the problems that are evident in the American church. MacArthur’s style may be preachy, but then, he is a preacher, and I would not have expected anything else from him.
Pastor Cecil Siriwardene
Clifton Park Community Church
Clifton Park, N.Y.
Robert Patterson’s assessment of John MacArthur will certainly find agreement among many of us who genuinely appreciate much of what John teaches but are also troubled by what Patterson labels his “[less than] irenic spirit and preachy tone.” MacArthur’s crusades do seem to be intensifying as he battles the windmills of counseling or charismatics. Some of us wonder when it might cross the threshold into Holy War.
But Patterson’s assertion that MacArthur’s divisiveness is in part the result of his calling as a preacher and the resulting “preacher’s predicament” is troubling for all preachers, and especially those who ever put pen to paper. Preachers do have a dominant verbal style that does not always make the transition to written form with ease. But to say that “many books written by ministers … are not carefully crafted, but appear to be collections of sermons” is just a generalization. Could we also discount what writers say—or ban them from the pulpit—because their messages are drawn from things originally written for the print medium?
Dr. Robert Wenz
Spiritual Overseers Service
Glendora, Calif.
Patterson’s attitude, while acknowledging the great Reformation principle of “Sola Scriptura,” constitutes a subtle attack on the perspicuity and sufficiency of God’s Word. If the believer has Christ and his Word, then he needs nothing else—neither charismatic “experiences” nor the “insights” of humanistic psychology. MacArthur maintains that the Bible provides a “blueprint” for all of life—a grievous error in this reviewer’s eyes—but a position that John Calvin, Cornelius Van Til, and Gordon H. Clark would applaud wholeheartedly.
George T. Thompson
Opelousas, La.
Vote-Mongering In The Palace?
Ron Sider [Ron Sider’s Unsettling Crusade,” April 27] apparently equates social concern—meeting the physical/spiritual needs of the underprivileged—with political involvement, which is little more than vote-mongering in Caesar’s palace. However, the former is strongly supported by Scripture while the latter is not.
William B. Leak
Barrington, N.H.
It appears that most men who earn their living ministering on a national level live a much higher lifestyle than the national average, or than most of the people they serve. Why is that? Does God really care if you spend money on yourself to buy a Rolex or add that amount to your mortgage?
We think the Ron Siders of this country could teach us a lot about sacrifice.
Mr. & Mrs. David W. Luttrull
Evansville, Ind.
What planet could Tim Stafford and CT be living on when you dismiss so easily Ron Sider’s beliefs on structural evil and injustice? One need look no further than the Gulf War to see misguided American policy in action. The U.S. kept giving Iraq money, credits, and technology right up until 30 days before the Kuwait invasion. When American defense contractors profit from building up Saddam’s military capabilities, and innocent lives are lost due to bombing in a war that didn’t need to happen, is that not an example of someone being “poor because we are rich?”
Kevin Wayne McFall
Klamath Falls, Oreg.
Thank you for your fine treatment of Ron Sider. We at Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary have at times wondered if Ron was leading a double life: portrayals of his beliefs and attitudes by others have not always matched what we know to be true. His leadership of our “Christian Faith and Public Policy” program, his view of Scripture, his holistic concern for evangelism, personal holiness, and social action represent the heart of our school’s mission.
Manfred T. Brauch, President
Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary
Philadelphia, Pa.
I had to smile when I read that Ron Sider “had married a Mennonite farm girl” and saw the many-years-ago picture of his wife and my good friend, Arbutus Sider. The youthful spirit of the girl in the picture is still very much a part of Arbutus, but since those early days, she has earned a master’s degree in Marriage and Family Therapy from Hahneman University in Philadelphia. Arbutus has a private practice, working with people from various socio-economic groups, and in many instances she makes herself available to those who could not afford the “going rate” for such expertise, CT readers, especially women, might like to know what became of the farm girl who married Ron Sider.
Margaret D. Campolo
St. Davids, Pa.
Does God Have A “Dark Side”?
Thank you for your courage to include “How Wide Is God’s Mercy?” [April 27]. Is it not surely time to think hard about the notion that there is a dark side to the character of God who arbitrarily and mysteriously decrees some to be drawn to Jesus and others be left to a hopeless eternity?
I labored for years among Muslims who believed that after a life of strict adherence to all the rules of the Qur’an, one could never know at the moment of death whether it would be heaven or hell.
Can evangelicals do no better when it comes to being sure whom the Father gives to Jesus? Need the saints forever stumble over John 6:37, 44, and John 17:2? Whom does the Father draw to Jesus? One must read the whole text. How blessed John 6:45b: “Every one who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me.”
There is no uncertainty in the Psalms. A broken and a contrite heart God will not despise. There is no uncertainty in Jesus.
Alton J. Shea
Houghton, N.Y.
I appreciate Edward Fudge’s attempt to make peace between warring factions of evangelical theology. I would be even more appreciative of an evangelical theology that rested solidly upon the loving Fatherhood of God and regarded the godly role of “Judge” as a powerful metaphor picturing God as he disciplines rebellious human children (both teaching them and limiting as much as possible the harm they can do—now and throughout eternity).
Many evangelical Christian writings seem to me to point to a two-faced God—both loving Father and rigid Judge who periodically loses his memory of how pitifully inadequate—albeit free—we human beings have been since we retreated from him. I somehow find it impossible to relate in a genuinely positive way to the God of that dualistic theology.
Phyllis Beatty
Indianapolis, Ind.
