Dietrich Bonhoeffer speaks from the crucible of experience.

The following brief study is based on Matthew 6:25–34.

Be not anxious! Earthly possessions dazzle our eyes and delude us into thinking that they can provide security and freedom from anxiety. Yet all the time they are the very source of all anxiety. If our hearts are set on them, our reward is an anxiety whose burden is intolerable. Anxiety creates its own treasures and they in turn beget further care. When we seek for security in possessions we are trying to drive out care with care, and the net result is the precise opposite of our anticipations. The fetters which bind us to our possessions prove to be cares themselves.

The way to misuse our possessions is to use them as an insurance against the morrow. Anxiety is always directed to the morrow, whereas goods are in the strictest sense meant to be used only for today. By trying to ensure for the next day we are only creating uncertainty today. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. The only way to win assurance is by leaving tomorrow entirely in the hands of God and by receiving from him all we need for today. If instead of receiving God’s gifts for today we worry about tomorrow, we find ourselves helpless victims of infinite anxiety. “Be not anxious for the morrow”: either that is cruel mockery for the poor and wretched, the very people Jesus is talking to, who, humanly speaking, really will starve if they do not make provision today. Either it is an intolerable law, which men will reject with indignation; or it is the unique proclamation of the gospel of the glorious liberty of the children of God, who have a Father in heaven, a Father who has given his beloved Son. How shall not God with him also freely give us all things?

“Be not anxious for the morrow.” This is not to be taken as a philosophy of life or a moral law: it is the gospel of Jesus Christ, and only so can it be understood. Only those who follow him and know him can receive this word as a promise of the love of his Father and as a deliverance from the thraldom of material things. It is not care that frees the disciples from care, but their faith in Jesus Christ. Only they know that we cannot be anxious (v. 27). The coming day, even the coming hour, are placed beyond our control. It is senseless to pretend that we can make provision, because we cannot alter the circumstances of this world. Only God can take care, for it is he who rules the world. Since we cannot take care, since we are so completely powerless, we ought not to do it either. If we do, we are dethroning God and presuming to rule the world ourselves.

But the Christian also knows that he not only cannot and dare not be anxious, but that there is also no need for him to be so. Neither anxiety nor work can secure his daily bread, for bread is the gift of the Father. The birds and lilies neither toil nor spin, yet both are fed and clothed and receive their daily portion without being anxious for them. They need earthly goods only for their daily sustenance, and they do not lay up a store for the future. This is the way they glorify their Creator, not by their industry, toil, or care, but by a daily unquestioning acceptance of his gifts. Birds and lilies then are an example for the followers of Christ. “Man-in-revolt” imagines that there is a relation of cause and effect between work and sustenance, but Jesus explodes that illusion. According to him, bread is not to be valued as the reward for work; he speaks instead of the carefree simplicity of the man who walks with him and accepts everything as it comes from God.…

Worldly cares are not a part of our discipleship, but distinct and subordinate concerns. Before we start taking thought for our life, our food and clothing, our work and families, we must seek the righteousness of Christ. This is no more than an ultimate summing up of all that has been said before. Again we have here either a crushing burden, which holds out no hope for the poor and wretched, or else it is the quintessence of the gospel, which brings the promise of freedom and perfect joy. Jesus does not tell us what we ought to do but cannot; he tells us what God has given us and promises still to give. If Christ has been given us, if we are called to his discipleship, we are given all things, literally all things. He will see to it that they are added unto us. If we follow Jesus and look only to his righteousness, we are in his hands and under the protection of him and his Father. And if we are in communion with the Father, nought can harm us. We shall always be assured that he can feed his children and will not suffer them to hunger. God will help us in the hour of need, and he knows our needs.

After he has been following Christ for a long time, the disciple of Jesus will be asked “Lacked ye anything?” and he will answer “Nothing, Lord.” How could he when he knows that despite hunger and nakedness, persecution and danger, the Lord is always at his side?

DIETRICH BONHOEFFER¹Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a brilliant young Lutheran theologian in Germany who joined the resistance movement to Hitler, was arrested in 1943, and hanged in 1945—just days before the Allies liberated the Flossenberg concentration camp. Extracted from his The Cost of Discipleship, this selection also appears in The Martyred Christian (Macmillan), a new collection, by Joan Winmill Brown, of passages from Bonhoeffer’s works.

Fresh voices are winning a hearing.

In 1962, reginald fuller wrote The New Testament in Current Study, the last book to attempt to assess “where we are” in New Testament studies. Since then, a single word describes the nature of the discipline—proliferation, in every direction.

In 1962, for example, the field was dominated by three or four influential scholars: C. H. Dodd in Britain; Oscar Cullman in Switzerland; Joachim Jeremias and, above all, Rudolf Bultmann in Germany. Indeed, so powerful was Bultmann’s influence that the first two chapter’s in Fuller’s book dealt with “The New Testament and Mythology” and “For and Against Bultmann.”

One would not dare propose such a short list today—and not just because over 50 egos would be deflated! There has simply been such proliferation in the field that no single topic or person dominates.

To be sure, many of the concerns that were in the ascendancy 25 years ago are still current: (1) how to understand the essentially eschatological framework of the New Testament writers; (2) the concern of the biblical theology movement to see synthesis and unity in the New Testament alongside analysis and diversity; and (3) the redactional study of the Gospels, which had a similar interest in the wholes as over against the parts (in contrast to form criticism, which dominated the previous period).

The proliferation is further evidenced by the number of scholars worldwide admitted to the exclusive international society of New Testament scholars, the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas, during the past 25 years, and by the near circus that the Society of Biblical Literature has become. There are so many areas in so many sections at the same time that one goes more often to see friends than to learn anything.

In addition to the proliferation of persons and interests, there are some other “trends” worth noting. For example, these past two decades have seen the general breakdown of the influence of both existentialist and history-of-religions presuppositions on much of New Testament scholarship. Both the extreme antisupernatural bias and the hyperskeptical historical criticism of so much scholarship have been called into question in a variety of ways. Especially significant in this regard has been the work of Martin Flengel and Peter Stuhlmacher of Tübingen. (See Hengel’s Acts and the Earliest History of Christianity and Stuhlmacher’s Historical Criticism and Theological Interpretation of Scripture.)

Some older themes have shown remarkable resilience and have resurged to the forefront:

1. Christology continues to be at the cutting edge. The debate that resulted from the publication of The Myth of God Incarnate focuses on Christology from below (Jesus’ own self-understanding and its relationship to the understanding of the early church).

2. In Pauline studies, interest has again shifted to reexaminations of Paul and the law—whether Paul saw the law as essentially terminated, or fulfilled (with some sense of continuation) in Christ. Although this discussion is scarcely over, it is probably fair to say that the “trend” is toward a mediating position that sees the law ended as a means to righteousness, but continued as an ethical imperative.

3. This period has also been marked by a high interest in the parables. Jeremias’s monumental work, The Parables of Jesus, watershed that it was, is now seen only as a halfway house. To place the parables only in the life setting of Jesus, without adequate attention to their present settings in the Gospels, is to deny both their inherent power as story and the hermeneutical paradigm offered by the various redactions within the Gospels themselves.

4. What is currently emerging as a field of rich fruitfulness for exegesis is the sociology of religion as it is being applied to the understanding of the early church. To be sure, some positions are one-sided, but much is to be learned from Gerd Theissen’s The Social Setting of Pauline Christianity and Wayne Meeks’s The First Urban Christians, for example, as they try to put us in touch with the sociological factors that are part of the milieu of the early Christians, both Jewish and Greco-Roman.

A trend of a different kind has been the emergence of a significant contribution by younger evangelicals. This input has been most notable for its rigorous work within the traditional methodologies of the discipline, and therefore for its considerably less upfront agenda of apologetics. (Examples include the superior commentaries on Luke by I. H. Marshall and on the Sermon on the Mount by Robert Guelich, as well as such books on Jesus as that by J. Ramsey Michaels.) At the forefront of this resurgence are three new series of commentaries—Word Biblical, the New International Greek, and Harper’s Good News Commentaries—the earliest volumes of which are now available.

Many conservatives have reservations about their work. But overall their contribution seems to be a very positive one. More traditional orthodoxy has an articulate voice in New Testament scholarship, and it has moved away from the fortress mentality of an earlier generation.

If the ultimate goal of our discipline is a more precise understanding of the biblical text, that we might lead God’s people to obedience, then New Testament studies is much better off than it was 25 years ago, and the future looks even better.

GORDON D. FEE¹Dr. Fee is professor of New Testament at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

Let them taste a slice of the world.

Why do you spend so much of your youth group time teaching your teenagers about world missions?

Why do you have two or three fund raisers for missions each year and ask for substantial aid from your missions committee to send teenagers into cross-cultural service opportunities?

Wouldn’t your efforts be better focused on college students?

These valid questions were posed by a perceptive visitor to our youth ministry. Here are my answers:

It promotes the lordship of Christ. Submitting to Jesus Christ as Lord is the greatest challenge today’s teenager faces. Urging our students to consider God’s call to missions has helped them realize that following Christ means yielding their priorities to him. God still uses the singing of traditional missionary hymns and the reading of missionary biographies and missions histories to stir our high schoolers to intensified devotion.

It instills the Christian “basics.” Two-week mission trips have been our most effective tool for training teenagers in the importance of daily time alone with God, the disciplines of walking in the Spirit, and the exercise of loving others. Adult leaders and missionary or national hosts have modeled Christian living and compassion. Their examples are leaving lasting, life-changing impressions on these young men and women.

It solidifies Christian conviction. Many church teenagers live in a relatively secure, “Christianized” world. Through the contrasts of other religions, service teams show students that being a follower of Jesus Christ sets us apart. This contributes to the necessary adolescent phase of making the faith of their parents their own.

It teaches them to pray. The results orientation of our culture, combined with the pragmatic mindset of most teens, makes intercession a difficult discipline to teach. By experiencing God’s answers to their prayers as they have raised money to feed the poor or spoken through an interpreter in another culture, students are learning to dedicate more effort to prayer.

It builds Christian unity. Teamwork in the church is a necessity if the Great Commission is to be fulfilled. Before embarking on service projects, we train our high schoolers in teamwork, resolving conflicts, and relational commitments. Students discover true Christian fellowship through group efforts in fund raising and in the high-pressured environments of cross-cultural service teams. They bring this understanding back home, becoming willing to work together in spite of their differences.

It combats a materialistic outlook. Most North American students are wealthy compared to the rest of the world. Mission trips to Third World countries and educational fund raisers such as a “planned famine” bring this into focus.

One girl, after seeing a poverty-stricken barrio in Colombia, decided to stop her habit of window shopping because “it led me to think I needed things that I now know I don’t need at all.” Another began supporting from her own budget a child she met at an orphanage in Costa Rica. Another student who worked hard on a mission team saw how much he could accomplish. On returning home he sold his television set because “I saw how much time I had been wasting in front of the tube.”

It creates world awareness. A missions emphasis helps destroy stereotypes and racist attitudes. Students learn the complexities of world economies, and become able to refute simplistic, bigoted ideas (“people are poor because they won’t work hard”).

Our goal is to bring students to a level of world awareness that allows them to make decisions about their future in the light of both world needs and opportunities, and their commitment to Christ.

Numbers of our teenagers, upon applying for college, list the youth missionary teams as the most important experience of their high school years.

It develops servanthood. Teenagers can be the most self-centered members of society because marketing, the media, and standard adolescent growth phases force them to focus on themselves. And like most youth ministries, we have our share of activities and talks on self-image. But students have grown more in two weeks of energy expended on behalf of others than they have in two years of “finding themselves.”

It produces cross-cultural servants. As missionaries increasingly work under national leadership, the need for people who understand what it is to serve grows. We emphasize missions with our teenagers because we are convinced that preparation for such service must start before college or Bible school.

Our goal is for the local church to produce young men and women who are willing to serve cross-culturally. God can then direct many of them to fulfill his plans for our world in this way. Exposure to the worldwide scope of Christianity is causing many to add a uniquely Christian perspective to the career plans they are making.

Why do we spend so much money and work so hard to involve our youth in world missions? Because of the results in their lives.

PAUL BORTHWICK¹Mr. Borthwick, who is minister of youth at Grace Chapel, Lexington, Massachusetts, has coordinated 19 youth mission teams in eight countries, and has written How to Plan, Develop, and Lead a Youth Missionary Team (1980, published by his church).

Roadblocks And New Avenues For The Mission Of The Church

Missionary practice and theory is nearly as chaotic as the world political and economic scene in which it operates. Theologies of mission diametrically opposed to each other are applied side by side with inevitable frictions. Theorists from the non-Western world are challenging what consensus has existed among Western missiologists. And vigorous new mission agencies are being spawned in Asia, Africa, and Latin America in a kaleidoscope of new forms.

Here are three books that give a feel for the strong tides running through, and reshaping, the missionary enterprise today.

Surprising Allies

Arthur Glasser and Donald McGavran, both former deans of the School of World Mission at Fuller Theological Seminary, have highlighted burning issues for the mission of the church in Contemporary Theologies of Mission. Their contributions, interwoven one with another, uniquely compare four different theologies of mission: conciliar, liberation, evangelical, and Roman Catholic. Some evangelicals will be surprised to note that the authors reject the first two and find basic agreement in the mission theologies of evangelicals and Roman Catholics.

The book deserves careful study because it clarifies missiological issues that are essential for evangelism and church growth today. The authors are concerned that three billion people are still unreached and commend this to all of us as being “a paramount concern of God.” The World Council of Churches has turned from evangelicalism toward bringing in a new humanity, “the outlawing of all forms of oppression and distress.”

Glasser has found what he calls a paradigm shift of such far-reaching proportions between this conciliar view and evangelicals that he questions if dialogue between them is possible. McGavran is concerned because the pleas of the International Congress on World Evangelization at Lausanne in 1974 were ignored by the Fifth WCC Assembly at Nairobi in 1975. He states that “to date the World Council has not to our knowledge added one penny to any of its allocations for gospel proclaiming, sinner-converting, church-multiplying evangelism, nor begged its affiliated churches to thrust workers into earth’s many white harvest fields. We state this with regret, but fear it is true.”

A most cogent and concise evaluation of liberation theology has been contributed by Glasser. Of equal value to evangelicals is the introduction to Roman Catholic mission theology. McGavran reviews the pre-Vatican II missiology, and Glasser summarizes the official Roman Catholic theology of mission. Historically, evangelical harmony with Roman Catholic missiology is found where the mission of the church is declared to be the “discipling of the peoples of the earth” in contrast to the nonevangelical quest for “a new world order.” Moreover, Roman Catholic theology does not identify the improvement of the social structures with the eschatalogical kingdom of God. McGavran says, “For Roman Catholics, the essential and continuing goal of mission is the founding, developing, strengthening, and spreading of the church of Jesus Christ.” They call responding to the economic, social, and political concerns in the world duty, not mission.

This book takes a solid stand on the Lausanne Covenant’s definition of biblical inspiration and authority. Some statements, however, leave unanswered questions. Is it true that all of those who confess Jesus as Lord deserve to be taken seriously and deserve to be heard? The large context of this book does not support this contention of the authors. Rather, it points to confusion in mission that has been introduced by nonevangelicals as a result of their low view of Scripture.

This raises still another question for evangelicals. What is meant by the confession “Jesus is Lord” when it is uttered in a nonauthoritative context? Greater consistency seems to be required if evangelicals are to avoid the “evangelistic hesitancy” Lesslie Newbigin recognized in the WCC as early as two decades ago.

It is difficult to understand what McGavran means when discussing the Roman Catholic missiology of Vatican II, which he affirms, and the basic Roman Catholic doctrines he rejects. He writes: “It is clear to anyone who can read the signs of the times that all those branches of the Church which believe that the Bible is the inspired, authoritative, infallible Word of God and which trust in Jesus Christ as God and Savior are going to grow closer and closer together, despite differences on some points. In the urgent and enormous task of world evangelization, cooperation with Christians of other branches of the church and a zealous dedication to the universal command of Christ are clearly needed.”

Evangelicals should surely think of one another in these terms, but if McGavran is suggesting evangelicals should collaborate with Catholics, he should tell us how he perceives Roman Catholic doctrines of authority and soteriology.

Contemporary Theologies of Mission, by Arthur F. Glasser and Donald A. McGavran (Baker, 1983, $12.95). Reviewed by Arthur P. Johnston, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois.

An Expanded Calling

Reading Christ Outside the Gate confirmed my belief, held for some time, that Orlando Costas is a missiologist who deserves careful attention. It is not that I found myself in agreement with everything I read here: I knew beforehand that I would be startled by some things he would say and angered by some of his positions. But I knew, too, that I would find much that I needed to hear and be confronted by important insights that my own prejudices may have kept me from considering. I was not disappointed.

I urge evangelical leaders not to ignore this book, even though they may take strong exception to parts of it.

Certainly Costas’s evaluation of liberation theologies ought to be carefully considered by anyone who ventures to comment on this movement. Here, as elsewhere, the reader will find the author determined to be faithful to the Scriptures. Consequently, he does not hesitate to raise basic questions that he has with liberation thinking, and he effectively refutes some of the liberation theologians’ basic tenets.

In his discussion of “Christian Mission in the Americas,” Costas issues a call to deeper thinking about the character of God’s mission in a Third World situation. He sees the kingdom of God as the frame of reference for all such thinking and boldly deals with what it means to proclaim the kingdom and face its demands and priorities.

If he is right in his teaching here, many evangelical missions may have to expand greatly their understanding of their calling. If he is wrong, this needs to be demonstrated by arguments that combine—as his do—a strong emphasis on Scripture and a passionate sensitivity to the plight of great multitudes in the Third World.

The author very forthrightly states how he feels North Americans ought to respond to the cry of Latin America. My personal reaction to this chapter is that—while it contains much that ought to prompt us soberly to reflect and repent for what we have done, and are doing, in Latin America—Costas so overstates some points that he may unnecessarily lose a hearing among those he would most want to influence constructively. Some generalizations would carry much greater impact were they not stated in such unqualified fashion. We ought not ask to be spared strict accountability for our failures, but we may call for a more balanced evaluation of the imperfect efforts of several generations of North American missionaries—especially when their motives are being called into question.

At the same time, he validly insists that evangelicals (and particularly North American evangelicals) dare not casually write off loud cries from the world’s oppressed peoples. And he will not allow us to continue to overlook the glaring inadequacies he perceives in our North American understanding of the gospel. We owe him a vote of thanks for helping us come to grips with the incompleteness of some cherished viewpoints.

While Costas is especially concerned to better our understanding of the Scriptures as they bear on the Latin American situation, his burden extends to the work of Christ throughout the world. He touches on a wide range of contemporary issues in mission and brings to them a biblical perspective, combined with the contextual insights of a widely read, deeply committed Third World theologian and missiologist.

Christ Outside the Gate: Mission Beyond Christendom, by Orlando E. Costas (Orbis, 198 pp., $12.95). Reviewed by Horace L. Fenton, Jr., consultant on mission. First Presbyterian Church, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

A Dynamic Dawning

The “last age of missions” into which we are rapidly moving is, according to Lawrence Keyes, the era in which the Third World joins the Western world as a major locus of intensive and increasing missionary-sending activity. Whether or not this is indeed the last age of missions (God may have some plans we are not aware of), the rapidly growing cross-cultural missionary activities of non-Western churches must be one of the most significant world evangelization developments in our time.

Lawrence Keyes, newly appointed president of Overseas Crusades, and research and information coordinator of the World Evangelical Fellowship’s Missions Commission, carefully documents this gratifying rapid growth of non-Western missionary activity in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Oceania. His is the third major research focusing on this worldwide phenomenon in the last 10 years. The James Wong, Edward Pentecost, and Peter Larson 1972 survey, Missions from the Third World, first focused attention on the significant rise of Third World missions. In 1976, Marlin Nelson produced refined data regarding Asian missions. In The Last Age of Missions, Keyes now moves the research forward by again surveying indigenous missions in all the Third World, attempting to discover some of the dynamics undergirding this new missions thrust, and seeking also to discover how Western missions might encourage and cooperate with these emerging missions in meaningful patterns of partnership.

Keyes first quickly traces the expansion of missionary-sending activity from that of the early church in the Middle East, to that emanating from Europe during the Middle Ages and up to the present, to that of North American Christians during the last two centuries, and finally moving full circle to the new missions activities of Third World Christians. He shows how, missions have moved from paternalism to partnership. He also tells why he feels that the emerging missions are more likely to be successful in contextualizing their missionary methods and message than Western missions have been.

In the heart of the book, Keyes reports the significant findings of his survey. The tables comparing the 1980 data with that of 1972 are particularly enlightening. The 1972 study reported 203 non-Western mission agencies, while Keyes reports 368 active agencies in 1980. In 1972, the estimated number of Third World missionaries was 3,404. In 1980, the conservative estimate was 13,000.

The last 75 pages of the book form a useful “Third World Missionary Agency Directory,” giving accurate, and up-to-date information about the 368 active agencies reported.

I have only one major concern about Keyes’s presentation of his findings. We need to be assured that he is comparing apples with apples. He himself seems to have some misgivings about his inclusion of so much data from African independent churches, such as the Nigerian Church of the Lord “Aladura.” We need to know more than the questionnaires can reveal. Follow-up research should be conducted on location, preferably by trained nationals from the areas surveyed.

Keyes has laid a good foundation for all future research in this area. This record of the growth of Third World mission activity spells out the privilege that is ours to witness the dawning of this new missionary day.

The Last Age of Missions, by Lawrence E. Keyes (William Carey Library, 1983). Reviewed by A. Leonard Tuggy, Asia secretary of the Conservative Baptist Foreign Mission Society, Wheaton, Illinois.

With its long history of sectarian violence, Belfast, Northern Ireland, isn’t a popular site for international conventions. But it was the city chosen by Prison Fellowship International (PFI) for its symposium on prison ministry.

PFI Chairman Charles Colson called Belfast the ideal setting for the July meetings.

“Belfast provided a backdrop and set a tone that could never have been realized in a secluded Caribbean setting,” he said. “After all, it is in a wounded, messed-up world that we must plant the kingdom. Belfast has become identified with sectarianism and hostility. Out of repentance and brokenness in that context can come genuine reconciliation.”

In the week prior to the Belfast symposium, a BBC reporter told Colson that his name was on the “hit list” of the IRA (Irish Republican Army), presumably because of Prison Fellowship Northern Ireland’s activities among inmates. The symposium passed without incident, but the alleged death threat was symptomatic of the strife that continues in Northern Ireland.

In the midst of that strife, reconciliation is taking place in Northern Ireland’s prisons. Many of the inmates have been jailed for terrorist activities or involvement in outlawed organizations.

Reconciliation has been especially evident during the past two years in prisons where Catholic and Protestant partisans have been converted. Such conversions were illustrated at the symposium by the presence of two prisoners, Liam and Jimmy, who were on a week’s pass from Magilligan Prison.

Liam, 26, was one of the IRA prisoners involved in the “dirty” protests in which inmates smeared their own excrement on the walls of their cells. He also took part in the 1981 IRA hunger strikes that took the lives of Bobby Sands and three others. Liam joined the hunger strike for 55 days, temporarily losing his sight.

Now a Christian, the former IRA terrorist said the answer to Ireland’s problems involves individual and social reconciliation through Jesus Christ.

Liam attended the symposium with Jimmy, 23, a Protestant inmate who had been sympathetic to illegal paramilitary activities. Jimmy became a Christian in prison and renounced violence.

Asked how they would have responded if they had met prior to their conversions, Liam said they would have tried to shoot each other.

Ministry to the inmates is being carried out largely by a dozen or more committed volunteers who faithfully visit the prisoners. Glennis Blackburn, an elderly prison visitor, has made a profound impact on inmates. In spite of the filth of the “dirty” protest, she persisted in visiting the prisoners to present a Christian witness.

Another volunteer, Bill Holley, conducts a weekly Bible study that attracts some 20 inmates, both Catholic and Protestant, in Magilligan Prison. Holley is a former medical officer at Magilligan who is now retired.

Christians who minister to the prisoners include Protestants and Catholics. The Rev. Neal Carlin, a Catholic priest and a Prison Fellowship Northern Ireland board member, has led several inmates to the Lord in the Maze Prison. Overseeing the work of Prison Fellowship Northern Ireland is Executive Director James McIlroy, a Protestant.

Much of Prison Fellowship’s work involves organizing volunteers on the outside of prison walls. In Northern Ireland, Catholics and Protestants have formed groups to pray for particular prisons. They also form groups to provide fellowship and support to inmates who are released from prison.

Carlin helped establish a program in Derry (Londonderry) to help inmates successfully reenter the community. Called Columba House, the ministry provides Bible studies, fellowship, temporary lodging, and assistance in finding employment.

The reconciliation that is taking place among prisoners is spilling over into the churches and cities of Northern Ireland. In Downpatrick, a Protestant mother told a congregation of Catholics and Protestants about the events that followed her daughter’s shooting. On her way home from church last year, the woman’s 18-year-old daughter was shot in an IRA ambush. The young woman died 10 days later.

Liam, the former IRA member who became a Christian in prison, heard about the shooting. He wrote to the mother, expressing his concern as a fellow Christian.

The mother wrote back, and the two began corresponding. They met for the first time in Downpatrick, where the mother took Liam’s hand and told the congregation: “Only Christ can heal our troubled land.”

LESLIE K. TARRin Belfast

The fractured relationship between blacks and whites in South Africa has experienced a hint of healing. Newspaper and television accounts of starving black children, victims of an extended drought, brought financial aid from many white businessmen. Most of the aid was administered impersonally, but on a small scale there were individual efforts that resulted in interracial human contact. One white woman was so touched by a newspaper article that she started a soup kitchen at an Anglican church community in Soweto, South Africa’s largest black township.

This is the “Year of the Bible” in the United States. But in France a week in October has been designated “The Week of the Bible.” French evangelicals, led by the French Evangelical Alliance and the French Bible Alliance, plan a massive drive to distribute the Bible throughout France. Some 2,200 French billboards will carry the slogan “Read the Bible.” Fifty thousand handbills will be distributed.

A spiritual renewal that began in Egypt a decade ago is still gaining momentum, according to Samuel Habib, president of the Evangelical Churches in Egypt. All three of Egypt’s denominations—Coptic Catholic, Coptic Orthodox, and Evangelical, which consists of 19 Protestant denominations—have experienced renewal among their lay people, especially youth. The major characteristic of the renewal is a heightened concern for worship.

Young followers of the Jain faith in India are increasingly questioning their religious values, says Kiranbhai Parikh, a leading Jain scholar. According to Parikh, few Jains understand their faith despite an increase in the practice of its rigorous spiritual and physical disciplines. Jainism was begun in India in the sixth century B.C. by Mahavira, a Hindu reformer and contemporary of Buddha. Jains stress asceticism and reverance for all living things. The worst sin is to kill a creature, even an insect.

By the year 2000, the earth’s population will increase by 90 million a year, says Rafael Salas, director of the United Nations Fund for Population Activities. The current· rate of increase is 80 million a year. According to Salas, there is a trend toward moderation in the rate of growth, but there will be no drop in absolute numbers. He predicts a world population of 6.1 billion by 2000, and says that 90 percent of the growth will be in the poor countries of Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

International outcry has slowed but has not ended persecution of followers of the Bahai faith in Iran. President Reagan is one of several world leaders who have condemned the persecution. Fundamentalist, Shiite Muslims generally regard Bahais as heretics because they advocate universal education, women’s rights, the work ethic, and world government, among other things. Bahais regard Muhammad only as one among many prophets, including Jesus, Moses, and Buddha.

Ireland’s Roman Catholic bishops have called a nuclear strategy based on deterrence “tolerable.” However, the bishops warn that nuclear build-up is escalating, not stabilizing. They say that if a strategy is based on nuclear superiority, there is an obligation to change the strategy, even unilaterally.

Andover Newton rekindles a warm spirit.

Once promoted as a “hotbed of left-wing radicalism.” Andover Newton Theological School is digging back to its evangelical roots.

Andover Theological Seminary was founded in 1807 after the fall of Harvard Divinity School to Unitarianism and was commissioned to carry on the torch of Jonathan Edwards and the Reformed tradition.

Newton Theological Institution was opened by the Massachusetts Baptist Society in 1825, also with a strong evangelical thrust. The two schools were affiliated in 1931 and officially merged in 1965. The present school is connected with the American Baptist Churches in the U.S. A. (ABC) and the United Church of Christ (UCC). It is located in Newton Centre, Massachusetts, near Boston.

During the twentieth century, the seminary lost sight of its purpose, says George W. Peck, 51, who, as dean, has been a driving force behind efforts to recover the evangelical tradition. Peck was recently named president, replacing Gordon Torgersen, who retired after four years. “We tended from the thirties until fairly recently to relate ourselves so strongly to ‘mainline liberal’ churches that we neglected that other aspect of our history. Now we’re seeking to affirm it.”

A recently published 12-page brochure features a small picture of a haystack and the title “Andover Newton Theological School—theological education rooted in and nourished by the Reformed tradition.” The haystack is symbolic of the historic Haystack Prayer Meeting at Williams College that sparked the modern missionary movement. The nation’s first missionaries, including Adoniram Judson, Samuel Newell, and Luther Rice, studied at the new Andover Theological Seminary.

The recruitment brochure was written by an independent consultant, who first interviewed members of the faculty about their vision for the seminary. The result—a strong emphasis on the Reformed tradition—was based on what the consultant heard faculty members saying, and what they said surprised seminary officials.

The new brochure was a far cry from those sent out from the seminary’s public relations office in the late sixties and early seventies. Those publications “portrayed the seminary as a hotbed of left-wing radicalism,” Peck said.

“They thought that was the way to get students,” he added. Brochures from that period played up the faculty’s political stand on issues such as the war in Vietnam, race relations, and the civil rights movement, at the expense of their commitment to the church.

“The truth is that while the school is committed to social justice, it is also committed to the gospel and to the churches.”

Peck himself was nurtured in the evangelical faith. The son of an Australian coal miner-lay Baptist preacher, he says he was “evangelical without being conscious of it. “He experienced a very profound conversion as a teenager and began preparing for what he soon realized would be a teaching ministry. Peck served as a missionary teacher in the Assam province of India from 1958 to 1963 under the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society.

He is a regular member of a group of evangelical leaders including Gordon MacDonald of Grace Chapel in Lexington, Massachusetts, and Richard Lovelace, professor of church history at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, who pray for renewal in New England.

Appointed the first dean of the combined theological school in 1966, Peck sees liberal American churches in a sad state.

“Mainline liberal Christianity as a ‘party movement’ has run out of energy, and people are looking for alternatives,” he said, citing the decrease of denominational church memberships. “There’s a sadness, a sense of being defeated, that ought not to be characteristic of the church. The energy has shifted. Clearly the evangelical wing has it.”

Although the seminary has no doctrinal statement, most faculty members are committed to the tenets of the Reformed tradition, which Peck listed as: Scripture as the sole authority for faith and conduct, the sovereignty of grace, justification by faith alone, the Christian life and action as an expression of justification, the gospel as God’s word to humanity, and an orthodox view of Christ as both God and human.

When Peck uses the term “evangelical,” he prefers the German definition of the word evangelische, which means “Reformed.” In other words, the seminary is not teaching a “reformed fundamentalism,” but is seeking to recover the spirit of the European Reformers, explains Gordon-Conwell’s Lovelace.

“These are not card-carrying evangelicals,” he said of the Andover Newton faculty. Lovelace sees Andover Newton faculty members as being “to the right of (Karl) Barth, but to the left of the evangelical establishment,” especially on the issue of Scripture. Still, Lovelace said he has found a “warm evangelical spirit” among many of Andover Newton’s staff, and he considers the emphasis on recovery as a work of the Holy Spirit.

Meanwhile, Andover Newton professors have begun to teach the history and theology of the movements that helped shape the seminary.

Also, the seminary is offering courses in evangelism and is encouraging students in their spiritual growth. In the fall of 1981, the seminary sponsored an evangelism conference that drew surprisingly large crowds. MacDonald of Grace Chapel in Lexington and Sen. Mark Hatfield addressed audiences of 400 and 1,200, respectively.

In January, Peck and Richard Broholm, who directs the seminary’s new Center for the Ministry of the Laity, taught workshops at Congress ‘83, an annual conference sponsored by the Evangelistic Association of New England. It was the first time in Peck’s 17 years that representatives of the seminary were invited to participate in an evangelical conference.

As president. Peck will continue to hold the chair of Judson Professor of Christian Theology and International Mission. He sees that decision as symbolic, an indication of the seminary’s commitment to international missions and the church in general.

Peck sees a critical need to recruit the kind of students who are rooted in the Reformed tradition and eager to pursue that kind of ministry. “That’s not the easiest thing to do,” he said, “because unfortunately, many of our churches have lost hold of this tradition and don’t always instruct their people in it. Students come with only a vague idea of what it’s all about.”

As Lovelace sees it, that means stiffer competition for the kind of student Gordon-Conwell has been getting since the Jesus movement of the early seventies. That’s the sort of competition that’s already taking place between Gordon-Conwell and Princeton, he said. “It’s the friendliest form of competition I’ve ever seen.”

Despite the conservative shift in the direction of Andover Newton, the seminary will not be hoisting an evangelical banner over its campus, said Peck. The seminary sees itself in a good position to establish links between the mainline denominations and other points of view, including those of evangelicals.

“The last thing we need is another round of party squabbles,” he said. “We don’t want to belong to a party. We want to affirm the gospel and get on with God’s work in the world.”

STEVE CROWE

In the last few years, visiting dignitaries from the worlds of religion and education have been making their way to the troubled countries of Central America. Upon their return, their reports and statements have been generally predictable. Conservatives, even theological conservatives, lean toward U.S. policy, liberals against it.

A group of educators from seven generally conservative, evangelical colleges who traveled through Nicaragua last month broke the mold. They had high praise for the beleaguered Sandinista regime and strongly condemned U.S. efforts to weaken it.

They reported “amazing strides” in literacy, education, health, and humanitarianism since the Sandinistas came to power four years ago. They found little evidence of the Communist takeover that the Reagan administration warns about. They said they found committed Christians in the government (although the Marxist tendencies among the ruling body is not generally disputed) and freedom of religious worship.

The 11 educators on the tour were from the following colleges: Bethel, King’s, Gordon, Goshen, Wheaton, and Whitworth, and from Seattle Pacific University.

A Miami, Florida, ordinance outlawing soft-core pornography on the city’s cable television system has been struck down in U.S. District Court. Judge William Hoeveler said laws against indecent speech on broadcast channels do not apply to cable television because cable television provides its own safeguards, which are activated by the viewer. City Attorney José Garcia-Pedrosa said the city might appeal the ruling.

A PTL network spokesman says some television stations are censoring antiabortion views expressed by PTL Club host Jim Bakker. Bakker has displayed pictures of aborted fetuses in some telecasts, which might have prompted the blackouts, said PTL spokesman Brad Lacy. He did not say how many stations had censored the program. The PTL Club is shown on some 200 commercial stations and about 700 cable systems.

The General Conference Mennonite Church will authorize its officers to stop withholding income taxes from the wages of employees who oppose the full payment of their taxes because of government military expenditures. The decision was made last month after four years of administrative, legislative, and judicial approaches failed to achieve a conscientious objector status exempting the denomination from withholding taxes. The new policy, expected to take effect this month, will leave the employees responsible to pay their own taxes. The move to stop withholding some employees’ income taxes will violate federal income tax laws.

Members of a West Virginia Hare Krishna group have been asked to pay more than $17,000 in property taxes. Marshall County Tax Assessor Alfred Clark said he considers the Hare Krishnas’ gold-domed temple, gift shop, restaurant, guest lodge, and chalets to be commercial, rather than religious, property. The commercial property tax assessment will increase the group’s annual tax bill from $93 to $17,257.

A bill that would give elementary and secondary school students equal access to public school facilities for religious meetings met stiff resistance at a Senate hearing. Spokesmen for groups representing Christians, Jews, and educators testified against the measure sponsored by Sen. Jeremiah Denton (R-Ala.). John W. Baker, general counsel for the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, said his organization supports the concept of equal access only for secondary school students. A separate bill limited to secondary school students has yet to be the subject of Senate hearings.

A Maryland church has announced the formation of Valium Anonymous, a support group for people who want to kick the Valium habit. A ministry of Hope Community Church of Bethesda, Maryland, the group also will be open to former Valium users, family members of Valium users, and health care professionals with an understanding of the Valium-dependence syndrome.

Miami, Florida, city commissioners have dropped a proposal for a city religion board. The board would have coordinated observances of religious holidays and organized an annual event called “City Under One God.”

California Governor George Deukmejian signed a bill that allows parents who spank their biological children to care for foster children. However, the bill does not allow parents to use corporal punishment on foster children. The legislation was initiated after a Christian couple was denied a foster care license because they spank their biological children. The couple’s church, Grace Brethren of Seal Beach, California, generated statewide support for the bill.

In the wake of criticism that his budget cuts have resulted in increased hunger, President Reagan said he will appoint a commission to study the problem of hunger in America. Both the Senate and the House have passed a nonbinding “Preventing Hunger at Home” resolution declaring food and child nutrition programs off limits to further budget cuts in fiscal 1984 and 1985. The resolution was initiated by Bread for the World, a Christian antihunger lobby.