NEWS

While European governments were slow to pronounce judgment on the martial law clampdown in Poland, their church members promptly showed where their sympathies lay with an outpouring of donated relief supplies for the Polish people.

Many of these were grassroots, ad hoc efforts. Probably the largest was a collection in Dutch Protestant and Catholic churches, in a drive sparked by two Hollanders of Polish background. Contributions were prepared as Christmas parcels, and a 140-truck convoy was set to move into Poland on the day—as it turned out—that martial law was imposed.

The drive engendered strong enthusiasm in the Netherlands. One church alone contributed enough to fill 10 trucks. Royal Dutch Shell donated the 80,000 liters of diesel oil needed for the convoy. Transport companies loaned the trucks, and the drivers were volunteers.

The organizers held hasty consultation when word of the Polish crackdown was received, and decided to proceed. The convoy made the 800-kilometer trip to the Polish border and was admitted into the country, but diverted to an old airstrip at Poznan.

The plan had been for the convoy to proceed on a prearranged schedule to points around the country to unload consignments for distribution through the Catholic church.

When Polish soldiers began to insist that the convoy unload its goods on the airstrip, the captain of the convoy refused. He was placed under arrest, but told his drivers to douse their cargoes with diesel oil and set them aflame (rather than have them fall into possession of the authorities). As they began to do this, the soldiers relented, and the convoy proceeded to its scheduled distribution points.

On their return, the drivers reported witnessing secret police beating Polish citizens. They said that Polish soldiers, however, had deliberately driven tanks off the roads and overturned them.

Scandinavians and Americans have been moving aid into Poland largely by ship through the port of Gdansk, and then overland to Warsaw. They are sending many small loads to avoid overloading distribution centers and providing authorities with an excuse to intervene.

The Polish government issued a statement in mid-December assuring all foreign contributors that “aid sent by them will come to the address given by the senders.” But a directive issued later by the Polish Ministry of the Interior instructed that all aid from abroad to people in detention should be confiscated by the state. This apparently included aid to their families.

Since December 16, only shipments made by major recognized relief agencies have been permitted across the borders. Individual or small, private shipments have been banned. Knud Wumpelman, secretary-treasurer of the European Baptist Federation, reported on January 12 that he had just accompanied a shipment of food aid to Warsaw. The convoy, he said, was interrupted on only four occasions, and the materials delivered intact to the Polish Ecumenical Council. Within four hours of arrival, the supplies were fully distributed.

The greatest barrier to adequate distribution of aid is the shortage of gasoline. “The Polish officials allow relief convoys only enough gasoline to carry goods to one destination, such as Warsaw, and to return to the border,” said World Vision relief official Tony Atkins. “Delivery to outlying areas is becoming more and more of a problem. It is a situation totally out of our control.”

Zdzislaw Pawlik, secretary general of the Polish Ecumenical Council, an interchurch agency that includes all the non-Roman Catholic churches of Poland, was allowed to travel by train to West Germany on December 17, four days after martial law was imposed in Poland. He visited the relief arm of the Lutheran church in Stuttgart and the German Baptist Union in Bad Homburg, and contacted representatives of other agencies in the West working with the council to continue shipments of aid into Poland.

Pawlik told World Vision worker Ralph Hamburger that if food aid was stopped, there would be many deaths. “We have terrible problems, especially with undernourished children. It is impossible to estimate what the damages will be; the winter is already severe,” Pawlik said. He noted that shortages would be more severe since “various governments are withholding humanitarian aid.”

In what may be his most important statement to date, Francis Schaeffer challenges the Christian community to reclaim the world for Christ. If we do not, he indicates, freedom for all men may be lost.

Schaeffer’s new 10-part film series, Reclaiming the World, follows his two earlier statements, How Should We Then Live? and Whatever Happened to the Human Race? (the latter made with C. Everett Koop, M.D., now U.S. surgeon general). The series was produced by Franky Schaeffer V Productions. In it, Schaeffer is interviewed by Jeremy Jackson (historical researcher for How Should We Then Live?) and Franky Schaeffer V. Unlike the previous two series, which abounded in cinematographic effects, the viewer is instead drawn into the dialogue as an unobtrusive listener, while Schaeffer and his two interviewers trade questions and answers in the Schaeffer home. The result is not unlike television interviews à la Barbara Walters. The 10 films are divided into three sections: “Reclaiming the World” (films one through five); “Reclaiming the Church” (six through eight); and “Reclaiming Our Personal Lives” (nine and ten).

The first and second films are entitled “Why I Am a Christian.” In them Schaeffer discusses the objective reality of God—the God who is there. In beginning here, he states that man can finally answer the metaphysical question of the nature of his very existence. Christianity, as seen in terms of the Bible and as applied to the world around us, is reality. Those who refuse the Christian solution live in conflict with the real world. And as men live out this illusion, they are driven to despair. Nonreality, as expressed in terms of humanism, has no answers except in the material realm—answers that soon exhaust themselves. Again, the hope for man is found in the Bible and its truths.

Why is Francis Schaeffer a Christian? “It is not,” he says, “because it will make me feel good” or “that I get a big emotional boost out of it.” It is because “it is truth. The truth of what is … the reality of the total of life. On this basis, we should become a Christian.”

In films three and four, entitled “What Is Humanism?,” Schaeffer examines the philosophical base of humanism (as compared to Christianity) and the logical consequences of humanistic thought forms. (He points up the inconsistencies and dangers of humanism as it operates in the world today.)

Schaeffer notes that the revolt of Adam and Eve is the true historic beginning of humanism. Modern humanism was born of the humanistic elements of the high Renaissance and came to its climax in the Enlightenment (which was played out in the real world during the French Revolution). Out of this period were born the thought forms that predominate in our present age.

People do live consistently with the way they think, Schaeffer states, and they manifest their philosophy in whatever they do. Humanism is being exhibited in a dominant form today in the West. This is clearly illustrated, he says, in the legal system in the United States. An example was the Supreme Court’s abortion-on-demand decision, in which it upheld the selfish desires of a pregnant woman to be free of an “unwanted” child. Schaeffer points out that in this case, the Court thereby stated that the personal peace of a particular individual is more important than life itself. He warns that we can no longer proceed on the idea that humanism is a theory without practical application in the real world. It is a movement (although not a conspiracy) and a continuous crusade practiced with religious fervor.

Humanism is dedicated to the destruction of the system of biblical absolutes. All this is in light of the fect that humanism does not have anything to replace the biblical system it attacks. The logical consequences of humanism are therefore chaos and anarchy—first in personal lives and then in the political arena (as it has its outworkings in the real world). As such, Schaeffer issues a call for Christians to combat humanism on all fronts. Silent Christians must become vocal Christians.

In the fifth film, “Confronting the World: Challenging the Separation of Church and State,” Schaeffer exposes the modern concept of the separation of church and state for what it really is: “It is absolutely inane. It is not rooted in history. It is not a reality on the basis of the history of this nation.”

In this important episode, Schaeffer examines the dilemma faced by Christians when they vocalize their faith. They are most assuredly put down by the mass media as second-class citizens and told to be silent. Why? Because there is a separation of church and state, which, in humanistic terms, means the state is to be humanistic (atheistic, if you like). The Bible of Christianity is thus not considered relevant in any decision making by the state.

Schaeffer correctly states that the founders of America never intended a separation of the state and theistic religion, which, at that time in history, was the Judeo-Christian system of absolutes. With the predominance of humanism, however, the founders’ original intentions have been totally distorted Essentially, the humanists have applied a relativistic interpretation to the Constitution, molding it to fit their world view. To do so, they have invariably been forced to ignore history and distort words. It has become a semantic battle. For example, the phrase “separation of church and state” says nothing about the separation of religion and state, though unfortunately, that is the way the concept is now used.

Sadly, Schaeffer notes, the church has bought the humanistic propaganda line. As a result, in large part Christians have been silent except in the area of personal evangelism. But, Schaeffer emphasizes, Christians must reaffirm their Christian roots and say, in effect, “This is our world. This is our country. This is the way it was.” Christians must become assertive, and carefully consider Christian resistance to illegal and unbiblical acts by the modern state. If they do, there is real hope.

In “God’s Authority and Our Responsibility” (film six), Schaeffer analyzes the question of authority and the proper Christian response to it. He notes that in the fallen world, God has established hierarchy and authority in the form of the state, the church, and the family. Because men are fallen, authority is necessary to keep order and to keep things from collapsing into utter chaos. He indicates that nonbiblical rebellion against authority is rebellion against God. It leads to wrong ends and chaos in this life.

Thus, there must always be authority in the fallen world. Today, however, most authority has been assumed by the state. Schaeffer notes that this is the result of the church’s failure to be effective as salt or preservative in society. The real Bible-believing church has the power to reestablish proper lines of authority that should rest ultimately in such biblical institutions as the family and the church. Again, this means applying biblical absolutes in all walks of life in reaffirming the lordship of Christ. The modern state that sees itself as sovereign, however, will resist the claims of another sovereign—that is, Christ as the ultimate sovereign.

In film seven, “What Is the Church?,” Schaeffer discusses the true nature of the church and the church’s responsibility to the culture surrounding it. He sees the church as a living organism, not a formal liturgy or a building. It is a group of believers who come together to worship in spirit and in truth. For example, a group of Christians who meet in a home to worship God is no less a church than the more formal church gathering.

Schaeffer notes there should be room for creativity in the church; God created individuals, not committees. This means that men will worship God in varying ways and in varying forms, but they are still part of the church. He warns, however, that any body of believers that comes together must do so in accordance with biblical standards and discipline. There must be church government. He reiterates the proposition set forth in the previous film that authority is necessary in the fallen world, even in the church. However, because there must be authority does not mean there is but a single form a church should assume.

The eighth film, “Conversion and Evangelism,” focuses on the basic meanings behind such terms and concepts as conversion, salvation, and evangelism. Schaeffer begins by making the crucial distinction between conversion and salvation, saying, “Conversion is once and for all. Salvation is never complete till Jesus comes back again.”

He emphasizes that true conversion is not only hearing the Word of God, it is doing it. “It is keeping the laws of God, not as a bare religious abstraction, but because God is God.… It isn’t even just affirming his Word, but, theoretically, there will be fruit.” Christianity, he stresses, is not static, and each person will continue to grow at his or her rate of maturity. But as the Christian matures, fruit will be evidence of true conversion.

Schaeffer warns that Christianity is more than an experiential trip: we live in a real world with real people and real problems, and there will be suffering and pain. If Christians are to persevere, they must understand that Christianity is in the living and doing, not just the talking. The bottom line of the Christian experience is placing Christ at the center of things in making him Lord.

In the final two films, “Living with Suffering and Sickness” and “God’s Leading in L’Abri and Our Lives,” both Francis and Edith Schaeffer offer their views on suffering and sickness and their involvement in L’Abri Fellowship in Switzerland. From the perspective of their personal sufferings and afflictions, each observes that suffering is part and parcel of life in a fallen world. The idea prevalent in some Christian circles that sickness or suffering is a sign that something is wrong with the individual is strongly rebutted. Schaeffer believes such an idea arises when the Fall is not taken seriously. Neither the world nor Christians will be perfect until Christ returns. Until then, we live in an abnormal world where suffering is normal. God uses suffering for his purposes, and it is not something to escape at all costs. Schaeffer says sometimes God does chasten us, and that we have to ask with seriousness when trouble comes: God, are you teaching me something?

These 10 films are a very personal statement from one of the great theologian/philosophers of our times. In actuality, they are the culmination of a half-century of important work. They should be seen by a large audience, and appreciated for what they are: the tapestry of the life of a man who has given himself totally to the service of the God who is there.

Mr. Whitehead is a practicing attorney in Manassas, Virginia, and an expert in church-and-state legal issues.

Through a century of theological upheaval, Bible institutes and colleges have held fast to the authority of the Word of God. They have also taught and trained thousands of Christian workers and produced “75 percent of all evangelical missionaries on the field today …” (Kenneth Gangel, CT, Nov. 7, 1980).

The movement has mushroomed from one school with 12 students in 1882 to well over 400 schools in the United States and Canada, plus scores of others throughout the world. American Association of Bible Colleges (AABC) member schools and 12 candidate schools enrolled over 37,000 students in 1981. Together with the Christian liberal arts colleges and seminaries, they form a powerful army for the evangelical faith against the secularism of our times.

The purposes of Bible colleges and Bible institutes are essentially the same. They present a Bible-centered curriculum with the express purpose of preparing students for Christian service. They are “special purpose institutions.” The AABC defines Bible college education as “education of college level whose distinctive function is to prepare students for Christian ministries or church vocations through a program of Biblical, general, and professional studies.”

John Eagen, president of Saint Paul Bible College, says, “A possible difference between the two types of institutions is that the Bible college may provide approximately two years of liberal arts training, while the Bible institute may provide one year or less of liberal arts courses. Consequently, the Bible college awards a bachelor’s degree while the Bible institute usually awards a diploma. The latter kind of institution, however, may grant a baccalaureate degree on the basis of liberal arts courses taken elsewhere.”

But the Bible college is different from a Christian liberal arts college in that its curriculum concentrates on biblical studies and preparation for specific forms of Christian service. All students concentrate in Bible studies and courses in preparation for church-related ministries.

Early Schools Of Higher Education

One of the main reasons for the great migration of Europeans to North America was religious freedom and the privilege of proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ. The official seal of the Massachusetts Bay Colony displays the figure of an Indian repeating the words of Acts 16:9: “Come over into Macedonia, and help us.” They thought of the colony as a fulfillment of the Macedonian call.

The driving force behind the founding of the first colleges was primarily that of preparing Christian workers to proclaim the gospel. John Mostert, executive director of the AABC, says in speaking of the Bible college movement, “We should take note of the fact that the earliest colleges in the United States were quite similar to what the Bible colleges are at the present time. Developing good servants of the church and civil society constituted the major mission of Harvard and Yale. Religious motivations were also dominant in the founding of Canadian institutions of higher learning. This was true of King’s College, Acadia University, and Bishop’s College.”

• Harvard College was founded in 1636 with a special view to training the clergy. Until 1700, more than half its graduates went into the ministry.

An early booklet, titled “New England’s First Fruits,” was distributed in England in 1643 for the purpose of raising funds for the new college. It stated the purpose of Harvard as that which led a student “to know God and Jesus Christ which is eternal life (John 17:3), and therefore to lay Christ in the bottom, as the only foundation of all sound knowledge and learning.” Other literature described Harvard’s main purpose as being “to advance learning, and perpetuate it to posterity: dreading to leave an illiterate ministry to the churches, when our present ministers shall lie in the dust.”

• Yale, from its beginning in 1701, was more conservative. In 1795 its president addressed students on such subjects as “The Bible Is the Word of God.” In 1825 a gospel group from Yale traveled about the country in evangelistic ministry.

• Brown University was founded by the Baptists for the primary purpose of training clergymen. The charter stipulated that 22 of its 29 trustees must be Baptists and its president “forever a member of a Baptist church.”

• Dartmouth College was founded to train men as missionaries to the American Indians.

• Princeton, in its early days, insisted that the faculty be convinced of the necessity of religious experience for salvation.

The compelling influence behind the founding of the first colleges was the desire for students to study the Bible and eventually serve as Christian ministers.

Curricula in these colleges consisted of Greek and Hebrew to assist in the study of the Scriptures, natural philosophy or science, and theology. The subjects were rigidly prescribed for all students and presented a truth that was to be learned rather than debated. Attendance at religious services was required and discipline in moral matters was expected and enforced. The authority of the Bible was unquestioned.

Gene Getz, in his book The Story of Moody Bible Institute, states: “Two main trends were destined to change this academic situation rather drastically. First, as public education became prominent, people began to express general dissatisfaction with church-oriented higher education, and a growing secularization resulted. Second, as religious liberalism began to penetrate theological thinking near the close of the nineteenth century, many schools which had maintained evangelical purposes in spite of increasing secularization shifted from Evangelicalism to Liberalism.”

The Secularization Of Higher Education

For over 200 years, evangelical Christianity provided leadership to American higher education. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, modern secularism in American education gradually crowded out these classical and religious studies. The addition of the natural and social sciences were part of this change. Protestant students, for the most part, went through elementary, secondary, and college-level education on a secular level, and specific Christian education was deferred until they were in their early twenties. This delay in Christian education was virtually unknown in the history of the church.

The college, therefore, became the appropriate place for training in professions other than the Christian ministry. While the majority of college graduates of the seventeenth century entered the ministry, this percentage dropped to 50 percent in 1750, 22 percent in 1801, and 6.5 percent in 1900. Among freshmen who entered college in the fall of 1980, less than half of 1 percent indicated “clergy” as their probable career occupation. A naturalistic and pragmatic world view, the gradual erosion of the authority of the Scriptures in American colleges, and the scientific revolution all combined to secularize college training.

Added to this was the development of tax-supported schools that were separated from the church. State governments, aided by the Morrill Act of 1862, began to establish public institutions of higher learning. Eventually these secular institutions grew in size and influence until they dominated higher education in America.

Beginnings Of Bible Institutes And Colleges

By the late 1800s, some evangelical leaders in America felt that another type of school was needed. Revivals in the latter part of the nineteenth century had focused attention on the deep, unmet spiritual needs of the masses. Young people were volunteering to be Sunday school workers, missionaries, ministers, and evangelists. The 60 or 70 Protestant seminaries in existence had neither the room nor the curriculum for this new type of student. New schools were needed to provide these persons with the essential biblical and practical training that would prepare them for Christian ministry.

Two men, independently of each other, sensed the need to begin that kind of school in the late 1800s. The first was Albert B. Simpson, who was possessed by evangelistic and missionary zeal for world evangelization. A Presbyterian clergyman from New York City, Simpson returned from a visit to Great Britain where he had seen in operation the East London Bible Institute for Home and Foreign Missions. In its first five years, this school had enrolled 700 students in a program of Bible study and practical training for Christian ministry.

Simpson envisioned a school of this type to provide special training for missionaries and home workers. So one day in 1882 the stage of the 23rd Street Theater in New York City, equipped with wooden benches and tables, became Simpson’s classroom. The New York Missionary Training College (now Nyack College) began with 12 students and two teachers.

On October 1, 1883, it was formally organized. Between 40 and 50 students came for a one-year course of study that included English, Christian evidences, Bible study and interpretation, church history, and Christian life and work. Among the first-year lecturers were Arthur T. Pierson, George F. Pentecost, Charles F. Deems, A. J. Gordon, Thomas C. Easton, and Kenneth Mackenzie.

The first statement of character and purpose of the school declared: “This work originated in the felt need for a simple, spiritual, and scriptural method of training for Christian work the large class of persons who desire to become prepared for thorough and efficient service for the Master, without a long, elaborate college course. It aims, through the divine blessing, to lead its students to simple and deeply spiritual experiences of Christ, and to recognize the indwelling presence and power of the Holy Ghost as the supreme and all-essential qualification and enduement for all Christian ministry; and to give to them a thorough instruction in the Word of God, and a practical and experimental training in the various forms of evangelistic and Christian work; besides such other theological and literary studies as are included in a liberal course of education.”

The second person burdened for a new type of education was evangelist D. L. Moody. The year 1884 was marked by depression and unrest across America. People literally starved to death in some of the big cities in spite of the soup kitchens. Crime and vice abounded, while corruption flourished in high places. Moody was particularly burdened by the needs of Chicago, as well as the urban areas of the world.

In the spring of 1873, Moody urged Emma Dryer, a teacher and assistant principal at Illinois Normal University, to begin Bible classes in Chicago. These grew into two- and three-week training sessions called institutes, which majored in teaching the Bible and witnessing techniques.

Miss Dryer insisted that Moody was the one to lead in this effort, and that both men and women should learn to be city workers. As a result of these conversations, the May Institutes were launched as part of Moody’s ministry in Chicago. After some years, Christians in Chicago began to pray for a more permanent organization to teach and train Christian workers.

On January 22, 1886, speaking to a large crowd in Farwell Hall on the subject of city evangelism, Moody called for the training of “gap men—men to stand between the laity and the ministers.… I do not want you to misunderstand me, but the ministers are educated away from these classes of people. Not that it is too much education, but it is their training that has been away from them. For instance, a boy grows up to school. He is kept at school until he is ready to go to college, and then to college, and from college to the theological seminary, and the result is he comes out of a theological seminary knowing nothing about human nature, doesn’t know how to rub up to these men and adapt himself to them, and then gets up a sermon on metaphysical subjects miles above these people. We don’t get down to them at all; they move in another world. What we want is men trained for this class of people.”

Moody and his associates soon sensed the need for a permanent building. They realized that the work would be far more effective if students could live in Chicago year-round and be trained. One day Moody and an usher from his church knelt on a vacant lot at the corner of Chicago Avenue and LaSalle Street and asked God to give them that land for a training school. The property was purchased, and the first building of the Bible Institute for Home and Foreign Missions of the Chicago Evangelization Society was erected and finished in 1889. (It was not called Moody Bible Institute until after D. L. Moody’s death.)

Growth Of Bible Institutes And Colleges

Meanwhile, Christians from dozens of other cities had caught the vision and sent representatives to Chicago. They studied the curriculum and operation of the institute in Chicago. As a result, similar schools came into being in various parts of the country.

Nearly every institute began through a dynamic, strong leader who exerted a powerful influence on the school and its students. They were persons of great faith and, often, wide reputation. The maintenance of the original purposes of these founders by those who succeeded them is attested to by the number of such schools still in existence. That these schools continue to maintain the original purposes of their founders—to provide education that prepares students for full-time Christian ministry—is a witness to this continuity of purpose.

Robert C. Pace, in Education and Evangelism (a book sponsored by the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education), states that the fastest-growing enrollment pattern in American higher education today is that which is associated with the evangelical, fundamentalist, and interdenominational churches.

Bible Institute And College Curricula

The primary characteristic of Bible institute and college curricula is the central place given to direct study of the English Bible. The deep conviction that the approach of a receptive faith takes precedence over critical study is a cornerstone of the Bible college movement.

Study about the Bible is no substitute for study of the Bible. Bible colleges major in the Bible. The emphasis on the Bible in college-level study is nothing less than a return to what, in church history, was the normal, consistent process of Christian education from childhood to adulthood.

The other dominant characteristic of the curricula is the large place given to practical training. It has been said by proponents of this type of training that it is better to do without knowing than to know without doing. The weekly requirement of practical, down-to-earth Christian ministries concurrent with biblical studies has been a hallmark of this unique type of education.

In the beginning, Bible subjects were ungraded and the course of study in these training schools was usually about two years. During the 1920s and 1930s, there was a trend toward lengthening the course to three years and developing specialized programs for training pastors, missionaries, church musicians, and Christian education workers under the name “Bible institute.” In the 1940s and 1950s, many schools added a fourth year of liberal arts, granted bachelor’s degrees, and adopted the name “Bible college.”

The success of Bible institute and college curricula can be measured by a recent survey of over 2,000 Bible institute and college graduates that showed there are presently 57 percent serving in some kind of full-time Christian ministry. About half of those in full-time service are pastors, and approximately 17 percent serve as foreign missionaries (Kenneth Bosma and Michael O’Rear, Educational Experiences and Career Patterns of Bible College Graduates, 1981, AABC).

Bible Institute And College Accreditation

During the early years of the movement, there was a tendency for spiritual standards for admission and graduation to overshadow academic concerns. In fact, there was such a lack of commonly accepted standards that a meeting called by James M. Gray in 1918 to unify such schools and to establish a credit exchange system failed and the effort was abandoned.

Bible institutes and colleges during this period often suffered the stigma of being short-cut training schools rather than true educational institutions. Furthermore, few of these schools were recognized by state boards of education and other accrediting agencies. It became increasingly apparent that an accrediting agency was needed that could aid in meeting and correcting these deficiences.

As a result, the National Association of Evangelicals issued an invitation to U.S. and Canadian Bible institutes and colleges to meet at Winona Lake, Indiana, in 1946. At that meeting, the Accrediting Association of Bible Institutes and Colleges was formed. By the end of that year, the AABC was made up of 12 schools. By 1970, there were 50 schools enrolling 20,000 students, and by 1981, 77 schools and 12 candidate schools enrolling over 37,000 students.

Looking Ahead

Bible colleges face significant opportunities as well as serious dangers in the future. When we consider the over 37,000 students enrolled in Bible colleges, others in Christian liberal arts colleges and seminaries, and the growing number of believers in the emerging church worldwide, the possibilities for fulfilling the Great Commission are realistic. In addition to this manpower potential, the advances in technology, transportation, and linguistics, along with the miracle of mass media, mean that we have the possibility of reaching our entire world with the gospel in this generation.

But there are also grave dangers ahead. Bible colleges, like people, are born to live and serve. But, also like individuals, they are susceptible to death. The mortality rate historically in higher education is discouraging. In listing the dangers that confront the Bible college movement, no one is pointing a finger, but rather stressing the common pitfalls that confront us.

1. The danger of forsaking a Bible-centered philosophy of education. The history of education, from colonial times until now, dramatically illustrates the danger. Holding to the full authority of Scripture can never be taken for granted. It is my opinion that the administration and faculty of our schools must affirm and reaffirm, by our profession and personal lives, total confidence in the Word of God.

Speaking 75 years ago, Benjamin Warfield reminded us that “the Word of the living God is our sole assurance that there has been a redemptive activity exercised by God in the world.” He added, “Just in proportion as our confidence in this Word shall wane, in just that proportion shall we lose our hold upon the fact of a redemptive work of God in the world.”

Schools at times have drifted because academics became all important. Surely our goal must be academic excellence—but always coupled with a personal commitment to Jesus Christ and the Word of God.

Why do schools drift? Because of individuals. And individuals drift because they lack a stated purpose, or because the purpose changes or is forgotten.

To keep the faith, we must know the faith. It must be virile, and well defined. We cannot safeguard a nebulous, shibboleth-like shadow, hidden in a closet.

But it is not enough to know the faith. We must also affirm the faith. Bible Christianity is contrary to the natural man, and it cannot possibly be maintained without a constant struggle. We are encouraged to fight the good fight of faith.

But more than doctrine is involved. A Christian school must also undergird the faith. The New Testament word for “church” is ekklesia, which means “called-out ones.” A truly Christian institution, by its very nature, is called out to a superior lifestyle.

I realize that a significant number of administrators and educators will object; however, it is my conviction that the concept of separation is vital to maintaining the faith. Some may complain occasionally about standards and regulations, but if nothing else, this is a reminder that the Christian’s life is different.

Conformity to the world merely indicates that we are drifting. We are mindful of the emphasis of Romans 12:2, brought out with special clarity in the Phillips translation: “Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold.”

The Bible college also undergirds the faith by a positive program of training. Christian separation is from the world and unto Jesus Christ. That requires cultivation of the inner life. Students must be challenged and encouraged to develop a significant devotional life. In other words, the climate of the college must be conducive to spiritual growth.

Bible colleges must also actively share the faith. I firmly believe that a school that does not share the faith corporately, as well as individually, will ultimately not keep the faith.

2. The danger of a declining student population. Projections by the National Center for Educational Statistics tell us that there will be 500,000 fewer college students by 1990 than there are today. Private colleges will be down 7.4 percent by 1988, the center predicts.

Robert Baptista, in his 1980 article (CT, Nov. 7), succinctly wrote, “I believe the key not only to survival but to excellence in the 1980s and beyond is a satisfied student. When a Christian student understands the special mission of the college, when he experiences a first-rate educational program, when he has sound opportunities for spiritual growth and development, and when he is in contact with people on campus who consistently demonstrate Christian love and concern, it is then that a student can expect a satisfying experience.” Over the years we have discovered that the satisfied student and alumnus are our finest recruiters.

3. The encroachment of federal and state government into the affairs of private education. Will the government remove our nonprofit status and tax our property? Will we be required to accept students regardless of faith in Jesus Christ? Will we be forced to employ those who refuse to embrace our theological position? Will the government impose such rigorous restrictions contrary to our faith that it will be an unreasonable financial burden to contest them? These are real dangers.

It is incumbent upon Christian churches and individuals to be aware of these threats and to stand against them. Our influences can be felt in the voting booth and upon the legislative floors of our state and federal governments. Important groups like the Christian Legal Society, the Christian Law Association, and the National Association of Evangelicals can serve as vital links to preserve our freedoms.

4. The lack of adequate financial resources. For the most part, I do not foresee many Bible colleges failing because of finances, even though all of them admittedly are engaged in the dollar struggle. In a few instances, mergers are possible and would result in improved stewardship, as well as an improved school. The grassroots allegiance of committed Christians to world evangelization through the Bible college is alive and well. The Bible college that remains true to its historic purpose, demonstrating integrity in its program and exercising good stewardship of its resources, is one that will survive.

5. The need for educational flexibility. Throughout its history, the Bible institute and college movement has adjusted its curricula to meet contemporary needs. Some of these developments included the lengthening and specializing of courses and the addition of liberal arts courses leading to the granting of degrees.

While holding a firm grasp on the place of the Bible and its authority, our training courses need constantly to be kept current with today’s needs. Expanding technology has often been an indicator of needed courses. Aviation, broadcasting, and literature have all generated the need for Christ-centered training to prepare Christians to work in these areas. In the years ahead, technology will create the need for information managers and communication specialists in churches and missions around the world.

Shifting student populations also open needs for new courses. More women are seeking careers. The average age of the student body is rising. The employment needs of Christian agencies and missions are becoming widely varied, and greater vocational counseling is needed in our schools.

The story of the Bible institute-college movement is a dynamic expression of the life-giving power of the Word of God. In spite of significant obstacles in the 1980s, the future is promising.

Former evengalist and pastor George Sweeting has been president of Moody Bible Institute, Chicago, since 1971.

“I’m busier than ever, but without the stress that went with my other job before I officially retired.” So says Sadie Bryant, a retired teacher who spends four mornings a week teaching English to immigrant children. Her present group includes one Chinese, one Japanese, one Hispanic, and two Laotian children. As if that were not enough to keep her fulfilled, she has added to her weekly schedule a little boy who needs reading help. “It’s even more fulfilling than teaching because I don’t have all those duties that nonretired teachers have!” she exults.

• Her close friend Effie Erickson was the coordinator who made sure each foreign child was assigned a tutor. She also headed up a volunteer literacy program. Then just over a year ago, without having lost a day of her fulfilling work, she was rushed to the hospital where at the age of 80 she went to be with the Lord.

• Jack Pitau’s neighbors miss him. They had come to depend on his skills in carpentry, plumbing, and electrical work. But six months after his wife’s death, he took off for a bush station in Sudan. There he has built a house and a dispensary for a doctor couple and two single missionary nurses who are returning after their evacuation several years ago. He even knows how to make nails from scraps; if he didn’t, there would have been a month’s delay until the mission plane could fly them in. “My kids were afraid I would get some tropical disease.” He grinned. “At 77, I told them that the Lord must be looking forward to seeing me soon anyhow.”

• “We never thought the inner workings of a mission office could have so many facets,” John Zahn declares. “I thought I knew all about financial workings before I started to do the income taxes with their overseas complications for missionaries. Still, I don’t think we’ve ever been more fulfilled in all our lives.” John and his wife, Marg, were describing their past five years as financial secretary and hostess at a mission’s home office. Like the others, they seem to be defying that stereotyped picture of retirement where a person struggles with boredom, real or imagined ills, and a sense of uselessness.

Are these people exceptions to the retirement syndrome we read about in books? Perhaps. But if so, such exceptions are becoming part of a trend evident enough to lead to the coining of a new expression: “the young olds.” It indicates that there are those among today’s 38 million citizens 55 and over who are still vigorous, healthy, motivated, and alert enough to embark on new careers, to develop latent interests, fruitfully to continue on in present jobs, or to fulfill desires to use their lifelong experience in some unique Christian service.

What has brought this about?

First, with the postwar baby boom population well into adulthood, new attitudes toward aging are quickly developing.

Second, better nutritional habits, exercise, weight control, living conditions, and more accessible medical care have had their impact on the number of people who reach the age of the average life expectancy of 70 for men and 78 for women (about six years fewer for blacks).

Once a person arrives at 65 to 70, a third factor enters the picture: his life expectancy dramatically increases. For a male, it is about 80 years, and for a female, 84, white or black. Such helps as hearing aids, cataract surgery, heart pacemakers, bypass operations, and drugs to control blood pressure have dramatically improved the quality of these years. Statistics from the National Institute on Aging indicate that a large percentage of people now remain active and relatively independent until at least age 75.

A fourth explanation is the bare fact that inflation is eroding the spending power of pensions and social security. A 1979 survey directed by pollster Louis Harris revealed that 84 percent of the retired people and 88 percent of the workers polled saw inflation as seriously lowering living standards. However, in interviews with retirees, it became evident that the potential distress of having to work to maintain a certain living level was well offset by the genuine desire to remain active as long as possible. As John Zahn put it, “It’s far more stimulating and just plain fun to be where the action is. It gives a lot more meaning to our lives than rocking ourselves to the grave.” Those who were interviewed left the impression that they would agree.

Unique Options

What are the distinctive choices that Christians among the 38 million Americans 55 and older are making in retirement? What unique challenges do they have to confront, and how do they prepare for them?

Think what it means to the body of Christ when Christians have a longer period in which to apply the vast accumulation of 70 years’ wisdom and skill.

• There is Doug Smith, 69, of Passaic, New Jersey. At 65, he retired from a local assembly line to spend his meager life savings on a van to transport older folks to his favorite eastern historical sites. Eventually a small, yet financially viable, business developed. “In 1982 it looks like the government will let us have all our social security income-tax free once we reach 70. This will permit me to get ahead a bit financially,” he beams, “and I’m doing what I love for once, witnessing and all. You know, people my age have time to think. For some it’s the first time they have taken an inventory of their lives. They know they have to make decisions now or never.”

• Other “retirees” like Bob Stelles are teaching part- or even full-time at Christian colleges or Bible schools. He explains, “I ease their budget because they don’t have to pay pension and hospitalization benefits for me. I already have that as part of my retirement benefits. I can contribute my engineering background to this new generation, and I don’t have to be bothered by all those committee meetings and do all that paper work. This leaves lots of time for the students, and my wife is a top counselor. It makes keeping the bigger house worthwhile.”

• Jack Phillips, 74, a janitor in his church, feels no less needed as he contributes more services than his small salary demands to the church that nurtured him all his life. “I’m really in the center of things here,” he says. “The pastor uses me as a sounding board—I guess ’cause I listen, care, pray, and see that nothing goes further.”

• Tom Staun, 72, although formally retired a year ago from his own construction business, volunteered to direct the building of a church in Alaska. He sees another valuable contribution of active retirement. “You know,” he says, “there are a lot of magazines talking about the burden we elderly people can be on society. I wonder if it ever occurred to them that it is the growing group of elderly who are giving more and more to churches, missions, and other Christian organizations. We’ve had our day, and we know where our values are. In many ways, we are offsetting the problems that could be created by our longer lives.”

The blisters of these seasoned veterans have become the calluses that enable them to face life with realism: its starkness is tempered with the secret riches of experience. They have had their careers, so they are generally more relaxed, less driven to taste success, less concerned about recognition, and less affected by the politics of the system. Their children no longer demand the devotion of time and energy. Their pensions often permit them to work for lesser salaries, or, for others, to contribute their time and skill to organizations and people. Contrary to past thinking, mission societies are finding that these people do adapt well in a foreign culture where they can offer a quality of skills far beyond that possessed by younger missionaries.

What are the unique challenges Christians meet today in retirement? How are they facing them? Although no generalizations include everyone, the challenges are common enough to feel familiar to most retirees.

The Challenge Of Adjustment

John Zahn identified the struggles during his first two years of retirement. “We both had highly responsible jobs. I had been with the same company 30 years, had lots of good relationships, contact with all ages, and plenty of extracurricular activities that grew out of my job—like speaking at Christian Business Men’s prayer breakfasts in many cities. My wife started working when our youngest started college. We jokingly reminded each other how well adjusted and versatile we were. With all our interests we decided we might as well retire early. We had big farewell parties, a silver tea set, gold watch, and all the trimmings.

“We spent the first six months traveling, visiting the grandkids, golfing, seeing old friends, and fixing up the house. But bit by bit, it lost the spice it had when we were limited by time. Suddenly, bango! The bottom seemed to fall out of my life—no schedule, no stimulation, no important demands on me.”

John Zahn was describing what Robert Atchley, a specialist in social gerontology (aging) calls the phases of retirement. In the initial period, the honeymoon phase, activity is the name of the game, doing all those things the person always wanted enough time to do. It is hard to understand how anyone could ever be bored! This is particularly true for those who possess the health and the wealth to be fairly unhampered in their choices.

Doug Smith seemed confused that such a honeymoon could even exist. For him, it was an immediate slump into the disenchantment phase. “Even the sameness of the assembly line was better than being home alone. There was no garden in the inner city. The kids had their own lives. The grandkids weren’t as enchanted with a grandpa who was always there. I got tired of walking to the Passaic Falls by myself. I sure knew what it meant to be in the doldrums.”

Fortunately, both John and Doug gradually entered phase three, reorientation, where they began to assess the alternatives. John Zahn’s new lease on life came with a mission executive’s Wednesday night prayer request. He needed someone to handle the voluminous financial aspects of his mission office, and he needed a hostess for the visitors. For Doug, reorientation started with an old van put at his disposal to take other retirees on shopping trips.

This reintroduction of meaningful activity reduced the loss of purpose and status both keenly felt, and it led to the stability phase. They had a new orientation to life, some predictability, some satisfaction to provide a framework for more refinement of choices. In Doug’s case, it led to the gradual development of a small, but full-scale, private touring business. For John and his wife, it meant a recent overseas trip to train Nigerian church leaders in the rudiments of financial record keeping.

How, when, and if a retiree experiences all of these phases depends on the kind of preparation he or she has made for retirement, the significance of his employment, the degree of realism in retirement plans, and the internal and external resources at his disposal. However different the sequence and number of phases, our very humanness produces a reaction of some kind that is not necessarily correlated with psychological health. It is those who find themselves “stuck” in a phase who profit from talking with someone who can understand their pain. With an increasing interest in aging, many communities provide assistance in facing such trauma. Pastors, too, are becoming more aware of transitional stages in life.

Serious preretirement planning about such things as finances, activities, geographic locations, and housing gives time to weigh the possible choices by investigating the facts and discussing them with others, discovering families’ and friends’ perspectives, thinking through one’s own preferences, and seeking the Lord’s direction. Separating fantasy from realism leads to a smoother transition.

The Challenge Of Role Modification

It was Bob Stelles’s wife who suffered the greatest pain of disenchantment when he retired. He zeroed in on an interest he had only very occasionally expressed in the past when he helped his wife with dinner parties. Now he became absorbed in the culinary arts, complete from doing the necessary shopping to producing an immaculate kitchen before they sat down at the table!

“It wasn’t just that one of my big roles was suddenly pulled out from under me, but it seemed like Bob was always there. I didn’t even feel comfortable to call my friends and chat an hour or so each day. He seemed busy, happy, and proud of the requests for his recipes. Well, we finally went to a pastoral counselor for my depression. To make a long story short, he’s back to teaching and I’m loving the surrogate parenting of the college kids.” She sheepishly added, “I don’t mind the groups he invites unannounced because then he has his chance to do some of his gourmet stuff.”

Retirement demands readjustment by each member of the household. At this point in life, the submerged part of the personality often emerges—the one that didn’t quite seem to fit the contemporary sex role pattern. Women seem more able to let their assertiveness come through, while men tend to be willing to manifest more passivity and more overt need for their wife’s support and presence. Research shows that when a husband and wife are flexible about their emerging roles, not only do they both gain greater satisfaction, but also their longevity may be increased.

The Challenge Of Widowhood

A woman’s greater initiative in meeting her own needs can be a fortunate developmental trait when it is considered that four times as many women as men become widowed. Half of all widowed women are under 70 years of age.

Cathy Kammas and her husband were still in their reorientation phase of retirement when he had a fatal heart attack. The difficulties were accentuated through the sale of the family home just before his death. “It took me two years before I could let go of him, accept our shared memories as a source of strength rather than a devastation, and take a new interest in life. One of the hardest parts was that couples we were close to suddenly excluded me. It was as if I was a reminder that it could happen to them.

“My real healing came when a younger couple at church recognized my despair, and encouraged me to talk about my loneliness and express my outrage that this should happen to me. I started to recognize that part of grieving was even over my own inevitable death and the shortness of life. It freed me to live again. Maybe that’s what helped pull me out of the depression.

“At that point I found myself taking more initiative, yet I knew my Lord himself was guiding. I feel almost like I’m desecrating the memory of Pete when I say I wonder if he’d understand me if he came back today. I feel like I’ve grown so much. I’ve taken a business course and found my niche as an executive secretary—quite a role for a grandmother of seven! I’m sure it was the fact that I belonged to the Lord that kept me from being another suicide within a year after the death of a spouse.”

Some partners have time to prepare realistically for the eventual inevitable separation death causes. The Balens have moved into a condominium where the outside work is taken care of. “A smaller, but adequate house, even when the kids visit, meant getting rid of a lot of stuff. At least we could give the valuable objects to those for whom they have meaning, and yet keep enough to feel at home. Taking care of these things and adjusting to a new home together ought to save a lot of hard moments for the one left. We even gave each other permission to start over any way the other one wants to—like possible remarriage, you understand—no sense in having to struggle with guilt over it.”

The Challenge Of Increased Dependency

Health and possible dependency is at least a vague concern of retired people. Gerontologists say that with increased quality of life, many may eventually simply slip into the Lord’s presence in the midst of fullness of life.

On the other hand, a person may suffer anxiety all his life over the vulnerability he may feel toward becoming dependent in his later years. Perhaps this is even truer among Christians who keep themselves on what they perceive to be the giving end, often quoting, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” But suppose they now need to start receiving care from friends and family? They may not see that by receiving that care they continue to be givers—they give opportunity for growth and service to others. What a contribution! Yet if they do not see this, they can almost instantly become the most recalcitrant of “givers.”

Jack Pitau recently came home from the Sudan with terminal cancer. “The hardest thing I have ever resolved has been the idea of depending on my children. We all had to come to grips with the anguish I was causing in my resistence to more dependency, with their need to experience my peace and acceptance of their care, with a mutual realistic acceptance of what they and I could and could not do for each other. Just honestly facing it has been a release of tension for us all. Those extra-special two years in Sudan have made it easier to prepare to say goodbye down here and hello up there.”

Some of the concern others have about eventual dependency can be reduced through what gerontologists call a penultimate will. It is an expression, written when one’s thinking is still clear, concerning physical care, the use of money, the disposal of goods, or any other factor that would be helpful to family or friends in the event the person becomes incapacitated. Discussing it with a willingly named guardian not only puts the writer’s mind at ease, but can reduce painful conflict for those who would feel responsible.

The Intergenerational Challenge

Erik Erikson, a leading figure in the field of human development, speaks of the need to participate in the lives of others, making a significant contribution, directly or indirectly, particularly to younger generations. This helps avoid the sense of impoverishment that comes from a life lived unto oneself. Those who fail to reach out risk becoming absorbed by an overriding concern for themselves that eventually results in a sense of despair over what might have been. “He who would find his life must lose it.” Today more energy over a greater life span is like a special dispensation—a second chance to reproduce ourselves.

Cathy Croes, single, and Bella Eisenhauer, a widow, are sisters in their late seventies, not physically able to work. Yet they know the fulfillment of reproduction as the younger generation once removed continue to pop in on them and glean the wisdom and support they have offered those “younger ones” since they were teen-agers. The two have played a role in the lives of many foreigners they have never met as they have undergirded in prayer and emotional support those “kids” who became missionaries. “Keeping in touch with younger folks helps us keep in perspective those things that could seem like the shenanigans of the younger set. They fill our need, too, in so many ways. We are such interdependent creatures.”

Cathy and Bella are experiencing the richness of understanding the younger generation. Jack Phillips keeps in touch through the young people at church, although “not without aggravations. I am 72,” he admits. True, intergenerational contacts are not without problems. However, as the ranks of the elderly increase, the body of Christ faces the challenge of learning to combine the fresh knowledge, animated creativity, new perspectives, and high energy of the younger with the wisdom and stability of the older generations.

Challenge Of A Life Inventory

Somewhere between 40 and 55, people start to realize that the years they have already lived are probably more than the years that lie ahead. They tend to ponder on what life has been all about. A most rewarding preparation for retirement comes when they formalize the thoughts into a life review, which is most effectively done through writing or verbally sharing with someone. It means distinguishing in light of Scripture between those life responses that have had a positive or negative effect on one’s own growth and the growth of others. On one hand, it faces a person with the responsibility of deciding what elements he wants to maintain, to develop further, or to express in a different way. On the other hand, one must decide what to correct, to adjust, to eliminate. Often the entire gamut of emotions, from utter despair to great joy, is stimulated. The Christian needs the balance of Romans 8:28 as he recognizes God’s sovereignty at work in his humanness. This involves coming to grips with the unfinished business of life, appropriating 1 John 1:9 and Isaiah 43:18–19.

It is a process of coming as fully as possible to terms with oneself before the Lord. This is the person whose contribution in later life leads to a sense of meaning that eventually allows him or her to accept death with serenity rather than despair.

Fran J. White is associate professor of counseling psychology at Wheaton College Graduate School, Illinois. She also conducts a private counseling practice.

The famous Tien An Men (Gate of Heavenly Peace) in Peking was shrouded in bamboo scaffolding. The impressive structure, originally erected in 1412, was restored in 1651. But the old gate was showing the wear of time, the brutalizing of wars and revolts, and the ravages of pollution, so more necessary restoration was now under way.

I was in China with my two sisters and brother as part of a two-week pilgrimage to our old home. The pilgrimage completed, we parted company in Hong Kong. My older sister, Rosa, had never traveled through Europe and it was now or never, so we boarded the plane together for Athens.

In Athens, we could see the Parthenon from our hotel room. It was covered with scaffolding. What weather and wars had failed to do in 2,500 years, pollution had accomplished in just a few.

Our next stop was Paris. Jeanette Evans, whom we’ve known since college days, met us, gave us a swift and amazingly comprehensive tour of Paris, and then took us to her and her husband Bob’s home near Versailles. After a night’s sleep, we toured Versailles—that is, we walked through a small part of it.

Versailles, which was completed in 1689 after around 30 years of construction, has to be seen to be believed! In the 1700s the Royal Chapel was added, completed in time for the marriage of Louis XVI to Marie Antoinette. And wouldn’t you know—the chapel was covered with scaffolding.

We drove the 40 miles to Chartres to see its great cathedral, which is one of the finest examples of the French Gothic cathedral. Once more we found scaffolding.

From Paris we flew to London where even a whirlwind tour is better than no tour at all—especially if it includes Westminster Abbey. As we approached the exquisite abbey, so alive with history, what did we see? You’ve already guessed: scaffolding.

Is that the way the world sees the church?

Scarred by wars, buffeted by storms, and eroded by pollution, God is at work restoring his own, repairing, cleaning, purifying. He sees the end from the beginning. He sees us “complete in Christ” The day will come when “we shall be like him.”

But in the meantime, the world sees mainly the scaffolding.

The unifying center has fallen out of nonevangelical theological education. So says one of the latest issues of Theological Education (Spring 1981), semiannual publication of the Association of Theological Schools, the accrediting agency for most seminaries in North America. With astonishing candor, Edward Farley of the Divinity School at Vanderbilt University acknowledges that “mainline” theological education is trapped in a cul-desac because the basis on which it used to rest has been shattered.

We would do well to take note of what he says, both because it confirms the recent evangelical view of the matter, and because it may present new possibilities of future dialogue.

It seems, according to Farley, that the traditional seminary curriculum has rested on belief in the infallible authority of the Bible. Therefore, it was founded upon scriptural teaching and went on to explore the development of doctrine and confession, issuing in instruction concerning the preaching of the gospel and pastoral care. There was a common understanding about the content of the Christian message, and all the various segments of the encyclopedia contributed to its explication. The Bible gave the content of revelation, passages were exegeted often from the original languages, church history looked into the historical roots of one’s denomination, and all was related to parish and missionary life. In short, traditional theological education had focus, coherence, and direction.

But, says Farley, it no longer has any of these things. Why not? Simply because its basis in the authority of the Bible has been shattered.

The traditional pattern has been undermined by the negative impact of critical historical study. The foundation stone of the edifice has crumbled and the whole structure is giving way. There is no sure knowledge of divine revelation to study and apply any more. There is no material for normative systematic theology and no need to defend the faith. The authority formerly thought to underlie the whole enterprise had been relativized and dissolved away. We no longer have an infallible divine teacher in the Scriptures, only a cacophony of human voices. The members of the faculties are therefore less like an orchestra playing the same concerto than one tuning up, with each musician playing his own cadenza, at odds with his neighbor.

The result is what Farley calls “the dispersed encyclopedia.” Chaos would be another word. One does not study theology at seminary, but encounters a multiplicity of subjects and methods that do not hang together. There is no longer a paradigm of unity holding things together, but only increased specialization and distance. The faculty is made up of scholarly specialists owing allegiance to their independent sciences and guilds. If one is seeking for a unified view of the Christian message and mission, the result is nonsense. There is no rationale or common understanding running through the program. Coherence is lost.

The effect of this dismal state of affairs on a variety of people is predictable. Students experience theological education as a miscellany of courses, unintegrated with one another, and often at odds. Each course has to do everything since one cannot depend on any other course to build upon it. Students naïve enough to expect what laity generally still assume—an integrated education into the glorious mysteries of the faith—are sadly disappointed and disillusioned. When they turn into graduates, they find they have very little they can use because seminary was mostly an introduction to a variety of scholarly endeavors.

What are they to do? They could try to continue the research interests of their professors, but that is not what ministry is about. They are forced to close the book on these technical studies and seek to discover some practical help in ministry wherever they may. They quickly learn that the tentativeness and questioning spirit so natural in seminary goes over like a lead balloon in the congregation where, curiously enough, people still expect the pastor to believe the gospel.

The new system works a little better for faculty insofar as it allows them to get on with their research and writing, which have their own rewards. But even they get lonely because the distance between their scholarly discipline and the next one is so wide. Some even feel bad that their competence has to be measured in their role as specialist rather than theologian. The faculty find themselves as dispersed as the curriculum. All and all, it is not a pretty picture that Theological Education paints.

The only answer that emerges from this quarter, is sociological. One can try to get some unity back by choosing to stand in a church matrix and work as if that tradition were true: bracket the truth question and pretend to be good Presbyterians or Baptists. The difficulty is, the principle of secular criticism is still lurking there and gives the appearance of playing a game. Deciding to be a Lutheran is not quite the same as standing on the Word of God, though it is better than nothing, I suppose. Can we find our unity in “praxis” (the latest “in” word)? Not really, since what that means is as unclear and diverse as theology itself—everything from gay liberation to political insurgency. The crisis really is a deep one. Strong witnesses to Christ can only come out of a system like this by accident or by drawing on their own resources. The future of the churches saddled with theological education like this would not seem to be bright.

Without wishing to be triumphalist in any way, I think evangelicals have a good solution to this problem. There remain in our great seminaries—like Fuller, Gordon-Conwell, Trinity, Westminster, Dallas, and many more—faculties and student bodies of considerable size whose confidence in the authority of the Bible and belief in a confession of faith, howbeit often of an inclusive sort, remain strong. The unified paradigm has not shattered and the rationale has not vanished. While it is true that many issues in soteriology and eschatology that formerly would have been settled are left open, the substantial core of confessional Protestant belief remains strong and vigorous. Not in academic matters only, these schools are also in close agreement about the “praxis” angle, promoting world missions, church growth, and social justice in decent proportion. Evangelical theological education, with all its faults and growing pains, would seem to represent hope in the situation described. There are dozens of institutions where students can encounter a unified vision of faith and a focused concept of the mission of the church.

There must be no pride about this, however. “Let any one who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.” There is no guarantee written in stone that says an evangelical seminary will always be sure of these things. A good school can go bad, and a bad one can become good. We ought simply to be thankful to God that a sound witness exists in the midst of a great deal of declension. Furthermore, we owe it to our colleagues in the mainline stream to explain to them how it is we are able to keep our confidence in the theological center when they do not see it. If we do not try to do that, they can only suppose that we hold to our faith blindly and have nothing substantial to offer them.

Clark H. Pinnock is professor of systematic theology at McMaster Divinity College in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.

The letter before us is a most searching, thoughtful, and open presentation of the dilemma facing all of us. It is particularly relevant in a day when our technological advances have run far ahead of our ability to deal with their moral and ethical implications. Decisions that seemed simple, or that we faced with prayer a few years ago, are now fraught with confusion, guilt, and controversy.

Advanced technology is not all that has brought about the present confusion. A number of new pressures have come to bear on the problem: attention by the public, courts, and legislatures; mass media interested in airing controversial cases; a marked emphasis on individual rights with increasing participation of patients in decisions regarding their own health care; and a general suspicion of technology and medicine mixed with an almost magical belief that medicine has the answers to almost everything.

Along with these directions come new slogans: “Right to Choose,” “Right to Die,” “Death with Dignity,” “Quality of Life.” They all seem so reasonable until we try to define them. The “right to die” may mean anything from allowing a patient to die in peace without extraordinary attempts to prolong life when death seems inevitable, to involving physicians in ending the patient’s life when pain seems uncontrollable or life itself has become unbearable.

“Death with dignity” is even harder to define. Dignity has something to do with the meaning of being human. It may be consciousness and rationality; it may be respect of the person. It has something to do with community and interaction, giving and receiving. Perhaps dignity is maintained when individuals can make their own choices about themselves and their destiny. Many of these things are lost in the ravages of age, disease, and pain.

Medical science has made vast strides in the past decades. Diseases that a few years ago were fatal are now handled with comparative ease. But this has come about at the cost of ever-more-powerful drugs with potent side effects, and more intricate procedures with their attendant discomfort. All of these complicate the decisions about how to manage the patient who seems to be in a terminal illness. The end must come sometime, but the difficulty lies in knowing when to quit trying.

Physicians are able to anticipate probable response to therapy and expected outcomes. Still, it is medical impossible to predict accurately when does will come. Even when the prognosis seems most grim, the unexpected may happen or the miracle occur.

Physicians are guided by their own value systems, their own fear of death, their compulsions never to give up, or their interest in finding new treatments. Even if they do try to do only what is best for the patient, how are they to define extraordinary treatment? What is unusual for one physician or hospital is routine for another. What was extraordinary a few years ago is ordinary today. And what if there were no experimental programs? We would not be where we are today. Always within the heart of patient and physician is the hope that “this new treatment will be the ‘magic bullet’ ” that, for instance, will cure cancer.

It is equally difficult for patients and their families. Instructions left by patients, or in Living Wills, are necessarily vague and subject to misinterpretation. They may be used in a way or at a time that the patient would not have agreed to. Indeed, many who have made such wills have repudiated them when the time came and they were still capable of doing so. None of us can really imagine what we “would do if …,” whether it be for ourselves or for another. What seems intolerable in anticipation may be endurable when actually faced.

Where are we, then, as Christians? We are not immune to the fear of death, especially its attendant pain and disability, both for ourselves and those we love. The Lord’s compassion for those who suffer shines through the pages of Scripture. His answer was to deal as only he could and thus remove the suffering. It is a challenge to the church today to find ways to relieve the loneliness, rejection, hopelessness, and fear for those approaching the end of life.

But what of endless treatments and prolonged agony? Like everything else that we face in life, there should be a balance. There have to be trials of therapy to see if added years to life are possible, and experimentation, too, in the hope of finding new cures. But there must be limits to how far we can go.

When the decision to stop is made it is time for loving support. This means attention, food, warmth, and bodily care in a tender, patient spirit.

We will and do make mistakes. Heroic measures will bring one back to vigorous life, while another will have permanent brain damage or prolonged suffering. We must learn to live with this inequality. We may find that our knowledge was limited, our predictions wrong, and that the Lord had other plans. This, too, we must accept as from his hand.

On the other side, compassion is not the only virtue to be considered. We cannot make our decisions in a moral vacuum. We must guard the principle of the sanctity of life based not on the intrinsic dignity of any individual life but on the fact that God created man in his own image and determines his destiny. If we do not, we risk sweeping away of all restraints in this permissive, liberal society. Once the psychological barriers against taking innocent life are down, application to broader and broader categories of persons will become acceptable. We must be careful as Christians not to allow ourselves to be drawn into accepting euthanasia on the supposed grounds of compassion. Every decision to draw the line on what seems to be further useless treatment should remain a difficult one.

Then how do we cope with suffering that continues despite all we try to do? Somehow we have come to believe that if we did things right, suffering could not occur. But life does not consist in freedom from stress or pain. The Bible does not teach that our greatest good lies in removing all difficulties from our path. Rather, it speaks of learning to comfort others through our suffering, and it talks of enduring. It says the Lord comforts and strengthens us to face with courage the sufferings we endure, and it reminds us that he learned obedience through the suffering of death.

Ultimately, the choice lies with him. When we have done what we could in a loving, responsible way, it is no longer ours to determine. It rests in the sovereignty of God. The stress will remain, along with the perplexities that force us to run to the Lord and learn to rest in him.

Dr. Blumhagen, a former medical missionary in Afghanistan, is an emergency physician practicing at Delnor Hospital in Saint Charles, Illinois.

I am responding to your letter, Mrs. Chapman, as one who has thought a lot about such matters. I have discussed them with a number of Christian physicians, and to a slight extent, was forced to make, along with Mrs. Bayly, a similar decision—though not so difficult or continuing as yours—at the time our four-year-old died of leukemia.

In my opinion, there is no simple, all-embracing answer to the problem. Nor is there any particular course of action that does not involve the risk of being judged wrong in retrospect.

The basic problem is that medical treatment and technology have developed in recent years to the point where life can be maintained for days and weeks, even for years, after it would have ended in all previous ages of human existence. That is also true and in most of today’s world outside the United States that does not share our medical sophistication or influence.

Physicians today must make the decision in a specific case as to whether to apply that treatment and technology or to withhold it. Sometimes the decision is relatively easy; most of the time it is not.

The difficulty is in determining whether living is being prolonged, or simply the act of dying. Decisions about surgery, various life-support systems, blood transfusions, and intravenous and other extraordinary types of feeding and maintaining fluid levels are all involved. The end result is weighed against the factors related to achieving it (pain, consciousness, relational, financial, age, length of potential survival time, etc.).

When our little boy awoke bleeding one morning, we called in the pediatrician. He said, “I can admit him to Children’s Hospital and give him a massive transfusion, or I can leave him to die here. If he has the massive transfusion he might live for two weeks more; he might not. It’s up to you to decide.”

We decided that if he was going to die, we’d rather have him die at home than go through another hospitalization that really couldn’t promise more than very slight prolongation of life at best.

Our boy died that same day. I don’t believe either Mrs. Bayly or I have ever had second thoughts about that decision.

Your decision was based on your father’s expressed desire that doctors not take extraordinary measures to keep him alive. (Sir William Osler, the great Canadian physician, made a similar statement in his last illness: “I am so far across the river; if anything happens, don’t try to bring me back.”) Is such a request appropriate—especially from one who loves the Lord and his Word, as you describe your father? I think it is, and your father’s doctor evidently felt that it was or he would not have permitted you and other members of the family to dictate his medical decisions. As a physician, he, not your father or the family, is primarily responsible.

Since your letter was written some months ago, I’m reasonably certain your father is now with the Lord, “which is far better.” But the question and some feelings of guilt may remain.

Perhaps your decision to withhold feeding by extraordinary means was wrong. Your comparison to one of your children losing his swallowing reflex is not appropriate, however, because in the one case you are speaking of a dying person 83 years of age; in the other, of a child or adolescent with life before him. But even so, perhaps your decision about your father was wrong.

At best our decisions are made without knowing all the factors or all the consequences. And in a medical question of this sort, no layman can make an informed decision, especially under the emotional pressures that are present. A brief conversation—or even an extended one—with the physician is no substitute for medical school, residency, and years of practice. (For this reason I feel that ordinarily the physician in charge should make the decision rather than force it on relatives.) At the same time, he or she will usually share the prognosis and plan of action (or inaction) with the patient and/or family.

This presupposes that the person involved in the desire that heroic measures not be taken and the family both trust the physician in charge. This is one strong reason for having a Christian physician who shares similar values as far as life, suffering, pain, and so on are concerned. One question that I have found somewhat effective, both because it causes the physician to enter into the real situation and also because it frees him or her from the fear of a malpractice suit to some extent is, “If this were your own mother [or father], what would you want?”

If you were wrong, I need not remind you that God forgives sin. He removes guilt, true and false. (I personally find it hard to distinguish between the two. I just pray to God, through Christ, to forgive me.)

As far as your father is concerned, what difference does it make now? Was it wrong to hasten his departure from this veil of tears—if you actually did? And can anyone be sure that you did?

I agree with your statement about not necessarily having perfect peace when you do what you perceive to be the will of God. So many of life’s decisions are not between right and wrong, but between alternative choices, both of which may be right or (more often) wrong. To admit our fallibility, our dependence on God, and then to make what seems the better (or less worse) choice is all that we can do.

And in making such a choice, we trust in the sovereign God, who can undo our choices, changing consequences if we are wrong, and forgive our sin of ignorance. Often, as you indicate, there is no peace—only assurance that God is in control, whatever we may do, and knows our intentions were good and designed to do his will.

I trust that God is comforting you and your mother in the temporary loss of your father. Thank God for eternal life with Him!

JOSEPH BAYLY

Mr. Bayly is vice-president of David C. Cook Publishing Company, Elgin, Illinois. His 1973 book, View from a Hearse, was recently republished by Cook as The Last Thing We Talk About.

The thoughtful questions raised by Mrs. Chapman are of the sort where there may be no absolute answers. Some guidelines can be suggested, however, which may be helpful for one who must participate in decisions for patients in similar circumstances.

First, the person involved does have the right to share in decisions about his or her care, assuming that the individual’s reasoning powers are intact and there is a method of communicating with him or her. This is a legal right. But deeper than the legal implications is the fact that God has endowed the individual with responsibility and reasoning powers. The ability to reason, along with the ability to discern right from wrong, distinguishes man as having the stamp of God’s image. The child under the care of parents or a guardian, and without the experience needed for mature decision, is totally different. Parents bear the responsibility to decide what is best and appropriate for a child when decisions are needed.

Then there is the question of what would be “ordinary” forms of care, and what could be termed “extraordinary.” Ordinary measures could be defined as those that would allow or assist body organs to function effectively. Surgical procedures would be “ordinary measures” when they do not in themselves carry inordinate risk to the individual, and when they restore normal function to the organ system. For instance, in Mrs. Chapman’s father, a “urinary blockage” was present, and a tube (catheter) had apparently been placed directly into the urinary bladder above the pubic bone. The placement of such a catheter is a minor surgical procedure allowing the kidneys to function normally. This I would term as “ordinary,” “reasonable,” “prudent.”

Extraordinary measures might be termed as those that would take over the function of an organ system, or would themselves carry such a risk as seriously to call in question the use of such a measure for the patient. An example in this instance would have been to use dialysis to solve the “urinary blockage” problem rather than a simple catheter surgically placed into the urinary bladder.

Another example of what might be termed “extraordinary” is the use of a respirator when brain function is destroyed. (This is totally different from the damage to the portion of the brain controlling respiration from polio, where the higher centers of the brain are left intact.)

For the patient who has been injured or suffered a complication from surgery, any means available or useful to return that person to his or her normal life is appropriate. These measures may include a respirator, dialysis, transfusions, surgery, and so on. An individual may be incredibly ill, and yet return to a totally functional life.

For the patient known to have a terminal illness, however, a different set of guidelines is needed. The question in such a person’s care is, What measures will be of help in providing comfort and usefulness for however many days of life remain? Usually the use of a respirator or dialysis for such a patient would be “extraordinary.”

The specific question raised about nutrition for such an unfortunate individual is not uncommon. It is my feeling that where the individual’s gastrointestinal tract is functional, using that means is superior to others. A nasogastric tube (a tube placed through the nasal opening and through the esophageal tract into the stomach) can be used for short-term feeding. This is usually not satisfactory for anything but a very temporary measure, and has several distinct hazards, including pneumonia.

A “feeding gastrostomy,” or a tube placed into the stomach through a small incision in the abdominal wall (most of the time placed using local anesthesia), may be a good solution, providing the means to give nutrition to the patient. A gastrostomy tube can be cared for at home, while an intravenous line needs institutional care. On this basis, the use of an IV might be called “extraordinary” since it is more disruptive of life, requiring continued hospitalization. Remembering the definitions suggested, a gastrostomy tube might be termed “ordinary,” allowing the use of the gastrointestinal tract and being capable of home care.

Underlying all of these technical considerations, however, is the fact that God is lovingly involved and sovereign in the lives of each of his children—in this instance both the patient and the family members attempting to make good decisions on behalf of their father.

While the judgment of individuals may vary with respect to what is appropriate, I believe that when God’s children ask for guidance, they can trust him to give that guidance. We can also trust him to lead us to change an initial decision that might not be best. This conviction about God’s active care for his children is a great comfort to me. As Christians, we ask for guidance, and do our best with information available in the light of principles of Scripture. Then we can trust God.

We must also remember that even in our technological age we never understand the total picture. Job’s friends, and even Job, drew some incorrect conclusions about his circumstances. Job maintained his integrity and brought glory to God through his trust. We must do the same.

GORDON L. ADDINGTON

Dr. Addington practices general surgery in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He was formerly a missionary doctor in Hong Kong.

The following letter, received by a member of the CT editorial staff, raised profound personal questions for which there are no easy answers. Believing that many readers face similar situations, the editors asked three persons to write replies for publication.

I recently had an experience that continues to trouble me. After some deliberation, but perhaps too easily and with too much haste, I concurred with others in a decision that has left me with implications I find hard to handle.

The problem concerns my dad, who is 83 years old and a lover of the Lord and his Word. Because of a fast-growing cancer on his face, heart trouble, a diabetic condition, an operation for cancer of the colon five years ago, and a urinary blockage, he requested his family not to take extraordinary measures to keep him alive should he seem to be near death.

While I was in Maine in May visiting him, he was taken to the hospital with a stroke that left him partially paralyzed and unable to swallow. The doctor agreed with our decision, kept him as comfortable as possible, and gave him intravenous fluids but no other source of nourishment.

I had the privilege of caring for him every evening for 10 days. His vital signs were relatively stable. His body was not weak and fought to live. It was heartbreaking to see this and know that all such effort was useless. I faced guilt when my reaction was not one of gratefulness for any slight sign of improvement.

Now after five weeks, Dad is weaker but still not able to swallow or communicate, though he does know when Nana is there. He cries at times when she talks to him. He is being treated now for an abdominal infection around the opening to his catheter.

I still carry a guilt feeling. If we had known Dad would hold on this long, would we as a family have complied with his request and not given him food through a tube? In addition to the IV’s he continues to get, should we have given him stomach feedings against his will? Would he be any better now if we had? Physically, he would be stronger and better able to fight infection. In one sense, what we have done is predetermine that if Dad does not die soon of a heart attack or cancer or some other sudden infirmity, he will die of starvation. This is really a hard thing to face.

Did we have the right to make that decision? Exactly when is it permissible to let a person die without taking extraordinary measures to keep him alive? What is an extraordinary measure and what is not? If Dad could swallow, this would not be a problem. He would be getting nourishment normally.

Do any one of us have a right to choose our way of death, or cooperate with another in so doing? Where does trusting God begin and where does it end in this particular situation? If any one of our children lost his swallowing reflex, it would be criminal for us not to feed him with a gastric tube either through the nose or abdomen, even if he did not want it. Why is it not criminal in Dad’s case? The projected life span would be shorter, but are we putting value on quantity of life only and not quality?

Perhaps we are depriving my dad of moments or days or weeks or years of real living, of a quality he has not known before. Dad feared lonely hours of being in a nursing home, terrible face disfigurement, and a painful death from cancer. When we come to the very doors of possibilities of the things we fear, are we trusting God through it all, or do we have the right to make life and death decisions of our own? What is trust if it is not enduring?

These are difficult questions for me. Do you have any answers? If God had “cooperated” in the beginning, we would have said with deep feeling as Job did, “The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” Since God has not seen fit to take him yet, it is harder to say, “Blessed be the name of the Lord.” Will Dad’s final act of dying be one that God has ordained at that time, or will it be the result of our maneuvering?

As I puzzle over these problems, I am comforted by the fact that God’s understanding is infinite, understanding not only of the issues involved—a complete, whole understanding—but an understanding also of my own reactions, thoughts, and emotions.

I am learning other lessons. I used to think rather naïvely that when I knew and obeyed the will of God, a perfect peace would rule in my heart, and that any lack of that peace indicated some lack of obedience. Now I wonder if there are not situations in life that no matter which direction we take, we lack a perfect peace, a perfect assurance that “this is the way, walk ye in it.”

God’s guidance is not always that clear. We continue to ask, Is this the way? If it is, why do we feel guilty? In Dad’s case, if we had given him feedings against his will, would we not feel guilty for not only failing to show concern for his wishes, but for possibly prolonging his life in misery? Perhaps we should do more to let the family of God know that real distress of heart and mind should be expected in our Christian lives.

Grace P. Chapman and her husband have served as missionaries with the Evangelical Alliance Mission in Curaçao, Netherlands Antilles, for 25 years. Mrs. Chapman’s letter was written last year while she was in the U.S. on furlough.

Carried by the Spirit of God, the prophet Ezekiel was set down in the midst of a valley full of very many, very dry bones.

Burned bones, hang in a hot spot of their own making with apparently no solid frame of reference, lay shimmering in the heat. They represented the house of Israel. God surely intended them to be up on their feet and ready to go, a functioning part of his “exceedingly great army.” He desires a high state of combat fitness for all of his soldiers.

There is a war to be won, and God has raised the standard and set the battle in array. We sing hymns about it, like, “Fight the good fight with all thy might”—the “good” fight of the conflict between good and evil. Those who know God are supposed to be out there in the thick of things.

Why is it, then, that today we see many “bones” lying around in visionless valleys, mere shadows of all they were meant to be? How can we explain the fact that spooky saints are haunting our churches, frightening away the curious inquirer with their rattling religiosity? If we want to discover “the bare bones of this matter,” we have to ask ourselves: What was the matter with the bones?

First, the bones were very dry; second, they were very depressed; third, they felt pretty desolate (Ezek. 37:11). But God said to the bones, “Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live” (v. 5).

We must never confuse numbers with blessing. There came a time in the ministry of one pastor when he became very self-satisfied. His church was growing, and more and more people were becoming involved in the activities. But without realizing it, he had begun to confuse numbers with blessing. The situation was deceiving. As he was driving home one day, he passed the town cemetery and noticed that it was also growing. He began asking himself some hard questions; he wondered if his big, bustling church was simply a brimming boneyard. He decided that from that point on, he would not confuse numbers with blessing.

We must not confuse busyness with blessing, either. There may be busy little Bible-believing bones gyrating all over our churches, but as far as active duty and fighting in God’s great army are concerned, they have been absent without leave. For too long they have wasted time, talents, and opportunities.

It isn’t a question of how many committed committees we have operating, but rather how many committed Christians we are producing. Are we so busy planning church picnics, women’s day outings, or arguing about the color of the new church carpet that we have little time or energy left to teach people how to pray and study the Bible? Are we running around in evangelical circles thinking up new ideas for popular programs that will entertain our people and keep them coming, or are we motivating folk to minister and serve one another? Do we want to keep people happy or make people holy? This is not to say that holiness is not happiness, for holy means whole, full, fat, and satisfied.

Sinews and flesh are supposed to give substance to our spiritual frame. A skeleton is a permanent nucleus ready to be filled up with vegetable matter. As believers responsibly do their part, eating the spiritual food that God has prepared for them, they will begin to shape up.

Those who profess to know the Bone Maker and claim to have received his life must make choices. But it is this very freedom of choice that is the problem, for it is here that the “will of God” meets the “won’t of man.” “Why will ye die?” Jehovah inquired of Israel as they wasted away to nothing. Having willfully neglected their relationship with God and with his Word, the people of Israel admitted they were suffering from a chronic case of spiritual malnutrition.

It is a sin to refuse the diet that God so graciously provides. He sets our spiritual table Sunday by Sunday. He also lays it daily in the dining room of our souls.

Anorexia nervosa is an illness described by a British physician, Sir William Gull, as a “disease of the rich and privileged, a nervous consumption.” He describes the victim as “a skeleton only clad with skin, and the chief symptom that of severe starvation leading to a devastating weight loss—and this in the midst of plenty.” The outstanding feature of this problem is a “relentless pursuit of excessive thinness on behalf of the patient. Anorexics are defiant and stubborn people,” Gull writes.

I once lived within a mile of a Bible school. Week after week, men of God took the Word of God and explained it to the students. I was free to have it all explained to me as well, since my husband was on the staff at the school. It was a case of feast or famine. Being in a stubborn and rebellious mood, I chose famine. Pursuing excessive thinness, I developed a chronic case of spiritual anorexia—a disease of the wealthy and privileged. Even though God had shown me kindness, watched over my spirit, and prepared a banquet of rich spiritual fare well within reach, I deliberately lay down to die in a desert of my own making. It was not a wilderness of inactivity, either, because while I was losing weight I was working out. I was busy, but bony.

The frightening thing about anorexia is the mind-set a person cultivates. Stubbornly to refuse nourishing food for whatever reason is a totally self-destructive course—one you would think would be too painful to pursue. In the end, it takes a radical change of mind to turn the corner and choose to be a healthy, whole person instead of a bag of bones. In my case, I just got tired of being chronically hungry in the midst of plenty and decided to swap busyness for blessedness.

But what is the answer for our churches? How can the dry bones littering some of our churches be transformed? Part of the responsibility must be laid at the feet of our pastors. When God begins to work, the preacher will often be the first one he rattles. As pastors respond in obedience, they earn the right to apply the Word to others.

It is time to look at Ezekiel, who was certainly not a skeletal sort of saint. Somewhere along the line he had been captured. He chose to let the Bone Maker get a good grip upon his life, for “the hand of the Lord was upon him.” Once grasped by God he was well on the way to grasping for himself the reason for which he had been grasped by God in the first place. He got to know God, feasted at his table, and obeyed his call.

Having been captured by the Lord, Ezekiel was carried by the Spirit into the middle of the valley of dry bones. I am sure that had he been consulted, he would have suggested many other places of service to the Almighty as being far more appropriate. But he was not consulted, he was carried.

I remember similar situations when I cannot recall being consulted, just carried. One particularly dry and dusty valley in England comes to mind. The church buildings were pretty—but what good was that when they were pretty empty? Here and there a few people nodded in the pews. Most of my neighbors were aged, while I was young. I felt very much the way Ezekiel must have felt when he heard the Lord say, “Preach to the bones!”

I thought of what God had asked Ezekiel: “Son of man, can these bones live?” And like Ezekiel, I could not help but answer, “Lord, thou alone knowest.” Somehow I did not believe they could—not these bones. My neighbors were a generation away from regular church attendance. The local pastors had lost heart, and who could blame them?

I remember a wizened little old lady telling me that a new preacher had come to her congregation. She didn’t know what to make of him. “If you ask me, he’s a bit too religious,” she commented wryly. I perked up my ears at that, because he didn’t sound like the last two preachers, who had not been religious at all. I found out to my delight that this young man had been captured by the Lord and carried by the Spirit and set down in our midst. I was so excited. Now, surely, God would bring life into our valley.

But the young pastor soon grew discouraged and became part of the heap of dry bones. It was not long after he had arrived that he left, and I realized anew what a desolate place this was. But I couldn’t leave; this was our home. This was our village and these were “my bones.” The first step of “blessing of the bones” was to believe that God had carried me by his Spirit into that particular valley, set me down “in the midst of them,” and commanded me and nobody else to “preach to them.” Stuart, my husband, was away most of the time and could not do it. The preacher had left because he would not do it. And that left me. I realized the blessing of the bones would have to begin with my own blessing.

After the Lord’s servant had been captured and carried, he was commanded to preach. Some do it better than others, of course, for spiritual gifts are involved. But every Christian can pass on a message to some dry bones. The word preach means to tell forth plainly, and anyone can do that with practice. All we have to do is find out just what we are supposed to say and then say it.

We need not worry about it, either. God told Ezekiel exactly what he wanted him to say, and his methods have not changed. He promises to direct our words and also to look after the results. He does not tell us to get down on our hands and knees and rattle the bones into shape. Rather, he commands us simply to listen to his Word and then to communicate it.

After a time there was a shaking and a moving in our valley in England, and the bones began to stand up. The 5 “little old ladies” in my Bible class grew to 80. What’s more, they were no longer spiritually famished, but fat. They marched around bearing witness to God’s resurrection power. For example, one shared with a terminally ill friend how Christ had taken away her own fear of death. Over the following months, these women shared their new experiences with anyone who would listen. It was not long until the sound of an awakening was heard in our valley.

I have often been told by the organizing committee of evangelistic meetings that “this city is a very dead place; it is desolate.”

“Great,” I reply, “let’s go and preach to the bones.”

No doubt many pastors feel dry and depressed. They have lost their confidence; they feel cut off from the Bone Maker. They need to let God’s hand grip them anew and to consider again the call that “carried” them to their place of service in the first place. They also need to ask themselves what it was God commanded them to do. What was the message he asked them to preach?

In their frustration, some pastors resort to entertainment, or to some modern manipulative method to set the “fractured fragments of bones” into place. With some kind of fake finagling they try to get at least a slight rattle from the “rows of ribs” that face them Sunday by sad Sunday. But they need to start again and ask God what he wants them to do and to say.

In addition, it is absolutely essential to pray. The prophet Ezekiel was not only commanded to preach but also to pray: “Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.”

In the end, we will have to learn to call upon the Spirit of God. We can stick it out in dry desperation. We can preach faithfully week afer week and even see the sinews and the flesh start to fill in the frames of the people. We can certainly begin to feed them faithfully. But in the end, we will need to know what it is to pray with power.

Some changes, however, will have to occur before the wind blows. The complaint of the dry bones as they lay in their desperate condition was, “We are cut off.” Feeling unconnected with God and with each other, they confessed that sins and offenses had come between.

An offense is the art of hurting someone else. Have we offended another? Have we been contentious? Did we pick a fight? Do we know that we are a bone of contention with God? God does not like some of the things we have done and said. He wants us to come together “bone to bone,” to say that we are sorry, and to start again. He wants us to write that letter or make that phone call. I am well aware that this sort of behavior will cause a considerable uproar as a “rattled bone” tries to make amends. Perhaps there will be much shaking and quaking until we come together, but come together we must if God is ever to bring renewal. How can there be blessing if we are out of fellowship with a connecting bone?

I remember being responsible for a youth work and suddenly becoming aware that my coleader seemed distant. I realized I must have offended her, but I had not the remotest idea of how or why. You would think it would have been the easiest thing in the world simply to ask her what I had done, but it wasn’t; it was the hardest.

First, I did not want to ask because I really didn’t want to hear her answer. I knew the Bible verse that said, “faithful are the wounds of a friend,” but being very fond of myself, I did not like wounds. Why ask for trouble? Surely it would be best to pretend I hadn’t noticed anything was wrong, and then hope things would work out right. They seldom do, of course, and this situation simply deteriorated until the atmosphere between us fairly crackled.

In the end, I plucked up courage to ask her if something was wrong. Usually we won’t say, “Have I hurt you?” or “What’s wrong with me?” Instead we ask, “What’s wrong with you?” My faithful friend told me she had been offended by my bossy manner. I was able to say how sorry I was. It was not my authority she resented, but my attitude. As our “bones” came together, we could work in harmony again.

There is little that is more painful than having a bone out of joint. Dislocated bones must be set in proper relation to each other if normal activity is to continue. In the church, as the bones come together and find their place in the body, the feeling of isolation is also dealt with. Bone needs bone: we cannot do without one other. When we are truly connected, our gifts are detected and we are elected to the right spot. The jaw bone has to rest on the neck bone; the leg bone must lend its support to the foot bone. Then the whole body can begin to take shape and get moving.

Again, prayer is absolutely necessary. Think about the bones Ezekiel saw in the valley. After he prophesied as God had commanded, there was a rattling and the bones came together. There they lay, beautifully set in order at last, held together by sinews, fat with flesh, and covered with skin. But it was still only a valley full of corpses: “There was no breath in them.” Everything had come together—but to what purpose? There was no life yet in their frames, no spirit, no liveliness. Then Ezekiel prayed, for he knew the Spirit of God would have to quicken those bodies.

Do we know how to call for the breath of blessing? Many churches do not resemble boneyards full of bones so much as caverns full of corpses. Perhaps the Word of God has been preached faithfully, and perhaps the substance has been given; the flesh and the sinews have gone up and skin covers the whole. We may even be correctly connected to one another. But there is no life. Notice what happened when Ezekiel prayed: “The breath came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceedingly great host” (37:10).

We know that God is against dry, dusty, depressed, disintegrating disciples. He would not have us so, for Jesus Christ came to tell us personally that he wants us to have life, and to have it more abundantly. He wants to bend the brittle bones with the breath of his blessing. He wants to bring renewal to us all.

Jill Briscoe, a native of Great Britain, is a homemaker and pastor’s wife who lives in Brookfield, Wisconsin. She is the author of a number of books, and is also engaged in a speaking ministry. This article was adapted from a message given at the 1981 American Festival of Evangelism in Kansas City.

Stroll along the Tampa Bay marinas, and you will become aware of the push-pull pressure exerted on the boats riding anchor. Tides attempt to woo them out into the deep while the anchor commands the opposite. This seems also to be the case with the subject of clergy divorces. A great deal of ambivalence became strongly evident as research on this article was begun.

My intention here is not to cast stones at others’ glass houses, or to put pressure on the family of the ordained pastor. Scripture says, “Let us reason together.”

Robert Sinks gets directly to the heart of the matter. Writing in Christian Century (Apr. 20, 1977), he says, “The phenomenon of divorce has long been an embarrassment to the Christian church. At best, it has been regarded as a reluctant concession to human frailty, a painful reminder of our failure to fulfill the exalted standards which God holds for marriage.”

Lyle Schaller believes the divorce rate for ministers has at least quadrupled since 1960. G. Lloyd Rediger’s statistics point out that 37 percent of the clergy with whom his organization works are seriously considering divorce; based on precedent, 15 percent will dissolve their relationship. Over 60 percent of his population deal with problems serious enough to make divorce a distinct possibility. David and Vera Mace bring the current situation into perspective when they write: “The clergy has remained in a state of supposedly blissful obscurity … until now … broken clergy marriages have … become an issue to be reckoned with, and ecclesiastical officials are addressing themselves to the perplexing task of formulating policies for appropriate action.”

There appears to be little doubt that there has been a recent trend toward divorce among clergy of all denominations. Like it or not, we have a tiger by the tail. There may be a strong desire to “let go” or to ignore it, but it is obvious the problem will not just go away. It should command the attention of the church; it cries out for workable solutions.

Why The Upward Trend?

It would be simple to wrap this situation up in a neat little package, saying: “Causal factors in clergy marriage dissolutions are no different from those outside the profession.” There are similarities, differences, and overlap. Some of them apply especially to clergy families.

1. A synod president believes the reasons to be twofold: (1) the greater acceptance of clergy as people—the stigma previously associated with divorce is no longer a threat; and (2) the tension and pressure of today’s society exerted on the life of the pastor, his wife, and family.

A pastor in the Western United States recently became involved with a married woman in his congregation. Both divorced their spouses and were married in the church of which he was the minister. The congregation turned out en masse for the wedding, giving open support. The generally more tolerant attitude of society toward divorce may make it a more readily available option than in the past.

2. A statement from “Guidelines for Dealing with Marital Crisis, Separation, Divorce and Remarriage of American Lutheran Church Clergy,” Exhibit D, reinforces the above:

“In our day societal pressures are adding to the dilemma so many experience in regard to the marriage relationship. One factor is the increasing expectation people have for satisfaction in all of their relationships and activities. This often becomes a self-centered search for immediate personal gratification. Another factor is the decreasing social pressure they feel to continue less-than-satisfactory marriages. The result is that husbands and wives are giving up on their marriages in tragically increasing numbers.”

Howard Clinebell, writing of “parent-child marriages” in The Christian Ministry (July 1971), theorizes that some pastors’ wives marry out of a need for a daddy figure, while he marries from a need for a wife who desires him in that role. In the cold light of the dawn of reality, a spouse may see her clergyman-hubby as less than perfect as husband, father, lover, provider, and community leader, and a sense of “being had” may set in. There are about as few wing-buds as halos around these days, and the turned collar does not guarantee either sainthood or perfection. This “sword,” of course, has two edges, cutting against wife as well as husband.

3. Another problem, which demands considerable study, is that of the women of today. It is true that the pastor receives a ministry’s official call. It is also a fact that because of this, many wives have been relegated to basking in their husband’s (or today, wife’s) shadow. Clinebell, among others, believes the changing role of women is probably the most profound of the multiple revolutions our society is experiencing. Women’s lib has, and will undoubtedly continue to have, earthquake-force power on relationships.

Formal education for both sexes exists in proportions not known just a few years ago. Since World War II, females are coming into their own, and they believe, and often act on the premise, that they are equal partners with their mates. The message of the centuries that men are to be at the forefront of leadership and control is just not being “bought” by today’s bright, assertive, educated women.

4. Stemming from the above, one often hears this comment: “I’ve had it with the role of Mrs. Pastor! I just want a more normal life for myself and family.”

“Normal” may mean just attending church and/or church school—period. It may mean “doing my own things,” which may evidence itself in actively supporting the pastor and congregation, or not doing so. With privilege comes responsibility. If the role of a pastor’s wife is to be fulfilled and fulfilling, certain responsibilities beyond those of the majority of parsonage wives must be assumed. Spouses’ ability to communicate this to one another and to work out a mutually satisfying solution is vitally important.

5. Diversity of backgrounds is a further reason for the accelerated splitting up of parsonage families. An experienced synodical president shared his thoughts: “I have a hunch that the diversity of backgrounds … of many ministers and their spouses may also contribute to an increase in divorce. We are no longer dealing with a minister and spouse who come from solid, stable homes with good models of marriage relationships or from congregations in which effective models for minister and spouse have been lived out and observed. I seem to sense an increasing number of couples in which at least one partner comes from a single-parent family in which one or both partners have had little vital contact with live pastoral ministry.”

If the pastor’s wife has been at best a nominal or fringe member of her congregation, she may have only an inkling of what it takes in terms of personal sacrifices on everyone’s part for the work of the Lord to be effective. There are probably few factors with as much potential to destroy or seriously hamper a leader’s work as the push-pull of personal allegiances. There is just no way a pastor can be at his or her peak if there is a running battle going on at home. If he is torn between his inner convictions and strong demands of family, the results may be chaos, conflict, and possible breakdown.

6. Rediger speaks of the problem of the dual career phenomenon as another cause of divorce. The day when the husband’s job dictates where a family lives may be on the wane. Wives have increased potential to make as much or more money than husbands, and with it, more bargaining power or control. Males have been conditioned to believe their paycheck should always be a notch above that of the female. When this is not the case, the ramifications may be potentially traumatic.

7. Another contributing factor is infidelity. There is little doubt that there is a percentage of women who consider the sexual conquest of a pastor a goal worth pursuing. The minister may appear distant or unapproachable, above such behavior, and is thus a challenge. Pastors have relatively easy access to the homes of a vast number of people, including distraught, “helpless,” and dissatisfied women. Playing on his ego over a period of time many finally succeed in the seduction. If a member of the opposite sex perceives a minister’s marriage as shaky and that person is also experiencing unhappiness, there is a certain kinship. Commiseration may lead to conquest.

8. Eighty-five percent of married couples are estimated by Herbert Otto to have failed to utilize their God-given sexual potential. About 62 percent of couples who present themselves for therapy do so because of problems centering on sexual dissatisfaction. There is no 100 percent guarantee that a graduate degree in theology bestows a “lover cum laude” on the minister and his or her spouse. Hang-ups, inhibitions, myths, maybes, half-truths, past experiences, sexual training, attitudes, a desire to experiment, to sow wild oats, all contribute to the number-two problem area in marital relationships.

9. The inability to love is a sort of umbrella, encompassing many of the preceding problems. Leo Buscagelia believes so strongly that one of the common problems of our society is nonloving that he has initiated a college course on love. His findings, along with others’, reinforce the belief that love is a process taught in interaction with our “persons of significance.” There is a positive correlation between one’s ability to love, and self-esteem and self-concept. Our Lord gave us a commandment, often played down or ignored: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

When a clergyman says to his spouse, “I am no longer in love with you,” that may be true. It may also be that there is a battle within that person to accept himself. It is not necessarily true that we see others in transactional analysis terms of “I’m okay, you’re okay.” My definition of love is simple and easily understood: it is active, willing, caring. Overtly showing affection is a primary ingredient in enriched and growing relationships. However, the secret of making the formula work is willingness. As each spouse asks, “What can I do to bring greater happiness to my wife [or husband]?” and then acts upon it gladly and willingly, love has the soil in which growth is likely to take place.

10. With the emphasis on things, the “good life,” and the accumulation of material possessions, it is easy to get hooked on the Madison Avenue merry-go-round. A reporter once asked the elder Rockefeller, “How much money does it take to satisfy a person?” The billionaire snapped back, “Always a little more!” If a pastor’s family operates in a milieu where affluence is evident and he is just “not in the running,” jealousy may insidiously creep into the relationship to disrupt and destroy.

The Other Half Of The Story

For many families, and especially for the wife, the parish experience is a goldfish-bowl existence. Spats or problems within the parsonage seem often to be more public than private information. One pastor’s wife put it: “As Caesar’s wife, I had to be beyond reproach.” Living behind this façade can grate on the family’s personality, and the strain, real or imagined, can contribute to a wife’s basic dissatisfaction.

Unless a woman is familiar with the irregular hours of the profession, she may be ill prepared for the demands placed on her husband. Nor may playing a “behind the scenes” role or basking in the shadow of her spouse be quite “good enough” for the educated, more assertive parsonage wife. Nan Andrews wrote recently, “Many ministers’ wives are well educated and talented in their own right, but are getting their ‘goodies’ primarily or only through their husbands’ work. They have not felt free or been encouraged to pursue their own careers if they wished.”

The church may get so large, duties (real or felt) so demanding, community- and hierarchy-motivated programs so time consuming that the family is squeezed out or relegated to positions of seemingly secondary importance.

A Texas minister’s wife spoke from personal experience: “The congregation may turn to the pastor for counseling, but where do we go for help? The shoemaker’s children go barefoot; what happens to the clergy family?”

A potpourri of clergy wives’ concerns/complaints include too little personal time together; less freedom than the majority of families to move or stay in the community of their choice; less remuneration than other professions with similar educational requirements. (“Perks” such as car allowances; rent-free, church-owned housing; and occasional discounts narrow the gap. But a sense of dissatisfaction may still permeate parsonage families.)

Some Solutions

So far we have spoken of reasons for the rising incidence of clergy divorces. If it is true that there is a causal factor for everything, then can we not say that if walls are built between two people then these same people can cooperatively break them down? The UNESCO preamble reads: “If wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that peace must be constructed.” I believe this applies to couples and families as well as to nations.

A recent article appeared in the Lutheran Church of America’s Lutheran, “1980’s: Groping or Coping?” I believe this is the challenge facing those who want to improve parsonage relationships. It will require some of the keenest minds of Christendom—minds open to what key people in the fields of human relations and theology have to say. It will take agonizing and soul searching as well as decision making as humbly, perhaps hesitantly, we seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The following may add to the contribution already made.

1. I have long advocated that there be one or more pastor’s pastors in every synod or similar division. Though seemingly this has fallen on deaf ears, perhaps some day it will happen. Some say the synod president is a pastor to pastors, and I agree to a point. One of his prime responsibilities (this applies, of course, to a bishop or district superintendent) is to place the most qualified and effective person in a given parish. But regardless of how fair, open, or non-prejudicial a leader may be, is it not logical that he may hesitate to recommend someone to a congregation if he is aware of the individual’s personal or family problems? Leaders tend to operate out of a considerable number of “shoulds” and “oughts.”

I believe church leaders should provide someone with experience in the active ministry, skilled as a counselor and trained in the behavioral sciences, who would travel about the territory without clout or official representation. He or she could be a friend to the minister, listening, counseling, supporting, and reporting numbers, not names, to the leaders. This would apply to clergy in “tent-making” ministries. Reinforcing my conviction, Howard Clinebell comments: “Denominations ought to make it easier for ministers and their families to receive competent counseling, non-ecclesiastically related. Such counseling should be confidential and should not be reported to those in the ecclesiastical power structure.”

2. I am also concerned to see top quality premarital counseling provided. While in seminary, I was also a member of the faculty who tested “pre-theos” and theological students for “fitness for ministry.” Why not include another category: “fitness for family life?” Preventive medicine seems to be a logical response to the marital difficulties of our day. A leader in pastoral education writes: “I personally think our judicatores have a responsibility to provide actively for the care of clergy families in emotional and marital concerns as we do in the medical programs commonly provided.”

3. Dr. Clinebell advocates the personal involvement of seminarians and those in the parish in growth groups. Responding to a question asked by Christian Ministry’s interviewer, who inquired after “the positive, therapeutic things that can and should be done for minister marriages,” he said, “Many discover they are really fighting old battles, that they are prisoners of their own past … this can sabotage their own effectiveness.”

4. Ministers need to recognize their need for counseling. A leading writer and counselor said to me, “Ministers seem to be the last ones to seek help.” The ex-wife of a pastor wrote: “… ministers are often the last ones to feel or admit a need for counseling. They counsel other people. Frequently a minister’s ego makes it extremely hard for him to seek help until it is too late.” Others concur. Statistics stored in denominational headquarters are so well guarded that it is not possible to report the percentage or numbers of ministers seeking therapy. It appears, however, that younger, counseling-oriented ministers tend to seek assistance more freely than others whose training did not include this orientation.

Reasons for the minister’s reluctance to enter into a therapeutic relationship are varied. Reuel Howe submits one that says, “Helping others serves to contribute to the formation of illusions about our own adequacy. Such attitudes are in part reinforced by unreal expectations of us (the pastor) on the part of others.” A second reason may be fear of acknowledging we are unable to control our lives. To admit that we need to reach out to another professional may be so unpalatable that counseling is refused. We need to rid ourselves of the “halo effect.” Those who are ordained are neither perfect nor infallible. To admit this and reach out to God and man in time of need is a sign of strength, not weakness.

5. Congregations need education in the area of realistic expectations for the pastor and his family. Due to demands (overt or covert) of members, applied pressures, and selfish, controlling tactics, the clergy and their families often are caught in a crossfire or a push-pull of loyalities. In a fairly recent cross-denominational survey, the interviewers asked wives, “How many days have you had alone with your husband in the last month?” Over 50 percent of them said, “Not one.” Only 2 percent had as many as one a week, and only 16 percent had as many as two days alone with their husbands in the month prior to the survey!

6. The minister needs to practice what he preaches. The gospel of love is still alive and well. So is the power of the Holy Spirit. Prayer is still a channel between God and his creation, and the Word still offers guidance for our lives. Resources within the church and secular community are available. Their competent people are trained not only in counseling, but in keeping confidences.

7. Participation in marriage encounter, marriage/family enrichment, family checkup/family strengths seminars, S.O.S. seminars (Self-Awareness, Self-Understanding, Others [communication], and Sexuality), and similar programs can be undertaken before the divorce lawyer is engaged. The S.O.S. and checkups/strengths seminars have proven helpful to many over the past several years.

The End Result

From various denominational headquarters, including Lutheran, Baptist, Episcopalian, Methodist, and Presbyterian, have come some positive responses to the need. Action is being taken: a pastor to pastors has been established by one large denomination; committees are being formed to take a closer look at the divorce problem on an ongoing basis; guidelines are being written; clergy and laity are sharing ideas, agonizing over an issue that refuses to keep silent.

Robert Sinks speaks of a “theology of fulfillment.” This stems from John 10:10 and the human potentials movement. He writes: “Applying this divine order to divorce and marriage, we come to realize that faithfulness to the intention of marriage is the best pathway to human fulfillment and joy. The goal that marriage is lifelong is to be taken with full seriousness; for only as couples commit themselves to the process and discipline can they hope to create the fidelity and mutuality out of which the highest joy of marriage can issue.”

The pathway to more enriching and fulfilling marriages will not be an easy one; applying Band-Aids or simple prescriptions will not suffice. A great deal of cooperation is needed, but it will result, I believe, in helping to stem the tide of divorce and alienation, and foster enriched, fulfilled marriages and families where there is support and love for one another.

Robert J. Stout is professor of psychology/marriage and the family at Saint Petersburg College, Florida. He also has a private counseling practice.