Fourth in a Series

There is no need whatever to apologize that a Buddhist may chair a university religion department or teach in an elementary or secondary public school; public education can accommodate even proponents of the death of God or other momentarily fashionable views. Something else is at stake, however, when public education reflects the religious heritage of the West and the basic commitment of the citizenry mainly through the perspective of those who disown it, or professes to be neutral while denying adequate representation to traditional religion. Such a posture is akin to religious propaganda and not to academic objectivity.

The Supreme Court makes it clear that the teacher of the history of religion, comparative religions, and sacred texts must not endorse one religion over competing faiths in the classroom, nor give systematic indoctrination in any creed. The fact is that many religious colleges and day schools thrive in the United States mainly because American public education is thought not to deal adequately or fairly with the religious heritage and commitment of the masses. Some persons no doubt busily blast public schools as such in justification of private schools. But private schools do not depend upon inept public schools for their existence; they have a legitimacy of their own, whether public schools fulfill their proper role or not. The private school need not be in competition with the public school in the area of religious teaching and religious adequacy.

To be sure, the public campuses are not evangelical colleges or Christian elementary and secondary schools and are not expected to be so. But a school jeopardizes rather than protects its public character if it virtually excludes competent scholars who reflect the religious heritage of the West on its own presuppositions. Apart from a few noteworthy exceptions, the representation on secular campuses of evangelical scholars in religion and philosophy departments is proportionately very small; it might well be asked whether an anti-supernaturalistic and anti-evangelical bias has gained religious academic tenure.

Not only historic Protestant Christianity but the Catholic faith and traditional Judaism suffer maltreatment from such prejudices. Fair treatment must be accorded all religious perspectives, whether minority or majority faiths. We are now seeing on public campuses the rise of divisions of Jewish studies in affiliation with religion departments; divisions not only of Christian studies but of Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant and/or evangelical studies and of other alternatives as well may emerge unless a truly representative overall balance of scholarship is maintained, providing a comprehensive overview of the past religious heritage and of the present religious scene.

Unfortunately, modern academic tolerance often is reduced simply to indifference over questions of religion and ultimate values, and even to polite disdain for the Judeo-Christian heritage; current resignation to value-free education nurtures the peculiar suspicion that attention to religious traditions will somehow prejudicially taint education. The Schempp decision declares that a complete education requires “a study of comparative religion or the history of religion and its relationship to the advancement of civilization.” If this is so, what can we say about a generation that has had virtually no academic exposure to Old Testament and New Testament religion, or whose impressions are often limited to the prejudices of those contemporary thinkers who dismiss the supernatural as mere myth or linguistic bewitchment?

Study about religion in the public arena calls, assuredly, for both academic competence and an academic spirit. It is remarkable that across the years few states have included religion as a required subject for teaching certification at the elementary level. Recently Michigan and California approved religion as a teaching minor; Wisconsin also has an approved program at Marquette. But religion has traditionally been taught simply in an introductory crash course. The question now arises whether only prescribed institutions are to hold a monopoly of religious training that counts toward state teaching credentials, or whether all accredited institutions preparing elementary and secondary school teachers will be free to declare religion studies a part of their teacher program. And are faculty recruits for religion offerings to be drawn from public institutions whose religion departments are prone to exclude candidates who do not bend easily to the prevailing religious orientation?

The Schempp decision applies in principle to public education at all levels. It is now often emphasized, however, that elementary and secondary education differ significantly from higher education. At elementary and most secondary levels, students stand in a compulsory educational relationship to educators; at higher levels this relationship is voluntary. Some observers would also add that elementary and secondary students are more prone to indoctrination by their teachers. This may be true, but in this mass-media age even elementary school children are not exempt from skepticism over television commercials; college and university students, on the other hand, frequently parrot or mirror the views of their professors even in areas like philosophy that presumably demand critical reflection.

The second point in the Schempp decision refers specifically to the Bible. Public schools obviously cannot be expected to teach the Bible in the same way as do church institutions. Many church-related schools, for example, insist that the Scriptures be taught by believers only, and that Scripture be presented as the Word of God or as qualitatively unique. The Bible, according to the Supreme Court decision, merits study “for its literary and historic qualities.” For an evangelical Christian to insist that the Bible cannot be studied as literature or history unless one is a believer, and unless the Bible is accepted in advance as the Word of God, is inexcusable. The believing instructor ought not to forget that faith is a divinely engendered response that not he but God presses upon man. It is equally inexcusable for a non-evangelical to insist that one must be a modernist or a disbeliever to appreciate the literary and historical facets of the Bible. [To be continued.]

Day Of Infamy

In doing the sort of in-depth research necessary for this column I went to one of the young secretaries in our office.

“Tell me,” I said, “everything you know about December 7.”

She flipped over the leaves of her desk calendar and announced, “It’s a Friday.”

“What else is it?”

“Let’s see,” she said, “the only holiday you know is Global Tree Frog Day but that’s in April. Sorry, there’s nothing on my calendar. You must have the wrong desk.”

“Try thinking history.”

“Oh yes,” she said. “Something happened on December 7. Hiroshima?”

“Nope.”

“End of the Second World War.” “Try Pearl Harbor.”

“Of course,” she said, brightening. “The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1947.”

“No—1941.”

“What do you expect? I wasn’t even born then.”

So much for the day that was going to live in infamy. Not only does the day not live in infamy, but the perpetrator of that infamous act is now our most important ally in the East.

In our state, a Democrat turned Republican has just won the governor’s chair. And in national politics a former Democrat has his eye on a future Republican nomination for President.

The point of all this is that in politics, whether international or local, expediency is the operational principle. Yesterday’s enemy becomes today’s ally. The Chinese are no less enemies of human freedom than they were in the days of the cold war, but their friendship is thought to be necessary in maintaining the international détente.

At one point in my immoderate youth I became a card-carrying conservative, rallying behind the banner of God and Man at Yale and “Human Events.” I even (blush) wrote a fan letter to Barry Goldwater.

My naïveté is so deeply entrenched and resistant to illumination that it took some years for me to realize that only the amateurs in politics operate on the basis of fixed principles. Professional politicians are champions of expediency.

Unfortunately, this principle has come to control a great deal of modern life. It’s easy to see it in operation in business arrangements and sometimes even in personal relationships.

Expediency says, “I’ll do whatever is in my own interest.” What we need to do is to recapture the principles of the radical from Galilee who demands that we do what is right even if it works against our own interests.

EUTYCHUS V

An ‘Iffy’ Leadership

Did I ever … thank [Cheryl Forbes] for all of the good press she’s given us? By reporting our activities she has helped us gain acceptance and support from the Christian community, which we need and want. One thing I like about her reporting is that she has the knack for picking up statements we’re making which seem to typify or epitomize the event for us.…

However, in her article on Jesus Christ Superstar (The Refiner’s Fire, “ ‘Superstar’ Brings Us Together—In Protest,” Oct. 12), she used the phrase “Moishe Rosen and his Jews for Jesus. Ordinarily that would be cool. However, I think it would be safe to say that I named the movement, but unlike Adam, our first father, who named the animals, then had dominion over them, the Jews for Jesus movement is mine by participation and influence, not any real authority.

Now here’s where the real problem comes in. The parents of many of these young people, and most of them are in their early twenties, think that I’m some kind of a Svengali who has succeeded in mesmerizing their children, then brainwashing them to do my will.

I’m a spokesman, but I don’t even have a figurehead position of leadership. Jews for Jesus in San Francisco is unofficially organized like a tribe and maybe I’m the tribal leader, but I’m the leader of the tribe by the consent of the others.…

Most of the decisions to demonstrate as we did at Jesus Christ Superstar are shared decisions. We have a staff or council meeting for two hours every Monday afternoon. About twenty-five people attend. The initiative for the Superstar demonstration came from Steffi Geiser. My role is chiefly that of a strategist. Anyone who attends the council meeting has the right to make certain initiatives. Then we follow an adversary procedure to try to find fault with the plan or the project. If there is any disagreement, we call for a vote.… Anyone who votes, even if he votes no, must participate in a group project. Since I’m the only one who is trained as a preacher, I get most of the speaking engagements. However, several of the group are in Bible college and a couple have graduated already. What I’m trying to say is that my leadership of Jews for Jesus is a sometime thing and an iffy thing.

MOISHE ROSEN

Jews for Jesus

Corte Madera, Calif.

Critics tend to be critical, but ought not always to go uncriticized. Hence this opening dialogue with Cheryl Forbes on her recent review of Superstar.

First, to the point of anti-Semitism. Christianity has had to live with this for a long time. But it occurs to me that for our time, the message is rather that his own people killed him—as you and I would be the first to do were Jesus to venture into 1973 America. Is it not true that the most pious of his time found him most uncomfortable to have around? And would not we? Indeed, do not we?

The tour theme fascinates me, as it did our youth group and confirmation class. It is novel to have a story of Jesus begin with a bus trip. But if Jesus got on that bus at the end, it escaped our eyes. I think that was intentional, and therefore a far stronger statement of the resurrection than the record Superstar was (which ends with a musical interpretation of John 19:41).… You and I long for a more faithful interpretation of the great Story, but we are not likely to be satisfied. Any telling is an interpretation, if only a voice inflection of the telling, or even the reading of the passages as printed.… I do believe that I can learn from even the worst interpreter of that story. At least one of the purposes of the coming of Jesus is that we might be provoked—thought-provoked, that Superstar has been faithful to the intent of God. As the line goes, “This was unexpected. What do I do now?”

JOHN R. MCELDERRY

The Wheat Ridge Congregation of the United Church of Christ

Denver, Colo.

Not By Us

I appreciated Howard Snyder’s needed and balanced treatment of spiritual gifts in (“Misunderstanding Spiritual Gifts,” Oct. 12). However, the exegesis is seriously amiss where he quotes David R. Mains.… Talents are genetic and learned endowments to be offered to God as a living sacrifice, and these natural abilities may be anointed and blessed of God for service. Spiritual gifts, on the other hand, have prior existence in the Godhead and are not brought into existence by our attitude. For example, the gifts of salvation and faith exist in the Godhead independently of any change in human attitudes toward them; so it is with all spiritual gifts.

NORMAN COPPIN

Calgary, Alberta

Wrong Way Of Words

Immediately after mentioning to my wife how helpful it would be for CHRISTIANITY TODAY to publish an article on our speech (conversations), I ran across your excellent article “The Two Ways of Words” (Oct. 12). I commend D. G. Kehl on his work and recommend the publication to youth ministers throughout our nation. Is my speech outdated (at only age twenty-nine), and is it becoming an accepted practice for youth men to use historically taboo words even when preaching? The words I am referring to go even beyond the type wormed at by D. G. Kehl. In my last two years at the National Youth Workers Convention, in keynote addresses the audiences have been subjected to [all the usual “four-letter” words].…

I can fully appreciate the context of these words and the purpose for which they were uttered, but I must totally reject the choice of words themselves. Is this the manner of conversation we are to project to a world which is already confused?

GARY R. WILLIAMS

Youth Director

Community Baptist Church

Manhattan Beach, Calif.

Good Words

The officers and staff of the American Bible Society are most grateful for the splendid coverage you give the program we have called “Good News for New Readers” (Oct. 12). The endorsement contained in the editorial “Spreading the Word With Impact” is warmly appreciated and should produce new support for the Bible cause from those who love the Lord and wish to see his Word more widely known. The news story by David Kucharsky is thorough and factual, characteristics which we have come to expect from your writers.

LATON E. HOLMGREN

General Secretary

American Bible Society

New York, N. Y.

Editorial Kindliness

We have been intrigued by the kindly handling which Salvador Allende has had in some sections of the press. It seems to us that in their solicitude for him, the press reveals its own preference for Marxism over against democracy. In this opinion it seems the only requirement is that Communism come to power by the so-called democratic process. Some people seem to forget that however it comes to power Marxist Communism is still Marxist Communism—the very antithesis of the democratic way of life and the very opposite of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Even though honestly elected to power (Allende, by the way, came to power with about one-third or more of the popular vote), the Antichrist would still be the Antichrist.

Your rather strange editorial “Repentance That Leads to Salvation” (Oct. 12) was by no means one of your best. We are sure that your apparent kindliness does not indicate that you join with those who would prefer Marxism over democracy just so Marxism comes to power by the use of what we know as democratic techniques.

THEODORE S. SMYLIE

St. Louis, Mo.

Luther Who?

Mark A. Noll’s article “Believer-Priests in the Church” (Oct. 26) opens with the sentence, “Martin Luther, as every school boy knows, challenged the Roman Catholic Church and founded Protestantism.…” Martin Luther did indeed challenge the Roman church and found Protestantism, but not every school boy knows it. I was appalled recently in announcing a showing of the film Martin Luther to discover that not one single young person contacted had ever heard of Martin Luther or the Reformation. All, however, had heard of Martin Luther King! Teachers are complaining that there is too much history to teach anymore, so I suppose there are historical priorities. At the same time many religious leaders are saying, Let’s have unity at the expense of doctrine. I suppose Martin Luther and his Reformation are caught in the squeeze—shall we say, victims of the latest phase-out?

JOHN M. KACHELMYER

Director

Christian Mission to Youth

Belen, N. M.

The Basic Formula

The editorial “New Reformation Aborning?” (Oct. 26) prompted me to make the following remarks.… I feel strongly that the “earlier Reformation allegiance” is exactly the place from which the “new Reformation” will come. This Reformation gave to all mankind a basic spiritual formula [which] … rests upon the assumption that it is the duty and sole function of the Protestant clergy to “preach the Word of God written.” It was the responsibility of the civil body to make and enforce such laws as would organize and control all of the activities of the civil body in accordance with the Law of God as found in the Word written. This is the democratic principle.

The alternative to this principle is, and always has been, the principle of the Oriental religions, and primitive religions, throughout history, viz., that both civil and religious authority and power were held by one man, the headman, by whatever name he might be called. This is the ontocratic principle.… There can be no freedom, either religious or political, as long as the powers of priest and magistrate, or the reverse, remain in the hands of one man, by whatever name he may be known.

This division of powers was the profound gift of God in Jesus Christ.

GEORGE L. TAPPAN

Minister of Pastoral Visitation

First Presbyterian Church

Binghamton, N. Y.

Question … And Answer

Cheryl Forbes’s statement that Bishop John Allin “will become, when consecrated, ‘chief apostle on earth,’ according to church tradition and polity” (News, “Bishop John: The New Chief Apostle,” Oct. 26) is simply untrue.… Ms. Forbes ought to let us know the source for such a bizarre assertion. Moreover, Allin will not be “consecrated”.… He has already been consecrated and ordained a bishop.… A presiding bishop … is of no higher order than his fellow bishops.

KENNETH D. ALDRICH, JR.

St. Luke’s Episcopal Church

Westville, N. J.

I am an Episcopal parish priest, a former newsman with metropolitan daily experience in Chicago and Washington, and author of a story from the sixty-fourth General Convention of the Episcopal Church [a quote from which] has caused some consternation among your readers.… My error, I believe, was in attempting to describe a vague church doctrine known as “apostolic succession.” A life-long Anglican and a priest for four years, I have been brought up to believe apostolic succession to be a doctrine of the Episcopal Church, albeit a touchy one in this day of ecumenical negotiating. I have understood the doctrine to mean that bishops are successors to the apostles by virtue of the laying on of bands at the time of their consecration. And further, that this line of succession is unbroken from earliest times to today. Likewise, all priests were included in the apostolic succession by the laying on of hands. Thus, I wrote that the presiding bishop is placed in a special relationship to the apostles at the time of his consecration. In other words, he is an apostolic successor.

Secondly, I took a vow at my ordination to “reverently obey … [my] Bishop, and other chief Ministers, who according to the Canons of the Church, may have the charge and government over … [me].” Thus if the bishop is a modern-day successor to the apostles, then the presiding bishop is “chief apostle” among those over whom he has authority.…

I did not intend to create controversy. I thought I was honestly reporting church dogma. My error was in attempting to interpret it. However, I am amazed that I, a life-long Anglican from a family of Anglicans and a priest of the Episcopal Church, could have gotten an idea which many have termed “sheer fantasy.” What this says to me is that it is time the Episcopal Church reviewed the doctrine of apostolic succession and the tradition of the historic episcopacy. I would urge theologians and church historians to write papers on these subjects in hopes of exploring their relationship and perhaps giving some answers to the questions raised by William White in 1789.… If the doctrine of apostolic succession and the tradition of the historic episcopacy are vital to the Christian faith, let us understand what they mean. If we believe either or both of these “dogmas,” let us say so. If we do not, then let us abandon that which we do not believe. For it seems to me that these “dogmas” are very much at the heart of ecumenical discussions as to the validity of holy orders, the nature of ministry, and the authority for ministry.

If my unintended “offense” has caused some in the church to seriously consider these matters, then I am thanksful. And if I am simply one confused priest, then I appreciate the opportunity to be corrected and humbly apologize for sharing my ignorance in an official press release.

JAMES M. CORAM

St. Christopher’s Episcopal Church

High Point, N. C.

Forties-Style

Your [news story] “Youth for Christ: Now There Are Two” (Oct. 26) was interesting, but it missed a couple of important points. The reason for the creation of Youth Evangelism Association is to provide a fellowship of men and women who want to help each other without rigid control over direction so long as they meet the high standards of separation and an aggressive evangelistic drive using both mass and personal soul-winning. Each member organization will remain completely autonomous and may do their job using whatever personnel and facilities best fit their local people and situations. A major dynamic of Youth for Christ historically has been the autonomy of local ministries. The departure from this approach is an integral part of the current administration of Youth for Christ, Incorporated—U.S.A. A central control is now the stated goal. The original intent and purpose of Youth for Christ International was service to local rallies. Now this has been reversed, with local entities serving the top-heavy headquarters.… Again, historically, Youth for Christ was known as an aggressive evangelistic outreach … with open, public invitations.… Now a new approach is being taught in what was formerly called the Youth for Christ Director’s School but is now dubbed the Summer Institute of Youth Evangelism. Public commitments to Christ are no longer popular with those promoting the current Campus Life philosophy. The new approach is “Don’t advertise your deal as a Christian event. Don’t use the name Jesus, or Christ, or God in your announcements, or during your initial (image) events such as Burgerbash or Scream-in-the-Dark.” This approach has long been used by another youth organization, but it is a complete departure from the hard-hitting, front-door type of youth evangelism begun by Torrey Johnson, Billy Graham, and Bob Cook, continued for thirty years by Al Metsker, and protracted by many of the largest local Youth for Christ rallies in America. The present regime of Youth, for Christ—U. S. A., by innuendo just short of decree, despairs the mass-rally approach that has been the mainstay of Youth for Christ during its thirty years of existence. The gigantic Billy Graham crusades (with the majority attending being youth), the phenomenon of Explo ’72 in Dallas, the success of the Kansas City Youth for Christ Super Rallies, and the Tristate youth for Christ Faith Festivals … are virtually ignored by the Wheaton-based Youth for Christ people.

The five founders of Youth Evangelism Association have been members of the Youth for Christ Executive Council. All are veterans of more than ten years in the Youth for Christ ministry. Each serves as executive director of a youth outreach that functions from a locally owned (not-for-profit) corporation, youth center complex. The tangible assets (land, buildings, and equipment) total more than $3 million. The combined annual operations budget of these five ministries exceeds $1 million. More than 10 per cent of all high school Youth for Christ clubs in America are connected with these five local ministries. The aggregate Saturday-night rally attendance in the five cities averages more than 3,000 teen-agers. These ministries won more than 6,000 teenagers to Christ during the past twelve months. One founder is the former Eastern Area vice-president of Youth for Christ. One is a former state director. One is director of the largest local youth ministry in the world.

Our [group’s] purpose is to continue the type ministry begun in the midforties, but proven even more effective in the seventies, as the way to reach the maximum number of young people most efficiently and economically with the unchanging Gospel of Jesus Christ.

GEORGE H. DOOMS

Vice-President

Youth Evangelism Association

North Evansville, Ill.

Fairy Tales For Women

Among the entertainments vying for the leisure time of women responsible for home management is the fiction in “women’s” magazines. Much has been said about the image of women in these glossy, colorful publications that promise help for achieving successful marriage and parenthood, beautiful hair, clothes, and figure, tastefully decorated homes, and good eating on a limited budget (without, of course, suggesting not buying the magazine as a step toward cutting cost). Indeed, they have felt the not-always-gentle prodding of some women’s groups. The purpose here is not to debate whether the magazines fit the image of women’s lib but whether reading them helps fit a woman to the image of God.

It is not an entirely just exercise: the magazines and their fiction make no claim of being Christian, and it is not completely fair to judge them by standards they do not set for themselves. Still, their readers must include thousands of church-going women and probably not a few minister’s wives. So it is not unfair to ask how the contents might affect Christian commitment.

To the mirror of biblical truth, then, we shall hold up thirty-six stories from fourteen issues (dated January through July, 1973) of Family Circle, Good Housekeeping, Ladies’ Home Journal, and Redbook. Eight of them are short, short stories—one or two magazine pages long. Nine are novelettes or condensed novels, and by length the rest fall somewhere between. Generally in this non-comprehensive sample the best stories—most entertaining and best written—were either short or long.

Only one has a clearly Christian theme. In “Mrs. Barton Declines” by Pearl Buck (LHJ, Feb.), a dying woman forgives her husband’s affair (he had committed suicide years earlier when she had refused to forgive him) and encourages her daughter-in-law to do likewise. The story concludes with a suggestion of salvation, resurrection, and eternal life:

“Of course,” Mrs. Barton said faintly but cheerfully, “I have to die sometime. Then … I’ll be buried in Boston.… But I’m not going to die. Not this time! I’m going to have a good night’s sleep as soon as Charles takes you home, Aline, and in the morning when you both come to see me, I’ll be resurrected!”

Mrs. Barton’s sisters and son had been called to her bedside on other occasions, but she had always rallied. This time, with those who trespassed against her forgiven, will be the last, the reader is allowed to believe.

Twice more in this sample an element of personal religion appears; in two stories frightened, lonely widows consider prayer. The woman in B. J. Chute’s “Turn of the Tide” (FC, July) believes she sees a gull being torn apart out on New York’s East River as she herself feels torn by fears of city life. “She thought she might pray,” Ms. Chute writes. “Pray that a boat would come along and run into the gull and kill it mercifully.… Or that the tide would suddenly rush in and whirl the gull away.” Finally the tide does begin to turn and she realizes the gull is actually a cardboard box. And a tugboat does appear: “It was the boat she had prayed for, and now it was here and she no longer needed it.” The point of the story is not her appeal to God for help but her realization that fear of the unknown is foolish and she might as well live one day at a time. It is an emotionally powerful story; the protagonist’s icy stabs of panic reach the reader, too.

Equally powerful for its depiction of terror is the condensation of The Crystal Mouse, by Babs H. Deal (LHJ, Jan., Feb.). Sara Hillstrom, just widowed, moves into her new apartment to discover she is the building’s only occupant. Strange night noises—most of which she makes herself—terrify her, but, she thinks, one o’clock is “too late to call anyone without a reason. And to whisper ‘Help’ is never any reason.”

Shamefacedly, and with a touch of self-irony, she looked up the number and dialed the Dial-A-Prayer. The line clicked, hummed, faltered, and a cheerful mechanical voice said, “The number you have reached is not in service at this time. This is a recorded announcement.”

It would not serve Ms. Deal’s story to have Sara find comfort. But it is significant that the appeal that fails is to a spiritual service. The next day Sara does find a companion: a young woman with whom she drinks lunch. Although the woman discloses she’s a “Jesus freak” and buys Sara a recording of Jesus Christ Superstar, Sara does not find through her the perfect love that casts out fear. Sara never finds it and ultimately dies. By spiritual standards, it is a bleak story indeed.

A similar failure occurs in a Good Housekeeping novelette, Search for a Little Girl, by June Lewis Shore (Jan.). While the parents, who had been returning home from vacation when their child was lost, and local people comb the snow-covered Kentucky countryside, the child is safe at the nearby farm home of a widower and his unmarried daughter. Before he could notify authorities about the child he fell ill and delirious. To his daughter Garnet the child seemed a replacement for the baby she’d lost, and for a brief time her severe depression lifted. The story suffers literarily from a lack of focus and spiritually from a lack of minister to comfort the desperate parents. And it is significant that Ms. Shore chose for the father of Garnet’s aborted baby a traveling evangelist.

Another ministerial indiscretion occurs in one of the most delightful of the stories, “How I Got Me a Bear,” by Robert Roper (RB, June). It is a country-music ballad in short-story form. A burly truck driver (the Bear), smitten by a Dairy Queen waitress, declares his love on the local radio station till the whole town knows he aims to claim her for his own. Embarrassed by the attention, she consults her cousin, who is a minister and who owes her a favor “since it was me that talked his Louisa out of going and getting a divorce when she caught him fooling with that Cherokee girl.” When the Bear returns and, before the assembled townsfolk, declares his love, she produces her clergyman cousin, who marries them on the spot. The story is a well-done bit of entertainment; only the minister’s escapade jars.

The minister in Shelby Hearon’s novel The Second Dune (RB condensation, June) appears moral enough; but his wife leaves him for another man. Harold’s divorce counters that of Ellen, the story’s narrator, who had left her husband to marry Harold’s lawyer brother. For the most part Harold is treated respectfully and sympathetically—and a bit patronizingly: the preacher is too tender to have to suffer this woman’s harshness. Ellen, however sees him in terms of her first husband—and no one worried whether he could bear the pain of losing his wife. It seems that Harold is a preacher just so he can appear pathetic (to his lawyer brothers at least)—as though such an appearance would be inappropriate for someone in another profession.

The only other appearance of organized religion is in The High Valley, a condensation of a mystery novel by Jessica North (GH, Feb.). The local Mexican priest is cultured, charming, intelligent, and understanding. He seems too good to be true. But at least he provides welcome relief from clergymen who show only the bad side.

Faith may not fare well in women’s fiction, but the happy nuclear family thrives. Indeed, more than two dozen of the three dozen stories feature love (or romance), marriage, and family life. Half a dozen times the main character’s family is diminished by death, but only four times by divorce—a far lower divorce rate than that usually cited by these magazines. For the fictional characters at least, the how-to-keep-a-marriage-humming articles seem to work.

A few of the love stories provide insight into the nature of love—and in the process offer the reader something to think about and an opportunity for growth. Two stories by Florence Jane Soman—“A Perfect Marriage” (GH, Mar.) and “Emergency” (GH, Jan.)—show the value of restrictions inherent in the choice of marriage and family over more casual liaisons. “Things That Last,” by Lauren R. Stevens (RB, March), describes fickle emotions: a boy concerned during his father’s terminal illness because his feeling of grief sometimes is overshadowed by other emotions wonders if his feeling of love for the girl he wants to marry will last through the flow of life’s events. The headstone he chooses for his father’s grave and the ring he buys the girl become symbols of lasting relationships.

Mostly the stories are less edifying variations on the boy-meets-girl-they-marry-and-live-happily-ever-after theme. And they are mostly mediocre stories. The preoccupation with happy romance is no doubt an appeal to readers’ fantasies, and the choice of stories suggests the editors believe those fantasies are of the type of which princes on white stallions slay dragons and carry off beautiful maidens. Perhaps so. Yet if women were to divulge their daydreams the world might also glimpse the creator of the great American novel, the discoverer of long-lost civilizations, the capable and profound exponent of a great truth. Indeed, such hopes of creativity and searches for truth bring a woman closer to the image of God than do dreams of fairy-tale romances. One could wish there were fewer fairy tales for women.

JANET ROHLER GREISCH

Christian evangelism, both in America and in the Third World, appears to be rounding a curve and entering a third stream. During the fifties and sixties, two streams of evangelism gained international prominence. The first was crusade evangelism, typified by Billy Graham. The second stream was saturation evangelism, which originated with the late Kenneth Strachan of Costa Rica and became a part of the American scene with Key 73.

The third stream of evangelism is called “church growth” and is related to Donald McGavran and his associates. Although Donald McGavran is a household name, so to speak, on the world’s mission fields, his teaching is not widely recognized in the United States as yet. Not until the fall of 1972 did he attempt to apply his growth principles systematically to churches in America. But events since then, most recently the publication of McGavran’s latest book, How to Grow a Church (with Win Am; Regal Books, 1973), have catapulted the church-growth movement into prominence in the United States. Since church growth has clearly become one of the major trends of the times in the church, I would like to try to describe the movement.

McGavran decided to put the two common words “church” and “growth” together and make them a technical term when he became disgusted at the way in which certain theological and missiological liberals had redefined such terms as “missions” and “evangelism” in unbiblical ways. Back around 1955, while a missionary in India, McGavran began to use the phrase “church growth,” filling it with his own meaning. He could not have had an inkling at that time that the term would gain the currency it now has. Among missiologists, one no longer has to stop to define church growth any more than he would have to define General Motors or free enterprise in the business world.

Particularly in America, however, many still have a hazy idea of the meaning of church growth. Some, for example, identify it as the particular view of one man. Donald McGavran is indeed the father of the church-growth movement, but it has become much more than McGavran. He has six close professional colleagues, more than 400 have graduated from his school, and thousands of others have identified with him through books, articles, and seminars. All these consider themselves very much a part of the church-growth movement.

Others identify church growth with one school. The Fuller Seminary School of World Mission and Institute of Church Growth is the institutional center for church-growth research, but church growth has far outgrown Fuller Seminary. Dozens of other seminaries and Bible schools in many countries of the world now list courses in church growth in their catalogs. More will do so in the future.

For some, church growth brings to mind a periodical. These people are among the 8,000 subscribers to the Church Growth Bulletin, which used to be virtually the only source for church-growth articles. Now almost all leading Christian periodicals are carrying church-growth material with increasing frequency.

The key book on church growth is McGavran’s magnum opus, Understanding Church Growth. But the literature has now gone far beyond that. In my own library I have a shelf five feet long labeled “Hard Core Church Growth.” Both Eerdmans and Moody have developed entire lines of church-growth publications, and the William Carey Library was established basically to publish church-growth materials.

Church growth, then, has become much more than a man or a school or a periodical or a book. It has become an entire school of thought that is profoundly influencing missiology and the theology of evangelism. Before looking at its distinctives, however, we would do well to glance at some central areas where church growth holds much in common with other lines of missiology and evangelism:

1. Theologically, church growth is in the conservative evangelical tradition. The typical church-growth advocate is thoroughly committed to the doctrines of the inspiration and authority of Scripture, the deity of Christ, the person and work of the Holy Spirit, the centrality of the Church, the depravity of man, heaven and hell, and the totality of the “faith once delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). A biblical theological position is the bedrock of church growth.

2. As to the Christian life, church-growth people believe that orthodox doctrine must prove itself in daily living. Evidence of the fruit of the Spirit, the pious life, personal Bible reading and prayer, love for one’s neighbor, the cultural mandate, social service, and all other good and proper Christian qualities are both commended and practiced by church-growth people.

3. The church-growth school holds that men and women without Jesus Christ are eternally lost, and that soul-winning, disciple-making evangelism, and missions are a primary and continuing task of the entire Church.

4. The supernatural power of the Holy Spirit is a crucial part of the theory and practice of all church-growth people. All fully recognize that nothing is accomplished for the Kingdom of God without “power from on high” (Luke 24:49).

These four points have been characteristic of men and women of God throughout the ages. Other contemporary missiological schools of thought would claim them as well.

But the church-growth movement also has some distinctives. Again, these six distinctives are not the exclusive property of church growth. But years of experience have shown that these are the places where the rubber meets the road. They are the issues that have to be debated, even with others who hold the four points above in common with church growth. Evangelicals who disagree with the church-growth school of thought almost invariably do so on one or more of these six distinctives:

1. The proper combination of the lordship of Jesus Christ and the responsibility of man requires church growth. As our Lord, God has made his will clearly known in the Scriptures, and as his servants we do poorly if we do not pay attention. Our Lord, for example, is clearly not pleased with:

• Fishing without catching (Luke 5:4–11).

• An empty banquet table (Luke 14:15–23).

• Sowing without reaping (Matt. 13:3–9).

• A fig tree that bears no figs (Luke 13:6–9).

• Lost sheep that are not brought into the fold (Matt. 18:11–14).

• A lost coin that is sought but not found (Luke 15:8–10).

• Ripe harvests that are not reaped (Matt. 9:36–38).

• Proclamation without response (Matt. 10:14). Or, by extension of these principles, God is not pleased with evangelistic or missionary work that does not result in church growth. In bolder terms, and contrary to some popular missionary literature, God is interested in results, since he is not willing that one man, woman, or child should perish (2 Pet. 3:9).

2. What is the mission of the Church in the world? Church growth says that among the many good things God expects his Church to do in the world, a primary and irreplaceable task is to preach the Gospel to every creature, persuade men and women to become faithful disciples of Christ, and incorporate them as responsible members of his Church. When true disciples are made, there is church growth. But notice some refinements:

• The focus on the human responsibility in making disciples should not be overly individualized. The task is the task of the Church as a body, and individuals best function as members of the body. Goals are measured according to what is accomplished by the body as a whole.

• Numerical church membership growth is not the only task of the Church. But biblically it does have a very high priority, and God is glorified when new members are added to the Church.

• Ultimately, evangelistic effectiveness must be measured in terms of disciples, not merely decisions. Evangelistic reporting should, but rarely does, reflect this principle.

3. Clear objectives are necessary if the Church is to fulfill its mission in the world, and thus obey its Lord. God’s will as to missiological and evangelistic goals can and must be discerned from Scripture, articulated in plain terms, and subsequently used to measure achievements. In view of this, there is no need for Christians to work under a shadow of doubt as to whether they can really know what God’s objective is. Recourse to the “mysterious working of God’s Spirit” is often a thinly disguised rationalization of evangelistic failure, couched in pious terms.

No command of Jesus is clearer in this regard than the Great Commission. Careful exegesis of Matthew 28:19, 20 reveals that God’s imperative is to make disciples. Disciples are tangible, identifiable, countable people, and whenever a true disciple is made, church growth occurs. Objectives that deviate from or fall short of the ultimate objective of making disciples are, to the degree they do so, inferior, and in need of correction.

4. Sound, effective strategy must be developed as a means of accomplishing the biblical objectives mentioned above. Improved strategy will, other things being equal, result in more fruitful evangelistic work, and thus be more pleasing to God. Far from reflecting lack of spirituality, well-honed strategy is a mark of maturity and competence in God’s work. Efficiency needs to be stressed, since resources are limited and God is unhappy when invested resources do not bring intended results. The Parable of the Talents warns us that servants who fail to use their Lord’s resources productively are considered “wicked and slothful” (Matt. 25:26). Does this not apply to evangelists?

5. The social and behavioral sciences can contribute much to missionary strategy. Anthropology, sociology, psychology, and other related disciplines have made us aware, for example, of such valuable principles as:

• People movements. We now know that in many—if not most—circumstances, multi-individual interdependent conversions are the most productive vehicle for making disciples.

• The power encounter. Anthropologists have shown that a vital step in the conversion process of many peoples, particularly animists and followers of the occult, is a test of power between God and the evil spirits, known as the power encounter.

• Dynamics of innovation. Missionaries can be trained to avoid blunders as they try to introduce new ideas and practices into the culture in which they are working.

• Indigeneity. We now know that true indigeneity goes much deeper than self-supporting, self-governing, and self-propagating churches. Proper indigeneity can make the difference between a church that is effective in discipling an entire people and one that is sealed off and relatively impotent.

• Ethnotheology. A new discipline that combines the insights of anthropology with sound biblical theology is being developed with the goal of better communicating to peoples at home and abroad God’s plan of salvation.

6. Research is essential for optimum church growth. Sound evangelistic strategy must be based on facts, not on vague hopes or wishes or promises. Church growth is skeptical of promotional material and success stories if the facts of the case are not clearly presented. Research into the dynamics of the growth of churches in all countries of the world attempts to penetrate foggy thinking and make known the true state of affairs. For example, church-growth research has led to:

• A recognition of the resistance-receptivity axis. We now know that some peoples are more receptive to the Gospel at a particular time than other peoples. This is a key church-growth principle. Resistant peoples must be neither neglected nor abandoned, but sound evangelistic strategy will concentrate available resources on receptive peoples.

• A ruthlessly objective attitude toward evangelistic methods. Methods simply cannot be “canned” in Lower Zax, for example, and exported to Mamba Bamba Church growth diligently seeks to locate, describe, and analyze, for each time and place, the methods that God has blessed and those he has not blessed.

• A discovery of the crucial importance of structures throughout missionary history. The concept of the relation between modalities (the parish church) and sodalities (voluntary societies of Christians) is proving to be an invaluable aid to missionary strategy, particularly now that missionary societies are proliferating in the Third World.

Church growth believes that unfruitfulness is a curable disease. The remedies are diagnostic research, prescriptive treatment, and strategic care.

Three moods characterize all church-growth advocates, I have found, and these can therefore be said to be moods of the movement in general:

Obedience. Full obedience to the Word of God and the will of God is essential. No apologies at all are made for whatever unswerving obedience might involve.

Pragmatism. Church-growth people do not hesitate to use whatever means God provides to do the best possible job in reaching the goals. They are not very much interested in what should bring unbelievers to Christ, but they are acutely interested in what does, in fact, bring unbelievers to Christ.

Optimism. Christ said, “I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” There is no warrant to be gloomy in Christian work. We are ultimately on the winning side. If God be for us, who can be against us?

For about a year now I have been witness to a drama that is all too familiar to us mortal men. Someone finds he has cancer; the medical treadmill begins, with its implacable log of defeat; hope is marshalled, begins the march, is rebuffed at every juncture, flags, rouses, flags again, and is finally quietly mustered out.

And meanwhile, because the people in the drama are Christian believers, everyone is dragged into the maelstrom that marks the place where our experience eddies into the sea of the Divine Will. The whole question of prayer gapes open.

The promises are raked over. And over and over. “Is the primary condition enough faith on our part?” “We must scour our own hearts to see that there is no stoppage there—of sin or of unbelief.” “We must stand on the promise.” “We must claim thus and such.” “We must resist the Devil and his weapons of doubt.”

And we leap at and pursue any and all reports and records of healings. “Look at what happened to so and so!” “Listen to this!” “I’ve just read this wonderful pamphlet.” We know the gospel accounts by heart. We agree that this work of healing did not cease with the apostolic age. We greet gladly the tales of healing that pour in from all quarters in the Church—no longer only from those groups that have traditionally “specialized” in healing, but from the big, old, classic bodies in Christendom—Rome, Anglicanism, Lutheranism, Presbyterianism, and so forth. “God is doing something in our day,” we hear, and we grasp at it eagerly.

And meanwhile the surgery goes on its horrific way, and the radiation burns on, week after grim week; and suffering sets in, and the doctors hedge and dodge into the labyrinthine linoleum and stainless-steel bureaucracy of the hospital world, and our hearts sicken, and we try to avert our eyes from the black flag that is fluttering wildly on the horizon, mocking us.

And the questions come stealing over us: “Where is now their God?” “Where is the promise of his coming?” “He trusted in God that he would deliver him …” and so on. And we know that we are not the first human beings into whose teeth the Tempter and his ilk have flung those taunts.

We look for some light. We look for some help. Our prayers seem to be vanishing like so many wisps, into the serene aether of the cosmos (or worse, into the plaster of the ceiling). We strain our ears for some word from the Mount of God. A whisper will do, we tell ourselves, since clearly no bolts or thunderings have been activated by our importunity (yes, we have tried that tactic, too: the “non-faith” approach).

But only dead silence. Blank. Nothing. “But Lord, how are we supposed to know if we’re on the right track at all if we don’t get some confirmation from you—some corroboration—in any form, Lord—inner peace maybe, or some verse springing to life for us, or some token. Please let us have some recognizable attestation to what you have said in Your Book.” Nothing. Silence. Blank.

Perhaps at this point we try to think back over the experience of the people of God through the millennia. There has been a whole spectrum of experience for them: glorious deliverances, great victories, kingdoms toppled, widows receiving their dead back, men wandering about in sheepskins and goatskins—

“Men wandering about in sheepskins and goatskins? What went wrong there?”

“That’s in the record of faith.”

“But then surely something went wrong.”

“No. It is part of the log of the faithful. That is a list of what happened to the people of faith. It is about how they proved God.”

The whole spectrum of experience is there. The widow of Nain got her son back and other mothers didn’t. Peter got out of prison and John the Baptist didn’t. Elijah whirled up to heaven with fiery horses and Joseph ended in a coffin in Egypt. Paul healed other people, but was turned down on his own request for healing for himself.

A couple of items in the Gospels seem to me to suggest something for the particular situation described in this article, where deliverance did not, in fact, come, and where apparently the juggernaut of sheer nature went on its grim way with no intervention from Heaven.

One is the story of Lazarus and the other is the Emmaus account. You object immediately: “Ah, but in both those cases it turned out that the dead were raised.” Well, perhaps there is something there for us nonetheless.

For a start, the people involved in those incidents were followers of Jesus, and they had seen him, presumably, heal dozens of people. Then these followers experienced the utter dashing of all their expectations and hopes by death. God did not, it seemed, act. He who had been declared the Living One and the Giver of Life seemed to have turned his back in this case. What went wrong? What did the household at Bethany not do that the Widow of Nain had done? How shall we align it all? Who rates and who doesn’t? Whatever it is that we might have chosen to say to them in the days following their experience of death, we would have had to come to terms somehow with the bleak fact that God had done something for others that he had not done for them.

From the vantage point of 2,000 years, we later believers can, of course, see that there was something wonderful in prospect, and that it emerged within a very few days in both cases. The stories make sense. They are almost better than they would have been if the deaths had not occurred. But of course this line would have been frosty comfort for Mary and Martha, or for the two en route to Emmaus, if we had insisted to them, “Well surely God is up to something. We’ll just have to wait.”

And yet what else could we have said? Their experience at that point was of the utter finality of death, which had thrown everything they had expected into limbo. For them there was no walking and leaping and praising God. No embracing and ecstatic tears of reunion. Only the silence of shrouds and sepulchres, and then the turning back, not just to the flat routines of daily life, but to the miserable duel with the tedious voices pressing in upon their exhausted imaginations with “Right! Now where are you? Tell us about your faith now! What’d you do wrong?”

The point is that for x-number of days, their experience was of defeat. For us, alas, the “x-number of days” may be greatly multiplied. And it is small comfort to us to be told that the difference, then, between us and, say, Mary and Martha’s experience of Lazarus’ death, or of the two on the road to Emmaus, is only a quantitative difference. “They had to wait four days. You have to wait one, or five, or seventy years. What’s the real difference?” That is like telling someone on the rack that his pain is only quantitatively different from mine with my hangnail. The quantity is the difference. But there is, perhaps, at least this much of help for us whose experience is that of Mary and Martha and the others, and not that of the widow of Nain and Jairus and that set: the experience of the faithful has, in fact, included the experience of utter death. That seems to be part of the pattern, and it would be hard indeed to insist that the death was attributable to some failure of faith on somebody’s part.

There is also this to be observed: that it sometimes seems that those on the higher reaches of faith are asked to experience this “absence” of God. For instance, Jesus seemed ready enough to show his authority to chance bystanders, and to the multitudes; but look at his own circle. John the Baptist wasn’t let off—he had his head chopped off. James was killed in prison. And the Virgin herself had to go through the horror of seeing her Son tortured. No legions of angels intervened there. There was also Job, of course. And St. Paul—he had some sort of healing ministry himself, so that handkerchiefs were sent out from him with apparently healing efficacy for others, but, irony of ironies, his own prayer for himself was “unanswered.” He had to slog through life with whatever his “thorn” was. What does this data do to our categories?

But there is more. Turning again to the disclosure of God in Scripture, we seem to see that, in his economy, there is no slippage. Nothing simply disappears. No sparrow falls without his knowing (and, one might think, caring) about it. No hair on anybody’s head is without its number. Oh, you say, that’s only a metaphor; it’s not literal. A metaphor of what, then, we might ask. Is the implication there that God doesn’t keep tabs on things?

And so we begin to think about all our prayers and vigils and fastings and abstinences, and the offices and sacraments of the Church, that have gone up to the throne in behalf of the sufferer. They have, apparently, been lost in the blue. They have vanished, as no sparrow, no hair, has ever done. Hey, what about that?

And we know that this is false. It is nonsense. All right then—we prayed, with much faith or with little; we searched ourselves; we fasted; we anointed and laid on hands; we kept vigil. And nothing happened.

The Singing Christ

Their mighty song burns heavenward

And glory shines in sound;

The herald angels praise the Lord

In shouts that shake the ground.

Sing, O sons of heaven’s joy,

The wonder of his ways;

The birth-cry of an infant boy

Perfects his Father’s praise.

Sing, O Jesus, Mary’s son,

The pilgrim psalms appointed:

How great the works the Lord has done!

How blessed his Anointed!

Sing in Nazareth, young man,

The songs of jubilee;

Today fulfill redemption’s plan,

Proclaim the captive free!

Sing, O Saviour, lift the cup,

“Jehovah is my song!”

The sacrifice is offered up

Before the shouting throng.

“I come to do thy will, my God,

My body is prepared

To drink the cup and bear the rod

That sinners should be spared.”

Sing, O Christ, up Zion’s brow

From Kidron’s rocky bed;

The pilgrim songs are silent now

And all thy friends have fled.

Sing in agony, my King,

The God-forsaken Lord:

Count thy bones in suffering

While malice mocks thy word.

Sing, ascending King of kings;

Lift up your heads, ye gates;

The King of Glory triumph sings,

The Lord that heav’n awaits.

Sing, O Son of God’s right hand,

Our Prophet, Priest, and King;

The saints that on Mount Zion stand

With tongues once dumb now sing.

Sing, Lord Christ, among the choir

In robes with blood made white,

And satisfy thy heart’s desire

To lead the sons of light.

O Chief Musician, Lord of praise,

From thee our song is found;

Ancient of everlasting days

To thee the trumpets sound.

Rejoicing Saviour, sing today

Within our upper room;

Among thy brethren lift the lay

Of triumph from the tomb.

Sing now, O Lamb, that we may sing

The glory of thy shame,

The paean of thy suffering,

To sanctify thy Name!

EDMUND P. CLOWNEY

Did it not? What angle of vision are we speaking from? Is it not true that again and again in the biblical picture of things, the story has to be allowed to finish?Was it not the case with Lazarus’ household at Bethany, and with the two en route to Emmaus? And is it not the case with the Whole Story, actually—that it must be allowed to finish, and that this is precisely what the faithful have been watching for since the beginning of time? In the face of suffering and endurance and loss and waiting and death, what is it that has kept the spirits of the faithful from flagging utterly down through the millennia? Is it not the hope of Redemption? Is it not the great Finish to the Story—and to all their little stories of wandering about in sheepskins and goatskins as well as to the One Big Story of the whole creation, which is itself groaning and waiting? And is not that Finish called glorious? Does it not entail what amounts to a redoing of all that has gone wrong, and a remaking of all that is ruined, and a finding of all that has been lost in the shuffle, and an unfolding of it all in a blaze of joy and splendor?

A finding of all that is lost? All sparrows, and all petitions and tears and vigils and fastings? Yes, all petitions and tears and vigils and fastings.

“But where are they? The thing is over and done with. He is dead. They had no effect.”

Hadn’t they? How do you know what is piling up in that great treasury kept by the Divine Love to be opened in that Day? How do you know that this death and your prayers and tears and fasts will not together be suddenly and breathtakingly displayed, before all the faithful, and before angels and archangels, and before kings and widows and prophets, as gems in that display? Oh no, don’t speak of things being lost. Say rather that they are hidden—received and accepted and taken up into the secrets of the divine mysteries, to be transformed and multiplied, like everything else we offer to Him—loaves and fishes, or mites, or bread and wine—and given back to you and to the one for whom you kept vigil, in the presence of the whole host of men and angels, in a hilarity of glory as unimaginable to you in your vigil as golden wings are to the worm in the chrysalis.

But how does it work? We may well ask. How does Redemption work?

Ruth, the Moabitess, is one of four women cited in Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus. Orpah, Ruth’s country-woman and sister-in-law, does not appear.

Ruth’s story is told in four limpidly clear chapters in the Old Testament. The family of Elimelech, including his wife Naomi and his two sons Mahlon and Chilion, journeyed to the land of Moab to seek relief from the famine ravaging Israel. While there the sons took Moabite brides, Orpah and Ruth. In time Naomi lost her husband and both sons and, stricken with great sorrow, resolved to return to the land of her fathers. She urged her daughters-in-law to stay in their native land. Orpah consented, but Ruth refused to leave her mother-in-law, saying: “Entreat me not to leave you or to return from following you; for where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God; where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if even death parts me from you.”

After Ruth and Naomi departed, Orpah returned to her land, and she does not appear again in the record. When Ruth and Naomi returned to Israel, Ruth urged herself upon Naomi’s wealthy relative, Boaz. In a daring ploy Ruth went at night during the harvest season to warm Boaz’s feet with her own body, thereby proposing that Boaz raise up children through her for the house of Elimelech. When an unnamed Israelite, next-of-kin to the widowed Ruth, refused to exercise his legal right to marry Ruth, Boaz deigned to love her and take her in marriage. Naomi and Ruth, who had returned from Moab in poverty, were now securely settled. Naomi’s joy was completed when the union of Ruth and Boaz produced a son. Naomi, who had changed her name to Mara (bitterness), was again called Naomi (pleasantness). The grandson of this son became King David, who was beloved of God. And it is in the line of David that the Saviour of all men was born.

NARRATOR: If, beyond the grave,

exist reflection, memory,

subjection to the craving

to recall a vanished history;

and if the lives beyond

all dying still may sense somehow the earth—

detached, pristine, not causing it—

ancestors of the Christ may

have been there, might have seen

the sight that night

when God enslaved himself by birth.

Winding out in whispers, spirits lurking

in the dank and dripping corners of the cave

breathe their wonder

at the Father’s finally worded nave,

His gentle gauntlet laid down to the world.

In the chorus move the strains

of joy, of high fulfillment, or of mortified chagrin—

all awed; and seeping somewhere in

the dry and faint remains

of weeping, weeping high and fine

from a strained and lonely face—

Orpah weeping for her almost own

that were not; tears for him, for them,

and most for Boaz whom she’d never known.

ORPAH: My sister went with old Naomi when

she left here, found herself once more a bride

and took (in love) for her God their God. Then

just as Naomi had, in peace, she died.

Her curse upon herself, like roses do

when spread with dung, bloomed into life. (Their God

has always done this for the ones who knew

how near he was to hear.) Her twilight held

the joy of seeing their son’s grandson, who

became both son and father of her God.

They left me stripped of love, of hope, of all

the promise I had spent in choices

squandered then and now beyond recall—

abandoned, hearing only echoed voices …

NAOMI: Come, men! Away from dust,

away from parching ground, we

must seek a new land, find

some new blood, cast our lot

where rivers flow and plants bloom green.

ELIMELECH: We go, dear land, but I will sing

(while leaving here and going where

His light is dim) what He did there

in Egypt’s dark. And He will someday

bring this stricken place a light

for those who wait in deepest night

but sharp-eyed for the promised King.

MAHLON: Why, when there is now enough to eat,

do the harpies beat thus, bite thus

deep within my throat?

Why then do the red flecks sparkle

in the sputum spat into the sunlight?

Where then is that Yahweh? Why, when in the sky

at last are clouds (that I’ll admit are

pagan), do I have to die?

CHILION: There my brother (phaw! his rancid

innards succored death for me) can

see no further than his expectoration

or his nightly enema;

while we, expatriates from the Promised land,

grovel with the dogs. Like Esau,

he was hungry, we were hungry, selling out our

rights of promise for a hunger we could not withstand!

TOGETHER: Come, wives, hold our heads of Promise

in your barren pagan wombs;

you may tell your sometime nieces, nephews

in your haggard days—you have held Jehovah’s rods,

given them a decent tomb.

ELIMELECH: With this my last and cloying breath

I praise thee, Lord, and welcome death.

NAOMI: So soon you’re gone now, husband-lover,

strangely foreign sons of mine:

Pray God? yes, but where in rag-tag

foreign blood can there be

another hope or any other man for me?

ORPAH: And now the voices shriek out of the darkness:

mine, Naomi’s (who would say her name

was Mara, bitterness) and Ruth’s, who in

a whisper loud as icy thunder says

she’ll go as well. My last farewell mocks on.

The voices rise from far away now. They

are clearer, though; like knives they pierce my ears.

NAOMI: I’ve come back home now,

brought a proven love away from there,

one final solace for a death-dealt, God-forsaken crone.

BOAZ: That Moab woman strikes my heart and fancy.

She is kin—Naomi’s, mine—it’s said.

Perhaps the time to fill my empty bed

is now. I’ll search and see;

the time for sons is almost by.

NARRATOR: There is within the spirits’ chorus

(at the cite of Him, the real new Jerusalem)

one voice antiphonal to Orpah

keening for a lost and shriveled self—

a voice that had she too gone back

she would have known as next-of-kin.

NEXT-OF-KIN: I sold my damned rights by birth for …

what? A fear of strangers,

scent of danger?

Scorn of neighbors, fear of favor

lost because some pagan shares my bed?

The reasons why are so absurd

(they must have been) I can’t remember when

before then

I had lost my awe of God and thought

I’d sound my soul by men.

RUTH: It was a daring gambit; she,

Naomi, forced me to it; but though we faced despair,

she knew that Israel’s God delights

in risks. And through it all Naomi clung

to Him. Now the child I bear

will be hers too; the days and nights

he dreams of Cod her legacy; and if perhaps among

his children’s children (my fond dream) our Father’s

promised one appears, then He will too belong to her.

[History and the Christmas Story]

Only she who bore the Child

and nursed him at her breast

received by sight what eyes of faith

had shown to all the rest.

Those who toiled the years before

the hour of holy birth

had borne through hardship, pain, and grief

God’s lineage on earth.

Root of Jesse! Royal heir

of David! Orpah’s fear

is out of place; Naomi’s hope,

the son of Ruth is here!

Praise our Lord who sent the Son

to solve time’s mystery:

in Christ he saved mankind and blessed

his faithful ancestry.

Praise the Father! Praise the Son

who sums up all, the last

of Adam’s race: the hope of all

men, present, future, past.

Christmas, as everybody knows, is a time to be merry. It is a time for parties, gaiety, good food, gifts, traditions, carols, and happy expressions of peace and good wishes for the coming new year. We think about shepherds rejoicing, angels announcing “good tidings of great joy,” and Mary “magnifying and praising God” for the coming of the Christ-child. Enthusiastic anticipation, exciting activity, pleasant memories, and warm feelings all merge into something called “the Christmas spirit.” But great numbers of people, even in our churches, experience Christmas very differently. For them, the season to be jolly is instead a time of discouragement, fatigue, anxiety, and unhappiness. Suicide rates jump sharply in the days preceding Christmas, and recent studies show an increase in the number of Americans who consult psychiatrists between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. Even people who rejoice in the activity and message of Christmas sometimes find themselves facing what has come to be known as the Christmas depression.

There are at least four reasons for this yuletide unhappiness. First, there is the increased pressure that many people feel: pressure to get the shopping done, the cards addressed, the house decorated, the presents wrapped, the food prepared, the bills paid. It is easy to get caught up in a whirlwind of preparing for parties, visiting with friends, practicing for the cantata, getting the Sunday-school program ready, and attending to numerous other seasonal activities. In the midst of all this activity, our resistance gets down, we do not get enough sleep, we overeat (or drink too much), and as a result we tend to be more irritable, impatient, and inefficient—all of which can make us feel more pressured and anxious. For some people, the traditional Christmas gathering of the family increases the feeling of pressure. Old resentments, family rivalries, and insecurities that normally are kept hidden suddenly reappear, often accompanied by anxiety and depression. In many families there is also worry over a family member who drinks too much.

Loneliness is a second cause for Christmas depression. Students and servicemen and others who are away from home, widows and others who grieve, the sick and elderly, people who feel unloved and friendless—all tend to feel discouraged and lonely when everyone else is preparing for parties or visits with friends and relatives. Even people who have no problems with loneliness during the rest of the year are likely to feel unhappy and rejected when they have no one with whom to share the joys of Christmas. Sometimes this leads to self-pity or a “poor-little-me” attitude, to resentment at being left out, and to envy of those who appear to be happy at the holiday season.

Feelings of inadequacy are also accentuated at this time of year. Recently two psychiatrists, one in Europe and one in the United States, reported that most of their Christmas patients are people who felt inadequate and unwanted as children. Over the years these feelings become buried in the unconscious, but they rise to the surface when the person begins to compare himself to the perfect Christ-child, whom everyone wanted, worshiped, and adored. Some people feel inadequate because they cannot entertain as well as their friends, saddened because they cannot afford the gifts they would like to give their children, frustrated because they cannot give presents that are as expensive as those they have received, or guilty because they have overlooked someone or received a gift they feel is undeserved.

Perhaps all of this unhappiness comes because Christmas seems to be a time of increased Satanic activity. Whenever people begin to think about Christ, it appears that the devil becomes more active. The Scriptures, for example, report increased demonic activity at the time when Christ was on earth in human form. More recently, the expanding Jesus movement has been accompanied by Satan worship and a resurgence of interest in the occult. At Christmas, more than at any other time of the year, Christ’s name and birth are predominant. It is not surprising, therefore, that Satan is especially active at this season, distracting people from the babe of Bethlehem, creating misery instead of joy, and even providing his own substitute for the divine Christ in the form of an old man named Santa Claus who is eternal, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, infallible, the giver of good and perfect gifts, the symbol of happiness, and a powerful judge who judges on the basis of works.

Becoming aware of the existence of Christmas depression is the first step towards helping ourselves and others who tend to get discouraged at this time of the year. There are also some practical steps to combat it. First, we can make a deliberate effort to reduce holiday pressures. We can start our preparations early, eliminate what really does not need to be done, and plan activities that will focus on the real meaning of Christmas, the birth of God’s son. Most of the busyness of Christmas is our own fault. It comes because of poor planning, procrastination, or disorganization, and it tends to crowd out. Perhaps we need to spend more time considering how we can be still at Christmas and know that He is God.

Second, Christians should ponder ways in which they can help those who are lonely or in need at Christmas time. This may mean giving of our money, time, and energy to make others feel wanted and remembered. It may mean opening our homes to others and sharing Christmas, or giving to those who have less than we do. We spend so many dollars on gifts and food for our own families, so little on others who are ignored at Christmas or in need.

Third, we should give special consideration to what we teach our children about Christmas. Saying little about the Christ of Christmas, over-stressing frenzied activity or the receiving of gifts, teaching children to believe in Santa Claus, doing little to minister to the needs of others at Christmas—these are all ways in which we teach children that Christmas is something other than a celebration of the coming of God’s Son.

Fourth, those who are counselors, pastors, teachers, and parents should be alert to the pressures and discouragement that others feel at Christmas. We need to show a tolerance and compassion for those who find this to be a difficult time of year. Counselors should make themselves available to reassure and encourage people who are in need. Psychologists give a lot of short-term support to those who experience Christmas depression; similarly, we who are Christians should be willing to bear one another’s burdens in a special way at this time of year.

Finally, each of us must actively draw near to God at Christmas. Caught up in the holiday season, we easily let our devotional life slip. A Christ-centered Christmas is not likely to come automatically. It comes because we deliberately make room for Christ in our holiday activities. And that is the one sure way to make it really a season to be “jolly.”

Here in Washington, as elsewhere, a few November days gave us a chilly foretaste of winter as the temperature dipped below 40°. Our “missionary kids” from the Congo and Nigeria shivered at the bus stop, and our native African buttoned up her overcoat and tried to think warm. But our hardy general manger was still wearing his summer jacket; he hails from Minnesota, and his problem is the Washington summer.

We are delighted to note that Wheaton College has honored evangelist Billy Graham (who is a member of our board) by naming one of its programs the Billy Graham Graduate Program in Communications.

Our former co-editor Frank E. Gaebelein and his wife, Dorothy, are celebrating their fiftieth wedding anniversary this month.

My book, The World, the Flesh and the Devil, is off the press at long last, delayed by printing and paper problems. Readers who want copies can obtain them at local religious bookstores or order them directly from our book-publishing branch, Canon Press.