Book Briefs: April 14, 1958

Powerful Book

The Preacher’s Task and the Stone of Stumbling, by D. T. Niles, Harper, 1957. 125 pp., $2.00.

In this review I am doing what I have never before brought myself to do, viz., recommending a book for its vital message that contains theology with which I cannot possibly agree. The author is a thoroughgoing Universalist. He denies a historical Fall of any kind. He affirms that the Cross did not enable God to forgive sins, it was only the place where Christ “exposed” sin. But he has written the most powerful book on Gospel preaching, against a missionary background, that I have ever read. His heresies seldom appear and in almost every instance could have been left out without affecting either the theme or the continuity of the book. And I found myself saying, as I read it, O that someone could edit no more than three or four pages of lines throughout!

These are the Lyman Beecher lectures for 1956–57. They take as their text the scriptural references to the “stone of stumbling” and the “rock of offense.” Examining primarily the missionary task of the Church (and the author is a great-grandson of the first Tamil convert in Ceylon), these lectures deal with the objections of a Hindu, a Moslem and a Buddhist to the Gospel.

Jesus Christ, of course, is the stone of stumbling in every case, and men stumble because they must take him as he is and not as they would like to receive him. But men stumble over him for different reasons. The Hindu would like to fit Christ into his own culture. But Christ cannot be made ours, we must become his. The Muslim would accept Jesus as a prophet, not as incarnate God. But the nature of sin demands the Incarnation, though the Muslim (including many of us) would make sin something that man can himself correct. The Buddhist would accept Christian religious “disciplines,” but not its other-worldliness. Yet Christianity is not identical with its own practices of renunciation, prayer and morality, disciplines shared by the Buddhist. Christianity is not “religion,” it is Gospel: the Good News that in the Resurrection God is still among men and at man’s disposal.

This is a powerful book. Page follows page of ringing Christian apologetic as the author shows up the universal human tendencies to adapt Jesus to culture, to gloss over the reality of sin, and to avoid the reality of the Resurrection. He writes against the background of pagan religions. But the points that he makes are applicable in First Church, Main Street, U.S.A. Particularly stimulating is a chapter in which Niles evaluates various evangelistic philosophies—from those which view evangelism as an attempt to supplant the existing religion with Christianity, to those which present Jesus Christ from the point of reconception or adjustment to the existing religious climate.

How does Niles manage to be a fervent Christian apologist and, at the same time, a Universalist? He does it by one of the most interesting feats of gymnastics that I have seen in this day of theological gymnastics. Christ, evidently, is the only answer both for time and for eternity. Eternally, all men are his. In time, all men can become his and enjoy his benefits only by obeying the uncompromised Gospel.

Niles would take into the church a low-caste Hindu who knew only that Christians have no respect of persons, and then he would teach him that it is only in Jesus Christ that he will ever understand the reason why Christians are willing to forget his low caste. But as the man already belongs to Christ and, if he thereby truly accepts him, then he, too, will come to look upon others without respect of persons. Says the author, “We believe that it is essential for the Church to evangelize, but we don’t believe that it is essential for people to be evangelized.”

What a pity to spoil a good book like that!

G. AIKEN TAYLOR

All-Out Evangelism

Evangelism in a Changing America, by Jesse M. Bader, Bethany Press, 1957. $3.00.

After 12 years of practicing evangelism in pastorates in Kansas and Missouri, 12 years serving as secretary of evangelism for the Disciples of Christ denomination, and 25 years holding the position of secretary of evangelism for the Federal Council (now National Council) of Churches, Dr. Bader speaks with the “voice of experience” on evangelism.

He has given us a comprehensive, evangelical, enthusiastic and kindly book. He emphasizes the sinfulness of men, the power of the Word of God, the place of the Holy Spirit, the incarnation, atonement and resurrection of Christ, repentance, faith, the new birth, baptism, church membership, and the necessity of prayer and witnessing.

Believing that “evangelism is the church’s first business” and that “to evangelize is the greatest work in the world” (p. 13), Dr. Bader advocates all types of evangelism, revival meetings, educational evangelism, home evangelism, visitation evangelism, military evangelism, university campus evangelism, preaching missions, rescue missions, and especially personal evangelism. He has chapters on child, youth, and adult evangelism.

He thinks that the local church should go all-out for evangelism and world missions, and should cooperate fully with community, denominational and interdenominational evangelistic programs.

His book is quite statistical. He gives the latest statistics on population growth, the churches and denominations, statistics regarding children, youth, adults, radio, television, colleges, crime, liquor, comic books, war costs, and he makes them interesting.

The conservative Christian can find little to criticize in this book. He might think that Dr. Bader is too optimistic about the various phases of evangelism going on today and too enthusiastic about the National Council’s cooperative evangelism, but certainly there is vastly more to agree with and rejoice over than otherwise in this fine book.

FARIS D. WHITESELL

Christian Realism

Least of All Saints, by Grace Irwin, Eerdmans, 1957. 251 pp., $3.50.

“The novelist’s aim is not to tell a story, to entertain and touch our hearts, but to force us to think and understand the deep and hidden significance of events.” So wrote de Maupassant.

Measured by this standard, Miss Irwin has a contribution to literature. The reader is taken underground and shown why certain complex drives and forces in a human soul can create an anomoly, a paradox. Thus “the deep and hidden significance of events” is brought to light.

Andrew Connington, 29, a veteran of World War I, receives a call to a large city church. He is an intellectual snob, a resourceful pulpiteer, the product of a liberal theological seminary. Reacting against the shallow liberalism of the 1920s, he converts his pulpit into a sounding-board for evangelical doctrine of a scholarly order. His whole appeal is necessarily to the intellect, never to the conscience. Why should a person immersed in radical skepticism wish to set forth the case for historic Christianity? Or talk to his flock about “a Being who for him was non-existent?” The answer makes for stimulating reading.

It is not always that a Christian novelist develops a situation without sermonizing, a plot without preachment, a message without moralizing. But here is a writer who does just that. And she is refreshingly free from cliches and tired platitudes. She puts her story together with skill and facility, and builds her characters with compassion. One might wish she had polished her quoted sentences, a la Hemingway, with the unobtrusive “he said” or “she said” rather than the redundant “he agreed,” “he contributed,” “Andrew inquired,” “she took up,” “he interposed.” But this is a minor criticism. On the whole Miss Irwin has done much to help lift Christian fiction out of its deplorable rut. Certainly Least of All Saints ought to furnish an exhilarating challenge to the school of young Protestant writers.

There is romance too. Cecily is someone you know. She’s not the saccharine sweet type, the formal feminine profile without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but completely natural, and therefore believable.

And the last page has for you a unique twist. The fade-out which is quite surprising, is Christian realism at its best. With the touch of a Rembrandt, the writer has called into play the contrasting principles of light and shadow, and woven them into a scene that will live with you long after you put the book down.

HENRY W. CORAY

On Human Fear

Prescription for Anxiety, by Leslie D. Weatherhead, Abingdon, 1956. $2.50.

In an introductory note careful distinction is made between fear and anxiety. The author calls the first “a God-given response to danger,” a danger that is focal. On the other hand, anxiety comes when one feels terror and helplessness with no definite foci. “A patient with an anxiety neurosis feels afraid without being able to say what makes him afraid” (p. 16).

The book is written with a warm sympathy for human suffering, by one who has had much experience in pastoral counseling. The causes of anxiety are dealt with. The place of confession as a therapeutic means is given large place, and suggestions of what and how and when to confess.

Help from the spiritual world is shown to be available and this is the final stress of the book. It is assumed that if and when anxiety-ridden souls sense the “reality and ultimate friendliness of the spiritual world—the world all around us,” they will put themselves en rapport with the heaven that everywhere about them lies and find the grand solution to all unsolved problems by realizing that Someone has the solution and will take care of it for them.

Weatherhead of course believes that every man must bear his own burden. He is not so visionary as to say that all anxiety vanishes with complete commitment. But the general idea certainly is that everything becomes delightfully tolerable that still must be borne, and that if we commit it with the best of our understanding all unnamed fears will flee.

This book must be read with rare insight in order that one not fall ultimately into a slough of disillusionment. For a bitter fact of life is that there is no solution to the problems of anxiety outside of the gospel personally accepted and fully understood and constantly appropriated. If one is a discerning Christian he will find much in Weatherhead’s book that he can use, for the simple reason that in such a case he has the inner resources of the Holy Spirit. But the danger is that a person who is not yet born again will seek to employ these indicated spiritual panaceas and find they do not work.

To those who do not yet realize and live by that which Christ came to earth to give, this volume has no message. To those who are the Body of Christ the book may speak of their need of more constant commitment to the One all-sufficient to banish all sorts of fear.

WALTER VAIL WATSON

Modern View

Understanding the Old Testament, by Bernhard W. Anderson, Prentice-Hall, 1957. $7.95. Understanding the New Testament, by Howard Clark Lee and Franklin W. Young, Prentice-Hall, 1957. $7.95.

These handsome volumes, designed as textbooks for the college and seminary levels, present the modern view of the Bible as persuasively as style and technique can make possible. Embellished with numerous maps, charts, illustrations, etc., these sister books win half of the student’s mind by the mere force of their physical format and attractiveness. Liberals will naturally glory in the addition of these works to an extensive literature already existing on their side.

The conservative Christian and biblical scholar will receive these contributions with mixed emotions. He will admire the beauty of the casket and all of its external adornments, but will look loathingly at the corpse which it contains—the corpse of German rationalism of the nineteenth century now “touched up” and “colored” (as if still alive!) by American neo-orthodoxy.

Understanding the Old Testament, for example, is simply a popular presentation of the critical view of the Bible associated with the names of Driver and Pfeiffer and their lesser satellites. Or, to put it another way, one will find here a condensation of the views set forth in Interpreter’s Bible. The author runs up and down the whole vocabulary of “higher criticism.” Such words as “colored” (pp. 31, 62, 130, 438), “borrowed” (pp. 90, 158, 453, 468, 472), “touched up” (pp. 145, 180, 218, 433, 478), “exaggerated” (pp. 45, 81, 83, 84, 295), etc., are applied quite freely to the history and literature of the Old Testament. The student will learn of the “legends,” “folklore,” “blunders,” “inaccuracies,” “embellishments,” “theological bias,” and “propaganda” which Dr. Anderson characteristically imputes to the biblical authors and their writings.

After sailing through the turbulent waters of Understanding the Old Testament our ship of faith finds no rest in the equally tempestuous billows of Lee-Young’s Understanding the New Testament. Here, surely, we ought to find some hope that is stedfast and sure! No, the Christian community becomes the ultimate authority in New Testament history and literature. It is that body that “creates” a story (pp. 90 f), or places something upon the lips of Jesus (p. 127), or reworks a tradition (pp. 163,165), or uses mythological language (p. 397).

The reading of these pages—over 1,000 in the two volumes—convinces us that the liberalism of neo-orthodoxy is just as destructive of the Bible’s authority and uniqueness as the older liberalism ever was. Nowhere in all these pages do we find the thought that the prophets and apostles were men who were inspired with an authoritative message from God which was recorded accurately in the sacred pages of Holy Writ. Rather, the Bible becomes in the hands of the Anderson-Lee-Young school a very fallible book which, perchance, contains a message somewhere from Deity. It will be difficult for this reviewer to understand how either of these Understandings will make the Bible more understandable, in its avowed supernatural features, to those young men and young women who, in our tragic times, are seeking for light and life in the only book that professes to be God’s final message to man.

WICK BROOMALL

Classic Treatment

Exposition of the Epistle of James, by Thomas Manton, Sovereign Grace Book Club. 454 pp., $4.50.

What Pusey is to the Minor Prophets and C.H.M. to the Pentateuch, so Manton is to the Epistle of James. This is a reprint, of course, as Dr. Manton did his writing during the seventeenth century, but it will be welcomed by any who like to collect the best.

The author writes, as may be expected, in the grand manner of the seventeenth century. And one occasionally wishes that he had managed to have his say in fewer words. But the material is rich and suggestive, especially from the homiletical standpoint.

As the Epistle of James, by the way, is the classic New Testament treatment of the place of works within the framework of faith, a pointed, suggestive exposition done in the modern manner is very much needed today. The implications of faith vs. works for modern theology are almost unlimited.

G. AIKEN TAYLOR

Thrilling Life Story

Dr. Sa’eed of Iran, by Jay M. Rasooli and Cady H. Allen, Grand Rapids International Publications, 1957. 189 pp., $2.95.

The word “thrilling” is much overused in our day, but there seems to be no other way to characterize the life story of this great servant of Christ. From the time he left the Moslem faith of his fathers to give his heart to Jesus Christ, this Kurdish doctor was almost constantly in the midst of difficulties and dangers, and the record of his deliverance from them makes great reading.

Dr. Sa’eed ministered to the high and to the lowly, and always seems to have borne a sweet witness for his Lord. His medical skill was in constant demand; his travels took him far and wide, and everywhere he went he ministered the Gospel of Christ in effective fashion. Although often threatened, and repeatedly in danger, he was strengthened by his simple faith in the Lord’s keeping power, and his life was a blessing to untold numbers.

Recognized for his medical and surgical proficiency, Dr. Sa’eed was respected by many great doctors, and he became friends with Sir William Osler and Dr. Harvey Cushing. He spent himself without limit in the service of Christ and of his fellow men, and his biography is certain to bring a challenge to many readers.

H. L. FENTON, JR.

Reverent Testimony

At the Foot of the Cross, by an imprisoned pastor behind the Iron Curtain, Augsburg, 1958. 210 pp., $3.00.

This book of Lenten meditations surveys the scenes and events of our Lord’s Passion from the viewpoint of a humble believer kneeling at the foot of the cross. It is written in the form of an informal monologue. The informality, however, is not of the irreverent and offensive kind which we encounter among many modern Christians. On the contrary, it simply bears witness to the remarkable spiritual intimacy which one friend shares with the Master.

Nevertheless, it is difficult to justify the lavish praise which attended the recent publication of this book. In commending it to the public, one well-known leader rated it the best selection for the Easter season that has crossed his desk in a decade. After reading it himself, this reviewer is not nearly that enthusiastic. This is not to say that the book is altogether void of value. Here and there one finds an occasional spark of fresh insight, especially in the places where the author makes the ancient persons and scenes contemporaneous with the present. But the real value of the book lies in its vibrant testimony to the fact that simple and sincere Christian faith and love are stronger than even the bars of a communist cell. Perhaps that, if little else, makes it worth reading.

RICHARD ALLEN BODEY

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