Eutychus and His Kin: January 5, 1962

Desk Calendar

This morning I cleared the litter on my desk into a carton and labeled it “Miscellaneous, 1961.” On the empty expanse of varnished oak I arranged my clock, lamp, and desk calendar. A new year is before me.

It begins with a brief interlude between holidays, conferences, conventions, and convocations; let us call it Winter Work Week. For a few short days we are out of Seasons. Barring blizzards, flu, and missiles, this is the season for getting the year’s work done.

First, to plan the week.

An engagement calendar is fascinating: square, regular pages, crisp and clean. It suggests days both ordered and open. Looking at the pile of fresh pages, I am ready to believe the formula for success: Plan your work and work your plan. The book offers no resistance as I plot a balanced pattern of achievement. Marshalled hours conquer the whole docket of unfinished business, with a reserve of leisure left for mopping up—triumph of intelligent planning.

Of course, it won’t work. Days aren’t like pages. They are lumpy and twisted. They recall the rueful warning of that bogus barbershop ballad: “Don’t go out in the wheatfield, mother; you’ll run against the grain.”

In short, the days are evil. But good or bad, they are measured better by heart beats than by clock ticks. Which brings me back to seasons. Commercialized holidays exploit the seasons of life, seasons we all know. The farmers’ almanac is more true to life than an executive’s desk book. The tides of our lives never rest. Days rush in with thunder, or ebb out in silence.

All the seasons God has set in his own power. The rainbow of his promise arches over every one. The cycles of nature, history, or my life are not meaningless. In the fullness of time the Lord of glory entered history. When his hour was come he finished salvation and redeemed all time for his people.

We can’t plan our own lives, even a week ahead. The time is His, not ours. We can only redeem the time he gives. Christian wisdom discerns in time His seasons of opportunity.

EUTYCHUS

Ministers And Mergers

I am deeply disturbed about the article “What Ministers Think of Mergers” (Nov. 24 issue) by Harold Lindsell. I am happy to note the very honest statement … where Mr. Lindsell recognizes that the group of ministers questioned might not be a good cross section. Being well acquainted with ministers in my own denomination and with many others, I feel this cannot be so.…

I think there is no question of the fact that at least 90 per cent and probably 97 per cent of the ministers in the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. will heartily back this plan to study the merger and do so with the understanding that we will do everything we can to make a merger come about.…

Admittedly we might have to change a few of our creeds, some that might well need changing, but is there not the possibility that our creeds can be richer and truer because of this merger with other churches?

MARION L. MOYES

Roanoke Presbyterian Church

Kansas City, Mo.

This quote is from Dr. Alfred Edersheim’s book, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah. It states (with reference to the Scripture “that they may be one”): “But while moral union rather than outward unity was in His view, our present ‘unhappy divisions,’ arising so often from willfulness and un-readiness to bear slight differences among ourselves … are so entirely contrary not only to the Christian, but even to the Jewish spirit, that we can only trace them to the heathen element in the Church.” …

Does not Dr. Edersheim, in essence, express the core of the problem?

WILLIAM H. SCHOBERT

Bankers Baptist Church

Hillsdale, Mich.

The “control” group is biased by definition and conclusions drawn from such comparisons are invalid on the face of it.

If the intent of the article is to represent a discussion of the points of view of some fraction of 150 ministers who responded on paper to some written questions, then the reporting would have been far more realistic and effective if both the discussion and conclusions had not been generalized to: “What Ministers Think of Mergers.”

JESSE W. MYERS

United Campus Christian Fellowship

University of Maryland

College Park, Md.

A word about the laity that said they were in favor of the merger of the Blake type—I would assume that they aren’t aware that this would mean a possible surrender of the episcopate. A better question to ask Episcopalians is, “Would you favor merger even if it meant the surrender of the episcopate?” I think the results would be decidely different.…

Certainly we can’t refuse to talk to anyone of unity, but it must be done in the light of the Catholic faith, which includes the episcopate.

RAY RANTAPAA

Lead, S. Dak.

Along with the episcopate goes belief in apostolic succession, which is something the Methodists profess to disbelieve.… The Methodists, indeed, have “bishops” but as administrative functionaries, not as followers in the apostles’ steps.

Articles such as Mr. Lindsell’s may make heartening reading for your subscribers, but merely ignoring obstacles is not going to hasten the cause of re-union. Norman, Okla.

JOHN VORNHOLT

Men’s attempts at world unity will always in the end fail. Christ alone, at His coming, will unite. Organized unity movements, however well arranged and impressive, do not really unite. The preaching of the Word under the power and influence of the Holy Spirit is God’s directive to his Church.… Unity of spirit alone is vital.

When He comes, He will unite those who are His, in East and West, in a manner beyond their wildest dreams.

GRIFFITH QUICK

Rhyddings Congregational Church

Swansea, Wales

In our community (as in many others we have heard of) a group of 18–24 of us meet together one nite a week for Bible study, hymn singing, discussion and prayer. We take turns sharing our homes, and have a rotating leadership in the host. Our group, which is composed of members of the faculty and staff at the Air Force Academy, at present is represented by the following denominational backgrounds: Lutheran, Congregationalist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Disciples, Southern Baptist, Salvation Army, Conservative Baptist and Plymouth Brethren.

This positive experiment in ecumenicity has not only increased our understanding of the Bible, but of the convictions and feelings of one another. During the past two and a half years we have come to realize as a result of this “koinonia,” that there is probably room within the non-legalistic framework of the New Testament for several kinds of worship services and church programs adaptable to the variety of needs and tastes of different people.

WILLIAM PATERSON, D.D.S.

USAF Academy Hospital

Air Force Academy, Colo.

Interview With Dr. Malik

I just read your interview with Dr. Charles Malik (Nov. 24 issue)—a great man, Christian at the heart and in the mind. He was discomfited at only one point … and that was in his failure to see or admit that the Roman branch of Catholicism is such a strong force in Mediterranean, Latin culture—it is in the warp and woof of it, hence the vulnerability of the people to Communism’s bait. They rebel against their religiously dominated culture; not at the theology so much as at the exploitation of their poor countries by an ecclesiastical system. Frankfort, Ind.

JOHN WAYE

In the sixteen years since the founding of the U.N., the following countries have been enslaved by the Communists: Czechoslovakia, Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, Roumania, Albania, Yugoslavia, North Korea, China, and Cuba. Apparently it is impossible to stand against this spreading malignancy while we are yoked to it in such an international agency.… We will never see justice done in the U.N. as long as it is opposed to Soviet interests. We have forgotten that a Russian veto blocked a U.N. investigation of the Hungarian people’s revolt against their Communist captors. Time and again the nations of the Free World have appeared to be more interested in winning the approval of these godless men than in seeking righteousness.

Though many fine and noble men have served in the U.N. working for a just peace, it is time for Christian realists to openly acknowledge that as it is presently organized, it is a tremendous detriment to the cause of justice and freedom.

FRANCES D. SWANN

Tyler, Texas

Malik’s answers should give many professing Christians food for thought and serious self-examination.

O. L. WILLSON

Monmouth, Ill.

Will someone of authority and honest insight please write an article on the Greek Orthodox Church. I thought it was a “dead church”; but Malik is anything but dead.

M. PAUL VAN HOUTEN

Hull Christian Reformed Church

Hugue, N.D.

Evangelical And Council

Regarding “New Delhi” (Nov. 10 issue): … Why aren’t “evangelicals” better represented in the NCC and the WCC? If they are not, it may be through default because of their lack of concern. Have you ever explored the possibility that Protestant evangelicals have not been willing to do the day-by-day service to the NCC or WCC which gives leadership in most church or inter-church groups? How often have they, I should say we, for I count myself as one with “evangelicals,” given up the minute some cherished pressure resolution was defeated in committee or on the floor of a denominational gathering?

R. EUGENE CROW

Director-of-Evangelism

Southern California Baptist Convention

Los Angeles, Cal.

Since when has the word “conservative” indicated the theological classification of a clergyman who does not subscribe to the doctrine of the total inerrancy of the Scriptures?

There is such confusion in terminology these days that words are taking on new meaning. And it is all a part of a passionate desire to be labeled anything but a fundamentalist. It would be a wonderful day in America if 74 per cent of her clergymen were fundamental and conservative in the true sense of the words.

ROY J. CLARK

Bethlehem Baptist Church

Cleveland, Ohio

Caught The Wrong Stage

May I draw your attention to an unfortunate misprint in my review of Keri Evans’ book, My Spiritual Pilgrimage from Philosophy to Faith (Nov. 10 issue). I do this because I regard the book as of such outstanding worth that I feel it should not be misrepresented.

The misprint runs as follows: “In establishing such he passed through three stages which he affirms should never be confused: awakening, conviction, and hesitancy.” In reality the point that he insists upon more than once is that the experiences never to be confused are: awakening, conviction and conversion. St. Paul’s Cathedral

COLIN C. KERR

Prebendary

London, England

The Context

In reply to the letter by Durrett Wagner (Nov. 10 issue) criticizing your editorial “No Academic License to Pervert Moral Standards”:

On March 16, 1960, an article by Dick Hutchinson and Dan Bures appeared in the Daily Illini of the University of Illinois. This article deplored, and quite justifiably, the “pre-determined ritual” of prolonged necking which occurred in the sorority houses on Saturday nights when the girls and their escorts returned after a date.… Hutchinson and Bures felt this was reducing the human personality to no more than a male or female sex unit. It was in response to this courageous article that Koch, a biology professor, wrote his letter to the editor.

Mr. Wagner’s remarks on Koch’s letter fail to take into account its attitudes toward the student article above in particular and toward society in general.

In the first place, Koch labels Hutchinson and Bures as discussing sexual problems with a “narrow-minded, if not entirely ignorant perspective.” Others come in for similar adjectives: “By far the more important hazard is that a public discussion of sex will offend the religious feelings of the leaders of our religious institutions.” …

Further on, he refers to the “hypocritical and downright inhumane moral standards engendered by a Christian code of ethics which was already decrepit in the days of Queen Victoria.” …

Mr. Wagner, ignoring the rest of Koch’s letter, based his comments upon the one sentence, which doubtless seems restrained by comparison with the above.…

RALPH C. SIDES

Tacoma, Wash.

Optimism Unwarranted

In the Sept. 25 issue, page 7, first column … it should read: C. S. Lewis’ The Pilgrim’s Regress, not Progress. Fairfax, Va.

MRS. TOM DODSON

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