Will 1966 Signal a Breakthrough?

Here are some promising areas for evangelical progress

The year 1966 presents evangelical Christians a fresh opportunity. In this world gripped by anxiety and moral impotence, we who know the God of the Bible can manifest the peace and purity, the power and promise, of a new level of life. If we fail now, we fail Christ and our generation. Here are some areas of promising spiritual advance in the new year:

1. World Congress on Evangelism. This event will bring to Berlin next October leaders who conspicuously carry the burden of biblical evangelism on their hearts and are strategically related to evangelistic planning in the churches. From more than a hundred nations, Christian workers of all races will match vision with vision to claim the modern world for Christ. They hope to appropriate the glory of Christ’s resurrection in a new way, to re-emphasize the apostolic sense of mission, and then to get on with the task of carrying the Gospel to the ends of the earth. They will ask those everywhere who acknowledge Christ as their Saviour and Lord to enlist as an army of missionary volunteers.

2. Christian University. Evangelical thought as well as evangelical action needs bold exposition. This year may see the projection of a Christian university that honors the Living God, the supernatural Jesus, and the Bible. A strategic beginning might be a Christian institute of advanced studies with access to a prestigious secular university. In a day when even prominent church-related colleges seem embarrassed by ties to the historic faith, and when some administrators and trustees defend faith-destroying professors whose salaries are paid by God-fearing Christians, the time is ripe for a bold new advance in evangelical education.

Liberal Protestantism evinces no eschatological hope based on a transcendent Christ who offers redemptive rescue and a holy destiny; nobody therefore should be surprised that such liberalism devotes itself to socio-economic and political concerns in an effort to relieve man’s horizontal anxieties. The evangelical community has an open opportunity to champion a rationally integrated view of life and learning. Younger movements on the periphery of the regular churches already sense these possibilities, as evidenced by the establishment of Oral Roberts University.

One of the most underplayed religious news stories of 1965 was the resignation of a Big Ten department chairman, Professor John Alexander of the University of Wisconsin, to direct the Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship, in an era when the slant of university learning is against belief in the supernatural. Even sensitive news media that featured stories of prominent businessmen who entered the pulpit ministry missed the dramatic force of Alexander’s transition. But an even greater challenge looms on the horizon of contemporary Christianity, offering evangelicals with resources and vision a singular opportunity to establish a great interdenominational university on an evangelical base.

3. Transdenominational Cooperation. Another opportunity of the new year is a larger type of cooperation among evangelicals of many denominations. Restless over the diversion and proliferation of energies in ceaseless ecumenical dialogues, more and more pastors are exploring the possibility of transdenominational cooperation for evangelical ends. A growing multitude of churchmen, both clerical and lay, are increasingly impatient over the National Council of Churches’ political involvement, theological looseness, and evangelistic indifference. These workers are eager to link hands with one another and with those outside the ecumenical complex who recognize the authority of Scripture, honor the great ecumenical creeds, and promote the common mission of the Church in New Testament dimensions. They credit the National Council with providing certain useful services but cannot excuse its ecclesiastical wandering. They do not want a merely negative, reactionary crusade, nor relationships predominantly outside regular churches. They are reaching for fellowship—not necessarily in structured forms or as an organized movement—that links those who cherish biblical Christianity and explores the possibilities of larger cooperative effort. They may find outlets in city-wide evangelism, urban church renewal, Bible translation, publications, and campus ministry.

4. An Awakening Laity. The spirited interest of laymen in local church affairs is a noteworthy development that may preserve the historic heritage of some of the ailing denominations. While there has been increasing talk in recent years of a new day for the laity, in some cases this has not meant much more than marshalling a church task force for fuller achievement of routine programs. But now there are signs of more spontaneous engagement; impressive numbers of laymen in some of the old-line churches are showing concern for the theological and evangelistic vitality of their denominations. In some sectors there are evidences of lay revival both in evangelistic engagement and in biblical and theological learning. These lay leaders, moreover, are raising searching questions about the lag in church additions, about the increasing engagement of some clergy in political affairs to the neglect of evangelistic effort, about the vast tax-exempt church properties that stand idle throughout much of the week while local businesses demand an efficient return from every square foot of their property, about the failure of some clergy to stand boldly upon their ordination vows and the failure of many seminaries to inculcate the Christian truths in a day when the forces of anti-Christ are gathering momentum. By all means these laymen should exercise as much leverage as possible within the structures of their own denominations to retain an evangelical witness and to promote a return to orthodoxy within and by means of their churches.

5. National Concern. A growing number of devout churchgoers see the future and security of the nation as ultimately tied to spiritual and moral principles, and sense the propriety of the phrase “freedom under God.” The outcome of the last election was sobering for many politically conservative Christians who supported politically conservative politicians out of a lively fear of socialism through expanding federal controls and the welfare implications of projected government programs. But the failure of the candidates to provide any real debate over political philosophy, and even more, the failure of politically conservative spokesmen to show the relation of spiritual principles to the secular issues before the public, has prodded some disappointed participants to deeper consideration of the spiritual and moral context of political theory. The outlook and emphasis of the clergy during the days of the American Revolution, the writings of the Puritans on both sides of the Atlantic, and scriptural teaching on the nature and role of the state and of the Christian’s civic responsibility, are being resurveyed.

Students on evangelical campuses are increasingly attracted to the political arena as a place of desirable vocational service. They sense that the exaggeration of the Church’s role in political affairs by ecclesiastical leaders must not discourage Christians from fulfillment of their proper individual role. Others who enter government service are increasingly distressed because political programs often promise more than they can fulfill. Among some churchgoers there is growing interest in a renewal of the independent sector of American life, in contrast with the government sector, which currently channels 90 per cent of all the funds spent for welfare, yet lacks the resourcefulness and efficiency of the large commercial or private agencies.

6. New Forms of Witness. Christian witness is taking new forms: cell groups, luncheon fellowships, home Bible studies, coffeehouses, and other activities outside the organized church. Some efforts are promoted by clergymen who espouse extreme views at the social frontiers and who, despairing of the Church’s non-revolutionary temper, pronounce doom on organized religion—even as they continue to draw salaries from this source. But most frontier efforts are carried by evangelicals whose evangelistic concern exceeds that of their churches or whose churches lack distinctive evangelism in difficult areas. In some cases, such work is the outgrowth of evangelistically alert churches that encourage and sponsor this penetration. A summer essay in Look Magazine described the exceptional virility of such independent activities as American Bible Society, Campus Crusade, Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship, Navigators, and Young Life. Interdenominational efforts like International Christian Leadership and Christian Business Men’s Committee International promote a program of spiritual dedication that reaches almost from one end of the land to the other. The Billy Graham crusades were neither originated nor nurtured by the ecumenical movement, fill a spiritual vacuum left by that movement, and trace much of their impact to the wide range of denominational cooperation. Perhaps the time has come to examine the prevalent idea that merger makes for the most effective evangelistic witness. While many leaders devote their energies to restructuring the churches, rescuing the lost remains the Church’s prime task, and every legitimate means of confronting men with the claims of Christ should be welcomed.

Life on the Threshold of Glory. We do not say that in 1966 the last year has dawned upon history. But for multitudes this nonetheless is the last year, and perhaps the last week, even the last day. Moreover, the so-called “apocalyptic umbrella” hangs over modern life wherever nations feel the pressures upon world peace in the context of the nuclear threat. The Christian’s confidence does not depend on sociological prospects but on the spiritual presence of the Saviour: “… my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27). The thundering nations do not know the Lord of glory, who will yet shake the heavens. The devout believer does, and knows the assuring Word of God in the midst of the modern babel. He knows that at death he will be united with Jesus of Nazareth, and that the one event surer than physical death is our Lord’s return. The fact that Jesus is coming means that all the pseudo-lords are going. So the follower of Christ, whatever his circumstances, stands but a step from the threshold of glory. This privilege our neighbors might well covet, were they to sense its remarkable identity. To mirror it to a world on the threshold of death is our duty and distinction.

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