Jesus Is Alive!

EDITORIALS

The perennial Christian symbol, often fashioned in gold, is a cross. This speaks of death. In two thousand years of church history no one has come up with a comparable resurrection symbol. Need we remind ourselves that to affirm the cross but deny the resurrection would empty the Christian faith of its content and make preaching, worship, and witness meaningless nonsense?

The Cross has a threefold frame of reference that spells out the meaning of the death of Jesus Christ in God’s plan for the salvation of sinful men. First, it was the final and ultimate revelation of God’s divine love. There is here no slushy sentimentalism like that which characterizes much of what is called love in our day. God’s love was characterized by sacrifice, suffering, and death, not only by ministry to the lame and the blind. He spared not his own Son, and his Son offered himself as an oblation and a substitute for sinners.

Secondly, the Cross was the measure of the divine judgment on sin. It brought death to the Son of God. Men everywhere like to pretend that death is just a normal part of the natural order; they resist the ugly fact that it is the inevitable, just, and logical consequence of sin. Calvary is no less than God’s judgment on sin.

Thirdly, the Cross is the ground of pardon and forgiveness. There and there alone the sinner finds forgiveness for guilt, release from sin’s penalty, and deliverance from its power. It is this that brings hope to the heart of man.

The Cross without the resurrection, however, would be a monstrous barbarity, a cruel hoax, a dastardly deception. Indeed, it is the resurrection that distinguishes Christianity from every other religion or pseudo-religion in the world. Buddha is dead; Mohammed is dead; Confucius is dead; Zoroaster is dead; Lao Tzu is dead; Gandhi is dead; Marx is dead; Lenin is dead. Jesus is alive!

Christianity is a factual religion, and one of its two central facts is the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. The resurrection is no less a fact because it was a supernatural act. The disciples and followers of Jesus saw him risen even though they did not see him rise. God’s ways are not man’s ways. There is a profound mystery connected with the resurrection, but this does not void the fact, nor does it excuse the unbelieving heart that balks at the thought of the dead made alive.

To believe in Jesus’ resurrection and rest one’s ultimate salvation on it, though essential, is not enough. The Christian does not comprehend the full meaning of the resurrection unless he works out its implications in his daily life. It is incongruous for him to talk of a resurrection that brings pardon and the forgiveness of sin without manifesting deliverance from its power. The unbelieving world cannot see the forgiveness of sin in a visible sense, but it can observe the lives of those who claim their sins have been forgiven. When a man who says he is a Christian lives and walks no differently than his unbelieving neighbor, he denies the resurrection reality of sin’s broken power. The world waits for the witness of the transformed life of purity, holiness, truthfulness, and integrity to validate the Christian’s claims that because of the resurrection he has been born from above through faith in God’s Son.

The greatest sin is not lying or cheating or murder, nor is it lack of love. The greatest of all sins is the refusal to let Jesus Christ be Lord of the life, because it is a violation of the first and the greatest commandment. This sin cannot be remedied unless repentance and confession include commitment of life to Christ as Lord. Otherwise the sin continues, and repentance and confession are without meaning. Once Christ is Lord of the life, then his resurrection has its fullest meaning: the believer subordinates his choices to the will of Jesus and does what Jesus wants him to do. And as Lord. Jesus has a supreme mission for his yielded people: take the Gospel to every creature.

The resurrection certifies that Jesus’ work on the Cross was sufficient and acceptable. In this we can rejoice. But we must not stop there. God intended that the power of the resurrection should be experienced and manifested in every believer’s life. Because Jesus is alive, the Christian should walk and act differently than the world does. If he doesn’t, then the fuller meaning of the resurrection is lost to him; he is deformed, and the unbeliever, failing to see evidence of the new life in Christ, has reason to continue in unbelief.

The first great question about the resurrection has been answered. It happened! Christ is alive! The second great question—whether the power of that resurrection can be seen in the Christian’s life—remains to be answered by each of us this Easter season.

Cocu: Call The Hearse?

The moderator of the United Presbyterian Church, joining his counterpart in the Presbyterian Church U. S., is outspokenly pessimistic about the present chances of success for the giant nine-way merger scheme of the Consultation on Church Union. “At this moment if our church were to vote on joining the Church of Christ Uniting [the proposed name for COCU’s child], we would turn it down,” Dr. William R. Laws told a Detroit reporter in an interview. “I am inclined to think that the national mood now makes church union very difficult if not impossible.”

This gloomy prognostication echoes a statement made a few months earlier by the chairman of the committee that drafted the COCU Plan of Union. Dr. William A. Benfield, Jr., moderator of the Southern Presbyterian Church, noted “strong opposition … in every participating church.”

Laws and Benfield won’t go so far as to say that COCU should be lowered into the coffin; they hope there is time to overcome the present lack of enthusiasm in the five or six years left before the nine denominations must finally turn thumbs up or down on the structural union. These two leaders merit praise for their candor about present COCU ennui. We hope merger proponents will be as candid in assessing how, if the staunch advocates of COCU see its life signs failing, others can be expected to see it as anything more than a corpse.

Missionaries As Guests

Some missionaries have been or are being deported from Taiwan and South Africa because they had become personae non gratae to the governments. From our perspective it is easy to fault the governments, and even easier to justify the missionaries and commend them for speaking out. We must acknowledge, however, that, regrettable as the deportations were, sovereign states have the right to extend or cancel visas, and are not required to justify their actions. It is never valid to assume that governments see things the way the Bible delineates them, or that they consider themselves bound by Christian moral principles and will act in accord with these principles rather than make decisions on the basis of what they think their own interests to be.

Missionaries who are dramatically deported get considerable attention. But some countries today simply will not grant visas to aspiring missionaries or to returning ones. Whether countries expel missionaries or refuse to grant or renew visas matters little. Both procedures effectively deny to the missionaries the privilege of bringing the Gospel to the people of those countries. Fortunately, even in countries such as China and Russia that are totally closed to missionaries from the West, there are other means such as short-wave radio by which the Gospel can be transmitted. Thus there is no place that is wholly impenetrable.

We trust that the situation in Taiwan and South Africa will not reach the point where all foreign missionaries are excluded. To prevent this may require that missionaries remain silent about some things they believe in, in order to accomplish their primary mission, which is to see men and women come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. Since missionaries see their roles and their responsibilities differently, some may not be able to remain silent and as a consequence may be forced to leave their posts. But for those who stay we can predict that if enough people get converted, repressive regimes eventually will go the way of all flesh and the unarticulated views of the missionaries will at last prevail.

Life’S Harmony

God created a harmony in nature that many composers have tried to imitate. Music reflects the balance and harmonic structure of the cosmos. As season blends into season, and storms give way to serenity, we see evidence of the Creator’s harmony. This, however, is not the harmony of prelapsarian perfection in the natural order, for storms and drought often bring disaster. Rather this harmony is the combination of the peace and chaos we find in nature, a blend that is also reflected in our lives. God sends sun and rain spiritually as well as physically.

It is Easter that best exemplifies this combination. As winter changes into spring we remember God’s supreme act of harmony—the blending of sinlessness and shame to bring triumph over death and man’s reconciliation with God.

To know the fullness of life, the reason for Christ’s coming (John 10:10), we need to understand and experience the power of God’s harmony and the joy that it brings. As Wordsworth says in “Tintern Abbey,” “With the eye made quiet by the power/Of harmony, and the deep power of joy/We see into the life of things.”

Charitable Competition

Who is the most admired resident of Washington, the nation’s capital? President Nixon? Mayor Walter Washington? The Reverend Walter Fauntroy, the District of Columbia’s new delegate to Congress?

With the opening of baseball season, the focus swings away from these highly respected men to manager Ted Williams. Washington, as every sports fan knows, has the lamentable reputation of perennially being first in war, first in peace, and last in the American League. The coming two years ago of Williams, who was one of baseball’s greatest hitters, put new life into America’s favorite pastime for Washington area residents.

One thing about Williams that nettles Senator fans, however, is his enthusiastic willingness to give batting instruction to those who play on other teams! In spring training this year, one opposing player asked for and got some batting tips from Williams before an exhibition game, then promptly went on to hit a home run against the Senators his first time up.

In the interests of his own Senators, who are still among the poorest batters in baseball, we’ll not encourage Williams in his charity. But does his spirit offer an example to churchmen who regard denominational loyalties as supreme? Many of the great spiritual advances of our time are those taking place outside the ecclesiastical establishment. We need to encourage and help endeavors that show potential, even if they run “competition” to our own efforts.

Two Marys: A New Beginning

Racial disturbances recently forced Principal Laird Lewis to close down Myers Park High School in suburban Charlotte, North Carolina. Tension was still high when classes reopened days later, But then two girls named Mary, one black and one white, introduced themselves during lunch. After drawing six others in the lunchroom into their circle of companionship, they went outside to get better acquainted. Others joined them.

Conversation gave way to songs and laughter. By the time the bell rang, hundreds of students were caught up in the joyous demonstration. Lewis canceled classes, and he and his 2,200 pupils—including the school’s 450 blacks—and their teachers moved to the stadium for a giant love-in.

An approving eyewitness, Presbyterian minister J. E. Fogarty, said they were like little children as they played together, embraced one another, and laughed away the hostilities. Hand-clapping and songs such as “Amen” and “Let the Sunshine In” created a revival atmosphere. The crowd cheered as appreciative students hoisted Lewis to their shoulders.

Lewis, a Baptist, said it was the greatest experience of his life. Parents telephoned him to report abrupt attitude changes in their young. More concern for others was commonly cited.

Nearly two months have passed, and the glow has continued, according to Lewis. Tensions are gone. The color lines have disappeared in the lunchroom and student lounges. Students show respect for one another.

“A lot of prayer went into this,” said Lewis. “The churches were concerned. The kids were searching for something.”

The love-in may not have solved the deep ingrained problems, commented student council president Robert Lewis, a member of Fogarty’s church. “But it was a beginning.”

Love is the answer to our nation’s simmering racial ills. The two Marys have shown us the way.

Fighting For God

The Catholic University of America found itself embroiled in another controversy last month. Students had contracted for a campus speech by Ti-Grace Atkinson, noted feminist, and university officials originally approved the agreement. Subsequently in a speech at Notre Dame Miss Atkinson used crude terms that some interpreted as a denial of the virgin birth. Catholic University officials then barred Miss Atkinson from the campus, but a student group got a federal court order enabling her to speak.

The speech itself evoked a regrettable incident. While Miss Atkinson was addressing the crowd, Mrs. Patricia Bozell ran to the podium and tried to slap her. Mrs. Bozell, sister of the Buckley brothers, later defended her action. “I think I did what God would have wanted me to do,” she said.

We disagree. God doesn’t need that kind of “help” to preserve his truth. Mrs. Bozell, managing editor of Triumph, got into the auditorium as a member of the press and for that reason alone should have behaved herself.

University officials showed poor judgment in trying to keep Miss Atkinson off the campus after they had approved her coming. If they are eager to preserve the campus from becoming a forum for alien views, they should see that contracts with speakers include escape clauses in which cancellations can be made legally.

There was some talk that Miss Atkinson had a right to speak at Catholic University because the school receives public monies (reportedly one-fourth of its income, mostly through science grants). However. Judge John Lewis Smith, Jr., did not rule on those grounds. He said it is “well established that First Amendment rights are not absolute, and private religious colleges are not public for every purpose.” His order was based on the contractual obligation.

Pressures On Israel

As Egypt and Israel continued their uneasy ceasefire, people everywhere joined in hoping it will not be broken by rash acts committed by either of the parties or by the Soviet Union or the United States.

The focal question seemed to be whether all the territories taken by Israel in the 1967 war will be returned. It is difficult to tell whether Egypt and the other Arab countries will remain obdurate and refuse to negotiate a peace treaty if Israel keeps some of the occupied lands that are strategically important to its security.

From a purely rational perspective, one is hard put to fault Israel and Golda Meir for insisting on retaining some of the occupied territories, since they have excellent reasons for doubting that their territorial integrity and viability as a nation can be maintained any other way. It would be silly for Israel to suppose that the Soviet Union can be trusted as a guarantor of any treaty or that she and her allies would not invade Israel if it served their purposes to do so. The installation of missile sites in Egypt near the Suez Canal immediately after the ceasefire began, and the breach of the agreement that the military situation would remain as it was at the start of the ceasefire, speak far louder than inked signatures on treaties and specious promises sent out for public consumption.

Israel rightly, in our opinion, does not believe the United States can be trusted either. She senses that any promises made by the present government could be disregarded by the next one, and that the will of the American people to live up to its solemn assurances is not above suspicion. At the same time Israel knows only too well that were it not for the United States she could not possibly secure the armaments she must have to defend herself. Golda Meir and her government have to walk a tightrope keeping the armament supply routes open and at the same time resisting the demands by the United States that she return all territories taken in 1967.

Since we do not live in an ideal world and since the probity of the super powers and of Israel’s neighbors is at best questionable, it would seem almost suicidal for Israel to give back the Golan Heights, Sharm el Sheikh, and a fortified line along the Jordan. For other reasons as well we can sympathize with Israel’s desire to control a united Jerusalem. The risk of another war would, in our judgment, be less if Israel were left with adequate defense positions geographically and did not have to depend only on the pledged assurances of nations whose words and performance she has good reason to doubt.

No Fault With ‘No Fault’

Currently the issue of man’s accountability is being raised in connection with automobile insurance. Ever since Cain asked “Am I my brother’s keeper?” men have been trying to evade responsibility for their misdeeds. In recent years the tendency to blame one’s surroundings or parents or abstract pressures instead of oneself has become more pronounced. Christians, who believe that God does hold all of us accountable, have resisted this dehumanizing tendency, which has the effect of regarding men as automatons.

As matters now stand, a person who is injured in an automobile accident is not compensated if he was at fault. If another person was at fault, then the victim must hire lawyers to sue the offender. If the guilty person is inadequately insured, the victim recovers little or nothing, despite the cost of his medical treatment and the income he may have lost (or that the family has lost if the breadwinner was killed). Moreover, the courts are so overloaded that cases are usually delayed for years. Meanwhile the bills keep piling up. The pressure is on to settle “out of court,” sometimes for less than what the victim would get if he could afford to wait. Those suits that do come to trial often prove very lucrative to the lawyers, who take a percentage of the amount awarded rather than a flat fee. One can easily understand why trial lawyers oppose major reform of the system!

The principle of holding men responsible for their misdeeds is sound, but in the matter of automobile insurance we feel there are compelling reasons to support change to a “no fault” system. A much greater percentage of the expenses arising from automobile accidents should be covered by insurance than is presently covered. A no-fault system better upholds the biblical principle that men are to accept responsibility for supporting themselves. Each driver makes his own provision against calamity, as he does already in the areas of health and life and fire. (Even if the fire that destroys your home started in someone else’s, it is your insurance, not his, that compensates you.) There is no good reason why company “overhead” expenses should be far greater in automobile insurance than in life or health or fire insurance. Since the courts are basically bypassed under a no-fault system, they would have more time to devote to the backlog of criminal cases. And, of course, criminal charges against irresponsible drivers should still be vigorously pressed. “No fault” applies to compensation for the victim, rather than punishment for the offender.

The Whole Armor Of God

Paul warns in the concluding summary of his letter to the Ephesians that to stand against the evil tricks of the Devil, we must put on all the armor that God gives us (chapter 6, vv. 10, 13).

We pride ourselves on our areas of strength, but Satan tries to find our weaknesses. He doesn’t “fight fair.” Ninety-nine per cent of the time, “truth” and “righteousness” (v. 14) may indeed be protecting us, but Satan will use the 1 per cent of the time when we fudge the facts or bend the standards of uprightness to negate our witness for God. Even if, by God’s grace, we do live a life of integrity, Satan has his “darts” of illness or catastrophe to fling at us, and we need the faith to see beyond the horizons of our present condition in order to ward off the effects of these attacks, though not the attacks themselves (v. 16).

We will fail more or less of the time. So to keep Satan from neutralizing us permanently, we need to hold on firmly to the assurance of a solution that is dependent not upon us and our weakness but upon Christ and his strength (v. 17). Knowledge of the forgiveness of sins, including sins committed when our armor is not at full strength, is an essential defense against the Evil One. He seeks to divert us from marching forth with the Gospel of peace (v. 15) and penetrating men’s minds like a sword with the Word of God (v. 17). Only with the whole armor of God can he be withstood.

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