Our executive editor, L. Nelson Bell, was honored last month at the eighth rally of Billy Graham’s ten-day Dallas-Fort Worth crusade (see News, page 36). At that meeting Dr. Bell, who spent twenty-five years in China as a medical missionary, gave his testimony, and Mr. Graham announced the publication of a biography of his father-in-law and our colleague. (Dr. Bell is also the author of our popular “A Layman and His Faith” column.) It was written by John Pollock and is entitled A Foreign Devil in China. The book provides excellent background material for those who are interested in China not only as a mission field but also as an emerging great power. Any reader of CHRISTIANITY TODAY can receive a free copy of it by simply addressing a letter to Billy Graham, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55403, and asking for it by title.
October brings Reformation Sunday, and John Lewis Gilmore’s essay Young Luther calls attention to a frequently forgotten fact: the Reformers were young men. Our Lord Jesus was crucified at age thirty-three after a ministry of 2½ to three years. Approximately half of the population of the United States is under thirty, and the percentage is higher for countries like India and China and those in Latin America. But the power still resides in the hands of the elders; prominent on the list of world leaders are octogenarians Chang Kaishek and Haile Selassie and septuagenarians Mao Tse-tung, Chou En-lai, Francisco Franco, and Marshall Tito. We can expect that things will be different as members of the younger generation rise to places of leadership in China and elsewhere in the world. And we fervently hope the change will be for the good!
While we pray for peace, we need moral clarity about this war.
As my doubts about his teachings grew, so did a secret fascination with Jesus.
The plan would organize UMC churches in four global regions, with each given more leeway around same-sex marriage and other theological issues.
