Eutychus and His Kin: November 8, 1974

And Now, Orthocalypsy

According to Francis Schaeffer, one of the most important things to recognize in spiritual warfare is where the important battle lines are drawn. We have to fight the right battles, not march out with full equipment to a quiet spot where no enemy is in sight.

One of the greatest errors we can make is allowing others to plan our battles. It was the liberals who decreed that the first post-war decade would be the age of the church and ecumenism, the second that of secularization, and now the theology of revolution. As Sr Don Cabeza de Madera so trenchantly illustrates (see the October 25 issue, page 21), it is a mistake to allow ourselves to be drawn into the pitfall of the theology of revolution, no matter how many liberals we may hope to crush in our fall.

While the liberals were trumpeting about various peripheral issues and keeping evangelicals running frantically from one corner of the ecclesiastical playing field to the other, die-hard conservatives were sticking grimly, and on the whole effectively, to the defense of the truth: in a word, to orthodoxy. Orthodoxy, as seen by biblical Christians, is intimately related to the authority of Scripture. But defending orthodoxy, even successfully, may grow monotonous. More and more evidence is accumulating to show that the more creative evangelicals are turning from their old preoccupation with the doctrine of revelation to a newer one with the Book of Revelation.

Lest it be thought by any that this might represent a turning away from the central to the peripheral, consider the fact that the very Greek word for revelation is Apokalypsis, the name of the last book in the Bible. Where only a few years ago books in defense of propositional revelation abounded, today new publications are mostly devoted to the interpretation of Revelation, however fancifully.

We may well be able to say that the Age of Orthodoxy is behind us, even within the “orthodox” Protestant churches. We are entering the Age of Orthocalypsy. There can be no doubt that a touchstone of Orthocalypsy in our age must be the doctrine of Dispensation, just as Inspiration was so important for old Orthodoxy. The catholicity implicit in full-orbed orthocalypsy can be seen from the fact that the dominant school within it is not named for a single place (as “Genevan”) but embraces the whole earth. We speak, of course, of the late great planetary school of orthocalypsy. It is indeed as Schaeffer says: for the evangelical the important thing is knowing where to draw the line.

Thanksgiving Testimony

Recent news articles and editorials in CHRISTIANITY TODAY have spoken to the question of the severe hunger in the world. For this awareness, your periodical must be praised; for the hungry and the poor have not been forgotten. I would like to suggest that this Thanksgiving the Christian community out of its abundance give the world’s hungry its prayers and financial support. What an appropriate moment for God’s people to lift up the hungry and poor. Christian missions would gladly appreciate this additional support and the world would receive the testimony of a caring Christian community.

Batavia, Ill.

For Excommunication

As an evangelical who is young, I have followed the disagreement between the proponents of Carl Henry’s “establishment evangelicalism” and Jim Wallis’s “young evangelicalism” with interest. Whatever are the intellectual shortcomings of Mr. Wallis and his Post-American cohorts in the area of economics and politics (there are many), I believe that almost as significant as this is their attitude towards their theological and political enemies. I engaged one of the staff members of Wallis’s journal in conversation, and was surprised to learn that the call of the Holy Spirit had driven the People’s Christian Coalition to abandon the dictates of basic politeness in order that they might interrupt the proceedings at Explo with their ill-received demonstration. This prophet of social justice then noted that Jesus was rude to the Pharisees, in which class he placed Campus Crusade for Christ. He then informed me that every soldier who fought in World War II was a “sinner.” When I pressed him on the theological wars in the Old Testament, he brushed me aside with “the Holy Spirit has led us into this.”

A casual reading of the Post-American will confirm to anyone the existence of this abrasive and uncharitable attitude towards their enemies that easily rivals the Coalition’s concern for the oppressed. It seems to me that evangelicalism should do to the kooks on the left what it did to the kooks on the right: excommunicate them.

Deerfield, Ill.

Wide Eyes

After reading Ms. Mollenkott’s review of A Literary Survey of the Bible in the September 13th issue I wondered how well your editorial staff knows the people selected as reviewers?… I must admit to a wide-eyed degree of serious distress when I read in her review, “… there is no mention of the possibility of universal redemption, although there are many biblical Christians who strongly believe that glorious promise is definitely ‘in the Bible.’ ”

Really, now, in the light of CHRISTIANITY TODAY’S theological stance in general, and Lindsell’s article in this same issue in particular, I object to the fact that you must have invited Ms. Mollenkott to write her review. Lindsell reports that the seminar on universalism (at Lausanne) rejected the thesis that all people will ultimately be saved. I feel that this correct interpretation of Scripture is crucial and thus I express my disapproval of your choice of book reviewers.

Chairman, Missions Department

St. Paul Bible College

Bible College, Minn.

Bad Shape

I resent very much the article, The Pastor and The Other Woman (Aug. 30). I think the article is timely and needed, but I know of no intelligent scholar who would consider Dr. Leary an authority on anything worthwhile. If this is the only source to find material on this subject, then we are in bad shape. I find it difficult to conceive of your fine magazine having an article like this.… I think a close examination of even this article will reveal the unscriptural approach. I refer particularly to the item about the reason men enter the ministry. At the risk of being called “old hat,” I believe in a God-called ministry. Now not all men who enter the ministry are God-called, but Dr. Leary would not know the difference. You see some things are spiritually discerned, and he would not know about this.

El Bethel Baptist Church

Tampa, Fla.

Capitalistic Vitiations

The efforts of a capitalistic typesetter to vitiate my message by substituting the verb viciar (vitiate, corrupt) for vivir (live) in my concluding sentence, “Viva la revolución! (Eutychus and His Kin, Oct. 25), was frustrated by his poor knowledge of Spanish, for “vica,” as he has it, is meaningless.

Habana

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