Are There Winds of Change at the World Council?

An evangelical church historian finds encouraging signs at the World Council of Churches’ Sixth Assembly in Vancouver.

This report on the Sixth Assembly of the World Council of Churches, and personal reflection on the significance of the event, was written by Richard Lovelace, professor of church history at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

After its Uppsala, Switzerland, assembly in 1968, the World Council of Churches (WCC) espoused liberation theologies, sent money to liberation movements, and acutely criticized Western failures. This, combined with comparative silence about Communist societies, convinced many evangelicals that it was controlled by the political and theological Left. But the Sixth Assembly of the WCC in Vancouver, which concluded last month, may significantly alter that perception, and may introduce stronger evangelical currents in the council.

Vigorous Trinitarian theology with a strong emphasis on eternal and supernatural life in Christ permeated this assembly. The theosis motif—the special Orthodox emphasis on our vital union with Christ in his death and resurrection, and our salvation through participation in the divine life—especially lent itself to the theme of this assembly, “Jesus Christ—the Life of the World.” Evangelicals were impressed by the powerful imagery of Father Theodore Stylianopoulos’s sermon on the assembly theme: “The preexistent Word … reveals divine life through creation, through incarnation, and through sanctification.… The eternal Word himself is the instrument of the revelation of God’s glory throughout the material and spiritual cosmos, to the end that all creation may be disclosed in its true nature as a burning bush ablaze with the glory of the Triune God, Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier.”

A later homily during the Orthodox liturgy, concluding the all-night peace vigil on the Feast of the Transfiguration, made clear that the Russians are anything but a secularizing influence in the Council:

“[Let us seek words] resembling the style and conveying the content of the Bible rather than ineffective resolutions commonly presented at the United Nations.… We are not here … to issue loud pronouncements that we know we will not be able to honor. Neither are we here to impress the news media with revolutionary concepts or interpretations of Christianity.…

“People of God everywhere are anxiously waiting to hear a voice proclaiming Jesus Christ, the God-man, as the sole ruler of our lives, and his law of love, compassion, social justice, personal dignity and peace, as the law that supersedes all human laws.… If, when we depart from Vancouver, our faces should shine like the sun … only then will people all over the world believe that we are really determined to reinstate Christ in our lives and our lives in him.

“Men and women of this century are praying that the twenty-first century will be the century of Christ. They can accept nothing less than that.… They are all looking for a new signal, for a new, more practical and believing Christianity, when they will be guided by the hand by Christ himself.… The Transfiguration stands not simply as a glorious event or vision but also as a luminous ascendance of human nature to its theosis.”

Along with strong Christology and an emphasis on supernatural life in Christ, the assembly seemed to evangelicals to have a stronger rootage in Scripture. Philip Potter’s general secretary’s report was no tame summary of activities but a strong expository sermon developed from 1 Peter 2:4–5, full of exegetical brilliance (especially a play on the words oikos/oikonomia/oikoumene, relating God’s house built of living stones to the well-being of the whole world). His message strongly challenged the church not to be “tempted to echo the doomed policies of the nations from which we come.” Potter did not hesitate to emphasize Protestant distinctives, which threw the Orthodox into shock: he magnified the priesthood of all believers and denounced “the heresy of magisterial authority.” During the rest of the assembly, even the most liberal speakers tried to exegete Scripture, not to tinker with it.

Pentecostal David Du Plessis, who has attended all five general assemblies of the WCC, felt that this was by far the most biblically solid yet. “When I first started, I couldn’t see anything but the tares. Now the wheat is overwhelming the tares.” Du Plessis especially noted the applause of the delegates, which regularly supported points affirming Scripture or historic Christian orthodoxy.

Delegates and observers complained that not enough prominence was given to evangelistic proclamation. Evangelicals have been delighted with the new WCC statement on Mission and Evangelism, which shows the influence of evangelical theology in its strong call for proclaiming the gospel and personal conversion to Christ. Roman Catholic observer Thomas Stransky called this “the most important document since the merger with the International Missionary Council,” but observed that the draft statement on “Witness” that came to the floor of the general assembly was far behind this in content and balance. Committee members complained that the drafter had ignored their corrections. After a series of delegates made plain that the implicit universalism and weak Christology of the document would be unacceptable to home churches, it was returned to the committee for redrafting, a move rarely made in assemblies. A similar protest against universalism in the assembly’s Message secured the change of a crucial sentence in a passage on evangelism: “We have no reserved seats at the banquet” became “All are invited to the banquet.”

One of the major leaders in the council, after declaring to me his evangelical sympathies, described the first draft of the “Witness” document as “a piece of trash.” He agreed with me that a problem the council faces is that its staff is not entirely representative of the spiritual and theological power in the member churches, especially in the Third World. Of course, American evangelicals do not represent this kind of grassroots power very well, either. Latin American and African believers are thoroughly like Americans in their devotion to Scripture, nurture, and evangelism, but their observations on both the superpowers sound harsh in our ears. They insist they are not motivated by Marxist ideology but are disturbed by the way multinational corporations support rather than challenge oppressive systems in their countries.

Another feature of this assembly that was strikingly different from the past was its emphasis on worship and intercessory prayer. M. M. Thomas noted that this assembly had no brilliantly innovative theology, but was rich in symbolic communication and in worship. Every day began with multilingual worship in a huge tent, a striking symbol of the Christian pilgrimage, and ended the same way, with a noonday preaching service included.

But the most remarkable spiritual dimension of the assembly was its background of prayer. Gwen Cashmore, the new director of renewal for the WCC, who has roots in Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship and in the East African revival, arrived in Vancouver a month before the assembly with a Franciscan nun, Sister Joan Puls, and set up a gathering that prayed by name for all those who were to attend the assembly. During the assembly, there was a round-the-clock prayer watch upholding every session and meeting. At the peace vigil, private requests were collected to be held before the Lord in the prayer watch.

Subjectively, this assembly was one of the great spiritual experiences of my life. We are dealing here with intangibles, but I must report that I have never been among so many supernaturally courteous, gracious Christian people. I am used to the formal pomp and logic of Presbyterian General Assemblies, or the partly manufactured cheer of evangelical and charismatic gatherings. But the assembly was conducted with an easy, natural good humor among the leaders and pervaded with a serious, loving humility among the delegates. Everything seemed dignified by the presence of the Spirit. The only arguments I had in Vancouver were with my fellow evangelicals. Perhaps the ecumenical venture attracts irenic and pacific Christians—peacemakers—or perhaps, as Spurgeon suggests in connection with Psalm 133, the Holy Spirit delights to dwell in fulness among the unity of the brethren. At any rate, I kept reflecting each day about shalom, about the city of the peace of God, and the peace that passes all understanding.

And I have one more thing to report that does not accord with our usual ideas about the World Council. In the 18 days of this assembly I did more witnessing for Christ than I have done in the past several years. The presence of 4,000 Christians from so many parts of the world, in so many distinctive styles of clothing, had an awakening impact on Vancouver. Everywhere I went, people wanted to talk to me about the council, thanking us for dealing with the issues of peace and the economy that are worrying them and open to hearing a reason for my hope in Christ. “I get up there to the meetings as much as I can,” said one waitress; “they’re beautiful!” “Thank God for the World Council,” said another traveler; “they’ll save us from the evangelicals!” (It turned out she had us mixed up with Ian Paisley and Bob Jones.)

As I concluded an impromptu counseling session with a lapsed believer and a lesbian Satanist—both hugged me as we parted—I wondered whether the WCC’S insistence that the kingdom of Christ changes things here and now, as well as in eternity, may be an evangelistic plus that we need to explore. The great eras of awakening are those in which the poor hear the gospel preached to them—perhaps because they see Christians taking sides with them against the forces that are destroying them.

The majority of evangelicals who caucussed at the assembly were also enthusiastic, so much so that they produced a statement commending the World Council and inviting evangelicals to add their gifts to its process. The main drafter of “Evangelicals at Vancouver: An Open Letter” was Arthur Glasser, who reflected the contributions of a group of about 40 others, including Waldron Scott and Orlando Costas, who was an adviser at the assembly. The evangelical statement made the front page of the assembly newspaper. Emilio Castro, head of the WCC Division of Mission and Evangelism, was ecstatic about the support provided for evangelical concerns in the council, and predicted that the open letter would turn out to be the most important event at the Sixth Assembly. More than 200 persons signed the document, and many others thanked us for it.

Not all evangelicals at the assembly affirmed this statement. A counterstatement produced by Peter Beyerhaus was signed by American missiologist Arthur Johnston and a Korean Presbyterian professor, Myung Yuk Kim. The Beyerhaus statement admitted some of the progress noted by the other evangelicals but called attention to theological vagueness, a neo-Marxist “theology of the poor,” feminist neopaganism, the presence and counterwitness of spokespersons for non-Christian religions, unbalanced criticism of the West, shallowness in perceiving sin, and lack of eschatological perspective. It concluded by warning evangelicals to stay clear of the WCC process, just as the open letter called for their involvement.

Another View …*

A discussion group of evangelicals at the Sixth Assembly of the World Council of Churches by majority vote decided to send an open letter to evangelicals all over the world, sharing with them their basically positive impressions and charging them to drop their previous theological reservations about the WCC and get actively involved in it. Some of us felt alarmed by this sudden shift of opinion. We could neither share the optimistic assessment of the Vancouver event nor the far-reaching consequences that were drawn from it. When it became clear that the majority insisted on going ahead with the plan and even managed to obtain the support of the assembly’s steering committee to broadcast its statement as the evangelical reaction to all participants, we decided to draw up an alternative statement.

We did not feel happy about this public appearance of a theological rift within the evangelical camp. But we thought this to be a far lesser evil than the danger that, through the impact of that open letter, Christianity at large might mistakenly come to believe that most of the serious doctrinal issues that have divided the evangelical from the conciliar movement, at least since Uppsala 1968, had now been settled, and that the WCC in Vancouver had moved to a basically biblical position. Our careful analysis of the speeches and worship at the assembly revealed that the opposite was true, in spite of an apparent new biblical orthodoxy on the surface. After all, this assembly was the first in the history of the ecumenical movement in which a theological atheist—Dorothee Sölle—and leading representatives of non-Christian religions were invited to address the audience on its central theme, “Jesus Christ the Life of the World.” We also felt that the supporters of the open letter had no mandate for sending such a weighty message to all our fellow evangelicals throughout the world. They did not participate in the name of their respective evangelical denominations and world bodies—who wisely had decided to stay outside. Second, it is far too early to come to such a revolutionary conclusion concerning the WCC’S stance and direction.

Our own discussion group is aware that technically ours is a minority statement. But the evangelical representation in Vancouver was very fragmentary, and the fact that our three members have been students of the ecumenical movement for many years, attending ecumenical and evangelical conferences and publishing books and articles about it, made us confident to share our views with our fellow Christians in and outside Vancouver.

We were afraid the open letter could mark a fatal turning point in the history of evangelical Christianity and lead to doctrinal alienation or a new split. Evangelical leaders should take the initiative to encourage serious local evaluation of present-day ecumenicity and convene international consultations about it.

PETER BEYERHAUS

The majority of English-speaking evangelicals at the assembly agreed with many elements of the Beyerhaus critique, though they felt it concentrated on the empty half of the glass and came to a wrong conclusion. (Most Third World evangelicals were not meeting with their Western counterparts because of language barriers and because they were unsure whether Western evangelicals were standing with them in their political and economic situations.) Ironically, Father Theodore Stylianopoulos thanked the evangelicals for Beyerhaus’s statement, which the Orthodox Christians perceived as strengthening their own critique of Western liberalism.

This indicates that not all evangelicals need to agree about the World Council in order to help it recover its original balance and dynamism. Unlike the evangelical and charismatic ecumenical networks, it is not a fellowship of like-minded Christians, but a process that brings together representatives from the grassroots of world Protestantism and Orthodoxy. Its leadership includes some dubious representatives of Western liberalism, especially Europeans. Though the “Guidelines for Dialogue with Other Living Faiths” does not violate evangelical convictions—it merely sets up a climate for “friendship evangelism” in a context of mutual sharing—some of the staff seem fuzzy about the uniqueness of salvation in Christ. But Orthodox Christians and Third World evangelicals are unlikely to be taken in by these errors. It is far more likely that they will change the leadership of the council, even more than young evangelical students have been changing mainline seminaries.

Those who do not feel comfortable working in the council can do helpful things outside it. If they will be careful to speak the truth in love, they can point out its needs with the objectivity distance lends. The council quietly insists that it cannot give Soviet abuses the same prophetic attack it levels on the West without imperiling its Russian members. But at this assembly I heard it stated several times that it is helpful for outside groups to protest civil rights violations in the East.

Evangelicals in member churches who feel comfortable working in the council, and others who are attracted by its holistic approach to the expression of the gospel in society and all of culture, should commend themselves to the process as representatives of the dominant subculture at the grassroots level. The council is increasingly aware that it cannot do its work without their help.

And we should pray for the council: for the strengthening of its theological side, the Faith and Order Commission; for the enabling of Emilio Castro, Cecilio Arrastia, and other evangelicals working in the Division of Mission and Evangelism; and for Gwen Cashmore and the renewal division that needs an enlarged budget and could profit from input and consultation with evangelicals. The new Theological Advisory Board is asking for theological representatives outside the WCC sphere. Perhaps we should pray for an international consultation with evangelicals to match the one recently held with charismatics at Bossey. In the future, some denominations might be joint members of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), World Evangelical Fellowship (WEF), and WCC. A convergence of the evangelical and charismatic networks with the WCC should be at least an item for prayer.

Evangelicals, after all, invented the ecumenical movement. In the Great Awakening of the mid-1700s, Lutheran Pietists, Wesleyan Arminians, and Calvinists all cooperated in bringing evangelical renewal to their churches. The achievements of the Second Evangelical Awakening in mission and social reform during the early 1900s were possible because renewal sectors in all churches combined in an “evangelical united front.” Later in the century, D. L. Moody’s Student Volunteer Movement generated the ecumenical momentum that led to the World Missionary Conference at Edinburgh in 1910, the first of the great series of meetings that forms the modern ecumenical stream.

At this point, however, the theological breakup of Western Christianity split the ecumenical stream. Protestant liberals dominated the Life and Work conferences of the 1920s and ‘30s. Neo-orthodox theology, which condemned both modernism and fundamentalism, ruled the Faith and Order conferences of the same period. Fundamentalists and Pentecostals developed their own national and international networks. The evangelical reform movement in the 1940s developed other separate arenas, the NAE, and later the WEF.

Thus, when the Faith and Order and Life and Work streams merged in 1948 to form the World Council of Churches, they did not draw many conservative leaders into their fellowship. Evangelicals tended to stay in their own ecumenical networks and to criticize others. But increasing numbers of American evangelicals are now joining their Third World counterparts within the council.

What about the political stance of the WCC? In many respects its leadership sounds like the United Nations at prayer. The New World Economic Order it recommends—the “just, participatory and sustainable society”—could turn out to be just another version of centralized socialism. It would be helpful to have this phrase clarified, and it would be good to have more free-market economists in the council to respond to its challenges.

Are the council’s social goals too utopian, or even anti-Christian? At times its theology sounds impossibly optimistic about what is possible in ordinary history, like the evolutionary monism of Teilhard de Chardin. It is particularly upsetting to modern evangelicals touched by premillenial pessimism. Jonathan Edwards’s dream of a world “united in one amiable society … one church, one orderly, regular, beautiful society”—is a dispensationalist’s nightmare, at least before Christ’s return. But those who suspected that Antichrist was at the Vancouver assembly were not a very credible bunch: Ian Paisley, Bob Jones III, and Carl Mclntire with his explicit affirmation of South African apartheid. The WCC can be pardoned for reaching toward the kingdom a little further than these critics.

Several leaders at the assembly clearly stated that the WCC does not support armed revolution. On the contrary, it has adopted the pacifism of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. It seems to be calling for unilateral nuclear disarmament. Isn’t this unrealistic and dangerously destabilizing? Perhaps. But as I read Isaiah 2:1–5, I hear the prophet predicting a time when the temple of the Lord, which we now know as the body of Christ, will be so lifted up that all nations will stream to it and be taught of the Lord, and will beat their swords into plowshares. This conversion of our destructive potential into productive wealth is now becoming such a rational necessity that the nations might even be prepared to trust the Prince of Peace to bring it about. I think the World Council can be pardoned for reaching in that prophetic direction. It may be underestimating the tenacity of sin and the powers of death and destruction—or it may simply be correctly assessing the power of the grace of Christ in an awakened church.

RICHARD LOVELACEin Vancouver

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