Letters

Spiritual Gifts in the Eighties

Concerning the three Dallas Theological Seminary professors resigning because of their charismatic leanings, [News, Feb. 5], the apostle Paul declares that he would not have us ignorant about spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 12:1), which Dallas Seminary appears to be. Paul also declares that we are to desire spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 14:1), which Dallas Seminary doesn’t; and we are not to quench the Spirit (1 Thess. 5:10), which Dallas Theological Seminary has.

MICKEY KERN

Sunray, Tex.

Linguistic gnats

In his percipient essay, “How to Avoid Offensive Language While Saying Absolutely Nothing” [Jan. 15], Prof. David Wells has much to say about current language patterns. But I fancy he hints at conspiracy where none exists. If we parrot the mass-media lingo, it’s unfortunate for society as a whole. Both print and electronic media are hardly known for grammatical precision or sophisticated diction. Still, society ought to think and speak much better.

I agree that “our culture is having to evolve language that can do service in two directions … [and] able to describe the new arrangement in which the utility of sex has displaced any consideration of its mystery and propriety.” However, the expression “alternative lifestyle” can mean anything from life in an artists’ colony to joining a religious community. The “alternative” maybe any of numerous nonconformist ways of living, including, but not limited to, homosexual and communal modes.

Let’s not strain at linguistic gnats. Language is being softened to absorb the impact of rapid societal change. Some euphemistic juggling is inoffensive and innocuous.

WILLIAM DAUENHAUER

Wickliffe, Ohio

As I’m sure many readers noticed, Wells’s article was really about sex. Nine-tenths of it dealt with various sexual illustrations. And what forcefully comes through his pen is not so much that we have used “linguistic sleights of hand” in our sexual terminology, but rather that sexual promiscuity has become all-pervasive, and we evangelicals are in danger of getting caught up in all the fun! How can Wells be so sure? Certainly being gay is not an “option,” but neither is being straight! I’ve never met a homosexual who made a well-thought-out decision to have sexual urges for someone of the same sex. And I have yet to meet a heterosexual who made a similar decision for someone of the opposite sex. Is being gay a sin? The Scriptures have little light to shed in response to that question.

REV. GARY MCCARY

Point Loma Seventh-day

Adventist Church

San Diego, Calif.

No impossibilities with God

In James Reapsome’s article, “Great Commission Deadline” [Jan. 15], there are those who answer the initial question, “Can the world be reached by the year 2000?” by saying no! There are always those who say “impossible” to any dream or vision or attempt.

But we are not bound by the impossible, for we have a God to whom the word “impossible” is a glorious challenge. We look to him, not to the churches, not to the mission agencies that are fearful, not to religious and political oppositions, and certainly not to the cost. If this goal to reach all nations by 2000 is of man, it will fail; but if it is of God, it cannot fail.

MARTIE BUSS

Corona, Calif.

Respecting “Fighting Bob”

In reading the article “The Wireless Gospel: Evangelical Radio Puts Televangelism into Perspective” [Jan. 15], I became increasingly concerned about how “Fighting Bob” Shuler, my grandfather, was portrayed. Schultze presents a man who is supposedly a rabble rouser, manipulator, and money grabber. In truth, “Fighting Bob” was a highly respected proclaimer of the gospel who believed that the convictions of his heart could not be separated from the words he spoke or the deeds he performed. Jesus was seen by some as an embarrassment when he chased the money changers from the temple. However, we know he not only held purity of devotion to God as a conviction, he practiced the same, holding a standard before us all. “Fighting Bob” Shuler held forth the same standard in his day.

Bob Shuler was undoubtedy feared and certainly controversial for going against the grain of a city heavily steeped in corruption, but he was not a manipulator. It is a shame that the years that remove his day from ours allow for superficial consideration of his impact and ministry.

BILL SHULER

Calif.

In your otherwise interesting article “The Wireless Gospel,” there was a glaring omission. Billy Graham has had a great, if not a greater, impact in his use of radio and television than any of the others you mentioned. Surely you have not forgotten Graham or the contributions he has made through broadcasting for nearly 40 years.

CAL THOMAS

Manassas, Va.

I felt your writer slighted the person and work of Aimee Semple McPherson. She put a gospel radio station on the air in February of 1924, just one month after she dedicated her world-renowned Angelus Temple. I sense that she was without doubt the most authentic pioneer in radio evangelism. Also, Paul Rader led Charles E. Fuller to the foot of the Cross in a gospel evangelistic service in 1917 at the Church of the Open Door in Los Angeles.

JOHN W. LITTLEFIELD

Church of Christianity

Hollywood, Calif.

Pause for reflection

“Last Thoughts by the Tombstone Pizzas,” by Mary Ellen Ashcroft [Jan. 15], gives us pause to reflect upon the rendezvous we all will someday have with death. The reader is simultaneously swept into a readily identifiable activity, then shocked into the realization that brand names, social status, and material possessions are merely evasions, just as a face lift is not a restoration of youth.

Recently I counseled survivors of a drug-related massacre. The most remarkable attitude some of them had was that the “innocent” victims (some of whom were involved in narcoticstraffic) were unlucky in their fate—not that they were reaping the foreseeable results of a sinful lifestyle. Having read this article only the day before, I mused upon the false gods and feeble goals that most of us set for ourselves and live by. Mary Ellen Ashcroft has depicted well the alienation of modern Western society. The article will haunt me for a long, long time.

REV. VICTOR E. BUKSBAZEN

The Christian Jew Foundation

Hyattsville, Md.

A better scriptural perspective?

Thank you for Philip Yancey’s insightful column on the Gay/Lesbian March on Washington [Jan. 15]. I suspect that by even seeming open to gay and lesbian people, you have attracted a large amount of flak from the “righteous.” I was at the march, too, and considerably put off by the unmitigated hate the counter-protesters were shouting. I shudder to think what the majority of people marching, mostly non-Christians, now have reinforced in their minds about what Christ is all about. But John 8 is not the best scriptural model for assessing the confrontation. A better perspective is found in Paul’s epistles, as in the issue of a believer purchasing meat offered to an idol—which bitterly divided believers.

When I read Yancey’s column to our local Evangelicals Concerned chapter, several mentioned his phrase “homosexual promiscuity” in the sin list at the end of the article. The question raised was whether Yancey considers all homosexual practice promiscuous (a strictly passé view, even among non-Christian gay people, in this age of AIDS), or whether he considers that nonpromiscuous homosexuality might not necessarily be sinful. We wondered.

MARK B. LEE

Denver, Colo.

Actually, Philip Yancey wrote “homosexual proclivity.” Somewhere in the production process, proclivity was accidentally changed to promiscuity.—Eds.

I waited to hear Yancey say that homosexual promiscuity is to be forsaken, along with murder and adultery. Yes, his list of sins can be forgiven, along with self-righteousness and scorn; but Christ would say, “Go and sin no more.” We readers have been impressed with the thought that there are only two options available to us in our attitude toward homosexuals: forgive or scorn. There is also the message of “repent and forsake” that I would like to give to my homosexual friends.

WARD FRENCH

Flagstaff, Ariz.

Yancey says he “stood on the sidelines” and “watched a startling confrontation take place,” and rebukes those who scorned the 300,000 “gay folks” who marched on D.C. And he watched a Christian coterie inveigh against the sodomites, screaming, “Faggots go home.” No doubt these Christians hate sin (a disaffection rarified amidst today’s peaceful, dialoguing Christendom). Perhaps the passive pious can forgive these activists their rambunctiousness. Better yet, rather than standing on the sidelines, let Yancey show us that more excellent way—or at least point to someone who is prophesying more politely.

MICHAEL BRAY

Ray Brook, N.Y.

Letters are welcome. Brevity is preferred, and all are subject to condensation. Write to Eutychus, CHRISTIANITY TODAY, 465 Gundersen Drive, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188.

First Church Of The Fish Stick

Cathedrals and parish churches used to dominate town squares and cityscapes. But churches have fallen on hard times, architecturally speaking, as the skyline shadows of corporate towers fall long and deep across our houses of worship.

Churches don’t need to engage in tower building (who could hope to dwarf the World Trade Center?). But perhaps they should architecturally express themselves in more pictorial (and peculiar) ways, much like those roadside restaurants shaped like giant hot dogs, teepees, bowler hats, and so on.

Innovative churches could look like boats, for instance. Combining Jesus’ promise to make us fishers of men with the symbolism of Noah’s ark could produce a church that was downright shipshape. And taking the Twenty-third Psalm literally could produce a church that was sheep-shape.

A traditionalist Catholic parish could advertise its Friday fasts with a building shaped like a fish—or perhaps a fishstick. (A congregation into simple living, on the other hand, might erect a giant lentil.)

An evangelist who preaches that God rewards faith with material goods could design an auditorium shaped like a BMW—complete with leather-covered bucket seats. And Unitarian Universalist faith could be visually summed up in a shapeless mass.

Right now, our own congregation is planning a new building just across the street from a shopping mall. Do you think a giant piggy bank would attract any visitors?

EUTYCHUS

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