Letters to the Editor

The President’s Faith

To raise the question of the reality of Bill Clinton’s faith as Philip Yancey did [“The Riddle of Bill Clinton’s Faith,” April 25] is to become engaged in an exercise in futility since the answer to that question is known only to God. The real question is whether Clinton’s life and actions reveal the presence of such faith. Yancey answered that question quite well when he wrote that Clinton “is a consummate politician” who takes “his cues from the crowd.”

Clinton’s assertions regarding his Christian faith and his belief in the authority of Scripture are negated when he shows greater concern for the results of polls than for what he says he believes is God’s Word.

Walter Mueller,

Maple Glen, Pa.

With all due respect to evangelical leaders with “impeccable credentials,” like Ed Dobson, perhaps the reason for our confusion about President Clinton’s faith comes from asking the wrong questions. Dobson suggests we look for clues and evidences. He concludes the President is “deeply spiritual” because he knows the Scriptures, is emotionally affected by prayer, goes to church, carries his Bible, and professes faith in Christ.

The Lord himself suggests we look for other clues—fruit (Matt. 7:20), hunger and thirst for righteousness (Matt. 5:6), and by taking up the cross and following the Lord (Matt. 16:24). Our confusion about the spiritual state of President Clinton is symptomatic of our confusion about why the visible church continues to record new professions of faith and remains largely impotent. It’s hard to imagine Luther, Calvin, or Edwards suggesting the evidence of regeneration will be found in going to church, carrying a Bible, and being emotionally affected by prayer.

Bob Lepine

Little Rock, Ark.

Fear Of Flying?

Our church, jumping into the new world of evangelism via niche marketing, has recently begu reaching out to an under saveed target group: the fregurnt flyer. Because so many people in our upscale community travel throughout the week, we spared no expense.

Our seats have individual airconditioner nozzles, reading lights, and usher call buttons. A seat-belt sign comes on automatically when the preacher starts to say something controversial; oxygen masks and airsickness bags are located in the pew racks.

Our “Frequent Attender Plan” rewards consistent attendance with discounts toward overseas travel (to the Holy Land, of course). Our “First Class” seating pampers those who make generous contributions to the church building fund by allowing them to exit the service during the last verse of the closing hymn.

After a few months, however, things have started to get out of hand. Some of our “frequent flyer” newcomers have begun making requests for special treatment They want vegetarian meals and alternatives to sermons provided on headsets, and pillows and blankets.

How far should we be willing to go? The elders met last Wednesday and decided to create an ad-hoc committee to consider the newcomers’ special requests.

Niche-market evangelism is great. But where do you draw the line?

I still don’t understand why Bill Clinton has become the flashpoint of so much hostility among evangelicals. Does anyone really believe that Republicans, in their current incarnation as defenders of America (suburban America, that is), are really any better?

Victor Clemente

Jersey City, N.J.

Two lines in Yancey’s article tell it all: “Clinton defends this shift by saying the approach to specific moral issues in a democracy should change as popular opinion changes” and “As a politician, he would take his cues from the crowd.”

Pete Simpson

Bloomington, Minn.

I was appalled by Edward Dobson’s statement: “I believe that he is more deeply spiritual than any President we have had in recent years.” Dobson is obviously lacking in historical knowledge regarding former Presidents, and even more lacking in his knowledge of the Bible in these matters. The apostle John tells us that “the man who says: ‘I know him,’ but does not do what he says, is a liar and the truth is not in him” (1 John 2:4).

Roy E. Knuteson

Fort Collins, Colo.

I have long awaited the interview in which President Clinton was provided opportunity to share what thousands of Christians know to be true: that the abortion issue can be argued from either extreme with the Bible as “evidence” for both sides. Having once had the opportunity to chat with Al Gore, I have no doubt of his Christian faith. Thank God neither leader compromises what he believes to be true just to win the support of evangelicals!

The “critics [who] remain unimpressed by religious words and other tokens of faith” might do well to examine how closely aligned their attitudes might be with the Pharisees of long ago.

Having spent most of my life in public-school administration, I sympathize with the President’s desire to address real issues confronting society today amidst the incessant criticism of evangelicals. If every evangelical would truly study the Scriptures, with a focus upon what Christ said and did (with said focus at least equal to or greater than the idiosyncratic writings of Paul, which are so much a part of evangelical preaching), there would be no “riddle” to Bill Clinton’s faith.

David Wood

Aurora, Colo.

Unlike Mother Teresa, who can afford to see the abortion issue in “stark, binary terms,” Clinton must consider the sticky questions, like, “When does human life begin?” Pardon me for being stark and binary on this one, but if life is not present in the mother’s womb at even the earliest stage of pregnancy, then what is it that must be killed lest it continue to grow? And if the life is not human, of what species is it? If the protection of human life is not the province of the law (and the presidency), then what is? Unless we believe that all human life bears the image of God, then no human life will be seen as worth preserving. The abortions Clinton allows and the urban shootings Clinton deplores are not unrelated phenomena.

Rebecca Merrill Groothuis

Littleton, Colo.

A Biblical Perspective on Ecology

The CT Institute on Eco-Myths [April 4] deserves continuing debate. And CT deserves credit for tackling ecological controversy, even if somewhat tardily. Yet something is missing. I wonder why CT did not really provide the kind of theological comment needed to put ecological problems in a broader biblical perspective.

Of course we are stewards of God’s magnificent creation! What I miss in the articles are considerations of the most essential biblical doctrines of mankind’s redemption and God’s glory therein:

1. Mankind’s depravity (his inevitable failure to achieve the beautiful life, but rather to destroy) demands attention. Other than in a postmillennial viewpoint, this indicts not only unbelievers but believers, too, in serious degree. The individual and collective sinfulness of the race underlie all suggested causes of ecological disaster.

2. Biblical prophecy projects human sinfulness to an inevitable total destruction of mankind’s efforts and, to a great degree, of his environment. Let’s face it: Other than with an optimistic expectation of the outcome of the present age, conditions will get worse, not better.

3. Biblical eschatology, if I read it correctly, asserts that God’s gracious work of redemption includes “a new earth.” A Christian, while properly concerned with stewardship, is nevertheless in a very different position from those whose values are limited to what is here. Indeed, the Christian, while exhibiting responsible stewardship, is ob-ligated to point unbelievers to that “blessed hope.”

John A. MacDonald

San Francisco, Calif.

All people of this world, including Christians, have before them issues that were of little concern earlier in this century. Aside from the usual concerns of war, crime, poverty, starvation, disease, and so on, there are those that must be looked at in a far broader perspective, requiring a reevaluation of our moral understanding and decision making. These issues involve sexual activity, sexual orientation, AIDS and STDs, family planning, contraception, abortion, the explosive growth of both the developing and developed countries’ populations, and the displacement of millions of people, migrating across national borders.

Discussing the greening of the church without considering the impact of growing numbers of people is like trying to mop a floor with the faucet remaining on. We cannot have endless growth of populations and hope for realistic solutions to these environmental problems.

Ronald J. Fasano

Bellevue, Wash.

Calvin B. DeWitt offered us three questions to help discern good science from “junk science.” But ironically, he, himself, merely acknowledges there is a debate about certain degradations of the earth, then proceeds to treat as fact allegations of global warming and ozone depletion. Where were the competent scientists who’ve been exposing the fallacies of the alleged crises and putting the problems in a realistic perspective? Just as our nation has a health-care problem, not a crisis, so I’m waiting for some valid information showing our world’s pollution problems are of crisis proportion.

Duane L. Burgess

Tucson, Ariz.

Creation’s Eighth Day

I enjoyed Eugene Peterson’s article “The Good-for-Nothing Sabbath” [April 4] about recovering a more biblical understanding of daily and weekly time and the Sabbath. I would have enjoyed it more had he not ended up treating Sunday as a sort of Christian Sabbath, but rather recovered the ancient Christian understanding of Sunday as the eighth day of Creation, the first day of the new creation, the beginning of the day without evening of the kingdom. Just as the Sabbath is more than a day off, Sunday, the Lord’s Day, is more than just the Christian Sabbath.

Stephen Parsons

Cary, N.C.

I agreed with the [former pastor] author up to where he said, “For 18 years, Monday was my Sabbath.” It seems to me that the choosing of which day is the Sabbath is up to God, and we then either decide to obey that choice or not.

Robert R. Baptist

Saugus, Calif.

Any Sabbath that is not fully experienced is a “good-for-nothing Sabbath.” There is no such thing as a meaningful half-Sabbath. From sunset to sunset, the time is holy, and it must be used as holy unto the Lord of the Sabbath.

We do have to settle for all or nothing. To settle for anything less you don’t have a Sabbath.

Ron Myers

Prince George, B.C., Canada

No Match for an Empty Tomb

Thank you for Lyn Cryderman’s editorial “Rising Above the Fall” [April 4]. It’s high time someone called evangelicals on their preoccupation with the “evils of modern society” and the resulting de-emphasis on Resurrection hope.

Unfortunately, this depravity doctrine may be facilitated by well-meaning evangelical Christian leaders. I was employed for several years by a Christian organization where this attitude prevailed as the leadership increased its commitment to influence public policy. In concentrating on defeating proposed antifamily (Democratic) legislation, the atmosphere of hope within the company—and the message of hope to its constituents—diminished. For me, it was actually refreshing to rejoin the “secular work force” where people weren’t always obsessing about society’s decline.

While I certainly advocate Christians being aware of and involved in issues that impact our world, I saw activism promote pessimism—even fear—when the “glorious doctrine of Easter” was allowed to be overshadowed. Thank you for the reminder that today’s headlines are no match for an empty tomb.

Suzanne Strawn

San Marino, Calif.

No Shame for True Victims

Haddon Robinson sweeps over thousands of women, men, and children who are true victims of violence, sexual crimes, and prejudice [From the Senior Editors, April 4]. There is no shame in being a victim. It is a shame when the church says, “Get over it!”

Often victimized persons do not find a safe haven in the church. Instead, they seek support and help from AA, Al-Anon, social agencies, and other people-centered groups. So many men and women have found [in them] the atmosphere of compassion and understanding they need to face their pain and learn to take charge of their own lives. This is hardly shunning responsibility.

Our ascended and risen Savior can extend his healing and life-giving power to others who have suffered evil. Not all victims are in “search for a scapegoat.” Many are looking to see if the church will welcome them with Christlike understanding and compassion.

Pastor Anthony Sarnicola

First Baptist Church

Boonville, N.Y.

Evangelicals and the Environment

Randy Frame’s report on my critique of the Evangelical Declaration on the Care of Creation [News, April 4] says World “obtained a draft and … published a lengthy critique.” Some evangelical leaders who had been asked for comments on a draft dated October 20, 1993, faxed me the draft and asked for my recommendations, which I gave them. Later, after the CT Institute met and the Evangelical Environmental Network adopted the final version of the declaration, I requested and received the final version from EEN’s office. My critique referred to the earlier version in a effort to lend some specificity and testability to the vague and unquantified empirical claims in the final version, but it was a critique of the final version itself, not the draft.

The main burden of my critique was that the declaration, as adopted, is so vague that many who sign it, lacking specific expertise in empirical debates about environmental issues, would be unable to know precisely what the declaration’s authors meant by some of their statements, and what specific claims and policies they would later promote under the umbrella of the declaration, with the im-plicit endorsement of all who endorse the declaration. My questioning of the truth of the empirical assumptions underlying the declaration was a secondary concern.

Finally, Frame misidentifies me as an economist and author. Although my advanced degree is in economic ethics, and I have written textbooks and taught courses in economics and the environment, I am not an economist but an associate professor in interdisciplinary studies at Covenant College specializing in the application of theology, ethics, and world-view to economics, government, public policy, and environmental stewardship.

E. Calvin Beisner

Chattanooga, Tenn.

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