The season of inventories is with us again. And seldom was spiritual assessment more urgent than in our day. The conclusion, or exhaustion, of 1958 raises traditional questions. What were the year’s significant events? Do they augur well or ill for Christianity? What trends may be traced? How fares the Church in its struggle to stem the swift-moving currents of competing ideological options? Where are we drifting? In an atomic age, answers are not always as traditional as the questions.
CHRISTIANITY TODAY’S 50 contributing editors have transmitted their reading of the times, seeking to weigh evangelical gains and losses and cautioning that generalizations are not to be absolutized.
Signs of hope are not lacking. The Billy Graham Crusades in San Francisco and Charlotte again demonstrated, says Dr. Faris D. Whitesell, “the possibility of effective organized mass evangelism in large cities. Would to God that he would raise up a few more Spirit-anointed leaders to lead the assault on our metropolitan areas of sin and corruption!” Dr. J. Theodore Mueller points to “the proclamation of the gospel over numerous radio networks, the general interest in religion and religious publications, the rapid gain of membership by Christian groups preaching the atoning death of Christ …, the increase of family worship: all these and other manifestations of divine grace remind the believer that now is the gospel age which our Lord predicted in Matthew 24:14.”
But the “overall impression” of Professor Ned B. Stonehouse is that 1958 produced “no spectacular developments or evidences of marked turning points in ecclesiastical and religious life.… Quite possibly the most significant events have been those which have seemed to have been done in a corner, such as the opening of the Auca tribe to the gospel, the publication of a paperback book, J. I. Packer’s strong treatise on the Word of God, and the declarations of the Reformed Ecumenical Synod of Potchefstroom on inspiration.”
In the literary realm, Dr. Whitesell observes that evangelicals have made progress “in meeting the need for more Christian literature to offset the tide of Communist propaganda now flooding the earth. The contributing editors further note the “spreading of the Bible in more than a thousand versions,” the interest of secular publishing houses in evangelical books, and the “continued popularity and influence” of CHRISTIANITY TODAY—contributing toward a greater unity among evangelicals.
As to this unity, Dr. Clyde S. Kilby senses a greater tendency for orthodox believers “to wish to get together rather than separate from each other. Those who seem determined to be a law unto themselves are finding it harder to survive at all.” Becoming more apparent to Professor Roger Nicole is the “trend of strengthening of the evangelical testimony and recognition for it in Christianity at large.” But there is a long way to go. Dr. Nicole sees a hindrance to this advance in the bitter attacks and counterattacks occurring between certain representatives of the evangelical cause “who cherish the same fundamental convictions and doctrines.” Adds General William K. Harrison: “It is high time to stop fighting one another over secondary matters and personal grudges and demonstrate by unity in love and missionary zeal that Christ not only can but does save from sin.”
In the present rapid growth of church membership in America, the contributing editors do not see unalloyed blessing. Professor C. Adrian Heaton points to increasing recognition by many that this may not mean genuine revival. Many pastors and churches are seeking, he says, “deeper theological foundations for preaching and evangelism.” Dr. Whitesell sees a multiplication of machinery and programs without the spiritual power to give them life. “The churches need a new and mighty infusion of the Holy Spirit everywhere. Pastors are running themselves to death trying to keep up with counseling demands and administrative problems.” He notes the weakening of visitation evangelism and holds out hope for a new evangelism implemented by group dynamics. “Small group activities” are being introduced in many churches.
Professor Kyle M. Yates warns against the “pathetic trend” in the direction of “shallow, superficial topical preaching” in place of “exegetical” messages produced through careful Bible study. “Why should men who have the divine call to preach spend the few years they have left in chattering away inferior arrangements of words?” He notes a dangerous temptation confronting seminaries in the lowering of standards in the field of the original languages. Famed preacher Andrew W. Blackwood points up the paucity in the pulpit of doctrine and biblical ethics. “Leading advocates of ‘missions,’ ” he relates, “advise us to quit trying to win Jews, Moslems, and others, because their religions are ‘almost as good’ as Christianity, at least when diluted into a mild form of ethical culture—‘sweetness and light.’ ”
Dr. Oswald T. Allis notes “increasing doctrinal indifferentism in the Protestant church and the increasing power of the liberals in the ecumenical movements,” while Professor Gordon H. Clark says he fails to see that “historic Protestantism has made any gains whatever” in the past year. Declares Dr. Harold John Ockenga: “The churches of all kinds have grown. Crowds have increased. Finances have risen. In this we might rejoice, but we are convinced that the movement is very shallow and in many cases not Christian. There is no evidence of revival and there is no religious check to the social evils … engulfing our nation.”
As for the evangelical outlook in England and Scotland, two of the writers use the term “cautious optimism.” But London’s Dr. W. E. Sangster asserts, “There is still no sign of religious revival in Great Britain.” Despite the presence in all branches of the church of dedicated evangelical ministers and the campaigns of interdenominational missioners, “the gulf between the church and the people outside remains deep and wide, and no strategy has yet been devised effectively to cross it.” The more hopeful sign in the church, says Dr. Sangster, is its “honest realism,” for the very difficulty of things throws Christians back more on God.
Another Londoner, the Rev. F. P. Copland Simmons, Moderator-Designate of the Presbyterian Church of England for 1959–60, believes the church is holding its own against the tide of secularism, “but there have been no spectacular gains in 1958.” The more successful churches have made greater use of the laity, he says.
The Rev. Maurice Wood, Vicar and Rural Dean of Islington, sees signs of a new evangelical revival in England. Overflow crowds greeted him and the Rev. John Stott at Cambridge’s Holy Trinity Church, the latter having recently completed the University Mission there amid many professions of conversion. Besides the new appointments of evangelical bishops in the Church of England, it is reported that the recent ordination to the Anglican ministry in St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, saw evangelicals composing more than half of those ordained. St. Paul’s also witnessed a capacity crowd for an October service which initiated a Tom Rees campaign which will take the evangelist to six centers a week in every county in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Response thus far has been most heartening. Dr. Wood reports further that evangelical influence is helping to bring the churches in England back to the authority of the Bible—reflected in the Lambeth Conference Report on the Bible (resolutions 5, 7, and 12).
Professor Norman C. Hunt of Edinburgh University served as president of the British Inter-Varsity Fellowship the past school year. His travels indicated to him a movement of God among university students, manifest in evangelism, prayer meetings and conferences.
Dr. Geoffrey W. Bromiley relays his impressions of the Scottish scene from Pasadena, Calif., having newly arrived there from Edinburgh as visiting Professor of Church History at Fuller Theological Seminary. He notes favorably the work done by missioners Tom Allan and D. P. Thomson, particularly in the country districts and the Glasgow underworld. Also encouraging to him is the “slow but patchy increase in general church membership and loyalty” as well as evidence that a more biblical theology is making some impact among students and younger ministers. The “difficulties which remain” he lists as “the lack of any clear-cut evangelical leadership in any area of church life; the tendency of the more strongly evangelical churches to hold aloof from the main stream of church life, especially as represented in the Church of Scotland; the unresolved tension as to the future use of large scale crusades for evangelism …; the continuing existence of a Liberal Moderation over large areas of the churches; and the comparative failure of the church to make impact in country and industrial districts.”
Turning to the American domestic scene, the contributing editors find little of cheer in the recent course of developments. To Dr. Ockenga, the fall elections revealed the desire of the American people for government paternalism, an increase of socialism, centralization of control, and bureaucracy. He sees a rebuke to Republican “me, tooism.” Economically, the recession has been checked, he feels, by the inflationary spiral, carrying with it a sham prosperity “which reflects the devaluation of the dollar rather than any true growth.” But the population explosion “cannot help but force us into further boom times.” Dr. Blackwood laments the loss of such biblical ideals as industry and thrift, while Dr. Cary N. Weisiger, III, asks: “Do unpunished labor racketeering, unchecked crime rates, and undisguised attachment to inflationary spending add up to further disintegration of Puritan character in America?” Facing another problem, Dr. Weisiger inquires further: “Has the passing of an old pope and the election of a new one made people think that the weighty traditions, authorities, and ceremonies of Rome offer us the security we crave?” Professor Clark speaks of the millions of dollars of free publicity afforded Rome through the pope’s death (“showing the Romanist hold on the public press”), and he notes Roman gains in the U.S. elections along with growing sentiment which refers to opposition to Romanists for public office as “prejudice.” Dr. Ockenga warns, “We must not be lulled by any innocuous promises from any candidate who is a Roman Catholic.” Dr. Blackwood sees Roman Catholics already in control of the large cities, through Protestant default and evacuation to the “white collar suburbs,” frequently featuring a “country club religion.” Roman Catholicism now reaches for national control, “partly by capturing the Negroes whom many Protestants do not even welcome at worship.”
The “velvet curtain” does not pose the only threat to freedom. There yet remains the metallic one. Dr. Clark sees 1958 as a year of enormous Communist gains, with the U.S. countering but feebly. Dr. Ockenga traces the route of Red initiative—Indonesia, Iran, Quemoy, and now Berlin—and notes Communist intransigence in Geneva. “Only a fool would close his eyes to the fact that the free world and the slave world are at war, that there is no co-existence peaceably, and that any hope for a lessening of this competition is wishful thinking.”
But America confronts not only Rome and Moscow as threats to her freedom. She must face herself. Her growing secularism presents her populace with the primitive bondage to the ego and its desires. Dr. Stonehouse notes a rapid growth of “a philosophy of life shaped by the worship of science.” The writers see the fruit of such deviations in manifold areas. There is the heightening crime rate, particularly among juveniles (Dr. Heaton points hopefully to growing Christian youth work reaching out to a disillusioned “beat generation”). The 25th anniversary of prohibition repeal witnesses a tremendous increase in drinking and liquor propaganda via every medium. Drug consumption has reached alarming proportions. Dr. Kilby observes that great increase in tobacco consumption is concurrent with severe medical warnings. He quotes Howard Vincent O’Brien approvingly: “Never on earth before was ‘education’ so nearly universal; and never, I suspect, were so many people ready to believe so many things that aren’t so.”
General Harrison contends that America with her countless blessings is probably “the one nation most deserving of God’s judgment.” Despite the unparalleled ministry of the gospel, “the nation does not repent.” There are signs, says the General, that the Great Tribulation is “not far off.” God is “graciously saving thousands …; millions continue in idolatry.”
Dr. William Childs Robinson looks hopefully for signs of revival, while Dr. Mueller sees the accompaniment of widespread gospel preaching by “wars and rumors of wars” as fulfillment of Christ’s teachings.
In such an hour, Dr. Stonehouse throws down the gauntlet to evangelicalism. “The question will not down whether evangelicals generally are characterized by sufficient clarity and humility to give assurances of wholehearted obedience to the Word of God and of the strong and dynamic leadership which can develop only on the basis of such obedience. If evangelicals speak with an uncertain voice, if their message becomes vague and vascillating, who can be blamed for regarding evangelicalism as simply one religious view among many? In brief, the progress of Christianity is bound up with the strength and consistency of its commitment to the Scriptures as the Word of God.”
And from The Netherlands comes warning against underestimating the opposition. Professor G. C. Berkouwer cautions against the common characterization of Western populations as possessed of fear and hopelessness. “It is very difficult to fathom the influence of world events on the inner life.” Threatening times can also bring about a “new reckless optimism” which could look toward creation of “a new form of humanism.”
“We do not go forth then,” declares Dr. Berkouwer, “from the principle of an easy receptivity of the gospel” but as facing the opposition not only perceptible in the world but also in the lives of religious people, whose present interests can be secularized. “Only as the whole life of the church” proves that it is “being fed from other sources can its testimony enter the world fruitfully under the eschatological outlook of 1 Corinthians 15:58.”
One is no longer surprised to come upon the occasional news story of yet another raft adventure in the Pacific Ocean for the purpose of proving some theory on ancient population movements. The same ocean, not far off the raft routes, has witnessed periodic testing of atom bombs. The broad Pacific thus poses the fateful question: “Is this the era of the atom or the era of drift?” Somewhere between Bikini and Tahiti lie the Scylla of nuclear devastation and the Charybdis of secular disillusion, decline, and decay. The delicate bark of the West approaches the narrowing point of no return, at times uneasily and other times recklessly—at least ambiguously. To the side there stands a luminous cross, beckoning as a lighthouse. But so distorted are the compass readings of the voyager, that he veers crazily away toward his destruction, in a display of somewhat less wisdom than manifest in Balaam’s ass. How desperately he needs the confidence possessed by the Apostle Paul on another perilous voyage—confidence in the word of God’s angel … confidence in the deliverance of Jehovah. He scarcely sees his need for what it is. But there is yet time.
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Ecumenism And Evangelism At M.I.T.
Reaching American college and university students for Christ is among the most important undertakings the churches can sponsor. A particularly fruitful ministry of this type is to be found on the campus of Massachusetts Institute of Technology among its 10 thousand students.
There are nine Protestant chaplains at M.I.T., most of whom are working with the Student Christian Movement in New England, related to the National Council of Churches. But the largest religious organization on campus is the United Christian Fellowship with over 100 Christian students actively winning their friends to Christ.
The United Protestant Ministry has recently sought a more effective approach to the student body. It seems that Protestant chapel services under approved chaplains had failed to arouse any significant interest and were finally discontinued. The evangelical chaplain suggested a more biblical and evangelistic presentation of the Protestant message. The other chaplains, lacking agreement as to what the Protestant message is, rejected the idea as unacceptable. Discussion further revealed that only one chaplain in the U.P.M. believed such cardinal doctrines as the inspiration of the Scriptures, the Virgin Birth, the Atonement and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Now pressures are being brought to limit the evangelistic program of the United Christian Fellowship. It is even proposed that the word “evangelical” be substituted for “Christian” since, it is charged, the organization is “narrow, inflexible and not representative of ecumenical Christianity in America today.” Strangely enough the resulting tensions on the campus are creating a new interest in the Christian witness. Bible study groups, visitation evangelism and other U.C.F. techniques are being effectively used of God.
It would seem that a united and vigorous presentation of the Gospel at M.I.T. would be the finest possible demonstration of the value of ecumenicity. What kind of unity is it that would achieve peace and goodwill in the religious community at M.I.T. at the expense of winning souls to Christ?
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Ncc World Order Policy Softens On Red China
In many of the 144,000 churches in the National Council of Churches, ministers and members doubtless were shocked to read the resolutions of the NCC World Order Study Conference urging prompt U.S. recognition and U.N. admission of Red China (CHRISTIANITY TODAY, December 8, 1958). The extent to which the Cleveland delegates, often acting unanimously, approved positions heretofore associated mainly with the political left bank, was almost incredible. But these tendencies have long been developing in NCC circles, and sooner or later a full harvest was inevitable.
Inside and outside NCC ranks, multitudes sensed that the Cleveland conference had issued a misleading and spurious statement of Christian responsibility.
The declaration of NCC’s General Board, two weeks later, that Cleveland framed no formal policy statement, but reflected only the view of the World Order Study Conference, was evasive. The conference met under NCC mandate; many top NCC leaders participated enthusiastically; none dissented at the time from main positions taken in plenary session; and the conference was openly hailed as initiating a $35,000,000 ecumenical peace offensive with plans already underway in many NCC denominations. The General Board asserted that the Cleveland conference spoke “with a mighty voice” (including some of its own voices, we might add) but spoke only for itself. Is it then to be understood that actions by NCC departments and divisions carry no official significance? The fact is, the General Board did not repudiate Cleveland’s conclusions. It reiterated its view that “the Christian churches … and their councils … have the duty to study and comment on issues, no matter how controversial, in the realm of politics, economics and social affairs, in view of their common faith in Jesus Christ as both Lord and Savior.” How, from their faith in Christ, the delegates arrived at a new sympathy for Communist China, it did not trouble to explain. Many devout believers are convinced that what the churches have to say was not really said at Cleveland. And they view the General Board’s pronouncement as falling comfortably into the category of the Delphic oracle.
Two additional reflections bear on the Cleveland conference. One is the naive confidence of delegates that recognition and admission into the family of nations has a reformatory effect. But it has not worked that way in the case of Soviet Russia, and a duplication in the case of Red China will worsen rather than improve the plight of the Free World. Beyond this, we again voice disappointment over NCC’s preoccupation at Cleveland with world affairs in a framework that virtually nullified the relevance of foreign missions to world disorders.
In view of its access to the Protestant ministry and lay leadership in the United States, CHRISTIANITY TODAY is asking its readers to fill out the following form (or a copy of it), scotch tape it to a postcard, and air mail it to the News Editor, CHRISTIANITY TODAY, 1014 Washington Building, Washington 5, D. C., before January 10, 1959, as a contribution to this magazine’s survey of Protestant opinion:
