A handsomely designed, smartly printed business card introduces the salesman and his firm. Ancient Israel’s liberator, Moses, didn’t have a business card when he introduced himself in Egypt after a 40-year absence. But he did have a striking introduction: “I AM has sent me to you.”

The story behind that introduction began with an impressive attention-getter, a flaming desert shrub that wasn’t reduced to ashes. Thus began an encounter that led to Moses’ enlistment in God’s cause to free his people. It was one of those unique calls that stands out in the biblical record. Succeeding generations of believers have also found their God to be one who intervenes to establish his authority in their lives. The mission of the church has advanced when Christians have received a divine calling card of some kind. They have been sufficiently impressed, as Moses was, to find out what the caller, God himself, has in mind.

When Moses inspected the burning bush, God twice called him by name. The speaker was no less than the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God worshiped and served by Moses and his family. In Egypt, Moses had shared ill treatment with God’s people. His premature rescue operation thwarted, the erstwhile deliverer fled to the wilderness and tended sheep and goats for four decades.

In this ignominious role, Israel’s future leader nevertheless was ready when the Lord’s call came. God was no stranger to Moses. He responded immediately to the voice out of the bush: “Here I am.” Christians sometimes think God has cast them into obscure, insignificant, useless places. But while Moses shepherded in the desert, he learned patience and long-suffering, two prime qualities of leadership needed for the long grind from Egypt to Canaan over another 40 years.

When God identified himself, Moses hid his face in fear and humility. He knew well God’s holiness and majesty. How we respond to God’s call depends to a large degree on our fundamental appreciation of his greatness. Looking intently at the bush, recoiling with upraised arms and hands, Moses did not mumble some flip remark about the man upstairs or the great L.A. Dodger in the sky. One significant reason some Christians fail to hear and obey God is that they have never permitted the awesomeness of the Almighty to overwhelm them.

With Moses in a proper frame, God revealed his plans. Basically, he told Moses his word was still good. He had not forgotten his people during four centuries of excruciating oppression. This was the answer to his seeming abandonment of his people and their prospective liberator. Four hundred years is a long time to wait; 40 years is a long time to wait. But patient endurance in faith and hope apparently is a divine priority for those who would recognize God’s intervention when it comes. We are not likely to answer a call from God if we have concluded in adversity that he has forgotten us.

No doubt Moses was exhilarated when he heard God say, “I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians.” But before he had a chance to yell Hallelujah!, God told him, “I will send you to bring forth my people out of Egypt.” No more monumental task could be envisioned; this was a call of gigantic proportions. For a desert sheepherder to go to Pharaoh would be unthinkable; to accomplish the freedom of his people would be impossible.

But the initiative and the responsibility rested with God, not with Moses. That made the difference. God’s call is tied to his empowerment to fulfill the duty. This fact has sustained Christians who find their assignments every bit as hard as Moses found his.

Of course, Moses questioned God’s choice. “Who am I?” he asked. God’s answer to his rightful insecurity was a firm promise of his presence. God’s power linked to Moses’ faith and obedience meant that one day Israel would worship God on that very mountain. The guarantee of God’s presence is sufficient for anyone to say yes to him, for any responsibility.

Before saying yes himself, Moses asked for a calling card of his own. “What name shall I give them?” he asked God. “Say this to the people of Israel,” God declared, “ ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ” Thus the mission to deliver Israel was launched. I AM—the self-existent, self-sufficient, eternal, unchangeable God—speaks, and it is the obligation of humanity to hear and obey.

I AM is pleased to identify himself personally with us. He deigns to love us, to call us, to permit us to live significantly and purposefully.

Christians hear, believe, and obey God’s call, not because he gives them a carefully blueprinted career mission in advance, but because they know in general terms who God is, what he is like, and what he is doing. God seeks people to repent and believe the gospel; he seeks worshipers; he wants believers to be shaped in Christ’s image; he wants them to be his ambassadors of good news.

That may mean a call to meet a neighbor, to befriend a coworker or business associate. That may mean a call to a lifetime ambassadorship in an urban setting, a university, or a primitive area overseas. That may mean a call to use one’s scientific, engineering, teaching, counseling, or preaching skills for the sake of Christ’s kingdom, not your own.

God does not lead us through some unfathomable maze. He speaks clearly, but sometimes his call is obscured because we are not very much interested in finding out what it is. We’d like to have a sneak preview and then decide if we want to witness the main event.

What is God’s call like? A voice from a flaming bush? A voice out of a dazzling, blinding light at noon? A voice from his own holy throne? A voice at night rousing one from sleep? That’s what it was like for Moses, Paul, Isaiah, and Samuel. But the key issue is not the dramatic setting; it is the unmistakable call of God himself.

Of course, God may get our attention in some spectacular way. But there is no scriptural warrant to wait complacently for a “burning bush.” This is not the time to count oneself out of a God-directed vocation or a specific Christian duty because one hasn’t been given a dramatic invitation.

Every believer in the church today has compelling reasons to seek God’s face and to volunteer, “What shall I do, Lord?” The answering call may very well come in quiet meditation and worship as God speaks in his Word through his Spirit. Christ’s followers are not only called but sent. He said, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit.”

Aware of that basic obligation, which grows out of Christ’s saving work, we can confidently anticipate more directive calls to keep us on course: calls that shape one’s basic life orientation and more momentary calls that tell us to whom, how, where, and when to serve in Christ’s name.

There are some indications that an increasing number of evangelicals are not only consuming alcoholic beverages, but becoming alcoholics. These people require specialized treatment because besides their drinking problem, they also have a very real spiritual problem that cannot be dealt with at local or federal government treatment centers. Such people consequently are often more reluctant to give up alcohol. Frequently they go back to it in an effort to find a solution to their miseries.

Research shows that people from religious backgrounds where drinking was forbidden are more likely to become problem drinkers once they experiment with alcohol than those who come from a background where alcohol was acceptable in moderation and only its abuse condemned.

At a conference at the University of Georgia for people involved in the treatment of abusers of alcohol and other drugs, it was reported that while an estimated 95 percent of the Jewish population occasionally drink alcoholic beverages, only 5 percent ever have problems controlling its use. Other religious groups, including Episcopalians and Presbyterians, were also mentioned. While these groups represented a relatively high percent of alcohol users, the percentage of those who became habitual abusers was low. The situation was different for the Baptist community. There the use of alcohol has traditionally been forbidden. Though only 48 percent used alcohol at all, an alarming 18 percent of those got into trouble. The reason was probably guilt: Baptists and others from similar backgrounds were more likely to get into difficulty simply because they suffered more guilt when they used alcohol.

Vernon E. Johnson, well-known author of I’ll Quit Tomorrow and other articles on alcoholism, states that “the most startling observation has been that alcoholism cannot exist unless there is a conflict between the values and the behavior of the drinker.”

The Christian who is attempting to ignore the restraints of his background teachings and his own moral code fits this description. Alcohol serves rather well for a time as a lubricant to ease problems and conflicts at work and at home. His or her drinking progresses, bringing about an adjustment to a lifestyle in total conflict with the individual’s deep-seated convictions.

When seeking treatment, the Christian frequently encounters another problem. If he goes to a secular treatment center, all the focus is on the addiction and no effort is made to deal with his spiritual needs. The exception might be a suggestion that he needs help from “some higher power.”

If, on the other hand, he turns to his pastor or other spiritual leader, he might be told that his problem is “sin,” and that all he needs to do is “get right with God.” While it is true that he needs spiritual counsel, his problem is not only spiritual, but physical and mental as well. He may require careful medical assistance even to withdraw and begin treatment. Also, the power of the addiction itself is usually more than he can handle on his own; he needs help if he is to carry out what he has already purposed in his heart.

Treatment for the Christian alcoholic must include the “whole man.” He should be thoroughly educated about alcohol the drug, and in particular its effect on users who drink against their own better judgment and inner convictions. He must be made to realize that God waits to forgive and restore him to the place of fellowship he probably thought was gone forever. He will need guidance on how to deal with the affairs in his life that were damaged during the drinking period. In a majority of cases, family ties have been broken and unhealthy relationships have often developed as a substitute. These can leave lasting guilt and anxieties unless they are dealt with openly and a right decision is made concerning them.

As it is for many who have similar problems, an alcoholic’s best friends are often his worst enemies. The Christian family is not unlike others who attempt to cover up a drinking problem—just as they do other problems with which they need help but are ashamed to face. Even the pastor may not know how serious the problem is. Sometimes he is also convinced that the less said about it the better. Far too many Christian alcoholics are determined to keep their problem from everyone else—and, if they are church members, especially from those with whom they worship—simply because they fear rejection.

Sources of help must be sought out. Normally a patient will need the help of a family member or church leader who is acquainted with both his problem and the available sources of help. It should be kept in mind that alcoholics usually lack motivation and are not likely to initiate action on their own.

The most readily available help lies with the head of a rescue mission. While mission staff members are rarely trained to handle this problem, the director will have been involved with alcoholics. In some instances, he himself is a recovering alcoholic. Though he and his program may not be in a position to handle the case, he will be aware of some that are. If there is no program in the community, concerned individuals may contact William Wooley at the International Union of Gospel Missions, P.O. Box 10780, Kansas City, Missouri 64118.

I have worked with Alcoholics Anonymous and consider AA this nation’s best weapon against alcoholism. But because Christians who become addicted to alcohol have problems not only with addiction but also with their spiritual condition, I feel heads of rescue missions generally are qualified to deal with the spiritual aspect of the problem. At the same time, they know of treatment centers that offer long-range help spiritually, as well as with the addiction.

Drug abuse centers operating under the auspices of state and county mental health organizations may also be able to supply names of local ministers working with such people. But care should be taken to avoid clergymen who will underrate the intensity of the spiritual problem—or ignore it altogether.

A few Christian rehabilitation treatment centers for alcoholics are located in different parts of the country, which give particular attention to Christians. The I.U.G.M. office in Kansas City can help in locating these if no other source of information is available.

Drug and alcohol abuse, in the view of the public, are among the most destructive effects upon family life. The following look at the dimension of this problem shows its relationship to the family.

A solid majority of Americans view alcohol abuse as at least a potential problem affecting family life. From a list of 11 items, Americans say the most harmful to family life are alcohol abuse (named by 60 percent) and drug abuse (named by 59 percent). Alcohol and drug abuse are viewed as “most harmful” by all groups and in all regions of the nation.

As many as one-fifth to one-fourth of the population report that liquor has been a cause of trouble in their homes. The percentage was far lower in the mid-seventies.

And as many as one person in seven (14 percent) believe that alcohol and drug abuse are (from a list of 14 items) one of the three most important problems facing their families.

A large majority of Americans, therefore, see alcohol abuse as having a potentially serious effect on the family; one-fifth to one-fourth say liquor has actually been a cause of trouble in their homes; and one in seven say that alcohol abuse currently ranks as one of the top three problems facing their families.

Certainly one of the trends that is undermining the stability of the family in our nation today is the high divorce rate. In one study we asked: “Which three of these reasons (12 were listed) do you feel are most responsible for the high divorce rate in this country?”

The responses given most often are: “money troubles,” “people are too young when they marry,” “rejection of responsibilities,” “divorces are too easy to get,” “decline of religious and moral values,” and next—“alcohol and/or drug abuse.”

Alcohol and/or drug abuse is cited by one person in four (23 percent) as one of the three reasons most responsible for the high divorce rate in this country. Among persons with only a grade school background the figure soars to 39 percent, making the category of alcohol and/or drug abuse the problem cited second most often after “people are too young when they marry.”

CT-Gallup Poll Findings

Significant highlights of the CHRISTIANITY TODAY-Gallup Poll on the use of alcoholic beverages:

• One-third of the public are abstainers, but two-thirds of evangelicals are.

• Just over half of the clergy abstain, but better than three-fourths of the evangelical clergy do.

• Among laymen, Baptists are divided roughly 50 on using alcohol; Methodists and Lutherans are two-thirds to three-fourths in favor.

• Among clergy, more than 90 percent of the Baptists abstain, and two-thirds of the Methodists do. But only one-third of Methodist laymen are abstainers.

• Three-fourths of frequent Bible readers and two-thirds of tithers abstain. Among frequent church-goers, slightly more drink than abstain.

Perhaps the most shocking statistics to emerge from our survey, conducted for the White House Conference on Families, were those related to child and spouse abuse.

About one person in five in the survey knew personally of at least one instance of a husband or wife being so badly abused that police or social workers were called in, or the situation led to divorce action. Such instances are reported by similar proportions among all segments of society.

Furthermore, about one in five (18 percent) also cite personal awareness of at least one serious instance of physical abuse of children by their parents happening to someone they know or someone who lives in their neighborhood.

Although we do not have survey data to indicate to what degree alcohol abuse is related to spouse and child abuse, other studies have shown a close relationship.

If America cherishes the family, steps must be taken to deal with alcohol abuse; it is one of the factors most responsible for the destruction of the family. But are we launching the all-out campaign we need to get on top of this problem? The answer, I’m afraid, is that we are not. We still face an uphill battle that will take the concerted efforts of teachers, doctors, the mass media, the clergy, and, most of all, parents to deal with a problem that is having a serious drain on society.

Parents should therefore: (1) pay heed to their own drinking habits; (2) set the proper example of pursuing higher and more lasting values than those embodied in drug dependency; (3) be aware of their children’s drinking habits; and (4) above all, talk to their children about drinking and the potential dangers (as many as 4 in 10 do not presently do so!). In addition, parents would do well to encourage their offspring to look at the use of alcohol from a religious perspective.

The nation’s clergy are surely in a unique position to make an enormous contribution to dealing with alcohol abuse and alcoholism. I would like to suggest a five-part plan for ministers:

• Encourage parents to discuss drinking problems with their children;

• Attend a good workshop on alcohol abuse;

• Speak openly about the subject from the pulpit and in counseling;

• Establish a team program with parents so the church and family can reinforce one another;

• Stress religious reasons for abstinence or moderation.

The course of religion in America in the 1980s will have much to do, in my opinion, with the impact of alcohol and drug abuse on our society. For while alcohol and drug abuse are seen as having a strongly negative effect on families, for the vast majority of Americans, religion is viewed as strengthening family relationships and the family as a whole.

Last month, another well-known couple terminated a long and apparently agreeable marriage. The reason given: incompatibility—an all-too-familiar legal umbrella under which an assortment of excuses can find shelter.

I looked up the dictionary definition of incompatibility and brushed it aside as beside the point: “Incapable of coexisting harmoniously, discordant; mismated …”

Incapable of coexisting harmoniously? “With God all things are possible.”

My husband was given a Swiss watch by our daughter’s Swiss in-laws. When it stopped, no local watchmaker could fix it. The next time we were in Switzerland we sent it directly to the people who had made it. They had no problem; the ones who made it knew how to make it work again.

Who invented marriage? He is the one to whom we must go. His Book of instructions has the answers.

“Disagreeing in nature …” Great! One can disagree without being disagreeable. Before we were married, someone gave me a gem of wisdom: “Where two people agree on everything, one of them is unnecessary.”

“Irreconcilable …” I doubt it. When two draw near to God, they find themselves closer to one another.

“Conflicting …” Terrific! I once knew a man who refused to let his wife disagree with him on anything. Now, every man needs to be disagreed with occasionally. This poor man’s personality, his ego, and even his judgment suffered.

When someone gets into a position of political or social power or one of fame or fortune and no one dares to disagree with him, look out! He is in danger. At times, we all need to be disagreed with.

Three of us were lunching one day while our husbands relaxed over what, for me would have been hard work: a game of golf.

“Would you two like to know the secret of our happy marriage?” our older companion asked.

Forks in midair, we waited.

“Because,” and the mischievous eyes brimmed with laughter, “we never do anything together.”

“Except,” she added with an irrepressible laugh, “sleep together.”

We were still laughing when our husbands joined us. Her words ringing in my ears, I noticed the affectionate kiss with which her husband greeted her, his loving hand on her shoulder.

All I can say is, “Three cheers for incompatibility!”

The disease concept may help avoid condemning the patient, but it may also delay dealing with real causes.

Mention alcoholism and alcohol abuse and thoughts may turn to skid row and the unshaven, poorly dressed men who shuffle in and out of rescue missions, the homeless wanderers who probably left their families years ago.

But a different kind of alcoholic has emerged in American society in recent years. He or she is the person apparently uncontrollably addicted to liquor, yet still managing to hold a job, stay with a family, and avoid the skid row route.

The CHRISTIANITY TODAY-Gallup Poll documented the sharp increase in this form of alcohol abuse. One in four persons reported that an alcohol-related problem affected family life. Only one in eight, or 17 percent, gave a similar response in 1974.

The personal testimonies of prominent public figures have brought more attention to the problem of middle-and upper-class alcohol abuse. Joan Kennedy and Betty Ford have talked publicly about their problem and how they recovered through hospitalization. Other public figures, such as former U.S. Senator Harold Hughes of Iowa, have described how conversion to Christ, coupled in some cases with the support of Alcoholics Anonymous, has helped them recover from addiction to liquor.

Christian conversion, however, is not the only remedy offered these days for alcoholism and alcohol abuse. It may be the most effective remedy, but the government, the mental health profession, hospitals, and alcoholism counselors offer a variety of other routes to recovery.

Sheer willpower and rigorous self-discipline do not seem to be effective remedies—at least when alcoholism is defined as uncontrollable addiction to liquor. Alcoholism is not necessarily the same as drunkenness, though at times the two overlap. Some people get drunk without getting addicted to liquor. Some Christians can recall drunken weekends from preconversion days, but they were never alcoholics in the sense of their repeatedly drinking uncontrollably.

What seems to be needed for any recovery is outside support of some kind. Evangelicals are quick to point to conversion and the indwelling Holy Spirit and church fellowship as a kind of support. But the twentieth-century secular mind has been looking for other routes to recovery, and Christians ought to be familiar with these.

The Disease Theory In Treatment

The dominant theory in the field of alcoholism is the disease concept. It emerged in various forms before World War II, when in 1933 the repeal of Prohibition made social drinking legal and socially respectable. The disease concept borrows from various disciplines.

To some, the theory that alcoholism is a disease points to the fact that there are people who seem able to drink liquor moderately over a lifetime, whereas there are others who drink and become uncontrollably addicted. To others, the theory provides a ray of hope that medical science will discover some cure for alcoholism, perhaps a medicine or pill, that will allow the alcoholic to drink moderately without continually craving more. To still others, this concept merely points out the damaging results physically of heavy drinking. In short, the disease theory is not well defined, but it must be reckoned with because it dominates the field of alcoholism treatment and research in the U.S.

The American Association for the Cure of Inebriates declared drunkenness a disease in the nineteenth century. The American Medical Association voted approval of the disease concept of alcoholism in the 1950s. One of the primary goals of many alcoholism groups, including the federal government’s National Institute for Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse, is to advance the concept that alcoholism is a disease.

In this case, applying the term disease is somewhat arbitrary, because the definition of disease has widened in recent years. According to the American Medical Association, it is “a deviation from a state of health.” E. M. Jellinek, in his influential book, The Disease Concept of Alcoholism, says of the disease label: “A disease is what the medical profession recognizes as such.”

The major weakness of the disease theory is obvious: someone may say, “Don’t blame me if I catch it. Furthermore, don’t blame me if I pull out a gun and shoot you; I’m just drunk and it’s not my fault.”

Some experts respond to this by saying that alcoholism is a bit like heart disease: you are not necessarily responsible for getting the problem, but you are responsible for recovering and taking steps to avoid it in the future.

In that sense, the disease concept reflects the widened meaning of disease: it is no longer just something caught, like the flu or a cold, but it is any deviation from a state of health. In the latter sense, alcoholism is a disease. However, widening the definition of disease tends to make it less meaningful for ordinary discussion of alcoholism.

But the disease concept may have a few pragmatic advantages. It points to the possibility that physiologically some people may be more prone than others to alcoholism, even after one drink. If science ever develops a means of detecting who has that predisposition—whether it is based in genetics, for example—then it would be helpful to issue no-drink warnings to certain people. The disease concept may also serve some purpose in relieving the guilt that some alcoholics feel. But such guilt seems only to drive them to more and more drunkenness.

However, even though the disease concept may have some practical value, it is not necessarily verified by medical and scientific studies. Harold Mulford, director since 1956 of alcohol studies at the University of Iowa, notes: “I think it’s important to recognize that the alcohol disease concept is a propaganda and political achievement and not a scientific achievement. Science has not demonstrated that alcoholism is a disease by defining it, nor has science or technology demonstrated it’s a disease by coming up with an effective treatment or preventive.”

The pragmatic approach also suffers from lack of biblical insights. Psychiatrist John White explains:

“For too many years we have paid too much attention to what works and too little to what is right. What is right may or may not work. If we were laboratory animals or computers, the right would be determined by what works and morality would bow to function. But we live in a moral universe, a universe made by a righteous God and inhabited by creatures who have often failed to respond to the way he has handled them, who have instead chosen the opposite of what he wished (Parents in Pain, InterVarsity, 1979, p. 163).

The weaknesses of the disease theory far outweigh its benefits. It tends to relieve the alcoholic of personal responsibility for recovery. Harold Mulford believes it actually encourages nondrinkers to assume: “I don’t have the disease, so I don’t need to watch my drinking. I only hope I don’t catch it. But even if I do, I can always get treatment at the center. So why should I worry about it?”

The disease theory also seemingly encourages an almost totally materialistic approach to the problem. It assumes that our problems in life are essentially physical and material, not moral and metaphysical, and that they can best be resolved by science and its research. The impressive advances of science and medicine in the twentieth century lend extra weight to this world view.

“The disease concept of alcoholism [is] out of tune with the facts and a serious obstacle to rational solutions,” says Dr. R. E. Kendell, a Scottish psychiatrist, in a British Medical Journal article.

Timothy Johnson and Stephen Goldfinger, editors of the Harvard Medical School Health Letter Book, claim “there is still no good evidence that persons with a drinking problem consistently demonstrate biological differences that separate them from others.”

Kendell asserts that despite stories of people getting hooked on alcohol after just one or two drinks, most alcoholics who enter treatment centers admit to a previous daily intake of at least a half bottle of liquor. “In other words, what determines whether a person becomes dependent on alcohol is how much he drinks and for how long, rather than his personality, psychodynamics, or biochemistry.”

One study from London, based on 100 married male alcoholics, showed that sophisticated medical treatment, assuming alcoholism is a disease, was no better than telling the alcoholic to stop drinking, go back to work, and improve his marriage. Both methods produced the same results at the end of a year: about one-third of each group had improved.

The disease concept encourages some counselors to describe alcoholism as a physiological, emotional, and spiritual problem. Usually they are more well versed in the physiological, and sometimes the emotional, aspects of the problem

I asked one counselor at an alcoholism hospital about the personal responsibility of the recovering alcoholic. Was he morally responsible for becoming an alcoholic in the first place? To what extent was it his responsibility to quit drinking after being told he had this disease and should never touch liquor again? What if he fell back into the problem even after he had been hospitalized several times? Was he responsible at that point?

The counselor’s answer has helped me understand the tragic deficiency in the disease concept of alcoholism and in secular treatment of the problem. He said he would leave those questions in the hands of a loving God and get on with the business of counseling and treatment as best he knew how. The failure to have at least a foundation for exploring questions of personal responsibility is the key weakness in such alcoholism treatment.

The answers to these questions lie in Christian theology. There is a critical need to apply the doctrine of man to questions about personal responsibility for destructive behavior.

Christian And Other Remedies

There are Christians who work with the disease concept of alcoholism, developing answers to the theological questions. To what extent is a person responsible for behavior that seems to have a physiological basis, at least in part? To what extent is alcohol addiction similar to greed, lust, smoking, temper, and overeating? Some people have more of a struggle with these things than others do. Failure to control them is sin.

How can a Christian condemn the sin of drunkenness, but not the alcoholic? The disease concept, in part, is an effort to avoid condemnation of the alcoholic. It is a means of trying to restore the person’s self-image. The alcoholic, the same as everyone else, is created in God’s image. He deserves dignity and respect, no matter what his addiction leads to. But we have a hard time holding on to these two truths at the same time. Some Christians fall short in terms of seeing God’s image in the alcoholic.

There are other Christians who have not adopted the disease concept of alcoholism, but who have made enormous contributions in the treatment and prevention of alcohol abuse. These contributions are not a cause for pride, but they show what God has done and can yet do.

The temperance and abstinence movements have saved thousands of persons from alcohol abuse and alcoholism. As Mark Noll pointed out in an earlier article (CT, Jan. 19, 1979, “America’s Battle Against the Bottle”), evangelical support for temperance is nothing to be ashamed of. Even Prohibition is getting a second look from those who are concerned about the increasingly tragic impact of alcohol abuse.”

Robert Sherrill, writing for the widely distributed Field Newspaper Syndicate, has written:

“Prohibition is usually marked down as a great failure. In fact, it was a smashing success at first—and even though the law was widely disregarded in later years, the era of Prohibition significantly changed America’s drinking habits. Total alcohol consumption during Prohibition was lower than it had ever been before during a comparable span of years … lower than it would ever be again. Despite the proliferation of bootleg, rot-gut whiskey during Prohibition, total hospital admissions from alcoholism dropped sharply during those years.”

After describing in detail the tragic costs of alcohol abuse in terms of drunk-driving deaths, productivity losses, and with other statistics, Sherrill suggests a new kind of liquor prohibition: raising the price. He favors massive tax increases on alcoholic beverages to cut consumption.

Revivals have also made a significant dent in the problem of alcohol abuse. The first Great Awakening came during the “Gin Age” of English history. Statistics tell why. Gin consumption ran 527,000 gallons in 1684, 2 million gallons in 1714, 5.3 million gallons in 1735, and 11 million gallons in 1750. The cure, according to some historians, was revival. Historian John Wesley Bready sums up the impact of the revivals:

“Not till the challenge of the evangelical revival had touched the hearts and directed the lives of great numbers of people in all parts of the country, did any semblance of redemption appear.

“Liquor control legislation, challenging perforce deeply rooted personal appetites, before it could effect any real reform, had to be backed and vitalized by strong moral and spiritual convictions; and of such convictions, prior to the great revival, England was almost bankrupt.”

Christian social and gospel ministries have also made significant contributions in response to alcohol abuse. Many rescue mission workers have accomplished what proponents of the disease theory only aimed at—loving the alcoholic but still hating his drunkenness. At the same time, they have saved the taxpayers millions of dollars.

An Indianapolis attorney, Jack Brown, board member of Lighthouse Mission and a former U.S. attorney, once made an informal calculation of the savings that mission, one of several in Indianapolis, provided for the city. “I figured up that the Lighthouse Mission saved the city of Indianapolis over $1 million in a year,” he said. An accountant figured various public costs, assuming that 30 percent of the transients who came to the mission would be arrested and jailed. He included court costs, but not social welfare payments to families and some other items. “This was over 10 years ago when I did this,” he adds. “Naturally all these prices are higher today.”

Another major factor in defeating alcoholism has been the work of Alcoholics Anonymous. Widely acknowledged as the most effective popular means of recovery, AA includes biblical principles. A quick reading of AA’s 12 steps reveals the biblical roots, though they were written so as to avoid doctrinal controversy. (AA’s debt to biblical Christianity is clearly spelled out in Not God, by Ernest Kurtz.)

Throughout American history, evangelicals have made significant contributions in response to the tragedy of alcohol abuse. Now we must enter the debate about the exact nature of alcoholism, its cause, to what extent it is a sin that requires repentance, to what extent it is also harmful behavior with which some because of physiological differences must grapple more than others. The treatment of alcoholics must not be left to those who disregard biblical truths.

In medical and counseling circles, evangelicals can counteract the weaknesses of the theory that alcoholism is a disease. The popular idea that society need not accept any limitations on drinking, simply because comparatively few people are “sick,” must be attacked with vigor. The whole of society suffers a dreadful toll because of alcoholism. Besides offering hope of deliverance and therapy for alcoholics, Christians can demand rigorous enforcement of drunk driving laws, stiff penalties for offenders, and higher taxes on beer and liquor.

While Christians respond with loving care for those whose lives have been broken by alcohol abuse, they can also be sensitive to the millions of closet alcoholics (many of them lonely women at home). Responsible action and teaching are demanded in churches and schools as well, to head off the growing spiral of teen-age alcohol abuse. But beyond studying the explanations for the alcoholic’s condition and behavior, Christians can get involved at many stages on the local level. Doing so will help curb what many believe to be this country’s most destructive social problem.

Leaders in Third World countries today function in a climate of suspicion, distrust, and jealousy produced by the revolutions of the twentieth century. Some, who were educated in mission schools and reared in Christian teaching, have turned against missions and even ordered missionaries to leave their countries. We hear that in certain places traditional mission works are no longer permitted, and that white missionaries are not needed and should go home.

These are pressures missionaries face in a changing world, but with an unchanging commission to fulfill.

Many Christians and sending churches believe these threats are endangering their missions involvement around the world. While to a certain degree these threats are genuine, churches must not be blinded or discouraged by such events. We are living in a new era of change both at home and abroad, but the Lord of Hosts is in control.

The more I hear of such threats and oppositions, the more strongly I feel about the concept of partnership in the missionary task. Both sides need each other, not only in trade and politics, but much more so in mission work. There can be partnership in areas of education, health work, socioeconomic projects, missions, and in human and financial resources.

A good example can be seen in the United Church of Australia, where the Fiji Methodist Church provides personnel while their counterpart in Australia supports the work financially. There are Fijian ministers ministering to white Australians; at the same time, the church in Fiji requires the service of Australian missionaries. This has functioned very successfully for many years. There is a spirit of oneness, trust, belonging, and equality experienced in this partnership.

It is not enough just to invite Third World church leaders to do deputation work or to show up in a general conference of some kind, without actual involvement. The opposition to Western missionaries and Western missions is very much about their attitudes of superiority toward nationals. The cry against imperialism and the call, “missionary, go home,” reflects a lack of partnership. We need to see in every land the national church reinforced and encouraged by a cooperating group of international Christians coming from every continent and striving together side by side for the gospel.

The Methodist Church in Fiji, a Third World church, has been sending missionaries to other countries since 1875. George Brown, a famous pioneer missionary from Australia, went to the Methodist Pastor’s College in Fiji in 1875 to recruit six Fijian pastors to go with him to Papua New Guinea. To his surprise, all 86 students in training at that time responded. However, only six were needed, and some of those first Fijian missionaries were massacred by New Guinea natives.

This was but the beginning of Fijian missionaries working alongside their European colleagues. Today there are Fijian missionaries in Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, New Hebrides, the Northern Territory of Australia, and among white Australian churches. There are also missionaries from Tonga, Samoa, Papua New Guinea, and Cook Islands serving in other countries. It is entirely reasonable that a church in a given country should be both a receiving church and a sending church.

The question that needs to be raised is this: Is it possible for Third World missionaries to serve in some Western countries, and are they capable of ministry to white people who are more sophisticated? Dr. Burt W. Tofaeono, a Samoan pastor of the First Samoan Congregational Church in Los Angeles, commented to me that in Boston he pastored a church of predominantly white Americans. There he experienced a new atmosphere of belonging and trust with his white Christian friends. He sensed a new spirit of partnership in faith and work, and in daily living.

It is time for the Western world to accept people from other countries, not only to migrate, but to come as Third World missionaries to aid in evangelizing non-Christians. Many Western countries once labeled “Christian” now live in modern paganism.

There are those who feel that Third World missionaries going abroad may only be seeking new status and better living. Such a narrow-minded view only serves to show the preconceived ideas already planted in many Western minds. This is the thinking that normally creates hostility and distrust of others.

The Reverend Leilie Boseto, moderator of the United Church in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands, said during his church’s annual conference, “God’s mission has no boundaries and his love to people throughout the world can never be politically or denominationally fenced around. God’s missionary concern is to be for all people in every nation; and the whole world is his mission field.”

This church in Papua New Guinea is now negotiating with sending churches in Fiji, Samoa, and Cook Islands to exchange missionaries as part of a mutual partnership in mission. New organizations with new structures and new attitudes are needed. And there is a need for internationalization of missionary work among sending churches, mission boards, and receiving churches throughout the world.

There are two full-time Fijian ministers who serve with the Uniting Church in Australia in an assignment worked out by the Methodist officials of both countries. They serve under the Australian church and are fully supported by them. They have been there for the past five years. Another Fijian minister serves full-time with the synod of the Uniting Church in New South Wales. Called by that church to serve in their head office at Chatwood, N.S.W., he has been ministering in Australia for three years.

People give different meanings to this word “missionary,” but as far as we are concerned, because they were requested, our men have been sent to Australia, even though we do not support them financially.

There is another way in which we are involved in ministry. This is through an “exchange ministry,” involving an exchange of pastors for six to twelve months. A pastor from a parish in Australia will go to Fiji and one from Fiji takes his place in Australia. Though this has not occurred often, when it has, it has been very successful. Australian churches sincerely accept pastors from other countries for ministry, and there is no prejudice toward them.

To minister to an ethnic group other than your own is not easy; but if the Lord calls us to serve another culture, who can prevent us?

I speak with conviction, for I come from a multiracial country. I have worked with multiracial groups and was in charge of the work in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea. There 20 families from Western countries were under my leadership.

We must take positive steps toward achieving better relationships between Western churches and those in the Third World. Unfortunately, we Christians are also caught with prejudice, preconceived ideas against others, and feelings of superiority.

From the Third World perspective, I believe modern Western countries are fallow mission fields that need new cultivation, revival, and renewal for quality growth. Do you ever think that the Lord may be saying to us today that we should use partnership strategies in his mission?

World Evangelization Requires the Right Tackle

Resources, personnel, and money are the problems that must be faced today by Christians who are concerned about getting on with the task of evangelism.

These key areas need to be evaluated by something greater than quantity and quality, however. Two words that have become important are “more” and “better.” The implication is that the world can be evangelized if we can just do more of what we are now doing, if we have better coordination—more tools, better methods, more money, more people, better people, better techniques, more technology, more resources.

I disagree.

It is not bad to have more things and better things, but it is fatal if we Christians think these hold the key to the success of our mission. World evangelization will remain little more than a pious slogan if we pursue a business-as-usual approach, even if it is more business and better business.

Let’s be honest. Most of what we have been doing to reach the unreached is not working well enough. If it were, the size of the task would be diminishing, not increasing. Just “more” and “better” will not reach the three billion unreached. “Different” might. At least, it is worth a try.

Professionals Versus Nonprofessionals

Let’s look at some of the church’s status-quo thinking. For example, what about the widely held notion that evangelism, particularly across cultures, must be done by professionals with special training? I thank God for all who are specially trained in theology, pastoral skills, and cross-cultural communication. But world evangelization is too big a task to be left to an elite corps, even if we had more of them and even if they were better trained.

The clear biblical responsibility for evangelism lies not with a professional class, but with the entire church and with every believer. Witness is not the privilege of a few: it is the obligation of all.

When mission leaders complain about the shortage of personnel, they are subtly communicating to the average Christian that he or she lacks the necessary qualifications to share Christ. This diminishes the mandate of the Great Commission, which makes every believer an evangelizer. It was nonprofessionals who carried the burden for evangelism in the early church. While the apostles kept the spiritual fires burning in Jerusalem, persecution scattered the rest of the believers like glowing embers, and each one started a fire wherever he or she landed.

The Holy Spirit, who is the Great Evangelizer, can take stumbling, weak men and women and turn them into powerful witnesses. In 1973, a Cambodian schoolteacher and his wife came to know Christ in an evangelistic campaign. God called Sin Soum and his wife to move into a large refugee settlement outside Phnom Penh where there was not one Christian. It was a hard decision, for it meant personal hardships. Shopping meant a half-day’s journey, and the nearest water was a 15-minute walk. Their first shelter was a tiny thatch hut they built themselves.

In a short while that little hut was overflowing with people coming to study the Bible. In six months, 30 people had believed. In two years, this couple—untrained in evangelistic techniques—was shepherding a congregation of over 1,000 people, almost all of whom were their spiritual children or grandchildren. Such is the power of the Holy Spirit working through the nonprofessional.

External Support

What about the cherished concept that poorer churches must wait for richer churches to provide funds before they can engage in cross-cultural mission? While cooperation and partnership has a rightful place, some churches fail in outreach because the founding mission convinced the congregation—or they convinced themselves—that they are too poor to respond to the Great Commission and to sustain their local structure at the same time. But the early churches of Asia Minor did not depend upon the Jerusalem congregation to sponsor their evangelists.

Not long ago I talked with a graduate of a Bible school in a non-Western nation and asked about his plans. He said, “I don’t have any yet. I’m waiting for a mission to sponsor me.” His answer is understandable. He was the victim of a dependency mentality that others created in him.

A study now under way of non-Western missions suggests there are more missionaries from Africa, Asia, and Latin America than anyone had previously thought—perhaps as many as 15,000 in over 400 societies. Most of them are functioning very well without money or support from the West.

Consider the Friends Missionary Prayer Band in India. This movement of 20,000 lay people grew out of deep poverty. Although these Christians have few worldly resources, they are rich in the things of God. They emphasize prayer, godly living, love, the Bible, generous giving. They have developed a strategy to place over 400 of their members in unevangelized villages by 1985. They are doing it with rupees, not dollars, Deutsche marks, or francs. They have learned that even when outside money is available, it is sometimes best not to take it.

The Lure Of Technology

For mission agencies looking for an easy way to reach the unreached—a way not marked with blood, sweat, and tears—the allure of evangelism by mechanical device is almost irresistible. It is here that the “more and better” syndrome reaches its peak. The church is presented with a sparkling array of technological gadgets that are supposed to make the fulfillment of our mission easier, faster, and more efficient.

Technology must be appropriately evaluated and used. At World Vision we use every enhancing tool that God has made available through science. But we try not to forget that gadgets are always second-rate evangelists. No scientific breakthrough will ever replace Spirit-filled men and women whose hearts are so aflame with Jesus and so burdened for hell-bound souls that they will agonize with God as did John Knox, who cried, “Give me Scotland, or I die!”

The whir of a computer cannot replace the agonized cries of an evangelist who carries on his heart the burden of a lost world. It is time to recover and restore the human dimension in evangelization.

Emulating Western Models

It is appalling the way Western programs and structures are exported, as if their blueprints were given in the Old Testament along with those of the tabernacle. An Asian pointedly asked, “Does everything God sends the church in Asia have to come through New York?” (He might as well have said Los Angeles or Wheaton.)

Some Western models are good; some bad. Some work; some don’t Some may be adapted with profit; others may not. Churches on the receiving end must be discerning and discriminating. If Western missions send something that doesn’t work or isn’t needed, overseas Christians should send it back freight collect. We have acted as if program methodology, ecclesiastical structure, and even terminology can be franchised worldwide like hamburgers and fried chicken.

This is not a new problem. But we learn so slowly. Almost 100 years ago, Alexander Mackay, a pioneer Scottish missionary to Uganda, wrote: “There is much in our ways and methods that strengthens the idea of foreign rule—Englishmen, English church, English formula, English bishops. When will they learn that Christianity is cosmopolitan and not Anglican?”

The words might well have been written today and he might well have said Americans and Methodist, Baptist, or parachurch. Most often we still seem to believe that “our way” is the only way—or, at least, the best way.

Western models should be rejected outright if they truncate the gospel and divide the needs of human beings into “social” and “spiritual.” When we stop treating people as if they were souls without bodies, and when we start treating the gospel as the instrument for holistic redemption and change, our message will gain a new, powerful credibility.

Misplaced Priorities

Perhaps the most deeply entrenched and deadly missions practice is that of concentrating most of our personnel and resources on already-reached areas of the world. The emphasis of mission has shifted over the past century, with disastrous consequences: from planting and cultivating to storing and conserving. Most missionary energies and resources go toward places where the seed of the gospel has already been sown and taken root. Some 91 percent of the Western missionary force are estimated to be assigned to maintain and strengthen established churches. Only 9 percent are sent to do the tough pioneering work of cross-cultural evangelism.

The goal, we must never forget, is not just to send missionaries. The goal is to reach people. Every church, society, and agency should evaluate every program and activity to see if its priorities have changed from reaching people to sending missionaries.

So we must ask the question: What will work to reach the three billion unreached?

First, the world will be evangelized when Christians act on the belief that the Holy Spirit indwells each believer and empowers him or her to carry on the work of God. The Holy Spirit is our chief resource.

Second, the world will be evangelized when Christians implement God’s mission strategy. The first part of that strategy is for those who have been evangelized to send cross-cultural missionaries to plant churches among the thousands of unreached people groups. The second part is for the planted church then to accept its responsibility to evangelize its own people. These are the evangelists upon whom Christ is depending. They are his body in diaspora, scattered through every society and vocation, speaking every language, having a face of every color.

Third, the world will be evangelized when local churches apply new criteria for measuring ministry. The strength of a church is not revealed by how many people it seats, but by how many it sends. When you say your church seats 500, you really say nothing significant. Tell me whether it sends 100, or 50, or 10, and you immediately communicate something about its value system.

Fourth, the world will be evangelized when every congregation sees that it has a responsibility to reach someone who is unreached. It may be a town, a square city block, a province or a tribe, but each congregation should be able to say, “Here is where God wants us to work in outreach.”

One example is the recent Korea/Indonesia church-planting project. Working in a three-way partnership with a committee of Indonesian church leaders and World Vision, over 20 Korean churches with a passion for planting more churches initiated an innovative ministry that has resulted in 20 new churches being started in one year. The Korean group is now meeting with Thai and Filipino leaders to bring about more partnerships.

Fifth, the world will be evangelized when money and personnel are seen as having an international character instead of a national identity. Why cannot Western funds be used to help support non-Western personnel? Multinational teams will break down suspicion that the gospel is Western. When staff and support come from many nations, fewer doors will be closed. The Bible and Medical Missionary Fellowship has members from nine nations. Overseas Missonary Fellowship draws people from 22 countries. Wycliffe Bible Translators reports 30 nations represented among its missionary force. The Asia Evangelistic Fellowship has staff from nine countries.

Sixth, the world will be evangelized when churches are truly free to adopt or develop flexible methods of evangelism that are suited to the cultures in which they work.

Here, too, examples abound. Tentmaking ministries are becoming respectable again after nearly 2,000 years. A young Indonesian Bible school graduate and his wife were sent by a mission agency to a remote area where he was able to get land to farm and his wife could work as a midwife. They are a cell nucleus to bring Christian families together to witness to others. In another Asian nation, Christians with professional skills as teachers and nurses deliberately accept government assignments to villages as an opportunity to evangelize. As a result, the gospel has reached areas that had no prior Christian witness.

A group in Nigeria has sent over 200 missionaries, most of them trained in agriculture. These missionaries support themselves in part by working at farming and improving agriculture while doing evangelism. They describe their ministry as “saving souls and saving crops.”

Let us stop complaining that we don’t have enough people, enough money, enough tools. That simply is not true. There is no shortage of anything we need—except vision and prayer and will.

Prayer is the one resource immediately available to us all. If more Christians were on their knees praying, more Christians would be on their feet evangelizing. Robert Speer, a great Presbyterian missions pioneer and leader, wrote: “The evangelization of the world … depends first of all upon a revival of prayer. Deeper than the need for men; deeper, far, than the need for money; deep down at the bottom of our spiritless lives, is the need for the forgotten secret of prevailing, worldwide prayer. Missions have progressed slowly abroad because piety and prayer have been shallow at home.”

The liberating Spirit of God can free us from the paralyzing guilt of our past mistakes. He can free us from slavish attachment to ineffective traditional methods. He can free us from schism and division that dishonor his name and cause men to reject his salvation. He can free us from a gloomy, defeatist attitude about the future. He can liberate Christians to go gladly, love limitlessly, serve sacrificially, witness powerfully, suffer joyfully, and if need be, die triumphantly.

Last year’s Consultation on World Evangelization at Pattaya, Thailand, emphasized strategy: developing a methodology to evangelize the world before the coming of Jesus Christ. In doing this, COWE took a hard look at such major opponents of the Christian faith as Marxists, Muslims, cult advocates, secularists, Buddhists, and Hindus. Responding to the enormous need, COWE advocated an all-out missionary advance around the world. Participants were faced with the challenge of enlisting 200,000 missionaries by the end of this century.

Speaking specifically about the United States, which currently has more missionaries overseas than any other nation (about 35,000), one can say to this challenge that this country will not raise up 200,000 missionaries now or in the near future. Why do we make such a statement? Because the recent history of some of the major denominations, relative to evangelism at home and missionary outreach abroad, reveals retreat and retrenchment, not growth and advance.

Perhaps the best way to show how dramatic the missionary retreat has been is to look at the percentage decline in the number of overseas career missionaries among some of the major denominations between 1962 and 1979: Episcopal Church, 79 percent decline; Lutheran Church in America, 70 percent; United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., 72 percent; United Church of Christ, 68 percent; Christian Church (Disciples), 66 percent; United Methodist Church, 46 percent; American Lutheran Church, 44 percent.

Many factors have contributed to the serious loss of missionaries among the traditional ecumenical denominations. However, it is legitimate to reckon that these figures are a rough index of the depth of conviction about basic Christian doctrine—the nature of the gospel, the lostness of mankind apart from Christ, and the necessity of obeying biblical mandates calling for sacrifice and discipline for the sake of advancing the kingdom of Christ.

On the other hand, there were some significant increases in the missionary forces of some denominations and parachurch agencies. Among these were: Southern Baptist Convention, 88 percent; Assemblies of God, 49 percent; Wycliffe Bible Translators, 55 percent.

Three major umbrella missionary associations represent both denominational and parachurch agencies. It is instructive to compare numbers of missionaries under these three groupings. Between 1962 and 1979 the number of missionaries from denominations belonging to the Division of Overseas Ministries of the National Council of Churches decreased by 51 percent. However, the two associations requiring evangelical doctrinal commitment from their member missions—the Evangelical Foreign Missions Association and the Interdenominational Foreign Mission Association—showed increases of 63 and 19 percent, respectively.

Of course, overseas missionary vision is also tied in with evangelism in the U.S. Some of the major denominations showing striking decreases in missionary forces have also shown declines in membership between 1960 and 1979, according to the Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches, 1981 (Abingdon).

For example, the Episcopal Church lost 430,000 members; Lutheran Church in America, 130,000; United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., 770,000; United Church of Christ, 520,000; Christian Church (Disciples), 570,000; United Methodist Church, 1,150,000.

These six denominations alone lost over three and a half million members in 19 years. It is apparent that declines in both missionary outreach abroad and evangelism at home can be attributed, in part, to the infiltration of theological liberalism. The vitality of evangelical commitment in other denominations has led to both growing membership and an enlarged missionary force. These trends are noticeable in such denominations as the Southern Baptist Convention, Assemblies of God, Church of the Nazarene, Baptist General Conference, the Christian and Missionary Alliance, and the Church of God (Cleveland, Tenn.).

In addition, one must consider the rising tide of missionary interest among evangelical young people, most dramatically obvious at Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship’s Urbana student missionary conventions. At the 1979 gathering, for example, more than 8,000 youths indicated they were serious about God’s call to a missionary vocation.

Another recent phenomenon affecting missionary outreach relates to the short-term as opposed to the career concept of service. If one were to subtract the number of youths involved in short-term service, the total numbers in overseas deployment would be significantly less. Even among evangelical denominations and parachurch agencies, short-termers account for much of the personnel growth in the last decade. For example, Youth With a Mission and Teen Missions between them account for nearly 2,000 short-term missionaries.

How realistic, then, is it to expect U.S. churches to come up with 200,000 missionaries by 2000, when the number now is about 35,000? Twenty percent growth per decade would bring this figure only to 50,400. To put 100,000 couples, each with two children, on the field would cost about $2.8 billion (figured at an average support figure today of $28,000).

Statistically, one would not be far wrong to guess that the United States has a shrinking role in this endeavor. That is why many missiologists are now saying that reaching the unreached will be the major task of those who once were unreached but now have been reached and must therefore assume responsibility for their own people. Churches have been planted around the globe. These churches must reach their own peoples with the good news.

Any strategy that does not major in evangelism in every country is doomed to failure. Evangelist Billy Graham has grasped this fact and is therefore planning a worldwide conference for national evangelists from churches all over the world. They are the key to world evangelization. They know their people, their languages and customs. They know how to proclaim a gospel in terms indigenous to their cultures.

North American Christians can provide the money; Christians can pray that the Lord of the harvest will thrust laborers into the harvest fields. But more and more it appears that the answer to the need lies in the expanded outreach of Christians of all nations to evangelize their own people.

From the looks of things in some American churches, it is obvious that the need for evangelism exists at “home” too. Maybe sending Third World missionaries to the U.S. would help us. Yet the great wealth and number of Christians in the U.S. shows that the resources for evangelism are there—but they must be enlisted. When U.S. churches see effective evangelism and dynamic growth, there will be a corresponding growth in worldwide missionary vision and practice.

What More Can I Say?

Over the years, I have read some of Tim LaHaye’s books and have been occasionally helped by an idea or two. But nothing Dr. LaHaye has preached or written has helped me as much as his statement about his successor at the church he previously served in San Diego. You will find this profound statement on page 89 of the July 17, 1981, issue of CHRISTIANITY TODAY. I quote: “In my opinion, [he is] the most dynamic 40-year-old, Bible-teaching Baptist minister in America today.”

Marvelous! Thank you, Dr. LaHaye! You have freed me from guilt and given me the perfect approach to use when people ask me for my opinions or recommendations.

You see, up until now I have tried to avoid trouble by being deliberately vague in my statements. You know the approach: “My, that is a baby!” or “Yes, that is some book!” or “Now, that was a sermon!” But I have been taking the wrong approach. The secret is to imitate Dr. LaHaye and be more specific.

“Madam, your daughter is the greatest 6-year-old bass soloist wearing a pink dress that trails on the floor who has ever sung on an August evening in this church.” Just watch that mother beam and immediately decide to add me to her Christmas card list.

“This is the finest book on how to have a happy family ever published on a Tuesday by a Grand Rapids publisher, and bound in green cloth, having 116 pages.” Nobody can fault a review like that!

“Pastor, I must tell you that your message was the best exposition of the burial of Moses ever given in this church by a Talbot graduate wearing a blue suit and carrying a copy of the NIV.” Why, a pastor hearing that kind of praise will immediately begin to expect a D.D. from his alma mater.

Thank you again, Dr. LaHaye. Your statement is helping me win friends and influence people. In fact, it is the finest endorsement of a successor that has ever been recorded from a California-based minister who has resigned from a church, and—oh, well! I’m sure you’ve got the idea.

EUTYCHUS X

Cooks Can’T Cook

Re “So, What’s Cooking?” [Eutychus, Aug. 7]: Myself, I have a hard time finishing most meals. I am as hungry as when I began, and yet I don’t really care to eat any more. I feel most cooks spend most of my mealtimes chiding me for not being as healthy as I should be; but frankly, on their diet, I am surprised anyone would be, unless they take a lot of supplements. Far too many of us are far too undernourished to be able to do all the things our cooks are insisting on. I am sure most of us would gladly do all we should if our meals really gave us the strength, nourishment, and energy to do so. I suspect a lot of cooks really don’t know how to cook.

LARRY CRAIG

Wilmette, Ill.

Dostoevsky’S Okay

Dostoevsky knew alienated man and he knew redeemed man. God makes no mistakes. Dostoevsky’s own sad life story probably gave him the deep and tender understanding of the human hearts he wrote so poignantly about [“The Dostoevsky Who Might Have Been,” Aug. 7]. Somehow, the gospel of Christ shines through his writings more powerfully than in all of the born-again Christians currently writing about how to become a success in ten easy steps. I’m sorry, but I thank God for the Dostoevsky who was.

KOREEN SNOW

Gayville, S.D.

It was a special shock to read your terrible remarks about Dostoevsky. It is hard for me to believe that anyone with an appreciation of Dostoevsky could write such pious nonsense. Yes, the poor man did live a wretched life. The point is that God would not let him suffer in vain and found in Dostoevsky a channel for the truth. One can only wonder just what kind of writer Dostoevsky would have made as one of your teetotaling, born-again Christians. As far as the kingdom of heaven is concerned, he has found a much stronger welcome than will those who presume to make such judgments as were made in your editorial.

REV. DANIEL GOLDSMITH

Mission Farm

Killington, Vt.

Raids On Our Review Of Raiders

Must a movie, even about the ark, be a theological statement [“Raiders of the Lost Ark Puts God in a Box,” Aug. 7]? Raiders is entertainment, not indoctrination. It should not be rejected because it fails to achieve someone else’s expectations. Raiders was not billed as a documentary about the ark. It is simply a modern adventure epic, offering wholesome entertainment.

ARTHUR MAY

Springfield, Mo.

It is a very violent film and reveals the depth of human depravity. It is certainly not fit for children.

RICHARD DURSTON

Denver, Colo.

We wondered whether Hiawatha Bray was not the one placing God in a box while practicing a safe religion. His contention that the film should have taken the form of either a sermon or a lesson on the nature of God demonstrates his lack of discernment vis-à-vis the film’s intended purpose: to provide a good time and perhaps prod us into asking our own questions about God, without the producer or director furnishing the answers.

JAMES AND LEONE ANASIEWICZ

Indianapolis, Ind.

Hiawatha Bray goes to extreme efforts to find something theologically wrong with a movie that is immensely pleasurable, silly, and harmless. He should know that it isn’t meant to be taken seriously. The movie isn’t about God, one way or the other.

My beef extends beyond Mr. Bray and this film, however. CT has admitted other bizarre interpretations of movies. Ordinary People was somehow “anti-Calvinist.” Altered States supposedly “takes Christianity quite seriously, and systematically dispenses with it.” Star Wars is snidely referred to as vague mythological symbolism. The film is in some way dangerously pseudo-Christian.

In each of these reviews, the essence or spirit of the film was passed over in favor of something more peripheral. The problem, CT, is that you understand films only in your own terms—theological and philosophical—and you can’t appreciate a movie on its own level. Your reviews generally have no sense of the visual style of films, or of the meanings that design and color and light communicate. There is little feeling for the texture of a story, the nuances of character, or the philosophical structures that editing, cinematography, or direction impose upon a film. Instead, you grab at the only thing you understand—theology. And if it’s not there, you put it there.

KEN PETERSEN

Wheaton, Ill.

Mr. Bray states Raiders is a dangerous film in that it limits our conception of God. To this I can only answer that I have never heard more discussion of a biblical story than I did from people, Christians and non-Christians alike, who have seen the film. It may be a very simple and sensationalist version, but then how many non-Christians ever saw The Hiding Place or Joni?

PETER SCHNEIDER

Ossining, N.Y.

Evangelism In Poland

It is the height of arrogance to suggest that there is any need for evangelism in Poland, a country which has been Christian for more than a millennium and is without question the most Christian country on earth [“Polish Pastors Meet and Pledge Evangelism Thrust,” Aug. 7]. Speakers spoke of revival. What could be more ridiculous? The Catholic church is in a constant state of renewing itself through prayer, the sacraments, and the guidance of the Holy Father. Only total ignorance could lead anyone to believe that Poland is not the world leader in spiritual and temporal renewal. It borders on spiritual treason to call the election of Pope John Paul II a hindrance to evangelism in Poland. Political treason, too, considering the popular leadership Karol Wojtyla has provided over the years. Evangelism to the unchurched and non-Christian is one thing; trying to convert Poland to Protestantism is not only a waste of time but a slap in the face to a people who have died and are dying for their faith.

KEITH SKRZYPCZAK

Tulsa, Okla.

Good To Be In, Or Out?

Mainline denominations have more to offer evangelicals than an arena for missionary activities [“Spiritual Sparks Ignite Some Mainstream Churches,” Aug. 7]. Having been reared in an evangelical tradition, for the first time in my life I found myself in a middle-of-the-road Methodist church following a job relocation. After several months of theology shock, I began to appreciate my decision. I found that the challenge of loving liberals required me to reanalyze long-accepted views, which further grounded and balanced my faith. I sense a new drive to work with all my Christian brothers.

DAVID BOURELL

Austin, Tex.

I was moved by Robb’s emotional plea to infiltrate the mainline churches to purge them. However, I do not find his recommendation biblical. God commands not to do what Robb advocates. God forbid that I should fellowship or have partnership with the enemy, no matter what spiritual garb he may wear (cf. 2 Cor. 6:14–7:1).

REV. GREGORY MOYER

McDonald Federated Church

McDonald, Kan.

More Monuments

When Christians in much of the Third World regularly worship in what Robert Webber calls “if necessary” places, why should we be so certain that God is calling us to build yet another monument to please our architectural tastes [“Church Buildings: Shapes of Worship,” Aug. 7]? With school buildings standing empty on weekends, and church buildings standing empty the rest of the week, and with interest rates forcing us to pay large sums to creditors rather than to God’s work, we ought to consider stewardship in our choice of worship places. The humility of the people who worship in a given place determines what takes place there much more than the “shape of the space.”

DAWN MICHELSON

Grand Forks, N.D.