Africa News: April 15, 1957

Mau Mau Mission

The Navigators, with several cooperating groups, have completed an evangelistic mission in Kenya camps among the Mau Mau, the terrorists responsible for the death of over 2,000 African Christians.

Mau Mau prison camps are graded into a series called “the pipeline.” At first, men are put into camps with no liberty. Those who prove themselves are graduated to work camps, surrounded only by barbed wire. The final step before release is the open camp, under the watchful eye of the village chieftain.

Thousands heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ before their return to village life and many became Christians in the face of threats and bitter antagonism from their countrymen.

(Lorne C. Sanny, president of the Navigators, will be guest speaker each Friday from April through June on Theodore H. Epp’s world-wide Back to the Bible Broadcast. The series will deal with “Individual Witnessing.” Since 1951, Sanny had trained personal counselors and directed follow-up for every major Billy Graham Crusade).

Middle East News: April 15, 1957

Cutting Home Ties

The Synod of the Nile, one of 13 U. S. and overseas synods of the United Presbyterian Church of North America, has voted to ask the General Assembly for permission to sever its official link with the body in the interests of full Egyptianization.

Organizational links with foreign bodies are looked upon with disfavor by the Egyptian government.

Independence from the General Assembly, approved by the United Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions and almost certain to be approved by the Assembly, is not expected to affect the close cooperation which has existed between the Egyptian Church and the American Mission.

The move is designed to eliminate a technical tie which may conceivably become a source of embarrassment to the Protestants of Egypt in a day of surging nationalism.

Egyptian Christianity is thought of there in terms of the Coptic Orthodox Church, which makes up perhaps 2,000,000 out of a population in excess of 22,000,000.

Protestantism, however, is looked upon as a Western importation. And Protestants are often charged (usually by irresponsible speakers and writers) with having at best a weakened form of national loyality by reason of their close religious affiliation with the West.

The synod vote was an attempt to prove the validity of the assertion, made openly for years, that Egyptian Protestantism stands on its own feet, directs its own affairs and that it is in no sense less loyal than any other body made up of the sons and daughters of Egypt.

The first U. P. presbytery was organized in 1860, six years after the start of American missionary activity in Egypt. It included eight local members, in addition to the foreign missionary personnel.

Within 40 years, the Protestant movement had grown so rapidly that on February 22, 1899, the 50 organized congregations and 165 stations, embracing over 6,000 members, were divided into four presbyteries: Thebes, Assiut, Middle Gypt and the Delta. Organization of the Synod of the Nile was completed in May, 1899.

The growth has continued to the present eight presbyteries, including more than 26,000 communicant members (the largest Protestant body in the country).

—W. A. M.

Change Of Policy

The Iranian government has approved the opening of a missionary school—the first time since 1940, when all foreign mission schools were closed by order of the government.

Properties were bought and the schools were reopened under supervision of the government.

A Teheran newspaper announced that the High Educational Council of the Ministry of Education now had authorized the founding of a vocational school by the Seventh Day Adventists. A three-year course in arts and crafts will be given.

South America News: April 15, 1957

Unexpected Liberty

When Dr. Camilo Ponce Enriquez, arch conservative, triumphed by a slim margin in Ecuador’s presidential elections last June, most evangelicals predicted difficult days ahead.

They had reason. As Minister of Government in a former regime, ardent Roman Catholic Ponce ran roughshod over the principles of religious liberty. He prohibited the entrance of Protestant missionaries, outlawed open-air Gospel services and threatened sterner measures against the Protestants.

Things have been different, however, since President Ponce took office in September. He has leaned over backwards to maintain a democratic government. He has not infringed on the liberties of opposing political or religious groups. In recent speeches he has insisted that he will follow this course of action throughout the four-year term.

Different reasons have been advanced for such a commendable attitude on the part of Ecuador’s leader. Many evangelicals feel that the large volume of prayer focused on Ecuador since the martyrdom of the five missionaries has been the key factor.

—A.V.D.P.

1960 World Congress

The first Baptist World Congress south of the equator will be held in July, 1960, at Rio de Janeiro.

Arnold T. Ohrn, general secretary of the Baptist World Alliance, visited the city recently to discuss arrangements. He conferred with Joao Soren, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Rio de Janeiro and others.

Theology

Unknown God or Risen Christ?

WORLD NEWS

Christianity in the World Today

The wonder of Easter will unfold in majestic settings around the world when millions gather before sunrise to glory in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Services of worship will be held on awe-inspiring mountaintops, in spacious amphitheaters, imposing cathedrals and small country churches. Inner warmth will come to thousands, as men of God unveil again in simple words the greatest miracle of all ages.

One of the notable sunrise services will take place at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, where the speaker will be Dr. Norman C. Hunt, University of Edinburgh professor and contributing editor of CHRISTIANITY TODAY.Dr. Carl F. H. Henry, editor of CHRISTIANITY TODAY, will interpret the significance of the service to the Bowl and radio audience.

The message prepared by Dr. Hunt has meaning for people throughout the world. It is presented here, in part:

“Many of us observe the festival, but do not believe the fact, or if we do believe it we know little of its transforming power. Our attitude to Easter is characteristic of our attitude to God; we acknowledge him but we do not really know him. We respect him but we do not love him. Yet the glorious message of Easter is that God has revealed himself in Jesus Christ, who by his death and resurrection has made it possible for sinful man to know him. We need to pray Paul’s prayer this morning—‘that I may know him and the power of his resurrection.’

“The prevailing attitude of ordinary, intelligent people to the Christian faith is not one of antagonism but rather of tolerant scepticsm, if not agnosticism. Our times might be called ‘the age of unbelief.’ Call it ‘honest doubt’ if you will, but it is still unbelief. Christ is not denied, but neither is he exalted. He is the great teacher, but not the only saviour. Christian morality is accepted as an ideal but its only dynamic, the spirit of Christ indwelling the heart is rejected. Men are prepared to believe in God in a vague, shadowy sort of way, but a personal God and a personal saviour they cannot, or will not, accept.

“Thinking people everywhere admit that something has gone sadly wrong with society and with the individual, but the biblical diagnosis of it as the spiritual disease called ‘sin’ they refuse to believe. A great change has come over the attitude to religion in the universities during the 10 years or so in which I have been a university teacher. Whereas a decade ago, following the end of the war, there was a surge of optimism and confidence which made religion almost unnecessary, today in common room and quadrangle, students’ union and hall of residence, wherever university people gather to discuss and argue, one is sure to hear someone say, ‘Things are in a mess; it is time we got back to God and the Church.’ Or, ‘What we need is a revival of religion.’

“In a sense, I suppose, this is some little gain in that men are less self-confident than they were, and yet, I cannot help feeling there is a grave danger in all this. All too rarely does the name of Jesus Christ come into the discussion. Why? Because his very name means ‘saviour’ and men who will not believe that they personally are sinners see no reason why they should need a personal saviour. It is all very well to say ‘We must get back to God,’ but God is holy; we are sinful, and between us there is a great gulf fixed which can only be spanned by the atoning work of Christ upon the Cross. ‘God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself.’ We need to be reconciled to God.… There is no other way than the Cross of Christ to accomplish this.

“It is because of our persistent refusal to acknowledge the fact of sin in our hearts that God remains distant, unreal, unknown. We may be good living, kindly, hard-working, honest, religious, God-fearing, church-going folk, but we have no certain, assured spiritual anchorage in a world of change and decay. We believe in God, but we do not know him. You may remember the story of Paul in the Greek city of Athens, told in Acts, chaper 17. In that great center of human civilization, that repository of the priceless treasures of art and architecture, philosophy and drama, Paul came upon the altar with the inscription upon it, ‘To the unknown God.’ Small wonder that his spirit rebelled at this prostitution of man’s noblest aspirations, at this evidence of man’s capacity for God, man’s longing after eternal things expressed in the altar, and his spiritual bankruptcy expressed in the inscription. Here was the ultimate agony of man’s idolatry—an altar to an unknown God.

“Paul rose to the occasion as he cried, ‘Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you.’ It was all so unnecessary, this ignorance; God had revealed himself in Jesus Christ. No longer need men grope after him, crying, ‘O that I knew where I might find him.’ God’s perfect revelation of himself in Christ had been given for all to see and believe.

“Almost two millennia have come and gone but this world of ours in the 20th Century is spiritually akin to the Athens of the first. All around us are great churches and monuments to Christian leaders. This very land of America is itself a monument to the great faith and Christian conviction of the Founding Fathers. The personal liberty we cherish is based upon the Christian philosophy. Yet, for most of us, God is still unknown, and the altar of our hearts has the same inscription upon it, ‘To the unknown God.’ As a consequence our quest for peace of heart is vain, our lives are purposeless and unsatisfying, our best hopes are frustrated. Our religion brings us no real spiritual satisfaction and some us have already given up trying to maintain the pretence of Christian living.

“Diagnosing aright the fundamental need of these men of Athens who ‘spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell or to hear some new thing’ (what a commentary that is on our generation). Paul ‘preached unto them Jesus and the resurrection.’ What a gospel for a dead city! The Risen Christ instead of the unknown God; a vital faith instead of a vague, empty philosophy. And who better than Paul to declare such a message? To the Athenians, God was unknown; to Paul, he was the one of whom he could say, ‘I know him in whom I have believed.…’ He had seen him on the Damascus Road; he had known his friendship on many a long, weary journey; he had experienced his consolation when persecuted; he had proved his emancipating power when imprisoned for the sake of the gospel. Paul was sure of Christ; he really knew him.

“Nearly 25 years ago, in my late teens, I got to know him, too. Born in a godly home, trained in the Christian faith from earliest childhood, a regular attender at church, yet God was unknown to me. In my self-confidence and intellectual pride, I saw no reason why I needed to accept Christ for myself, and I despised the sentimental emotionalism, as I saw it, of those who kept harping on the need for a personal decision. How thankful I am that one day God broke my pride, convicted me of my sin, made me realize I was estranged from God, and revealed to me Christ who had died and risen again to make a reconciliation possible. In faith I received him into my life and I was ‘born again.’

“I knew him, and I know him still!”

Religious Freedom

“One of the most zealously guarded traditions in America is the separation between church and state. Yet there are few nations in which religion exerts greater influence than it does in the United States,” according to a State Department Public Affairs official who examines some 257 religious publications each month.

Harry W. Seamans, Senior Organization Liaison Officer of Public Affairs and active layman in the Methodist Church, who addressed the recent National Association of Evangelicals Convention in Buffalo, New York, said religious freedom and religious influences depend and thrive upon church and state separation.

Only in this way, he said, “could the 268 religious denominations existing in the United States today feel secure that no government privilege will be extended to any one denomination above another.”

Seamans, who interprets State Department policy to representatives of religion who make inquiries, said, “The members of both houses of the U. S. Congress open each session with prayer. Every coin minted today for use is inscribed ‘In God we trust.’ These factors are brought out only to illustrate the extent to which the American government, basing its authority on the consent of the American people, is bound to be influenced indirectly, even without any concerted pressures directed against it, by organized religious groups. Religious influences may be even greater, of course, when various churches band together and deliberately exert pressure in behalf of a moral cause.”

Convention Quotes

“The Christians in Tibet don’t even know where New York is but they are praying for the Billy Graham Crusade because they know God is going to work there.” Dr. Robert Pierce, President of World Vision, Inc.

“In Washington, since establishing the (NAE) office 13 years ago, we have watched as our freedoms have been threatened. Our government has continued to grow until big government threatens to become, not a government for the people, but in place of the people.” Dr. Clyde W. Taylor, Secretary of Public Affairs, National Association of Evangelicals.

People: Words And Events

Christian Oscars—“Seventeen,” produced for Gospel Films, Inc., by Charles Peterman, wins Christian “Oscars” in four of 10 categories—best actress (Cheryl Lee Oppenhuizen), best direction (Ken Anderson and Ralph Papin), best musical score (Ralph Carmichael) and best soul winning film. Other bests by National Evangelical Film Foundation—best actor, Ray Collins, in “Unfinished Task,” Family Films, Inc.; best motion picture, “Unfinished Task;” best documentary, “Walking Middle East,” Bob Jones University; best missionary film, “Before the Harvest,” Word of Life; best educational film, “Crescent and the Cross,” Winona School of Theology; film with best sermon, “Facts of Faith,” Moody Institute of Science.

Alumni Giving—Moody Bible Institute Alumni, with $200,857 in 1956, ranks 14th among 165 other large private coeducational schools in giving to alma mater. Led by Columbia, Cornell, University of Chicago, New York University, Pennsylvania, Syracuse, Boston, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, Loyola, Marquette, Temple, Illinois Institute of Technology.

Separate News Items—Clare Booth Luce, wife of Henry R. Luce, editor of Time and Life, named by University of Notre Dame, to receive 1957 Laetare Medal, given annually to outstanding member of American Catholic Laity.… Henry R. Luce, criticizing separating religion from education in public schools, tells Presbyterian that “secular, agnostic education is the greatest problem facing the Christian Church today.”

Religious Studies—Rockefeller Foundation grants $140,000 to Missions Research Center of University of Chicago for a program of “interreligious studies.” University hopes to bring three experts to Chicago to teach Buddhism to students.

Up in Smoke—Tex McCrary, radio and television producer, unable to obtain representative of tobacco industry to engage in radio debate on smoking and health. Cancels proposed interview on National Broadcasting Company television with Dr. David M. Spain, member of study group that issued recent report warning of direct cause-and-effect relationship between smoking and lung cancer. “Will not be possible for us to participate,” says letter from Tobacco Industry Research Committee.

Link with Faith—Harry Denman, Nashville, Tenn., General Secretary of Methodist Board of Evangelism, following return from Russia, says “the many world-famous religious paintings still on display in Russian museums may be the one link with faith still possessed by the young people of that country.”

Gift from Widow—Mrs. Lillian M. Nelson, 73-year-old widow who has lived frugally all her life, gives Texas Baptists $100,000 in common stocks. Money to be used for missionary work in foreign lands. “If I can’t go to the foreign mission field,” she says, “it is my duty to make provision for those who can. I am obligated to see that the other person has the same opportunity of knowing Christ that I have had.” She and husband, Joseph Edward Nelson, both school teachers, bought no new cars, took few vacations and wore made-over clothes.

Baby-Sitting Fees—No arrangements for a nursery at the site of the 1957 Southern Baptist Convention in Chicago. Groups in charge of arrangements reveal that hotels in city provide “baby sitter” services for parents, but that rates are “very high.”

Deluge of Letters—Over 100 Congressmen received letters from Dr. J. R. Sneed, First Methodist Church, Los Angeles, asking that they press FCC for full investigation of radio station which announced intention of eliminating religious broadcasts. First Methodist program, broadcast since 1923, recently was discontinued.

Digest—Philippine station DYSR, church sponsored, to step up power from 10,000 to 100,000 watts. Will reach Indonesia, Burma, Thailand, East Pakistan, India and other countries.… Public Affairs Commission of Los Angeles Church Federation urges members to oppose state’s “loyalty oath” as threat to separation of Church-State.… Complete Bibles, Testaments, or Bible portions, now published in 1,109 languages.

Evans Honored

Dr. Louis H. Evans of Hollywood, Calif., minister-at-large for the Board of National Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., will receive the “Churchman of the Year” award from the Washington Pilgrimage on April 27.

William Harper Bryan, Baptist layman of St. Louis, Mo., will be named “Lay Churchman of the Year.” Mrs. W. Murdoch MacLeod of New York, general director of United Church Women, will receive the “Church Woman of the Year” award.

The citations will be presented at a dinner in Washington, D. C. during the three-day Pilgrimage which brings together churchmen from over the country to consider the implications of America’s religious heritage. Cecil B. DeMille, movie producer, will make the presentation to Dr. Evans.

The second annual Faith and Freedom Award in Journalism will be announced and presented at the dinner.

Speakers at Pilgrimage sessions will include Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, Senator Francis Case (R-S. D.) and Sir Hubert Wilkins, noted explorer.

A massed band concert at the Lincoln Memorial will commemorate addition of the words “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag. Another special ceremony will be held to make the 350th anniversary of the first American settlement at Jamestown, Va.

Dr. Evans formerly served as pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood. He now travels more than 40,000 miles a year, has filled 450 speaking engagements since 1953, and has written several widely-read books.

Mr. Bryan, president of the Associated General Hardware Company of St. Louis, is a trustee of Third Baptist Church there and has taught a Sunday School class since 1923. He has been prominent in St. Louis civic affairs.

Mrs. MacLeod has directed the work of United Church Women, a department of the National Council of Churches since 1948. Previously she was with the Board of Women’s Work, Presbyterian Church in the U. S.

The Issue: Freedom

“Only faith in God can turn back our plunge toward a totalitarian state.… What a travesty it is to see so many of our ministers, and laymen, too, running to Washington to obtain more laws to make more people subject to more government controls!”

These opinions were among those expressed recently by J. Howard Pew, noted industrialist and Presbyterian lay leader, in an address at Chicago to the National Council of Presbyterian Men in the U. S. A.

Mr. Pew, retired president of the Sun Oil Company and for years identified with the Presbyterian Foundation (U. S. A.) Board as a member and president, said, “Those of us who have given years of study to this problem, believe that our country has already gone far beyond the limit of safety.…”

He added:

“The Founding Fathers were students of history. They knew that every government throughout recorded history had eventually fallen into the absolute control of unprincipled men, who enslaved the people, confiscated their property and threw the objectors into jail.

“They knew, too, that many of the great minds throughout the world had for thousands of years been pointing out that Divine Law, Moral Law, commonly called Natural Law, must be basic to all man-made laws, if dictators were to be prevented from destroying the freedom of people.

And so our Founding Fathers gave to us a Declaration of Independence, a Constitution and a Bill of Rights, which virtually said to those who might eventually come into control of our government: ‘We the people are endowed by God with certain inalienable rights,’ and that this government was set up primarily for the purpose of protecting the people in the exercise of those rights. In effect it said to them: ‘We the people will handle our own human relations and control our own institutions.’

Answers To Prayer For Crusade

Preparation highlights for the Billy Graham New York Crusade, beginning May 15:

More than 1,500 cooperating churches.

► Telecasts—The Crusade Committee has announced that it is accepting the offer made by a major television network of one hour each Saturday night. The telecast will carry the meetings coast-to-coast from Madison Square Garden. The unusual opportunity, most challenging ever offered an evangelistic undertaking, will be available from the first Saturday in June through the duration of the Crusade. Each telecast will include sufficient time for a choir number, solo by George Beverly Shea, sermon by Graham and the accompanying invitation for commitments to Christ. Plans also call for nightly telecasts over a New York station to begin with the start of the Crusade.

► Counsellor training program—opening enrollment totaled 3,200, with peak enrollment of 4,500 reached at end of second week. (London’s peak was 2,300).

► Prayer—New York Radio Station WABC, flagship station of American Broadcasting Company network, utilized from 12:15 to 12:30 p.m., Monday through Friday. Effort joined by thousands in homes, apartments, business offices and factories. Amplified by world-wide program under guidance of Willis G. Haymaker.

► Ushers—more than 2,000 churchmen recruited to fill nightly need of 600 in big 19,000-seat Madison Square Garden.

► Choir—two complete choirs, each with 1,500 voices, being organized. One will sing Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and other to sing Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

► Associate evangelists—enlarged staff will join Dr. Graham in meeting need for scores of daily auxiliary meetings. Includes Grady Wilson and Leighton Ford of Graham team, the Rev. Joseph Blinco and the Rev. Stephen Olford of London, Dr. Paul S. Rees, First Covenant Church, Minneapolis; Howard Butt, layman-evangelist from Corpus Christi, Texas; Paul Little, former Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship staff member.

► Special speakers for pastors’ workshops—Dr. L. David Cowie, University Presbyterian Church, Seattle; Dr. Robert Boyd Munger, First Presbyterian Church, Berkeley, Calif.; the Rev. John Stott, All Souls’ Church, Langham Place, London and the Rev. Tom Allan, organizer of “Tell Scotland” movement, Glasgow.

► Group reservations—new high reached. Chartered trains, planes and buses already arranged from such distant points as Oklahoma City, Houston, Nashville, Richmond, Louisville, Detroit and Toronto.

“Today our courts and our politicians spurn Natural Law. They refuse to accept it as the basic law of our land.

“The issue is freedom, just as it was 180 years ago; and freedom can exist only in a state where the people generally accept honesty, truth, fairness, generosity, justice and charity as a rule for their conduct. If the people of a state accept bribery, guile, cupidity, deception and selfishness as a rule for their conduct, then the strong exploit the weak, might becomes right, and anarchy stalks the land. Freedom under such conditions for the individual is no longer possible.

“But honesty, truth, fairness, generosity, justice and charity are the attributes of Christianity. So if we would have individual freedom, we must first have faith in God. William Penn truly said: ‘Man will either be governed by God or ruled by tyrants.’

“The wearers of the cloth have long realized that religious freedom is of paramount importance if America is to remain great; but far too few of our ministers realize that religious freedom cannot exist in a collectivist state, because freedom is indivisible.

Thus, if we should lose our industrial freedom, then religious freedom, political freedom, and all other freedoms will certainly fall. Christ depended on the power of persuasion. He saw clearly that attitudes of the heart cannot be changed by coercion, law or penalty.

“When Christians lose faith in the message of Jesus and seek to reform society by the power of the state, they are in effect appealing from God to Caesar; they are resorting to force because they have lost faith in the power of their religion.…

“During the last hundred years, America has made far greater material progress than was previously achieved by the whole world during all recorded history. How did America accomplish so much in so little time?

“There seems to be only one answer to this question—individual freedom. Today most people are losing their interest in freedom because they are prejudiced in favor of certain objectives which deny the true concept of freedom.

“This is not a new subject. Lincoln was deeply concerned over it, for in 1864 in a speech to the American people he said:

“ ‘The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty, but in using the same word, we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men and the products of other men’s labor. Here are two not only different but incompatible things, called by the same name—liberty.’

“Lincoln believed that each man should control his own life and the product of his labor, provided that by so doing he did not infringe upon the rights of others.

This is the concept of liberty which was held by our Founding Fathers, who bequeathed to us the finest form of government ever conceived in the minds of men.

“Real liberty is the freedom of the individual to exercise his talents, his initiative, his ingenuity and his resourcefulness. It is freedom to be an individual. Bogus liberty is the freedom of the individual to have the security of a government bird cage.

“In 1790, John Philpot Curran, the great Irish patriot, said: ‘The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt.’ Now Curran did not invent that idea. He undoubtedly acquired it from the letters of Saint Paul and from the teachings of Christ himself.

“Saint Paul wrote: ‘Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.’ And again he wrote: ‘Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.’

“But it was Christ who taught us, saying: ‘If ye continue in my word … ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.’ ”

Religion At Harvard

A Harvard University student committee has urged that the study of religion be given a more prominent place in the liberal arts curriculum.

The committee’s recommendations were based on a survey of the state of religion at Harvard since 1954.

Sixty per cent of 150 undergraduates who answered a questionnaire replied that religion or faith was necessary to achieve a “fully mature” philosophy of life. Twenty-three per cent replied that it was not.

The report stressed that Harvard had “intensely religious” origins and traditions, which were broken by the rise of the 18th century rationalism and 19th century liberal unitarianism.

Birth Of Church

May, 1960, has been set as the time for the constituting convention of the new Lutheran Church that will emerge from the union of at least three, and possibly five, Lutheran denominations.

The target date for the birth of the new church was fixed by the Joint Union Committee of the Evangelical, American and United Evangelical Lutheran Churches.

These groups, committed to union by convention actions last year, may be joined by the Lutheran Free Church and the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (Suomi Synod). Both are scheduled to make decisions on merger this summer.

With more than 2,000,000 members, the proposed merged body will be known as “The American Lutheran Church” and will have its national headquarters in Minneapolis.

Far East Chaplains

Dr. L. Nelson Bell’s article on Korea, in the February 18 issue of CHRISTIANITY TODAY, mentioned that chaplains in the Korean and Chinese Nationalist armies are supported by their respective governments.

Information has now been received that the Indonesian and Philippine armies also have Protestant Chaplains assigned to their armed forces. Christians have expressed profound thanks for this significant development in the Far East.

Eutychus and His Kin: April 15, 1957

EASTER BUNNY THEOLOGY

“That ever popular personality—the Easter Bunny—again leads the Easter Parade … Added is the fact that he is truly an American Bunny—symbolizing the observance of another great American occasion. He suggests that you remember those you love—with Easter gifts—from Blank’s.”

This revealing bit of ad copy is classic Americana. The Easter Parade includes crowds of church-goers who for a single Sunday fill the pews with America’s church-membership statistics in the flesh. The Easter Bunny has led them there. Church attendance on Easter is part of another great American occasion for those dressed in Easter gifts from Blank’s.

The preacher may view the world’s best-dressed multitude with exhilaration, compassion or even with suspicion. He can scarcely welcome the Easter Bunny so many have followed to church.

Unless, of course, the Easter Bunny shares the pulpit.

Strangely enough, he is often found in churches thronged with Easter Bunny paraders. Easter Bunny preaching regards the resurrection of the body of Jesus as a myth, as a religious symbol for grown-ups, just as the Easter bunny is a symbol for the kiddies. The preacher is delighted on this occasion simply to dwell on the “life-affirming” meaning of Easter.

Which reminds me of Bultmann and an irreverent parody:

“Hark the herald angels sing,

‘Bultmann is the latest thing!’

At least they would if he had not

Demythologized the lot!”

For Easter we may more reverently parody the Apostle: “If Christ’s resurrection be a myth, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.…”

EUTYCHUS

THE CHURCH AND RACE

In all of his elucidation (?) on the segregation issue, Mr. Ellis forgot that simple prayer taught by Jesus: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Or is the “as” asinine?

ALBERT CRAMER

West Chicago, Ill.

To me Dr. Ellis’s article boiled down to the hateful doctrine that men of one race are better than men of another.… Pressure for integration will lessen on the day that a white man is hanged in Mississippi for the rape of a Negro girl or a white man is sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a Negro man.

DUFF TUCKER

Mt. Sterling Presbyterian Church

Mt. Sterling, Ill.

An integrated society will surely come—just as man evolved out of the ape (and with the same inevitable surety). When it comes the pathetic white aristocracy—the frightened southern intellectuals—(and if it does not lend more support than has been forthcoming, the church)—when it comes those forces which have opposed it will be evacuated in the process as so much historical waste material.…

LYMAN R. HARTLEY JR.

First Presbyterian Church

Yonkers, N. Y.

I sincerely hope you will never again publish such a dishonest and sacrilegious article.… It should be answered by an honest and religious person, regardless of whether he is a segregationist or integrationist.

FLETCHER BENNETT

Trinity Methodist Church

Superior, Wis.

How anyone today can defend segregation in a church paper is more than I can understand.

G. BARRETT RICH III

Fourth Presbyterian Church

New York City

Basically he (Dr. Ellis) is trying to defend and save face for the southern system. However, the issue is not one of voluntary integration or segregation. A more fitting term would be domination.… The Negro is kept separate because the white man wants to dominate him.… Christian or not?

HAROLD C. HOSLER

First Baptist Church

Norborne, Missouri

Personally, I think you have allowed your very fine magazine to be exploited by someone who is teaching in a northern college but in his heart lingers still the way of life his native state has so long endeared.…

ROBERT C. THOMAS

C. M. E. Temple Church

Shreveport, La.

Mr. Ellis … ignores certain facts. One fact is that when society has tolerated an evil for a long time there comes the inevitable period of revulsion … during which the evil is either controlled or erased.… To deny either the necessity for these “revolutions” or to blind oneself to the reasons for them is unrealistic.

Another fact that is ignored is that the Negro people, under the system of segregation, have been given neither equal opportunities nor equal rights in either the South or the North.… Consequently I’ll vote for integration and I’ll try to live up to my creed.

A third fact … is this, that segregation exists in the North, too.… Let’s just say that segregation of both the Southern and Northern variety have failed and that it is high time we realized this. Certainly the Kingdom of God cannot come if we refuse to make the correct appraisals of ourselves and of our systems.…

WILLIAM W. REILEY

The Methodist Church

Waterville, Ohio

The view expressed by Dr. Ellis … somewhat in the nature of a conclusion is one-sided. When he says New Testament Christianity implies that “the servant is no less a servant” … he is ignoring one of the finest declarations of the Christian ethic which the church possesses in the case of Onesimus … “not now … as servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved … both in the flesh and in the Lord.” My comment has little to do with the current agitation of either the integrationist or the segregationist, which is principally focused in the educational and social fields, but it is pertinently concerned with our attitude as believers toward fellow believers in the sphere of Christian fellowship and communion.…

ERLINC C. OLSEN

New York City

It is an untrue implication that integrationists exist only in places remote from the scenes of racial mingling. I speak as a Southerner by birth, rearing and education. I have pastored churches for seven years in the South and am now minister of a church in a town with a considerable Negro element. I am an integrationist, and the woods of the South are full of us.… I am no theological liberal.… But any serious study of the New Testament … tells us that segregation and New Testament Christianity have no common affinity.… If the conservative emphasis of Christianity prevails, and if the New Testament is ever taken seriously by the Church, the social picture of the South as we know it today, is doomed.

WILLIAM S. SMYTHE JR.

Tabor City Presbyterian Church

Tabor City, N. C.

It is difficult to restrain my amazement.… With physiological sciences, the U. S. Constitution and especially the Word of God all supporting the Christian concept of integration, just what do you expect to accomplish by publishing such an article?.… I cannot help wondering if your editorial on “The Church and the Race Problem” in the same issue was not written to correct some negative impressions your readers would invariably receive from the Ellis article …

DONALD K. BLACKIE

Hope Community Church

Los Angeles, Calif.

Dr. Ellis does an excellent job … on some rather interesting aspects of the segregation issue, but he leaves much to be said and says much that isn’t true.

ROBERT L. WENDT

Salem College

Winston-Salem, N. C.

While Dr. Ellis … makes many pertinent points … he has missed the chief issue involved, namely, that segregation in the South is by law with no freedom of choice given to the Negro who is the object of this discrimination.

Without drawing any distinction between such forced segregation and voluntary segregation, Dr. Ellis contends that segregation may be closer to the Christian pattern than integration. As an illustration …, he refers to a segregated housing unit in a community where race-relations were good. This is an excellent example of what voluntary segregation can accomplish but is far removed from the present situation in the South where no such freedom to choose exists. Consequently, such ideas have little meaning to either the Negro or White of the South.

It is quite probable that a large majority of the Negroes in both the North and South prefer voluntary segregation in many walks of life.… However, at present they are rebelling, and rightfully so, against being forced into this situation which is so humiliating and degrading to any human being.…

The excellent editorial of the same issue, “The Church and the Race Problem,” brings out this distinction but without this distinction in his article, Dr. Ellis’ contention that segregation can be a Christian pattern has no relevance to the present situation and seems decidedly foreign to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

E. T. CLARK JR.

Purcellville Baptist Church

Purcellville, Va.

I would like to commend the article Segregation and the Kingdom of God by Ellis. I feel he has properly stated the problem and has pointed out some fallacies in the usual approach.… I am getting weary of being classed as a second-class Christian because I am not willing to proclaim from the housetops that integration is the only religious way to solve the problem. I feel that unless some of the agitators on both sides show a little more of the spirit of love, we are in for a great deal of trouble.…

R. P. MARSHALL, Editor

North Carolina Christian Advocate

Greensboro, N. C.

As a Florida boy misplaced in the North and knowing the Negro, I cannot help but write a word of great praise for the article.… It really crystallizes my thought on the matter.…

RICHARD E. COLEMAN

First Evangelical U. B. Church

Flora, Ill.

Please allow me to commend … your editorial.… It is, on the whole, an excellent statement of the Christian position, with which I can disagree only in some minor respects.…

“Forced integration,” you say, “is as contrary to Christian principles as is forced segregation.” I would certainly agree that the use of compulsion to make anyone act against his will is contrary to Christian ethics. But here is a dilemma. In the status quo, such compulsion is heavily in force. Is not an equal or less-than-equal counter-force justified if it will rectify the situation? In the absence of more strictly Christian measures, allowing the issues to be decided in the secular realm by default, so to speak, this conclusion seems to me inescapable.… White people must decide whether theirs is a Church of Jesus Christ or merely a sanctimonious kind of exclusive social club, bearing the label “Christian church.”

WILLIAM ROBERT MILLER

Nyack, N. Y.

Dr. Ellis’s discussion of integration arising from a secular view of the Kingdom of God is excellent. His … distinction between segregation-in-practice and a segregation “equitably administered” will be missed by some people, but others of us appreciate it … Conscientious Christian people are being browbeaten by the crusaders who identify integration as “the Christian way.” If a person is not for them they brand him an enemy, and sneer at his Christian profession.…

C. E. NOTSON

Nyack, N. Y.

I appreciate the editorial “The Church and the Race Problem” very much …

JESSE L. GANN

Wilsonville Baptist Church

Wilsonville, Ala.

CHRISTIANITY IN CHINA

The Anglican Church in China does not accept the Marxist philosophy, and she can criticize the government so long as she avoids treasonable disloyalty. She has remained loyal to her Catholic principles, and the Chinese bishops affirmed their adherence to the “Lambeth Quadrilateral” by sending to us in Australia four symbolical gifts which I catalogue in their Scriptural order: a beautifully hand-printed scroll of the Nicene Creed in Chinese, a photograph of the seventeen Chinese bishops, a supply of wafer breads for every Australian Diocese to use at the Holy Communion, a copy of the Chinese Bible.… To these four essentials [the Apostles’ doctrine, the Apostolic ministry, the Sacraments, and the Bible] Christians of the Papal obedience have made one or more additions, while most Protestant grounds of Christians have subtracted one or more of them.

The Right Rev. C. E. B. MUSCHAMP

Bishop of Kalgoorlie

Bishopsbourne, Kalgoorlie,

Western Australia

• By way of comment on religious conditions in China, the opinion of our observers may be noted that, the situation is likely to remain indecisive until the government demands some simple act (such as incense and the shinto) which Christians may regard as a denial of Christ. Red China is striving to integrate its minorities into national life, and the Protestant church is viewed within this category. In the past, both evangelical and the more liberal missionaries denounced some evils of the old precommunist regime, and they cannot disown present-day corrections. The organized church appears to be independent of the government, in the sense that it is currently tolerated and ignored, and hence free compared to other societies, though not free as we count freedom. In contrast with the picture in eastern Europe, church leaders in China say from their pulpit and press that a person cannot be both a Christian and a Communist (the latter being defined as a member of the party in power, in contrast with the governed, or even with sympathizers). Christian workers who have been brainwashed have confessed to political faults; the government will not permit a religious issue. One source describes all who have confessed as “mental wrecks,” pointing out that a breakdown occurs several months after release. That the Communists evoked confessions from imprisoned Christians by means of torture seems not to have adversely impressed the visiting Anglican delegation from Australia. Nor did the party see or hear any of the underground.—ED.

LITURGICAL RENAISSANCE

The article of your columnist Eutychus entitled “Liturgical Revival” in your issue for March 18, 1957 is a flagrant example of irresponsible journalism. It is difficult for me to see how a discriminating person could attempt a satirical column on a subject which he neither understands nor evidently cares to examine objectively. Not everyone will find something of value in the contemporary liturgical renaissance in Christendom; however, a responsible critic would endeavor to gain some first hand knowledge of the matter at hand and attempt to appreciate its purposes before leveling his criticism.

As I understand the liturgical revival in contemporary Protestantism, interest in the nature and conduct of worship have followed upon our reconsideration of the nature of the Church and its character as a worshipping community. The liturgical revival has emphasized that worship is an action of the whole congregation gathered together to glorify God and to praise his holy name. Each person present, minister as well as layman, has his own proper and essential work, his liturgy, to perform in this corporate action of Christ’s Church. We are reminded that the Church may be defined in part as the congregation of faithful men in which the Word of God is preached and the sacraments ordained by Christ are administered. Those persons interested in the reform of worship are seeking to redress the balance which has been upset by our emphasis on preaching to the neglect, relatively speaking, of the sacraments, particularly Holy Communion. The church is defined by the word and the sacraments; our life in the church is impoverished if either of these two facets is slighted. This emphasis on word and sacrament is very good Protestant doctrine, as the writings of Luther, Calvin and Wesley will attest.

It seems to me that we honor God by worshipping him in the very best way we can—with honest architecture, tasteful and well performed music and the most fluent language which we can command. A dignified and orderly service in which the thoughts and emotions of the worshipping congregation are directed toward God entirely, without any distractions, is conducive to a joyful response to God. We do not come to church primarily to hear a great orator in the pulpit or to sing the songs we like to sing; we come to worship God. The appointments of a church, its arrangement and the kinds of things we do there depend in large measure upon the kind of God who has laid hold of us.

JOHN C. ENGLISH

Yale Divinity School

New Haven, Conn.

Doctrinal unity is a necessity to any true and lasting fellowship … But what are creeds or dogmas if they are not a real part of the life of the Church and expressed in the worship of the Church? Yet we find that worship, particularly liturgical worship, is belittled … This I cannot understand, for the liturgy is a true expression of what the Church believes to be true.…

The greater part of world wide Christianity worships liturgically. There is very little “free service” worship. The few church bodies and splinter groups that uphold the so-called “free service” are largely found in the United States. In reality … they have borrowed heavily from established church liturgy.…

RUSSEL WEBERG

Principal

First Luth. Elem. School

Compton, Calif.

Neither Rome nor the Middle Ages supplies the inspiration for the Liturgical Revival. It finds its inspiration in the earlier times … Rome allows too little participation for it to be truly liturgical.… Nor is the Liturgical Revival a movement for form without meaning but for meaning which is expressed by form … We do not believe that the real nature of worship is found until it is seen as an objective reality …

A. M. JONES

St. James A. M. E. Church

Goodman, Miss.

I will agree with the evangelicals that it is wrong to consider the tools of faith as ends in themselves. And it is a matter of internal church discipline on the part of the religious body involved, when its authorities discover a parson allowing his spiritual life to deteriorate to such an extent. However, God has given beauty to his world, and he has given power to men to make beautiful things … Why can’t evangelicals appreciate this?… “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them …”

FRANK W. MARSHALL JR.

St. Mark’s Episcopal

Newport, Vt.

CORRECTION

“… under the heading, “Claims Disputed,” you refer to me as the Roman Catholic Archdeacon of Halifax, York. I am not … a Roman Catholic. I am an ordained minister of the Church of England and … vicar of the Parish of Halifax as well as Archdeacon of Halifax.”

ERIC TREACY

• CHRISTIANITY TODAY regrets this error in identification.

AMERICAN THEOLOGY

In response to Mr. Wurth’s hopes (“Theological Climate in America,” Feb. 18) for a decline of liberalism in America: I am praying that Protestantism in Holland may have a resurgence of spiritual power, such as produced its greatest theologians, Hugo Grotius and Jacobus Arminius.

J. NOBLE ATKINS

Union Church (Christian, Methodist, Presbyterian)

Grandfalls, Tex.

The writer … speaks of “the so-called” social gospel and Rauschenbusch in a way that proves he has gone into the far country and left every bit of his objectivity at home. I first came in touch with Rauschenbusch in 1899 when I took up study in Rochester.… His social theology was deeply rooted in the grace of the Triune God and the redemptive need of man and human society. However, the other was: personal salvation and as a consequent obligation, social action. The Kingdom of God was the framework of and the end of any and all social action. But to him the Kingdom of God was a spiritual realm, not an earthly paradise.…

F. J. MONSCHKE

Alhambra, Calif.

LIBERALISM AS A MIRROR

Modernism was just one more expression of basic world evil—the motive of proud, assertive self-sufficiency—and … this motive can express itself quite as dangerously in the ideas of the philosopher as in the vices of the prodigal. World evil wears a hundred different masks; its motivation alone is constant.… There are two great motives continually confronting each other within history—the motive of humble, aspiring trust outside one’s self in the grace of the infinite Other; the motive of proud, assertive self-sufficiency.… The moment the high motive is relaxed, the low motive will be expanded. This is the tragedy of the first half of the twentieth century; and only a great moral deepening of life and thought can save the second half.

HAROLD PAUL SLOAN

Browns Mills, N. J.

Dr. Rule’s article … is very interesting. However, his assumption that “It would be ungenerous and presumptuous to deny the genuine Christian status of all of these liberals, yet their thinking certainly was seriously out of harmony with Christian truth” is a dangerous one. Can we so facilely separate what a man is and what he believes?.… I attended a seminary where many students and professors were liberals … They were often good men and great thinkers, but they are humanists and not Christians.

PAUL B. MCCARDEL

First Congregational Church

Woodhaven, New York

In his excellent analysis of the sources of “liberalism” Professor Rule’s acceptance of apostolic Christianity is strangely lacking in apostolic execration of those who destroy men’s faith.…

ELBERT D. RIDDICK

Church of the Good Shepherd

Portland, Ore.

A WORD IN SEASON

Ralston Smith’s discerning tribute to Clarence Edward Macartney and Dr. Macartney’s classic sermon, “Come Before Winter,” reawakened my own memories of this preacher who was both great and good. Two months before he died I had occasion to thank him again for the encouragement he gave me through letters when I was a student at Houghton College and am grateful that events so conspired that I was motivated to write him “before Winter.”

KENNETH L. WILSON

Managing Editor

Christian Herald

New York City

Many have come to know Dr. Clarence E. Macartney through his long life of outstanding speaking and writing, but it was my privilege to know him best as he neared the gates of death. The last year, and especially the last few months of his life, were filled with much pain and suffering. Many a martyr to the Christian faith has suffered less, but he stood stedfast unto the end. One of his last statements to close relatives was, “Tell them that the anchor still holds”.… It is one thing to live well, it is another thing to die well.… Here was a man of great and strong character who finished his course with colors flying.…

FRANK H. LATHOM

College Hill Reformed Presbyterian Church

Beaver Falls, Pa.

A SORE THUMB

The quote from Harry Emerson Fosdick stuck out like a sore thumb. I could not help thinking that he would deny the substance of all the articles that the magazine contains … The cause of Christianity owes absolutely nothing to Fosdick. This is one thing in which I feel that the Lord would not be pleased.…

J. M.

Washington, D. C.

• The issue quoting from Dr. Fosdick’s The Living of These Days contained a critical review of that book. But the concern for the individual in the throng was an emulable emphasis of Dr. Fosdick’s ministry, and evangelical churchmen do well not to neglect it. The fine art of avoiding blanket condemnation is an almost vanished art today. The companion quotation alongside that from Dr. Fosdick, should have put the discerning reader on guard against considering the quotation itself as an endorsement of Dr. Fosdick’s vapid theology.—ED.

GOSPEL ON RADIO

Congratulations on your editorial on “The Scramble for Radio-TV” … I am vitally interested in keeping the air free so the Churches of our Lord may purchase time …

MALLOY OWEN

Greenville, N. C.

Every religious broadcast dependent upon the free will gifts of the listening audience should be required by law to furnish, at regular intervals, a complete financial statement to every contributor.…

CARLTON L. MYERS

Riverside Baptist Church

Baltimore, Md.

OPPOSITION TO EVANGELISM

Your editorial … showed the ridiculous bias of your mind against the “separatists.” The vitriolic language was wholly unnecessary.… I am one who still believes that God can get His gospel preached without the aid of liberals of any stripe. We do not do evil that good may come.

JOHN J. MCCALL

The Baptist Tabernacle

South Belmar, N. J.

I believe in evangelism whether it is carried on by Billy Graham or John Smith. We are a far cry from the enthusiasm displayed by the liquor and cigarette industries, in advertising our wares.

WESLEY A. MOORE

Edgecombe Junior Academy

Baltimore, Md.

I gasp and grasp at the learned dissertations in your wonderful new medium.… Wish it were all as simple as Billy Graham’s preaching.

RUTH MURDOCK

Houston, Tex.

I defy anyone to prove that Jesus Christ accepted money and … close fellowship, and cooperation of the Pharisees and Sadducees … Jesus preached unsponsored. Jesus preached against these men, calling them by name!

W. C. MELOON

First Baptist Church

Harmony, Me.

Theology

Bible Text of the Month: 1 Peter 1:3

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1 Peter 1:3).

It is a cold lifeless thing to speak of spiritual things upon mere report: but they that speak of them as their own, as having share and interest in them and some experience of their sweetness, their discourse of them is enlivened with firm belief and ardent affection; they cannot mention them but their hearts are straight taken with such gladness, as they are forced to vent in praises. Thus our apostle here breaks forth into thanksgiving.—BISHOP R. LEIGHTON.

Blessed—A form consecrated to God alone, a completely different word from the blessed of the Beatitudes; and differing from the blessed of the Virgin Mary in that this form implies that blessing is always due on account of something inherent in the person, while the other only implies that a blessing has been received. The idea of blessing God (literally, speaking Him well, Ps. 110:3) is, of course, wholly Hebrew.—BISHOP C. J. ELLICOTT.

God is here blessed, as is frequently the case in the Epistles of Paul, not only as the Father but also as the God of Jesus Christ. Only in Christ and through him do all find and possess God. The paternity points to the eternal generation out of the being of God, (Ps. 2:3) and to the intimate relation to the Incarnate Son.—J. P. LANGE.

Abundant mercy. The idea is, that there was great mercy shown them in the fact that they were renewed. They had no claim to the favour, and the favour was great. Men are not begotten to the hope of heaven because they have any claim on God, or because it would not be right for him to withhold the favour.—ALBERT BARNES.

Born To New Hope

And for Christ’s death; even that also will not save you, without this new begetting; and the text will warrant this too. For consider but this, that he rose again as well as died. Now as he died for the pardoning of your sins, so he rose again to regenerate and beget you again.—THOMAS GOODWIN.

The hope of the Christian is a living hope, in opposition both to a dead and a dying hope—in opposition to the dead hope of the hypocrite, and the dying hope of the self-deceiver.—JOHN BROWN.

Without being converted there is no hope of this inheritance. You may have a dead hope, a false hope, that will deceive you, but not a lively hope. Is any man so fond as to hope for a crown that was not born to it? How then can we hope for heaven, if we have not the new birth, God’s image, to show for it?—THOMAS GOODWIN.

As Christ’s resurrection was the first step unto his glory, and to that exaltation that followed his resurrection, so regeneration is the foundation and first step unto all those privileges of a Christian that follow upon the state of grace.—THOMAS GOODWIN.

Resurrection Of Jesus

The resurrection of the Lord Jesus is the foundation of our hope. It was a confirmation of what he declared as truth when he lived; it was a proof of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul; it was a pledge that all who are united to him will be raised up.—ALBERT BARNES.

The resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ is one of the most striking and satisfactory proofs of the divinity of his mission, and, of course, of the truth of all its doctrines; and, among the rest, of that grand characteristic doctrine of his gospel on which the hope of eternal life is founded.—JOHN BROWN.

The oneness of believers with Christ is the explanation of the connection between his resurrection and theirs. It is because Christ and they are one by faith, that his resurrection involves theirs, and their resurrection is of the same kind as his. They are themselves in him; and their resurrection consequently is also in him. His resurrection is theirs.—ROBERT S. CANDLISH.

There is an intimate connection between the saint’s resurrection and that of Jesus Christ. The simple re-union of their souls and bodies, is not to be considered as the effect of his mediation, because the same thing will take place with respect to the wicked; and of all opinions none is more absurd than that of certain Divines, who have maintained, that the general resurrection is a privilege which Christ has procured for mankind in general by his death. To the wicked the resurrection is not a privilege, but a curse; it is not the effect of the goodness, but of the avenging justice of God. What the saints owe to his mediation is a happy resurrection, the change of tremendous evil into an unspeakable blessing.—JOHN DICK.

It is the Gospel alone that gives the well-grounded hope of eternal life; and the ground on which this hope rests is the resurrection of Christ himself. The certainty of our Lord’s resurrection is the great seal of the Gospel. The resurrection of the human nature of Christ, the incontestable proofs of this resurrection and the ascension of our nature to heaven in his person, are such evidences of the possibility and certainty of the thing, as forever to preclude all doubt from the hearts of those who believe in him.—ADAM CLARKE.

That he died manifests his love and his willingness to save. It is his rising again that manifests his power and his ability to save. We cannot be saved by a dead Christ, who undertook but could not perform, and who still lies under the Syrian sky, another martyr of impotent love. To save, he must pass not merely to but through death. If the penalty was fully paid, it cannot have broken him, it must needs have been broken upon him. The resurrection of Christ is thus the indispensable evidence of his completed work, of his accomplished redemption. It is only because he rose from the dead that we know that the ransom he offered was sufficient, the sacrifice was accepted, and that we are his purchased possession. In one word, the resurrection of Christ is fundamental to the Christian hope and the Christian confidence.—B. B. WARFIELD.

Ideas

The Word Of God Will Not Be Bound

Creation and preservation, revelation and redemption, resurrection and judgment: in all these the agent is Jesus Christ, the Word of God. This eternal Word of God cannot be bound.

This eternal Word of God is sovereign. Lord of nature and of man, he encompasses the cosmos with his purpose, “upholding all things by the word of his power” (Heb. 1:3), Throughout the far-flung galaxies his mighty hand of creation, his pierced hand of redemption, his waiting hand of judgment, probes the destinies of men and of nations. This eternally sovereign Word of God cannot be bound.

This eternally sovereign Word of God is incarnate. “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). “In him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9). This one who was seen and heard and handled of men, “who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification” (Rom. 4:25) is still incarnate: raised and exalted to the Father’s right hand he ever liveth to make intercession “in the presence of God for us” (Heb. 9:24). This incarnate Word of God cannot be bound.

“I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending (saith the Lord) which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty” (Rev. 1:8).

“I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life” (John 8:12).

“I am the living bread which cometh down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world” (John 6:51). “Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day” (John 6:40).

“I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep” (John 10:11). “And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand” (John 10:28).

“I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this? (John 11:25 f.).

This Word of God written lives and abides forever: It cannot be bound.

Atheism and skepticism may darken the spiritual skies, but only for a season. Communism and secularism may flaunt their challenge at the face of God, but only for a season. Critics may scissor the Scriptures to myth and legend; science may fling the supernatural from its laboratories; industry may scrap the Word of God as a poor risk; society may dismiss him as an embarrassment; governments may unseat him as superfluous—but only for a season.

The eternal and sovereign Word of God, and the Word of God written, keep shining in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overwhelm them. The Word is not, will not, cannot be bound.

Citadels of heathendom crumble before his power. Tinged even in our day with the blood of martyrs, the onflowing stream of missionary endeavor inundates satanic demons of superstition, fear and despair with the Word of God. Unleashed are the purifying floods of love, of hope and of a sound mind. The Word of God bursts the bonds of heathendom. It cannot, it will not be bound.

The vagaries of philosophy, the conceits of learning, must quake at his voice. The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God (1 Cor. 3:19). “He takes the wise in their own craftiness” (Job 5:13). But to the despised, and foolish, who have ears to hear, Christ the Word of God is made wisdom. With the foolishness of God that is wiser than men, they confound the wise. In their weakness they confound the mighty.

The imprisoning subtleties of unregenerate learning must yield before the Word of God that “is quick and powerful … a discerner (critic) of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Heb. 4:12). He cannot, he will not be bound.

All of civilization itself, even in its historical magnitude of centuries upon centuries, cannot restrain the Word of God; indeed, it is preserved by the Word, often unknown to itself, for a higher calling than it owns. Before him who ordained the peoples of the world into his created universe; before him who has temporarily yielded earthly government into the self-seeking and warring hands of men, all nations of the world shall bow, kings and queens shall bow, every knee shall bow. “Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing” (Isa. 40:15). “All nations are before him as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity” (Isa. 40:17). “Have ye not known? have ye not heard?… It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in: That bringeth the princes to nothing; he maketh the judges of the earth as vanity” (Isa. 40:21 ff.).

But of the increase of government and peace of the Word of God, sovereign, incarnate, coming again, there shall be no end. He will “establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever … the government shall be upon his shoulder” (Isa. 9:6 f.). This Word of God cannot, will not be bound. The times and the seasons are at his command.

This triumphant Word of God is the risen Christ. Crucified, sealed in a guarded tomb, he could not be bound, could not be holden, as the King James version quaintly expresses it, (even) of death. Christ is risen. As Paul, the aged apostle, exhorted young Timothy: “Remember that Jesus Christ … was raised from the dead … the Word of God is not bound” (2 Tim. 2:8 f.).

In the Easter issue of Reader’s Digest, Dr. Clarence Hall contributes a moving article, “You Can’t Hold Back the Dawn.” He recalls the pre-dawn darkness at the Garden Tomb in Jerusalem, where the sun broke suddenly over the horizon, casting the dawn’s bright halo over a party of Easter worshippers singing anthems. The article emphasizes Christianity as a religion of an empty tomb and of the dawn. The amazing refrain, “Jesus is alive,” sounded by the apostles to the world of their day, echoes to our own century, accompanied by victories that Jesus continues to work, for he is “the man who would not stay dead.”

“There is something familiar,” Dr. Hall writes, “about the account of Pilate’s attempt to shut Christ away in a tomb. It has happened in every age.” Dr. Hall ventures to ask whether, in our dark day, the Christian faith is to be written off as a failure. And in reply he casts this glance at some of its achievements:

“It has fought and won over slavery in all its forms.… It has shaken the systems of caste and class.… It has produced and fostered the finest in art, music, literature.… It has marched along with the explorers and pioneers, helping to open up new frontiers.… It has gone into every field of human distress.… It has brought the laboring man up from contempt and bondage.… It has elevated womanhood, abolished infanticide, ennobled marriage.… It has authored the freedom of man, has been—and still is—the guardian and sentinel of liberty.…

“The God of Easter is forever coming out of the tombs in which evil forces try to confine him.… A resurrection dawn is coming—and nothing can hold it back.… Easter is the birthday of vibrant hope for the individual. It is also a terrible warning to every evil power that preys on mankind—a warning that says that truth is again breaking out of its tomb.”

What glorious reason for the Christian church to take heart in this time of tyranny and trouble! “You can’t hold back the dawn.” Indeed! Christ is risen. Who can extinguish the Light of the world? The Word of God will not be bound.

In an era of foreign missions when doors once open to Western missionaries are unmistakably closing, native converts are going as missionaries to distant lands. National churches in India, for example, are sponsoring missionaries to Africa.

Today in Ecuador five widows of five martyred missionaries glory rather than grieve in God’s way of reaching the Auca Indians.

Hostility to biblical supernaturalism emanating over the years from naturalistic influences at Columbia University Teachers’ College, and even from religious circles, would seem to have immunized New York City against evangelical Christianity. Yet on May 15 Billy Graham proclaims the Gospel in Madison Square Garden.

Abroad and at home, in silent jungles and in teeming cities, the Light is shining in the darkness and the darkness cannot overwhelm it. The Word of God will not be bound.

Is The Elder Brother Also A Prodigal?

An ever increasing number of ministers turn to the Scriptures for normative theological knowledge and inspiration for preaching. Dissatisfied with the husks of Liberalism they turn to the milk and meat of the revealed Gospel. This calls for merriment and rejoicing in the Father’s House. The joyful welcome, however, is often marred by grumbling and even animosity on the part of the elder brother. Suspicious and unforgiving, he would deny a joyful reception to the prodigal.

Although the repentance may be genuine, evidence of the sojourn in the far country may still cling to the prodigal. Biblical knowledge, theological discernment, practical application of the Gospel may not measure up to exacting standards. The Father, however, hastens to clothe and feed. He wastes no time in bitter criticism.

The resentful elder brother must engage in intensive soul searching. A true son of God manifests the spirit of the Father. Like the Father he must hasten to welcome those who turn away from the husks of error. The real prodigal may be the elder brother who refuses to show a forgiving spirit.

Theology

The Resurrection

Gordon H. Clark

The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, or, if you wish, the alleged resurrection, is the most stupendous miracle on record. A dead body’s resumption of life, walking out of its tomb, eating and talking with its former friends for a period of forty days is a series of events that we do not experience very frequently. No wonder the foes of Christianity doubt it and pseudo-Christians spiritualize it.

Power Of Hume’s Argument

No one since the time of David Hume has argued more powerfully against the resurrection than he. Therefore it is not amiss to begin with a reconsideration of Hume.

Suppose, he says, that all historians should agree that on January 1, 1600, Queen Elizabeth died, and that after being interred a month she again appeared, resumed her throne and governed England another three years. Hume confesses that the agreement of all the witnesses on so many details would puzzle him. He would be compelled to believe that Elizabeth had died, he would have to accept the public circumstances that followed for three years, but far from having the least inclination to believe so miraculous an event, he would assert that the resurrection was merely pretended and could not possibly have been real. If, further, this alleged miracle were made a part of some religion, this very circumstance would be full proof of a cheat and would induce all men of good sense to reject it without examination.

The arguments against the possibility of miracles from the viewpoint of scientific mechanism are too intricate for the present discussion, and as a matter of fact Hume remains pretty well within the limits of ordinary observation. But if anyone think that the broader questions of competitive world views are more difficult for a Christian to answer, and that therefore their omission here is a sign of weakness, it can un-embarrassingly be asserted that scientific mechanism does not enjoy the widespread acceptance it did fifty years ago. And when it comes to a particular miracle, such as the resurrection of Christ, the range of Hume’s procedure is satisfactory.

Some of Hume’s argumentation can be immediately dismissed because it begs the question. He assumes, for example, that any religious claim is automatically to be regarded as erroneous. Historians and travelers may mix truth and untruth, but religious stories are pure, unmixed falsehoods. When, further, he writes, “It is a miracle that a dead man should come to life, because that has never been observed in any age and country,” and when he continues, “There must therefore be a uniform experience against every miraculous event,” it is clear that he is using for proof the very conclusion he wishes to prove. Obviously, one who maintains the resurrection of Christ cannot allow as a premise the assertion that in no age or country has a dead man ever come to life. To the extent that Hume’s argument depends on such infelicitous assumptions, it is definitely weakened.

Improbability And Probability

Aside from such material Hume insists that miracles are improbable. This may well be granted in the sense that the number of miracles, or alleged miracles, is much less than the number of ordinary occurrences. Of course, miracles are admittedly rare. But this admission does not imply the improbability of miracles in another sense. For although the probability of a miraculous occurrence at a random time and place is very small, yet the universe may be so constituted that the probability of a miracle’s occurrence at some time or other is very great. This possibility Hume neglected to discuss, except insofar as he works out elsewhere a nontheistic world view.

Hume continues by listing the suspicious circumstances of several miracles individually and then manages to produce the impression that the list as a totality applies to each. He remarks that all experience is fallible, and secondhand experience is more so; witness cannot be trusted and many alleged miracles are frauds. The more unusual the story, the less probable it is; yet it is the more believed because mankind enjoys tall tales. Then, further, he argues that since there is as much testimony for a miracle of one religion as for a miracle of another religion, and since all evidence in favor of one is evidence against the other, the witnesses for miracles cancel each other out, just as the witness in court who supports an alibi cancels out the witness who identifies the accused.

Flaw In Hume’S Logic

Aside from the fact that the last consideration is not the precise truth, for courts constantly manage to decide between alibis and identifications, yet the cumulative force of such a listing of objections is considerable. However, examination will show that the force is more psychological than logical. To the extent that it drives a Christian to produce detailed evidence in support of the resurrection, it cannot be disallowed. But with whatever literary repetition Hume embellishes his account, he is only begging the question again when he concludes, “no testimony for any kind of miracle has ever amounted to a probability, much less to a proof.” In effect he says, no miracle has a sufficient number of competent and honest witnesses in its favor. Thus by a series of selected examples and by a hasty generaliza tion, he hopes to avoid the responsibility of a serious historical examination of the resurrection of Christ. In spite of his reference to Queen Elizabeth—and note that he fails to explain the testimony of the historians—Hume has not studied the resurrection. His argument in reality is an argument against miracles as such, and it is only from the impossibility of any and all miracles that he deduces the falsity of the resurrection.

As was said above, Hume’s argument that miracles are impossible begs the question. He assumes the point in dispute. And particularly in view of his philosophical empiricism, Hume should have first proved that the resurrection did not occur, then that another alleged event had not occurred, and so on, and then only at the end should have concluded that there is “a uniform experience against every miraculous event.” Is it not reasonable, therefore, and all the more evidently reasonable in view of the later Hegelians’ attempt to rewrite history according to a preconceived pattern—is it not reasonable, therefore, to insist that the actual events be determined first and that the theory be made to conform to them?

The demand that the resurrection, or the alleged resurrection, itself be examined rather than ruled out beforehand has a facet that may go far to explain why its opponents rest their case on a general nontheistic argument against miracles as such. In the examination of any particular event the person who decides that the event did not occur is under obligation to give an alternate account of the history in question. Hume, as noted above, would have had to explain the alleged resurrection of Elizabeth and the remarkable agreement of the historians. Or, as a more modern example, anyone who wished to deny that Hitler committed suicide in Berlin would have to produce evidence that he escaped to Bavaria, Argentina or some other definite place. So too those who refuse to believe that Christ rose from the dead are under logical compulsion to give an alternate account of what happened. This turns out to be so embarrassing that Hume’s procedure is psychologically understandable.

Undeniable Historical Facts

What, then, happened? Well, it can hardly be denied, even by the most violent opponent of Christianity, that the Christian church happened. In the first century there were groups of people who believed, preached and were persecuted for the name of Jesus Christ. Second, it can hardly be denied that these people, who at first were mostly Jews, held their worship services on the first rather than on the seventh day of the week. These Christians claimed—their claim cannot be denied—that they did these things because Christ had conquered death, had risen from the tomb, and had been seen by five hundred of them. If now these claims are not true, in what manner may the undeniable history be accounted?

This is the question that is so embarrassing for the unbelievers, and it is embarrassing because their method precludes a consistent answer.

Historians And The Records

For example, Ernest Renan, whose Life of Jesus went through more than 140 editions, claims to be a scientific historian: “J’avais fait mon livre avec la froideur absolue de l’historien.… L’histoire est une science comme la chimie.” In this role he asserts that “the evangelists themselves, who have bequeathed to us the portrait of Jesus, are so far below the one of whom they speak, that they constantly disfigure him.… Their writings are full of errors and misunderstandings.… [they] do not understand, [they] substitute their own ideas for those they only partly grasp” (Chapter XXIII). But if the documents are so faulty, how can an objective and scientific historian conclude that the belief in the resurrection was the result of Mary Magdalene’s hallucinations? The end of chapter XXVI in the original edition says, “the strong imagination of Mary Magdalene here enacted a principal part. Divine power of love! sacred moments in which the passion of an hallucinated woman gives to the world a resurrected God.” The later editions have deleted this chapter, but retain an anticipation of the idea in chapter VIII.)

In view of the utter unreliability of the Gospels, how could historian Renan objectively assert that Mary Magdalene is the source of the resurrection stories? Why could it not have been Peter?

As a matter of fact, this claim has been made. Arthur Cushman McGiffert, who has a much better claim to the title of historian than Renan ever had, vaguely traces the Church’s belief in the resurrection to some unrecorded, unknown experience of Peter (The Apostolic Age, pp. 37–38 n. 3; pp. 48, 55–56); and to this McGiffert joins Paul’s visions of a spirit—not a man of flesh and blood, but a heavenly apparition (ibid., p. 126), thus emptying the word “resurrection” of its essential significance.

Now, obviously, these and all other alternate theories conflict with the written reports. The substitution of visions for a resurrection, whether they be Mary’s visions or Peter’s, conflicts with the evidence of the empty tomb. Is the account of the empty tomb therefore to be deleted as one of the numerous errors? But if the tomb, so carefully sealed and guarded at the insistence of the Pharisees, was not empty, would not those implacable enemies of Christ have exhibited the body and silenced the disciples? On the contrary, they bribed the soldiers to say that the disciples had stolen the body—at least so the record reports. Is this too an error, perhaps a fabrication of the authors? The story that the Pharisees are said to have invented cannot be true because it implies that the disciples suffered martyrdom for a gospel they knew to be false. Since the story cannot be true, we cannot, by reason of the same implication, suppose that the disciples invented the story and put it into the mouths of the Pharisees. Hence at least this part of the account must be true. But if this part is true, the tomb was empty and the Pharisees knew it.

How much then of the gospel account is true? It cannot be all false. Could Caesar’s Gallic Wars contain many true statements and the Gospels none?

No Consistent Alternative

One way to distinguish the true from the false would be to construct a satisfactory alternate theory. But this attempt has failed. Hume did not really try. Renan and McGiffert give impossible reconstructions. A still more radical writer, Corliss Lamont (The Illusion of Immortality, pp. 153 ff.), mentions several alternate theories and allows his readers to take their choice. This procedure follows a famous case at law. A man was sued for damaging a crock he had borrowed. The defendant offered three watertight defenses: first, when he returned the crock it was not cracked; second, the crock was already cracked when he borrowed it; third, he had never borrowed it.

The alternate theories—the vision theory, the swoon theory, the deliberate falsehood theory, of which one but not three may be chosen—fail to account for the later undeniable history. None of them can construct a consistent story.

The explanation of their failure lies in the fact that none of these theories results from an honest attempt to discover whether or not the resurrection actually occurred. They all proceed upon the hypothesis that miracles are impossible. Thus a nontheistic world view is made the criterion of history. Instead of examining the world to obtain a world view, the unbelievers use their world view to construct the history of the world. And the history they construct is self-contradictory.

But if the Gospel narratives are accepted as true, then (1) we have a self-consistent story, (2) the subsequent events are satisfactorily explained, and (3) redemption has been accomplished by Jesus Christ the Lord. Otherwise our faith is vain and we are yet in our sins.

Few Protestant scholars today are at home both in the history of theology and the history of philosophy. Gordon H. Clark is among the few. His writings, for that reason, bridge the chasm in the intellectual outlook of the mid-century man. He is Chairman of the Department of Philosophy in Butler University. His latest book, Thales to Dewey, appeared in January.

- More from Gordon H. Clark

Cover Story

Calvary Hill

Dorothy L. Sayers

Sequence 1 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

THE EVANGELIST: And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the robbers, one on the right hand and the other on the left.

1ST SOLDIER: Whew!… well, that’s two of ’em.

2ND SOLDIER: That Gestas is a sturdy rogue. We had to break his fingers to make him open his fists.

3RD SOLDIER: Yes—he put up a stiff fight. You’ll have a black eye, Corvus.

(Laughter)

1ST SOLDIER(vindictively): He’ll ache for it. We strung him out tight as a bowstring.

2ND SOLDIER: Come on, come on, let’s have the next … got him stripped?

3RD SOLDIER: Yes. Here you are.

4TH SOLDIER: This one won’t give trouble.

3RD SOLDIER: Dunno about that. He wouldn’t drink the myrrh and vinegar.

1ST SOLDIER: Why not?

3RD SOLDIER: Said he wanted to keep his head clear.

1ST SOLDIER: If he thinks he can make a get-away——

4TH SOLDIER: Ah! he’s only crazy. (Persuasively) Here, my lad—don’t be obstinate. Drink it. It’ll deaden you like. You won’t feel so much.… No?… Well, if you won’t you won’t.… You’re a queer one, ain’t you?… Come on, then, get down to it.

1ST SOLDIER(whose teiwper has been soured by the black eye): Kick his feet from under him.

2ND SOLDIER: No need. He’s down … Take the feet, Corvus.

1ST SOLDIER: Stretch your legs. I’ll give you king of the Jews.

2ND SOLDIER: Hand me the mallet.

JESUS: Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they are doing.

(His voice breaks off in a sharp gasp as the mallet falls. Fade out on the dull thud of the hammering)

Sequence 2 (The High Priest’s House)

NICODEMUS: Is your mind at ease about this matter, my Lord Caiaphas?

CAIAPHAS: Why not, Nicodemus?

NICODEMUS: I will not argue with you about the person of Jesus. His attitude at his trial has shaken me. I was ready to believe him a great teacher, a great prophet, perhaps the Messiah. I can do so no longer. He has claimed to be the Son of God—not in a figure, but literally—the right hand of the power and equal partner in the glory. That is either an appalling blasphemy, or else a truth so appalling that it will not bear thinking of.

CAIAPHAS: Are you saying that it might be truth?

NICODEMUS: I dare not. For in that case, what have we done? We have conspired in some unimaginable manner to judge and murder God.

CAIAPHAS: Just so. You have only to state the case to expose its absurdity. God is one, and God is spirit. Do you think there is a host of gods and half-gods walking the earth, and subject to human fraility, as in the disgusting fables of the heathen?

NICODEMUS: No.

CAIAPHAS: Then what have you to object to? Or you, Joseph of Arimathaea?

JOSEPH: Not the deed so much as the manner of it. Was it necessary, most Venerable, to lick the feet of Rome in public? admit the sovereignty of Caesar?

NICODEMUS: Was it wise to threaten Pilate with the Emperor? The power you invoked against Rome was still Rome.

JOSEPH: There is but one way with Rome—to slam the door against her; for let her squeeze in so much as a finger, and she will follow with the whole arm, till Jewry is no longer Jewry.

CAIAPHAS: Joseph and Nicodemus, let me tell you something. Jewry has gone for ever. The day of small nations is past. This is the age of empire. Consider. All through our history we have tried to slam that door. Jewry was to be a garden enclosed—a chosen race, a peculiar people. But the door was opened. By whom?

NICODEMUS: In the strife between the sons of Alexander, when Hyrcanus appealed to Rome.

CAIAPHAS: True. That strife brought us Herod the Great—the creature of Rome, who for thirty years held Jewry together in his gauntlet of iron. And when he died, what? New strife,—and the partition of Israel, with Pilate the Roman made Governor of Judaea. Under Herod a tributary nation; after Herod, three tributary provinces. With every Jewish quarrel, Rome takes another stride. One stride—two strides—the third will be the last.… I have killed this Jesus who would have made more faction; but for one pretender crucified, fifty will arise.… One day, the Zealots will revolt and the sword will be drawn against Caesar. Then the ring of fire and steel will close about Jerusalem; then the dead will lie thick in the streets, and the tramp of the Legions will be heard in the inner Sanctuary of the Temple. I, Caiaphas, prophesy.

JOSEPH(impressed): What would you have us do?

CAIAPHAS: Accept the inevitable. Adapt yourselves to Rome. It is the curse of our people that we cannot learn to live as citizens of a larger unit. We can neither rule nor be ruled; for such the new order has no place. Make terms with the future while you may, lest in all the world there be found no place where a Jew may set foot.

JOSEPH: Strange. You echo the prophecies of Jesus. But he, I think, would have enlarged the boundaries of Israel to take in all the world. “They shall come,” he said, “from east and west and sit down in the Kingdom of God.” Samaritans, Romans, Greeks—he received them all.… Is it possible that he saw what you see, and would have chosen to fling the door wide open? Not to exclude, but to include? Not to lose Israel in Rome, but to bring Rome into the fold of Israel?

NICODEMUS(shocked): Impossible! Israel can have no dealings with the Gentiles. He must have been mad to imagine——

CAIAPHAS(drily): Quite mad. It is the duty of statesmen to destroy the madness which we call imagination. It is dangerous. It breeds dissension. Peace, order, security—that is Rome’s offer—at Rome’s price.

JOSEPH(gloomily): We have rejected the way of Jesus. I suppose we must now take yours.

CAIAPHAS: You will reject me too, I think.… Be content, Jesus, my enemy. Caiaphas also will have lived in vain.

Sequence 3 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

(Excited CROWD-noise, out of which VOICES emerge)

VOICES: Who was going to destroy the Temple and build it in three days?… Looks as though the Temple ’ud see you out!… Come to that, why don’t you destroy the cross?… Split the wood, melt the iron … that’s nothing to a fellow who can overthrow the Temple.… Go to it, miracle-man!… Show us your power, Jesus of Nazareth.…

MARY MAGDALEN: Is it nothing to you, all you that pass by? What has he done to you that you should treat him like this?

VOICES: He said he was the Messiah.… King of Israel.… Son of David … greater than Solomon.… Does Israel get her kings from the carpenter’s shop?… or out of the common gaol?… Will you reign from the gibbet, King of the Jews?

MARY MAGDALEN: He would have made you citizens of the Kingdom of God—and you have given him a crown of thorns.

VOICES: Where are all his mighty works now?… He saved others, but he can’t save himself.… Come on, charlatan, heal your own wounds.… If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.

MARY MAGDALEN: He gave power to your hands and strength to your feet—and you have nailed his hands and feet to the cross.

VOICES: Are you hungry, are you thirsty, Jesus of Nazareth?… Where’s the water you talked about?… Where’s the never-failing bread?… Nothing up your sleeve now, conjurer? (Laughter) Loaves and fishes! Loaves and fishes!

MARY MAGDALEN: He fed you with the bread of heaven and the water of life freely—and you have given him inegar to drink.

VOICES: Charlatan!… Sorcerer!… deceiver!… boaster!

MARY MAGDALEN: John—can’t we get closer? It will be some comfort to him to have us near.

JOHN: I don’t know if the soldiers will let us through. But we can ask them.

(CROWDbackground)

CENTURION: Pass along, there! pass along, please!… Now then, my lad, stand back—you can’t come any closer.

JOHN: Pray, good Centurion, let us pass. We are friends of Jesus of Nazareth.

CENTURION: Then you’d best steer clear of trouble. Take those women away. It’s no place for them.

MARY VIRGIN: Sir, I am his mother. I implore you, let me go to him.

CENTURION: Sorry, ma’am. Can’t be done.… Corvus! Keep those people moving!… Now just you go home quietly.

MARY MAGDALEN: Marcellus—do you know me?

CENTURION: No, my girl. Never saw you in my life.

MARY MAGDALEN: Has grief so changed my face?… Quick, you Maries, pull off my veil, unpin my hair!… Look again, Marcellus! Is there another woman in Jerusalem with red hair like mine?

CENTURION: Mary of Magdala!

SOLDIERS: Mary!… Mary of Magdala!… Where have you been all this time, Magdalen?

MARY MAGDALEN: By the feet that danced for you, by the voice that sang for you, by the beauty that delighted you—Marcellus, let me pass!

MARCELLUS: Beauty? that’s for living men. What is this dying gallows bird to you?

MARY MAGDALEN: He is my life, and you have killed him.…

(TheSOLDIERSlaugh)

Think what you like—laugh if you will—but for old sake’s sake, let Mary of Magdala pass.

1ST SOLDIER: Oh, no, you don’t, my lass!

2ND SOLDIER: Not without paying.

3RD SOLDIER: Sing us one of the old songs, Mary!

SOLDIERS: That’s right!… Give us a tune.… Sing, girl, sing!… Make us laugh, make us cry, Mary Magdalen!

MARY MAGDALENE (distracted): My songs?… I have forgotten them all.… Wait.… Wait.… I will try.… What will you have, lads? “Roses of Sharon”? “Dinah Dear”? “Home Again”?

SOLDIER: (applauding): “Home Again”! “Home Again”!… S’sh! (As MARY sings, SOLDIERS and CROWD listen quietly)

MARY MAGDALEN(sings):

Soldier, soldier, why will you roam?

The flowers grow white in the hills at home,

Where the little brown brook runs down to the sea—

Come again, home again, love, to me.

(Here the SOLDIERS join in the chorus)

Pick up your feet for the last long leagues,

No more pack-drill, no more fatigues,

No more roll-call, no more bugle-call,

Company halt! and stand at ease.

Sunlight, starlight, twilight and dawn,

The door unbarred, and the latch undrawn

Waiting for the lad that I——

(She breaks down)

I can’t go on.

CENTURION: All right, Mary.… Let her through, lads … and the mother and the friend.… That’ll do.… No more.… Keep back, there.… Move along, now, move along.… Yes, Publius?

4TH SOLDIER: The prisoners’ clothes, Centurion.

CENTURION: Oh, yes. They’re your perquisite. Take ’em and share ’em out evenly.

SOLDIERS: Three pair of sandals.… Four into three won’t go.… We ought to have had Barabbas to make it square.… Who wants a cloak?… Me!… me!… You can’t both ’ave it.… Nah, then, don’t grab.… Fifty-fifty.… Tear it at the seam.… This tunic’s full of ’oles.… Gestas, you mean thief! Why didn’t you put on something decent?

GESTAS: May it rot your flesh, Roman dog. I wish it were steeped in vitriol.… Curse these filthy flies!

1ST SOLDIER: Temper, temper!…

SOLDIERS: Ah! here’s a nice bit of stuff—the Nazarene came from a good home.… Fair shares! fair shares!

4TH SOLDIER: ’Ere, wait a bit! It’s a shame to tear it up. It’s a lovely piece of wool and woven right through without a seam.

2ND SOLDIER: Toss for it, then.

3RD SOLDIER: Anybody got the dice?

1ST SOLDIER: Here you are.

2ND SOLDIER: Luck, Lady Venus.… (throws dice: laughter) Hades! I’ve thrown the dog. Here, Publius.…

(The dice rattle again)

3RD SOLDIER(humming to himself): “Pick up your feet for the last long leagues …”

MARY VIRGIN: Jesus, my son, I am here—Mary, the Mother who loves you. The pain is sore, my darling, but it will pass.

MARY MAGDALEN: Jesus, Rabboni, I am here—Mary the sinner who loves you. Kneeling at the feet that I once washed with my tears. I will kiss them very lightly, for fear the touch should hurt you.

JOHN: Jesus, my lord, I am here—John bar-Zebedee, the friend who loves you. We ran away from you, Master. We refused the cup and the baptism, not knowing what we asked, and the places on your right hand and on your left have been given to these two thieves.

MARY MAGDALEN: Oh, look and see if there is any sorrow like this! The Master and King and Christ of Israel—crucified like a common felon!

GESTAS: Hold your tongue, blast you! Ain’t hell’s pains bad enough without all that caterwauling?—Tell ’em to shut up—d’ye hear!

DYSMAS: Aw, Gestas, leave him be. There’s no ’arm in him. You and me was askin’ for it. Broke the law and got what was comin’ to us. But this pore blighter ain’t done nothing. (whimpering) Gawd! I got the cramps something cruel!

GESTAS: Christ and king—arr’h! a ruddy fine mess you’re in, ain’t you, with all your cant and pi-jaw? Slobbering about forgiving your enemies—I’d tear the throats out of the whole pack of ’em—and I’d start with you, you son of a dog!

DYSMAS: He’s loony, that’s all. Let ’im think he’s Goddamighty, if it makes him feel any beter.… You’re all right, mate, ain’t you? Of course you are. This ’ere’s just a bad dream. One o’ these days you’ll come out in a cloud of glory and astonish ’em all.…

GESTAS: T’chah!

DYSMAS: There! he’s smiling. He likes being talked to that way.… (in a deeply respectful tone, humouring this harmless lunacy) Sir, you’ll remember me, won’t you, when you come into your kingdom?

JESUS: Indeed and indeed I tell you—today you shall be with me in Paradise.

DYSMAS(after an astonished pause and in a changed tone): You’re not mad!… You’re … I don’t know what you are!… Don’t look at me like that.… I been bad—bad all through—you don’t know how bad.… Yes, you do; you know everything.… Near Jordan, I was born, near Jordan, and the water cool to the feet.… It’s a long way, but you won’t leave me.… Stay with us, Jesus, stay with us on the cross—go on looking at me.… I’m sorry—that’s selfish … keeping your head upright—like red-hot pincers in your neck.… Give me the pain—it’s all I’m fit for—but I think it’s you that’s bearing mine—somehow. I’m all muddled … and the water is cool to the feet.

(His voice dies away into a kind of muttering which sounds like delirium)

Sequence 4 (The Roman Barracks)

CHILIARCH: Well, Bassus, what is it? another chit?

ADJUTANT: Programme of the regimental sports, sir.

CHILIARCH: Oh, yes. I want to see that.

ADJUTANT: And by the way, sir—isn’t it about time we relieved those chaps on Gallows Hill?

CHILIARCH: Eh? Oh! Yes. How long have they been on duty?

ADJUTANT: Since 6 a.m., sir.

CHILIARCH: H’m. Have we got a centurion we can send? Who is there?

ADJUTANT: Well, sir—there’s old Proclus.

CHILIARCH: Proclus?

ADJUTANT: From Capernaum, sir. Attached for special duty during the Feast. Very reliable man, sir.

CHILIARCH: Right. Send him in.

ADJUTANT: Yes, sir. (At door) Orderly! Tell the Centurion Proclus he’s wanted by the Chiliarch. (Returning) The boxing-match should be pretty good, sir. I’d lay a few sesterces on Tiger Balbus.

CHILIARCH: Plenty of punch, but no style. Pompilius will beat him on points if he goes six rounds.… I see you’ve put Favonius down as a heavy-weight. I should have thought—ah yes!—this is Proclus, isn’t it?… Centurion, I want you to take four men along to Gallows Hill to relieve Marcellus and his bunch. Keep the crowd moving—and see that the followers of this Jesus don’t make a disturbance.

PROCLUS(startled out of his military propriety): Gallows Hill, sir—I—I—I—(recovering himself, in a stifled voice) Very good, sir.

CHILIARCH: What’s the matter, Centurioni? You look as if you didn’t like the job.

PROCLUS: Beg pardon, sir. You see, sir—I know the man.

CHILIARCH: What man? Jesus of Nazareth?

PROCLUS: Yes, sir. He was very decent to me, sir. Cured my batman.

CHILIARCH: (rather taken aback): I see.… I’m afraid there’s no one else available.…

PROCLUS: I quite understand, sir.

CHILIARCH: Old legionary, aren’t you?

PROCLUS: Yes, sir. Forty years service, sir. Drafted to the sixth. Seconded to King Herod’s Guards, sir—seven years. Fifteen years active service in Germany. Remained on as a veteran. Ten years regionary in Galilee, sir.

CHILIARCH: Good record.… Well, Centurion, it’s bad luck—but duty’s duty, isn’t it?

PROCLUS: Yes, sir. Sorry I forgot myself, sir.

CHILIARCH: By the way—the bodies are to be off the cross before sundown, because of the Jews’ sabbath. If they’re not dead by then, put ’em out.… All right, Centurion, carry on.… Damn it, Bassus, I hate ticking off these veterans. Forty years service. Old enough to be my grandfather.

ADJUTANT: Yes, sir.… Queer thing—that Jewish prophet—making an impression on an old tough like that.

CHILIARCH: Extraordinary.… Well, well! what were we saying? Oh, yes—the heavy-weight contest.…

Sequence 5 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

CALPURNIA: What’s the time, Flavius?

FLAVIUS: It must be close on noon.

CALPURNIA: (yawning): This is a very slow entertainment.

GLAUCUS: It’s not meant to be quick.

PHOEBE: These coarse peasants don’t feel things as we should. How long does it take as a rule?

GLAUCUS: Sometimes they linger on for three days.

CALPURNIA: That’s absurd! We can’t wait all that time.

GLAUCUS: Your man won’t last so long. Three hours, more likely.

FLAVIUS: The god will die, then?

GLAUCUS: The god is dying. He has the marks upon him—the pinched nostrils and hollow face, sunken about the temples, and the skin dry and dusky like parchment. The countenance of death, as old Hippocrates taught.

PHOEBE: I can’t see properly. It’s coming over very dark.

CALPURNIA: The colour’s gone out of everything—it reminds me of the day of the great eclipse.

FLAVIUS: It’s a sort of blight, I think.

GLAUCUS: Perhaps the gods are angry after all.

FLAVIUS: Hadn’t we better get home? We’ve seen all there is to see. The soldiers are looking at the sky and muttering.…

(Rattle of dice)

1ST SOLDIER: Publius, you owe me fivepence.… What’s happening to the weather? I can scarcely see the pips on the dice.

2ND SOLDIER: Better chuck the game.… How much longer are we going to stick here? I’m getting damned hungry.

4TH SOLDIER: What’s it going to do? rain?

1ST SOLDIER: I wish it would. Stifling hot, and not a breath of wind.… I hate this beastly climate.

2ND SOLDIER: Better down here than up there. It’s taken the kick out of Gestas, even.… Is the Nazarene dead?

3RD SOLDIER: Going home fast, I fancy.… I wish the relief would come.…

MARY MAGDALEN(whispering): John, John—is it the darkness? or is there a change in his face?

JOHN: Yes, Mary—there is a change.

MARY VIRGIN: My son is dying.

MARY MAGDALEN: The whole world is dying. He is going out into the night and has taken the sunlight with him. He is so far, so far that our voices cannot reach him. O love, O love—will you not come again?…

MARY VIRGIN: Hush, he is trying to speak.

JESUS: Mother!

MARY VIRGIN: Yes, dear?

JESUS: Let John be a son to you now.… John—she is your mother.

JOHN: Yes, Master. I will take care of her. I promise.

MARY VIRGIN: And I will love him as though he were my own.

MARY MAGDALEN: He is dying.… I could not believe it. But he is dying.

(Pause)

JOHN: It grows darker and darker.… All the people are drifting away.… Soon there will be only the soldiers and ourselves.… When everything else has perished, love and duty still keep watch.…

(Silence. Then, from a great distance, the sound of a small troop of men marching. It comes nearer and nearer till it reaches the foot of the cross)

PROCLUS: Squad, halt!

(MARCELLUSsteps forward to meet him and the twoCENTURIONSperform the usual movements for changing the guard)

MARCELLUS: Proclus?

PROCLUS: Yes.

MARCELLUS: I am glad you have come.… Squad, ‘shun … by the left, march!

(The first quaternion moves off. The tramp of their departing feet recedes to an infinite distance)

THE EVANGELIST: And there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice:—

JESUS: Eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani!

1ST SOLDIER: Gods! what was that?

2ND SOLDIER: It startled me.

3RD SOLDIER: It was the Nazarene.

4TH SOLDIER: I thought he was dead.

PROCLUS: What did he say?

1ST SOLDIER: I don’t know, Centurion—he spoke Hebrew.

2ND SOLDIER: He called on Elias for help.

PROCLUS: Elias?

2ND SOLDIER: He’s a national hero, or a demi-god of some kind, I think. Ask the young man there, he’s a Jew.

PROCLUS: Young man, what did your master say?

JOHN: He said: “My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?”—What horror could wring that cry out of him? He was always one with God.

PROCLUS: (worried): If there was anything I could do—consistent with my duty, that is——

JESUS: I am thirsty.

PROCLUS: Have we any water?

2ND SOLDIER: Ah! let be. Perhaps Elias will come to help him.

1ST SOLDIER: There’s some vinegar here in the jug, Centurion.

PROCLUS: Better still.… Dip a cloth in it, and hold it to his mouth.

1ST SOLDIER: I can’t reach so far.

PROCLUS: Put it on the end of my cane.… It’s so dark, I can hardly see his face.… Is he taking it?

1ST SOLDIER: I can’t tell.… I think he’s going.…

Sequence 6 (The Governor’s Palace)

PILATE: Claudia, Claudia, tell me—what was this dream of yours?

CLAUDIA: I was in a ship at sea, voyaging among the islands of the Aegean. At first the weather seemed calm and sunny—but presently, the sky darkened—and the sea began to toss with the wind.…

(Wind and waves)

Then, out of the east, there came a cry, strange and piercing.… (Voice, in a thin wail:

“Pan ho megas tethneke——

Pan ho megas tethneke——”)

and I said to the captain, “What do they cry?” And he answered, “Great Pan is dead.” And I asked him, “How can God die?” And he answered, “Don’t you remember?” They crucified him. He suffered under Pontius Pilate.”

(Murmur of voices, starting almost in a whisper)

Then all the people in the ship turned their faces to me and said: “Pontius Pilate”.…

(Voices, some speaking, some chanting, some muttering, mingled with sung fragments of Greek and Latin liturgies, weaving and crossing one another: “Pontius Pilate.… Pontius Pilate … he suffered under Pontius Pilate … crucified, dead and buried … sub Pontio Pilato … Pilato … he suffered … suffered … under Pontius Pilate … under Pontius Pilate.…)

… in all tongues and all voices … even the little children with their mothers.…

(Children’s voices: “Suffered under Pontius Pilate … sub Pontio Pilato … crucifie sous Ponce Pilate … gekreuzigt unter Pontius Pilatus … and other languages, mingling with the adult voices: then fade it all out)

… your name, husband, your name continually—“he suffered under Pontius Pilate”.

PILATE: The gods avert the omen.

CLAUDIA: This day is like my dream, Caius—this darkness at mid-noon.… Hark! What was that?

PILATE: Nothing, Claudia … there is nothing to hear.… Come away from the window.

Sequence 7 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

THE EVANGELIST: And when he had received the vinegar, Jesus cried with a loud voice:

JESUS: (loudly): It is accomplished! (softly) Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit.

THE EVANGELIST: And he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.

(Earthquake)

And the earth did quake, and the vail of the Temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom. And when the Centurion, and they that were with him, saw this, they were afraid.

(Earthquake repeated, and dying away. Pause)

Sequence 8 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

BALTHAZAR: Centurion!

PROCLUS: Sir?

BALTHAZAR: For whom are these gallows erected?

PROCLUS: Why, don’t you know?… I see by your complexion you are a foreigner.… Two of the men are robbers. And the third is Jesus of Nazareth, whom they called the King of the Jews.

BALTHAZAR: Jesus, King of the Jews. Then the stars have led me aright—and I have found him as my dream foretold, by the tall tree on the hill.… I think I recognise you, Centurion, though it is thirty years and more since we met.

PROCLUS: Indeed, sir? Where was that?

BALTHAZAR: At the court of King Herod.

PROCLUS: I remember. You are Balthazar, King of Ethiopia.

BALTHAZAR: I am. And there is the child that was born King of the Jews, at whose coming the great star shone.

PROCLUS: (astonished): Is that he?… Herod told me to slay him and I refused. But you see they have killed him at last—and here I stand.… Son of God he called himself—and so I believe he was.

BALTHAZAR: King of the Jews; king of the world; king of Heaven. So it was written; so it will be.

PROCLUS: As he died, the darkness lifted. It is very strange.

1ST SOLDIER: Excuse me, Centurion.

PROCLUS: Yes?

1ST SOLDIER: A Jew called Joseph of Arimathaea is here, with an order from the Governor. He is to have the body of the Nazarene for burial. And you said that all the men were to be taken down tonight, so we broke the legs of the two robbers to finish them off, but as Jesus was dead already we left him as he was.

PROCLUS: Quite right.

1ST SOLDIER: Yes, Centurion. But that young woman is hysterical and clinging to his knees——

PROCLUS: I’ll come.… Good evening, sir. You are Joseph of Arimathaea, I take it. Very good.… Now, my girl, I’m sorry—you don’t want him left hanging there, do you? We’re going to take him down, and this kind gentleman will see him properly done by.

MARY MAGDALEN: Go away—don’t touch him! He’s not dead! Jesus! Lord! Master! Speak again! Tell them you are alive!

JOHN: Mary, Mary!

PROCLUS: Are you sure he is dead, you men?

2ND SOLDIER: He’s dead enough, Centurion. But a spearthrust will make sure. There!

PROCLUS: (angrily): What did you want to do that for?

MARY MAGDALEN: Oh! what have you done! He is living! See how the blood runs down.

PROCLUS: No, my poor lass! If he were living, the blood would leap—but this creeps dark and sluggish, clotting as it falls. He broke his heart, I think, in that last cry.… Excuse me, ma’am, but we must do our job—can you do anything with her?

MARY VIRGIN: Mary, my dear—come to me. There, there!… You will handle my son gently, Centurion?

PROCLUS: We will, ma’am. You are a brave woman.

JOHN: Mary—let me tell you a thing that he once said to us.… Are you listening?… He said, “The Son of Man is only a week-end guest in the house of death. On the third day he will rise and go.”

JOSEPH: Did he say that indeed?

JOHN: He did, sir. I do not know what he meant.

PROCLUS: Carefully, men, carefully.… Lower him by the knees and shoulders.… Have you the winding-sheet ready?

MARY VIRGIN: Give me my son into my arms.… I know you, King Balthazar. These are the baby hands that closed upon your gift of myrrh. This is the fair young head, crowned once with gold by Melchior, but now with thorns to be a king of sorrows. The third gift is yet to come.

JOHN: What was that third gift, Mother?

MARY VIRGIN: Frankincense.

THE EVANGELIST: Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. There laid they Jesus; and they rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre. And the sabbath drew on. And the Chief Priests and Pharisees came together to Pilate.

Scene III (The Governor’s Palace)

PILATE: (abruptly): Yes, Caiaphas. What is it now?

CAIAPHAS: Excellency, that lying charlatan Jesus of Nazareth——

PILATE: I want to hear nothing more about Jesus of Nazareth.

CAIAPHAS: Something has just come to our knowledge. During his lifetime, it seems, he boasted that if he were killed, he would rise again on the third day. It is surely advisable that the tomb should be carefully guarded. Otherwise, some of his followers may steal the body and give out that he has risen from the dead—thus starting a new superstition, infinitely more damaging than the first.

PILATE: Well?

CAIAPHAS: I suggest that you order sentries to be posted.

PILATE: It has nothing to do with me.

CAIAPHAS: The bodies of criminals are Roman property.

PILATE: A member of your Sanhedrim applied to me for the custody of this particular body. I was happy to oblige him. The thing has now become a Jewish affair. Rome is not concerned.

CAIAPHAS: Excellency——

PILATE: You have your own guards. Take whatever precautions you think fit.… Slave! show these gentlemen out.

(A party ofSOLDIERSpasses in the distance, singing)

… “No more pack-drill, no more fatigues,

No more roll-call, no more bugle-call.…”

THE EVANGELIST: So they went, and made the sepulchre sure, sealing the stone and setting a watch.

Secular and sacred themes alike have been sketched by Dorothy L. Sayers’ piquant pen. Her writings have won her a measure of distinction as a dilettante Anglican theologian, although her religious conceptions and writings have sometimes been highly provocative. Twelve plays on the life of Christ, written for British Broadcasting Corporation in the colloquial language of England, stimulated wide debate. The eleventh play, “King of Sorrows,” from which the scene “Calvary Hill” is selected (and reprinted by permission from The Man Born to be King, copyright 1943 by Dorothy L. Sayers), caused even supporters to flinch and shrink from the Crucifixion scene. But the BBC’s director of religious broadcasting confided that Miss Sayers’ work had “forced many of us to the grim task of considering afresh the awe-ful implications of the two words incarnatusest.”

- More from Dorothy L. Sayers

Cover Story

Understanding Calvary

Harold John Ockenga

And they understood none of these things: and this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken (Luke 18:34).

I have a wonderful text. It opens up the counsels of the Trinity, the mysteries of redemption and the glories of heaven. Would I had the tongue of an angel to declare it. It is the truth of redemption by the cross. It, not the virgin birth, not the miracles of Christ, not the second coming of the Lord, is the very center of the Christian message (1 Cor. 1:23; 2:2).

Calvary was plainly foretold by Jesus, repeatedly and understandably. Yet the apostles did not grasp what he said. A strange incomprehensibility rested upon these disciples so that they could not understand plain language. Luke 9:31 says of Moses and Elias, “Who appeared in glory, and spake of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem”; Luke 9:51 says, “When the time was come that he should be received up, he steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem”; and now we have this plain statement of Luke 18:31–34. Matthew is just as plain in his record of the statements of Jesus concerning the inevitability of Calvary (Matt. 16:21; 17:12b; 17:22, 23: 20:18, 19). In spite of these clear statements, the disciples did not understand.

Calvary was foreseen and foretold by the prophets. No doubt is left by the writers of the Old Testament concerning the suffering servant of the Lord, the Messiah. Every sacrifice according to the law looked forward to this; the precepts concerning blood anticipated this; the Passover and the Day of Atonement forshadowed this; Psalm 22 and Psalm 69 described the sufferings of the Messiah; Isaiah 52:12 to 53:11 delineated these sufferings; Daniel 9:26 and Zachariah 13:6, 7 referred to it; yet no one in the time of Jesus understood the Old Testament prophecies concerning the suffering servant in the Messianic sense. Only at a later time did some of the Jewish rabbis teach that there would be a suffering Messiah (Messiah ben Joseph) and a triumphant Messiah (Messiah ben Judah). Not even the prophets themselves understood what they wrote (1 Pet. 1:10). The fact that the prophets searched to ascertain the meaning of their own prophecies which the Spirit revealed unto them is evidence that it was given to them by revelation. But this in itself is a proof that they did not understand Calvary.

Calvary was foreordained of God, and yet our text says that the meaning of Calvary was hid from the apostles. Did God deliberately hide it from them? If so, why? Was the hiding of this due to their own blindness because of sin, or was it a blindness sent from God? It was hid from them for several reasons: First, that God’s eternal plan might be fulfilled, namely, to make Christ Jesus our substitute in the satisfaction of the law. From eternity God the Father decreed the death of Jesus on the cross. He was the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. Second, it was hid that men through wicked hands might slay the Prince of Life. Peter declared that if they had known the identity of Jesus, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. Their decision was an independent one, but it was embraced in the plan of God. Third, it was hid from them that God might turn their evil actions to good. God’s love matched man’s sin. The fall of the Jews was to be the riches of the nations, and it was embraced for this purpose.

Why They Couldn’t Understand Calvary

Luke declares that this was “hid from them.” A veil was over their eyes so that they could not understand. It is strange about our capacity to understand. This capacity changes with different ages. What you could not grasp as a child, or as a youth, you now may understand. At one time you did not understand the value of music and you refused to have any part of it, but now you understand and regret your decision. At one time you did not understand the value of financial thrift and resultant security; now you understand and regret your prodigality of youth. Once you did not understand fidelity in human relationships, but now you understand and possibly with deep regret.

When the Lord told his disciples of his impending suffering, crucifixion and death, understanding was hidden from them. Peter cried, “Far be it from thee, Lord.” He could not believe that Christ would be delivered up, mocked, shamefully treated, scourged and killed. For this reason he attempted to defend Christ in the garden of Gethsemane for he did not understand the inevitability of Calvary.

Calvary was hidden from those who put him to death. For this reason Christ prayed, “Forgive them for they know not what they do.” Pilate asked him, “Art Thou a king?” and when he condemned him to be scourged and crucified, he did so in ignorance. The Pharisees cried, “Come down from the cross,” but they did not understand why he could not come down. The soldiers and the thief mocked him and ridiculed him because they did not understand the meaning of his claims.

Only God the Father and Christ understood what was occurring on Calvary, with the possible exception of Mary of Bethany, who broke her alabaster box against the day of his burying and also of the penitent thief who caught a glimpse of heaven when he was on the cross and asked to be remembered.

The understanding of Calvary was granted to the apostles through the postresurrection interpretation by Christ and through Pentecost. As the resurrected Christ explained the necessity of his sufferings from the law, the Psalms and the prophets, their eyes were opened and their hearts burned within them. When the Holy Ghost came upon them at Pentecost and they were guided into the fullness of truth, all the strands of truth fell together into an harmonious whole. From that time on the apostles were in unanimous agreement on the necessity of the death and resurrection of Christ which constituted the Gospel.

Calvary can be understood and known only by regenerate persons (1 Cor. 2:14). Because of this, men do not understand Calvary today. For God to die on a cross seems ridiculous to the unregenerate. Natural reason cannot comprehend this. It wants to earn salvation. But these things are hidden from the wise and prudent and revealed unto babes. The human mind must be renewed in regeneration by the Holy Spirit if it is to understand Calvary. With such regeneration the problems concerning the cross vanish from the human mind. Students who are filled with questions concerning the goodness of God, predestination and freedom, the problem of human suffering, the dual nature of Christ, the understanding of the Trinity find that when their central question is answered, many of their other questions disappear. In my own Christian counseling I listen to the problem or the question that an inquirer has and then I turn the conversation to Calvary and the knowledge of salvation. Once this question is settled, it is easy to face other questions. When a person is regenerate, the mystery is no longer hidden but open.

How Believers Understand Calvary

Calvary must be understood in the framework of theology. There is a Divine reason for the cross. The cross must be understood in the light of God’s justice. The Bible declares that God spared not his own Son but delivered him up for us all (Rom. 8:32), that Christ Jesus “abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances … that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby” (Eph. 2:15, 16), and that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself” (2 Cor. 5:19). Justice had to be satisfied and God reconciled. What this meant is beyond description and understanding of man. Holiness is an attribute of God. Holiness in motion against sin is wrath. This wrath of God was expended upon Christ on Calvary.

Mercy is an attribute of God. Because God loved, he was moved with compassion and mercy so that he gave his son, he sacrificed himself, and he suffered an indescribable anguish in the place of those he loved. Love found a way which could not be found by justice or by wisdom.

Wisdom is an attribute of God. Wisdom dictated that justice and mercy, holiness and goodness should both be satisfied and it found a way for them to meet in the cross (Psa. 85:10). There was no other way for such reconciliation, atonement and mediation than Calvary. If there had been, Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane, “If it be possible, let this cup pass from me,” would have been answered by the removal of Calvary. When Jesus cried, “it is finished,” all the demands of the attributes of God which had been affected by sin were satisfied.

Believers give to the cross a great significance in experience. This experience is threefold. First, the cross is the way of salvation. It is the only way to come to God, the only means of salvation, the only bridge from sinful man to holy God. Thus, it is emphasized in the law, the Psalms, the prophets, the Gospels and the epistles. It is the essence of the Gospel which is presented throughout the entire Bible.

The second way of experiencing the cross is for sanctification or victory of Christian life. The believer accepts the cross as the means of his dying to the old man. He takes his position with Christ as crucified to the old nature and the motions of sin. By faith he reckons himself to be dead. Once the believer so accepts the cross, he may then be united with Christ in resurrection life. By the Spirit he is quickened and seated with Christ in heavenly places. Thus, the resurrected, glorified, reigning Christ may release the Spirit in the life of the crucified and resurrected believer, producing all the fruit of the Spirit which makes the believer like unto Christ.

The third meaning of the cross in Christian experience is as a way of service or of living. The principle was set down by the Lord Jesus when He said, “Except a com of wheat fall to the ground and die, it abideth alone, but if it die it bringeth forth much fruit.” The cross must become a constant way of life. The believer must voluntarily accept his position of self-denial, sacrifice and service for Christ’s sake. Insofar as he does this, he shall bear fruit, for “he that loses his life for my sake shall find it.” Only as the believer voluntarily follows the pattern laid down by Christ in his acceptance of crucifixion, is he able to effectively serve the Lord.

What Can Never Be Known Of Calvary

Though there is much that the believer understands about Calvary, there is much he will never understand. Christians will never know the depths of suffering which Christ Jesus endured on the cross. We know that he tasted death (Heb. 2:14), and what a death it was. No believer will ever die the kind of death that Jesus died upon the cross. We know that he endured the curse of the broken law (Gal. 3:13) and that that curse will never rest upon the believer. We know that he carried the wrath of God which was holiness in motion against the sin of humanity held back and dammed up through the ages and then released to overwhelm Christ Jesus on the cross (Rom. 3:25, 26). It was this that overwhelmed Christ and broke his heart. No believer will ever be able to understand the depths of such suffering through which Christ passed.

We can never know the full mystery of what occurred on Calvary. Remembering that Jesus was the pre-existing Son of God whose goings were from old, even from everlasting, that he was with the Father from eternity, that he was the creator of the world, we cannot help but wonder what happened when he cried, “My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” What happened in the Trinity at that moment? What happened in the two natures of Christ when he suffered the wrath of God in our place? How did God die on the cross? How did he take death into himself? If he had not done these things, how could the atonement have been made efficacious for the believers? When will the human mind ever understand this, and where shall we ever find language to express this? This mystery can never be known and will always cause us to fall down and worship before the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the world.

We shall never know the fulness of redemption wrought by Jesus on the cross. This is suggested to us in the Scripture, and we may apprehend more of it when we get to heaven, but we certainly cannot know it now. What is included in “being able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge” (Eph. 3:18, 19)? In Calvary God exhausted himself, and it is impossible for a finite being to fully comprehend this action of an infinite being.

Witness Of The Disciples

But let’s ask these same disciples who did not understand when Jesus told them of Calvary what they now understand about it.

How about you, Peter? What do you understand about Calvary?

“I saw them take him away from Caiaphas’ hall when I was offended because he did not accept my defense of him by force. It seems incredible, impossible that I did not stand with him in that hour, but I did not understand. But now I know. I know that it was the Prince of Life they crucified. They ‘denied the Holy One and the just, and desired a murderer to be granted … and killed the Prince of Life, whom God hath raised up from the dead.’ I know that we are redeemed with his precious blood as of a lamb without blemish and without spot who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world. I know that he his own self bare our sins in his body on the tree, that we, being dead to sin, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes we are healed. I know that Christ hath once suffered for sin, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but quickened by the Spirit. I know that Calvary was the means to life.”

And how about you, John? You were very close to Christ. What do you think of Calvary now?

“I stood with Jesus through it all: through the trial in Caiaphas’ hall, through the suffering on the Gabbatha and through the agony of the cross. It was all so dark and confusing that I did not understand. Then, on the resurrection day, when he appeared to us and explained it, saying that it behooved Christ to suffer, and rise from the dead the third day: that repentance and remission of sin should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem, I began to understand. Now I know that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin and that the evidence of love is not that we love him but that he loved us and gave himself as a propitiation on our behalf. Now I look forward to the day when I shall stand with that throng, a glimpse of which I was granted, and shall cry, ‘Worthy art Thou to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation.’ ”

How about you, Paul. Do you understand the cross?

“Once I did not. Once I hated the Nazarene and I persecuted his followers for worshipping him as God because this was blasphemy. Once I stood by and watched men stone Stephen to death. Once I was crucifying the Son of God afresh. But one day I saw him: saw him in glory, saw him as he revealed himself to me with his wounds as I traveled on the road to Damascus. Now I know. I do not know him any longer after the flesh, but after the spirit. Now I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. Now, God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. For now I know that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, and has committed unto us the Gospel of reconciliation.”

My friend, do you understand Calvary? Is Calvary a mystery to you? Are your eyes veiled? If you have seen him with the eyes of faith as he was crucified for you, the veil has been taken away and you understand. If not, pray at this season that you may have your eyes opened, that you may see the necessity of Calvary, that you may see what God has suffered for you, that you may understand the cross.

Harold John Ockenga is pastor of the famed Park Street Church in Boston, where he has ministered since 1936. After receiving the A.B. degree from Taylor University in 1927, he attended Princeton and Westminister seminaries, and holds a Th.B. from Westminster, A.M. and Ph.D. from University of Pittsburgh and numerous honorary degrees. He is author of Protestant Preaching in Lent, The Church in God and other works. He is presently chairman of the board of Christianity Today.

- More from Harold John Ockenga

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Unexpected Liberty

1960 World Congress

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Born To New Hope

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The Word Of God Will Not Be Bound

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Power Of Hume’s Argument

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Sequence 1 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

Sequence 2 (The High Priest’s House)

Sequence 3 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

Sequence 4 (The Roman Barracks)

Sequence 5 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

Sequence 6 (The Governor’s Palace)

Sequence 7 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

Sequence 8 (At The Foot Of The Cross)

Scene III (The Governor’s Palace)

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Why They Couldn’t Understand Calvary

How Believers Understand Calvary

What Can Never Be Known Of Calvary

Witness Of The Disciples

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