What’s Hot? Christian Fiction

Big-name evangelical leaders have joined the ranks of celebrity novelists, drawing both unprecedented sales and secular attention to a still-developing category of publishing known as "Christian fiction."

Recently released apocalyptic novels by Pat Robertson ("The End of the Age") and Tim LaHaye ("Left Behind"), and pro-life, first-time fiction by Charles Colson ("Gideon's Torch"), are selling well in Christian bookstores, publishers and retailers say. The books complement the excitement that already gripped the genre because of the September release of Frank Peretti's new novel, "The Oath."

"Christian fiction is where the excitement really is right now," says Phyllis Tickle of Publisher's Weekly.

According to NPD Group, sales of religious fiction books more than doubled between 1991 and 1994, to 22.4 million from 11 million. In the same span, religious fiction increased to 2.2 percent from 1.4 percent of all book sales.

The genre was largely carved out beginning a decade ago with tales of Western romance by such writers as Janette Oke.

Peretti created a diversification into Christian thrillers in the 1980s with "This Present Darkness" and its sequel, "Piercing the Darkness," about small-town skullduggery raging against the backdrop of spiritual warfare. Those two books and "The Oath" have sold a combined 6.4 million. Financial adviser Larry Burkett began the parade of end-times plots with 1991's "The Illuminati."

The appeal to believers is obvious: No sexual situations, but lots of romance; no four-letter words, but lots of references to scriptural truths; and the good guys nearly always triumph.

Tickle says that fiction also might accomplish for evangelical purposes what no number of nonfiction tomes could achieve for the faith because it is a departure from the "self-referencing" approach taken by so much of Christian writing.

But best-selling author Warren Wiersbe is one of a chorus of critics who believe that Christian fiction has become an empty exercise. He says the genre contributes to a "fast food theology" without spiritual discipline.

"We have story and narrative, but we don't have content," Wiersbe says. "I suspect that lots of Christians in reading this fiction are being entertained but not edified, and they think they're doing something spiritual."

Some critics assert that much of Christian fiction is bad writing. Humanities professor Richard Terrell of Doane College in Crete, Nebraska, says a rule of the genre is to "make all of the characters, especially evil characters, very mannequin-like, very plastic, and smoothed over."

The emergence of "celebrity" Christian novelists will not help, Terrell says. "All these people who are in other ministries now are instant novelists, and that says something about the [Christian] publishing industry."

Truth Makes a Comeback in University Settings

Helen Lee in Ann Arbor, Michigan

Most people do not usually find Jesus in a Harvard University lecture hall. But Tricia Lyons became intrigued by an “Is God Dead at Harvard?” poster on campus during her sophomore year and attended a lecture by apologist Ravi Zacharias. She emerged a changed woman. “It was a complete road-to-Damascus experience for me,” she says.

Students in today’s universities are accustomed to difficult questions. But a growing number of universities are hosting an apologetic Christian outreach program with a much different flavor, asking perhaps the hardest questions of all: Does truth exist? And is it worth seeking?

This program, called the Veritas Forum after the Latin word for truth found on Harvard’s seal, is built around an intensive period of on-campus events, discussions, and lectures. The goal is to target “the thinking seeker or skeptic, to help them see the presuppositions behind their beliefs,” according to Kelly Monroe, Baptist chaplain of the Harvard-Radcliffe United Ministry and cofounder of the Veritas Forum. “We want people to see the beauty of truth in the person of Jesus Christ and his relevance to all of life.”

Birthed by Monroe and friends at Harvard University in 1992, a dozen Veritas Forums have taken place across the country, with 25,000 people attending. Another 15 forums are planned this year.

The transmigration from Harvard resulted in large part from the support of cofounder Jerry Mercer, a Columbus, Ohio, businessperson whose New Creations Foundation gives money toward the first forum a school holds. “The church needs to stop hiding from rigorous questions,” he says. “The Veritas Forum is trying to destroy the false paradigm that you have to shatter your brain to follow Jesus.”

TAILORED TO SCHOOL NEEDS: While certain speakers such as Zacharias, sociologist Os Guinness, law professor Phillip Johnson, and philosopher Eleanor Stump have made repeat appearances, the actual presentation differs from school to school. Monroe notes that the mission statement of the Veritas Forum is “intentionally vague.” She says, “Wherever the Veritas Forum is, we want it to represent a co-mission of Christian and kindred spirits” that contextualizes its presentation based on the history and heritage of the school.

For example, Harvard’s 1994 forum featured an “alternative historical tour” of the school, designed to enlighten listeners about the original Christian purposes of the institution. On the other end of the programmatic spectrum, nearly 1,000 people gathered to hear Johnson discuss his case against naturalism at the University of Michigan’s forum in Ann Arbor. “Often, our outreach misses the faculty and the graduate students,” says Charles Roeper, a field director with Campus Crusade for Christ’s Christian Leadership Ministry and codirector of the Veritas Forum at the University of Michigan. “For this audience, I thought integrating faith and scientific disciplines was a great idea.”

Between one-fifth and one-half of forum attendees are unchurched students, faculty, or community residents. Bob Fryling, of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, says that “if you want a huge attendance, you plan a concert and talk about sex. But the Veritas Forum will attract those who are interested in truth. It may be a smaller minority, but those people will be a galvanizing force on campus.”

In addition to raising the credibility of Christian witness on campus, forum organizers single out another significant byproduct of hosting such an event: the gelling of the Christian community, which must come together to organize and raise funds to host a forum on campus. In some cases, this proves to be the most painstaking part of the process.

Mercer hopes that these partnerships and the growing visibility of Christians on campuses will not cease after the meetings end. “I don’t think of the Veritas Forum as a one-time event,” he says. “I think of it as a way to systematically change the campus.” He is also planning a one-week summer “Veritas Institute” for Christian faculty and professionals.

THE TIME IS NOW: While some Christians advocate withdrawing from the “battleground” of the modern secular university, Guinness believes now is the best time for students to be challenged with the truth claims of Jesus Christ. “There is no strong post-Christian rival to the gospel. This is the greatest evangelistic opportunity the church has had in 500 years,” he says. “Sometimes, Christians are too preoccupied with perceived persecutions.”

Harry Stout, professor of church history at Yale University, agrees. “Some evangelicals have a tendency to focus only on the negative on our secular campuses, to create an embattled rhetoric of ‘us against them,’ which is unfortunate, and in the long run, unproductive.”

In the meantime, some students who attend Veritas Forum events continue to further the cause of Christian truth. Lyons, for example, is now a graduate student in theology at Harvard Divinity School; she plans to get her doctorate in theology and teach at the university level. As a result of her Veritas Forum experience, she says, “I want to communicate to others that you don’t have to be crazy to be a Christian intellectual.”

- More from Helen Lee in Ann Arbor, Michigan

Religious Freedom Amendment Has Many Hurdles to Clear

Jennifer Ferranti in Washington, D.C.

After a year long effort to convince Congress that a constitutional amendment is the only way to end government discrimination against religion, conservative groups are now arguing among themselves which of the two religious-equality amendments proposed by House Republicans is better.

The first is a 45-word amendment introduced November 15 by Henry J. Hyde, a Catholic from Illinois who chairs the House Judiciary Committee. It would protect religious expression in public schools and other venues from government interference by providing the courts with an authoritative interpretation of the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, which says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”

Hyde’s amendment would not change fundamental principles of constitutional law, says Michael McConnell, a church-state scholar at the University of Chicago who helped draft the religious-protection language in Hyde’s amendment. “It [describes] what those principles are and makes clear that the Establishment Clause should no longer be misused as a basis for hostility against religion.”

At present, McConnell contends, “Government officials are under the impression that discrimination against religious speech is not only constitutionally permissible, but required.”

Steven McFarland, director of the Annandale, Virginia-based Christian Legal Society’s Center for Law and Religious Freedom, says, “The Supreme Court has frequently cloaked discrimination in the guise of neutrality.” McFarland’s organization is one of about a dozen groups that participated in drafting the language that Hyde used in his amendment. “A mere statute cannot correct constitutional misinterpretations,” McFarland says. “Only an amendment can head off decades of additional discrimination and costly lawsuits.”

A BROADER PROPOSAL: The more far-reaching version of a religious equality amendment, introduced November 21 by Ernest Istook, a Mormon from Oklahoma, would allow student-sponsored prayer in public schools and permit local communities to determine their own religious practices, such as whether to set up religious displays during religious holidays.

Istook says the Hyde amendment is inadequate because it does not address school prayer as his does. But McFarland says Istook’s 63-word amendment “allows the government too much involvement in religion.”

Forest Montgomery, counsel to the National Association of Evangelicals, which also participated in drafting language in Hyde’s amendment, says the crux of the problem with Istook’s amendment is that it does not prevent courts from construing the Establishment Clause as a method of requiring discrimination against people because of religious expression.

Only one of the two amendments proposed will emerge from Hyde’s committee, probably late next month. Observers are predicting the Hyde version will prevail. Although Hyde’s bill has only 10 cosponsors, compared to 106 for Istook, it has the support of all but one Republican of the panel’s Subcommittee on the Constitution.

CHURCH-STATE WATCHERS: But many organizations object to any version of a religious-equality amendment. Both amendments are “atrocious,” according to Joseph Conn, spokesperson for Americans United for Separation of Church and State in Washington, D.C. Conn argues that the Hyde amendment would allow the government to promote religion through a “benefits provision” that requires it to finance religious institutions whenever it finances secular institutions.

The Istook amendment, Conn contends, is an attempt to appeal the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, which smacks of a “majority rule” that would exclude members of religious minorities.

J. Brent Walker, general counsel of the Baptist Joint Committee, objects to a religious-equality amendment because he says it would permit, if not require, government financing of religion. “When religion bellies up to the public trough, it becomes lazy and dependent,” Walker says.

Opponents of an amendment argue it is unnecessary. The Supreme Court ruled in religion’s favor in all three of the church-state cases it heard last term, and President Clinton’s July directive calling for the elimination of “religion-free zones” at the nation’s 15,000 public school districts may hinder efforts to move either religious-equality amendment out of committee.

UPHILL BATTLE: Even if one of the amendments survives out of committee, it would be a long road before becoming law, requiring two-thirds approval of both chambers of Congress and ratification by the legislatures of three-quarters (38) of the states within seven years.

“I believe the amendment will do a great deal of good for our national discussion even if never ratified,” McConnell says. “The question members of Congress should consider is whether an official proposal of an amendment or of a statute embodying similar principles would not help to bring about change in this area more rapidly than would happen otherwise.”

- More from Jennifer Ferranti in Washington, D.C.

Closing the Borders

Joe Maxwell

Twenty years ago, Americans rallied in unprecedented fashion to help the flood of Vietnamese refugees entering the United States at the end of the Vietnam War. But two decades and 2 million Vietnamese refugees later–as sentiment against immigrants sweeps across the United States–the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees is about to close the remaining detention camps in Hanoi, where about 36,000 languish.

“We are in a new era in refugee resettlement,” says Heidi Schoedel, executive director of Exodus World Service (EWS) based in Itasca, Illinois. “We are facing some unprecedented assaults on refugees and immigrants.”

Legislation is pending in Congress that would cut the quota of legal refugees allowed to enter the United States from its long-time yearly average of about 100,000 to 75,000 this year and 50,000 annually thereafter. This is at a time when refugee numbers internationally are escalating, from 7 million in 1980 to 22 million in 1995. The situation is expected to grow worse this year because of the ongoing problems in such hot spots as Bosnia.

“We seem to be losing the capability as a nation to respond compassionately to new groups in need,” says Ralston Deffenbaugh, executive director of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services (LIRS), one of a dozen nonprofit groups that have teamed with the government for more than two decades in a partnership to resettle refugees.

SUPPORT DRYING UP: In addition to the government restricting refugee numbers, many Christians themselves have become wary of helping. LIRS recently closed its California extension office, folding operations into two other ecumenical groups. The move is a result of a $40,000 deficit within the Lutheran organization and a shift in public attitudes toward resettlement of refugees.

Subsequently, local Christian families and a few church groups, recruited by LIRS and other nonprofit groups to resettle refugee families, have ended up shouldering more of the burden. When government-church resettlement partnership began in the 1970s–inspired by the Vietnamese refugee problem (one of the most successful government-church partnerships ever)–the federal government allotted church groups $500 per refugee to aid in funding initial resettlement. That has increased to only $700 in more than two decades.

World Relief (WR), another group resettling refugees, is facing a small drop in its 1996 and 1997 budgets due to the end of the Vietnamese resettlement program. And WR is closing an office in Binghamton, New York.

CHANGING LIFESTYLES: Don Hammond, WR vice president for U.S. minority and refugee affairs, recalls that he once could enter a church and speak about the refugee issue, and people would immediately offer help. These days he must be more specific.

“Now it needs to really be an individual appeal,” he says. “That definitely shows a trend to me that we are less willing to deal with refugees as a subject, but just as willing to deal with refugees as people.” He notes that 70 percent of WR’s 10,200 refugees allotted by the government resettlement program in the last fiscal year had some form of sponsorship or Christian involvement.

Peggy Gilbert, WR director of migration services, says organizations are having to adjust to changing times. Today, families are less likely to be able to sponsor refugee families one on one, though this was the mode of operation long considered the Cadillac option. In such cases, an American family provides the refugee family some money, housing, and help in obtaining social security cards, enrolling children in school, teaching English, and generally adjusting to American culture.

Gilbert says changing work patterns are a factor. “In the U.S. we have predominantly two parents working, so you have fewer people who have the time to give to help to get somebody on their feet.”

Newer organizations, such as Exodus World Service, founded in 1988, work to aid the larger government-designated resettlement groups such as WR in activating American families into the resettlement process. EWS’s Schoedel says lifestyle changes in the 1990s necessitate innovations in resettlement operations, often downsizing from one-on-one sponsorship to performing more short-term acts of compassion for the newcomers. “There is not compassion fatigue,” Schoedel says, “but we need to provide opportunities that fit with the hectic lifestyles of the volunteers in the Christian community.”

LESS COSTLY COMMITMENT: For example, EWS has designed a program in which a church or family can assemble and present a “Welcome to America! Pack” full of toiletries and food to a refugee family upon their airport arrival. Often, Schoedel says, a church group will extend its commitment after meeting the family.

Ultimately, Christian refugee experts say, American believers must examine their lifestyles, commitments, and willingness to heed the call to aid others.

“Issues of isolationism come about because people are afraid of losing what they have,” says Michael Friedline, director of development for the Seattle-based World Concern. “People think: Those refugees are going to crowd our roads; they are going to invade our way of life. As Christians, we have to let God take care of those things, and we have to take care of the justice issues.”

- More from Joe Maxwell

Vineyard Severs Ties with ‘Toronto Blessing’ Church

James A. Beverley in Toronto

Leaders of the Anaheim, California- based Vineyard Association of Churches last month voted to sever ties with the controversial Airport Vineyard fellowship in Toronto. The split, however, may not be permanent.

John Wimber, international director of the charismatically oriented Vineyard movement, flew to Toronto on December 5 to announce to John Arnott and other senior staff of the Airport Vineyard that the American Vineyard Board and Council had decided at its annual meeting to cut the association’s ties with the controversial Canadian church. The congregation has gained global attention for launching what has been called “The Toronto Blessing,” a Christian renewal movement born in January 1994 (CT, Sept. 11, 1995, p. 23). The Vineyard Association worldwide has 546 member congregations.

Formal separation: In explaining the action, Wimber, in an interview with CHRISTIANITY TODAY, cited his earlier teachings that Vineyard churches must focus on “the main and plain things in Scripture.” While in Toronto, Wimber was joined by Robert Fulton and Todd Hunter, two American colleagues, and by Gary Best, the Canadian Vineyard coordinator. The meeting lasted nearly three hours and ended with a request that the Airport Vineyard leaders review the association’s decision, meet with Best, then respond to the American leaders the next day. However, two hours later, Arnott, author of the recently published “The Father’s Blessing” (Creation House), wrote a brief letter saying that the Toronto staff had agreed with the move for formal separation.

The next day, December 6, Arnott sent a message via the Internet to four key supporters, saying the previous evening’s meeting “was conducted very well, no anger or tension.”

Richard Riss, one of the recipients of Arnott’s E-mail, openly released Arnott’s note, along with personal commentary on the decision. Riss, a church historian at Drew University, wrote of “a precipitous separation of the sheep from the goats” and warned that Wimber is “putting himself in the position of [King] Saul,” Israel’s first monarch, who waged war on his eventual successor, King David.

However, Airport Vineyard staff quickly distanced themselves from Riss’s comments. Riss later issued an apology for premature disclosure of the news and for his language about Wimber.

Wimber has told the Toronto leaders that the association’s decision could be reviewed. “Our differences [with Toronto] will cause pain, for us and others,” Wimber told CT.

A SURPRISING MOVE: The Airport Vineyard staff was caught by surprise at the separation, in part because Wimber and Best had planned to be in Toronto for a now-canceled February conference. In addition, Wimber had given an endorsement to Arnott’s book on renewal.

Hunter, the American Vineyard national coordinator, says the American board thought its report and Wimber’s own statements had made it clear that board members wanted the renewal in Toronto to move toward greater scriptural emphasis. Hunter now admits there were probably “mixed signals” sent to Toronto and that the communication could have been better.

However, he also says he “did not hear the Toronto leaders backing down” in the December 5 meeting.

Wimber’s concerns focus on the controversial charismatic manifestations connected with the Toronto Blessing.

He and others have been increasingly troubled by animal manifestations, including doglike barking. Wimber has directed that no attention or prophetic explanation be given to such behaviors.

“I believe that there has been an authentic visitation of the Spirit there,” Wimber told CT. “However, I am unable because of my own scriptural and theological convictions to any longer give an answer for, or defend the way, this particular move is being pastored and/or explained.”

IMPACT OF THE FALLOUT: Hunter believes the Vineyard will “lose very few churches” over the rift with Toronto, although there will be “temporary confusion” and “a great deal of sadness.”

Sociologist Margaret Poloma of the University of Akron in Ohio says the split would represent a negative byproduct of renewal. “Protestantism is rife with examples of how charisma lights a fire and the institutional church, in its attempt to control it, stifles its energy and light,” Poloma says. “A remnant goes off carrying the torch, but the institution set up by these believers soon becomes filled with firefighters rather than torch-bearers.”

But Tom Stipe, an ex-Vineyard pastor in Denver, says, “John Wimber has helped true biblical renewal by this decision. It’s unfortunate that the Airport Vineyard leaders didn’t really hear his concerns.”

Wimber insists that he has tried to give some freedom to local churches in a movement where he wants “the best of Pentecostalism” combined with a “conservative theology.”

- More from James A. Beverley in Toronto

Pivotal Minority Movements Strive for Racial Unity

Rodolpho Carrasco

Meeting in Colorado and California, some of the nation’s top urban outreach leaders agreed in November that racial reconciliation is not solely a black and white issue.

In Denver for the seventh annual Christian Community Development Association (CCDA) conference, opening night keynote speaker Manny Ortiz of Westminster Theological Seminary in Escondido, California, challenged the crowd of 2,000 to “move the discussion on race past black and white to include Latinos and Asians.”

CCDA board chair John Perkins and president Wayne Gordon joined Ortiz, the keynote speaker at last year’s historic gathering between the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) and National Black Evangelical Association (CT, Feb. 8, 1995, p. 48), in calling for reconciliation efforts targeted to all Christians.

Meanwhile, in Long Beach, California, at the second annual Alianza de Ministerios Evangelicos Nacionales (AMEN) conference, Jesse Miranda of Azusa Pacific University confirmed this Latino-focused association is a willing partner with Christian groups of all ethnicities in accomplishing the mission of the church.

“Latino Christians coming together under the umbrella of AMEN is about specialization on a key area of need–Latino church development–not segregation from the church at large,” said Miranda, AMEN’s president.

Miranda noted that AMEN leaders have discussed joint ventures with Promise Keepers, AD 2000, the NAE, and Discipling a Whole Nation (DAWN) Ministries.

ROOTS OF RECONCILIATION: John Perkins, publisher of Urban Family magazine, is the force behind CCDA. Years before racial concerns gripped the evangelical church, Perkins urged leaders to be reconciled across racial lines.

Operating from Mississippi, and later California, Perkins carried on a long crusade during the 1970s and 1980s before helping to found CCDA.

CCDA serves as a forum for the honest yet healing dialogue many Christians desire. Chris Rice, coauthor with Spencer Perkins of “More Than Equals,” notes that within CCDA, Christians “can get past white guilt and black anger and build a spirit of trust and commitment.”

LATINO UNITY: Like CCDA, AMEN is a young movement. Born out of Pew Charitable Trust-sponsored gatherings of top-level U.S. Latino leaders in 1992, the first AMEN conference in 1994 (CT, Feb. 6, 1995, p. 38) not only created the organization, but also helped forge Latino Protestant unity.

“The community of Latino Christians is no monolith,” Miranda says. “There is great diversity among ethnic backgrounds–Cubans, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Central and South Americans–as well as in denominational and theological positions, and finding common ground takes time and participation.”

Latino Protestants number 5 million, and the selection of Miranda as AMEN’s first president signifies the desire of this fast-growing sector of the evangelical church to build bridges, according to Danny DeLeon, host of the Spanish-language 700 Club television program.

“Bringing together different organizations, denominations, and doctrinal points of view is not easy, but Jesse has the ability to build unity within amen and with people outside it,” DeLeon says.

INTERNAL RECONCILIATION: As CCDA and AMEN develop hopeful opportunities for better race relations in churches, each organization is confronting issues of internal reconciliation.

In his CCDA address, Ortiz cautioned members to avoid creating a new black/white majority that perpetuates the marginalization of Latinos and Asians. CCDA leaders took the critique to heart. During the conference, Perkins announced a board decision to increase Latino, Asian, and Native American board representation, and Gordon later affirmed that CCDA would continue inclusive efforts such as cosponsorship of a Hispanic ministry preconference track with the Hispanic Association of Bilingual Bicultural Ministries (HABBM).

“We want to grow to become a multi-racial association, where we see each other as equals and believe that each of us has inherent dignity because we were created in the image of God,” Perkins said.

For AMEN, the organization’s very existence is tied to reconciliation. AMEN members come from 21 different Latin American and Caribbean countries, as well as Spain and Canada, and represent 27 religious groups, from Southern Baptist to independent Pentecostal.

Another challenge of reconciliation, according to Luis Madrigal, executive director of HABBM and an AMEN member, involves accommodating U.S. Latino demographic shifts.

“Hispanics are thought of as Spanish-speakers and immigrants, and the majority of Hispanic churches reflect this perspective,” Madrigal says. “But this perspective is reality for only half of the Hispanic community.” Madrigal cites studies showing that the U.S. Latino community is bilingual and bicultural, with more than half of all Latinos being U.S.-born and speaking English as well as or better than Spanish.

To be sensitive to this linguistic and cultural diversity, AMEN members took a critical step voting for amen to be officially bilingual, the first national Latino church organization to place English prominently alongside Spanish.

- More from Rodolpho Carrasco

Cover Story

Basic Stott, Part 1

Roy McCloughry

John Stott joins together what most people tear asunder–or at least are incapable of holding together. He is a theologian of depth and breadth, yet he preaches and writes with clarity to a wide audience. He integrates social concerns into the mission of the church without ever minimizing his commitment to evangelism. Since he was ordained in 1945, he has ministered within a mainline denomination (the Church of England), while neither compromising his convictions nor diminishing his role as an evangelical thought leader. Engaged in parish ministry for 50 years at All Souls, Langham Place, in the center of London, where he now holds the title rector emeritus, his influence among evangelicals is of international proportions.

One of Stott's enduring legacies is as the key framer of the historic Lausanne Covenant (1974), which serves almost as an evangelical apostles' creed in many Third World settings. His faithful witness to the gospel in his writings and preaching has made him mentor and friend to a global community. The author of 34 books, Stott's primer on the faith, "Basic Christianity," has been translated into over 50 languages, and 22 more are in progress.

Speaking of "Authentic Christianity," an anthology of his writings from the past 50 years (forthcoming from InterVarsity), evangelical historian Mark Noll serves up this accolade: "I consider John Stott the sanest, clearest, and most solidly biblical living writer on theological topics in the English language." It is difficult to dispute this assessment.

More than his books, documents, or institutions, Stott's most important legacy to the church has been his wisdom. Thoroughly biblical, disarmingly open, shrewdly discerning, Stott's thought has helped guide the evangelical movement as it engaged social concerns, the charismatic movement, female clergy, homosexuality, and challenges to core doctrines. In preparation for Stott's seventy-fifth birthday, Roy McCloughry, associate editor of the British Christian magazine "Third Way," interviewed this evangelical Solomon on these and many other topics. The discussion can serve as a measure of where we are as a movement–and where we need to go.

YOUR MINISTRY STRETCHES BACK OVER 50 YEARS. HOW HAVE YOU CHANGED OVER THAT TIME?

I was very naive when I was ordained. I was more an activist than a thinker. I saw needs and wanted immediately to meet them, and this crowded out my studies.

It was in the early days of my ministry that I learned the necessity of stepping back, looking where I was going, and having a monthly quiet day to be drawn up into the mind of God and look ahead for the next six or twelve months. That was an enormous benefit to me.

YOU'VE COVERED AN IMMENSE RANGE OF ISSUES IN YOUR MINISTRY–THEOLOGICAL, SOCIAL, DOCTRINAL, AND CULTURAL. HAS THAT BEEN DUE TO CURIOSITY OR TO OBLIGATION AS A MINISTER?

A bit of both. Even before my conversion, I believe that God gave me a social conscience. When I was only 14 years old, I started a society at school whose major purpose was to give baths to tramps. I had a great concern for these homeless, dirty men.

We called it the ABC, because we thought they could understand that; having decided on the letters, we had to look around for words that would fit, and we came up with two: either "Always Be a Christian" or "the Association for the Benefit of the Community." It only lasted a few years, and we never gave any baths to tramps; but we did some other good works until the treasurer loaned all the subscriptions to his brother, who spent everything.

My father was a doctor and a very high-minded, high-principled person, though not a Christian. He believed in a national health service before it was even dreamed about. My mother, too, was very concerned for the maids in the doctors' homes who had nothing to do on their afternoons off. She started the Domestic Fellowship. So they both had a social conscience.

EVANGELISM AND SOCIAL ACTION

SOME PEOPLE MIGHT DIVIDE YOUR MINISTRY INTO TWO HALVES, ONE FOCUSED ON PIETISM AND ONE CONCERNED WITH THE VERY BROADEST SOCIAL, CULTURAL, AND ECONOMIC ASPIRATIONS OF SOCIETY. WHAT CAUSED THIS CHANGE?

I think it was reading the Bible. As I read and studied and meditated, my vision of God grew and I came to see the obvious things: that God is not just interested in religion but in the whole of life–in justice as well as justification.

I don't see any dichotomy between the "pietistic" and social realms. To me, they're two aspects of the same thing: a pursuit of the will of God. I have always been moved by the phrase "to hunger and thirst after righteousness"; righteousness covers both personal holiness and social justice.

SOME PEOPLE MIGHT SAY THAT YOUR COMMITMENT TO THE JUSTICE OF GOD, EXPRESSED IN SOCIAL TERMS, LED TO A WATERING DOWN OF YOUR COMMITMENT TO THE GOSPEL.

I think that's rubbish, honestly. I remain committed to evangelism. I have had the privilege of leading more than 50 university missions all over the world, and they spanned a period of 25 years until I felt I was a little out of touch with the student generation and too old.

I can honestly say that my social concerns have not diminished my zeal for evangelism. If anything, it's the other way round. What people could say is that I talk a lot about social action but don't do much about it. And that is true, because my calling is to be a pastor. Although I disagree with polarization between these two, I've often said I do believe in specialization.

Acts 6 is the obvious biblical basis for this specialization of roles: the apostles were not willing to be distracted from the ministry of the Word and prayer. In fact, the seven were appointed to handle the care of the widows. Both those works are called diakonia, "ministry"; both required Spirit-filled people to exercise them. Both were necessary, but one was social, the other pastoral.

DON'T SOME PEOPLE FEAR THAT RENEWED EMPHASIS ON SOCIAL CONCERN MIGHT MUFFLE THE CALL TO EVANGELISM?

There are a number of mission leaders, particularly Americans, who are frightened that we want missionaries to give themselves to social-political work, which is none of their business and would distract them from their primary role in evangelism. I have no wish for missionaries to change their role. There is a real need for evangelists who are not engaged in holistic mission because their calling is evangelism. I don't criticize Billy Graham because he simply preaches the gospel and doesn't engage in social-political work–well, he does a bit, but not much–any more than we don't criticize the Good Samaritan for not preaching the gospel to the man assaulted by robbers.

It's partly our existential situation that determines what we concentrate on, partly our vocation. Everybody cannot do everything, as I keep saying to myself.

IN "ISSUES FACING CHRISTIANS TODAY" (1984), YOU SAY: "EVANGELISM IS THE MAJOR INSTRUMENT OF SOCIAL CHANGE. FOR THE GOSPEL CHANGES PEOPLE, AND CHANGED PEOPLE CAN CHANGE SOCIETY." ISN'T THAT REALLY A RUGGEDLY INDIVIDUALISTIC PICTURE OF SOCIAL CHANGE?

I think that quote is from where I list four or five instruments for social change. I put evangelism first because Christian social responsibility depends on socially responsible Christians, and they are the fruit of evangelism.

Having said that, I would also want to make the complementary point that Christians are not the only people who have benefited or reformed society. We evangelicals do have a very naive view. Take marriage: people say, "They have got to be converted and then they'll have a good marriage." But there are Christians who don't have good marriages, and there are plenty of excellent marriages among people who are not Christians. Morality and social conscience are not limited to Christian people.

WHY IS THE CHURCH SO OFTEN THE LAST TO JOIN A PROTEST MOVEMENT? THE CHURCH IN TIME MIGHT TAKE THE LEAD; AND IT MAY SPEAK WITH THE GREATEST INTEGRITY AGAINST JINGOISM OR APARTHEID OR NUCLEAR WEAPONS OR THE ABUSE OF THE ENVIRONMENT. BUT THESE MOVEMENTS ARE OFTEN STARTED BY OTHERS.

Well, that has not always been true. The slave trade is a good example and Shaftesbury's reforms in relation to mental illness. Nevertheless, by and large what you say is true. Why? First, because we're busy; we're busy evangelizing and doing other things, mostly in the church. We don't always demand our liberty from the church in order to be active in the world.

Second, we have such a strong doctrine of fellowship and are so clear about our responsibility not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers that we have seldom learned that we can be "cobelligerents," to use Francis Schaeffer's well-known term, even if we are not in active spiritual fellowship with one another.

SOME PEOPLE MIGHT SAY THAT THE CHURCH IS SIMPLY VERY CONSERVATIVE. IT ONLY JOINS THESE MOVEMENTS FOR CHANGE UNDER PRESSURE FROM SECULAR FORCES IN SOCIETY.

I wish it were always Christians who took the initiative in seeking needed social change. But I am still thankful when others take the initiative and Christians follow, even under secular pressure.

We must not set secular fashion and the Holy Spirit over against each other, as being always and inevitably incompatible. Public opinion isn't always wrong. What is wrong is to bow down before it uncritically, like reeds shaken by the wind. Why should the Holy Spirit not sometimes use public opinion to bring God's people into line? The Spirit seems to have done so on a number of occasions in the debate between science and faith.

WHAT IS THE THEOLOGICAL BASIS FOR CHRISTIAN SOCIAL INVOLVEMENT TODAY? IS IT ENOUGH TO SPEAK OF BEING "SALT AND LIGHT"?

Start with the nature of God. God is interested in and concerned about more than religion: God is the Lord of creation and the covenant. God is the lover of justice, one who protects and champions the oppressed: this is God's nature. If this is the kind of God we have, then clearly God's people have got to be the same.

Second, there is the doctrine of human beings, of male and female made in the image of God–the unique dignity and worth of human beings. William Temple said, "My worth is what I am worth to God, and that is a marvelous great deal, because Christ died for me." And I would say that the ministry of Jesus in life and death exhibits the enormous value of human beings.

Then, I would want to back up this biblical theme with examples from history. Take Mother Teresa, for example, who sees a woman on the pavement of Calcutta with awful sores infested by live maggots. Mother Teresa kisses this woman and picks her up. She sees an intrinsic value in her.

That, surely, is what has motivated people. That is why the word humanization, which was first adopted in the World Council of Churches, is something we evangelicals ought to have taken up. Anything that dehumanizes human beings should be an outrage to us, because God has made them in his image. The whole concept of the rehumanization of human beings, and the deliverance of human beings from anything that dehumanizes, ought to inspire people, and has inspired people.

MAINLINE CHURCHES

DO YOU STILL THINK THE ANGLICAN CHURCH MAKES A GOOD HOME FOR EVANGELICALISM?

Yes, I think it's a good boat to fish from, but that's not the reason I'm a member of it.

There are three options for evangelicals in mainline denominations. The two extremes are to get out or cave in. The third is to stay in without giving in. The extremes are actually the easy options. Anybody can cave in: that's the way of the coward, the way of the feeble mind. To cave in is to stay in but to fail to hold on to your distinctive evangelicalism. You just compromise.

To get out is to say, "I can't bear this constant argument and controversy any longer." That also is an easy option. I know people have done it and suffered because they have given up a secure job and salary; but it's an easy option psychologically.

The difficult thing is to stay and refuse to give in, because then you're always in tension with people with whom you don't altogether agree, and that is painful.

BUT NO CHRISTIAN CAN GIVE UNQUALIFIED ALLEGIANCE TO ANY INSTITUTION. WHAT, FOR YOU, WOULD BE THE SIGNALS THAT IT IS TIME TO LEAVE THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND?

I've always felt that it's unwise to publish a list of criteria in advance. Nevertheless, I'm quite happy to talk about them. I think one's final decision to leave would be an exceedingly painful one, a situation that I cannot envisage at the moment.

I would take refuge in the teaching of the New Testament, where the apostles seem to distinguish between major and minor errors. The major doctrinal errors concern the person and work of Christ. It's clear in 1 John that anyone who denies the divine-human person of Jesus is anti-Christ. So, if the church were officially to deny the Incarnation, it would be an apostate church and one would have to leave.

Then, there's the work of Christ. In Galatians, if anybody denies the gospel of justification by grace alone through faith alone, that is anathema: Paul calls down the judgment of God upon that person.

On the major ethical issues: the best example is the incestuous offender in 1 Corinthians 5. Paul called on the church to excommunicate him. If you want me to stick my neck out, I think I would say that if the church were officially to approve homosexual partnerships as a legitimate alternative to heterosexual marriage, this so far diverges from biblical sexual ethics that I would find it exceedingly difficult to stay. I might want to stay on and fight for a few more years, but if they persisted, I would have to leave.

EVANGELICAL FRAGMENTATION

IT SEEMS THAT EVANGELICALISM HAS FRAGMENTED INTO DIFFERENT GROUPS, WITH DIFFERENT HEROES, PUBLISHERS, AND CULTURES. HOW SHOULD WE THINK OF OURSELVES NOW?

I don't mind plurality as long as it goes hand-in-hand with unity. But I've given a great deal of my life to the development and preservation of unity within the evangelical constituency. I have never believed that our differences have been great enough to warrant fragmentation. I don't mind people founding their own societies and going after their own thing–again, it's an example of specialization–provided they still recognize that we belong to one another.

(continued)

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Cover Story

Basic Stott, Part 2

Roy McCloughry

WHAT ARE THE CURRENT CAUSES OF EVANGELICAL FRAGMENTATION?

We fragment over what we regard as issues of principle, but often the real reason is personal, isn't it? When we're afraid, we withdraw into our own fellowships and ghettos with like-minded people where we feel secure. I'm aware of that fear in myself; it's part of our basic human insecurity. We're looking for contexts in which we can be supported rather than questioned.

I'm afraid that in some cases the cause of fragmentation is worse than that–it's a simple matter of ambition. There is a great deal of empire building among us. The only empire in which we should be interested is the kingdom of God, but I fear some people are building their own.

ON ISSUES OF PRINCIPLE, WHAT CONCERNS YOU MOST?

The uniqueness and finality of Jesus Christ in an increasingly pluralistic world is one–the debate about whether we go for exclusivism, inclusivism, or pluralism. Then there's the homosexual question, and the whole subject of sexual ethics.

So the church must recover its prophetic voice and reject both the idea that ethics evolve and the notion that love obliges us to capitulate to the modernist view of things.

We need a voice that is essentially positive, not just negative–for example, on the family, or the joy of sexual intercourse, and so on.

I don't know why we are always caught on the defensive and are reactive instead of proactive. I don't think it is something in our make-up as evangelicals. I sometimes wonder if it is that God has not given us many leaders who are visionaries.

The evangelical renaissance of the last 50 years has really been one of biblical scholarship. What we have lacked is systematic or creative theologians. I believe we have one in Alister McGrath; I am sure in England we had one in Jim Packer before he left the country. But we have very few theologians who are really far-sighted and give us a vision that will unite, inspire, and enthuse us.

DOES THIS LACK OF VISION FOR THE FUTURE HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH OUR PERCEPTION OF TRUTH LODGED IN ORTHODOXY? DOES THIS MAKE IT DIFFICULT TO BE CREATIVE AND TAKE RISKS?

Yes, there is something in that. Evangelicalism is fundamentally loyal to a past revelation, and because we are tied forever to what God did and said in the historic Jesus, we look back more often than we look forward.

In my debate with David Edwards [published as "Evangelical Essentials," InterVarsity], I drew a distinction between the liberal, the fundamentalist, and the evangelical. The liberal, to me, is like a gas-filled balloon which takes off into the ether and is not tethered to the earth in any way. The fundamentalist is like a caged bird, unable to escape at all. To me, the true evangelical is like a kite, which flies high but at the same time is always tethered. This demands a particularly unusual combination of loyalty to the past and creativity for the future.

ETERNAL PUNISHMENT

YOU HAVE FALLEN AFOUL OF SOME EVANGELICALS. SOME OF YOUR REFLECTIONS ON THE NATURE OF ETERNAL PUNISHMENT WERE CONSIDERED UNCONGENIAL TO ORTHODOXY BY SOME PEOPLE.

In "Evangelical Essentials", I described as "tentative" my suggestion that "eternal punishment" may mean the ultimate annihilation of the wicked rather than their eternal conscious torment. I would prefer to call myself agnostic on this issue, as are a number of New Testament scholars I know. In my view, the biblical teaching is not plain enough to warrant dogmatism. There are awkward texts on both sides of the debate.

The hallmark of an authentic evangelicalism is not the uncritical repetition of old traditions but the willingness to submit every tradition, however ancient, to fresh biblical scrutiny and, if necessary, reform.

HOW WOULD YOU ADVISE THEOLOGIANS TO THINK CREATIVELY IN THE LIGHT OF ORTHODOXY?

I don't think any of us is wise enough to express ourselves in a creative or questioning manner without first testing it within the Christian community. It is part of our loyalty to that community that we allow it to criticize or comment on what we may want to say.

DIALOGUE WITH LIBERALS

IN YOUR DEBATE WITH DAVID EDWARDS, YOU BOTH SEEMED TO REACH A GENUINE UNDERSTANDING OF AND RESPECT FOR EACH OTHER'S POSITIONS. DO YOU THINK THAT EVANGELICALS CAN LEARN FROM THE LIBERAL TRADITION?

David Edwards, a self-styled liberal, is crying out for a certain intellectual and academic freedom that can move with the times and respond to what he continually calls "the climate of educated opinion today," without being tethered to anything more than the love of God manifested in Jesus of Nazareth. I don't think that's an unfair summary. But all the time he's pulling at the tether, and that's the great difference between us.

He would say that evangelicals have a poor doctrine of the Holy Spirit, because we don't think the Spirit is continuing to teach and to "lead us into all the truth." I believe that text, John 16:13, is the most misunderstood and manipulated text in the whole of the Bible, because every branch of Christendom claims it.

It's a key text for the Roman Catholic Church. "He will lead you into all the truth." Who is the "you" here? Roman Catholics would claim it refers to the bishops as successors of the apostles. The liberal quotes it, and the charismatic quotes it: "He'll lead me," they say. But even the most elementary hermeneutical principle would tell us that the "you" means the apostles. Jesus said, "I have much more to say to you, but you cannot bear it now." Who is he addressing? The apostles. "But when the Spirit comes, he will do what I have not been able to do; he will lead you into the truth which I wanted to give you but you weren't able to take it." It must be the apostles. We cannot change the identity of the "you" in the middle of the sentence.

So the fulfillment of that prophecy is in the New Testament. The major ministry of the Holy Spirit has been to lead the apostles into all the truth and to give us in the New Testament this wonderful body of truth that remains our authority. That does not mean that the ministry of the Holy Spirit has ceased. It means that the role of the Holy Spirit has changed from the revelation of new truth to giving us a profounder perception and application of old truth–from revelation to illumination, if you like.

Although I may be overstating it slightly, I want to say that God has no more to teach us than he has taught us in Christ. It is inconceivable that there should be a higher revelation than God has given in his incarnate Son. But although God has no more to teach us, we have a great deal more to learn. And although he has no more to give us than he has given us in Christ, we have a great deal more to receive.

EVANGELICALS AND CATHOLICS

Some people feel that evangelicals adapt, eventually, to changing circumstances, whereas Catholicism stands firm like a rock. Those who say there is a loss of authority in our world are tending toward Rome…

Or Orthodoxy.

DO YOU THINK THERE IS SOMETHING ABOUT ROME THAT IS RIGHTLY ATTRACTIVE?

Yes. The true evangelical wants both liberty and authority. We want to ask questions, to think, to pry, to peer, to probe, to ponder. We want to do all these things, but within a framework of submission to an ultimate authority. But we're asking questions about our authority: what does it mean and how does it apply? So we experience an uneasy tension between liberty and authority.

I couldn't find a lodging place in either Catholicism or liberalism, because one seems to major on authority with little room for liberty, while the other emphasizes liberty with very little room for authority.

AUTHENTIC CHRISTIANITY INCLUDES THIS QUOTATION: "THE WORD CHRISTIAN OCCURS ONLY THREE TIMES IN THE BIBLE. BECAUSE OF ITS COMMON MISUSE WE COULD PROFITABLY DISPENSE WITH IT." SINCE THE WORD EVANGELICAL DOESN'T APPEAR AT ALL AND IS ALSO MISUSED, SHOULD WE DISPENSE WITH IT, TOO?

We could, in theory, for the same reason. The words that are used in the New Testament most frequently are believer, brother or sister, and child of God. There isn't a word that the Bible itself gives us to which we have to be loyal.

But the reason I want to stick with evangelical is a historical one. It has expressed a recognizable tradition, to which I still belong (and am proud and thankful to belong), and I want to take my stand not only on Scripture but in that tradition.

DOES IT ALARM YOU TO HEAR PEOPLE CALLING THEMSELVES "POSTEVANGELICAL"?

Yes. I don't know what they mean, but it does alarm me. If you are "post" anything, you are leaving something behind, and I want to know what it is. If it's our many faults and failures, fine, but that's not postevangelicalism, it's post-twisted-evangelicalism.

WHAT ARE THE WEAKNESSES OF EVANGELICALISM?

We've discussed our rugged individualism and the difficulty we have in cooperating with one another. Another weakness is our dogmatism. Instead of remembering Deuteronomy 29:29, we are dogmatic about even the things that God has kept secret. We're often not prepared to admit a certain agnosticism, which is a very evangelical thing, if we are alluding to what God has not revealed.

We have many weaknesses. I'm sure there are plenty more if I were to go on.

DO YOU THINK THAT OUR EMPHASIS ON "THE CHRISTIAN MIND" MAY HAVE PREVENTED US FROM FULLY AFFIRMING THE WISDOM TO BE FOUND OUTSIDE THE CHURCH?

What you mean is: Should we pay attention to the wisdom literature of other religions?

AND THE WISDOM OF PEOPLE WITH NO RELIGION?

Yes, we certainly should, even if with reservations and a desire to bring their thinking to the ultimate touchstone of biblical authority.

The key text is John 1:9, which says that the logos, the Son of God before the Incarnation, is the true light coming into the world and giving light to everybody. I believe that is the right translation–that he is constantly coming into the world. Indeed, he has never left it, because the world was made by him, and so he is in the world. He was in the world even before he came into it in the Incarnation, and as the logos he is giving light to everybody.

So, there is a certain light of common sense, reason, and conscience that everybody has, because they're also made in the image of God. To be sure, reason is fallen and fallible; nevertheless, it still operates.

For those two reasons, the divine logos and the human logos, if you like, we should listen respectfully to what other people are saying, even if at the end of the day we have the liberty to say, "No, that is wrong, because the Bible teaches otherwise."

GOD AND THE POOR

Authentic Christianity records you saying in 1981: "What will posterity see as the chief Christian blind spot of the last quarter of the twentieth century? I do not know. But I suspect it will have something to do with the economic oppression of the Third World and the readiness with which Western Christians tolerate it, and even acquiesce to it."

I did, I think, mention three blind spots. The nuclear horror was another one: evangelicals were the last people to make a statement about the immorality of weapons of indiscriminate destruction. I think the third one was the environment.

There is a great deal in the Bible about God's concern for the poor. Poverty–not poverty in the sense of simplicity, but in the sense of lacking the basic wherewithal for survival–is not really on our evangelical conscience yet. Partly because many people have not traveled and seen oppressive poverty with their own eyes, although they have seen the pictures on television.

ARE WE TOO READY IN THE WEST TO ACCEPT THE VIEW THAT A SUCCESSFUL CHURCH IS ALSO AN AFFLUENT ONE?

Because some people see prosperity as a mark of God's blessing, even today, they can't come to terms with poverty. We have to have the courage to reject the health-and-wealth gospel absolutely. It's a false gospel.

DO YOU THINK THE IDEA THAT GOD WANTS US TO BE COMFORTABLE BECAUSE HE LOVES US PRESENTS A THREAT TO A CUTTING-EDGE SPIRITUALITY?

Well, we're sitting in a very comfortable flat as we talk, and it's easy to say! But I do think that comfort is dangerous, and we should constantly be re-examining our lifestyle.

The New Testament is beautifully balanced on this. Paul avoids both extremes, not least in 1 Timothy 4 and 6. Asceticism is a rejection of the good gifts of the good Creator. Its opposite is materialism–not just possessing material things but becoming preoccupied with them. In between asceticism and materialism is simplicity, contentment, and generosity, and these three virtues should mark all of us.

It's not a question of rules and regulations about our income and how many rooms or cars we have. It's these principles of simplicity, contentment, and generosity over against covetousness, materialism, and asceticism that we have to apply to our living all the time. We need to give away what we are not using, because if we don't use it, we don't need it.

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Basic Stott, Part 3

Roy McCloughry

YOU'VE SEEN A GREAT DEAL OF POVERTY AROUND THE WORLD. DO YOU PERCEIVE A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE CHRISTIANITY OF THE POOR AND THE CHRISTIANITY OF THE RICH?

Yes, I do. In the Old Testament, there is a fundamental association between material and spiritual poverty. Often, you are not sure what is meant by "the poor." But they tend to be those who are materially poor and who on account of that poverty need to put their trust in God with a greater strength than if they were rich and so self-dependent.

My own understanding is that in the Sermon on the Mount, which may have involved a concentrated period of instruction, Jesus said both "Blessed are you poor" (Luke) and "Blessed are the poor in spirit" (Matthew). I think there is a blessedness attaching to both. The kingdom of God is a blessing to the materially poor because it affirms their dignity and relieves their poverty; it is also a blessing, a free gift, to the spiritually poor. So, there is a sense in which poverty is an aid to faith and riches are a barrier to faith.

I want to add that all these terms–simplicity, contentment, generosity, and wealth–are comparative. There is no absolute simplicity or poverty. My little kitchen not only has running water but constant hot water. That would be regarded as the height of luxury in some parts of the world, yet we don't regard it as that, and comparatively speaking, in this country it isn't. We need to feel the challenge of Jesus to us in the light of our own situation and circumstances.

Is God's kingdom a blessing to the poor even if they do not recognize that they are poor in spirit?

No, I think the two blessings go together.

DO THE POOR TEND TO SEE THEMSELVES AS POOR IN SPIRIT?

Some do. Their material poverty helps them to see their need of Christ. Others, however, become bitter and can't listen to the gospel. What is the African phrase? "An empty belly has no ears." When they're that poor, they can't respond to the gospel. It's like the Israelites when Moses told them about the exodus: "They did not listen to him because of their cruel bondage."

WOULD YOU AGREE WITH LIBERATION THEOLOGIANS WHEN THEY SAY THAT THE SCRIPTURES WERE WRITTEN AGAINST A BACKGROUND OF POVERTY AND ARE MOST TRULY UNDERSTOOD WHEN THEY ARE READ WITH THE EYES OF THE POOR?

I'm very keen on cross-cultural Bible-study groups. We can help each other listen to the Word of God, but I don't think it is true to say that the poor necessarily have greater insights. We all come to Scripture with our presuppositions and our cultural defenses, and these may be very different from one another's. The liberation theologian and the Marxist also have their cultural defenses.

What we need to do in cross-cultural Bible-study groups is to cry to God to use each other in breaking through these defenses.

THE CHARISMATIC MOVEMENT

CAN WE TURN TO THE CHARISMATIC MOVEMENT? HOW HAVE YOUR VIEWS CHANGED SINCE "BAPTISM AND FULLNESS?"

"Baptism and Fullness" was the second edition; the first was "The Baptism and Fullness of the Holy Spirit." I practically rewrote the book, principally because I felt I had been less than generous in my evaluation of the movement. I wanted to put on record that I had no doubt that God had blessed the charismatic movement to both individuals and local churches. It would be quite impossible and improper to deny that.

I do believe in the Holy Spirit! The Christian life is inconceivable without the Holy Spirit. The Christian faith and life depend entirely upon the Holy Spirit: the Spirit convicts us of sin, opens our eyes to see the truth as it is in Jesus, causes the New Birth to take place, bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God, transforms us into the image of Christ, is the earnest of our final inheritance, and so on. Every stage and every part of the Christian life is impossible without the Holy Spirit.

So I believe in the Spirit; but I still believe that some of the distinctive doctrines of charismatic Christians are not as honoring to the Spirit as they think they are, and are in fact mistaken.

What I find difficult is the stereotyping of Christian experience, that everybody has to go through the same two hoops. I don't see that in the New Testament. I see the emphasis on the New Birth; and the New Testament bends over backwards in its attempt to find adequate phraseology to define the New Birth. It speaks not only of rebirth but of re-creation and resurrection, and nothing could be greater than that. It seems to me we are bound to go askew if we put any subsequent experience on a level higher than the original one.

As for the gifts, I simply think that many charismatics focus on the wrong ones. There are at least 20 gifts identified in the New Testament, and these lists are so random that there are probably many more that were not included. But the Pentecostal still concentrates on the three supernatural gifts of healing, prophecy, and tongues.

The most important gift today, measured by Paul's principle that we should excel in those that build up the church, is teaching. Nothing builds up the church like the truth, and we desperately need more Christian teachers all over the world. I often say to my charismatic friends, "If only you would concentrate on praying that God would give teachers to the church who could lead all these new converts into maturity in Christ, it would be more profitable."

COULD THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MOVEMENT BRING ABOUT AN EXISTENTIAL FORM OF CHRISTIANITY? JUST AS LIBERALS READ SCRIPTURE IN THE LIGHT OF ITS RELEVANCE TO CULTURE, COULD THE CHARISMATICS READ IT IN THE LIGHT OF ITS RELEVANCE TO EXPERIENCE?

I think that's well put, and I want to endorse it. I wish I'd thought of it first!

Mind you, I don't want to denigrate experience. I don't want charismatics to say of me, as they often do, "He's a dry old stick." Because I'm not, actually. I'm a much more emotional person than people realize. I thank God that he hasn't made me a fish, cold and slippery. I'm very thankful to be a human being, with all the emotional passion and fervor, as well as intellectual concern, which that entails.

I do believe in emotion; I do believe in experience. The Christianity of the New Testament is undoubtedly an experiential faith, in which deep feelings are involved. But I want to combine clear thinking with deep feelings.

I find that mind and emotion are kept together very much in the New Testament. I have always loved, for example, the Emmaus walk: "Did not our hearts burn within us when he opened to us the Scriptures?" It was through their mind that their heart began to burn. We have to recognize the important place of experience, but our experience does have to be checked all the time against biblical teachings. Otherwise, it will become an ungodly and non-Christian existentialism.

HAVE YOU YOURSELF HAD EXPERIENCES OF GOD THAT COULD BE CALLED "CHARISMATIC"?

I want to say yes to the first part of the sentence and no to the second. Certainly God has given me in his goodness some profound spiritual experiences, both when I've been alone and even more in public worship, when tears have come to my eyes, when I've perceived something of his glory.

I can remember one particular occasion when we were singing, "At the name of Jesus every knee shall bow." I did really break down, because I saw again the supreme exaltation of Jesus to the right hand of the Father. I have had other profound experiences that have moved me to the core of my being. But I wouldn't say that any of them has been a traditional charismatic experience such as speaking in tongues. And they have not been disassociated from the mind. In 1 Corinthians 14 Paul is all the time saying, "You mustn't let these experiences bypass your mind." The mind is involved, though the experience goes beyond it.

But I know what Paul meant in Romans 5 about the love of God being shed abroad in our hearts. I also know what he meant in Romans 8 about the Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.

THE TORONTO BLESSING

What do you make of the Toronto Blessing?

I never want to criticize anything which people claim has been a blessing to them in terms of a greater awareness of the reality of God, or a profounder joy, or an overwhelming love for God and for others, or a fresh zeal in evangelism. It's not for me to doubt any of these things.

My major questions concern three areas. First, it is a self-consciously anti-intellectual movement. I listened on tape to the first person who brought the Toronto Blessing to Britain. This person said: "Don't analyze, don't ask questions. Simply receive." I think that is both foolish and dangerous. We must never forget that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth.

Secondly, I cannot possibly come to terms with those animal noises, and it grieves me very much that–as far as I know–no charismatic leaders have publicly disassociated themselves from them, as they should. The whole Bible tells us that we are different from the animal creation; it rebukes us when we behave like animals and calls us to be distinct. Nebuchadnezzar's animal behavior was under the judgment, not the blessing, of God.

My third problem concerns all the falling. Even charismatic leaders have pointed this out, that on the few occasions in the Bible when people have fallen over, they have all fallen forwards on their faces, and they have all done so after they have been granted a vision of the majesty, holiness, and glory of God. In the Toronto experience, however, people fall backwards without any previous vision of God.

Those three things trouble me.

ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM

EVANGELICALS, TOO, HAVE BEEN ACCUSED OF ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM IN TWO NEW BOOKS: MARK NOLL'S "THE SCANDAL OF THE EVANGELICAL MIND" AND OS GUINNESS'S "FIT BODIES, FAT MINDS." THIS TREND SEEMS TO BE MORE PERVASIVE THAN JUST AN EXISTENTIAL OR EXPERIENTIAL FORM OF THE FAITH.

I agree. It has been characteristic of much evangelicalism (but even more of Pentecostalism). There are notable exceptions, and thank God for them.

I think we need to encourage each other in the proper use of the mind. Preachers are still the key people; the church is always a reflection of the preaching it receives. It is not an exaggeration to say that the low standards of Christian living throughout the world are due more than anything else to the low standards of Christian preaching and teaching.

If we can recover true expository preaching as being not only exegesis but an exposition and application of the Word of God, then congregations will learn it from us preachers and go and do the same thing themselves. We need to help our congregations to grasp and use the hermeneutical principles that we are using ourselves. We need to be so careful in the development of our evangelical hermeneutic that the congregation says, "Yes, I see it. That is what the text means, and it couldn't mean anything else."

The worst kind of preaching allows people to say, "Well, I'm sorry, I don't agree with you. I think you're twisting the Scripture."

WOMEN'S ROLES

YOU SEEM TO ME TO HAVE CHANGED YOUR POSITION ON GENDER. CERTAINLY, YOUR LATER WRITINGS PRESENT A DIFFERENT VIEW OF THE STATUS AND ROLE OF WOMEN. WHAT HAS BROUGHT THIS ABOUT?

What has helped me most in struggling with this issue is a growing understanding of the need for "cultural transposition." This is based on the recognition that although biblical truth is eternal and normative in its substance, it is often expressed in changeable cultural terms.

The Lausanne Covenant described Scripture as "without error in all that it affirms." Our duty is to determine what it does affirm–that is, what God is teaching, promising, or commanding in any given passage. When we have identified this, we have the further task of reclothing this unchanging revelation in appropriate modern cultural dress. The purpose is not to dodge awkward teachings of Scripture, still less to foster disobedience, but to make our obedience contemporary.

If we apply this principle to the role of women, it seems clear to me that masculine "headship" (which I believe refers to responsibility rather than authority) is a permanent and universal truth, because Paul roots it in Creation. And what Creation has established, no culture is able to destroy. We have no liberty to disagree with the apostle Paul.

But we still need to ask, "What are the appropriate cultural expressions of this in the church today?" For one thing, we may drop the wearing of veils. Is it possible, then, that the requirement of silence is similarly a first-century cultural application which is not necessarily applicable today?

This, if I remember rightly, was the position we adopted at the National Evangelical Anglican Congress in 1977. We expressed the view that a woman could be ordained and so could teach men, but that an appropriate contemporary expression of masculine headship would be for her to belong to a local pastoral team, of which a man would be the head.

I still hold this view, although, of course, I know it has been overtaken by history.

THE FUTURE

YOU HAVE SAID THAT CHRISTIANS ARE OPTIMISTS BUT NOT UTOPIANS. ARE YOU OPTIMISTIC ABOUT THE CHURCH? DO YOU FEEL THAT THE NEXT GENERATION OF LEADERS IS ADEQUATELY EQUIPPED?

Yes, I must reply in the affirmative. Elderly people always have difficulty recognizing the gifts of the young, or younger, but surely, as I look around, there are men and women of most remarkable gifts that God is raising up.

Yet we are not utopians. We cannot build the kingdom of God on earth. We are waiting for the new heaven and the new earth, which will be the home of righteousness and peace.

But meanwhile, I'm an optimist, because I don't think pessimism and faith are easy bedfellows. I believe that God is at work in the world; I believe that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every believer; and I believe that the church can be salt and light in the community. Both salt and light are influential commodities: they change the environment in which they are placed.

WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TO THE NEW GENERATION OF THE CHURCH'S LEADERS?

I'd want to say so many things. But my main exhortation would be this: Don't neglect your critical faculties. Remember that God is a rational God, who has made us in his own image. God invites and expects us to explore his double revelation, in nature and Scripture, with the minds he has given us, and to go on in the development of a Christian mind to apply his marvelous revealed truth to every aspect of the modern and the postmodern world.

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- More from Roy McCloughry

Protestants Project Rapid Growth in Peru

John Maust

Peruvian Protestants hope to represent one-fourth of the nation’s population by the year 2003–almost tripling in number in the next eight years.

This goal, included in a document drafted by church leaders at the recent Peru for Christ congress in Lima, sounds ambitious but not far-fetched considering rapid evangelical growth in the South American nation.

“The evangelical church in Peru is growing at a rate of 17 percent per year, one of the fastest growth rates anywhere in the world,” says Harold Rivas, general director of the National Evangelical Council of Peru (CONEP), a group representing nearly all Peru’s Protestant denominations. Protestants now constitute 9.3 percent of the 24 million people.

According to Rivas, the increase is the result of prayers and increased unity within the evangelical church. Suffering from years of terrorist-related violence and extreme poverty also has made people more receptive, he says.

More than 1,200 church leaders from every part of Peru (roughly the size of Alaska) and most Protestant groups attended the four-day Peru for Christ congress that ended November 3. Financial assistance from the Colorado Springs-based dawn (Discipling a Whole Nation) Ministries helped cover travel costs for pastors from impoverished regions in the interior.

“We aren’t trying to convert Peru into a Protestant country,” Rivas says in regard to the goal. “Just because someone is Protestant doesn’t mean he’s a committed Christian.

“Our task is bringing about holistic growth in which the Christian is committed not only to his church, but also to making a difference in his society and country.”

- More from John Maust

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EVANGELISM AND SOCIAL ACTION

MAINLINE CHURCHES

EVANGELICAL FRAGMENTATION

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ETERNAL PUNISHMENT

DIALOGUE WITH LIBERALS

EVANGELICALS AND CATHOLICS

GOD AND THE POOR

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THE CHARISMATIC MOVEMENT

THE TORONTO BLESSING

ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM

WOMEN'S ROLES

THE FUTURE

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