BROTHER LOVELL AND CHURCH OF CHRIST MISSIONS

The purpose of this editorial is to make some observations relative to missionary activity among Churches of Christ, offering both commendations and criticisms that we trust will prove helpful. We are especially concerned with viewpoints and practices that reflect both immature and inconsistent thinking. Some of our ways and means of missionary work not only make us appear self-righteous, but actually impede the cause of Christ in foreign lands. And yet there is much to commend.

The title should not be taken to mean that we are suggesting that all or even most missionary activity is centered in the work of brother Jimmie Lovell. We realize that many of our congregations function apart from his program in missionary enterprises. And yet the story of Church of Christ missions in our generation certainly begins with his labors, and it is our intention to restrict our remarks to his work. This is due in part to some recent correspondence I have had with brother Lovell, to which I shall be making reference.

To most Church of Christ people James I. Lovell needs no introduction. He is known mainly as one deeply devoted to the cause of missions and to projects related thereto. His organ, a magazine called Action, is widely circulated among our churches, and it is staffed by zealous writers who are almost as eager for the Church of Christ to convert the world as he is. He is forever pushing some highly commendable project, all the way from enrolling youth in an “I don’t smoke” club to a “miss a meal” program for brethren generally. The latter calls upon people to miss at least one meal a week, and send the money saved to him for missions. Action is well named, for it vibrates with the personality of its editor. It is tangy and exciting, and is obviously good tonic for a people given to lethargic ways.

In most respects brother Lovell is unerringly traditional as an editor of a Church of Christ journal, so much so that he can hardly be expected to venture too far from the secure confines of Church of Christism. And yet there is an unpredictability about him, and he sometimes says things that are both dangerous and heretical. There has been enough of this that I fear the keepers of orthodoxy have enough rope to hang him high on Haman’s gallows if he should ever jump the traces completely. I recall that back in 1955 when he was summarizing the events in Church of Christ history for that year that he made a statement to the effect that the most disgraceful thing to happen in the brotherhood in recent years was when brethren jailed Leroy Garrett in Henderson, Tenn. That was one of his dangerous statements!

I get the impression that brother Lovell is torn between a deep love and devotion for his Lord and a traditionalism that he holds in suspect but dares not let go. In reality he is too big a person to make a good party man, and he would certainly find distasteful any suggestion that his labors are sectarian in nature, and yet he is reluctant to question our brazen insinuation both at home and on the mission field that we and only we are “the church” of the New Testament and the only Christians.

I have a deep admiration for brother Lovell, not only for his editorial and missionary endeavors, for which he is justly praised by many, but because he has demonstrated that a layman with a busy and responsible position can at the same time assume leadership in the church. I am using “layman” advisedly, for I have long since conceded to logic that we have a clergy just as much as most other churches. But Jimmie Lovell is not to be numbered among our professional class of ministers. He was for many years a top representative for DuPont, but all that time he edited a paper and served as an anchor man for many projects in the brotherhood, especially missionary enterprises. Now that he has retired from DuPont he devotes himself entirely to his labor of love. And if I understand correctly, he has done all this at his own expense, never being on salary with any church. There are far too few instances of this in our brotherhood.

A history of our brotherhood in this generation would be incomplete without an extensive reference to Jimmie Lovell. If I should write that history, I would entitle one chapter “The Enigma of James I. Lovell,” and while I would give proper attention to everything from his “miss a meal” project to his supervision of very large sums of missionary money, I would raises the one big question about Jimmie Lovell that any critical historian would ask. This would point to a most glaring inconsistency in our practice, for while we have made missionary societies a test of fellowship, even to the point of rejecting brethren that support them, we have in fact allowed brother Lovell to set up his own missionary society.

Perhaps we have done no wrong in doing this, but it is wrong for us to reject as brethren (we call them brethren in error.’) those Christians who believe in missionary societies whose funds and activities are always under the close scrutiny of the church, while we allow a single man to have similar responsibilities, but whose missionary program is not so much as under the control of a local eldership. A missionary society’s function is to encourage zeal for missions among the churches, raise money, select and advise missionaries, and watch for their welfare in the field. The money is sent to the society, which in turn is responsible for directing it into those areas where it is most needed; and it is the society, of course, that has control of the money, even though its books are always under the surveilance of other officials. Churches of Christ have always vigorously opposed the likes of this, insisting that it is unscriptural. Yet we have Jimmie Lovell, who has similar functions and influence, including the control of large sums of money, but who is responsible to no one.

It shows what the zeal of one man can do, but it also shows how grossly inconsistent a people can become. Even if brother Lovell should conduct his missionary program “under the oversight of an eldership” (a cliche unique with us), it would not change the fact of inconsistency, for one church could serve as a missionary society as well as one man. The truth is that we are growing, we are interested in missions, and somebody has to do what a missionary society does. If we choose to have brother Lovell and a few other energetic men do this on a kind of self-appointed basis, I have no particular protest to make; but in doing so let us quietly drop our references to those who have missionary societies as “digressive brethren.”

An illustration will point up what I mean. Recently I sent a donation to the Christian Missionary Fellowship, a society maintained by independent Christian Church brethren for the support of missionaries. I asked that the money should be used to support brother Martin Mitchum, who is now laboring for the Lord in Ethiopia as an engineer among missionaries. This society raised the money for Martin’s journey to Ethiopia and persuaded churches and individuals to pledge for his support while over there. All this money comes into the society. They supervise the fund for Marrin Mitchum, always making sure that he will be cared for financially. If a church quits sending to the society for Marrin, the society will draw upon other funds to make sure of a faithful commitment to the missionary. And the society has on hand in Martin’s fund enough money to make it possible for him to come home at once in case of emergency. They issue a journal that keeps brethren posted on all missionary activities.

Now most of my Church of Christ brethren believe this is wrong. And yet it would be all right to send the same amount of money to Jimmie Lovell and designate it for some missionary that he is watching after, like the society, Jimmie has a Missionary Directory, and like the society he has a paper that keeps people posted. The main difference is that Jimmie’s setup is much more vulnerable. What if he should drop dead? Suppose he were dishonest. And there is the pragmatic value of a society that is set up especially for a missionary enterprise being able to function more effectively than anyone man could be expected to. The society can deal with our government and with foreign governments and with language schools, and a hundred other things, more effectively. At least we should be able to see how some brethren prefer a missionary society, believing it to be more responsible in every way, and thus more scriptural.

And yet I wish for brother Lovell every blessing, and I have nothing but commendation for those who choose to have fellowship with our brethren in foreign fields through brother Lovell’s agency. God bless everyone of them! And God bless the missionaries! And God bless brother Lovell! What I am fussing about is that some of the very missionaries that Jimmie is serving will have nothing to do with other missionaries because they are sent out by a society! And even brother Lovell, as wonderful as he is in so many ways, makes things like missionary societies a test of fellowship. If we were consistent, we would all have to withdraw from each other, including Jimmie Lovell withdrawing from Jimmie Lovell!

Brother Lovell has some strange notions about what some of us are trying to do in our unity efforts, which are penetrating missionary activities. In a recent communication he expressed his conviction that I am wrong in what he described as “your unlimited reaches of fellowship.” What idea does my dear brother have about what I am trying to do? Unlimited? This would mean, I suppose, that I consider everything from a Unitarian to a Universalist, along perhaps with Buddhists and Muslims, as being within the fellowship of Christ!

The truth is that the historian of tomorrow who is tracing the literary history of Churches of Christ will be hard put to find any editor in our entire history that has placed greater stress upon a fellowship based upon the belief of the one fact, that Jesus is the Christ, and obedience to the one act, immersion into Christ, than have I, unless it would be Alexander Campbell himself. I have repeatedly made it clear that if I were an elder in a congregation I would not accept anyone into the fellowship who had not been immersed into Christ. I have had letters from some of our more “liberal” brethren suggesting that I injure my plea for unity in insisting upon immersion as a condition of Christian fellowship.

Surely brother Lovell did not get an idea of “unlimited reaches of fellowship” from reading this journal, which he receives. What then is the real import of this kind of statemen! about fellowship? I am afraid my fellow editor really means that I am “unlimited” in the sense that I accept as brothers in the Lord all those that have been baptized into Christ, something that brother Lovell and many missionaries will not do.

Withou t endorsing instrumental music in worship, I acknowledge as brethren beloved those who do, and I make no difference between instrumentalists and non-instrumentalists in terms of Christian fellowship. I do not call one group “brethren in error” and the others “loyal brethren.” All my brethren, including myself, are brothers in error, for none is right about everything. So it is with brethren who are premillennial. They are no less my fellow saints. I can honor them as brethren in the Lord without endorsing any error I may suppose they adhere to. So it is with liberals and conservatives, cooperatives and independents, class and non-class, and all the rest. They are all my brothers in HIM, and I love and respect them because of the holy relationship that they sustain to the Father.

For this reason I can live with, work with, pray with, study with any or all of them. I can call on one to lead a prayer in the assembly, or to deliver a discourse, as well as the next one. They are my brothers, not because they happen to agree with me on a long list of doctrinal interpretations, but because we are sons of the same heavenly Father.

Brother Lovell, however, is raising hundreds of thousands of dollars to go into missionary enterprises only for “loyal” Church of Christ missionaries. And a “loyal” missionary has no fellowship with a premillennialist or with an evangelist that is sent out by instrumentalists or even our own conservative group. And Jimmie challenges me to get all these different groups to help him build churches in Korea, if they are so interested in a unity project. I have replied that I would be delighted to do this if I could be assured that a building that all our segments financed could be used by all of them, and that no lines of fellowship would be drawn. I did not get that assurance. Jimmie wants all of us to erect a building in Korea, but when the work is finished a premillennial brother could not even make a talk in it, nor would a Christian Church preacher be called on to lead a prayer!

What troubles Jimmie Lovell about my position is not so much that mine is unlimited, but that his is limited to a narrow sectarianism, a Church of Christism. I make nothing a test of fellowship that God has not made a condition of being saved. I accept all immersed believers as my brothers in Christ, with none looked upon as a half brother or a second cousin. Brother Lovell makes a difference. He limits the fellowship not only to those who have believed in Christ and obeyed Him, as Mk. 16:16 indicates he should, but also to those who agree with him on such things as instrumental music, missionary societies, and the millennium.

Brother Lovell insists that I am wrong. Will I become right by drawing the line of fellowship on those that have obeyed the same gospel I have and who serve the same Christ I do? Must men agree with me about a lot of things and opinions, interpretations that the church has always had disagreements about, before I can treat them as brothers? Jimmie opposes me because of “the unlimited reaches of fellowship” when this means only that I accept as brothers all who are in Christ.

If “the unlimited reaches of fellowship” means that I enjoy fellowship with all who are in Christ, then I must plead guilty. I can only respond with a fond hope that brother Lovell will cease placing limitations that God has not placed and making laws on fellowship that God has not made. I choose to be a free man in Christ. Perhaps this makes me “wrong” by sectarian standards.

I can only conclude that brother Lovell, being the man of virtue that he is, is a big person trying to be a little sectarian. It does not become him. I might warn him, however, that he had better watch his missionaries.

Many of them are likely to jump the traces — sectarian traces I mean, of course. The Holy Spirit is at work among our missionaries, and Christian freedom is finding expression in many places. Orthodoxy had better watch out!

I should add in closing that I notice in Jimmie’s Missionary Directory some premillennial brethren are listed, and he defends this in his preface. But I’ve already said, haven’t I, that he does some unpredictable and dangerous things? And the keepers of orthodoxy have a way of keeping score. So watch and pray, brother Lovell, lest … —the Editor