OUR CHANGING WORLD

 

E. G. Homrighausen, one of my teachers at Princeton, is retiring from 30 years of writing for Theology Today, much of which has been a kind of running chronicle on “The Church in the World.” In his last installment he lists what he considers the most significant developments over the past generation, some of which are: 1) The birth and growth of the ecumenical movement, reflected in the World Council of Churches, which in 1948 had 147 churches from 48 countries and now has 263 churches from 90 countries, 40% of whom are from the Third World; despite all its weaknesses, it is the most important fact in church history in this century; 2) The calling of Vatican II, the most significant assembly of Roman Catholic leaders since the Council of Trent; the windows of the church were opened as never before, enabling the church to break out of its protective ghetto; 3) The survival of the church in Russia and Eastern Europe, despite all efforts to seduce it into union with totalitarian systems; it has passed through an age of martyrdom, with uncounted believers giving their lives for their faith; there are about one million Baptists in Russia, many of them now a part of the underground church; and yet 50 Orthodox churches still operate in Moscow, each providing two services each Sunday. 4) The growth of the churches has been phenomenal, especially in Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, the Pacific Islands, Africa, and Latin America, and this by the work of indigenous lay witness rather than by missionaries from the West. But what especially impresses Homrighausen is the impact that Jesus has had outside the established church. “Never has Jesus been so widely known and perhaps so highly regarded as he is at the present time, even outside the older Christian circles in Europe and the U. S.,” he writes. He “turns on” youth; he is the center of musicals; he is the authentic person-for-others for many outside the church; he is the center of the current religious revival, one expression of which in the circulation of Good News for Modern Man, which has now passed the 40 million mark!

Richard Hall of the Proctor Street Church of Christ in Port Arthur writes of his exciting experience in attending the Mission Magazine seminar in Houston. Featured this year was William Kearly of the Covenant Church in Houston, speaking on “Worship in the Free Churches; A Call to New Life.” While Kearly is a Baptist, his church is an effort toward unity in that it is made up of all backgrounds, including several from the Church of Christ. They have no building, but meet in the afternoon at a Disciples building, where they have their offices. It is a sharing church, dedicated to being helpful and kind to one another (Heb. 10:24). Mission’s board of 40 concerned souls impressed Rich as hardly a “conspiracy to wreck the church,” but as a sincere effort toward responsible Christian journalism. Vic Hunter, the editor, is quoted as. saying he wished to listen to his readership, and he set forth a philosophy of “participatory journalism.”

In Ira Rice’s Contending for the Faith our brother Max R. Miller has a piece on “The Church of Christ Zoo.” Instead of sheep being in the fold there is instead those who would fill the church with predacious creatures like serpents and buzzards. The zoo keepers, he tells us, are “the Ketchersides and the Garretts,”which I presume includes Nell and Ouida. The predators are identified as instrumentalists, pentecostals and rationalists. The Bible sings of Jesus as purchasing “men for God of every race, language, people and nation and made of them a line of kings and priests... (Rev. 5:9), which is more diverse that we have yet attained, with out any reference to a menagerie. Our good brother must realize that many of our folk are all caged in because of their fears of things like change and a new idea, whether they be in a zoo or not. Besides, whoever heard of a buzzard being in a zoo? If I were the keeper, it would be over my dead body!

In the current issue of the Lexington Theological Quarterly there is a historical review of the modern pentecostal movement. It began at the turn of the century with one Charles Parham in Topeka, Kansas. A Methodist preacher that felt a lack of spiritual power in his own life, he gathered around him a group of 40 concerned souls who became convinced that the power and success of the early church was the empowering by the Holy Spirit. The movement now boasts of 10 million members worldwide, including a formidable penetration of the Soviet Union.

First Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh is featured in Decision, published by Billy Graham, as one of the great churches of today. Its building is used by 8,000 people every week even though it has but 2500 members. A thousand business men meet weekly for lunch and study; 400 women gather weekly in a similar way. Kids meet all over the place and all through the week. It has a staff of ten that ministers to 28,000 students in downtown Pittsburgh, and they call it “the Power and Light Company.” Its concept of “ministering members” has resulted in 68 people over the past 20 years becoming public ministers of the Word. Thirty-five per cent of the church’s income goes to missions of various kinds, and the pulpit is known to be strongly evangelical.