OUR CHANGING WORLD

 

Our dear friend and brother, Moto Nomuro, a Japanese minister of Christ, is moving from his home-church near Tokyo, where I visited with him in 1983, to a new, more spacious facility in the mountains 100 miles northwest of Tokyo, which he is naming Bethany Home as a symbol of his concern for the unity of all heirs of the Stone-Campbell Movement now working in Japan. The land he sold brought 100 times the price he paid for it back in the 1950’s! Talk about inflation or a capital gain!

There are signs of “breaking out” among the black Church of Christ. You may know they like to debate, even with each other, but you would not have supposed such a proposition as this: “That the Church currently known as ‘The Church of Christ’ (which came out of the Stone/Campbell movement) contains within its membership Christians only but not the only Christians.” Two black ministers, both serving Churches of Christ in Florida, are soon to debate this issue. If our black brothers can come to see what should be obvious enough, that we in Churches of Christ are not the only Christians, then we should invite them to Denton (and other parts of Texas) to teach their white sisters and brothers what we should have learned long ago.

There are 30-odd former Church of Christ ministers attending the Richland Hills Church of Christ in the Ft. Worth area. They are now in law or real estate or insurance or what have you, but no longer preaching. Some are divorced, some disenchanted, some have “had it” with trying to be a minister in the Churches of Christ. Whatever this says about the ex-preachers, it speaks volumes about the graciousness of the Richland Hills church, who receives all those that Christ receives, including our rejected ones, the divorced and the ex-preachers, who are sometimes the same. Even a preacher’s wife, driven to divorce her husband after half a lifetime of being harassed by legalism, has found refuge at Richland Hills. One difference at Richland Hills, I am told, is that the elders behave more like caring shepherds than like hard-boiled. corporate executives.

In another Church of Christ, which I will not name except to say that it too is in Texas, there is a dear sister who is understandably distressed because the members make her feel that her husband, who recently died, is lost since he was never baptized. The facts are that he was a believer who attended church with his wife and might have been baptized but he supposed that in joining that church that he would be expected to accept some of its hardline doctrines, such as making instrumental music a sin, which he could not conscientiously accept. During her sad ordeal in burying her husband she received little comfort and no reassurance from the very ones who should have been her stay. Since her husband died unbaptized they did not know what to say to her! Someone might have asked those elders if they had ever given any serious thought as to why the man was not baptized. Maybe he did not choose to be like them! This superstitious view that many of our folk have about baptism is a source of great anxiety. Do we really believe that people are saved because they are baptized and not saved when they are not baptized? Do we know so little about the grace of God? Yes, of course, baptism is an ordinance commanded of God that has its proper place in becoming a Christian, but it is not the essence of the Christian faith. It is a serious matter when we assume to control God, even by his own ordinances, and presume to judge who is saved and who is not. There are always conditions and circumstances that we know not of. And surely we can offer hope and consolation to a grief-stricken sister whose husband sat beside her in church and died as a believer, one who was apparently doing the best he knew how. If we must judge someone, let us judge ourselves for being so void of the grace and mercy of God as to be unattractive to our captive audience.

The October issue of Paraclete Journal will include an article from my hand entitled “Essentials for Renewal,” which will appear only there. If you would like to subscribe to this new journal the address is 3707 Edgewood Dr., Cincinnati, OH 45211, and the sub rate is 6.00 for the year. I also had an essay published in Restoration Proclaimer, March-May issue of this year, on “Restoration and Reformation.” The address is Box 233, Williamsville, IL 62693, and there is no charge. I also did “The Anatomy of a Slogan” for Mission, February issue. This fine journal, representing the elitist Church of Christ, more or less, is surely worth the reading. The sub rate is 12.00 a year and the address is 12102 Tanglebriar Cove, Austin, TX 78750.

Journals may be dying during these days of high postal and printing costs, but journals are also being born. The Reformed Church of America and the United Methodist Church will both launch new papers this year. And Don DeWelt and Ralph Small of the Independent Christian Churches are planning to launch a journal that will transcend the confines of “Restoration Movement” churches and will reach out to the entire evangelical world. We will in time be telling you more about this one.