READER'S EXCHANGE

 

We have appreciated your efforts to bring about a new spirit in the relationship between our churches. We know many changes have taken place in the thinking of the brethren. We congratulate you and Ouida upon your recent picture and hope to see others as time goes on. — Max Moon, Sweet Home, OR

I attended Freed-Hardeman College and heard  your  name,  along  with  brother Ketcherside's, slandered quite a bit. No explanation was given as to what the great crime was that you had committed against the brotherhood. After reading much of your  material  I  now  understand  your position  and  believe  you  to  be  more biblically based and kinder in spirit, or more Christlike, than those who have opposed you. May God forgive their sectarian spirit and open their eyes to the truth of Jesus. — Name withheld

About Benjamin Franklin's motion for prayer at the Constitutional convention, this quotation reveals the strong convictions the framers of the Constitution bad about separation  of church  and  state:  "The delegates failure to invoke divine guidance was not inadvertent.  In response to a motion by Benjamin Franklin that prayers for the assistance of heaven be said each morning, the Convention adjourned to avoid taking a vote."

(I understand that James Madison's notes,  the most reliable record of the convention, reveal that Franklin's motion for prayer was received favorably by the delegates, but since there was no money in the treasury to pay a chaplain to come in and pray, the motion was allowed to die. That reveals their idea of the clergy. I suspect  Franklin  himself  could  have uncorked a prayer that would have gotten heaven's attention. What is significant about that anecdote is that such a motion was made.) — Ed.

Your  writings,  along  with  certain others have had a great influence on my thinking, and I am persuaded on many others as well. The Body needs such work and I pray the Lord will bless you in your efforts for a long while. — Don E. Neff, Flat River, MO

Thirty-five years! As you continue to climb upward toward the summit of your Nebo of understanding, you can look back upon what may now seem as wilderness wandering. From your new heights, you have a panoramic view of the promised land of fuller understanding. Like Moses, you will not be permitted to enter in but you can be thrilled with the view of peaks and valleys yet unexplored. Only when God takes you beyond earth's limitations can you fully know. How thrilling it will be to sit before the omniscient Creator as be explains the mysteries of the ages. Some of the stones over which we stumbled will seem as grains of sand then. — Cecil Hook, New Braunfels, TX