READER'S EXCHANGE

 

I got out old copies of Bible Talk (1953-54) and read what you once wrote about the rise of the clergy. In one article you told how pagan practices had been "christianized" by the clergy, which included the ceremonial use of candles. Then I read in the January issue of Restoration Review of a kind of candle-mass leading up the advent of Jesus. This comes as no surprise, whether in Denton or elsewhere, for reformers grow tired of fighting and in time adopt practices they once abhorred. And yet it may he that some practices adopted from pagans may be right.—Darrell Bolin, Lock Haven, Pa.

(My series on church visits is not to be interpreted as an approval of all the things I tell about, whether a footwashing service at an Adventist church or dancing-in-the-aisles at a Pentecostal church. And that goes for Churches of Christ, including my own. The reports are intended to better acquaint our people with their religious neighbors and to show that we do, after all, have a great deal in common. I have of course changed my mind about some things since 1953, but my misgivings about the clergy system is not one of them. -Ed.)

At Harding College I sat at the feet of J. N. Armstrong, who was as unsectarian as any Church of Christ person I've ever known. He spent a summer at Wheaton College and upon his return to Harding gave a glowing report of the spiritual lives he observed among the faculty and students at Wheaton. In chapel he once introduced a professor from a Methodist college as "Brother so and so." When some students questioned him about this, he told them that they should concern themselves with more important matters than whether a Methodist should be called brother. At that time E. R. Harper was our most prominent preacher in Little Rock, and he took broadsides at brother Armstrong and Harding College. —W. L. Wilson, El Paso, Tx.

(One thing I point out in this Journal through the years is that we in Churches of Christ have had our magnanimous leaders, lots of them, all the way back to our pioneers; and we have had leaders who were less than magnanimous, lots of them. I urge that we follow the magnanimous ones as they follow Christ.-Ed.)

I appreciate your letter in which you noted that my wife is the hero of my life. Without her I would likely still be wandering in sin. You "picked up on" my past problems with guilt. It continues to be a real problem to me, but as God's grace becomes ever more clear in my mind, I am better able to accept His forgiveness. —Kansas