Twentieth Century Witness

W. Carl Ketcherside

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     This is the last article in our series called "Deep Roots." It may not endear us to a great many of our brethren. We would probably be better off personally if we wrote upon an entirely different theme and there is no lack of other material crying for discussion. Yet there is a sense of editorial integrity and responsibility which makes it imperative that we take some risks for what we believe to be the common good. It may be that we are mistaken as to what is best for us all but our only recourse is to proceed prayerfully to do what seems proper to us and leave the eventuality with Him "whom having not seen we love."

     Read as far as you wish and if your interest wanes, do not go on. We will love and revere you as much as if you shared our concern and agreed with our method of approach. It is not at all necessary for you to concur in our personal convictions, or to acknowledge the timeliness of what we say. It is our hope that you will credit us with wanting to be helpfully critical even though you may resent the criticism and reject its value. Sometimes one gets to the place where he feels that he simply must speak. This in no sense implies that what he says will be justified or worthwhile.

     I think I shall address what I have to say primarily to those identified with the non-instrument "Churches of Christ." This is not because they are more partisan than other segments, because they are not. But there are some features of this article which will apply more specifically to these brethren than to some other groups, because of the persons involved.

     The use of that last word triggers what I really want to talk about involvement. We live in a world that is seething and bubbling with new and strange ideas. There has never been another age in which there has been such a ferment of thought. Almost every standard and criterion which we have accepted as valid is being rudely challenged. It is a different world, a defiant world, a frightening world--yet one which has the greatest potential if its thoughts can be captivated and its energies channeled in constructive fashion. It is made to order for a real test of the vitality of the Christian faith and that test must be made if we are to live with ourselves and our consciences. It is not being made because we are not in real contact with the enemy.

     The church has retreated to entrenched positions. It has surrendered ground to the enemy. It has called its forces into medieval fortresses or summoned them behind monastic bastions. It has gone on the defensive and is satisfied if it can repulse attacks. It will do little good to point out our increased foreign mission activity as a denial of what we say. We

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glory in every effort to take the message of hope to other parts of the earth. We thank God for every man and woman who leaves home to follow the star and seek him in foreign lands. But we dare not overlook the fact that in these days of intellectual growth, of affluence, and of power structures, it may be easier for us to win converts, or to make proselytes, among the ignorant and untutored of the earth, than to face a clever, trained and taunting foe at home. We may glory in our conquests afar to cover up the shame of our failure close at hand. If victory is equated with the number of scalps dangling from a sectarian belt it little matters where we get them so long as we swell the tally. This has no reference to how the converts look at Jesus. It refers to how the faction may look at converts.

     For some reason I have the idea that we are in a vacuum of our own creation. As I listen to the talks that are made it is obvious that we are not of the world. That is good! It is also just as obvious that we are not in the world. That is bad! We have created our own little worlds. We are answering questions no one is asking. We know all of the answers but we do not understand the questions. The things in which we glory are often badges of our shame. We point to baptisteries heated in the winter time, and to auditoriums air-conditioned in the summer time, but the warmth of our love for all of our brethren is missing, and our hearts are cold to those who do not line up with our faction.

     We are not training spiritual commandos who seek out the enemy and grapple with him on his own terms. We have no infiltrators who penetrate the ranks and fight their way out. Instead we develop men for remote attack and long distance bombardment. We furnish them with sermon outlines which fizzle out when the fuse is lit. We substitute homiletics for hand-to-hand encounter, and well-turned phrases for battle-scarred faces. Yet the only aggressive weapon furnished us is a sword. And a sword must be used for close in-fighting. It cannot be thrown, hurled or flung at a distance. And one does not become skilled in its use by playing mumble-peg with those who agree with him.

     Sooner or later we shall have to decide whether we have a message which can captivate the intellectual world for Christ, or whether we must abandon this as a lost province. If we decide to withdraw from meaningful combat with this area on its own ground (the only way you can ever fight with a sword), we are committed to a war of constant retreat and attrition for intellectuality will expand and the Christian concept will be driven into a corner and eventually crowded out altogether in our land. We cannot count, in the future, upon having enough non-intellectuals or anti-intellectuals, to keep our cause alive. God has not guaranteed to keep enough folk ignorant that we can survive if we lose the whole intellectual world.

     You will note my use of "meaningful combat." This is the opposite of fighting merely for the sake of fighting, or of creating the impression that you are really fighting when you are making a noise, beating the air, or attacking a projection of your own imagination under the guise that it is the enemy. This can always be made to appear a victory when you may not have been near the real enemy at all.

     One good brother out west, whom I greatly admire, exhorts us to keep shouting "God is not dead!" So we take our positions on two hills across from each other and engage in a shouting match to see who can out-yell the other. If an

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issue can be settled in this fashion it may not appear as important to the people down in the valley as it does to those on either hill. And it will amaze you how many people are down in the valley.

     I was at the Abilene Christian College lectureship when the program chairman announced to the packed auditorium that Dr. James D. Bales of Harding College had challenged Dr. Thomas J. J. Altizer, of Emory University, to debate whether God is dead. It was apparent that the great majority of those present were relieved that the Church of Christ had once more come to the rescue of God. They felt that God was in good hands. Moreover, it was another good chance for nationwide publicity. One good Texas brother said to me, "This'll make the big guns in the east know we are on the map!" To defend God and let the guns, and the sons of guns in the east, know we are on the map, is a double victory. Besides, since God had saved us from our enemies it was deemed only fair that we should reciprocate and save him from his enemies when we could help out!

     Please do not think I am sarcastic, cynical or disparaging when I say it is probably one of the best things that ever happened when Altizer did not accept the challenge. That is merely my personal judgment. I may be wrong. But you will note that one of the first things he said was that he did not want our brother from Arkansas accusing him of being a Communist. We had a medical doctor down home once who was a specialist on gall bladders. He had built up a fair reputation in that field, and folks came to rely upon him a great deal. The worst feature about it was that he wasn't too good at treating other things, so when. a patient came in, regardless of what he had, the doctor always diagnosed it gall bladder trouble because he knew how to prescribe for that. Altizer did not want to be diagnosed according to Dr. Bales's specialty. And you'll have to admit that Brother Bales is a specialist in his field.

     But I think that we have to face up to the fact that the kind of God whom Brother Bales represents could never die. You have to live before you can die, and I am not certain the kind of God Brother Bales projects (and I once did the same thing) ever lived, except in an overwrought partisan imagination. You see, our brother believes that the God of the universe has focussed his fatherly love exclusively on members of the non-instrument Churches of Christ. We are the loyal ones and his special favorites. Our brother thinks that "the Lord's church" is identical with the branch of non-instrument "Church of Christ" with which he is affiliated and that the Father dispossesses his children and puts them in exile if they do not agree with us on the millennium or music.

     I confess that I'm a little perturbed in heart because I wonder if the kind of God whom we have proclaimed may not have something to do with some of the so-called "Christian agnosticism" of today. We have made a pretty small God out of the Almighty. I know one brother who thinks the entire kingdom of heaven consists of six or seven congregations in three states. I know another who says he can count all of the faithful gospel preachers on his fingers, and he lost one of his thumbs in a sawmill accident.

     To pinpoint the problem we face, let us ask a few questions and understand them, before we start to answer them. What does Thomas J. J. Altizer mean when he says that God is dead? What does he mean by "Christ?" What does he mean by "darkness?" Does he acknowledge that God was manifest in the flesh of Jesus? Who should answer these questions? Obviously, Thomas J. J. Altizer should do so. And when he does we see how much his conclusions are the fruit of the thinking of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Paul Tillich, Rudolf Bultmann, John A. T. Robinson, and others. Thus we are truly dealing with a "movement" and not with an isolated individual and unrelated ideas.

     God is dead. Altizer declares he made this pronouncement only after vigorous mental wrestling with the terms "transcendent" and "immanent" as they are applied to the concept of God. A transcendent God is one who exists above and beyond the world of which we are a part. He looks down upon it and surveys it from afar, as a Being outside of it. He is not one with the world. He is a "wholly other." A university student in one of our campus encounters told me publicly that the God about whom he was taught as a child was "just not with it."

     An immanent God exists in the world, and to some extent, as the world. He merges or blends with the world and to the extent that he does is indistinguishable from the world. When carried to its ultimate, I think that immanence becomes pantheism. God is identified not only with the universe but as the universe. Nature, including all of its animate forms and man, would be God. I have always conceived of God as both transcendent and immanent, because he is omnipotent and omnipresent, so there has been no dilemma for me. But I am not a theologian, and it seems that theologians thrive better when they have dilemmas.

     Dr. Altizer declares that he accepted the incarnation as a historical fact but he reasoned that if God was in Christ, he emptied himself of his transcendence and became immanent. God was in the world. He was in the flesh. He had become wholly immanent. According to this thinking God did not become all of the universe. He was immanent only in Christ at first, but he did not again assume transcendence, and is still in the universe becoming ever more immanent. He will continue to do so until his immanence swallows up all else, and God will become all in all. When Dr. Altizer talks of the death of God he refers only to the passing from a state of transcendence to one of immanence.

     In this modern complex thought "Christ" is made to mean that point at which God divested himself of transcendence and entered the world. Altizer calls Jesus of Nazareth "the original Christ" because it was in him that God broke into the world and became a part of the created

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universe. He claims to accept the historical fact of the Logos (Word) becoming flesh, and that God was in Christ. But he does not believe in the resurrection of Christ and therefore rejects the idea of the ascension, coronation and glorification. It is his view that God is still in the world, moving ever toward greater immanence, and that there will be a final Christ, a Godhead in which there will be a wholly new creation--a new man, new world, and a new existence all embodied in a God who is all in all. It is his view that if God returned to heaven and again assumed transcendence this ultimate could not occur. God can become all only by being immanent and by conquest of the universe through being a part of it and extending himself to embrace it more fully and completely.

     To Dr. Altizer it appears that man is groping in darkness, but this darkness is linked with what he would brand as a misconception of the resurrection. He believes that the body of Jesus decomposed in the tomb and that by pinning our hope on the resurrection of that body we are projecting a false hope. He says that "darkness is the body of the dead God" and it is his theory that if we will acknowledge the incarnation and crucifixion as real and recognize the latter as the end of transcendence we can be delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the freedom and liberty of the immanence of God.

     I have taken the time and space to be thus specific for several reasons. First, I hold that we must clearly understand what we face and what we oppose before we develop our attack, lest we be found to fight against an image of our own creation. Secondly, I think it is a matter of personal integrity that I state the views of another, especially an opponent, in terms acceptable unto him. If I have misunderstood Dr. Altizer, or in any sense conveyed a wrong impression of what he believes, I sincerely apologize to him. I think he must also grant that the exponents of "the new theology" are not always clear and definitive in their Statements. They employ a considerable amount of professional clerical jargon.

     Thirdly, I would have our readers recognize that we face a clever and subtle foe (I speak of the theology and not of its exponents) which takes terms we have always used and employs them in such fashion as to completely warp their original sense and make them delusive and deceitful. Having said this much I must confess I am not afraid of the ultimate influence of this theology on the Christian concept for the simple reason that it is an old theology warmed over and served up with new dressing, and Christianity faced it many centuries ago.

     1. The Church of Christ must come into the twentieth century. It is evident from most of the articles appearing in recognized journals that our brethren are not only heirs of a nineteenth century movement but they are still moving in the nineteenth century. Very little of what is being written in orthodox journals has any relevance to the life or conflicts of men and women in our present world.

     2. We must close our ranks and recapture the vital unity of the Spirit. The bitter and frustrating wars of the past over cups, classes, the millennium) orphan homes, instrumental music, etc., no longer have any real significance. The tide of battle has swept on. If we continue our

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little pockets of civil war behind the lines, bushwhacking and sniping at our own brethren, not only will we not contribute anything worthwhile to the real conflict of the age, but we will not be in on the final victory. This in no sense means that one must surrender his personal convictions or that a congregation must change its practice as to cups, classes, or other things. These matters have absolutely nothing to do with fellowship in Christ or the unity created by the Spirit.

     3. We must seek new ways of giving to the world demonstrations of the workability of our plea for unity in diversity, a unity centered in mutual recognition of the lordship of Jesus. Perhaps we need a "restoration Kirchentag." In Germany, each year, on a special day, multiplied thousands of Protestants from various parties meet in a common witness of their allegiance to the cross. This day is called "Kirchentag." What would happen in Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, or Nashville, if there was a great rally of the members of the restoration movement who still believe in the validity of this ideal and heritage in spite of our disappointing showing in the past? Suppose such a rally was announced in every Christian Church and Church of Christ, and the members came overflowing a huge college stadium, with participants from every segment, even the smallest and most peripheral, reading, singing, praying and witnessing of their faith, without recourse to factional and sectarian attitudes. What a challenge for the Holy Spirit to work through them!

     True, the next day all would return to their own factions and segments, just as do those who attend the Kirchentag, but they would never be quite the same again. Neither would the sectarian world around them. Nothing would make sectarianism tremble and quake as such a demonstration of unity. And what makes it impossible to do this but our own narrow, limited, illiberal and intolerant spirit?

     4. As a move toward the recapture of a sense of involvement in the ecumenical age and a sane view of fellowship among the saints of God, brethren must start "levelling" with the world. They must quit using propaganda as bait with a hook concealed. Men are not "suckers" in this enlightened age. Let me be very frank with you. Radio and television programs are presented which make their pitch a tie-in with the restoration movement and plead for the unity of all believers. Smooth salesmanship is exhibited in using Hollywood stars who are members of the party. The word "ecumenical" is employed and it is made to appear that we are in the vanguard of the struggle for renewal of the church.

     But when the chips are down, the brethren reveal that they are not pleading for vital unity at all, but for the same old sterile conformity. The only unity they recognize is that which would come from everyone becoming like the "mother church" which supervises the program. It is probably only fair to say that some of the featured speakers are dedicated men with high ideals. They are trying to make a relevant presentation. But those behind the scenes who "call the shots" are still making tests of fellowship which God did not make. Their dogmas are law. It sounds nice in polite company to talk about "liberty of opinion" except for one thing. With them there are no opinions, and consequently no liberty. They decide what will be "faith" to themselves, and also decide what will not be "opinions" to others.

     Our brethren are still confessing the sin of others in causing division. We need a program in which the speaker will put his head in his hands, and before this whole nation, tearfully confess our own sins. The message of God should be free! The day is past when you can fool men into believing that everyone else on earth "interprets" the word of God, but we do not interpret it. We just take it for what it says. This childish and immature attitude has no appeal to intelligent seekers after truth. They know that elders are just as fallible as the pope, and for the same reason--all are human. Dressing a television program up in color does not

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alter its sectarian nature. The hooks on a luminous fishing plug are just as barbed as those on a homemade trout fly.

     I commend brethren such as those at Hartford, Illinois, for the fact that for several years they have arranged free discussion with members of the Disciples of Christ, Independent Christian. Churches and Churches of Christ. The elders are free men in Christ and therefore fearless.

     5. The Churches of Christ should at once free their missionaries on foreign fields from sectarian restraint and permit them to share directly in the experiences, knowledge and association of all of our brethren and God's saints laboring in the same area. If the missionaries do not possess enough stability that their judgment can be trusted they should be recalled. If sent forth to take the message of the cross of Jesus they should not be shackled, hampered and restrained by the sectarian attitudes "back home."

     The missionaries should be allowed, encouraged and urged to set up workshops, conferences, training sessions, and sharing events to which men of every segment of the disciple brotherhood in the region are invited as direct participants. It is silly, senseless, absurd and asinine, in this day of world ferment for us to export to foreign soil all of the trivial partisan divisions of the United States. Let all of the non-instrument Church of Christ men in foreign fields be given the right and freedom immediately to work with all of their brethren in the Lord, and that without threat of censure, reprisal or cessation of funds from their homeland. Our brethren have a hard enough time fighting Communism, atheism, secularism, and indifferentism, without having to fight other members of God's family in order to pamper a bitter sectarian spirit in their homeland. Free our missionaries from fear! Free them from exclusivism, aloofness, shallowness, bitterness and hate for brethren. Turn God's children loose in the Holy Spirit. Let us close the ranks in other parts of the earth so we can face paganism with a united front!

     6. We must infiltrate the neo-pagan intellectual world of our day but we must not confuse intellectuality with paganism. Men must feel a distinct urge to train as commandos for Christ. They must risk all to recapture for Christ the lost province of higher education. The most effective "ministry" of our day may not be behind the pulpit but in the college classroom. Men are eager to attend universities. They struggle with examinations. They pay high tuition fees for the privilege. They are not so eager to sit in ecclesiastical structures. The "sacred desk" is not an ornately carved rostrum. It is where God makes an impact on the souls of men. In our day it may be a laboratory table or a teacher's desk in a high school biology class! Let us not be derogatory about the teaching of the saints within their own edifices. This is necessary! But let us not confuse this with the only "ministry" available to us.

     We do not follow the example of Christ by remaining in our air-conditioned "heavens" with good people and angelic characters. Christ did not do that. He abandoned heaven for the world of men. He had no office room. He had no place to lay his head. His office was his function in the world. His office was his mission! We are doctoring people who claim to be well. If the sinsick ones want to be healed they must come to the office. We want to share in the glory without first sharing in the suffering of Jesus. Now is the time when we should be partaking of the suffering and shame of the cross. We should be moving among the lepers, the publicans, the prostitutes, the unwashed. It is possible we may exhaust our share of the glory, prestige and pomp on earth. If we do, God have mercy upon us. If we truly follow Jesus we will have to leave our heavens. We must enter the world. We are not acting like Jesus at all. Our pattern is the Pharisee!

     7. We must recapture the word "witness" in our confrontation with the world. We must grasp its real significance. I grew up under the teaching that the

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apostles were the only witnesses for Christ and we must never apply the term to our work. It is true that the apostles were the chosen witnesses of Christ in his post-resurrection appearances. Thus they could testify of the reality of that resurrection. One can only testify to that which he has personally experienced or seen. Most of our brethren have had no real encounter with Jesus in their own lives, so they cannot be witnesses at all.

     I am not in that predicament. I followed Jesus for years before I overtook him. We are walking together now. I knew a great deal about him then, I know him now! Regardless of what Dr. Altizer and others may say, I know that I serve a living Savior. I know what he can do because he has done it in my life. I believe that Jesus lived on earth in the flesh; I know he lives in my heart. This has happened to me. I am a witness of it and to it. I seek every opportunity to testify of what the grace of God has done. I will bear witness among philosophers, savants, theologians, publicans, prostitutes, Pharisees, Sadducees, members of the restoration movement or of any other movement.

     There isn't anything mysterious or mystifying about it. It does not involve any emotional upset or agitation. I'm coldly practical, pragmatic and businesslike about it. I simply took Him at His word when he said that if I would open the door He would come in. I did, and he did! I know that he is not dead. Neither am I -now! I'm not excited as if company had come and we had to hurry up and do a lot of things before they left. He is here to stay. We've got a lifetime together and it is a life not regulated by time. I do not manifest any visible signs or demonstrations. I do not speak in tongues or have any special gifts. I have a lot of difficulty with English. But I have no difficulty with Jesus.

     I know that I have passed from death unto life because I love the brethren. I have crossed the frontier into the life sector after years of patrolling in the dark along the border. I have received the Spirit of adoption and not the spirit of slavery again to fear. Perfect love has cast out all fear! I even find it possible to love my enemies. It is easy to love people whom I simply cannot like!

     I have tested myself and I find that I love Thomas J. J. Altizer. If we ever meet I do not think I shall try to convince him that Jesus is at the right hand of God, by reading from the apostolic witnesses whom he does not accept. I shall rather testify that he is at my right hand so I shall not be moved. I shall simply look him in the face and say, "I love you, and I want to tell you about the One who made it possible for me to do so." That's what I mean by witnessing. Love is the power. I am simply the mouthpiece. Someday my mouth will be stopped by the hand of death clamped over it, but love will not be stopped by death. "There is nothing love cannot face; there is no limit to its faith, its hope, and its endurance." I believe that! I believe it with all my heart!I am willing to "bet my life" on it!

     Editor's Note: This is the last in a series of essays which have appeared each month this year. All of the papers for 1966 will now be gathered into an attractive volume under the title "Deep Roots" which will be fully indexed. This book will be ready for mailing on March 1, 1967, and until that time you can reserve as many copies as you wish at a price of $2.49 per copy, payable on delivery. Send your order at once to Mission Messenger, 139 Signal Hill Drive, St. Louis, Missouri 63121.