Vol. 40, No. 4  April 2009

Many people today have perhaps forgotten the name of Marjoe Gortner, child evangelist. Born Hugh Marjoe (for both Mary and Joseph) Ross Gortner by his parents on January 14, 1944, Marjoe finally became an American actor. But long before he was a Holly-wood actor, he developed his stage “presence” as a tent evangelist who performed healings, and other miracles, in addition to proclaiming God’s Word. Just before he ended his crusade days, he invited a film crew to observe him for several weeks and witness how he could woo Pentecostal audiences out of their offerings. The 1972 documentary, Marjoe, is not difficult to find today. It is available from Amazon.com on DVD for about $25. In 1972 it won the Academy Award for best documentary. To say the least, those who originally saw the film were both impressed (perhaps for the wrong reasons) and shocked with what Marjoe revealed, how he could make people feel, whip them into states of religious ecstasy, and how he could move people to sacrificially give their hard-earned money to him (the DVD cover proclaims “You keep the faith, Marjoe keeps the money.”), as well as persuade people to believe God had healed them, and often experience His supposed direct presence. Although Marjoe says at one point he wasn’t sure how people could be so naive - freely giving away their hard-earned money and being “slain in the Spirit,” he knew what they craved in terms of religious fervor, which many viewed as genuine religiosity. Concerning the latter, Marjoe said he felt it was something that “just happened” because people wanted it to happen and believed in it. In this sense, he was more accurate than he perhaps realized. Reality is often what people are willing to believe, though it may not be either real (from God), nor the truth.

Vol. 40, No. 3  March 2009

In his 1996 book on holiness Steve DeNeff addresses the question: Whatever Became of Holiness? (Wesleyan Publishing House, 1996, 2004). In 1995, popular writer and speaker Keith Drury delivered a stunning and hard-hitting message to the Christian Holiness Association (CHA, a loose association of holiness denominations) announcing, “The Holiness Movement is Dead!” In saying this, Drury was not saying biblical holiness is dead, or that the doctrine of biblical holiness is dead, or that there is no such thing as believers who are entirely sanctified. Rather, he simply stated his perspective that the American Holiness movement was dead inasmuch as it had lost its broad-based power to influence the American culture (cf. Mark Tooley, Taking Back the United Methodist Church, Bristol House, 2008) and, for the most part, the doctrine of holiness as emphasized by John Wesley was not being consistently taught or preached upon, even in holiness churches.

Vol. 40, No. 2   February 2009

One of the reasons for the popularity of the CBS television series The Mentalist is the main character’s (Patrick Jane, played by Simon Baker) ability to discern truth from error, and his sharp skills of observation, specifically, to see links and implications that others, even trained others in the California Bureau of Investi-gation, do not usually see. In a word, Patrick Jane is very discerning. I won’t comment here on the psychic overtones of the series.

Christians must make decisions every day, decisions which have moral implications as well as decisions that, at least on the surface, appear to be amoral or have no readily observable moral implications. We all seek discernment in making decisions. We need to exercise discernment when drawing conclusions from reading a book or article, when viewing television, when talking with a friend, in disciplining our children, in planning out how we utilize our free time, and how we go about our work. Basically, discernment is something we need in every facet of our lives, particularly in how we interpret the Bible, but also concerning how we think  about even such things as a vivid dream we had two nights ago or whether God was speaking to us in that dream, or in a set of circumstances the week before that.

Vol. 40, No. 1   January 2009

 In the February 2008 issue of Christianity Today Ken Walker reported on “TULIP Blooming,” or, more specifically, the (often aggressive) reintroduction of five-point Calvinism into many Southern Baptist seminaries and churches under the guidance of the Founders Movement and other groups. He explained:

Although only 10% of SBC pastors identify themselves as Calvinists, nearly 30% of recent seminary graduates do, a groundswell that could spark more Oklahoma-like conflicts [the Arbuckle Baptist Association adopted a motion calling on the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma to rebuke Reformed theology, sending copies of the motion to all members of the Southern Baptist Convention’s executive committee]. Some of the denomination’s leading Reformed thinkers come from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, including president Al Mohler, and Tom Nettles, coauthor of Baptists and the Bible, a seminal text in the SBC’s conservative resurgence.

Vol. 39, No. 12 - December 2008

The idea that suffering is essential to Christianity, that suffering draws us closer to Christ, benefits the church, and produces servant disciples, are all true, but these concepts are very rarely articulated in what many today have termed "user-friendly" Christianity. However, Ajith Fernando wants to change this leaning. Writing specifically to pastors, but for Christians in general as well, he observes that today we often focus on affluency and modern technology, com-fort and convenience, wealth and pros-perity, with many preachers arguing that believers in particular have a biblical right to have these things, and that suffering is something to be avoided at all costs.Based on Paul’s words in Colossians 1:24-29, Fernando reminds believers of the joy they can experience when suffering is viewed through the eyes of mature faith. Can a believer experience joy even in the context of encountering grief and loss? Paul testified, "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church" (Col. 1:24, RSV). Observe how Paul links joy with suffering. Fernando observes that in the Bible, these two things, joy and suffering, are necessary aspects of the Christian faith, and they must exist together. If we emphasize joy while neglecting or downplaying suffering, we slip into heresy, because God designed suffering to be as much a part of the Christian life as joy.

There are many solid, biblical resources on suffering and evil for those seeking to teach or preach on this topic. In addition to Fernando’s book, these include Lynn Gardner’s Where Is God When We Suffer? (College Press, 2007), Os Guinness’ Unspeakable: Facing Up to Evil in an Age of Genocide and Terror (Harper SanFrancisco, 2005), and Gordon Clark’s God and Evil: The Problem Solved (Trinity Foundation, 2004). For a comprehensive bibliography on this topic write to us and request it at EMOS, P.O. Box 1664, Sylvania, Ga. 30467.