The Church of Christ

(Based on the Word of God; dedicated to the promotion of independence, Indianisation, unity, co-operation, and to the removal of corruption and evil in all forms and in all places.)

The Church Today Needs a Call to Arms

The total mobilisation of every Christian - is the only answer to the threatened annihilation of every creature.

We must have militant men with a martyr Spirit - that will stand against all the assaults of the enemy.

This is no hour for argument, controversy or debate. The call of God to the Church today is, “Be zealous therefore, and repent” (Revelation 3:19):

We need - not a polite reference to repentance - but a mighty call to cleanse our hearts and humble ourselves before God!

The modern, Laodicean, lukewarm “Love-the-Lord-Love-the-world” Church - cannot cover the shame of its nakedness.

May God forgive the shrivelled, spineless, sapless, fruitless Christians - who know well the theories of the Saviour-hood of Jesus Christ but have experienced little of the Lordship of Jesus Christ!

Far too many preachers are giving fatherly advice - when they should be uttering fierce denunciations against sin! They spend too much time comforting the afflicted, and too little time afflicting the comfortable! (Amos 6:1-7; Isaiah 58:1; 2 Timothy 4:1-5).

Oh, for men who could say like Micah, “Truly I am full of power by the Spirit of the Lord, and of judgement, and of might to declare unto Jacob his transgression, and to Israel his sin.” (Micah 3:8):

A New Work of the Holy Spirit - Are We Ready?

What is wrong with the Church today? Why is it so ineffective? Why is it so unsuccessful in appealing and reaching out to the populace? Why are its services so dull, its members so cold, and its messages so irrelevant? These are questions which exercise us constantly, and very rightly so. And the answer is close at hand, if only we will seek it in the right place. But it will not be found by taking crooners into cathedrals or guitars into pulpits, or by diocesan bishops dancing “the twist” in public. We need desperately to break free from the impersonal hand of institutionalism, from the puppetry of formalism, and from the smugness of respectability-not, however, by conforming to the world and its crazes (which is only to publicise our powerlessness), but by returning to genuine Christianity; and that means the Christianity of the New Testament. When we consider the gloriously triumphant power of the Holy Spirit in the lives of ordinary Christians as described in the Acts of the Apostles, the Church today almost seems to be a stranger to vibrant Christian dynamics. Where is the fullness of power, grace, and joy of the first Christians? For years now our church leaders and legislators have been preoccupied with the revision of canon law, a letter which kills; our diocesan conferences give a lead only in boredom, dominated as they are by financial estimates and committee reports; our parsons are masters of platitudes; and the faithful few of our parishioners who do come to church are annoyed if they find a stranger inadvertently sitting in what they regard as their place.

It is not God, but we who are to blame for this state of affairs. God is judging us for our complacency and little faith. If in humility and sorrow we seek His face, He will, in accordance with Christ’s promise, pour upon us the transforming blessing of His Holy Spirit yet again. Indeed, there are already indications of a new movement of the Holy Spirit within the Church at the present time. Is this something for which we are ready? Are we willing, do we long, for a divine tide of blessing to flow over us? That tide is even now on its way.

This, at least, is your Editor’s estimate of the developing situation which he had the opportunity of investigating during a visit to the United States earlier this year. What he witnessed points only in one direction, namely, that the Breath of the Living God is stirring among the dry bones of the major, respectable, old-established denominations, and particularly within the Episcopalian Church. News that Episcopalians were speaking in tongues was certainly strange: it sounded so incongruous! But it was probably attributable to a flirtation under the hot Californian sun with the extravagances of Pentecostalism - until in Washington he found a letter from the Editor of Trinity magazine awaiting him, elicited by the reading of an article he had written.¹ The personal experiences of his correspondence were described in the following terms:

I became an Anglo Catholic after years of nominal Episcopalianism had failed to satisfy me. There was a hunger inside for more of God, and Anglo-Catholicism offered an opportunity to express the hunger through form and ritual and daily communions. Everything I could procure written by Anglo-Catholics I devoured eagerly. However, the day arrived when I had gone just about as far as I could go … I adhered to a strict rule of life and said a multiplicity of prayers, and yet deep within me there was a feeling of dissatisfaction. At this point in my life the Lord graciously baptised me with the Holy Spirit and my life became charged with new meaning. At first, I accepted the language He had given me as merely the ‘gift of tongues’, and considered it a wonderful aid to my devotional life, but otherwise of minor spiritual significance. Gradually it became clear to me that my whole life had begun to be transformed at the time I first spoke in the language supernaturally given, and, through reading the Scriptures, I became aware that I had been filled with the Holy Ghost as I spoke with other tongues … I would like to emphasise that this experience was not a conversion experience. I had been converted some years before while on my knees during my morning devotions. It is of interest that the experience I had when I personally accepted Jesus as Lord of my life was not recognised by either of the two priests I consulted or myself as having been a conversion experience. After I became filled with the Holy Spirit I realised what had transpired and the significance of it … I naturally rejoiced in my experience of being indwelt by the Spirit and attempted to fit the experience into my theology and my devotional practices. To my astonishment, it did not fit. To my horror, my theology began to change, and it was most terrifying. The Holy Bible, which I had previously considered to be a history of the Jewish people plus an interesting follow-up that my Church had written, suddenly became to me the living, breathing Word of the eternal Godhead. The Body of Christ, which I had formerly believed to consist of the Anglican Church, the Roman Catholic Church, and the Orthodox Church, became to me all those who had accepted Jesus as Lord. Furthermore, they not only no longer appeared to me to be in grave spiritual danger, they seemed to be in a much safer state than fully half of the baptised, confirmed communicants of the church which I attended … The Book of Common Prayer, which I formerly lamented as being just terribly ‘Protestant,’ now strikes me as being remarkably sound and filled with the rustling of the Holy Spirit … I have gained an entirely new conception of Christianity which is most wonderful, and I enjoy a new and exciting relationship with our blessed Lord that I previously sought through meditation and other devotional practices, but never quite found … Thanks be to God that He has not changed and that the Baptism of the Holy Spirit is still a reality for believers to day, and that by this selfsame Spirit we are led into all Truth.

This experience, your Editor found, has been enjoyed by large numbers of other church-people. It is transforming lives. It is revitalising congregations. It is not confined to one church or to one district. Nor is it induced from without, but has every appearance of being a spontaneous movement of the Holy Spirit. Your Editor met individuals and groups whose lives had been affected by it. He attended their prayer meetings and worshipped with them, and visited the homes of some. He heard some praying in an unknown tongue. It was all restrained and calm, and immediately someone else would interpret what had been said. Nearly all the prayers, however, were in English. Much more impressive than the glossolalia were the love, the joy, the devotion which flowed out from their lips and their lives-and their consciousness of spiritual power: power to witness to their faith freely and daily in the world, and power to pray for the miraculous healing of the sick and to see the victorious answer to these prayers. Is not all this reminiscent of the situation with which we are confronted in the book of the Acts?

It is a movement, moreover, within the heart of the Church, not away from the Church, embracing clergy as well as laity. Last year a diocesan bishop told his annual diocesan convention that he was convinced that another Pentecost was coming and had already started. “For the past hundred years,” he wrote in a well-known Episcopalian magazine, “we have been largely occupied in turning the Christian religion into a loosely knit group of private chapels, which have been used as a place to extend a morality, a social behaviour, and a piously cultural way of life, tinged with local ceremonial additions - and all this with a growing neglect of the things of the Spirit.”

“Why,” asks a clergyman writing in a diocesan monthly:

Why did I have to live all of those years before someone told me that Jesus is related to life, that He is not dead, or impotent, but alive and able to help His creatures? The Sunday schools and churches never told me. The seminary (theological college) I went to never told me. In fact, the least Christian environment I have ever known was that seminary. I say this in love, because, you see, they did not know Him either … In Acts, I could see how a small group of frightened people were transformed instantly into the most powerful force that the world has ever known, by their experience on the Day of Pentecost. They became the Body of Christ, speaking His words, doing His works, reconciling the world to Him, bringing thousands to salvation through one sermon, performing miracles, making known the wonderful power and might and love of my Lord Jesus Christ. That is the kind of power I wanted in my ministry. I thank God that He led me to seek and receive, in accordance with His Word, a Pentecostal experience of my own, and that He has baptised me with His Holy Ghost, so that in this wonderful ministry to which He has called me I no longer need to do my own preaching, nor make my own decisions, nor operate by my own power.

Of a small city “mission” church, fifty years old and until recently spiritually moribund, we read: “A small Episcopal mission without love, without power, without the peace of God, is being converted by the power of God into a thriving church with the gifts and fruits of the Spirit being manifested in the lives of the parishioners. The Sunday morning service is, if anything, ‘more Episcopal’ than it ever has been. Yet here we perceive laymen praying for the sick visiting the afflicted, preaching the Gospel, and doing the works of Jesus. Here is the power which transformed the Apostles from a discouraged, powerless band of fishermen into the men ‘who turn the world upside down’.”

In another parish, a person speaks of the change which has taken place in his church:

The first notable fruit is that persons who once tolerated one another in parish life now have a deep association and understanding in the Lord Jesus Christ. Previously they had a hard time talking about sports, politics, and even the weather; now they can talk hours without end concerning what the Lord is doing in the lives and in the world … Because of this new aliveness, there comes the desire to share it with everyone. You tell this good news that Jesus saves - that His Spirit is abroad - to all who are in need What an evangelical heart the Holy Spirit gives you! You invite people to attend church with you; you read the Bible to shut-ins; you have tracts in your pocket to pass on to those who have questions; you pray for a greater revelation of the Lord for those you love. The command to go out into the highways and hedge and compel others to come in is a reality. You now look forward to the next meeting of the Christian community, whether it be on Sunday in the Breaking of Bread, or on a weekday evening to join in special prayers of healing and praise. In retrospect, you wonder how you ever existed previously without the gifts of the Spirit. Life now holds a new dimension; there is a new spirit of discernment, of understanding, of insight, of destiny.

“The Church’s purpose is the salvation of souls through personal faith in Jesus Christ”, affirms another Episcopal clergyman who rejoices in this same experience.

But if we have ceased to believe in the salvation of souls (and truly we talk very little about it), it seems rather irrelevant, at least in terms of New Testament Christianity, to talk of ‘building a Christian social order’ or “the Church’s impact upon society” or even ‘redemptive penetration of the social order.’ All of these have their place. Indeed, one of the most indubitable facts of history is that the early church did make a tremendous impact upon the society of its day. But the ‘social impact’ of the early Church arose precisely out of the fact that the Church was first, above all, salvationist in its approach to the individual seeker … _What is needed is assurance of a completed and finished salvation through personal acceptance and realisation by faith of the ‘finished work of Jesus’.

A clergyman of the Anglican Church in Canada, who for twenty-five years was a Professor of Systematic Theology, tells how God gave him the infilling of the Holy Spirit more than forty years ago when he was rector of an important city church in Canada, and how he witnessed souls saved from week to week as well as many remarkable healings and infillings. He remarks that it is very profitable for Episcopalians, as well as others, to read over frequently the Thirty-Nine Articles and the Creeds, and calls for a return to a full-orbed doctrine of the Trinity. “Whatever is true of the Triune God,” he says, “is true also of the Holy Spirit. A strange neglect of the person, power, and work of the Holy Spirit in the Church and in the life of the individual has left a barrenness which He alone can rectify.”

Christians should pray earnestly and expectantly that the Acts of the Holy Spirit may be powerfully manifested once again in the Church of our day through the lives of those who profess the name of Christ. The Christianity of the New Testament, with its fullness of power and joy and grace and its imperturbable peace in the face of adversity, is a reality, not a fantasy, and it is meant to be a reality for us now no less than it was a reality for those early believers in the first age of the Church. Only to the extent that it becomes a reality will the Church recapture its true effectiveness, its relevance, and its dynamism.

Eastern Light of the Bible

By The Most Rev. K. Chengolvaroya Pillai, D.D.

Archbishop and Primate - Indian Orthodox Church.

That the Bible is an Eastern book, written by Eastern people has always been acknowledged by the Western Christian world. Yet, the meaning of its being an Eastern book has not been very clear to the West. Many verses which could not be understood by Western people have been skipped when reading, or, the full force of passages could not be wholly appreciated because the book is Eastern, set in the Eastern way of living. And the West does not know how we live nor our Eastern views.

It has been God’s blessing that I have been able to explain a many passages from the Bible which the Western church could not understand. Perhaps more than a thousand churches in England and the United States have invited me to open up to their people biblical illustrations and incidents which had been closed to them. These people have therefore been inspired to take a fresh interest in verses that previously have had little meaning for them.

Heap Coal of Fire on His Head

“Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirsts, give him drink; for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.” (Romans 12:20). Some Westerners think that this is a form of revenge. But, the verse is an extension of the admonition, “Bless them that curse you; pray for them that spitefully use you.” It cannot be a method of course, it is a manner of blessing.

The saying originated from the way in which coals of fire are carried from one household to another in Eastern villages. One woman who has a flint rises first and builds a fire, and a boy then takes the burning coals on a piece of pottery, balanced on his head to the other households. This is a pleasant task for the boy because when the morning is cold, he is warmed by the coals as he goes his rounds. And all the villagers welcome him when he delivers enough coal from their kind neighbour to build their own fires.

The meaning of the verse is that to turn your enemy into your friend, you have to feed him, give him drink and warm him help him with the most vital thing he needs, a fire in his house When he receives these services from you, he will gradually change his attitude towards you. Of course there are many other ways than giving food, drink and fire in this age to show your good will towards an enemy, of showing him that you are a much better person than he had thought. The Christian cannot show revenge and the wise man will not; we must prove our human sympathy to our enemy above all others. Our friends know how good we are; our enemy has become convinced that we are not good, that if he is to live and prosper we must be deprived of our ability to damage him. We have to prove to him that we want to do him well. Even to warm him and provide a fire for his house.

Shake the Dust From Your Feet

“And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet” Matthew 10:14. This does not mean the dust of the road, but the dust of animosity and bitterness which have been aroused in you by the cool response you received. We do not have dust on our feet when we leave a house as we have left our shoes outside when we entered it - how then can this verse mean that earth is to be shaken from our feet, or that we mean thereby to have nothing more to do with that house. Jesus was telling us that even under provocation his followers must not have enmity in their hearts or feel bitter. We must shake these feelings out of our hearts by curbing them and reminding ourselves that feelings of that kind are like the dust of the road, fit only to be shaken off. Whatever happens to us, we must go on our way with our hearts full of peace and joy, as a godly man should. You must never take with you the dust of hatred and resentment: shake it off and leave it behind, so you may continue with a pure heart.

Shout It From the Housetops

“On the morrow as they went on their journey, and drew nigh unto the city, Peter went up upon the housetop to pray, about the sixth hour” (Acts 10:9). Eastern, houses have flat roofs; people go up and use the rooftop for various purposes. One of these purposes is prayer. The Jewish people feel that the closer to God they can go, the more effective their prayer will be.

“What aileth thee now, that thou art wholly gone up to the housetops?” (Isaiah 22:1). This refers to the custom of the whole population coming out on their housetops to pray for deliverance. This may be in response to some type of national calamity such as an approaching plague. A leader of the town will blow a trumpet to summon the people to their housetops, and the announcement is shouted from one to the other. Everyone, every living soul is brought up to join in the supplication; that is why it says “thou art WHOLLY gone up” everyone goes, the sick and the old people and everyone. Such a calamity occurred in Nineveh as described in the book of Jonah (3:7-8): the king caused it to be proclaimed and published by decree that everyone should be covered with sackcloth and cry mightily unto God. And we see that God did deliver the city.

Save Your Tears in a Bottle

In Psalm 56:8 we find: “Thou tellest my wanderings, put thou my tears into thy bottle are they not in thy book?” Saving one’s tears in a bottle is an ancient Oriental custom based on the belief that these tears will be proof to God that the individual has wept righteously many times for a good cause. Unrighteous tears are not saved, tears of anger for instance. But all weeping for the Glory of God is saved to be buried with the person as proof to God. The verse in Psalm 56 is saying, then, that godly people do not need to save their tears, since the good works of God’s people are written in God’s book already.

In Luke 7:37-38 there is the story of the woman of the city, who was a sinner and came to the house where Jesus was eating, bringing an alabaster box of ointment: “And stood at His feet behind Him weeping, and began to wash His feet with her tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed His feet, and anointed them with the ointment.”

I believe that this woman brought her own tear bottle and poured the tears over Jesus feet to wash them. This was quite a sacrifice, since it is a disgrace to be buried without ones tear-bottle. In fact, this woman was very penitent indeed, because she brought a costly box of alabaster, she gave up being buried with her tear bottle, and she lowered herself exceedingly by using her hair to wipe His feet. The hair is woman’s crowning glory, this woman was signifying that her crowning glory was only enough to wipe Jesus feet.

Explanation

Financial reasons have compelled us to abolish the “Seeker and Pilgrim” as from January 1964. But it is going to be transformed and to reappear under new auspices. Some of the special features will be retained. The essential stand of the magazine will be maintained. And readers will continue to see the comments of the Editor on important matters.

This new arrangement has been possible on account of the kindness and generosity of our sincere and faithful friend - Brother Henry Rodrigus - Director of the Christ-Nagar Mission, Editor of the Crusader, and courageous leader of the 20th Century Challenge. He has so lovingly offered to print our material free of charge and binding cost. We pay only for paper and postage. This is indeed a Good Samaritan uplifting us in our difficulties. We are truly grateful.

The old readers - subscribers and benefactors of the defunct magazine - will have the benefit of material in the spiritual life, Biblical expositions, struggle against untruth and evil, and on evangelical principles. We hope they will not only continue their old support and interest but help in relieving us from indebtedness to the extent of Rs. 600/- on account of the Seeker and Pilgrim.

Notes

1. Projected Chapel for Church of Christ (Union Church) Bhubaneshwar (Orissa): An appeal for funds for its construction in a nice folder adorned with the picture of the stately church to be built in the new Capital. Though the church is named Union Church the sponsors are Baptist leaders - whose affiliation is with the Foreign Baptist theology and ecclesiastical pattern. The land has been naturally donated by the Government and the money will be raised - mostly from overseas. The estimated cost is ONE LAKH RUPEES!

   In the name of Christ we cannot support this white elephant. We cannot conceive of a church being connected with Government, national or otherwise. This is pure negation of Christianity. It eclipses Christ from the view of India - a land of saints and sages. Many Christians call their churches indigenous under inspiration from their missionary parents. This is a delusion and a simple falsehood. How can a church in India depending on foreign money, direction and ideology, call itself indigenous? It is strange that thousands of Christians have been hoodwinked by foreigners. It has been possible because of their slavish position in which they have lost their initiative, personality and self-respect. In India or anywhere we do not need church buildings. The church is the body of Christ - the Sangha of believers who can and should worship anywhere homes, under a tree, even under the sky. Don’t Hindus and Muslims do it? Against inclement weather we need protection especially in towns where simple inexpensive structures may be built with the money of the congregation concerned and with our other countrymen’s help if necessary. That will be Apostolic and Biblical Christianity pleasing to God and appealing to our countrymen. Hindus will respect independent self-respecting Christians who will refuse to offer so-called worship to God in expensive fashionable churches under various physical comforts. God can never be pleased with such artificial and insincere worship. He dwells in humble penitent hearts.

2. Rajpur Retreat and Study Centre (Dehradun): This was founded a few years ago with heavy American funds and aggressive American missionary directors having Indian assistants to beguile the Indian churches and Christians. We have nothing against any Christians personally but such institutions with the assistance, participation, co-operation and the influence of Indian Christians are sapping the vitality of the church in India. What the Indian churches in co-operation ought to have done in their humble indigenous ways has been supplied by foreigners with big foreign money. The initiative has been taken away from the Indian hand for an indigenous laboratory of spiritual, intellectual and cultural cultivation. Missionaries have neglected the Christian Ashram Centres founded by Indians and have themselves started a number of similar institutions under various names thus vitiating the rosy picture of co-operation* and partnership-principles about which they have talked glibly and written extensively over the decades. To be quite frank, missionaries have never been humble, on the contrary very proud of their talents, training, and superior intelligence. They have had hardly any appreciation of Indian culture.

   One of these institutions is at Rajpur. We have recently received an appeal for help from India signed by Sriman Ranjit M. Chatsingh and Sriman B.N. Lall, Chairman and Vice-Chairman, respectively, of its Board of Management. We confess to a sense of disappointment and even shame that intelligent men of India get interested in exotic activities like this one all over India financed by foreign funds and directed by foreign inspiration and alien culture. Such Indian worthies have looked askance at humble but genuine indigenous efforts and sought limelight among missionaries. These institutions have piled resolutions, decisions, and findings which have been eaten up by Moths. Anyway they have not benefited the real Indian Church on whose behalf this is undertaken. Though it has given comfortable train and air journeys and a nice holiday to some individual sophisticated Indian Christians who themselves are not related to the situation. The sooner Indian Christians get disillusioned and take to humble efforts on the basis of personal self-sacrifice and hard work the better for the church and the country. How far have such leisurely activities and capitalistic concerns forwarded the Kingdom of God in India?

3. Brother R. Solomon, independent evangelist, Cuttack, sends us a report of his activities for the past two years or so. He spent 19 months abroad in Palestine (World Pentecostal Conference at Jerusalem) one year in England and the rest in other European countries preaching, healing and getting theological training. What’s the idea in having this hectic trip throughout Europe? While we admire his zeal we deprecate the waste of time and energy involved. Where is the quiet and deep appropriation of Christian experience in life which alone is effective in Hindu India? This is not America or Germany! We would advise our young friend to select an area in India, study things of India, emphasise Biblical studies and meditation, concentrate on a definite method of evangelism as led by the spirit, be friendly and approachable to Hindus: then his ministry will be blessed with fruit in conversion of souls to Christ. One of the many mistakes that these itinerant preachers make is that they neglect Hindus - the majority people and concentrate on the tiny Christian community. In the course of the past half a century we have known too many of this category of evangelists who have sought limelight, jumped hither and thither, amassed a good deal of money and then have married and settled down in comfort to enjoy the goods of this worldly life. They have thus shown a very bad example both to the church and to non-Christians. Hence, our warning advice in all sincerity. Let us firstly understand the nature of the religion of Jesus Christ. Quietness of Spirit, depth of devotion, simplicity of life whether in married or unmarried condition, faith ventures, love and fellowship are the qualities out of others in Christian character that our country will understand and appreciate.

Published by:

Acharya R.C. Das 129 Dashashwamedh, Varanasi, India.

Printed by Henry Rodrigus at the Evangelical Press, Christ. Nagar Mission, Badagayedapadavu, Mangalore Taluk, S. Kanara, India.

Edited and Published by:

Rev. R.C. Das, M.A.,
Khristpanthi Ashram,
129, Dashashwamedh, Varanasi, India

Printed at:

Evangelical Press,
“CHRIST NAGAR MISSION”,
Badagayedapadavu Post, Mangalore Taluk, S. India