July 2003 Contents

Have you ever felt that you needed an anchor for your life? That the storms of life were trying to smash you on the rocks? asks Pastor General Joseph Tkach. For some people, it might be family problems. For others, the loss of a job, the death of a loved one, or a serious illness. Page 6.

A vital part of the church’s mission of living and sharing the gospel is the “equipping of the saints for ministry,” writes Tom Hanson. As the church has matured in its understanding of the “ministry of all believers,” the need for ongoing training and development has emerged as a priority. Page 8.

I became a Worldwide Church of God member 34 years ago, and life in our church has been for me a mixture of joy and sorrow—satisfaction and exasperation—gratitude and remorse, writes Ted Johnston. Page 11.

A primary aspect of the disciplemaking challenge is to engage youths (children, teens and college-age young adults) in the life of each of our congregations. If we are to do that, we each need to contribute to making our congregations more youth-friendly, writes Ted Johnston. Page 14.

For any ministry to have lasting impact, new leaders must be identified, trained and mobilized, writes Jeb Egbert. During his earthly ministry, Jesus placed high priority on another essential aspect of disciplemaking: multiplying and sending leaders. Page 16.

SEP Ohio was home to 112 teen and 50 preteen campers together with 56 staff June 22 to 27 at Camp Cotubic in central Ohio. Most campers and staff came from Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Pennsylvania, with a few from as far away as Texas and Florida. Page 18.

Controller Ron Kelly writes that member donation income for June was $1,431,000. Our budget projection for the month was $1,466,000. So our shortfall was $35,000 or about two percent less than we planned for. Page 24.

As part of his description of the gospel, the apostle Paul explains the need for it. What is it that people need to be saved from? asks Michael Morrison. Page 25.

Tom Torrance looked up at us from his bed in his room, much older than I had ever seen him, and smiled a smile at me and asked, “John, how are you!?” Whatever his stroke meant for his body, however much he had to live with his short-term memory loss, it was clear to me that there was plenty of life in him yet, writes John McKenna. Page 27.

BATON ROUGE, Louisiana—Richard Rice, 67, a minister and employee of the Worldwide Church of God for more than 40 years, died unexpectedly Saturday morning, July 5, of a massive heart attack, although he had shown no earlier signs of heart disease. In fact, the previous day he and his son, Anthony, had mowed the lawn at the church where the Baton Rouge congregation meets.

The funeral took place July 9 in Baton Rouge. Carn Catherwood, south-central district superintendent, conducted the service. Representing headquarters were Pastor General Joseph Tkach and Mat Morgan, secretary to the church board of directors.

“This is certainly a sad event in our history as a fellowship,” Mr. Catherwood said, “but I am comforted by the realization that Richard, who always took the opportunity to focus our attention on Jesus, now lives in the presence of the risen Lord of whom he so often spoke and to whom he was so deeply committed. I know that he will be remembered for his loving kindness and particularly for his support for the ‘little ones.’ ”

Mr. Catherwood went on to emphasize Mr. Rice’s gift of encouragement and above all his legacy of Christ-centeredness. He will be deeply missed by the thousands whose lives he touched.

Mr. Catherwood said that Mr. Rice’s wife of 46 years, Virginia “Ginny,” “has shown great courage, and she has expressed to me her deep gratitude for the prayers and support of her spiritual family.” Mr. Rice is also survived by their sons, Phillip, pastor of the Phoenix, Arizona, church, his wife, Lil, and their children, Melanie and Peter; Anthony, pastor of the Baton Rouge, Lafayette and Alexandria, Louisiana, churches, his wife, Karen, and their children, B.J. and Miranda; and Michael, director of Client Services at Universal Studios in California, his wife, Edie, and their daughters, Rosie and Richelle. Cards may be sent to Mrs. Virginia Rice at 16131 Indigo Ridge Ave., Baton Rouge, 70817.

Mr. Rice became associated with the WCG in 1947 and began attending Ambassador College in 1954. After graduating in 1960 he taught at Imperial Schools in Big Sandy, Texas. He was ordained an elder in 1963, and began assisting in the pastoral ministry in the Big Sandy area. In subsequent years he pastored churches in Shreveport, Louisiana; Birmingham, Huntsville and Montgomery, Alabama; and Glendale, California.

In 1972 he became director of the Mail Processing Center in Pasadena. He served on the Ambassador College board and the Worldwide Church of God board. In 1995, he was named assistant director of Church Administration for the United States, where he served until he retired in 1996 and moved to Baton Rouge. He was was a member of the Advisory Council of Elders until his death.

A while ago, I took the time to list the 10 people who were the most encouraging to me since my baptism, and Richard was one of the top five. He had a gifted tendency toward giving encouragement, and at times it seemed to me that he didn’t know how encouraging his comments could be.
Pastor General Joseph Tkach.

Richard always focused on what a person could do instead of what he or she couldn’t. He was a constant encourager who knew how to bring something positive to the fore. I have known very few people who could inspire hope like Richard could.

The first time I met Richard was 34 years ago, and he made me feel like he’d always known me. Many might not know that he was advocating for a

greater focus on Jesus Christ as the center of the gospel well before the church began to change. Richard will be sorely missed by everyone who knew him. Mike Feazell, National Publications director.

For 15 years I had the honor and privilege of working with Richard Rice in Mail Processing and Church Administration. During that time as well as the years after I left Pasadena, Mr. Rice was the most influential Christian in my life in leaving a positive imprint on my life and ministry.

From 1990 through early 1996 I had the privilege of working in almost daily contact with him. I never saw him coast or stop at “good enough.” Rather, he exemplified his frequent admonition to MPC employees: “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men” (Colossians 3:23).

The Holy Spirit gave him a seemingly inexhaustible supply of love and compassion for others no matter who they were. He gave each person the utmost respect. No one was insignificant and no problem was insurmountable for him to do what he could to help.

This was especially evident during the crucial time in 1995 when the church was going through the greatest pains of transformation. He truly poured out his life as he along with his faithful wife, Ginny, visited local congregations throughout the United States nearly every weekend that year sacrificially serving others. The memory of our trips to and from Los Angeles International Airport and the chats we had have proved to be some of the best preparation for my own pastoral ministry.

I always had the utmost respect for Richard Rice, whose life was filled with compassion, discipline, enthusiasm, integrity, wisdom and balance. He kept his eyes on Jesus and walked in his light, his life and his love. I learned much about our Lord by seeing this dedicated servant in action in so many different circumstances over the years. Richard Rice was the personification of Paul’s letters to Timothy on how a faithful minister should live.

I’ve thanked God often for having had the honor of knowing him and spending so much quality time with him through the years. He was a man of loyalty and integrity whose favorite hobby seemed to be disciple building. I truly believe that every positive aspect of my life and ministry has been instilled or refined in some way by the life, the words, the

example and the legacy of Richard Rice. I miss him, but take comfort in knowing he is finally enjoying a well-deserved rest. Karl Reinagel, pastor of the St. Louis, Missouri, North and South churches.

Richard Rice was a sincere, soft-spoken Christian who reflected the servanthood of our Master. Richard was a caring and compassionate Christian, in spite of prevailing ideas and notions, whether his caring ministry was thought to be politically correct or incorrect.

He was a strong and resolute leader who lived out his convictions to our Lord and Savior. He spoke up for and was the champion for all of God’s children, and was tenderhearted in his ministry to all. I remember him best as the primary supervisor of hundreds of former employees who benefited from his leadership, among them part-time employees who were students at Ambassador in Pasadena.

The Rices leave a long ministerial legacy of friendship, warmth and caring service, and they are remembered by thousands of people for such a heritage. It was my pleasure to know all three of Richard and Ginny’s sons when they were in college, and they all, in their own way, reflect some of that same Christ-centered focus of their mother and father.

We will all miss Richard, but we are left with wonderful memories of his ministry and work. We are comforted by the assurance, the blessed assurance, that he is in the loving arms of our heavenly Father. G. R. Albrecht.

Richard Rice was a man of integrity who stood for what he believed regardless of the consequences. He constantly sought the will of God that he might make correct decisions.

Richard had a desire to learn, but not just for the sake of knowledge for himself, but so he

could help and teach others. He disciplined himself to work hard for the kingdom of God and to point as many people in the direction of the kingdom as possible. Eric Shaw, pastor of Altadena Community Life Fellowship.

As a student, I got to know him well when I had the opportunity to work for him under their

student training program. He was a truly wonderful, humble and inspiring man. Bermie Dizon, pastor of the Pasadena NewLife and Los Angeles, California, churches.

Mr. Rice was such a godly man, a true servant of the Lord. He always inspired me, either through his sermon messages or his personal words of encouragement. Back in 1978, I heard a tape by Mr. Rice titled, “The Highest Dimension of Love.” I took that tape home from services and wrote it out word for word. A certain portion of it I wrote inside my Bible because I knew it was something I wanted to aspire to. It has helped me through the years and I continue to read it often.

I don’t think I ever heard Mr. Rice speak without focusing on love, and when I think of him, I think of love. Ellie Jones, Patterson, Louisiana.

Mr. Rice was one of my Imperial School teachers and then years later he was the adviser to the singles group in Pasadena. I have fond memories of him and his wife because they were always so gracious and kind to me and my family. Shirley Senay, Denton, Texas.

I first met Mr. Rice in the fall of 1960, my senior year at Imperial School in Big Sandy. He, along with several others, had been sent from Pasadena to strengthen the faculty. One of Mr. Rice’s goals was to start an Imperial Choraliers like Pasadena had.

Since I was the only piano player in the high school at the time, I became the accompanist. This was challenging as most of the Imperial students had no prior music training. But through kind words and encouragement, Mr. Rice was able to get us into shape, and the Choraliers were able to perform, not only for the school and Big Sandy congregation, but for other local congregations as well.

I went on to Ambassador College and afterward married and lived in Pasadena. Years later, Mr. Rice and his family returned to Pasadena, where we renewed our acquaintance. When he was director of Mail Processing, my two oldest daughters, Joyce and Cynthia, had the opportunity to work for him.

I will always remember Mr. Rice as kind, gracious and patient with everybody. Joy Reese, Pasadena.

The week before my dad’s death, we had a guest speaker come to Baton Rouge. He was Peter Ndamba, a pastor from Zimbabwe. Dad and mom graciously hosted him in their home during his visit. I received the following e-mail from Pastor Peter Ndamba a few days ago:

“I am very sorry for what happened to your Dad, but one thing for sure, he is with the Lord. One thing you probably don’t know is that Mr. Richard, he blessed me a lot with three jackets and one suit, two pairs of

shoes and $100. The Almighty knew he was about to finish his work when he gave me some of this things. Mr. Richard said, ‘Let me do this to you because I might not see you again.’ ” Anthony Rice.

An anchor for life

Have you ever felt that you needed an anchor for your life? That the storms of life were trying to smash you on the rocks? For some people, it might be family problems. For others, the loss of a job, the death of a loved one, or a serious illness.

Such trials can overwhelm us like a wave that crashes upon a ship. Gone are the memories of peaceful sailing on smooth seas—all we can think of for the moment is the trial we are in right now. Will we survive, or will we sink? And sometimes the turmoil is so great that sinking doesn’t seem that bad of an option!

To weather the storms of life, we need an anchor to keep us in place, to keep us from being swept toward the rocky shore, to keep us from capsizing and sinking. What is our anchor?

The book of Hebrews tells us that we have an anchor—the sure hope of salvation through Jesus Christ. This is the hope set before us, the hope that greatly encourages us. “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure” (Hebrews 6:18-19).

Verse 20 tells us that this hope enters the presence of God in heaven, where Jesus is already helping us. Our hope of eternal life is anchored in heaven, where the storms of this life can never sink our ship! Our salvation is safe and secure.

The storms still come, though, and rage around us. The waves beat on us, but we need not fear—our anchor is in the unsinkable heavens. Our lives are safeguarded by Jesus himself. Our anchor will keep our lives safe—as long as life itself will last. That means forever! We have an anchor for life, a point of stability when life gets rough. Don’t wait for the storms to begin—anchor your life in Jesus now!

Parable of stability

Jesus taught something similar in the Sermon on the Mount:

“Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash” (Matthew 7:24-27).

Jesus describes two groups of people: those who follow him, and those who don’t. Both types of people build good-looking houses. Both types of people can appear to have their lives in order. But the storms of life strike them both, and the houses are tested not so much for how they look on the outside, but how well they are built underneath.

Listening to Jesus does not prevent the rain, water and wind—the problems of life—but it does prevent collapse. When the storms of life beat upon us, we need some solid foundations to keep us steady.

Jesus advises us to build our lives not just on hearing his words, but on putting them into practice. We need more than the name of Jesus—we need a willingness to do what he says, to trust him not just with the future, but to trust him in life right now.

If we hear the words but do not obey what Jesus says, our lives might look good on the surface. But eventually the trials come, and our lives can fall apart, or become unraveled or capsize—choose whichever metaphor you want. The point is that life works best when we do what Jesus says.

Jesus does not force us to obey, but he gives us a choice. He tells us what will happen if we don’t. Our behavior shows whether we believe him, and whether we trust him.

Seeking a foundation

If we want a basis of stability in times of trouble, then we need to consult the teachings of Jesus. We should not wait for the storms to begin—we should get right habits right now.

But how do we do that? Wait for Jesus to pop down in our home to tell us what we ought to do? Of course not—in most cases the words of Jesus are already in our homes. What we need to do is to take the initiative to learn what they are, and to do what he says. Don’t assume you know, just because you read it a few years ago. If you really want a stable foundation, you need to read it again. You can’t build on the right foundation unless you know what it is.

What you learned a few years ago may have been good enough for then, but you have probably forgotten a few things, and you might learn even more, now that you have some more life experience. I encourage you: Keep learning—keep growing—keep strengthening your connection with the true foundation of life. No one else can do it for you.

Joseph Tkach

SALEM, Oregon—Few things shake us and sadden us as much as the

death of a child. On Thursday, July 3, as communities were preparing for the long Fourth of July weekend, Shawn Robert Wargnier, 17, and Tara Lynn Granno, 18, were killed in an auto accident in Salem.

Tara had just graduated from high school, and Shawn, though he was eligible to graduate early, had decided to stay and spend his senior year with his friends. The two were dating and had discussed with their families becoming engaged before they started college.
Shawn Wargnier & Tara Granno

Shawn was the son of Gary and Judy Wargnier. He has an older brother, Derek, 20. He was the grandson of Robert and Pat Wargnier, longtime WCG members, currently members of Living Hope Church, the Salem WCG congregation.

For many years, in the 1960s and 1970s, the family lived in Southern California, where Robert and his brother Oscar worked in the Printing Department for the church. Their children, including young Shawn’s father, Gary Wargnier, attended Imperial Schools in Pasadena.

Both of the young people were bright stars in their families, schools and communities. Shawn grew up next door to his grandparents on the family property, and they were deeply invested in his young life in every way. He had a 4.0 grade point average and was loved and respected by teachers, faculty and friends alike.

A double funeral took place Wednesday, July 9. It was attended by more than 1,000 people. Beautiful testimonies, memorials and tributes were offered by family and friends. A teacher remembered Shawn as the young man who made her first day and her first year of teaching bearable with his warm smile and the funny pranks he left on her computer.

One of his high school buddies said that he was the most honest person he’d ever known. Shawn’s e-mail address and Internet username was Shawn 3:16, a reference to his favorite Bible scripture, John 3:16. That was written in large letters on most of the cars driven in the procession by friends who knew him well. Most of the young people wore red shirts or red armbands to remember his trademark color.

The community then gathered at the cemetery for the committal service and to say good-bye. Wayne Mitchell, pastor of Living Hope Church, was asked to officiate at the committal service.

After the service, everyone was invited to a Celebration of Life at the Wargniers’ family farm. In the generous and gracious style so typical of their family, they set up tents, tables and chairs for 800 people, and worked to see that everyone was provided for, serving people that afternoon and on into the evening. Shawn and Tara were good kids from great families. They are survived by many, many family members and friends. To say they will be missed is an enormous understatement.

Cards and letters can be sent to Shawn’s parents and brother at Gary, Judy and Derrick Wargnier, 4783 Verda Lane NE, Keizer, Oregon, 97303.

To Tara’s mother at Tracy Granno, 959 Greenwood Dr. NE, Keizer, Oregon, 97303.

To Shawn’s grandparents at Robert and Pat Wargnier, 5422 Portland Rd. NE Space 76, Salem, Oregon, 97305.

PASADENA—A vital part of the church’s mission of living and sharing the gospel is the “equipping of the saints for ministry.” As the church has matured in its understanding of the “ministry of all believers,” the need for ongoing education and development has emerged as a priority.

Of course, with Ambassador College and University as part of our denominational heritage, education has long been a focus for our fellowship. Now, an exciting new online educational opportunity will enable all members to access a quality, well-structured Christian Ministry curriculum through the new Ambassador College of Christian Ministry without having to leave home or undertake full-time study.

PLANNING SESSION—From left: Charles Albrecht, Russell Duke,
Mike Feazell, John McKenna, Ron Kelly and John McLean meet
March 6 to develop courses for the Ambassador College of Christian
Ministry. [Photo by Thomas C. Hanson]

“This is an exciting and timely step for our fellowship,” said Pastor General Joseph Tkach. “The new Ambassador College of Christian Ministry builds upon our denominational heritage but extends and expands formal study opportunities throughout the church.

“It offers the church the opportunity to provide practical and foundational knowledge and skills to men and women preparing for or serving in local church ministries around the world.”

This new, denominationally sponsored educational program will be available for both credit and audit study. Students will be able to study from home and commence studies at any time, since the courses will be offered on-line. This also enables the cost of the program to be kept to a minimum.

Students who successfully complete credit study will receive denominationally recognized certification. Those choosing to audit the material without completing the assignments will enjoy a quality Christian Ministry studies program that can enrich and enhance their personal journey of faith.

“The new program has been in development for more than two years,” said Mike Feazell, National Publications director. Dr. Feazell and other church leaders met in March with John McLean, Australian national director, to discuss lay ministry educational opportunities now possible through resources developed by Pacific College of Training & Development.

Pacific College was established by the WCG in Australia in 2000 to deliver structured education in Christian ministry. Dr. Feazell said that the Christian ministry courses that Pacific College has developed provide a comprehensive and practical framework for the church to use as a denominational standard. The courses reflect the church’s theology and doctrine, and the content and format are easy to understand.

Using the program and systems developed by Pacific College, the Australian Regional Office of the WCG will provide the infrastructure for the online courses offered through Ambassador College of Christian Ministry.

“The Worldwide Church of God has undergone dramatic change in the last 17 years, particularly the last eight,” Dr. Tkach said. “A significant aspect of this change has been the transition to ‘the ministry of all believers’ and the need for lay ministry education.”

“We believe we have achieved the goal of designing Christian ministry education that is practical, accessible, interesting and doctrinally and theologically mature and sound,” Dr. Tkach said. “This new program will provide an ideal foundation for effective Christian ministry.

“We hope that local congregations will see the program as an opportunity to invest in their local ministry leaders,” said Dr. Tkach. The courses will provide a structured approach to learning, with assessment components for credit students, opportunities for interaction with other students through course discussion groups, and denominational recognition for assessed course completion.

“Ambassador College of Christian Ministry will be a vital resource for equipping members for lay ministry and upgrading and enriching the skills of those who are already serving,” said Dr. Tkach. “It is also an important means of uniting the church worldwide in its learning, development and ministry practices.”

Anyone who wants to. Courses can be taken for credit (toward certification; includes assignments and grades) or for audit (not for certification; no assignments or grades). The courses are designed to enrich each individual’s personal journey of faith and to support those serving in local church ministries.

Those completing each level of study (four courses) will receive certification confirming the successful completion of their work. Those completing all three levels (12 courses) will receive an Associate Degree in Christian Ministry. ACCM degrees and certificates will be recognized by the Worldwide Church of God as certified preparation for lay ministry. While it is not an externally accredited program (and thus the units of study are not transferable to other programs), it is a quality program designed particularly to meet the needs of men and women serving in voluntary ministry within the church.

While completion of the program is not in any way a guarantee of appointment to a particular role of service, it is anticipated that people serving in positions of congregational responsibility will undertake at least selected courses of study.

Of course, we recognize that many of our lay leaders already have other ministry education. This program is in no way designed to supersede or negate such studies. It is simply an additional and probably more accessible program for WCG members who are interested. In addition, of course, members can undertake studies for their own interest and receive recognition for successfully completing the various levels of study.

You can enroll online at www. ambascol.org Information about the program and about individual courses is also available at the site.

Ambassador College of Christian Ministry’s program is designed to be flexible and allow students to start and finish according to their own schedules. Enrollment in a three-unit course will be valid for six months. However, the courses are designed to enable a person in full-time employment to complete the work over 10 to 12 weeks by setting aside several hours per week.

The assignments are designed to reinforce learning. In a number of courses you will be asked to write two or three short papers (1,000 to 2,000 words) about key issues raised in the course to demonstrate your understanding.

In other courses there may be sets of questions from the lessons and readings, or practical exercises to complete, such as leading a small group discussion, designing a worship service, or making a presentation. The emphasis is on practical application of the learning. Grades will be awarded as follows: Distinction; Credit; Resubmit selected material in order to obtain credit.

For the foreseeable future, Ambassador will only be offering its courses via Internet delivery. However, if you don’t have Internet access, you can still take the courses by accessing computers and Internet connections that are provided by most public libraries or perhaps using a friend’s connection.

You can enroll anytime. Initially, there may be limits on the number of enrollments for particular courses, but Ambassador is committed to providing a flexible learning environment, so you will be able to enroll anytime. Enrollments will stay current for six months.

The first two courses offered are Spiritual Formation and Survey of the Bible. Two more courses will be available in October: Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ and Foundations of Faith.

The program content will emphasize foundational but fundamental aspects of practical Christian ministry and will be delivered in three levels (completion of each level being a prerequisite for enrollment in the succeeding level).

Level 2: ‑Introduction to Christian Ministry: 4 Courses (prerequisite: Level 1: Foundations of Christian Faith)

Level 3: ‑Introduction to Pastoral Ministry I (prerequisite: Level 2: Introduction to Christian Ministry)

PASADENA—Curtis May, director of the Office of Reconciliation Ministries (ORM), participated in a multicultural festival May 17 in Duarte, California. Mr. May was assisted by nearby congregations and ORM chapter leaders Raul Ramos and Leigh Sniffen.

The content and purpose of the event was stated in the event brochure: “Once again we embrace Duarte’s and the San Gabriel Valley’s cultural diversity through dance, song, music and food. Our Festival includes an incredible food court of ethnic flavors and aromas. This Festival benefits the whole community by reaching out, accepting differences, promoting cultural awareness and activating community involvement.”

The Glendora, California, congregation, pastored by Neil Earle, paid for the booth as a donation to the event, and Pastor Bermie Dizon and Pasadena NewLife Fellowship members helped with setting up and staffing the booth.

That evening, Mr. May and his wife, Jannice, attended a banquet at the Westlake Village Hilton Hotel to honor John Dawson as newly appointed president of Youth With a Mission (YWAM). Youth With a Mission (YWAM) is an outreach ministry with more than 17,000 staff from 150 nations who work in 800 ministry centers. They have participants from many denominations.

Mr. Dawson is also founder of the International Reconciliation Coalition, of which Mr. May is a member. Mr. May is also a friend and prayer partner of Mr. Dawson’s. The YWAM board of directors invited Mr. May along with a few others to participate by making a video to honor Mr. Dawson and to pray for his success in his new responsibility.

CANTON, Ohio—Several U.S. congregations are reaching their 40th anniversary this year. We congratulate them, noting that such milestones are opportunities for remembrance and reflection.

As I have joined with some of these congregations in their anniversary gatherings, I have reflected on my own experience in our fellowship. I became a Worldwide Church of God member 34 years ago, and life in our church has been for me a mixture of joy and sorrow—satisfaction and exasperation—gratitude and remorse.

Perhaps it has been something like that for you—a journey full of ups and downs, high points and low points, progress and pitfalls. Such it is with most journeys in this fallen world—even ones within the church—including our church. No matter what your personal journey in our fellowship has been, we have traveled together, and with God.

In Scripture, God often exhorts his people to remember their collective journey. For example, the Lord called out through the prophet Micah to Israel, saying, “My people, remember what Balak king of Moab counseled and what Balaam son of Beor answered” (Micah 6:5a).

In the journey from Egypt to the Promised Land, Israel encountered great trials and peril. There was, for example, the time king Balak tried to annihilate Israel using the offices of the pagan priest Balaam to curse the nation. God intervened and turned a potential curse into a blessing (even speaking through a donkey to do so!—it’s amazing how God works, isn’t it?).

The Lord continues, “remember your journey from Acacia to Gilgal...” (Micah 6:5b, New Living Translation). Israel’s journey hit a particular low point at Acacia, east of the Jordan in Moab, where the nation descended into terrible sin—displaying a great lack of loyalty toward God.

Yet, despite this unfaithfulness, God granted Israel amazing deliverance—eventually taking her across the Jordan to the first encampment in the Promised Land at Gilgal. God exhorts Israel to remember that journey—one of many obstacles, trials and disappointments, including their own terrible sins and faults.

But why remember all this—why focus on the past? Is the goal to glory in one’s own strength—or to despair over one’s own sins (or the sins of others)? No, God encouraged Israel to remember their journey so that “you may know the righteous acts of the Lord” (Micah 6:5c).

I suggest that we reflect on our journey together in the Worldwide Church of God for the same reason.

If we take an eyes wide open look at our collective journey as a church, I think we find that we eventually arrived at our own Gilgal despite ourselves and over a rather circuitous and perilous route. My point is this—for any good we now experience (and my personal conviction is that there is much good), the credit and praise go to God—the Lord of “righteous acts.”

Many have fond memories of the journey. With them, we rejoice and give thanks to God for what was good. Yet, for others, the journey was painful and their memories are tinged with sorrow and sometimes anger.

With them we grieve and we acknowledge that our journey was a mixture of good and bad, joy and sorrow. It was a journey laced with human weaknesses, mistakes, faults and sins. And to those who were harmed, we reach out in compassion with a desire to help. The current leadership of the church has, appropriately, confessed our institutional sins and asked forgiveness from those who have been hurt by our sinful practices and beliefs. I join them in that confession and request forgiveness for any personal misbehavior, including leadership practices that brought harm to others.

It is my desire (one shared by all the current WCG leaders I’m blessed to know), to lead the church in newness of life so that on one hand we might not repeat the sins of our past and so that on the other we might experience the fullness of God’s blessing. It is thus essential that we remember and learn from our journey that we might see more clearly where God is taking us in the future.

Regarding that future, notice further God’s words, through Micah, to Israel: “With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:6-8).

Israel often misunderstood the basis of her journey with God. If the people of Israel thought their righteous acts (including offering of sacrifices), earned favor with God, they were mistaken. Their favor with God was because of who God was, not who they were. It was because of God’s grace that Israel was delivered from Balak.

It was God’s righteous acts, not theirs, that opened the way for them to enter the Promised Land at Gilgal. The sacrifices of the law of Moses were given to remember and celebrate God’s righteous acts of deliverance, not earn Israel God’s favor.

God’s point to Israel is that their deliverance is rooted in his grace, not in their obedience (or lack thereof). But notice also that God invites them to respond to that grace by embracing his heart and then expressing that heart in a life-style characterized by justice, mercy and humility. I think God has used our journey as a church to teach us a similar lesson and to offer to us a similar invitation.

My experience with members of the Worldwide Church of God is that we are a people who are serious about obeying God. Sadly, we often thought our obedience would earn us God’s favor. Worse, yet, we thought we were unique in gaining that favor. On both counts, we were wrong—terribly wrong.

To make matters worse, this approach toward God, rather than causing us to feel God’s favor, caused many to feel condemned. Knowing they were not living up to our standards and modes of obedience, they thought God rejected them.

Yet God is gracious—he indeed is the Lord of “righteous acts.” Rather than experiencing his condemnation, he has granted us confession, repentance and deliverance—leading to a transformed heart.

As we wrestled with our deeply entrenched legalisms and false doctrines, we began to hear a clear, compelling and (for us) new message from the God who had not abandoned us, despite our sin.

God, in his grace, wanted us to share fully and freely in the heart of the one who fulfills God’s charge to Israel. That one is Jesus, and we are invited to share in his heart of justice, mercy and humility.

The heart of Jesus is the heart of the one who is rightly related to God. Rather than being defined by religious ritual, that heart is defined by and expressed in the patterns of Jesus’ life and love, conveyed in his teachings and through his Spirit.

In words directed toward some Jewish religious leaders, Jesus paraphrased Micah’s exhortation: “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel” (Matthew 23:23-24).

Even under his covenant with Israel (the old covenant), what God sought was a heart that beat to his rhythm, reflected in a life of fairness and tender compassion toward people and one of faithful dependence upon God. Jesus called such love toward God and toward people the great commandments of the law.

This love, now exemplified fully in Jesus, is the great command of the new covenant. Under this covenant, those who put their trust fully in Jesus are brought into union with Christ through the Holy Spirit. In this union, they share in Jesus’ love for God and for people and are led to express that love by participating in Jesus’ patterns of relating to God, to people and to self. Jesus is thus the purpose—the goal of the journey.

In our past, we often tried to earn God’s favor through our self-defined set of sacrificial acts. Many of us tried hard. But our efforts did not get us into the Promised Land. Yet, God, in his mercy, did not abandon us as we wandered in our wilderness. Rather, in his righteousness and love he corrected us and brought us to Jesus, where we find the perfect union of God’s justice and mercy. In Jesus, God’s righteous judgment against our sin is fully satisfied—paid for in full at the cross in Jesus’ sacrifice. God’s mercy—his grace toward us—is made possible, not because God ignores our sin, but because the terrible price for our sin is met in Jesus.

In Jesus, our journey is finished—complete. In Jesus, mercy triumphs over justice, because justice is met on our behalf. That is the gospel.

In our relationship with God, in Christ, we discover a new relationship with people based now on the way Jesus relates to us—with mercy and grace. And that new way of relating with people includes a new way of relating with ourselves. During our former journey, some of us saw ourselves as failures—unable to live up to the standards we defined.

We walked with God not humbly, but in despair. Others of us saw ourselves as good—as measuring up to the standards and thinking God must be pleased. We walked with God not humbly, but in self-righteousness.

Neither view was accurate. Both were spiritually destructive—but, thanks be to God, he is delivering us from both—to Jesus.

To see our journey in this light is both liberating and humbling. But freedom with humility is God’s good gift. Concerning humility, Robert Morneau wrote in 31 Reflections on Christian Virtue: “Humility ... is that habitual quality whereby we live in the truth of things: the truth that we are creatures and not the Creator; the truth that our life is a composite of good and evil, light and darkness; the truth that in our littleness we have been given extravagant dignity.”

To see God as he is leads us to see ourselves and our journey as the mixed bag they truly are. Such humility leads us not to despair nor the desire to abandon our journey, but it leads us to a life of joyful, thankful dependence.

That dependence is not upon ourselves, but upon God, who in Jesus, gives us all we need for the journey and will take us on to its ultimate completion.

And so as we consider our journey, let us remember, rejoice and give thanks. Let us also, as appropriate, confess and seek forgiveness. Let those who were hurt be helped to grieve and be healed. And let us all embrace God’s gifts of justice, mercy and humility.

CANTON, Ohio—All of us in the Worldwide Church of God share in the challenge and responsibility to make our congregations places where people of all ages are encouraged and enabled to become increasingly mature disciples of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. That mission involves helping others meet Christ, know Christ and serve with Christ.

A primary aspect of this disciplemaking challenge is to engage youths (children, teens and college-age young adults) in the life of each of our congregations. If we are to do that, we each need to contribute to making our congregations more youth-friendly. This article is written to help us in this important work.

Before looking at how we can create youth-friendly congregations, let’s first ask, why should we care? Let me share some important answers to this legitimate question.

1. People need the Lord—and that includes young people. Jesus came to seek and save the lost—and children and teens who do not know Jesus are as lost as adults apart from Christ. We share in Jesus’ work to seek and save lost youths when we invite, bring and welcome lost youths into a youth-friendly congregation.

2. The church is always one generation away from extinction and thus youths are the church’s future. While we do not fear extinction (believing Jesus’ promises that the church will prevail), we do have the responsibility to work to see that the church continues into the next generation.

3. As workers in Jesus’ harvest of souls, we are sent to go where fruit is both present and ripe for harvest. The experience of the church throughout Christian history shows that children and teens are a significant harvest field.

Studies show that most Christians in our culture come to Christ before age 18 (with most of those doing so before age 14). As I have met with various groups of WCG adults in the United States, I have conducted informal polls and found that these statistics hold in our fellowship as well.

God is doing a particularly fruitful work among children and teens—throughout the world—including our fellowship. We have both the opportunity and responsibility to join him in this important part of the harvest.

4. Jesus showed in his earthly ministry that youths are to be full participants in the work of the church. By scolding his disciples for making it difficult for children to come to him, Jesus shows us that the church is to be a place where children are sought out and welcomed.

Having addressed the why of making our congregations more youth-friendly, let’s now discuss the how by asking, what does a youth-friendly congregation look like? Following are several indicators for your consideration.

1. A youth-friendly congregation works to meet the four essential needs that are shared by all youths. (The basic content of this list and some of the ideas for the rest of this article are taken from The Youth Friendly Parish by Michael Anderson, published online at http://yya.oca. org/TheHub/TOC/General/GImenu/General Info.htm

But many youths don’t find a sense of belonging in church. They might be more apt to say, “This is my parents’ church.” Our goal and challenge is to help them find a sense of belonging in our congregation.

Youths spend much of their lives—particularly during their teen years—searching out the fulfillment of these four needs. To do so is not selfish, nor ungodly. Rather, these needs are part of how God has made us.

Certainly youths can seek to meet these needs in unhealthy, ungodly ways (in gangs or cults, for example), but in our congregations they should have these needs met in ways that help them come to know Jesus and then grow as his followers.

Let me encourage each of us who are adults in WCG congregations to ask how we might reach out to youths in our congregations to help them meet these needs. In addition to the ideas noted above, consider the following:

1. Give youths opportunities to learn and then to perform tasks that are valued within the congregation. For example, they might participate in scripture reading, music performance, ushering, gathering the offering or serving as a greeter. Note that it is important to train them for these tasks so that they do them well. As they perform well, tell them. Show respect based on real achievement.

2. Look for opportunities to affirm young people—send them the message that they are special and essential to you and thus to the congregation.

We often send a contrary message by ignoring young people, interacting with them only when we need to correct them. But for them to feel loved and appreciated, positive interactions need to far outnumber the negative.

We can have positive, affirming interactions in various ways. For example, remember and use their names; send them birthday cards or handwritten notes any time of year. Spend time talking with them—give focused attention; if they are small children, get down on their level, eye-to-eye. Ask for their input and then use it.

Give them hugs (be careful about this if you are a man and they are adolescent girls); give them candy (check with the parents first).

3. Pray with and for the youths. Have a list in your congregation of youths for whom you are continuously praying. And let them know you are praying for them (but don’t brag about it)—ask them for concerns and needs they have that you can address in your prayers.

4. Spend time with a few youths. Many youths spend little time with adults. Try to provide a few youths with such opportunities and do not confuse taking a kid along on an adult activity as spending time with them. Get into their world—and be a mature, wise, caring and consistent presence with them where they are. It will pay big dividends in their lives.

5. Learn about their world. Respect the youths enough to go to the effort to get to know their concerns, culture, needs, preferences and challenges. Find out what they watch on television and in movies; what they listen to; what they read. How do you do that? Ask them and then listen lovingly and non-judgmentally.

The point here is not for an adult to act like a teen (trust me, teens hate that)—rather the point is for the adult to understand the teen. A second part of this approach is to look for what is good and godly in the youth’s world and then use that as a bridge to connect your world of Christ with what is consistent with Christ in their world.

6. Really listen to the youths. One of the greatest desires of young people (teens in particular) is to be heard. Youths are often timid around adults, so it will take some time for them to learn to trust you with their inner thoughts. Therefore, be patient and keep an open ear.

Having considered some ways to meet the needs of youths, let us now consider how we can work together to see that these things are happening more consistently and intentionally in our congregations. I recommend to you the following specific strategies:

1. Provide at church a setting in which teens can gather to express and discuss their needs and fears. Providing a teen small group moderated by a caring and mature Christian adult can do this. The small group could meet before or after services, or during the teaching part of the main service (though the better strategy is to make the main service entirely teen friendly and then have the teen small group before or after main church).

2. Provide times when youths can get away together and with caring, mature Christian adults. Retreats are great. So are trips to fun places. Many WCG districts offer Discovery Weekends, SEP camps and other events for youths. Take advantage of these opportunities to build closeness among your youths and for them to bond more closely with adult sponsors and leaders.

3. Plug your youths—your teens in particular—into meaningful, consistent ministry within your congregation. Do not just have a youth day at church a couple of times a year when the teens take over the worship service. Rather, give them a place in ministry week-in and week-out.

For example, do you have youths on your worship team? How about a drama team? Are youths frequently offering congregational prayers and helping with ushering. Do you have a mature youth on your congregation’s advisory council? Think about how youths can be active in all the ministries of the congregation.

Much more can be said about helping your congregation to be more youth-friendly. I will stop here, however, and simply ask that you take this challenge personally. You cannot do everything, but you can do something.

I ask that you pray about this, asking God what he would have you do, given your circumstances, your abilities and your gifts. God wants to use you to co-minister in his disciplemaking work with children, teens and college-age young adults. Seek his direction and he will grant it to you.

FRISCO, Texas—For any ministry to have lasting impact, new leaders must be identified, trained and mobilized.

During his earthly ministry, Jesus was active in making disciples. That work included winning the lost, building believers and equipping workers. But Jesus did not stop there—he placed high priority on another essential aspect of disciplemaking: multiplying and sending leaders. Jesus’ apprentice leaders, led and empowered by the Holy Spirit, gave birth to the disciplemaking movement we know as the Christian church.

Through the church, Jesus continues his disciplemaking work in our world today. An essential part of that work is multiplying and sending a new generation of leaders. Youth ministry is a particularly fruitful place for such leadership development to occur.

Within a youth group in a local church, young believers who have developed into workers are identified, encouraged, equipped and mobilized to become leaders within the youth group itself and within the congregation at large. But what is involved in helping a young disciple of Jesus to become a leader? For starters, the right candidates must be identified.

An appropriate candidate for leadership development within a youth group is a young disciple of Jesus who is AFT’R more—one who is available, faithful, teachable and responsive.

Available young disciples are ones who have been willing to clear their calendar to make great commandment—great commission (GC2) ministry a priority in their lives.

Faithful young disciples have demonstrated endurance over a period of time. The fruit of God’s Holy Spirit is evident. They exhibit a spiritual consistency and predictability. They have shown themselves “faithful in little.”

Teachable young disciples are humble enough to learn and to be accountable to leadership within the youth group and congregation. To be a good leader, one must first be (and continue to be) a good follower.

Responsive young disciples have team spirit expressed through contagious enthusiasm and passion. Through a young leader’s appropriately directed passion, youths catch a commitment to Christ, to the local church, to the youth group and to the church’s disciplemaking mission.

Would you as a youth ministry leader like to be more active and successful in giving birth to young leaders within and through your youth group? Would you like to be a multiplying leader? If so, you need to be aware of certain critical success factors that you must possess.

First, you need to have a clear vision about the future and be able to articulate it regularly and clearly to the members of your group—particularly to the emerging young leaders. In youth ministry, the vision is not something that needs to be created, because Jesus already provides it. Jesus’ vision for our ministries is that we would fulfill the great commission (to make disciples who make disciples) motivated by a great commandment heart of love for God and for people. A multiplying leader passionately and clearly articulates this GC2 vision for emerging leaders.

The second critical success factor is the ability to actively pursue GC2 ministry in and through the local church within the limitations of local resources and conditions. For example, what type of outreach activity might be most successful in your community, given the resources (people, time and money, to name a few) available? The multiplying leader has the ability to pursue the great commission within his or her context.

The third factor is passion. A ho- hum attitude neither sparks nor sustains movements. Relentless, God-anointed enthusiasm does.

The fourth factor is making leadership development a top priority in your life and ministry. Multiplying leaders requires lots of energy and lots of time to provide focused coaching for emerging leaders. Such coaching includes sharing ministry vision, discussing issues and providing developmental feedback. Jesus himself invested heavily in a small number of individuals, even though the masses were constantly vying for his attention.

The fifth critical success factor is the ability to share leadership with emerging leaders. We see this factor in Jesus’ earthly ministry—he carefully, intentionally and frequently sent out his disciples into ministry. Emerging leaders must be allowed to try on what they are learning. Much like a parent with a child, a multiplying leader allows the emerging leader to gain lots of hands-on leadership experience—moving from theory into practice. This strategy means taking risks—allowing the emerging leader to make mistakes, to fall down from time to time in the process of gaining experience.

Before the selection of the 12 in his inner circle of disciples, Jesus did a remarkable thing. He spent all night in prayer. Though he was fully God, Jesus was fully man who faithfully and consistently sought the will of his heavenly Father. He did so in the selection of those who would partner with him in leading a world-changing ministry. As those who are responsible for selecting and developing emerging young leaders, we too must fully rely on God’s direction through prayer.

In prayer we seek to see in people what God sees—things not always discernable to human eyes. As we do, we may be in for some surprises.

You may remember how God surprised his servant Samuel and taught him an amazing lesson about leadership when it was time for King Saul to be replaced. Samuel was certain that he had found the next king of Israel when he was introduced to Jesse’s strapping first-born son. But God told Samuel that he was looking at the wrong thing. It was not until the rather unimpressive (by human standards) youngest brother was reluctantly brought before Samuel that God confirmed the next leader of his nation: the young shepherd boy David.

Jesus, himself, would probably not be considered a good candidate for leadership in the corporate world of the 21st century. He spent an enormous amount of time with people, loving them and serving them. What corporate leader would get down on his knees and wash his employees’ feet? Which one would enter the city on a lowly donkey? Which one would have the humility to give up the glory of heaven in order to experience the reality of life in our fallen world?

The point is, developing leaders is serious business—we need God’s constant guidance. We understand that God’s thoughts are not our thoughts—his ways are not our ways. The worldly model of what makes a leader is not his model. Some of the most inspiring godly leaders I have known have been common people who, filled with the Holy Spirit, did remarkable things on behalf of the kingdom.

For youth ministry to be sustained, the model that Jesus demonstrated in prayerfully investing in a few available, faithful, teachable and responsive leaders is instructive. For our youth ministries to be outposts of the kingdom that will make disciples who make disciples, the charge to us is clear: let’s be active in multiplying and sending young leaders.

BELLEFONTAINE, Ohio—SEP Ohio was home to 112 teen and 50 preteen campers together with 56 staff June 22 to 27 at Camp Cotubic in central Ohio. Most campers and staff came from Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Pennsylvania, with a few from as far away as Texas and Florida.

Several campers participated for the first time (including several not associated with any church). Angel Tree Mission sponsored two preteen campers. (Angel Tree is a group that ministers to children whose parents are in prison.)

Thanks to the generosity of several WCG congregations, many kids were enabled to attend camp through partial or full scholarships. The value of this mission outreach was confirmed when several of those who were scholarshiped came to faith in Christ and were baptized.

Before the start of camp, Tom Smith, a WCG pastor and director and chaplain of the preteen campers and staff, mobilized 18 WCG congregations in the Great Lakes district in praying for the kids who would attend camp.

God answered those prayers in a powerful way as confirmed in a letter that Jim Valekis, SEP Ohio director, wrote to staff following camp: “Wow! What a week. It’s over, we survived, and actually thrived in the presence of Christ that was so abundantly clear at SEP Ohio!

“Twenty-two kids were baptized—many more made commitments to Christ and commitments to evangelize. In one breakout session alone, more than 200 names were placed on the kids’ most wanted list for evangelizing and discipling.”

Recreational activities at SEP Ohio included basketball, volleyball, rock wall, zip line, archery, water trampoline, the blob (see picture), water slide, water polo, boating, dance and drama. Special events included a water balloon battle, sock hop, mud pit and a formal banquet.

While these events provided memorable times of fun, many campers commented that what they would remember most were the times of worship and fellowship that connected them to Jesus Christ and to one another. Worship times at SEP Ohio included a praise and worship evening, fireside chats, morning devotional times and daily chapels for teen and preteen campers.

Chapels for the teens were based on the camp’s theme: Journey with Jesus. The journey was explored in a five-part chapel teaching-series written for all the U.S. camps by camp chaplain Ted Johnston: Jesus’ person (knowing Jesus personally), Jesus’ passion (love for God and for people), Jesus’ purpose (to make disciples who make disciples), Jesus’ provision (his gift of the Holy Spirit) and Jesus’ promise (to be with us always).

The series was taught in the camp by several WCG pastors, collaborating with young staff members who provided testimonies, dramatic readings and skits to illustrate each message.

The chapels also included extended times of praise and worship through music (provided by the camp’s Ragamuffin Praise Band led by Pastor Rick Shallenberger). After each chapel, campers were led by their counselors in debrief discussions that strengthened their understanding of the chapel messages. The chapels were also supplemented by three breakout sessions that discussed personal evangelism, the doctrine of salvation and being a lifelong follower of Jesus.

Pastor Tom Smith led preteen campers in their own chapel each day with teaching centered on Group Publishing’s Super Cool Underwater Bible Adventure Program” (S.C.U.B.A.) Vacation Bible School curriculum. Preteen campers also had their own recreational activities including arts and crafts and many of the activities enjoyed by the teen campers.

God used the camp in a powerful way to reach out to young people—drawing many to Jesus Christ for the first time and building many more in their love for Christ and for his body, the church, as confirmed by the following excerpted letter from Autumn Metcalf from the Dayton, Ohio, area. She wrote after returning home from camp where she had been baptized.

“I am writing this letter to say thank you for everything that you and the church have done for me. I found Christ and took him into my heart. It has taken me almost 19 years to find him. At first when my mom asked me to go to church I didn’t want to go. Finally I said yes. I wanted to see what was making her so happy.

“At first I was nervous. Would everyone judge me like the other churches in the past? But as soon as I walked in the doors everyone made me feel welcome. I felt like everyone was part of one big family.

“A lot has happened in my life and I have felt empty. Well, due to the church and the grace of God, I am happy to wake up in the mornings and be so full of life. The Lord is in me and I’m proud to say that that my heart belongs to him. Keep the Lord in your heart and keep showing the way for others in the Lord’s name.”

Autumn’s letter points out one of the key strategies of the camp—to connect youths with Christ and their congregation back home. SEP Ohio, like all WCG SEP camps, exists to support the local church in advancing youth ministry—reaching out to lost youths, building up young believers in the faith, equipping young believers to be workers with Christ in and through their local church, and multiplying young leaders to serve in the local church. By working in partnership with the SEP Ohio staff, many local churches powerfully advanced Christ’s disciplemaking mission.

Contributors to this article: Jim Valekis, SEP Ohio camp director; Jay Richie, SEP Ohio staff member. Ted Johnston, SEP Ohio camp chaplain.

John McKenna first met his mentor, Tom Torrance, in 1982 at Fuller Theological Seminary, when the visiting professor delivered
the Payton Lectures.

EDINBURGH, Scotland—At the start of my June 17 to 24 trip to visit my mentor, Tom Torrance, in Scotland, on British Airways flight 282 from Los Angeles to London, I sat beside an English girl whose father left Baghdad as a Muslim years ago and now lives in England as an Anglican.

One of his sons had become a producer in Hollywood, and Ellie, his young daughter, was still seeking for her way in life. She took my business card and promised to read books written by Tom Torrance before too long.

On the plane from Heathrow Airport in London to Edinburgh, George Harrow, a real estate broker, sat beside me. He was a truly Scot businessman and gentleman. Surprisingly, he offered me a ride from the airport to my hotel. I promised to send him in the way of thanks something from Pasadena, California. He hoped I would enjoy my visit with my old mentor.

The Braid Hills Hotel overlooks one of the seven hills of Edinburgh and a green and windy golf course. On one of these hills rests the Royal Castle, overlooking the old city’s baroque architecture. The trees wave in the wind upon the hills, the clouds move swiftly above in a sky that brings rain and sun quickly. With nothing else to do, you can watch them write in rain and sun God’s own secrets above you.

The waves of light and darkness move across this good earth at Edinburgh’s latitude bringing long days and short nights with them, and the unpredictable cycles of the weather. The hotel is used by Scottish golfers and international tourists alike.

The halls of the hotel are lined with portraits of golfers Frederick Guthrie Tate and John White Melville, as well as those of great personages such as Sir Walter Scott, Mary, Queen of Scots, Flora MacDonald, Lady Charlotte Campbell, Prince Charles Edward Stewart and James VII. The stained glass windows along the hallways contain images not of saints but golfers. It is a truly civilized place, with small well-kept rooms just right for the traveler.

I begin my stay through some hours of anxiety. When Tom left the hospital after being treated for his stroke, he did not go home to his family, but to the Braid Hills Nursing Home. There he had a fall, bruising himself but not breaking any bones. I must wait to see him. I feel sick.

The next day, Tom’s brother James and James’ wife Mary picked me up at the hotel and took me for lunch at a wonderful country pub. We ate Scottish salmon, boiled white potatoes and fresh vegetables, and James taught me his Trinitarian Theology.

Professor James B. Torrance bears heavily on his person the burden of the Christian church’s tendency to interpret legalistically the grace of our Lord for us. Legalism thus confines congregations all over the world to a worship that is cut off from real union and communion with our Creator and Redeemer.

Communion with the Blessed Trinity, not truly realized, breeds a nominalism that imprisons people in a religion alienated from the real power of the gospel. The believer is not truly free for the gift of God’s freedom for his people.

Legalistic repentance is not biblical, he goes on. It turns upside down the relationship of grace to repentance. Whole congregations can become alienated who worship God in this manner. They remain fragmented in their faith, unable to participate actually in the divine nature and being of our Lord. The church then becomes absorbed by the world’s agenda. Once Professor Torrance makes sure you understand these things, then you may move on to speak of family, friends and far countries.

After the good food, James and Mary drove to their home for tea. Mary showed me pictures of their clan, their children and their children’s children dressed at a wedding party together in full kilts. A wonderful family indeed! The grandchildren possessed considerable musical abilities, she boasted. James gave me two books that his students had written, students now pastoring churches. He was happy to hear about the WCG and its transformation and liberation from its legalism of the past, about a community seeking truly by the grace of God to worship in Spirit and truth the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit of the Blessed Trinity. After tea, James drove me to the nursing home to greet Tom.

I hate nursing homes, because I once served as an intern in them in Los Angeles. It was not easy for me to contemplate the Very Reverend Professor Thomas Forsyth Torrance living in one of them. But the Braid Hills Nursing Home was pleasantly laid out and surprisingly free of the smell of sickness, and full of an aroma that only comes with great care.

Tom looked up at us from his bed in his room, much older than I had ever seen him, and smiled a smile at me and said, “John, how are you?” I was delighted. Whatever his stroke meant for his arms and legs, however much he had to live with his short-term memory loss, it was clear to me immediately that there was plenty of life in him yet.

James did not need to reintroduce me to his brother. “How is [your wife] Mickey?” “How is [Mickey’s son] Paul?” I showed my old mentor their greeting cards. I gave him a Coptic newspaper published in Cairo, Egypt, in which appeared my article on John Philoponos, the sixth century Alexandrian scientist Tom has championed in our time.

But the man whom I consider to be our greatest living theologian seemed unable to attend all at once to all these things. (His eyes may be failing him.) We simply agreed then to begin our meetings together the next morning. As we left the room, James told me that I was fortunate that Tom had recognized me right away. Fortunate, indeed, I was to be able to visit with the Torrances of Scotland, champions of trinitarian theology in the Church of Jesus Christ and its relationship to our scientific cultures.

I felt that my visiting with Tom might have a good effect on him. I believed we would be able to cut beneath his problems and get to that which remained substantial for him. I looked forward to our times together. Driving back to the hotel, James pointed out the Hermitage Park, where I might walk in the evening. I took the hint and that evening met a Scot with his dog along the wonderful park’s path. We exchanged words easily. I learned that dogs in Edinburgh are never aggressive, unlike so many in Los Angeles.

The walk took me mysteriously through the woods farther from the hotel than I realized, and I found myself back at the Braid Hills Nursing Home. Yes, tomorrow Tom and I would begin our visits there. I had the home call me a cab. I was too tired to retrace my steps. From my hotel room I called Mickey. She was as excited as I was.

In the morning, at 10 a.m., I was back in the nursing home. Tom was sitting up next to his bed finishing his breakfast. He moved his old body to his bed to give me his chair. I put on a tape recorder and he said hello to Mickey into it. But he is not really up to confronting things thrust upon him like that.

I spent some time showing him the latest results from Kip Thorne’s LIGO project with the California Institute for Technology. We looked at how gravitational waves would open up for us a new window on the universe, take us all the way back to Planck time just after the original Big Bang.

We remembered together John Archibald Wheeler and Jim McCord of Princeton University, and then others we have known, Geoffrey Bromiley, friend of Barth’s Dogmatics, Lloyd Ogilvie, a former student just retired as U.S. Senate chaplain, Ray Anderson and more.

He talks easily about his childhood in China. He remembers his visits to Fuller Theological Seminary. He speaks about Elmer Colyer’s book, and we agree that the Methodist theologian has done an admirable job apprehending and explaining the scope of Tom’s works.

It seemed that Tom could readily recover from the effects of the stroke. He could go home again. But when I asked him about his stroke, he says he can remember nothing of it. He describes his problem as follows: “If I can get back enough independence, I will go home. If I cannot, I am ready to go to heaven. I am looking forward to it.”

Back in my hotel room, I read in Tom’s Doctrine of God: One Being, Three Persons. The “hypostatic union” cannot be properly understood except in the context of the “homoousial relation” between the persons of the Father and the Son.

Love comes for us in this way and no other, exposing the mystery of God’s being for us as this man that he truly is in the world. Love never fails. Nothing can separate us from his love. Even in all of our grief and sorrow, there is this love of God for us in Christ. This is the God who is love. This is the God we need to know.

When I spoke again with Mickey on the phone, I was delighted to hear that Paul Drew, her son, had agreed to come to Scotland to take care of Tom, if that would help. Paul is a caregiver, and he said it would be for him, an artist, like taking care of Picasso. But when I speak about this with Tom’s wife, Margaret, genuinely pleased for my visit with her husband, she is sure it will not be necessary. But she was happy for my visit. It was most kind of me. She felt sure, she says, that it was good for both of us. Yes, divine love conquers all.

There lived a somewhat demented woman next to Tom in the nursing home. She cries out loudly at times: “Help me! Where am I? Help me! Where am I?” Tom refers to her as a “poor soul.” After a number of visits, I thought he actually looked forward to having lunch with his new colleagues in the home. I believed, with plenty of the old pluck in him, he pastored them.

Tom was still the evangelist at heart whom I first met when he delivered, in 1982, the Payton Lectures at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena. We had ample opportunity to speak again and again of our Lord and the worship of His Blessed Trinity and the wonderful theology of grace which we must develop through our communion with him in our time.

The third evening, Thomas Spear Torrance, Tom’s youngest son, visited me at the hotel. I was surprised by the range of his interests. He is an investment banker who likes to talk about black holes and multiple universes and mathematics. He explains to me the algorithms of prime numbers employed to protect the business of the banking community.

He informs me that both he and his brother Ian started out studying philosophy in Edinburgh. Ian has become the moderator of the Church of Scotland. Thomas, besides his banking career, handles the family affairs at 37 Braid Farm Rd. In the midst of our conversation, Mickey calls, and also speaks with him. He seems happy with us.

Thomas Spear Torrance gives me Tom’s latest book, Theological and Natural Science, and we discuss Tom’s final studies of the relationship between theology and science. His dad traces in this book, from John Philoponos through James Clerk Maxwell to Albert Einstein and Michael Polanyi, his lifelong engagement with the epistemological development of this relationship. This, for Tom, is the way to follow Christ, when the church will be relevant to the way the world is going.

In the morning, Tom looked better than the day before. His short-term memory loss is not a problem for us. We talked about Philoponos and Maxwell. They both wrestled with the problem of light and the nothingness of the creation. Both impetus and light theory were important to understand not only for physics, but also for theology.

I pointed out that, if the gravitational waves took us back to Planck time and electromagnetic waves to 100,000 years after the Big Bang, the invisible structure of an “impetus” theory had to provide the context in which light became what it is. Perhaps Philoponos and Maxwell wait still for the ultimate justification of the meaning of their physics? Tom said he would think about it.

John McKenna’s doctrinal dissertation
was The Setting in Life for the Arbiter
of John Philoponos. The book is available
from the publishers at www.wipfandstock.com
or Amazon.com Two papers by Dr. McKenna
on Philoponos are available to read at www.quodlibet.net

Also, we spoke about our imageless knowing. I told him how last night at the hotel, Thomas had suggested I use the square root of minus one as an illustration for it. Tom simply replied that no one pictures a soul or a mind either. We know ourselves and God without image finally or we do not know either at all, except in fragmented forms. We shook hands then and I left him to his nap and lunch.

Because Tom had suggested I go and visit Professor David Ritchie at Maxwell’s home, now a museum for the great Scottish scientist and a active center for mathematical physics, I made my way to downtown Edinburgh. The Maxwell home was closed on Sunday, but I found a pub near the castle just off the Royal Mile. The waitress was a girl from Paris. She was in Edinburgh to learn English. It was a friendly city, she said. But John Philoponos’ “impetus” theory kept ringing in my ears, its embrace of a light theory was new in my imagination. I felt grateful to God for this place.

Tom appeared even better the next morning. He smiles with deep satisfaction in his eyes. He was successful in gaining some independence of movement. He talks easily of people again. Even if we go over some things two or three times, I do not find it merely repetition. There is a melody being played with him in a rather grand symphony.

He signs the book Thomas gave me and we talk about its essays. He agrees with me that the overlapping in the essays is no mere repetition. How often and in how many contexts must we hear before we truly hear what it truly is that is being said? It is more like a melody in a symphony.

He spoke about some trouble he had with a dream, his boyhood in China, and he recalled his confrontations with Dan Fuller. He spoke then of Pannenberg and Moltmann, disappointed in their tendencies toward reductionism.

Finally, he mused about what Karl Barth would think of what he has done. He is adamant about the natural theology to which he has pointed us. It is not the natural theology to which Barth had uttered his “Nein.” He wags his head strongly against those who would think to use it as such for their apologetics.

The natural theology for which he seeks is real only within the light of the revelation of God’s reconciliation of the race to himself as the Creator and Redeemer of the world. The fact that we must allow the Incarnation to inform us as to the justification of the creation out of nothing in the beginning cannot escape our attention, if we are going to get things right.

We speak then about the “perichoresis” in the relations of the Son with the Father, the differentiation that must be understood between that of the “hypostatic union” of the divine and human natures of the Person of the Lord and that of His “homoousial relation” with the Father by the Spirit. The spacetime of the Incarnation cannot be separated in these relations from the eternity of God Himself. It is under the compelling reality of this One that science has been developed in our world. Everything must be understood in this light or not at all.

We speak again of Mickey and Paul, of Margaret, Alison, Ian and Thomas. We speak of his brother James and Mary, and he says he is tired. We exchange places again—he to his bed, me to his chair. On the bed, he is soon ready for his nap. I remind him about the chocolate fudge cake I brought for Alison from the Buckstone, where once he and Barth lunched and talked together. Then I say good-bye.

Beside the nursing home, horses feed in a green field. The winds move the clouds across the sky speedily, and it is sometimes rain, sometimes sun one after another too quickly for me to walk back to the hotel. I call a cab. I never leave him without feeling a vague regret in my soul. I remember his smile. Once back at the hotel, I plan to read his Christian Doctrine of God again.

But I tell the cabbie to drive me to downtown Edinburgh. I wandered the city in the rain and sun, watched three young men formed into a rock and roll band playing beside a statue of General Wellington reared up on his horse near the Jenners department store. Edinburgh is at once Medieval and modern. Here Christian memory still produces a respect for intelligence. Self-destruction appears restrained. I liked wandering purposelessly its streets.

Tired at last, I stopped at a bar-restaurant near the cabstand that would get me back to the Braid Hills Hotel. I ate fresh baked Scottish salmon and drank some wine. My waitress is from New York, so we talked a bit. She is here just for the experience like the girl from Paris.

Somehow we get round to speaking about Israel and Israel’s great Shema: “Hear O Israel, The Lord our God, the Lord is One.” When I write the words down in my journal, she leans over and we recite them together. She tells me she has not said them for many years.

Thomas Spear Torrance had asked me why it seems the church is losing its members so steadily, why the church appears so irrelevant to the modern world. I thought how that Jesus is way out ahead of us all the while, calling his people to himself. No matter if it is Hollywood, Broadway, Paris or the others, we need to be able, do we not, to look forward to going to heaven? Everywhere, we need, do we not, divine forgiveness? The regret I felt to leave Tom was now long gone from me.

This morning, June 23, Thomas called me just before I was about to leave the hotel for Tom’s room at the nursing home to inform him that his dad had fallen again. They had taken him to the infirmary for X rays. I would not be able to see him again before I left for California. I caught a cab for downtown and found the Maxwell house again. XIV India Street is a Centre for Mathematical Sciences in his honor. I spend an hour looking at the place of his birth and memorabilia of his science.

Today, the science of this radiation is much devoted to medical uses. I leave a card on which I put Tom’s greetings to Professor Ritchie. I walk the streets again, buy a shirt for Paul Drew at the Hard Rock Cafe and then find the Guildford Arms, where men are still men and they stand at the bar hanging on the brass rail under the well lit dark wood and ales provided for their conversations. Time and space sometimes curve in such a way that even what seems lost may be found. The human race is lost and found, like the long days and short nights of Edinburgh, like the sun and the rain the winds with the clouds bring, like our good-byes and our hellos.

The last time I visited him, Tom Torrance asked me to tell him about the Worldwide Church of God. What do I do for the denomination? How is it doing? Both James and he are happy to hear that we are committed to learning to worship by his grace the Blessed Trinity of God in Christ. It is the Truth that sets us free, indeed. It is the Truth that makes the church always relevant in the world.

It was on behalf of the WCG, that I said good-bye to the Torrances in Scotland, knowing full well we would say hello again, even if it is sometime in heaven. It was good to know on the plane back to Los Angeles that they are praying for us.

PASADENA—Member donation income for June was $1,431,000. Our budget projection for the month was $1,466,000. So our shortfall was $35,000 or about two percent less than we planned for.

On the other hand, we had an estate donation and other sources of revenue that totaled more than $700,000 in June, bringing the total income for the month to just over $2.1 million. The totals were actually ahead of projections.

Now for the year-to-date figures as we pass through the halfway mark for 2003. Member contributions for the first six months totaled $8.4 million. Estate donations, litigation settlements and peripheral property sales were more than $9.9 million, making the total for the year so far $18.3 million.

Cumulative expenses for the year have been $16.8 million. We have added $1.5 million to the reserve fund. We are still on track to sell at least one adjacent piece of property and later this year begin the sale of selected single-family homes on Orange Grove Avenue. As I have pointed out before, our financial strategic plan has been to sell peripheral properties that have not been planned for the core development project. This has made it possible to keep our 2003 budget on a fairly solid foundation.

At the 2003 halfway mark we are now beginning our budget plan for 2004, and I would like to keep you apprised of our plans. As we round the curve into 2004, we will no longer have property sales to back up our expenses. Thus our budget plan for next year will need to be carefully evaluated and no doubt will include some major decisions on how we allocate funds in each departmental budget area.

We have already had one administrative team planning meeting and will continue to meet regularly until we hammer out a budget that will be submitted to the church board later this year. This budget, by necessity, will have a significant impact on spending and some extremely difficult decisions will have to be made. Please join us in prayer for guidance as we go through the budget-planning process over the next few weeks.

In the meantime, we continue to work tirelessly on the property sale project. Meetings with city officials, business groups, neighborhood associations and many other interested parties continue as a high level of priority. The environmental impact study is now well underway, and we hope to see its completion in a few months.

That will lead to public comment, which will in turn lead to a Pasadena City Council determination. We hope that determination will come by late in the first quarter of 2004, but could be delayed till midyear depending on a variety of factors.

As always, I want to express my deep appreciation that so many of you have patiently continued your most generous contributions to the Worldwide Church of God through the on-going transition of our church toward our projected new financial model.

Many members have requested information on how best to make a gift to the Worldwide Church of God, either during their lifetime or upon death through wills, trusts or other means.

August 2003 Contents

August 2003
Contents