By David A. Sheridan
CALGARY, Alberta--Almost 1,000 listeners of Hank Hanegraaff's Bible Answer Man radio talk program attended a meeting at the First Alliance church here Oct. 27. Mr. Hanegraaff is the president of the Christian Research Institute (CRI), which sponsored the meeting. Calgary is the Canadian headquarters of CRI.
The evening began with a video excerpt of Peter Jennings' ABC documentary on evangelicalism in America titled, "In the Name of God." Then Mr. Hanegraaff gave a 45-minute lecture on "The Counterfeit Revival."
Questions were then taken from the floor. The first was from someone who felt that his church was going through a revival, and this led to the question "What is a revival?" In his response, Mr. Hanegraaff launched into his now familiar accolades for changes made in the Worldwide Church of God.
"The recent changes in the WCG are without historic precedent and were made at great cost," he said. "I have met their leaders. I like them. We should encourage the WCG as they come closer to the pale of Christian orthodoxy."
Mr. Hanegraaff added: "The WCG is a church with guts, prepared to let the Word of God rather than their tradition be the final court of arbitration."
He mentioned that the next issue of the CRI Journal will include an article by Pastor General Joseph Tkach. At one point, with no prompting, the audience broke into spontaneous applause for our church. Little did they realize that seven Worldwide Church of God members and I were in the audience.
After the lecture, Mr. Hanegraaff was surrounded by an enthusiastic group who asked him questions for an hour. Member Matteo Ferrara commented: "He was warm and pleasant. I sensed his admiration for the WCG and found his comments encouraging."
Member David Crimmins commented: "I felt moved to thank Mr. Hanegraaff afterward for graciously praising our church. He then said that our church is in very capable hands under Mr. Tkach. He just couldn't praise Mr. Tkach enough."
Afterward I spoke briefly with Mr. Hanegraaff and showed him a copy of the Oct. 3 Worldwide News, which on page 8 included a photograph of him embracing Mr. Tkach at the funeral. The caption read "Kindling Friendship." He took the paper with him.
This was the first time I had been to an "outside" church in a long time. Over the years I have barely said more than a few words to "outside" pastors.
I came away with a deeper appreciation for our church leadership and their tremendous example of reaching out and giving us an entirely new perspective on the Christian world.
David A. Sheridan pastors the Calgary and Lethbridge, Alberta, churches.
[ Worldwide Church of God | Worldwide News | November 14, 1995 ]
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