We have surrendered... by Dr. Timothy Paul Erdel

The following excerpt is from a paper entitled: “Pedagogy, Propaganda, Prophetic Protest, and Projection: Dangers And Dilemmas in Writing an Authorized Denominational History.  

“…just as we have surrendered our Anabaptist heritage, we seem to be on a fairly fast track toward losing our Pietist, Wesleyan, and Keswickian emphases as well, at least in the majority of districts. The stand taken by a few to defend the most rudimentary Arminian theological perspectives may well be a lost cause (cf. Moran et al. 2004, 80-81; Erdel 2004, 82-88).

Should my confessional commitments be to a bygone past which I believe the Missionary Church should still hold dear, or to the current trajectory of assimilation into popular American culture and generic evangelicalism? If I attempt to cry out in prophetic protest, will I lose whatever voice I have within the denomination? This question of how to write about our very dramatic series of changes in doctrine and practice, a pattern which is rooted in the very birth of the those movements which are now the Missionary Church, may be the most important historiographical issue I face.

Are there some stories that do not offer any great historical lesson, but that are nevertheless too rich in irony not to be told? Just before going to Jamaica as a missionary, I visited J. A. Ringenberg one last time in 1987 at Hubbard Hill Estates in Elkhart, Indiana. The former president of both Fort Wayne Bible and of the Missionary Church Association, as well as a former missionary to Jamaica, his most basic doctrinal and spiritual concerns were forged as a young lieutenant to J. E. Ramseyer during the crucial period which led to a denominational split over the issue of Holy Spirit crisis sanctification in 1923. Teaching on the work and ministry of the Holy Spirit was a central portion of his life’s work (see, e.g., Ringenberg 1972; cf. Huffman 1940, 1944). Now Donald Gerig, who had openly questioned traditional Missionary Church teaching on crisis sanctification in print, was the new president of Fort Wayne Bible College. J. A. Ringenberg was all doom and gloom as he talked to me about the appointment, rather oblivious to the fact that Don and I had been good friends for years. J. A. was convinced that God could not possibly continue to bless the college if the man at its helm denied crisis sanctification, the very doctrine for which God had called and raised up the church and the school, the doctrine that was their special mission to guard and to teach. “Mark my words,” J. A. told me, “Don Gerig will be the end of Fort Wayne Bible College.” I think the ancient Greeks would love such a story.”