by Steve | Dec 8, 2016 | In the News, Uncategorized
By Steve Beard
Unbeknownst to him, Professor Thomas C. Oden was the prime agitator to the agony and ecstasy of my seminary experience. It was wading through 1,400 pages of his three volume systematic text books that introduced me to his dear friends Athanasius, Basil, John Chrysostom, Gregory Nazianzen, as well as Ambrose, Jerome, Augustine –– that’s just to name a few.
To be honest, sometimes it felt like fraternity hazing and at other times it read devotionally, healing the wounds of my worn-out and stretched mind.
Looking back on it, I would not have had it any other way.
It was with deep sorrow and great gratitude, mixed with a redemptive joy, that I heard about the death of Dr. Oden (1931-2016), my dear friend who taught me so much about the faith once delivered to the saints.
There will be many glowing testimonials to Tom – and none of them will be exaggerations. The praise will be deserved. He was a one of a kind theological mind with a deep spiritual yearning to be faithful to the deep roots of Christianity. Over our 25 years of friendship, there are a few notable reasons I have always trusted Oden.
First, he was steadfastly committed to the historic teachings of Jesus. He made a professional vow to be theologically “unoriginal,” a counterintuitive move for a brilliant intellect within a culture where newer is always considered better and theologians huff and puff to “keep pace with each new ripple of the ideological river.” Oden was sold out to the witness of the martyrs, saints, and prophets –– the faith that has been “everywhere and always and by everyone believed” to be the truth of Christianity.
Second, he had a checkered past. For some reason, I trust those whose skeletons have already been laid bare. He wasn’t always a bleeding heart for orthodoxy. As a “movement theologian,” he dabbled in theoretical Marxism, existentialism, demythologization, Transactional Analysis, Gestalt therapy, humanistic psychology, and parapsychology. Oden liked the bandwagons and everyone winked and nodded. Everyone, that is, except the late Jewish scholar Will Herberg, a brilliant colleague at Drew University who hounded Oden to rediscover his Christian roots.
“The modern philosopher had told me again and again that I was in the right place, and I still felt depressed even in acquiescence,” G.K. Chesterton wrote many years ago in Orthodoxy. “But I had heard that I was in the wrong place, and my soul sang for joy like a bird in spring.”
Taking Herberg’s admonition seriously, Oden incrementally turned his back on the countless trendy movements and “the fantasies of Bultmannianism” he had embraced and ended up being United Methodism’s preeminent and most prolific theologian.
Third, Oden smiled. Sounds insignificant, but it was not. He was pastoral and deeply concerned about the care of the soul. He was a lover of ideas, an engaged student and teacher. Oden was not bitter –– mildly amused, but not bitter. He was actually grateful for his colleagues –– feminist, form critical, deconstructionist, and even heretical –– who challenged him to be more clear in his espousal of orthodoxy. He only asked for a fair hearing.
One would need a billboard to list all his books. Oden spent 17 years editing the 29-volume Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture. My last lengthy interview with Oden dealt with his four-volume collection of John Wesley’s Teachings. He showed that Wesley’s instructional homilies addressed the “whole compass of divinity” through his deep grounding in ancient ecumenical teaching.
The same could be said of Professor Thomas C. Oden. Rest in peace, my treasured friend and teacher. I know that you are relieved to no longer see through the glass dimly, but finally you are granted the joy to see your Savior face to face.
Steve Beard is the editor of Good News.
by Steve | Dec 5, 2016 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
By Walter Fenton-
In 2010, leaders in The United Methodist Church hired two well-respected consulting firms to study the church’s institutional structure in an effort to assess its effectiveness and to arrest the denomination’s steady decline in membership and worship attendance.
One of the firms, Apex HG Consulting, reported a “general lack of trust” in the church’s leadership. It traced this finding to a “lack of accountability” across a denomination that lacked clear metrics for discerning the effectiveness of its institutional infrastructure (i.e., its general boards and agencies, and its executive and administrative bodies).
By September of 2012, after a deflating General Conference, a blue-ribbon panel tasked with evaluating the church’s efforts to make critical changes wrote:
“Business as usual is unsustainable. Dramatically different and new behaviors, not incremental changes, are required. We have not yet seen the degree of shared sense of urgency or commitment to systemic adaptations with the redirection of leadership expectations and sufficient resources that our situation requires.”
In May of 2014, at a combined meeting of the church’s Connectional Table and the General Council on Finance and Administration, economist Don House informed church leaders that lacking the expeditious implementation of a strategic, credible, and metrics oriented plan, the UM Church’s infrastructure would become unsustainable by 2030 and face collapse by 2050.
Despite these warnings from well-respected people in and outside of the church, the Council of Bishops’ (COB) lack of urgency this year in addressing existential threats is shocking. This lack of urgency is most clearly demonstrated in the COB’s ponderous response to threats against its governance and the covenant that binds together local congregations, annual conferences, and the general church.
Shortly after GC 2012 progressives plunged the denomination into crisis by adopting a strategy of ecclesial defiance of the church’s polity. If that were not enough, some active bishops tolerated or excused the defiance, and seemed unwilling or unable to hold clergy and even an episcopal colleague accountable. By the 2016 General Conference it was apparent to everyone the denomination was in crisis and the potential for division was real.
At that General Conference Bishop Bruce Ough, the incoming president of the COB, acknowledged the depth of the division, confessed the COB itself was divided, and therefore recommended the creation of a special commission to address the crisis. The commission would be directed to present a plan to resolve the crisis for consideration at a possible called General Conference in 2018 or 2019.
To the assembled delegates this seemed like the best way forward given the circumstances. But to many United Methodists, the creation of another body to address its problems lacked urgency. The COB appeared to be fulfilling the very critiques of the church’s leadership cited by the costly analysts it hired to diagnose its ailments.
Despite increasingly high profile attacks against the church’s polity in the immediate aftermath of General Conference, culminating in the Western Jurisdiction’s intentionally provocative election of a lesbian clergy member as a bishop, the COB bogged down even further.
It took the bishops five months just to name the members who would serve on its special commission. And to date, only the three commission moderators – three bishops, of course – have actually met. It is reported that the 32-member commission will have an introductory conference call in December, and finally get down to business in January.
Given all the disruption and divisiveness many would have thought the COB would have moved more quickly. Instead, it has reverted to form. Like other leading church bodies it has lacked the urgency people within and without the church have said it needs to exhibit. Instead of accelerating the timetable, the bishops recently explained that any potential called General Conference would now have to wait until 2019. Many are justifiably dubious of this ever happening.
“A requirement that materials be in the hands of delegates at least 230 days before such a session,” said Ough, “makes it unlikely that the Commission could complete its work in time to meet that deadline for a 2018 meeting, so 2019 seemed to us to be the best option.”
This is only true because the COB lacked the urgency to deal with a crisis that is harming local churches and annual conferences, exacerbating a looming demographic and fiscal crisis, and deepening the trust deficit in its leadership pointed out to it six years ago.
People across the theological and social spectrum have expressed surprise and even dismay by the number of bishops (eight, not including the three episcopal moderators) appointed to the commission. Given the COB’s failure to lead and its lack of urgency, the commission’s first order of business should be to kindly, but firmly minimize the role of bishops in its work and its ultimate recommendation. Business as usual is unsustainable.
A Healthy Debate
Recently the United Methodist News Service posted a commentary by the Rev. Paul J. Kottke on the Wesleyan Covenant Association’s convening conference in early October of this year. Kottke, a district superintendent in the Rocky Mountain Annual Conference, offers a critical evaluation of the new organization.
The Rev. Robert Kaylor, lead pastor at Tri-Lakes UM Church in Monument, Colorado, offered an insightful and engaging response.
We strongly encourage you to read both.
Walter Fenton is a United Methodist clergy person and an analyst for Good News.
[Editor’s note: the Rev. Thomas Lambrecht, vice-president of Good News, is a member of the commission.]
by Steve | Nov 29, 2016 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
For fifty years Good News has promoted and defended Scriptural Christianity and the orthodox teachings of The United Methodist Church.
Good News has provided critical leadership and worked for renewal and reform at General Conferences, as well as jurisdictional and annual conferences. It has rallied orthodox and traditional United Methodists to stand-up for the church’s core beliefs, and to work together for a vital and vibrant proclamation of the Gospel.
And every reader of Good News Magazine knows we feature inspiring stories of people committed to sharing the Gospel in marvelous and many different ways. We also report on church news, and offer an evangelical and orthodox view on developments in our denomination.
As traditional United Methodists await the work of the bishops’ special commission on A Way Forward and prepare to impact the special called General Conference scheduled for 2019, Good News’ work is more important than ever.
Please join thousands of United Methodists by supporting
Good News with a generous gift so we can continue our work in the critical days ahead. Let us unite together and stand strong for Scriptural Christianity!
by Steve | Nov 23, 2016 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
Mr. Steve Beard,
Editor in Chief of Good News
The special occasion in Memphis also marked the 25th anniversary of Mr. Steve Beard as columnist and editor in chief of Good News – at the helm for more than 150 issues of the independent United Methodist magazine.
In commenting on the anniversary, the Rev. Walter Fenton, a colleague at Good News, noted that Beard’s wide-ranging journalistic interests swung from John Wesley to Bono, Johnny Cash, and Mahalia Jackson – and passionately focused on the plight of martyrs and persecuted believers around the globe and the marginalized in our own society. “You’re always wondering about how we as a church can find ways to be more compassionate, gracious, and just simply kind and decent to the lost and lonely in this world that too many of us hardly even notice,” concluded Fenton.
“I remember a great picture on one of Steve’s office walls of him in a tuxedo, talking with the late William F. Buckley Jr. at a Washington D.C. reception,” recalled the Rev. Dr. James V. Heidinger II, president emeritus of Good News and long time professional colleague. “It always reminded me of the cultural adjustment Steve had to make in coming to our former offices in Wilmore, Kentucky.”
“But how fortunate for all of us that Steve did come! And that he stayed,” continued Heidinger. “He worked himself ragged giving Good News a first-rate publication, issue after issue. It has been your calling for quarter of a century, and you have done it splendidly!”
“You are gifted professional, a skilled craftsman, and a person of great integrity,” Heidinger concluded. “You have amazingly good instincts about how we can and should relate to a church struggling for its soul…. Congratulations on this very significant milestone.”
by Steve | Nov 23, 2016 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
Rev. Dr. Maxie Dunnam
By Walter Fenton
At its most recent meeting, the Good News Board of Directors bestowed the Ed Robb Jr. United Methodist Renewal Award on the Rev. Dr. Maxie Dunnam, pastor, author, seminary president, and former world editor of The Upper Room.
The award is presented to a person that has demonstrated dedication to the renewal of The United Methodist Church. It is named after the late Rev. Edmund Robb Jr., a United Methodist evangelist and author who served as a Good News director and chairman of the board. Robb was known widely for his tireless efforts to renew the UM Church. He is most widely remembered for joining with Dr. Albert Outler to establish A Foundation for Theological Education (AFTE), a ministry that continues to have a lasting impact on the future direction of the church.
Dunnam was presented with the award on November 3 during Good News’ President’s Dinner, hosted by the Rev. Rob Renfroe, current president and publisher. More than one hundred friends and supporters of Good News turned out for the event at Christ United Methodist Church in Memphis, Tennessee.
Dr. Dunnam, pastor emeritus at Christ Church, was recognized for his work as world editor of The Upper Room, leader of The Academy of Spiritual Formation and what would become The Walk to Emmaus, author of over 40 books – including The Workbook of Living Prayer, which has sold over one million copies, and president of Asbury Theological Seminary. Christ Church in Memphis is the location of the newest campus outpost of Asbury Seminary, in addition to Wilmore, Kentucky and Orlando, Florida.
In his presentation, Renfroe accentuated Dunnam’s commitment to civil rights and education for underprivileged children. “As a young pastor in the early 60s, he was one of the original signers of a document called ‘Born of Conviction.’ In the heart of a bigoted, segregated south, he and 27 others created and had published the document that made it clear that the Gospel and the church were for all people because Jesus died for all and Jesus is the Lord of the church,” said Renfroe. “A son of the south, Dr. Dunnam refused to be a child of his times, and pointed the people to the timeless biblical truth that in Christ we, all of us, are brothers and sisters.”
The award presentation also celebrated his influence as a five-time delegate to General Conference and his instrumental roles in helping create both the Confessing Movement and the Wesleyan Covenant Association. “Maxie, by nature, is a lover with a heart of grace. But, there is a commitment to the truth of the Gospel that has propelled him into the fray, at times reluctantly,” said Renfroe. “And for who he is and for all he has done, we honor him.”
Walter Fenton is a United Methodist clergy person and an analyst for Good News.
By Steve Beard
