Volume 14 Issue 1

The May 2010 issue of Christianity Today featured an interview article with James Davison Hunter, author of the recently released To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World (Oxford University Press, 2010). In the interview, Hunter, Professor of Religion, Culture, and Social Theory, University of Virginia, explains his view that culture groups vary in the weight they bring to bear on American society. Sometimes, this is out of proportion to their size; some cultural groups have a lot of cultural clout despite their relatively low numbers; other large cultural groups have very little cultural clout.

The focus of his analysis is American Christianity. This cultural group, as Hunter states, "has produced a huge cultural economy, but it operates on the periphery of status rather than in the center" (34).

One example of this axiom is the fact that "evangelicalism boasts a billion dollar book publishing industry, yet the books produced are largely ignored by The New York Review of Books, The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post Book World, and other key arbiters of public intellectual argument" (34). This analysis of evangelical clout even within American Christianity made me think about the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement. What is its clout within evangelicalism or other aspects of American Christianity? We have some big numbers in terms of adherents to the movement. Christian Churches (independent) have hundreds of megachurches plus a vast network of successful church planting operations. Disciples of Christ are major leaders in the National and World Council of Churches. Churches of Christ (A Cappella) have some very smart professors (Everett Ferguson) and ministers (Max Lucado) who have demonstrated clout within evangelicalism and beyond. However, I think we would have to admit by and large that we are at the far periphery in terms of clout amidst evangelical Christianity and even further out with regard to American Christianity. I have come into contact with hundreds of evangelicals over the years, particularly academics, who, when I mention the church group I come from, give me that "look" that demonstrates they have absolutely no idea who we are or where we fit in the American landscape of Christianity. I suspect this has happened to most readers of SCJ as well.

This situation has improved in the last decade or so as more of our prize college and seminary graduates head off to major academic institutions and then are publishing their work within the mainstream of evangelical publishers or even more academic publishers. One of the most important roles of SCJ and the SCJ conference is keeping these students connected to the movement during those crucial years when they are pursuing their higher level degrees. We do this in a number of ways: the promising scholar awards for college and seminary graduates, the student Stone-Campbell Journal 14 (Spring, 2011) 1–2paper competitions at SCJ conference, and "quotables" chosen by graduate students that occupy the top, center of the SCJ welcome page. I believe we will continue to make progress in establishing our cultural clout that is at least in proportion to our numbers.

Believe it or not, this gets me to the focus of this issue. Thomas Campbell's Declaration and Address, written at the very dawn of the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement in 1809, was the center of attention at a conference hosted by Johnson Bible College on September 17-19, 2009, with the theme Thomas Campbell's Declaration & Address: Past, Present, and Future. This conference was attended and received addresses by people from all three streams of the movement: Christian Churches (independent), Churches of Christ (A Cappella), and Disciples of Christ. Those who attended the conference were enthusiastic though not great in number. This is a microcosm of the impact of the Address when it was first published. Only a handful of people heard or saw it when it was written. Though Alexander took up its principles as his life work, as the movement advanced in the American landscape, the Declaration itself receded from the limelight. Despite its lack of cultural clout even within the Stone-Campbell Movement and the movement's lack of cultural clout within evangelicalism and American Christianity as a whole, this foundational document deserves far more attention. Within it is the heart of the movement and a compelling plan to unify Christianity.

To add to the cultural clout of the Declaration and Address and to and make available to posterity the value of the document, this issue features four presentations from the conference at Johnson. Tom Smith, Professor of History and Theology (Johnson Bible College), provides a historical introduction to Campbell's Declaration and Address. Mark Weedman, Professor of Biblical and Historical Theology (Crossroads College) assesses the interpretive principles at work in the Address. Paul Blowers, Dean E. Walker Professor of Church History (Emmanuel Christian Seminary) derives six conditions for creating consensus among believers contained in the address. My presentation keys in on one of the thirteen propositions of the Address and the connection of the Declaration and Address to 1 Corinthians.

Rounding out this issue is Ron Heine's (Northwest Christian University) article on spirituality as explicated by Origen, which was his presentation at the 2010 SCJ conference. Carl Bridges (Johnson Bible College) offers another of his brief but clear examinations of an issue in the Gospels, this time regarding whether or not Jesus taught that judgment will result in varying rewards and punishments.

Finally, I am pleased to announce that SCJ articles are available electronically, both at our website and now with ATLA serials from most college, university, and graduate schools. This allows for a much wider array of students to find the many fine articles by our contributors.

William R. Baker, Editor

Quotables for this issue were chosen by Tyler Stewart, Lincoln Christian University -- Seminary.

"Our biblical canon did not fall from heaven but was itself a product of tradition, formed over a long period of time through a hard-won consensus in and among early Christian communities."

Paul M. Blowers, "Striving Toward a Common Mind in Jesus Christ: Thomas Campbell's Declaration and Address and the Historic Principle of the Consensus Fidelium," (SCJ 14.1: 35)

Ministering in a time of political rebellion (1798): "As his parishioners were affected by these events, [Thomas] Campbell took an active role in opposing the ‘secret societies' that fomented much of the political unrest. In this dangerous context, he developed disgust for political wrangling that undoubtedly transferred to religious contention." 

L. Thomas Smith, Jr. "Thomas Campbell's Midlife Crisis: A Biographical introduction and Historiographical Synthesis," (SCJ 14.1: 7)

In the Declaration and Address, "Campbell's claim about the nature of the church implies that there is a correlation between the gospel and the church. How we understand one derives from how we understand the other. If that is true, then the claim that the church is essentially, intentionally, and constitutionally one is really a claim about the gospel itself, because to say the church is necessarily one is also to say that the gospel holds unity as a matter of prime concern. Unity is truth, therefore, because to have the gospel is to have unity and to have unity is to have the gospel." 

Mark Weedman, "Assessing the Declaration and Address: Hermeneutics vs. Unity in Stone-Campbell Movement Theology," (SCJ 14.1: 31)

"In appealing to the authority of the NT, we are dealing with what is itself a consensus of diverse witnesses, the tensions and divergences among which are precisely what fund and enrich the authority and credibility of the canon." 

Paul M. Blowers, "Striving Toward a Common Mind in Jesus Christ: Thomas Campbell's Declaration and Address and the Historic Principle of the Consensus Fidelium," (SCJ 14.1: 43)

"Campbell seems to want to retain the whole of Scripture as 'essential' in so far as it continues to reveal its truths successively throughout church history to the church and continually to individuals as well. However, he recognizes that neither the church nor the individual will ever exhaust its value and for both there is a progressive unfolding of its truth." 

William R. Baker, "‘Formally Binding'? Scriptural Authority and Private Opinion in Thomas Campbell's Declaration and Address and in the Apostle Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians," (SCJ 14.1: 58)

"Paul's way of conducting himself with regard to correcting people in the churches was to persuade them at all cost to come to his view without ever decreeing to them what they must do based on his so-called apostolic authority." 

William R. Baker, "‘Formally Binding'? Scriptural Authority and Private Opinion in Thomas Campbell's Declaration and Address and in the Apostle Paul's First Letter to the Corinthians," (SCJ 14.1: 63)

Origen "believed that the most important thing for a person wanting to read the Bible was not a knowledge of the biblical languages of the biblical languages, though he knew those. [. . .] Neither did he think knowledge of hermeneutics was the most important requirement for reading the Bible. [. . .] for Origen, the most important asset a person needs who wants to understand the Bible is a deep and active prayer life." 

Ronald E. Heine, "Origen and a Hermeneutic for Spirituality," (SCJ 14.1: 68-69)

"We all find what we go looking for in texts. I don't mean that we read our own conclusions into the text. [. . .] What I mean is that we don't usually find what we are not looking for. Texts rarely surprise us. If we read a text looking for nothing, that is usually what we find." 

Ronald E. Heine, "Origen and a Hermeneutic for Spirituality," (SCJ 14.1: 77)

"Much of believers' concern about the doctrine of hell springs from an intuition that some people deserve more punishment than others and from an upsoken fear that God will impose a one-size-fits-all condemnation on those who do not know him. Wise preachers and teachers will convey both ideas: salvation by grace and judgment by deeds."

Carl B. Bridges, "Degrees of Punishment and Reward in the Gospels: Exegesis and Praxis," (SCJ 14.1: 86)

"Although Jesus targets leaders with his stories, it takes only a small and justifiable interpretive step to apply them to anyone in the church." Pg 84

Carl Bridges, "Degrees of Punishment and Reward in the Gospels: Exegesis and Praxis," (SCJ 14.1:84)