ClarkeComments.com

Hello all:

Newell Williams, the president of Brite Divinity School and co-editor of the the Stone-Campbell Encyclopedia, has been appointed as the Moderator of the Christian Church.

As the moderator, Williams will preside over the General Assembly of the Disciples of Christ that will take place in Fort Worth, Texas in July.

This is good news. Newell Williams has a vision of unity for all three streams of the Restoration Movement, and his beliefs about baptism are much more in-line with Churches of Christ and Christian Churches than much of the Disciples. Hopefully he will be a “moderating” force that will steer the Disciples from the extreme liberalism that they have been embracing over the last few years.

-Clarke

Hello all:

Northwest Christian College has revealed their line-up for the second annual Stone-Campbell Symposium. The docket includes four women and one man (Paul Blowers). D’Esta Love, the Chaplain at Pepperdine University, is one of the speakers at the symposium. She is scheduled to preach at the 1st Christian Church of Eugene during the symposium.

The symposium is March 19-21, 2007. I’d like to go, but I’m not sure I will make it this year, as our anniversary occurs during the symposium. Last years symposium was great, and I have a feeling this year’s will be good as well.

Let me know if you are going to be in the area for the symposium.

-Clarke

Hello everyone:

Well, I am somewhat caught up in my Astronomy and Criminal Law classes for today, so I have a minute to sit down and blog.

As I wrote in my last post, I’ve been really busy with school. Work slowed down just about the time school started so that my activity level stayed just about the same. Now that has changed.

I’m still under an overtime freeze at work, but now I’m taking a fire apperatus operators classs for work during work hours. This is taking up some of my time. Also, my wildland fire classes are starting with the first one starting next week, so my schedule is very messed up.

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On the Restoration and Unity fronts, the Stone-Campbell Dialogue has issued a study guide and brochure on how to create a local Dialogue in your own community, in advance of the 2008 anniversary of 200 years of our movement.

This just came out a week or so ago, and was publized today in the Disciples News Service news brief for the week. This comes at an interesting time for me. Back in March or April when Sara and I went to the Stone-Campbell Symposium, I met the Regional Minister for the Disciples in Oregon. I then contacted her via email and we agreed to speak more and work together on something to promote unity within the Restoration Movement. She told me that she would be busy until November or so, but that we could start working on it then.

So, is it coincidence that the S-C Dialogue put this out right when they did, or is it providential? My faith tells me that there is something more than mere coincidence working here.

If the Disciples minister agrees, I want to persue a local S-C Dialogue here in Portland.

So…if you are in the Portland Metro area, or know someone who is a member of a restoration movement church, I’d like to hear from you. This project will take a lot of work. Its likely to get some strong reactions from some churches in the area, and some of those reactions will probably be pretty negative.

And you’ll hear about it here first.

-Clarke

Hello all:

I have a couple of different things to post about, but I’ll start with this one first.

A few days ago I was talking with my 80 year old Grandmother, who lives in Missouri, over the phone. I was curious, so I asked her how she became a Chrisitan. She told me that she grew up in the church, and that her mother had grown up in the church as well.

I made a comment during the conversation that her mother must have remembered the division between the Churches of Christ and Christian Churches quite well. My grandma wasn’t sure exactly when the division happened, but she did have something to say about it:

“You know, your granddad and I had friends in the Christian Church. Their service in town was before ours, so we would go and worship with our friends at the Christian Church, and could still make it to ours. They were pretty much just like us except they had an organ. I just couldn’t disfellowship those people just because they used an instrument.”

Thats a good example that we should follow today.

-Clarke