A Quest for Truth

By Edward D. Auchard

Edward D Auchard was born in Kansas August 8, 1920. He attended one-room country schools and small town high schools. He enrolled at Kansas State (1937) and transferred to York College in Nebraska, (1938-41). He studied at Eden Theological Seminary, St. Louis, Missouri (1945-46) and Bonebrake Theological Seminary, Dayton, Ohio (1946-1948). His thesis was a study of The Names of God in the Hebrew Bible. In 1952 he received the Masters of Theology degree from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. His thesis was: The Ministry of Reconciliation.:

Edward married Elma Breckenridge in 1944. They are the parents of one daughter, Joanne Senefsky---and have three grand children and two great granddaughters.

As a student in College Edward served small churches in Nebraska. He was pastor of the Riverdale Community United Brethren Church (1941-44). He served the United Brethren Church in St. Louis, Missouri (1944-1946) and pastor of both the United Brethren and Presbyterian Congregations in Raymore, Missouri (1947-49). He served as pastor of Grace Presbyterian Church in St. Louis (1949-1953) and as associate pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Pontiac, Michigan (1953-1957) and pastor of the Orchard Lake Community Church, Presbyterian in Michigan (1957-1975) and as pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Bryan, Ohio (1975-1988).

Since retirement Edward has served interim ministries in Ohio and Michigan and has served overseas with the Pastors Beyond program of Wycliffe Bible Translators in Kenya (1991), Columbia (1993), Brazil and Suriname (1994) and Mexico (1995). In 1999 Edward and Elma were guests of The Church of Christ in China as part of a group sponsored by Presbyterian World Missions.

A QUEST FOR TRUTH was prepared for Joanne and for two exchange students from Japan who were guests and continue to be dear friends---and later revised and expanded into the present volume.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 22, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465354839

Edward D. Auchard

Edward D Auchard was born in Kansas August 8, 1920. He attended one-room country schools and small town high schools. He enrolled at Kansas State (1937) and transferred to York College in Nebraska, (1938-41). He studied at Eden Theological Seminary, St. Louis, Missouri (1945-46) and Bonebrake Theological Seminary, Dayton , Ohio (1946-1948). His thesis was a study of "The Names of God in the Hebrew Bible." In 1952 he received the Masters of Theology degree from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. His thesis was: "The Ministry of Reconciliation.": Edward married Elma Breckenridge in 1944. They are the parents of one daughter, Joanne Senefsky---and have three grand children and two great granddaughters. As a student in College Edward served small churches in Nebraska. He was pastor of the Riverdale Community United Brethren Church (1941-44). He served the United Brethren Church in St. Louis, Missouri (1944-1946) and pastor of both the United Brethren and Presbyterian Congregations in Raymore, Missouri (1947-49). He served as pastor of Grace Presbyterian Church in St. Louis (1949-1953) and as associate pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Pontiac, Michigan (1953-1957) and pastor of the Orchard Lake Community Church, Presbyterian in Michigan (1957-1975) and as pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Bryan, Ohio (1975-1988). Since retirement Edward has served interim ministries in Ohio and Michigan and has served overseas with the Pastors Beyond program of Wycliffe Bible Translators in Kenya (1991), Columbia (1993), Brazil and Suriname (1994) and Mexico (1995). In 1999 Edward and Elma were guests of The Church of Christ in China as part of a group sponsored by Presbyterian World Mission s. A QUEST FOR TRUTH was prepared for Joanne and for two exchange students from Japan who were guests and continue to be dear friends---and later revised and expanded into the present volume.

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Copyright © 2011 by Edward D. Auchard.

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Contents

Introduction

Chapter One The Uniqueness Of Christianity

Chapter Two God Has Spoken

Chapter Three The God Who Is

Chapter Four Our Lord And Savior Jesus Christ

Chapter Five Our Eternal Environment

Chapter Six Who We Are

Chapter Seven Lost And Found

Chapter Eight The Price Christ Paid

Chapter Nine Conversion

Chapter Ten The Christian Way Of Life

Chapter Eleven Citizens Of Two Worlds

Chapter Twelve Jesus Is Coming Again

Chapter Thirteen The Holy Spirit

Chapter Fourteen The Nurture Of Our Souls

Chapter Fifteen The Only Infallible Rule

Epilogue An Invitation And A Challenge

Postscript— For Other Readers

Dedication

To Francis Edward Auchard and Elizabeth Jane

Dwyer Auchard whose lives were a testimony.

To Joanne, Yasuko, and Hisashi, for whom

this testimony was originally written.

To Elma, my inspiration and typist and a partner in the gospel.

Show me your ways, O LORD

teach me your paths;

guide me in your truth and teach me,

for you are God my Savior

and my hope is in you all day long. (Ps 25:4-5)

Introduction

In the Old Testament, men erected altars as a witness of their devotion. In the New Testament, we are told that (1) we are witnesses (Lk 24:48)—we have seen something or encountered Someone and (2) we must be witnesses (Acts 1:8)—we must tell the good news to others.

I am grateful to have been a witness. With Julia Ward Howe—and with Simeon of old—I rejoice that mine eyes have seen the glory . . . (Lk 2:30).

I have seen the glory in the green and brown expanse of the Kansas prairies and in the majesty and splendor of the Rocky Mountains and the Alps. I have seen glory revealed as men and women have studied the mystery of the atom and the vast wonder of space. I have marveled in the realization that a human being stands midway between the minute and the magnificent—midway between the vastness of a universe perhaps twenty billion light years in expanse and the infinitely small yet mighty subatomic particles. I have inhaled the fragrance of springtime for more than the three score years and ten promised to the Psalmist (Ps 90:10). I have marveled at the symmetry of the snow flake, the ponderous grace of an elephant, the majesty of the lion, the skill of a spider, the engineering of a beaver, the song of the meadow lark and the whole ornithological choir, etc. I have rejoiced at sunrise and sunset, the artistry of frost on the window pane, and the aeronautic wisdom of a bumble bee. Truly, I have witnessed great things in the world of nature.

Early in life I learned to observe God at work in history. Among my earliest memories are stories read from the Bible, followed by a growing sense that this is one story. Beard introduced me to Ancient Times. Biblical geography reminded me of the significance of place in the story of humanity and in the revelation of God. I discovered the Roman world in Mother’s Latin text of Caesar’s Gallic Wars—I could read only the English summary—and in The Book of Knowledge in the one-room Heller School, long since demolished. It stood on what is now the flood plain of the Tuttle Creek Dam near old Randolph, Kansas. Writers as diverse as H. G. Wells, Arnold Toynbee, and Winston Churchill have taught me to seek a strand of meaning and a purposeful pattern in the tangled strands of history.

Karl Barth counseled Christians to study life with a Bible in one hand and a newspaper open in the other. Mine eyes have seen the action of God in the great events of my own lifetime. I have observed the silence and the presence of God in the turbulent twentieth century. I have seen his judgments and his mercy in contemporary events. I have observed the horror of the deep darkness in human nature manifest in the death camps of Hitler, in Stalin’s Gulag, and in the attempted destruction of culture in Mao’s cultural revolution. I have sensed the frustration of humankind in the Vietnam War and in the Zionist dream and the Palestinian struggle in the Middle East.

Perhaps most dramatic of all, I have witnessed via television and the news media the fall of the Berlin Wall, the explosion of freedom, and the disintegration of the Soviet empire. These events surprised even those who were professional spies. They remind me that world leaders and crowds of people are not the only actors in time and space. There is Another—and perhaps many others. There is a spiritual warfare vividly portrayed in the book of Revelation. Beyond the demonic swarms and the heavenly host standeth God within the shadows, keeping watch above His own. I am grateful for John’s vision and testimony: I looked, and behold a door standing open in heaven . . . and behold, a throne set in heaven, and One sat on the throne (Rev 4:1-2).

Beyond the witness of nature to nature’s Creator and the witness of history to the King of the ages, like Timothy from childhood [I] have known the Holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith . . . in Jesus Christ (2 Tim 3:15). My mother read the Bible to her five children almost from our birth. She was a theological seminary graduate (Bonebrake, 1919). My father dropped out of the ministry the year before I was born, but yielded to his call and returned to the ministry when I was about thirteen. I learned to sing early:

Jesus loves me, this I know

             For the Bible tells me so . . .

Jesus loves me, He who died

             Heaven’s gates to open wide . . .

If I love Him when I die,

             He will take me home on high . . .

At about seven, I told my mother, I want to be a Christian. At about nine, I began preparatory membership in the Methodist Church. (My family had been United Brethren for generations, but at this point in our family’s life there was no nearby United Brethren Church.[1])

During the darkest years of the Depression, and before my father’s decision to reenter the ministry, I knew dark and terrible moments. I remember my prayer: O God, if there is a God, why do my parents fight so much?

My parents’ rededication to the Lord and his will for their lives was followed by a series of very remarkable revivals in southeast Kansas in 1933-34. Though not yet assigned to a church or ordained, my father preached in several tiny and discouraged congregations that suddenly sprang to life with several hundred conversions. During that period I became aware that I, too, was a sinner—self-centered, lustful, rebellious. One evening while milking a cow I cried out, O God, have mercy upon me. If you will forgive my sins . . . I will do anything, I will even preach the gospel.

In that moment I realized that (1) my sins were forgiven through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and (2) I was called to preach the gospel. While I have been a willful and wayward Christian, I have never been able to deny his gift of salvation or escape the conviction that I was called to be a preacher of the gospel. My ministry is a part of my identity.

I will not, at least at this point, explore my experience or enumerate my manifold sinfulness as Augustine did in his Confessions. Those who know me are aware of my struggle with alcohol and my pride, harshness, and lust. I have struggled with the erosion of faith that is a consequence of liberal theology. I have never been the good witness that, with God’s help, I might have been. I can concur with Paul who acknowledged that he was the chief of sinners (1 Tim 1:15) but I can also declare: We do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus’ sake (2 Cor 4:5).

I prepare this testimony, first of all, for my own family: for Joanne, God’s best gift to Elma and me, for our Japanese daughter, Yasuko Kitajima, and for our Japanese son, Hisashi Yamamoto. Even to those who are most near and most dear, I have been a very inadequate witness. But for them and their spouses and children I prepare this testimony. I hope that this will lead them to a personal and reasonable faith—a faith that rejoices with Julia H. Johnston:

Marvelous grace of our loving Lord,

             Grace that exceeds our sin and our guilt,

Yonder on Calvary’s mount outpoured,

             There where the blood of the Lamb was spilt.

Sin and despair like the sea waves cold,

             Threaten the soul with infinite loss;

Grace that is greater, yes, grace untold,

             Points to the Refuge, the Mighty Cross.

Dark is the stain that we cannot hide,

             What can avail to wash it a way?

Look, there is flowing a crimson tide,

             Whiter than snow you may be today.

Marvelous, infinite, matchless grace,

             Freely bestowed on all who believe;

You that are looking to see His face,

             Will you this moment His grace receive?

Chapter One

THE UNIQUENESS OF CHRISTIANITY

John Bunyan is most widely remembered as the author of Pilgrim’s Progress. This Christian classic describes the struggle of the heaven-bound soul. Between the late seventeenth century and the early twentieth century this was perhaps the most widely read book, apart from the Bible, in the English-speaking world. It was also translated into many languages and exerted a powerful influence far beyond the bounds of Western culture. In many ways, Pilgrim’s Progress is autobiographical. It describes the trials and temptations and triumphs of the author.

Early in life, John Bunyan was troubled by questions about the uniqueness of Christianity. He was aware that Jews and Mohammedans (Muslims) each insisted their religion was best. Is Christianity only another contender for the best religion award? And upon what basis do we judge the comparative value of various religions? Then young Bunyan realized that the relevant question was not Is Christianity best? The real question was Is Christianity true?

John Bunyan’s insight has been very helpful to me. Hindus and Buddhists, Confucianists and Muslims, Marxists and Taoists, African traditionalists and secular humanists may often be more devout, more moral, more at peace with the world, and even more compassionate than many professed Christians. These great religions of the world may, also, like Christianity, be corrupted, perverted, and exploited. It is not fair to compare Christianity at its best with non-Christian religions at their worst.

A definition of religion that I have used for nearly half a century is: Religion is man’s response to that which he believes to be the most real and/or the most valuable. (Please understand that in this sentence man and he are not gender-exclusive, but—inclusive.)

The question for the Christian—and ultimately for every human being—is: Is Christianity true? This may be elucidated by several questions:

Do we live in a created world?

Do we live in a fallen world?

Do we live in a visited world?

Do we live in a redeemed world?

Do we live in a supernatural world?

1.   Do we live in a created world? This question prompts others: Does this world have a beginning, a history, and an end? Does this world have a meaning and a purpose? Is there a Creative Intelligence and Power? Or is this world without beginning or end, without meaning or purpose? Is this universe the product of an equation that might read: Nothing + Chance = Everything?

Bernard Shaw is credited with the observation that original sin is the only doctrine of Christianity for which we have empirical evidence. While I believe there is, indeed, evidence of original sin (which we will discuss later) I believe that we also have evidence of other doctrines. I believe that the existence of creation is evidence of a Creator. As Bill Glass observed, I do not have faith enough to believe that Nothing plus Chance equals Everything.

With the Psalmist, I believe that the heavens declare the glory of God (Ps 19:1). I believe the angelic announcement to young Isaiah Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory (Isa 6:3). I believe, with the author of Proverbs that the LORD by wisdom founded the earth (Prov 3:19). Forever, O LORD, Your Word is settled in heaven. Your faithfulness endures to all generations. You established the earth and it abides (Ps 119:89-90).

The laws of nature represent the faithfulness and purpose and continuing activity of God as both Creator and Sustainer and both Maker and Ruler of creation. The fact that scientists do not agree, and that scientists promote conflicting theories, does not destroy my faith in science. The fact that I only partly understand the power and purpose of God, the fact that the meaning of life is often enshrouded in mystery, does not destroy my faith in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth (Apostles’ Creed).

2.   Do we live in a fallen world? I realized the importance of an affirmative answer to this question during a series of lectures on Buddhism in Thailand in 1990. There is something wrong with our world. There is something wrong with humanity. Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless millions mourn, Alexander Pope wrote. If this world with its caste systems and its corruption, with its vice and violence, with the inhumanity of slavery and Hitler’s genocide, if this world of affluence and starvation, of war and persecution, if this sin-sick world is the best of all possible worlds, I would be constrained to become a Buddhist or