Debates - And The Herald Of Truth
From the very earliest days of the Restoration Movement those who desired to follow "the ancient order" and to restore the primitive church as it is set forth in the pages of the New Testament recognized the value of formal, reasonable public discussions. This logical, deliberate, and careful contrasting of truth with error had great effectiveness in winning converts to the simplicity of truth. The honest and open-minded men of the frontier, bent only on serving God, were receptive to truth; they needed only to know that the thing being preached was indeed the word of God, and their acceptance was quick and complete.
It is unfortunate that as the years lengthened into decades and the decades into still longer sweeps of history that this early enthusiasm for debates declined and faded. Perhaps the debates themselves were partly to blame. All too often they became personal contests in which two professionals vied for victory, using all the tricks and stratagems which long experience had taught them. Debating came into disrepute. Even many faithful disciples began to have doubts as to its worthwhileness. A different atmosphere began to prevail. The honesty and forthrightness of that earlier generation began to be superseded by a spirit of tolerance and compromise and even at times timidity about crossing anyone on anything.
Evidence of the power of early controversies is seen in a brochure entitled "Baptist In Nashville" prepared and produced as a co-operative effort by a number of Baptist boards and associations and organizations in that city.
It states:
"Nashville Baptist Church was begun by James Whitsett and constituted in the Courthouse, July, 22, 1820. Their first building was erected and occupied in 1821. It stood on Summer Street, now Church Street, where Lowe's Theater now stands. Sam Houston was inaugurated Governor in this building. This building was lost in the Campbell controversy in 1828 and became the Vine Street Christian Church. The pulpit of the Nashville Baptist Church is now used in the Central Church of Christ.
"The Nashville Baptist Church was reconstituted as the First Baptist Church with five members the second Sunday of October, 1830. Whitsett also led this movement."
From this it would appear that the entire Baptist Church was "lost in the Campbell controversy of 1828" — and it took them two full years even to get started again with five members! Whatever the Campbell "controversy" did or did not accomplish, it apparently brought a considerable number of Baptists out of denominationalism and into an acceptance of simple Christianity. While Campbell himself had no formal debate in Nashville, he was a frequent visitor in the city, and from the days of his debate with Walker (1820) his preaching and writing was controversial to the very core! It was not vicious or radical, but hard, straight, and uncompromising. The "Christian Baptist" was begun in 1823.
All this, and the implications of such, came vividly to mind the other day in Indianapolis when brother William Wallace, in whose home we were staying during a meeting with the good Belmont church, showed us a recent publicity release from the "Herald of Truth" Evangelistic Co-operative of Abilene, Texas. These brethren (who have long since given up any serious effort to defend their organization) were listing the growth of their movement since its inception in 1952. And here are the number of stations carrying their program for each year from 1952 to the present:
Year Number of Stations 1952 85
1953 270 1954 276
1955 276 1956 187
1957 161 1958 147
1959 238 1960 252
1961 268 1962 283
1963 370 It will be seen from these figures that in 1956, 1957, and 1958 there was a serious and obvious dropping off in their power and program. The number of stations in 1958 was only slightly more than half the number they had had in 1955.
Why this dramatic and sudden decline in their income and influence? Well, those familiar with events of the past decade will recall that the first serious debate challenging the scripturalness of "Herald of Truth" was the Holt-Totty-Watson debate in Indianapolis in 1954. This was followed in 1955 by the Lufkin and Abilene debates between E. R. Harper and this editor. In 1956 came the two debates between W. Curtis Porter and Guy N. Woods, one at Indianapolis, one at Paragould. Then in the fall of 1957 came the great Birmingham Debate between Guy N. Woods and Roy E. Cogdill.
"Facts are stubborn things" — and the "Herald of Truth" brethren, astute business men that they were (brother Harper said so!) saw clearly the "signs of the times." Every single debate that was held caused some individuals and some churches to cease their contributions! For every church or individual who added Herald of Truth to its budget because of the debate, there must have been two or three that dropped them from the budget. The years of the debates demonstrated this beyond question.
So the formal defense of "Herald of Truth" ceased. At least, the Abilene brethren themselves did not publicly express any endorsement henceforth of any man to defend them in debate. And it is not hard to see the reason why. Honest and open-minded brethren in every debate were being shown the truth, and were discontinuing their support of the co-operative arrangement organized under the Highland elders. This perhaps will add a bit more light to the eight-year duration of brother E. R. Harper's "poor health" which is given as the reason for his reluctance to fulfill the public pledge made at the Abilene debate (December, 1955) that the discussion would be repeated in the Highland Boulevard church in San Antonio Brother Harper himself suggested this, and publicly committed himself to it. His challenge was quickly accepted both by this writer and by the brethren in San Antonio. Several months of futile effort failed to elicit from brother Harper a setting of the time when he would come to San Antonio. Finally, he wrote the brethren there that he would not debate until they decided whether they endorsed "Tant's position or Cecil Douthitt's position." To which the good brethren in San Antonio responded by saying that they would endorse both Tant and Douthitt — and expected brother Harper to fulfill his bargain, publicly made at Abilene, to debate again in San Antonio. To this request brother Harper's only reply was that his health was so precarious that he was unable to undertake the debate. That was eight years ago. Many prayers have gone up since then in behalf of brother Harper — that his health may improve, and that he may be given time to repent for the division he has brought to God's people. Let every faithful child of God continue to beseech the Heavenly Father to grant our brother a return to health — both physically and spiritually. He was a stalwart champion of the gospel of Christ for many years; it is truly a heart-rending spectacle now to see him so deeply committed to a course destructive of all those things for which he fought so valiantly in the years when he was in his prime both physically and spiritually.
F. Y. T.