"Debunking The False Claims"
In the June 30, 1066 issue of the GOSPEL GUARDIAN I wrote under the heading: "Debunking the False Claims." I have had two replies to the article. Neither reply warrants a further word from me, but, since each indicated they had sent a copy of their work to the editor of the Guardian, I thought good to do another column on the subject.
To refresh your memory, I suggested that the liberals kept their pleas for money alive by exaggerating their claims of success in their work. I said the whole mess would fall fiat if their efforts were stripped of these false claims.
A conservative brother from Nashville wrote chiding me for calling these efforts of the liberals (Gospel Press, World-Wide Bible Study, World's Fair Evangelism, and Herald of Truth) a mess! He suggested that I couldn't convert these brethren by calling what they were doing a mess. Maybe he is right. Maybe I should have used another word. Maybe calling it a mess did keep some of them from coming back to the truth. But there is just one thing wrong with that thing. I convert probably twenty-five of these people back to the truth to his one! Besides, the whole thing IS a mess!
Another brother, a liberal (his letter indicates it) wrote from Laurel Bay, S.C. to chide me for charging the liberals with making false claims and then making false claims myself. But I didn't make any false claims or any other kind of claims. I said the World-Wide Bible Study was going to reach over two and a half million readers in 1963 and that they MIGHT have reached nearly a thousand. I said the Gospel Press was going to reach 10,000 people with every $17.50 spent and they PERHAPS reached 1750 people with every ten thousand dollars spent. I said the World's Fair Evangelism was going to reach a hundred million people with the gospel whereas a hundred thousand MIGHT have gone through the booth. I said the Herald of Truth boasts of reaching millions whereas they reach thousands instead.
My main charge was that NONE of these organizations reach ANYBODY with the pure gospel. If anybody wants to contend that they do, send along your propositions and I will sign to deny it.
My next main charge was that perhaps nobody was really converted to Christ through these efforts, but that, if one were converted he was immediately led into error with the last state becoming worse with him than the first. I am standing by that statement. Does anybody want to meet me and contest it?
I hate for a conservative brother to try to tell me how to defend the truth and oppose error. Especially is it painful when it is apparent that my work results in converting dozens to the truth. And I hate to have a liberal brother to take me to task when he wouldn't try to defend these things for anything and when he wouldn't support a man to defend them. The reason I don't like for a conservative brother to criticize my work is that nine tenths of those who have done so are NOW WITH THE LIBERALS. The reason I don't like for a liberal brother to criticize my work is that I have never found one of them who will defend what the liberals are doing. They just want to find fault with my methods.
But, after all, it was good to get both of these letters. It gave me a chance to again call attention to the false and exaggerated claims of the liberals. And it gave me an opportunity to explain that the reason I called the liberal shenanigans a mess is because I sincerely believe it IS a mess.
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