No Paper Next Week
In keeping with the terms of our mailing permit, and to afford a sort of "breather" for all of us at year's end, we publish no Gospel Guardian the last week in December. Which means your next paper will be dated January 2, 1969. We have quite a variety of new things coming up early in the year. We believe you will find them both interesting and helpful. And at the end of the year let us express our grateful thanks to a great host of friends who have made this one of the best years yet for the Gospel Guardian. Your letters of encouragement, your articles, news notes, and business orders have brightened our days. It has been a good year. And to all our growing family of readers we express the hope that 1969 will be for each of you a happy and fulfilling year in the service of our Master.
A Backward Glance
The ending of the year is always a time for reviews, for inventories, for memories. It is a time for retrospection. It was just twenty years ago this very month (December 30, 1948 in fact) that this editor following a telephone call from Roy Cogdill, made a trip from his home in Oklahoma City down to Dallas to talk with Cogdill about the future of the Bible Banner (which was shortly to revert to its original name - the Gospel Guardian.) We spent most of the day together, meeting first in the Preston Road Church building, and going from there to another place or two. James Adams had accompanied Brother Cogdill to the meeting. John W. Akin was there briefly, as was also Hulen Jackson, who at that time was preacher for the Preston Road congregation.
These twenty years have not been easy; but they have been rewarding. It has been thrilling beyond measure to see the courage, the dedication, and the indomitable spirit with which hundreds of devoted preachers and many thousands of truly committed disciples have stood firm and unyielding against the sweeping tide of institutionalism, secularism, and 'social gospel' promotions in the Lord's church. There have been heartaches, of course, and bitter disappointments. One of the earliest, (and most shocking to this person) was the "about face" done by the founder and former editor of the paper, Foy E. Wallace, Jr. He turned first against the publisher of the paper, Brother Cogdill, then against the editor, then against the paper itself, and finally, and most tragically of all, against the very truths and principles he had so valiantly championed during the greater part of his preaching life. He now champions the institutions he once opposed, defends the practices he formerly attacked; fraternizes and fawns over the men he once (literally) loathed; despises the men he once loved; and has so demeaned and degraded himself that it is difficult to even hear his name without an inward wince of embarrassment and shame.
There have been other sad moments, but none perhaps quite as searing and heart-breaking as Foy's departure from the truth. Do you remember Brother Cled Wallace's shattering "That Rock Fight In Italy?" We say 'shattering' because that was what it was. Well, that was one article this editor did not see and did not know about till it appeared on the front page of the Gospel Guardian, January 19, 1950. It went in to the printer without ever having been in the hands of the editor! We felt then, and feel now, that Cled was misunderstood in that article; and although we did not see the article in advance, we refused to repudiate either it or him,...in spite of the urging of many friends to do so. The article should not have been printed. We all know that now. And Cled knew it before his death. But, once printed, any effort on our part to explain, disassociate, or disallow could only have added to the confusion. So we took the blame. And this is the first time in twenty years that the Gospel Guardian has ever had a reference to the incident from this writer.
More recently two smaller disappointments have come our way. One was the gradual drift away from the solid moorings of truth which we saw in Charles Holt over a period of two years. We did what we could to avert the tragedy, even to the point of incurring the disfavor of some mighty valued friends. But we felt that Charles might be saved for the cause of truth, and were extremely reluctant to see his fine talent lost. We still have some deep regrets that brethren were seemingly so much quicker in their desire to "expose" him than they were in their efforts to "save" him. The story might well have been different had they acted otherwise. But perhaps not.
Still more recently we have felt a sense of disappointment in the reaction many conservative brethren have liven to "the Arlington meeting." For fifteen years we have been trying over and over to get our 'liberal brethren to "talk over our differences." And when, at long last, a group of both `liberal' and 'conservative' men came together to explore the possibility of meaningful talks about the division existing (and widening) between the two groups, there was a swelling chorus of protest and suspicion on the part of an appreciable number of 'conservatives.' We deplore it.
But enough of the bad part; it has been insignificant compared to the good part. Frankly, we have enjoyed this editorial 'hot seat.' And now that Bill Wallace has come along to relieve us of an enormous part of the 'work load' of getting out a weekly journal, we are anticipating that the next twenty years will be greater in every way than the past twenty! We think we see an exciting and hopeful trend beginning to develop among the Lord's people. The future looks brighter than it has in a long, long time. The Gospel Guardian will play its part, as in the past, in seeking to encourage in every way that which we believe to be right and worthy — just as we will oppose that which we believe to be wrong. We solicit your continued good will, your loyal support, and your fervent prayers as we face the New Year with high hopes and great expectations.
F. Y. T.