Magyar Egyház, 1965 (44. évfolyam, 2-12. szám)
1965-05-01 / 5. szám
8 MAGYAR EGYHÁZ MAGYAR CHURCH Pnümiöt 1965 "YOU WILL RECEIVE POWER" Message from the Presidents of the World Council of Churches When the apostles were all together, they asked Jesus: “Lord, is this the time when you are going to establish once again the sovereignty of Israel?” He answered: "It is not for you to know about dates or times which the Father has set within his own control. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you; and you will bear witness for me in Jerusalem, and all over Judea and Samaria, and away to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:6-8) These men have learned to know Jesus as Lord. They believe in his resurrection. They understand that his death was not defeat but victory over all that enslaves and destroys men. But they want to know what this is going to mean in practice. Does it mean the Kingdom of God now? Does it mean that we are on the winning side, and we shall forthwith see the enemies of God put to flight? Jesus tells them plainly that God has not given us the timetable for his campaign. We simply do not know what are the limits of human life — for good and for ill. But God is going to give them something more important. He is going to give them his Spirit, who will empower them to be his witnesses to the ends of the earth. When this Spirit comes, they will become the evidences to the whole world that Jesus reigns, and that evil is doomed and on the way out. That promise was fulfilled at Pentecost. In a mighty outpouring of divine power, these doubting disciples were transformed into living signs of the reign of Christ over the whole earth. Out from Jeruslaem they went, reaching for the farthest corner of the world, a great movement of resistance against the established powers of evil, living torches to illuminate the night with certainty of a new day to come. The Church today is losing much of the power that it had when it was accepted and honoured part of the established order. Very many Christians today live scattered in small groups, minorities without political power. In this, they are nearer to the Christians of the first century than to those of the 19th. But God has never cancelled the promise or withdrawn the gift he gave at Pentecost. That power is always available to the church which wants it enough to pay the price. The price is to be made utterly one with the Lord Jesus Christ —one with his humiliation in order to be one with his victory. The power is power to believe and to help others to believe, power to hope without wavering to the end, power to love to the limit, power to make peace, to work for justice and reconciliation between men. It is the power of the coming Kingdom, given to us now. It is the pledge of glory. And it is offered to all who ask. We ask you, then, to join us at this season of Pentecost, in praying the Lord to fill the whole Church afresh with the power of His Spirit, so that it may be His witness to the ends of the earth. The Presidents of the World Council of Churches DR. J. H. OLDHAM — Honorary President ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY — London ARCHBISHOP IAKOVOS — New York SIR FRANCIS IBIAM —Enugu PRINCIPAL DAVID G. MOSES — Nagpur DR. MARTIN NIEMOELLER — Wiesbaden CHARLES PARI.IN — New York INTERNATIONAL ISSUES DISCUSSED AT W.C.C. MEETING A wide range of thorny international issues came under the scrutiny of the U.S. Conference for the World Council of Churches, which held its spring meeting at Buck Hill Fals, Pa., April 28-30. Three speakers told the two hundred church leaders in attendance that Communist China should be seated in the United Nations as soon as possible. Dr. O. Frederick Nolde, director of the WCC’s Commission of the Churches on International Affairs, said that this should be brought about “even though the functioning of the United Nations at the outset might be seriously handicapped.” However, Dr. Nolde made it clear that the seating of Communist China in the UN should not be interpreted “as a blessing on its policies but as a means of having it share in the responsibility of decision and consequent action.” Similar notes were sounded by Dr. John C. Bennett. president of Union Theological Seminary, New York City, and Dr. John K. Fairbank, director of the East Asian Research Center at Harvard University. Noting the theological and moral issues involved. Dr. Bennett urged Christians “to lose no opportunity to seek relations leading to reconciliation.” “We should recognize what a stake God must have in these 700 million people,” he said. “It is hard to think in these terms because we tend to see them only as creating problems for us.” Agreeing with this policy, Dr. Fairbank also said that “We stand irrevocably for an independent Chinese Taiwan on the western Pacific sea frontier alongside Japan and
