My Faith

I was raised in a small town in northwest Iowa, filled with Dutch people.  I was a half-breed.  My Dad was full Dutch but my Mom was Scotch-Irish (from West Virginia).  The town was split in two along religious lines.  There were members of the Reformed Church, including the mayor, and they went to the public school.  And there were members of the Christian Reformed Church, including us, and we went to the Christian school.  The Reformed Church had Boy Scouts, so the Christian Reformed Church had Calvinist Cadets instead.  My Mom supported Boy Scouts, so I went there until I was picked on intolerably.  In sum, I never quite fit in.

I was raised as a Calvinist (though my Mom had been a Methodist).  I was taught the catechism and went to church every Sunday (though we didn't go to church on Sunday evening, as good Christian Reformed people should have done).  The town was shut down tight on Sundays.  A movie theater came to town, but good Christian Reformed people did not go to it (though my Mom took me to see Walt Disney's Peter Pan there), and my domini (pastor) chased it out of town (and was featured in Life magazine for it).  After work, my Dad would go to the town's only bar for a friendly drink of beer--but he entered the bar by the back door in the alley.  The town was very clean, and so safe that we would go away for vacations without locking the doors to our house.

My Christian faith was taken for granted, and thus not taken seriously. We all believed, so we didn't talk about it much.  When I went away to college, I was free to behave less well than I should have, and was drifting.  In my junior year, my domini recommended that I read two books by C.S. Lewis: Surprised by Joy (his autobiography) and Mere Christianity (his philosophy of faith).  I had never liked autobiographies but I liked this.  I was enjoying classes in philosophy, and I was completely captivated by Mere Christianity.  It had such a compelling effect on me that I now refer to C.S. Lewis as my spiritual father.

I wanted to learn more.  I became insatiable for knowledge about God.  I decided to go to seminary.  In particular, I wanted to go to the best Calvinist seminary in the nation, Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia.  I was first rejected, so I had to enter the army and spend a year in Vietnam.  I applied again and was accepted this time (apparently I had proven that I was not simply trying to avoid the draft).  I studied there under Cornelius Van Til and Jay Adams, loved it, and graduated with a Masters in Divinity degree cum laude.

But I did not go into the ministry, though I wanted to.  The Christian Reformed Church would not ordain me or even let me preach, because I did not believe in infant baptism.  Since I had no other connections and I needed to earn a living, I went another direction.

Then I discovered another writer--even greater than C.S. Lewis.  In fact, Lewis had learned from his writings, and called him his master.  This writer was George MacDonald.  I first read Lewis' anthology of MacDonald's ideas.  It was like being hit by a blinding light.  I also read MacDonald's Unspoken Sermons.  It was like discovering new Holy Scriptures.

I was baptized in the Holy Spirit.  I wrote a poetic book (unpublished) which uses images (from Biblical Theology) to present the Gospel.  I have written additional poems expressing my spiritual experiences and visions.

I became heavily involved in the Parkland Christian Church after I heard the preaching of Steve Edwards.  He and I became best friends, and met weekly together for many years.  I also started up a fellowship group in my home.  The Lord brought many wonderful people to it, and I was greatly blessed.  We sang together, studied the Word of God together, prayed together, and then spent more hours playing games together (like trivial pursuit).  Two couples and a single man (at the time) became missionaries.

Two crises occurred.  Although I agreed that adult baptism was preferable, I was not willing to say that adult baptism should be necessary for church membership, and that such baptism must also be by immersion.  The leading elders warned me against speaking of my heretical notions, and suggested that excommunication might be necessary.  The second crisis had to do with my fellowship group.  The church started other fellowship groups and decided that they should all be one-hour meetings all covering the same texts--the same texts as the Sunday sermon.  Our group had always gone at its own pace as the Spirit led, so I refused to conform.  Our group was not included on the bulletin with the other groups.

For a decade, I did not attend a church, for I was quite sick of them.  My fellowship group ceased.  Steve moved away, after his wife turned mean and divorced him (he is now married again to a wonderful woman).  Finally I returned to church (at the urging of my sons).  I attended Puyallup Foursquare, where the pastor is a wild and crazy guy, who has his heart completely in the right place.  

My sons, however, began to attend a different church--a youth-oriented one called New Song.  They lived in houses with other New Songers, and grew spiritually at a very rapid pace.  Not only did New Song call them to the highest dedication to the Lord, but it recognized the gifts of the Spirit and raised people up in the gifts.  Miracles were happening and young people were loving the Lord.

I was delighted that they were being so greatly blessed, and I loved their new friends, but I wasn't quite comfortable is such a youth-oriented fellowship, so I stayed a Foursquare for a few years.  But then Gabe asked, "If you knew what God wanted you to do, would you do it?"  I said yes, and he suggested that I go for prayer with the pastor of the Clover Creek  (http://www.clovercreek.org/), and that I did (the prayer time was about two hours, with him and his wife).  I experienced great love from the Lord through them, and decided to try out their church.  That summer the church put on a Jesus Ministry conference (they do at least one annually) that helped me to see how to grow in the gifts of the Spirit and in the ministry of the Lord.  Melony and I have been attending since then, and are growing in the power of the Lord.  Praise Him.  

I am no longer even remotely a Calvinist. I do not believe in a God who predestines some to Heaven and some to Hell, and I pity those who do. If you want to know a good summary of what I believe, take a look at my presentation of the gospel (go back to my religion page and go to the power point presentation), or read my credo (latin for "I believe") below.

Credo

of Glenn Van Wyhe

I believe that there is one God

who is the almighty creator of all that is,

who created all things and does all things out of love,

who is Love, who is our Father.

I believe that there is one Son of God

who is from the Father in love before all,

through whom all things were and are created,

who is the way, the truth, and the life,

and no one comes to the Father except by Him.

I believe that Jesus Christ is the one Son of God

who was born of a virgin mother by the power of the Holy Spirit

        in order to become one with us in our weakness and trials and temptations,

who displayed the perfect love of God in His self-sacrificial life and death

in order to drawn us to the love of God

that we might experience the forgiveness of sins,

who was raised to eternal physical life and ascended to be with the Father

as a sign of hope to give us strength,

as a promise to us that we also would be raised

and live forever in the perfect love of God

after Jesus returns to judge in love the living and the dead,

to give to some unending life in love

and to some continuing chastening,

who is our only Lord and Messiah

and the only Name given under heaven

by which we may be saved from our lostness in sin.

I believe that there is one Holy Spirit of God

who is from the Father and the Son in love before all,

with whom all things were and are created,

who is the Spirit of Fellowship

who creates in love a unity in all who trust God,

a oneness with each other and with God

and a sign of God's love to those outside,

who calls together all who trust God

to assemble together often and regularly

to encourage and warn each other to live a life holy in love,

who is the Spirit of Truth

who has placed truth within all the creation

and especially within the heart of man,

man created in the image of God,

        and most especially, by His guidance, within the sacred Writings

of the apostles and prophets,

who constantly brings that truth to light in the life of every man

so that each man must constantly choose

between light and darkness,

who cannot be forever denied and whose grace is irresistible

for love truly conquers all

in the end.

As you can see, I do not always live up to my own beliefs. Yet God is faithful even when I am not, and I pray that I may become more faithful, and that all who care for me will help me.

[Artwork: the fields and farmhouse capture my memories of the place of my youth (the often wild sky is half of your vision there where the land is flat).  The fields are "Gray and Gold" (1942) by John Rogers Cox, and the farmhouse is "Company for Supper" by Dale Nichols.  The stern Puritan is by Jeff Jones.]