Brother Carl Ketcherside, editor of MISSION MESSENGER, frequently "writes up" brethren, though he usually does it by classes and without naming specific brethren. If brethren, in reply to him, mention his name, he usually makes an appeal under the pretense of fairness to be heard. Then rather than reply to tile specific reference, he uses the reference to his name as another occasion to make his patented little fellowship speech.
He is often scathing in his denunciation of brethren. Yet he conditions his audience to think that anyone who refers to him in reply is making a martyr of him.
He recently wrote of the "tragic arrogance" of brethren, and requested that brethren needed "a little more integrity" (MISSION MESSENGER, January, 1970, p. 10, 11). Of course, he lets you know he does not have this disease of "tragic arrogance" and is not wanting in integrity.
In the February, 1970 issue he castigates those brethren who deny "that there are Christians outside the restoration movement background" He says, "Those who think they have arrived and are therefore in a favored position from which they can summon all others to come and take their stand, have a great deal yet to learn." Yet he says that he has reached the mountain top, and does not intend to descend. He says "the truth must be known and 'I am weary from holding in.'"
He charges that those who think they have the truth are merely blind. "It only means they are in a worse state of blindness as to their own condition." If you do not think there are Christians in all denominations, you are in this "worse state of blindness," possess this horrible kind of arrogance, and have a "great deal yet to learn."
But be not dismayed, Brother Ketcherside has the truth and is "weary front holding in." He will teach you the truth. Reckon there might be a little of this "tragic arrogance" in our Brother Ketcherside? He even advises, "I can promise you that the coming months will provide the most challenging approach to the Christian concept in our generation." My! One would almost be led to believe that there is a wee bit of this "tragic arrogance" in that statement.
He loudly decries those who think they have the truth as being the blindest, but beseeches them to listen to him and he will indeed teach them the truth by the "most challenging approach" exemplified in this generation.
For nearly twenty years now, I have read nearly everything Carl Ketcherside has written. Just a few years ago he began to conduct his "in depth" studies. In his February, 1970 issue, he announces four "in depth" studies. Maybe I am the only one so affected, but I have grown just a little weary of this "tragic arrogance" that causes our brother to describe every study that he conducts as an "in depth" study. I wonder ii he would say that nobody else conducts "in depth" studies. If others do conduct "in depth" studies, what is so unusual about his?
A few months ago he covered the whole book of Hebrews at Fort Wayne, Indiana in five sessions of these "in depth" studies. At a little better than two chapters per day, he must have really gone into "depth."
Even if Brother Ketcherside does not grow weary of writing about his modestly described in depth" studies, I have certainly grown weary of reading about them. Especially when interwoven into the same issue there is so much criticism of the "tragic arrogance" of all the other brethren, and he so modestly proposes to let go with the "most challenging approach to the Christian concept in our generation." A little modesty might be in order, even in the MISSION MESSENGER.
TRUTH MAGAZINE XIV; 27, pp. 3-4
May 14, 1970
