The Front Page
A Letter

May 30, 1961
2708 Milam St.
Orange, Texas

Mr. Glenn Melton
1805 9th Ave.
Lake Charles, La.

Dear Glenn,

The recent meeting I was privileged to preach in with the congregation there was an opportunity that I could not ignore. In whatever good was accomplished I rejoice. It was my intention from the very beginning to do only good and no harm at all, and I trust that only the truth was preached and God was glorified.

Since I had preached in Lake Charles (when the church met on 2nd Ave.) from July of 1949 to March of 1953, had made many friends there, and had left the church there at my own volition and with the blessings of the entire congregation, I did not think it unreasonable (in spite of the present extreme difficulties in the churches) to expect to see many friends of yester-year in the audience. Their actual response was the most personally discouraging thing I have met since I began preaching. Whether they would endorse the church there or not, or whether they would agree with all that I preached or not, I earnestly believed that some would come as friends, and more, as brethren and listen with open minds. (I recall running an announcement in the bulletin about the beginning of the church of premillennial persuasion in Sulphur. We said that faithful brethren could not endorse and fellowship that church. But when Frank Mullins came there for a meeting, several from Lake Charles and Maplewood were willing to go out and listen to what he said. The truth has nothing to fear, but error has.)

In reality only one old friend came because he wanted to. He came to listen and even asked some questions of me. Four other former acquaintances (two of them as close as any friends I ever had) came, but it was a bitter disappointment to me to learn that they came because they were sent. I would have had a great deal more respect for them had they openly said, “Bill, we are not here because we endorse this church or all of the things that your preach. We are here as a committee sent from the Blvd. church.” Just how deep is friendship? and how strong is conviction?

Only after the meeting had begun did I learn how much the church for which you preach has been marked and opposed. Evidently minds have been closed and prejudice has set in among many members of the Blvd. church in Lake Charles and the church in Maplewood. I am convinced that such has come about as a result of two things: 1) they simply are not aware of the innovations that are pouring into churches all over the nation, and 2) they have received a diet of distorted information about some conscientious brethren--falsely portrayed as “trouble-makers,” “disturbers,” “church-dividers,” “ambitious,” “opposed to caring for orphans, to doing mission work, and to churches cooperating” and prejudicially branded as “antis.” (And some thought you people did not believe in Bible classes because they had heard this loaded and unqualified term applied to you.) If these brethren could simply hear a fair and open discussion of both sides (I can imagine how fairly brethren Guy Woods and Gus Nichols presented “both” sides.) of the present issues concerning the work of the church, the organization of the church, and cooperation among congregations, the situation would be quite different. Any man who refuses to make a thorough investigation, who does not want to hear or read both sides of every question, who is opposed to private and public discussion of differences, and who is not willing for all that he teaches and practices to be examined by the Scriptures does not have the truth on his side or is not on the side of the truth.

When I came for the meeting there, I had no intention of becoming the issue or any kind of an issue, but several people, some whom I have never met, seemed determined to make me the issue. One brother, as you know, who was not even acquainted with me was reporting that I had split two churches (and I was working with neither of them nor living in the towns where they were located). Some were circulating the report that I had changed my convictions and preaching since living in Lake Charles (I wonder what that would prove). Let me say that what Bill Crews has done or not done, what he has preached or not preached, whether he has changed or not, whether he has been consistent or not, and whether he believes and practices now exactly as he believed and practiced when he lived in Lake Charles will not determine what is right with reference to the present-day differences in the Lord’s church. Only the Bible can do that.

There isn’t any other man living who knows as well as I--and my memory is not acute--what I preached, wrote and practiced while I lived at Lake Charles. I have copies of the bulletins I prepared and outlines of the sermons I preached there. I had just become twenty-one when I moved to that city. At that time one might have asked me what I believed about a number of things and why I believed it, and I could not have told him. I had a lot of learning to do and know it better now than then. I did things then with reference to the work of the church that I would not do now. I used some verses in ways that I would not use them now. A man can be honest and sincere and wrong. If I had never changed on anything, especially after finding out that I had been wrong, I wouldn’t be fit to stand in God’s presence.

While I was at Lake Charles, I began to study a lot of things--church support of colleges, entertainment in the work of the church, benevolent work, cooperation among churches--that I had not studied before. Many of my present convictions were formed while I was there. While I was there, I preached against church support of colleges and entertainment in the work of the church. I, in time, was opposed to the “sponsoring church” plan of cooperation and church support of benevolent institutions that care for children. I am enclosing a complete copy of the outline of the sermon I preached in Lake Charles early in 1952. The Herald of Truth did not begin until 1952. While at Lake Charles I did not oppose it nor did I encourage the church to support it. Shortly before leaving Lake Charles, I became definitely convinced that it was an unscriptural arrangement. Not long after I left, I expressed my feelings to some friends in the Lake Charles church, and they stated that they would be opposed to the church sending funds to the Herald of Truth.

I left Lake Charles at the end of February, 1953 and moved to Opelousas, La. The second week in January I had driven 700 miles to Florence, Ala. to look into (at their invitation) the work with the Pine St. church. On the very night I arrived the elders took me to the building and asked me about my convictions upon sponsoring churches, children’s homes, and Herald of Truth. After I told them, I asked what their convictions were, and they responded, “Exactly the opposite.” Any one who cares to may contact the Pine St. church to corroborate this. I was allowed to teach a class and preach the next day (Sunday), but I was not hired because of my convictions. When I returned to Lake Charles, I told some of my friends in the church there what had happened in Florence. I was never reprimanded or opposed for any of my convictions or preaching while in Lake Charles. If any one there now believes that I am wrong, they will be welcome in my home to show by the Scriptures the error of my way.

Time would fail me should I go into the things that have transpired in the church from March, 1953 to May, 1961. I have a file of quotations from bulletins printed by churches scattered all over America. They are demonstrations of the truth that many churches of Christ are drifting away from the New Testament.

Glenn, as you well know, I am not ashamed of my convictions nor afraid to submit them to investigation. I am ready to tell anyone what I believe and why. Let me close this rather lengthy letter with a quotation from a bulletin I edited (March 5, 1950) while in Lake Charles: “Everything must be done by the authority of Christ. Colossians 3:17. All must be done within his teaching. 2 John 9.”

Yours in Christ,
Signed: Bill Crews
Bill Crews

PS: You have my permission to use this letter as you think best to “set the record straight” and to encourage brethren to investigate present practices in the church.

(This letter was written forty years ago, during the institutional controversary. Read and weep, but learn. Division in our own time over such things as Marriage, Divorce, and Remarriiage, Nature of Christ on earth, fellowship, Genesis One, is causing the same things. I am rapidly going the way of all the earth. Other men will have to finish this battle. Will you stand up and be counted for truth and righteousness? God is looking for men. Will He see you? I write this with blinding tears in my eyes. - Glenn Melton

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