In my opinion, World Bible School (WBS) is one of the most exciting works presently going on among churches of Christ! Having known Jimmy Lovell since the 1940s, and having worked closely with him in the 1960s, I was impressed by the urgency Jimmy felt for finding ways to evangelize that could include all our members in the task. To this day WBS remains a marvelous example of the Biblical teaching of the "priesthood of all believers" (1 Peter 2:4-9).

The rapid growth of the church in the first century is presented as a work accomplished by ordinary members who went everywhere "preaching the word" (Acts 8:1-4). It was believed that the church was a body, and that the Lord had gifted individual members in such a way that every body part had a function to perform (1 Cor. 12:12-20). Early church leaders were told to train individual members for ministry with the promise that when each member of the body does its work, numerical growth will occur in an environment of love (Ephesians 4:11-16). It was also believed that judgment would involve individual accounting for the use of talents that had been given (Matt. 25:14-30).

Sadly, history documents that what was intended to be a ministry of the whole church to the whole world, increasingly became a ministry of a few called the "clergy." Furthermore, what was intended to be a ministry to the world, became predominantly a ministry to the church. As one writer insightfully said, "By making it a ministry of the clergy to the people, there are two losses: loss of a ministry to all the people (now only to the church), and a loss of joy, freedom, spontaneity, and variety of Christian ministry" (Training the Ministry the Church Ought to Have, I.R.M., Jan. 1977). Some have suggested that the modern definition of "service" would seem to demand a different spelling like, "serve us!").

Allow me to give three reasons why I am sold on the program of WBS. Recently, I heard that there are more members of churches of Christ in Africa than there are in the United States (keeping in mind that only the Lord knows the true number!). Whether or not this be true, it is obvious that WBS is excitingly effective, on a world-wide basis, in bringing new members into the body of Christ. This writer has been involved in mission work in Italy since 1950. A few years ago, Italy began permitting African nationals to migrate to Italy . Many of these have come from Ghana . The church is unusually strong in Ghana , and so hundreds of these new "Italians" are brothers and sisters in Christ who are fervent in faith and very evangelistic. Consequently, they are blessing the Italian congregations.

Secondly, working members tend to be fulfilled and happy. Nonworking members can never know the joy of being active and productive citizens of Christ's kingdom. The idea of being a loving family working together in the common task of saving the world through Christ, escapes them. It is my conviction that many fall away from the church because they have little or no part in the work of the Kingdom. WBS has blessed the church by creating Kingdom work for thousands of members all over the United States .

Finally, as already suggested above, WBS has given us a wonderful model for the way the church should look. Thanks for the way our God has worked through Jimmy Lovell and all his successor to encourage the Biblical ideal of "the priesthood of all believers."