Excitement of Triune truth is matched by excitement of telling about God's eternal evangelizing of me. God's pursuit makes the common, such as the following, become a base for exciting, uncommon studies and results. Medora Junction, between small town and campus, promised changes. Shared moments of people-watching with Dad from the drug store door step, spoke of grandeur in persons. Defeated faces of two African American corporals, haunted my social concerns. Mom's rocking chair rhythm of gospel singing, rocked gospels into me. Boyhood railroad adventures helped recognize adventure in theological insight. Value of professional skill was seen in Dad behind the drug store prescription screen. A summer evening walk through Medora heard feet moving to varying rhythms of gospel singing. Church bells told of the sound of God's welcoming grace. Such common experiences support uncommon, disciplined, entertaining and exciting scholarship of professors, who presented theology of the familial, in-history, personal, relational God-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Their mutuality unified the workings with the natural order that provided for my coming to be, gave saving words and promises of Jesus Christ and, through the Spirit, sustained me in the present and the future-these three in perfect concert evangelized me. An exciting story to tell.

My Journey into the Trinity

A Personal Adventure into FaithBy Emil Beck

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2011 Emil Beck
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4634-0342-3

Contents

Preface.......................................................................................vChapter 1 Before Telling The Story............................................................1Chapter 2 "Just Trinity"—Its Community And The Becks....................................3Chapter 3 Legacy In Race Relations............................................................9Chapter 4 Growing Up In The Drug Store And Its Community......................................13Chapter 5 Freedom With Measured Restraint.....................................................17Chapter 6 The Great Depression................................................................21Chapter 7 The Family Circle...................................................................29Chapter 8 The Small And Large Of Medora Life..................................................33Chapter 9 Songs Of The Church.................................................................47Chapter 10 `Medora Junction'—Between Two Worlds.........................................53Chapter 11 Unexpected Assignments In The Army.................................................63Chapter 12 Civilian Life—What To Do Now.................................................69Chapter 13 Becoming A Christian Minister......................................................71Chapter 14 A Good Start In Poultney...........................................................91Chapter 15 Pain And Pleasure In Windsor.......................................................99Chapter 16 Building A Church At Brookside.....................................................103Chapter 17 A Guide To Home....................................................................113Chapter 18 Boston And New Perspectives........................................................123Chapter 19 The Spirit Returns Me To Pastoral Ministry.........................................141Chapter 20 Time To Focus......................................................................145Chapter 21 The Breaking Forth Of Light........................................................149Chapter 22 A Defense Of My Epiphany...........................................................153Chapter 23 Looking Back.......................................................................157Chapter 24 Yes, To The Eternal Evangel........................................................175Chapter 25 Blessed Assurance..................................................................179Chapter 26 A Charge To The Confirmand—Before, During And After..........................183Chapter 27 A Tribute To Scholarship...........................................................185Agenda........................................................................................187Appreciations.................................................................................191A Pictorial Of Some Places And Persons On The Journey.........................................193A Memorial To: Betty May Preston Beck, April 16, 1922—July 21, 2007.....................211

Chapter One

Before Telling The Story

My life's spiritual journey is in summary, a journey into the Trinity—that is into the communion of God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In the Sacrament of Baptism, I received the mark of that communion. In the Sacrament of Holy Communion, I participate in that communion through its specificity or through my identification with the humanity and divinity of Jesus Christ in the bread and the cup. This journey was made through the grace of the Holy Spirit. I will write of those personal experiences and qualities which I believe the Spirit used to lead me into the Trinity.

This writing is "after the fact". Change is occurring. God is constantly changing my perceptions of the experience I had, enlarging my view of the experiences and the qualities that were central in keeping me in the journey. In this connection I write in the awareness that the Triune God is a dynamic, relational being—a moving force—not static, sitting back in a perpetual day of rest, waiting to see how well we do with what has been given us. No, the Spirit is always changing so as to extend the impact of the experiences and the qualities developed

I have avoided relating family experiences that are of a very private nature. This causes no loss of what I seek to do through writing of my family. Sometimes the smallest incident leads to a large influence. But the large incidents are not unnoticed. I trust that all this will be illustrated by what follows. In this story I will deal with how I could believe in the Trinity and yet not believe in it. I will deal with how I arrived at the Trinity and yet was not in it. I will deal with my various adaptations of the Trinity (i.e. not quite the Trinity) and yet my holding to the orthodox words of the Trinity.

This account of my journey, will logically follow the general chronology of events. However some events will be placed outside the chronological order. This, in part, is following my family's habit of "looking back", sometimes with joy and sometimes with "how did we do it?" The journey was not a straight line. It revisited places and thus felt a renewed impact of the experience. And the qualities developed became more significant, which is no surprise, considering the dynamic nature of the Triune God. So this account of the journey will "zig-zag"—right and left and back and forward. Theological thinking does this. This is a natural part of any remembering and of any accounting of the influence of experiences on current beliefs. I will avoid any research into the details of the various contacts which have been influential in my journey. Any knowledge that I would gain in my research would not be a part of my actual experience in the journey, except where the knowledge confirms in retrospect what I emphatically sensed at the time. I am convinced that the insights gained from the events have come as a result of the Spirit and his play on the events, which I will discuss in more detail later. Also obviously the emphasis is on "my" journey. Though "my foot steps" would track across others, and would benefit from trails left by others, still it is my experience in the walk. Also the emphasis is "into". There is the aspect of being "in" the Trinity. Of course this cannot now be fully. But in the "after-experience-truth" the Trinity does draw me into a foretaste of the blessed communion.

Chapter Two

"Just Trinity"—Its Community And The Becks

This is the story of my journey.

Significantly the journey began in the Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church in Terre Haute, Indiana. Church was an important part of my family's life. It was a central facet–an assumed facet in my father's and mother's lives and they would make it so in the family they would have a part in creating. The flow of their lives before I came on the scene tells much of what would influence them in the broad aspects of church life. Dad's folks were married in Kansas City, Missouri on May 10, 1871. So William and Margaret Beck started their lives together in one of the jumping-off places into the rigors of the Great Wide West. But they decided to back up from Kansas City a little and settled in Logansport, Indiana. He became a printer. In one picture in our family photos, he is...