William E Pannell:
Gradually, and without any conscious realization, the world got smaller too. We were taught to shun the world, to be separate from it, and while I am sure the interest was right, the result of such instruction developed a negative and defensive mentality. I found myself viewing people as the enemy, especially if they smoked or cursed. They were to be saved, of course, but not necessarily to be loved as they were. Imperceptibly, I came to be more doctrine and program-centered than people-centered. Our negative world-view was further compounded by the constant stimulation we received to live a holy life. I fought the struggle and became progressively more self-centered. We wanted to become sanctified in order to serve, but for many of us the kind of sanctification we sought served only to separate us further from the world we professed to love.
I became a fundamentalist. Not that I understood what that meant, but I became one. I was, of course, anti-modernist, anti-RSV, anti-World or National Council and anti-Roman Catholic. Men became guilty by association with any of these issues or movements. I now know that we were not really trained to think. I could not have given you a good reason for many of my views. But no matter, since “orthodoxy” was all-important and at that time even love for those who differed was considered compromise, betrayal or apostasy. The same could be said, of course, for my contemporaries in liberal schools. From our “deep wells” we fought our verbal battles, never caring that we were strangers to the love of God.
But we did have zeal. There was a job to be done, a world to be saved, and time was running out.