The Greatest Work In The World [Hardcover]

This volume of correspondence contains exchanges written between Lloyd Cline Sears (1895-1986) and Pattie Hathaway Armstrong (1899-1977), two influential leaders in early educational efforts of the Churches of Christ. Spanning the years 1915 to 1921, the letters document their writers' romance, but they are more than simply love letters. They also express an educational philosophy and an understanding of Christian purpose as inspired by the Stone-Campbell Movement and held in tension with the intellectual and social ferment of the times. Posts from family members J. N. and Ida Woodson (Harding) Armstrong as well as from Pattie Cobb Harding, wife of James A. Harding, augment those of the principle authors. Their correspondence allows rare access to privately expressed thoughts of men and women attempting to live as Christian educators at the outset of an uncertain and rapidly changing twentieth century. The letters also offer lessons for contemporary American Christians in these even more volatile times. This book is a marvelous glimpse into perceptions on Christian liberal arts education in the correspondence of a young couple whose past and future weigh heavily in churches of Christ higher education. Their granddaughter, Elizabeth Parsons the editor, has indefatigably searched to establish the backgrounds for these letters and supply information on all the persons mentioned. The outcome is remarkable. --Thomas H. Olbricht, Distinguished Professor emeritus of Religion, Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA There are few occasions when a book comes along that completely catches you by surprise. Such is the case with The Greatest Work in the World, edited by Elizabeth C. Parsons. . . . What prompted a religious tradition like the contemporary churches of Christ, known for its sectarianism, its sectionalism, and its bias against the labors of the intellect, to engage in a frenzy of educational effort in the first decades of the 20th century? These efforts left remnanl