· What On Earth Do you Want -
· Apocalypse (Then and Now)
· Wrapped in a Rainbow
· What In Creation Is God Doing?
· Bread for the Journey
· When We Are Real
· I Believe...
· Fire In My Bones - Sword In My Soul
· Aggrevating Essays on Controversial Issues
The Writings of Roy Key (1918-2006)
Roy dedicated 67 years to ministry, serving the Church of Christ and the (Disciples of Christ) and retired from the First Christian Church in Ames. He received a doctor of ministry from Union Theological Seminary in 1981. After he and his wife moved to Rogers in 1983, he served as interim minister in Springdale and Bentonville. While living in Ames, he was active in local government and founded Keystone, the first assisted living center for low-income families. He was a dedicated husband and an author. We are please to share his written legacy with you.
A Message From Roy
Greetings!
I like writing, crafting words freighted with emotion... and information. Early I came to believe that, “the pen is mightier than the sword.”
As a teenager I read stacks and stacks of books, most of them westerns and space adventures. One day I decided to write. I located an ancient Oliver upright with keys looped and, like organs pipes, ranked on either side. On this typewriter, using the hunt-and-peck system, I began a volume entitled Bill “Texas ” Smith and The X-Bar-X Boys at Rattle Snake Gulch. After writing several chapters, I quit, deciding that if I was to spend countless hours at the task, I should produce something more than the thrill of an imaginary shootout between fictional “good guys” and “bad guys.” There’s a real “shootout” going on, and we’re smack in the middle, deciding which gang we’ll join.
It was a long time, however, before I realized how important a place in my life writing would be. For years I prepared to teach in a Christian college and serve struggling churches on weekends. However, either Satan or God, had other plans. I was rejected as “too liberal” for Church of Christ colleges. Shattered, I turned to writing and serving small churches where I was still accepted. My pen had opposite results: 1) in Churches of Christ it helped clear the way for a richer understanding of salvation by grace through faith; 2) it burned the last board in the bridge between me and the power structures. Further, it made clear that I would have to move to the Disciples, or somewhere else, if I was to continue in the ministry. The “somewhere else” was a choice I would not make.
The move, though excruciatingly painful, has proved an untold blessing to me. I am humbled and gratified at the reception Disciples have offered, and I am still trying to make payments on that immeasurable debt. It is in this spirit that I offer a few samples from the store accumulated over the years.
Yours and His,
Roy
About the Texts
Roy wrote the following descriptions about his texts. The texts themselves are linked in the upper right box in PDF format.
FOR MY GRANDCHILDREN was written for children, grandchildren and all those who love them, who want to speak to open minds and tender hearts, who want to lift them up to our Heavenly Father in prayer, who want to recapture something of that spirit of our own childhood and help prepare those who will be keepers of the flame and stewards of this spaceship “Earth” long after we are gone.
WHAT ON EARTH DO YOU WANT WHEN EVERYTHING UNDER HEAVEN IS YOURS? Is the relation of God to Nature and Human Nature issues with which you struggle? One book of the New Testament deals with these basic questions. A short letter to some folks in Colossae, written from a Roman prison by the Apostle Paul offers the Clue to this ancient “mystery.” Here is a series of five lectures I was asked to give to College Students on this now “open secret.”
WRAPPED IN A RAINBOW I know what it is to struggle with low self-esteem. I know what it is to enlist help in that struggle. This is truly a love letter to “the poor in spirit.” My heart goes out to those who encounter defeat and are almost ready to despair. Let’s see if we can fight this battle together.
WHAT IN CREATION IS GOD DOING? IS GOD DOING ANYTHING THAT MATTERS? A giant question mark hangs over the head of contemporary humanity. The question is not so much about God’s existence as about God’s relevance. What kind of God is God, and does it make any difference to us?
BREAD FOR THE JOURNEY When asked to contribute a series of articles to a Springdale weekly, I entitled them “Bread For the Journey.” These devotionals, geared to the Christian Calendar, offer nourishment to travelers on the way. Since Christians are citizens of two worlds, and the secular calendar cannot, and should not, be ignored, a few entries focus on secular holidays. The Christian Calendar, though, assists us in full-filling our time. The First Semester (God’s Half-Year) lifts up God’s work for us. The Second Semester (Church’s Half-Year) lifts up our grateful response.
WHEN WE ARE REAL… Stopped cold by a severe auto accident, I saw that Reality was something I couldn’t con. So I pondered how best to cooperate. My question was, “How can we find the Way?” I concluded that our prime temptation is pretense, as from our wardrobe stuffed with masks the empty silence thunders. We can be real only when all that garb goes, and we stand stark naked before the Holy God, but by His grace re-clothed before one another. Here is one attempt to point to the Way it happens.
I BELIEVE… This statement was written for my family. Since the church in which we grew up branded me a “heretic” and “infidel,” I wanted my children to know my faith and be able to judge for themselves whether it is biblically grounded or a loose-knit rag of sentimental subjectivity. Of course, this assumes that the reader knows the Bible well enough to be a competent judge. Since I share this with you, I trust that you do.
FIRE IN MY BONES – SWORD IN MY SOUL This I had to write. To make one more attempt to reach back across the gulf to family and friends who could not understand why I am gone. To let “Disciples” know who this sojourner is among them, why he came, the road he traveled, the dream that lures him still, and the pain that will not stop as long as the rift remains.
AGGRAVATING ESSAYS ON CONTROVERSIAL ISSUES FIRE… AND SWORD…I thought was my last word to those in Churches of Christ. However, the book stirred requests for discussion of a number of current controversial issues. Some of them are very much alive in the wider Church, and I trust they are of both interest and help to any student of the Christian faith.
