A while back I posted this picture just for fun and said I’d explain later how it came about.
The photo was taken by Thuy Dang, then registrar at Westminster Seminary in California. (She is now sadly deceased.) Here’s the context in which that picture was taken.
It was spring semester, 1995, and I saw Professor Kline and Lee and Misty Irons (front right) eating lunch. So I went over to join them. Kline looked up as I came over and teasingly said, “Only like-minded people are allowed at this table.”
“I’m like-minded,” I said, sitting down. “Only I’ve become a postmillenialist.”
“What?!” roared Kline, leaping from the bench to assume the position picture. Thuy Dang, who happened to be on the spot with a camera, snapped the shot.
Once the drama had concluded, Thuy explained that she was taking photos to be included in brochures and other promotional material for the seminary. “You can put that picture in the section on Nouthetic Counseling,” I quipped. We all laughed.
We chatted for a bit through lunch. I don’t recall what about. When it was time to go, I said, “I just want to make sure you know I was kidding about what I said earlier.” (I was referring of course to my claim that I’d become postmillenial.)
“Except for the part about nouthetic counseling!” Kline replied.
1 May 2007 at 3:14 pm
That’s an awesome story! Who is the 4th person in the picture? It looks like it may be David Van Drunen?
There was a memorial for Dr. Kline at Westminster last week. Lee and I were together in the audience but Owen had been asked to give a student’s remembrance of MGK. And he made us proud. One thing he said that has stuck in my mind was that Dr. Kline had “…a godly disdain for worldly glory and an earthly inheritance because he desired a better country, a heavenly one.” That came to mind when you recounted the context of the picture. I have no doubt that even in the midst of his joking and choking, his spirit was vexed at even the prospect of such a misplaced hope.
1 May 2007 at 3:18 pm
LOL I just realized I asked you who that was in picture the first time you posted it. You didn’t know then, so you probably wouldn’t know now either. Sorry.
10 May 2007 at 9:56 am
he! bill, you must be a first-born. i think there is something natural to being such that compels us to provoke and push buttons in order to get a friendly rise out of folks.
the background effect of that picture makes kline look like an experiment in irony: a demonic grimace with an angelic halo-effect.
zrim
1 January 2008 at 9:11 pm
Where art thou, Bill?