(Eric Pement – Executive Director EMNR) Former EMNR board member Elliot Miller passed into the presence of the Lord Jesus on April 11, 2018. Born in 1951, Elliot turned to Eastern mysticism and meditation during the Age of Aquarius in the 1960s, experimented with drugs and psychedelics, but in his confusion was confronted and converted by the real Christ during the Jesus Movement of the late sixties and early seventies. Southern California in that era provided many coffeehouses, cults, and communes, and Elliot lived for a while in one of the Christian communes in the west coast. I believe it was called Shiloh.
In his early twenties, Elliot landed back in Orange Country, California, where he soon started working for Walter Martin, founder of Christian Research Institute (CRI), recently transplanted from New Jersey. A gifted and riveting speaker, Walter Martin inspired literally hundreds of people to study Christian apologetics and provide reasonable answers to many sects and “cults,” which previous generations considered unreachable.
Starting his work with CRI, Elliot’s earliest colleagues and co-workers included Kurt Van Gorden, Paul Carden, Gary Metz, Bob and Gretchen Passantino, and Cal Beisner, Gretchen’s brother. (If I have forgotten anyone, please forgive me but let me know.) Elliot soon became newsletter editor and then magazine editor for CRI. He remained editor-in-chief of the Christian Research Journal for most of his career, serving with CRI for 42 years (1976–2018).
Elliot joined EMNR’s board of directors in December 1988 and remained an active board member until the summer of 1998. Elliot’s mentor, Walter Martin, was a founding board member of Evangelical Ministries to Cultists (EMNR’s predecessor) in 1982 and a board member of EMNR from 1984 until his death in 1989. Colleagues Paul Carden and Bob Passantino also served as board members of EMNR at different times.