An Aside

As a Reformed Catholic in the PC(USA), I've tried to conform to the teachings of Scripture and the Book of Confessions. Yet, I've just skimmed most of the Westminster Confession of Faith, and read some of the shorter Confessions.

However, with the recent votes on adding Belhar to the list of Confessions in the BOC, I thought it a good idea to think about holding a Bible study on some of them. I picked up a copy of G.I. Williamson's The Westminister Confession of Faith for Study Classes, 2nd ed.. Needless to say it is a comprehensive study, and not one that will be done in 10 or even 20 sessions.

I'm finding the teaching to be fascinating, and not having taken the time to go through the Westminster Confession previously, very enlightening.

I find that Chapter 1, paragraph 6 is highly enlightening:

The whole counsel of God, concerning all things necessary for his own glory, man's salvation, faith, and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions of men.

As ordained Elders (Teaching and Ruling) in the PC(USA), we vow before God and our congregation to conform to Scripture, the Constitution and the Confessions. Does this paragraph not tell us that Scripture is complete, and that what it says is not to be challenged?

The paragraph goes on:

Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word ...

Now this seems to give those who want to reinterpret scripture to say that sin is not sin an out, but does it??

...and that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed.

Note, that is says there are some areas that can be decided by man, but always under the rules of the Word, .. always to be observed. In other words, we cannot change the fact that sin is labeled sin in Scripture. Yet, here we are in the PC(USA) doing just that.

And so it goes ....

Interesting Times for the PC(USA)

The Presbyterian Outlook yesterday (June 7th) came out with an online article proclaiming the passage of the New Form of Government by a majority of Presbyteries.

It also announced that the Belhar Confession, written for a specific time and place (apartheid and separate churches in South Africa) was voted down by over 1/3 of Presbyteries.

The way they phrased it, "the Belhar Confession has been approved by a solid majority – 89 presbyteries to 60 so far. However, this proposal to amend the Book of Confessions requires a two-thirds majority for adoption, so it only takes 58 negative votes to defeat it." Interesting spin ... a solid majority, why not say over a third of presbyteries did not approve of Belhar.

Finally, the article reiterates that amendment 10A passed, removing the so-called fidelity & chastity clause. Now presbyteries and sessions can, if they so desire, recommend for ordination and/or call to office sexually active individuals who are not married. Please note, I do not say sexually active homosexuals. While that clause had been characterized as targeting LGBTs, it covered all those who did not practicefidelity in marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness.

So what's the big deal? Why are the passing of two and the defeat of one so bad?

From the progressive, liberal side the defeat of Belhar removes a confession that was going to be used to justify the ordination of sexually active LGBTs under the new clause .. governing bodies shall be guided by Scripture and the confessions in applying standards to individual candidates ...

That said, you have the new nFOG's Foundations section that has a paragraph F-1.0403, which is nicknamed the diversity provision. It states:

The unity of believers in Christ is reflected in the rich diversity of the Church‟s membership. In Christ, by the power of the Spirit, God unites persons through baptism regardless of race, ethnicity, age, sex, disability, geography, or theological conviction. There is therefore no place in the life of the church for discrimination against any person. The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) shall guarantee full participation and representation in its worship, governance, and emerging life to all persons or groups within its membership. No member shall be denied participation or representation for any reason other than those stated in this Constitution.

Well, guess that tells us. If we believe that sin is sin and others don't we can't do anything about it. Don't believe Christ is Lord, so what come on in; otherwise we'd be discriminating against their theological conviction.

Preach that the Resurrection is just a myth, no worries .. you're OK. (Oh wait, that's already occurred under the current FOG ... nevermind .)

There are other parts of the nFOG that will trouble the PC(USA) in the future. No one knows the full impact of the changes affecting the independence of the local Session, Presbytery or Synod. There are paragraphs referring to the General Assembly, Synod and Presbytery as having authority and power to develop strategy for the mission of the church, the Session is left to lead the congregation in the mission of the whole church. It does sound like the Session is getting the short end of the stick.

In describing the problems with the nFOG at the day of the vote in Crimson-rock Presbytery, one speaker called a yes vote on nFOG " .. buying a pig in a poke ...". I think she got it right, we have no idea where nFOG is going to lead us. I fully expect a boatload of amendments to the BOO next year at General Assembly once individual Sessions (well, those that care to actually interact with others in their presbyteries) and Presbyteries realize the ramifications of the this change. Moving the PC(USA) from a connectional to a hierarchical organization.

So where do we go from here? There are a number of possibilities being talked about, but that's for the next rock.

And so it goes ....

A thought about Christian Marriage .... a small flight of fancy.

I was having a conversation with SWMBO about life after 10A. Her response is that while the PC(USA) slowly abandons the teaching about not conforming to the world, she's going to continue to preach about Christ, His death and resurrection to redeem us, and His teaching to Go and sin no more.

That said, if our state decided to OK same-sex weddings, she'd give up any right to certify civil weddings. She'd only do Christian marriage, which is defined in the PC(USA)'s Constitution part II (Book of Order) as between a man and a woman. If someone wanted to get married, they'd have to go to a Justice of the Peace, Court Judge or County Clerk for the civil registration and certificate after the Church Wedding.

As a flight of fancy, I extrapolated that further. It appears that a Christian marriage, joining a man and woman in Holy Matrimony is actually a good thing for those seniors who are living together outside of civil marriage because they would lose benefits if they were wedded in the eyes of the state. In this way, they could have all the blessings of a Christian marriage and not live in sin, yet to the state they are still the widow and widower of a previous spouse.

It is this living in sin that some one supporting Amendment 10A referred to when talking about the replacement of the fidelity and chastity language. Using my idea, there's no need to repeal 10A for this elder, just do a Christian Marriage. The elder would then be living in the fidelity of Christian marriage, which is not recognized by the state, but is recognized by the Church.

However, there is a sense that the next target of the LGBT alliance funded by the Arcus Foundation (see the Reformed Pastor's posts here and here) will be the area in the PC(USA) Book of Order governing marriage. Currently it says that Christian marriage is between a man and a woman, which according to some is non-affirming, and old fashioned. It should be interesting at the next GA.

And so it goes .....

What happens now ?

Many evangelicals in the PC(USA) have thrown in the towel over the news that South Louisiana flipped their vote from supporting biblical ordination standards, to against this past weekend.

One blogger notes that since 2008 when the last go round happened and biblical standards were supported in S.L.P, about 7 or so churches left the denomination for a more biblically faithful denomination. He figures that those seven churches probably would had enough Presbytery representation to defeat the measure this time around.

So what happens now? The way I look at it is that those who are faithful to biblical standards of chastity and marriage must make an effort to attend the remaining presbytery meetings on the 10A vote, no matter what inconveniences you need to overcome. You just can't sit back and say that someone else will defeat it, there is no one else!!

You need to attend those votes on nFOG and Belhar. You need to understand that rejecting Belhar will make it harder to justify ordinations that do not conform to Biblical standards. For under the 10A language, Governing bodies shall be guided by Scripture and the confessions in applying standards to individual candidates. If Belhar is not in the BOC, it cannot be used to water down what the existing confessions say about sin.

Then there's nFOG, where language takes away much of the local church Session's discretion on contributions to higher governing bodies. That means that you could be forced (depending on the Presbytery) to pay Per Capita to support the headquarters in Louisville.

The same headquarters that created a 10 or 12 page, full color magazine touting all the good that the mission arm of the PC(USA) is doing. I'm wondering how much producing and mailing 10 or 12 copies to each congregation cost the denomination; probably would have paid for a few missionaries?? They could have done the same with a small pamphlet that contained a link to the online magazine.

Its not over, quit throwing in those towels. Consider this a wake up call to end all wake up calls.

And so it goes ....

Arizona White Paper

A few weeks ago, a group of tall steeple pastors met in Scottdale, AZ to discuss the state of the PCUSA. All of these pastors are firmly in the moderate to conservative branch of the denomination.

A letter introducing the White Paper, along with the White Paper itself was published on the Presbyterian Outlook website

As expected there are a few responses, some for, most against. There is much railing against the fact that all the signers were pastors of tall steeple churches, and that they are all white males.

I'm not sure that I could tell that they are all white males from their names, at least one response agrees with me on that. However, they are all males, but why is that a surprise.

While it is true that the PCUSA and its predecessors found that there is a scriptural basis for the ordination of women, both as elders and as ministers of Word and Sacrement, it is hard for a biblically conservative woman minister to find a pulpit outside of a small to medium sized church.

A case in point, SWMBO, also known as the Pastor. Graduated from a conservative seminary, PTS in Pittsburgh. Born and raised in the PCUS as a child, affirms the Westminister Confession without quibble. That said, either did not get a response, or got a polite thank you, but after being listed as the required women's candidate.

There aren't that many women who are Senior Pastor's in any church over 1,000 members that I know of, if there are please enlighten me.

So the fact that .... the letter prompting this response was published by a group of white, male pastors of large churches, who were inviting the whole church to consider their concerns to quote from the Outlook, is nothing if not disingenuous, and a Red Herring to detract from what the White Paper actually says.

A response by the Stated Clerk, GAMC Exec Director, and the current Moderator of the GA is, according to Jack Haberer, In the process, they urge their fellow Presbyterians to pursue a course of unity, citing John Calvin’s resolve, “‘So far as I have it in my power, if I am thought to be of any service, I shall not be afraid to cross ten seas for this purpose, if that should be necessary.’”

But did Calvin really pursue Unity as the end all and be all, or was he pursuing to reform Christianity into what the Scriptures really said.

As you can probably tell, I can understand where these pastors stand. I fully support the ideas they espouse. I can also understand why there aren't other names there, pastors of smaller churches who do not have the security of a tall steeple. These pastors know full well that in some locales, to publicly say what the White Paper says could be a career breaker.

There is that kind of disunity and distrust in the PCUSA. Another blogger at Mountains and Magnolias talks about how the PCUSA has become almost episcopalian in scope, and that the tall steeple pastors are looking at congregationalism.

He has a point, but I don't believe the part about becoming congregational. That's already here with many large to small churches simply exiting the PCUSA in place. Yeah they're still listed, but they don't all pay per capita and many don't attend Presbytery meetings any longer. Why?? Its the same thing every year or so, we said NO once, why can't it stick !!

Is the new nFog, which appears to push unity as the main driving force and will if adopted will promote anything but; going to really ...engage elders and pastors in shaping a more responsive polity to paraphrase from the response letter?

Will the nFog be more responsive to those who see the PCUSA as heading down the road to biblical irrelevancy?

Does it give a voice to those who see that the current way we nominate representatives to GA does not allow for the diversity of opinion and theological views that should be the goal of GA?

You can probably quess the answer to all those questions, and more from the moderate/conservative side of the PCUSA. I think NOT!!

And so it goes ..... !!

One more off the Bucket List

As I approach my sixth decade (good grief, did I actually write that), I've been realizing that there are things I wanted to do but never got around, or had the patience to do.

One of which was to get my Amateur (ham) Radio License. I was really into shortwave (SWR) radio listening when I was younger, even bought and built a Heathkit receiver for use when I was stationed in Greece to listen to the Voice of America, BBC and Radio Canada.

While stationed there, I helped run the local military MARS station at the detachment, which also allowed me to listen to Hams in the US and elsewhere try to get QSLs from stations all over the world.

My problem was that I could never get past the Morse Code requirements. I could never send or receive at the speed needed. So I resigned myself to be a passive listener.

I didn't keep up with the license requirements, so when someone said they had just gotten their Technician level license, I asked what was the Morse requirement. He said there was none !! Sure enough, I was qualified for the Tech license, at least an online test said I was. When I sat for the test, I passed with flying colors.

A friend of mine had given me a 2m/440mhz Kenwood mobile rig, so I ran some coax up through a hole in the ceiling of a closet, installed a 2m antenna in the attic, and promptly started talking to locals through a repeater. Of course, there is only so much you can talk about locally, and I was definitely not going to get QSL cards from them. So, now its on to get my General, and a HF rig. Slowly, but surely I'm putting the 'shack' together, but first I'll dig out my old SWR set, and see if it still works.

73

After Christmas Blues .....

Its been snowing here in Cannoli, PA for the past week. Not heavy amounts, but enough that I need to head out at least once a day and clear the back door and walk. The good news is that that's the only area I have to do, the front of the manse is handled by the church.

My wife does the area from the manse to her office. The joke is, her office is on the other side of the connecting door to the church.

Anyway, I finally got the last of the outside decorations down after Epiphany, so all the lights are off the lawn, the wreath down from the front, and the lit electric candles out of the windows. It just looks drab at night now ...



I think it looked quite nice, of course some of the locals were scratching their head until the first candle was lit.

.... and so it goes !!