The Session of Unity ARP, Piedmont, SC alleges that The Reverend James Hering filed a “public civil suit against his brother in Christ in the denomination” which is contrary to Biblical principles

According to a story filed overnight on the web site of the Greenwood, SC based Index-Journal newspaper, the Session of Unity Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in Piedmont, NC voted to present allegations against a minister in their Presbytery for “failure to promote the unity, peace, purity and prosperity of the church.”

Additionally, the Session alleges that The Reverend James Hering, filed a “public civil suit against his brother in Christ in the denomination” which is contrary to Biblical principles

Hering is a tenured Associated Professor of New Testament and administratively serves as the Director of the Master of Arts in Practical Ministry Program at Erskine. He attended Mercer University in Macon, GA – a Baptist related institution – and received a Master of Divinity degree (the normal training for a Minister of the Word) at Erskine Seminary. He completed his studies with a PhD from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland.

Hering is a Ministerial member of the Second Presbytery of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, the same regional body of which Unity ARP is a member church. According to Presbyterian polity, all discipline against a Minster of the Word must be filed with the Presbytery that holds his credentials.

When the General Synod of the ARP met March 2-3 in a called meeting in Flat Rock, N.C., it called for the removal of 14 trustees from the college’s board, a recommendation Hering did not vote for, and instating an interim board.

According to the Index-Journal story, Hering was quoted as saying that “he commission’s argument for the removal of trustees was disjointed and sometimes incoherent. The board of trustees had formulated a response to the demands acquiescing most of the recommendations, including paring the size of the board over time, he said.”

After the ARP Called Synod meeting that approved action to replace the board of Erskine College and Seminary (see http://bit.ly/d9nwcQ for the full story) Erskine College board chairman, Scott Mitchell – acting on behalf of the College – filed a law suit against the church, saying it violated the school’s charter and bylaws and its own rules in removing the 14 trustees and replacing them with in an interim board.
Immediately following that suit, Hering joined several other Erskine faculty and administrators, filed a second lawsuit. The same day, the lawsuit by Erskine College was dropped.

Again, according to the Index Journal article, the allegations presented to Second Presbytery state that Hering “rose his hand against and broke covenant with his brothers in the ARP Church Synod” and with the Second Presbytery, judicial process against Hering has been requested by the Unity ARP Session.