Identity Theology in the PCA
The central agitating issues at the recent PCA General Assembly meetings have been related to both race and gender.
This movement in the PCA is what I personally call Identity Theology. It is a new theological focus on race and gender. Identity Theology tends to substitute a paradigm of a class-struggle for the paradigm of sin-salvation. Not that one is mutually exclusive of the other, but the prism though which the sin-salvation motif is... Continue Reading
Actions of the Forty-fifth General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America
The PCA General Assembly met in Greensboro, NC from June 12-15, 2017.
PCA by the numbers: Comparing 2015 with 2016 reported statistics, in 2016: We had 1,545 churches, an increase of 11. We had 347 mission churches, an increase of 20. We had a total membership of 374,161, an increase of 3,829. Giving was up in all categories. With virtually all mainline and some evangelical denominations... Continue Reading
A Report on PCA General Assembly 2017
Any gathering of sinners like me will at times be discouraging. But by the end of the week I was, for the most part, encouraged.
I understand that some brothers, believing the PCA has drifted too far left, are seeking a way to lead their churches to a more confessional Presbyterian denomination. I am certainly sympathetic to their perspective. However, I believe it is far too early to abandon the PCA. This is not 1936. We are not the PC(USA).... Continue Reading
Why I Voted Against the Ad Interim Women in Ministry Study Committee Report
I believe that the PCA should entrust the local session to address the issue of women in the diaconate as it sees fit according to scripture.
This report primarily interacts with the New Testament exegetical report made by the women’s study committee, giving special attention to Romans 16:1 and 1 Timothy 3:8-12. My report does not set out to prove the committee’s findings as erroneous, but rather to show that their conclusions are, at best, tenuous. Introduction: The study committee... Continue Reading
Is It Time To Understand Deacons?
In my PCA we don’t agree on everything, no surprise. What shall we do about it?
Our world has changed; women now do other things besides secretary, nurse and teacher. Now they’re senators and executives and doing well. Do we welcome that or were the Amish right after all: we should have stayed on the farm? But we won’t be wiser than God on that either! We’re all learning about gifts... Continue Reading
Selected Acts & Deliverances of the 45th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America
The 45th PCA General Assembly met in Greensboro, NC from June 13-16, 2017.
A summary of selected actions of the 45th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America, including the actions on the recommendations presented by the “Ad Interim Study Committee on Women in Ministry.” The report is provided for the Assembly, but is not adopted by the Assembly. 1) Approved to be sent down for... Continue Reading
PCA Study Committee Report: Recommendation 2
Recommendation 2 was contentious because there is no broad agreement in the PCA about the scriptural and constitutional parameters on the role of women serving in the church.
It is the lack of clarity in the report regarding what is biblically and confessionally acceptable for women in worship that makes it difficult to adopt anything other than a wait-and-see attitude with regard to the 2nd recommendation. Mutual respect is not the problem. For the most part, I think progressive and conservative men in the... Continue Reading
When the Exception Becomes the Rule: An Observation from the Recent PCA General Assembly
An observation about subscription to confessional standards and then granting of exceptions to parts of the standards.
Some have said that we may allow exceptions to the standards so long as the person taking the exception promises to not teach or practice their actual convictions. I think that is a horrible attack on Christian conscience. How can we ask a believer to bury their convictions? If a believer does not do or... Continue Reading
Missing Mandate and Better Metrics: Understanding the 2017 PCA General Assembly
If broad churchmen were looking for a mandate to increase female ordination in the PCA, based on a concessive study, it didn’t happen at this PCA General Assembly.
To be encouraged: after 8-9 years of sustained badgering, virtue signaling, and nagging, the vaunted study of women’s roles has now been completed, and barely anything is settled. There’s nothing left but to amend the constitution—which in its present form is clear and offers little consolation to those who’ve given so much of themselves to... Continue Reading
A Big Moment for the PCA
In a time when the cultural winds are blowing so strong in support of the normalization of homosexuality and other forms of sexual perversion Christians do well to articulate God’s standard all the more clearly.
If you are a commissioner at this year’s GA I urge you to vote in favor of Overture 2. If you are a member of a PCA church I urge you to pray that it passes. In recent months we have become aware that those opposing such actions as Overture 2 are well organized, ready to “fight,”... Continue Reading
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