PCA vs. OPC

[wsw201]

Outside of the differences that have been discussed, one major difference is polity. The PCA operates totally different from the OPC. Its like day and night! You can easily see this from reading each denominations BCO. This is one reason I could never see a merger between these two denominations.

 

[Kevin]

Where does Chalcedon fit in?

Chalcedon pres of Atlanta (Cumming, actually)?

They are members of the RPCUS a denomination formed when a couple of PCA congregations left over the ordination of a man who took an exception or held to a non 6 day view of creation. If memory serves that was in the mid 80's.

 

[Kevin]

The Dutch Reformed DON'T fit in. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

(Sorry)

 

[5solasmom]

My personal experience (from one PCA) is that it differed in worship style - they had a band, praise songs as well as hymns and a children's church. The OPC's I know of were mostly hymns, no band and children were encouraged to be part of the church.

I don't know if that is at all representative of PCA's and not assuming it is. OPC just seemed to fit us better.

 

[ChristopherPaul]

Is it true the PCA distinguishes between Ruling and Teaching elder whereas the OPC does not? I thought not, but I have got the impression there is a difference in this area.

Also if the PCA merges with the EPC then that may close all chances of an OPC merger.

 

[R. Scott Clark]

Where do the 'Dutch Reformed' fit in? I once heard that Crystal Cathedral was 'Dutch 'Reformed'.

Both Bob Schuller (Crystal Cathedral) and Norman Vincent Peale (Marble Collegiate Church, NYC and author of the Power of Positive Thinking) were or are ministers in good standing in the RCA.

The RCA historically "Dutch Reformed." They were the American daughter of the Hervormde Kerk, but they haven't been confessionally Reformed for about a century or more. That's why the CRC was formed in the 1850s, because they judged that the RCA was already too "Methodist" (i.e., broadly evangelical).

There are some fairly conservative classes and congregations but they tend to be in the Midwest. My impression is that on the E. Coast and W. Coast the churches tend to have been weakened greatly as symbolized by the twin pillars of the Be-Happy Attitudes.

rsc

 

[fredtgreco]

Is it true the PCA distinguishes between Ruling and Teaching elder whereas the OPC does not? I thought not, but I have got the impression there is a difference in this area.

Also if the PCA merges with the EPC then that may close all chances of an OPC merger.

If anything, the OPC tends to be more three-office (TEs more distinct from REs), as can be seen in the revised Directory of Worship, and the PCA tends to be more two-office (less distinction between TEs and REs).

 

[Contra_Mundum]

The OPC is pretty distinctly a "three-office" church. They have deacons, elders (ruling), and minsters. In practice, I have not seen the "clericalism" that some outsiders feel marks a church that has a distinct ministerial class (clergy) of elder. Certainly I have not seen any OPC churches that have ever been "run" by the pastor/cleric.

The PCA created on paper a very clear "parity" between RE's and TE's. This reflected the view espoused by Thornwell that elders were elders, their difference being primarily functional. 1) I think that these concerns were overwrought to begin with; besides, in practice TE's are still functionally very distinct from RE's. 2) I actually think there may be more "clericalism" in the PCA, and in my opinion it stems in part from the need that some TE's feel to stress their uniqueness, since there is no simple formal acknowledgment of it, but rather extra emphasis is placed on the "parity" of elders.

 

[yeutter]

After the Clark VanTil dispute over the incomprehensibility of God, the OPC has become largely [if not exclusively] VanTillian.

The PCA is more broad Church. Some one who agreed with VanTil, or Clark, or Gerstner, or Warfield, or Hoeksema, or Kline could find a home in the PCA.

 

[ChristopherPaul]

After the Clark VanTil dispute over the incomprehensibility of God, the OPC has become largely [if not exclusively] VanTillian.

The PCA is more broad Church. Some one who agreed with VanTil, or Clark, or Gerstner, or Warfield, or Hoeksema, or Kline could find a home in the PCA.

or Bruce Wilkinson, or Rick Warren, or Billy Graham....

If you agree with Gerstner, Warfield, Hoeksema, Kline, or Clark you will not be welcomed in the OPC.

That is nonsense. Upon my first visit to the OP church I am now a member of, I was given two Clark books because the Pastoral intern who is studying at Greenville had extra copies for the very purpose of handing them out. One of our teachers uses Warfield often and recommends his books to the congregation. During my family’s last visit to Carlisle Pennsylvania we spent the Lord’s Day with the family of Rev. Morris who is the senior pastor at Redeemer OPC. He considers Kline his greatest influence and recommends him highly.

So your statement about not finding a home is totally debunked just within the last six months I have been a part of the OPC.

When in fact I can say from the PCA church I was a member of prior to moving actually taught from the Prayer of Jabez and the Purpose Driven Life.

 

[R. Scott Clark]

Though the OP has a strong theoretical and practical commitment to Van Til's apologetic, there remain Clarkians and others.

I was in an OP some years ago where the adult catechism class was watching video of John Gerstner railing against the free offer of the gospel.

During the Q/A I pointed out the report to the 15th GA on the Free Offer of the gospel written by John Murray, I was told, in effect to shut up!

The PCA is broader than the OP, no doubt, but there are Warfieldians, Klineans (including Meredith himself!), as well as followers of Hoeksema et al in the OPC.

In theory, anyway, most Presbyterian congregations don't even require subscription by the laity to the Westminster Standards, let alone adherence to the particular views of a given theologian.

rsc

After the Clark VanTil dispute over the incomprehensibility of God, the OPC has become largely [if not exclusively] VanTillian.

The PCA is more broad Church. Some one who agreed with VanTil, or Clark, or Gerstner, or Warfield, or Hoeksema, or Kline could find a home in the PCA.

 

[greenbaggins]

Bruce, it seems to me that the PCA, on paper, is 2 office, but in practice is 3 office, since elders are not allowed to serve communion without a TE present (but are allowed to preach: what is up with that?). If you want 2 office, then go the whole way, I say. If you want 3 office, then go the whole way, and don't let them preach either. But, in my opinion, this half-way house is not especially helpful.

 

[wsw201]

Actually RE's in the PCA and OPC can only exhort, not preach.

 

[greenbaggins]

What do you see as the difference?

 

[KMK]

most Presbyterian congregations don't even require subscription by the laity to the Westminster Standards

Are you referring to PCA and OPC or do you mean all Presbyterians including PCUSA?

 

[fredtgreco]

Actually RE's in the PCA and OPC can only exhort, not preach.

Wayne,

I don't think is correct - at least by BCO standards. The reason is that a man must be licensed to preach if he preaches regularly, not if he preaches at all. Different Presbyteries in the PCA interpret regularly differently (in Great Lakes we defined it as preaching more than 12 times in the year, but it is possible to preach and not need to be licensed. Hence, it is possible to be an RE (or even unordained) and irregularly preach.

 

[Archlute]

Actually RE's in the PCA and OPC can only exhort, not preach.

I'm not trying to pounce on you in particular, Wayne, but the whole distinction between "exhorting" and "preaching", is a false distinction in my opinion, and cannot be supported by scripture. It is rather a theological distinction that stems from a false view of the nature of preaching and its relationship to office.

I wrote a paper against this view for an ST class here, propounding what I felt to be the historic view within the broader tradition of the reformers (not just within American high-Presbyterianism, which is just about as early as I can find this semantic split ever mentioned). A fellow student, who is an elder in a local PCA, asked for a copy as their session had been studying the issue for a bit. They read it, and told me that they had basically come to the same conclusions as I, and even pointed out an area that was helpful in advancing my thesis.

Basically, the problem lies in a linking of the power and authority of preaching with the ordination of a man to his office, rather than in the power of the Holy Spirit and the authority of the Word. These men want to say that the unordained only exhort, and that their "exhorting" is not as authoritative as an ordained man's "preaching". Whereas the apostolic view (which I don't have time now to cite and discuss), is that it is the message itself that is authoritative, and that it is the work of the Spirit that brings it its power. Also, if we want to be scriptural in our description of terms, "exhorting/exhortation" is always seen as a style or a subset of preaching, it is an action done within preaching, and it is never something other or lesser.

If you look up vol. 9, p.454 in the Works of John Owen, you will find him specifically stating (in a sermon on pastoral duties) that every minister needs authority in their work (particularly their preaching), and that authority comes from the unction of the Holy Spirit, and not the office, which he is rather emphatic about. He discusses this in more detail in an essay found in vol. 13 (I believe) regarding ordinary and extraordinary callings to the ministry.

Also to be noted, the Westminster Directory for the Public Worship of God recognizes the preaching of an unordained man as such, and describes it in no lesser terms that "preaching". Neither the term, nor the concept, can be found there from what I've read of it.

There's much more, but I haven't the time to post it - I'm preparing to preach this coming Lord's Day at a small, out-of-state church during my Spring Break travels, which will require much driving time over the next few days. Please pray that (however we may describe the delivery of the message) the people will be made to glory in the Gospel, and that the Lord would work among them.

(Can we still be friends? )

 

[Contra_Mundum]

Bruce, it seems to me that the PCA, on paper, is 2 office, but in practice is 3 office, since elders are not allowed to serve communion without a TE present (but are allowed to preach: what is up with that?). If you want 2 office, then go the whole way, I say. If you want 3 office, then go the whole way, and don't let them preach either. But, in my opinion, this half-way house is not especially helpful.

Definitely, we are 3 in practice. We are 3 with a vengeance. Reason? Because we expend all that energy defending parity, and then more energy defending a TE's uniqueness. We have to do that, or we'll end up in either thoroughgoing congregationalism or clericalism. Meanwhile, the GA turns itself into a Convention, creates a Supreme Court and now a Senate, all the while developing a denominational bureauocracy that rivals anything the mainline ever created. And the OPC, with its open admission of 3 offices and delegated GA rolls along without rampant clericalism, and running their denomination out of a strip mall. And that has little to do with the fact it is 1/10 the size of the PCA, and much to do with the perception of power in the gathered church as exercised at all three levels.

 

[wsw201]

Fred,

You may be right. In the NTP it was exhort. Per our past Clerk if you showed an RE as preaching in your minutes, you would get a gig from the Presbytery.

Lane,

If you don't know, I'm certainly not going to tell you!

If you take that as "he doesn't know either" you would be right. But it's got to mean something!

 

[wsw201]

Adam,

No problem I always figured that the distinction had to do with office versus the substance of the message.

BTW, what did you get on your paper?

 

[Archlute]

Adam,

No problem I always figured that the distinction had to do with office versus the substance of the message.

BTW, what did you get on your paper?

Heh, heh. Let's just say that it was not quite the "A" I had hoped for, but I should have expected as much. The previous two times that I had written a paper that went directly against a thesis that the professor had argued for in class, it went about the same. Go figure. What prof wants to have their student writing a paper that basically says that what they just taught in class was flawed?

The grading was a hoot, each time I scored perfection, or near perfection in the categories of style/grammar/research/etc. You know where I lost all of my points every time? Under the sole category of "convincing argument"

 

[fredtgreco]

Adam,

Any chance you could email me a copy of the paper? (Even better if you have the material from your interaction with that Session.

 

[greenbaggins]

Definitely, we are 3 in practice. We are 3 with a vengeance. Reason? Because we expend all that energy defending parity, and then more energy defending a TE's uniqueness. We have to do that, or we'll end up in either thoroughgoing congregationalism or clericalism. Meanwhile, the GA turns itself into a Convention, creates a Supreme Court and now a Senate, all the while developing a denominational bureauocracy that rivals anything the mainline ever created. And the OPC, with its open admission of 3 offices and delegated GA rolls along without rampant clericalism, and running their denomination out of a strip mall. And that has little to do with the fact it is 1/10 the size of the PCA, and much to do with the perception of power in the gathered church as exercised at all three levels.

 

[fredtgreco]

Definitely, we are 3 in practice. We are 3 with a vengeance. Reason? Because we expend all that energy defending parity, and then more energy defending a TE's uniqueness. We have to do that, or we'll end up in either thoroughgoing congregationalism or clericalism. Meanwhile, the GA turns itself into a Convention, creates a Supreme Court and now a Senate, all the while developing a denominational bureauocracy that rivals anything the mainline ever created. And the OPC, with its open admission of 3 offices and delegated GA rolls along without rampant clericalism, and running their denomination out of a strip mall. And that has little to do with the fact it is 1/10 the size of the PCA, and much to do with the perception of power in the gathered church as exercised at all three levels.

Bruce,

I agree with your criticisms of the PCA, but many REs I have met would object to the thought that the OPC is free of clericalism. In fact, many that I know have basically given up on being able to do anything or have any influence in Presbytery or GA. At the higher courts, only the TEs really matter.

 

[SRoper]

Wayne,

I don't think is correct - at least by BCO standards. The reason is that a man must be licensed to preach if he preaches regularly, not if he preaches at all. Different Presbyteries in the PCA interpret regularly differently (in Great Lakes we defined it as preaching more than 12 times in the year, but it is possible to preach and not need to be licensed. Hence, it is possible to be an RE (or even unordained) and irregularly preach.

For some reason I thought the BCO already defined preaching regularly as more than once a month. I could be mistaken.

 

[fredtgreco]

For some reason I thought the BCO already defined preaching regularly as more than once a month. I could be mistaken.

No, it doesn't.

19-1. To preserve the purity of the preaching of the Gospel, no man is
permitted to preach in the pulpits of the Presbyterian Church in America on a
regular basis without proper licensure from the Presbytery having jurisdiction
where he will preach. An ordained teaching elder who is a member in good
standing of another Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church in America may
be licensed after being examined as to his views, according to the provision
of BCO 13-6. This license shall immediately become void if the minister’s
own Presbytery administers against him a censure of suspension from office
or the sacraments, or deposition from office, or of excommunication (in the
event of such censures, the Presbytery with jurisdiction shall always notify
the licensing Presbytery). A ruling elder, a candidate for the ministry, a
minister from some other denomination, or some other man may be licensed
for the purpose of regularly providing the preaching of the Word upon his
giving satisfaction to the Presbytery of his gifts and passing the licensure
examination. (See also BCO 22-5 and 22-6.)

 

[bookslover]

What do you see as the difference?

There is no difference, especially to the person in the pew. This "exhortation" versus "preaching" thing is a fake distinction propagated by 3-office guys who are out to protect what they think is their territory.

The OPC is unofficially 3-office, but I think it's getting more explicit all the time.

The Bible only knows two offices, though - elder and deacon. (Can you tell that I'm a 2-office guy?)

 

[bookslover]

I'll be honest with you, I think the name of the OPC is a hinderance to its broader appeal and it might have grown more rapidly in recent years if it didn't have the name.

Actually, the word "orthodox" in our name has led to a different problem in modern times. With the rise in popularity of Greek and Russian Orthodox Churches in the last 20 years (go figure), we have sometimes been mistaken for one of those churches! I was standing on the steps of an OP church some years ago before the worship service when a car drove up with a couple of people who thought we were the local Greek Orthodox church in town - and all because we have "orthodox" in our denominational name.

I'm sure no one thought about that in 1936. Talk about unintended consequences...

 

[Contra_Mundum]

Bruce,

I agree with your criticisms of the PCA, but many REs I have met would object to the thought that the OPC is free of clericalism. In fact, many that I know have basically given up on being able to do anything or have any influence in Presbytery or GA. At the higher courts, only the TEs really matter.

Fred,
I guess the real question is how each of us is defining "clericalism." I don't know how the OPC GA apportions its representation, and maybe they make it minister-heavy (if so, is it because as usual, its almost impossible for an equal number of REs and TEs from the Presbyteries to go?). But we know that the PCA GA draws TEs to REs at a 5, 6, 7, 10 to 1 ratio. That's pushing clericalism in fact, though not perhaps by the rules.

My personal feeling is: its inevitable that the ministers will be predominant. So, set a strong ratio of not more than 3:1 (limiting factor placed on the ministerial reps), and insist on RE representation. That approach counters the clericalism tendency.

I would distinguish between "clergy", divines, what is essentially a professional class of men whose specialty is the study of God (for other's info: divines are to divinity, what chemists are to chemistry), and "clericalism", or the notion that these specialists are entrusted exclusively with the duty and honors of church authority, as distinct from the "laity", who are all sheep. That sharp distinction is not supposed to be present in Presbyerianism.

The RE ensures that the clergy cannot turn that church into a hierarchical institution. But he doesn't exist for the purpose of "balancing" every enlarged court. That kind of thinking, in my opinion, actually works against Presbyterian principles. After being chosen by the Presbyery to represent it, all those men (REs and TEs) must shed their "identity" politics, and function as Presbytery representatives.

An RE or TE that feels as though he is primarily representing his "class" in the GA has stumbled regarding his duty. But I regret that in the PCA, this thinking is actually fostered by the structure. And others would disgree, not with the analysis, but with my negative evaluation. But speaking as a person who has studied polity from both secular and ecclesial perspectives, I am confident (for myself) that history validates my view.

I do not agree that the old denominations fell due to ministerial dominance. They fell due to systemic issues, failures up and down the line. Only one problem was failure in the seminaries. Another was bureauocracy, independent organs of the church with vast powers and big budgets. Perhaps the greatest issue was failure to discipline at every level. This is how Israel fell into sin generation after generation. From the human standpoint, it was the failure of discipline at every level. (Rich and I are in perfect agreement on this). And in the world-wide church age, not much has changed.

But now I'm almost off topic.

 

[ChristopherPaul]

Actually, the word "orthodox" in our name has led to a different problem in modern times. With the rise in popularity of Greek and Russian Orthodox Churches in the last 20 years (go figure), we have sometimes been mistaken for one of those churches! I was standing on the steps of an OP church some years ago before the worship service when a car drove up with a couple of people who thought we were the local Greek Orthodox church in town - and all because we have "orthodox" in our denominational name.

I'm sure no one thought about that in 1936. Talk about unintended consequences...

I have witnessed this same sort of confusion.