RIP PCA?

[fredtgreco]

Sorry, Ben, I was replying to the general tenor of the thread, and just used your post as a reply mechanism.

But I do find it odd that people are critical of what the PCA might do, when the ARP and RPCNA have already committed that error.

 

[Backwoods Presbyterian]

The situations behind all three are certainly different.

 

[NaphtaliPress]

Yet the RPCNA is trying a blue blood for maintaining woman out to be ordained to the ministry. Granted, the guy was foolish to trust in his blue blood to shield him and was too open. Folks are not open in the PCA and hide in safe spaces and couched language. So while they ain't perfect, score one for the RPCNA. Kill this madness study committee for woman's ordination, I'll give something to the PCA. If it goes forward it will be another creation report where "everyone gets a trophy" and there are no losers and we continue the downgrade.

I have personal knowledge of a PCA minister who was denied transfer into an RPCNA presbytery solely because he refused to acknowledge that there was Biblical warrant for women deacons. It is incorrect to assert that women's ordination in the RPCNA is of no import.

 

[Edward]

My ARP ordination exam last year before the Minister & His Work Committee:

Chairman: What is your position on women serving as deacons?
Me: I do not believe Scripture supports women serving as deacons.
Chairman: What argument would you make from Scripture?
Me: "Let deacons each be the husband of one wife," (1 Tim. 3).
Chairman: Okay, next question...

I knew a lesbian out of California that was the husband of one wife....

 

[Parakaleo]

I knew a lesbian out of California that was the husband of one wife....

If lesbians (or feminists, for that matter) knew the etymology of the word "husband", they would try to shame and ridicule anyone using the term until people stopped.

Late Old English (in the senses ‘male head of a household’ and ‘manager, steward’), from Old Norse húsbóndi ‘master of a house,'

...like they already have done with the word "patriarchy". Remind me why we're so afraid to use that biblical word, again?

 

[Andrew P.C.]

If this passes, the PCA, and very quickly, will go the way of the old PCUS. Not exactly the same, but in generalities, exactly the same (toss subscription, advance egalitarianism, evolution, etc.). The progressives killed any hope of a confessional church in 2002 when good faith subscription was rammed through, theistic evolution is taught without consequence, and we have in practice, women deacons already and with impunity. Just have them in a way the skirts the letter of the law. This may fail this year; but history tells us progressives are untiring, and conservatives give up and when their numbers dwindle the pace quickens. I read/showed this to two TEs, one former and one still PCA, and one while generally pretty down on the PCA was still shocked by this and the other said "this is sick."
I got this from Andrew Barnes on Facebook who explains,
"This comes from the Cooperative Ministries Committee (which is made up of the last 5 moderators of GA, and heads of all the Permanent Committees/Agencies). However, CMC can't recommend anything to the GA by themselves, they have to go through a Permanent Committee/Agency (one that is appropriate to the action they are recommending). So this is the CMC through AC to GA."

3. That Assembly form a study committee on the issue of women serving in the ministry of the church (RAO 9-1; 9-3). The Assembly authorizes the Moderator to appoint the study committee. The study committee should be made up of competent men and women representing the diversity of opinions within the PCA (RAO 9-1; Robert’s Rules of Order [11[SUP]th[/SUP] edition], 14, pp. 174-175, 50, pp. 495-496; 50, pp. 497-498 56, p. 579]).
The committee should give particular attention to the issues of:
​

1. The biblical basis, theology, history, nature and authority of ordination;​
2. (2) The biblical nature and function of the office of deacon;​
3. (3) Clarification on the ordination or commissioning of deacons/deaconesses;​
4. (4) Should the findings of the study committee warrant BCO changes, the study committee will propose such changes for the General Assembly to consider.​

The committee will have a budget of $15,000 that is funded by designated donations to the AC from churches and individuals (RAO 9-2).
A Pastoral Letter to be proposed by the ad interim study committee and approved by the General Assembly be sent to all churches, encouraging them to (1) promote he practice of women in ministry, (2) appoint women to serve alongside elders and deacons in the pastoral work of the church, and (3) hire women on church staff in appropriate ministries.
Grounds: The Cooperative Ministries Committee may not make recommendations directly to the General Assembly but must do so through an apropriate committee or agency (RAO 7-3 c; 7-6). The CMC has had a subcommittee on the role of women and has sent several recommendations to the AC (including a proposal for a study committee on the issue women serving in the church) and CDM to bring to the Assembly.​

For back ground here is the report of this committee of past moderators, and other men and women:

View attachment 4508
Now maybe this is watered down or killed but the fact that it is proposed, by a committee that included 5 past moderators no less, indicates this is not going away. It will keep coming up. When they get tired of dealing with the confessionalists or conservatives they will force it through like they did good faith subscription. And after all, it is more important to them to retain millennials who own the surrounding degraded culture than retain those defending Presbyterian doctrine and practice.

Serious question: If the PCA rules in favor of the degrading culture, what should be the appropriate action of the confessionalists in the PCA?

 

[NaphtaliPress]

It would almost surely depend on how it unfolds, and the conditions in the presbyteries and churches in which confessionalists find themselves. My guess is the usual disorganized flight or remaining to fight on an individual basis.

Serious question: If the PCA rules in favor of the degrading culture, what should be the appropriate action of the confessionalists in the PCA?

 

[Edward]

My guess is the usual disorganized flight or remaining to fight on an individual basis.

Are you aware of any organized groups of conservatives such as were found in the PCUS and in the PCUSA?

 

[NaphtaliPress]

I am not.

Are you aware of any organized groups of conservatives such as were found in the PCUS and in the PCUSA?

 

[lynnie]

Is a PCA church able by itself to pull out and join the OPC ( or another R denom)? Or is it a long and complicated thing that takes months and years to weave through presbyteries and courts?

 

[NaphtaliPress]

I don't recall specifics, but if there is no controversy within the church itself, pretty easy. It is nothing like the PCUSA.

 

[Edward]

A merger would take at least two general assemblies and approval by the Presbyteries. And it would be unwise for the OPC to merge with the PCA at this point. They dodged a bullet a generation ago when it was close to happening (technically, the proposed union was not set up as a merger of equals, it would have been the OPC being absorbed by the PCA.) The initial plan for uniting the two denominations failed when the proposal was not approved by enough PCA presbyteries. A later effort was rebuffed by the OPC. Given the time needed to negotiate the terms and sell the idea, and I'd want to allow at least 3 years. (Four years passed between the two previous efforts).

Or is it a long and complicated thing that takes months and years to weave through presbyteries and courts?

 

[Romans922]

Is a PCA church able by itself to pull out and join the OPC ( or another R denom)? Or is it a long and complicated thing that takes months and years to weave through presbyteries and courts?

For a local congregation of the PCA to leave the denomination, it takes one very simple congregational meeting to leave the PCA. It would probably however be a longer process to join another denomination (depending on that specific denomination).

 

[Edward]

For a local congregation of the PCA to leave the denomination, it takes one very simple congregational meeting to leave the PCA. It would probably however be a longer process to join another denomination (depending on that specific denomination).

You are correct. I misread the question.

 

[yeutter]

When the old Presbyterian Journal, and Presbyterian Guardian were, whether intentionally or not, killed off by the PCA and OPC starting denominational magazines, an effective independent voice was lost. This makes it more difficult; to call to the attention of the average ruling elder, errors floating around in their denomination.

 

[Andrew P.C.]

When the old Presbyterian Journal, and Presbyterian Guardian were, whether intentionally or not, killed off by the PCA and OPC starting denominational magazines, an effective independent voice was lost. This makes it more difficult; to call to the attention of the average ruling elder, errors floating around in their denomination.

Although the Journal that Chris puts out is technically independent (if I recall). I just got the new issue last week and in there he points out that the Sabbath is being lost (well...its being killed) by progressives in the PCA. Good read. I'd highly recommend the Journal and this issue in particular.

https://www.cpjournal.com/

 

[NaphtaliPress]

Yes; I took over the journal full time beginning with the 3rd issue. It had been 'my baby' and project and when I changed churches I managed a buy out as it would not have continued otherwise. So, now it is twelve. Killed, as in more like killed by neglect. It is almost surely true the doctrine was very ill from the first days of the PCA and really needed far more attention to turn it around. It's decline is not just the progressives' fault but has been generally neglected by all.

Although the Journal that Chris puts out is technically independent (if I recall). I just got the new issue last week and in there he points out that the Sabbath is being lost (well...its being killed) by progressives in the PCA. Good read. I'd highly recommend the Journal and this issue in particular.

 

[TheOldCourse]

When the old Presbyterian Journal, and Presbyterian Guardian were, whether intentionally or not, killed off by the PCA and OPC starting denominational magazines, an effective independent voice was lost. This makes it more difficult; to call to the attention of the average ruling elder, errors floating around in their denomination.

Although the Journal that Chris puts out is technically independent (if I recall). I just got the new issue last week and in there he points out that the Sabbath is being lost (well...its being killed) by progressives in the PCA. Good read. I'd highly recommend the Journal and this issue in particular.

https://www.cpjournal.com/

Speaking of which, I visited a PCA congregation today that seemed, from what I could tell ahead of time, to be more towards the confessionally conservative side of the denomination and by no means progressive (at least as far as the region in question goes). After worship the pastor came over and invited my wife and I out to lunch with some other couples who do this regularly (and out meaning to a restaurant, not their home). Surprised, I said that it is not my wife and I's practice to eat at restaurants on Sundays and the pastor seemed to not recognize in the least that we were referring to any sort of scruples regarding the 4th commandment. I can understand to some extent one taking an exception with confessional language and differing on exegesis on the point, but it's astonishing that a long-time minister would flout the confession openly with a visitor from another NAPARC church without any consciousness of the issue. Has it really gone so far in the denomination?

 

[NaphtaliPress]

He may have known more than he showed, but not much surprises me now about the PCA (except maybe how quickly the rest of the dominoes are falling, and now, even that is not going to surprise me). My church's presbytery at the motion of a confessionalist set up a committee to study recreations on the Lord's Day because so many were taking the exception without a clue of the issues or doctrine involved (the wax nose 'continental sabbath', divorced from any actual continental view, etc.). I was told by the committee chair that it was with a very great difficulty that the more (or less) Sabbatarian minority (and in this presbytery one hand is too large to count the Sabbatarians), could get the antiSabbatarians to even grant any moral abiding validity to the fourth commandment. The PCA is not just functionally but doctrinally AntiSabbatarian. Forget the pesky thing of an actual doctrinal standard.

Has it really gone so far in the denomination?

 

[TheOldCourse]

He may have known more than he showed, but not much surprises me now about the PCA (except maybe how quickly the rest of the dominoes are falling, and now, even that is not going to surprise me). My church's presbytery at the motion of a confessionalist set up a committee to study recreations on the Lord's Day because so many were taking the exception without a clue of the issues or doctrine involved (the wax nose 'continental sabbath', divorced from any actual continental view, etc.). I was told by the committee chair that it was with a very great difficulty that the more (or less) Sabbatarian minority (and in this presbytery one hand is too large to count the Sabbatarians), could get the antiSabbatarians to even grant any moral abiding validity to the fourth commandment. The PCA is not just functionally but doctrinally AntiSabbatarian. Forget the pesky thing of an actual doctrinal standard.

Has it really gone so far in the denomination?

I suppose I've read you and others say such things before but it was something else to be face to face with it today. Due to a recent move we will be living in an area (New Orleans) where the PCA is the only Reformed denomination within two or three hours so it seems that it is a pill we'll have to swallow for the time being.

 

[NaphtaliPress]

For now, it is far better than nothing.

Due to a recent move we will be living in an area (New Orleans) where the PCA is the only Reformed denomination within two or three hours so it seems that it is a pill we'll have to swallow for the time being.

 

[Jeri Tanner]

I have been reading the latest Confessional Presbyterian with great interest and profit. I so appreciate its being put together and published; the need is so great. I am praying that these things will be once again understood and embraced by more of the churches.

 

[NaphtaliPress]

This is was the reason and aim. And if it will not turn many from their error, it will at least be a testimony to the truth. I'm thankful to those that wrote on such short notice (3-4 months window to make this June release, as we were pivoting hard and fast from just getting v13 out late) or gave approval to run pieces from elsewhere.

the need is so great. I am praying that these things will be once again understood and embraced by more of the churches.

 

[lynnie]

It is my understanding from the two PCA churches in my past (two different presbyteries), that elder vows taking an exception to the Sabbath as understood in the Confession are the norm. Not trying to say who is right and wrong about specifics (and I found it very annoying once when an adult told my minor daughter that my husband was sinning and breaking the sabbath to start a fire in the woodstove on Sunday).....but until I started reading at PB I just assumed the OPC was strict and the PCA was not.

I guess people are different about what essentials bother them. This doesn't bother me, but I could not go to a biologos theistic evolution church in the PCA. I'd pick creationism over what we can do on Sunday. Don't know if that attitude is right or wrong.....

 

[NaphtaliPress]

I should hope so; that does not reflect a proper understanding of the Puritan Sabbatarianism of the Westminster Standards.

and I found it very annoying once when an adult told my minor daughter that my husband was sinning and breaking the sabbath to start a fire in the woodstove on Sunday

Sadly, as to this issue the difference between the OPC and PCA, while it varies as to degree, I've been told by OPC TEs it ain't a hill anyone will die on in the OPC. Some of the common issues are there as well; maybe not pastors running out to the ball game after morning sermon like in the PCA.....

Exceptions to the Sabbath doctrine of the Standards are not to some minor point. It is as Professor Murray pointed out, woven into the ethic of the Westminster Standards. As the old confessionalists of the PCUS cried long and hard, 'as goes the sabbath, so goes the church, as goes the church so goes the nation.' God is not mocked; easy go one creation ordinance, easy go another. See the larger catechism and the Calvin cited below.

While exception to the puritan Sabbath doctrine is common now, it didn't use to be and those antiSabbatarians that may cry about evolution, women deacons except in name and other downgrades have only themselves to blame because they aided and abetted the erosion of the old school concept of confessionalism.

“The word Remember is set in the beginning of the fourth commandment, partly, because of the great benefit of remembering it, we being thereby helped in our preparation to keep it, and, in keeping it, better to keep all the rest of the commandments, and to continue a thankful remembrance of the two great benefits of creation and redemption, which contain a short abridgment of religion; and party, because we are very ready to forget it, for that there is less light of nature for it, and yet it restraineth our natural liberty in things at other times lawful ....” Westminster Larger Catechims Q/A 121.

“And for this cause the prophet Ezech. reproves the Jews that they kept not the Sabbath. For this is said unto them as if they had in general broken the whole law, and not without cause. For he which sets at naught the Sabbath day, has cast under foot all the service of God as much as in him is. And if the Sabbath day be not observed, all the rest shall be worth nothing, as is spoken by the prophet Isaiah….” Calvin, Sermons of M. John Calvin upon the x. commandements of the lawe (1579; 1581), 31v–32r.

“When the Sunday is spent, not only in games and pastimes full of vanity, but in things which are altogether contrary unto God, that men think they have not celebrated Sunday, except God therein be by many and sundry ways offended; when men, I say, unhallow in such sort this holy day, which God has instituted to lead us unto Himself, is it any marvel if we become brutish, and beastly in our doings all the rest of the week?” Sermons, 36v. The latter cited from Nicholas Bownd, The True Doctrine of the Sabbath, (2015), 444.

 

[Jeri Tanner]

I started to say, Lynnie, that maybe the move towards evolution is related to the move away from the love and keeping of the Sabbath.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[lynnie]

Interesting concept I hadn't thought of before...."easy go one creation ordinance, easy go another."

Maybe that is why evolution and women in church leadership go together now. Interesting insight, I'll have to think about it more. Thanks Jeri and CC.

I don't think any sincere Continental view is rejecting it though, just seeing it as fulfilled ie Hebrews 4. When I read "Calvin on the Sabbath" by Gaffin I thought Gaffin "won" as it were (Confessional position), but he did lay out the other side well. I only know one sincere Continental person who has studied it and come to that conclusion by conviction, and he works harder for God seven days a week than anybody I know.
But I am not sure exceptions in the PCA are because they are Calvinists on this subject, I really don't know the basis for the exceptions.

 

[NaphtaliPress]

Danny Hyde is Reformed and his article on Dordt's sabbath regulations shows they were, to use English labels, moderately puritan. It was a compromise as some at Dordt wanted a much stricter position. My church's presbytery had a study committee on the sabbath (regarding recreations and continental view) and the study found that the term 'continental' view had become so misunderstood and twisted from meaning a Reformed view, to simply mean a non Sabbatarian view, that it had been rendered meaningless. Danny's piece was rerun in the current issue of The Confessional Presbyterian journal but was previously printed in Puritan Reformed Journal (v4, #1) which is online (look for Regulae de Observatione Sabbathi: The Synod of Dort's (1618–19). Deliverance on the Sabbath).

 

[Romans922]

I wrote an article on this recommendation from the OP:

http://theaquilareport.com/pca-gene...study-committee-on-women-serving-in-ministry/

 

[TheOldCourse]

I wrote an article on this recommendation from the OP:

http://theaquilareport.com/pca-gene...study-committee-on-women-serving-in-ministry/

Thank you for your needful response. Those quotes from Ross make me feel even worse about the overture. It's unfathomable to me how society denouncing our positions can ever be a argument for change in a denomination committed to the Scriptures, much less the confessional standards.