Uncategorized – Vita pastoralis

Advent Is Not Christmas: Part 1

I have a pet peeve. Actually, I have several. This one has to do with the way that many churches do Advent, that is, as an extended time of Christmas. Their focus is on the first Advent of Christ, and the time is spent covering the biblical material leading up to his birth. Christmas carols and hymns are sung from the first Sunday of Advent onward and there is no distinctive Christmas season. In other words, Advent is Christmas.

There is just one problem. Advent is not Christmas.

Before I get any further I need to make several disclaimers. First, the purpose of this essay is not to shame anyone or call anyone out. I’ve observed this practice enough to not have any one particular church in mind. In fact, the church I attended this week on the First Sunday of Advent did it correctly. So, I’m not calling anyone out in particular and neither do I have any recent experience in mind. Second, my goal is not to cause anyone to feel ashamed or to cause any immediate, drastic changes in your church. My purpose is to educate and train. The church year is a secondary (or even tertiary) matter, and there’s no reason to go to war over how anyone does the church year (or doesn’t).

That said, if we are going to do the church year, I think that it ought to be grounded in what the Scripture teaches and what the church has observed over the centuries, and that as Reformed Christians we ought to have a good rationale and purpose for doing it.

In this essay, part one of two, I will cover the broader biblical and historical aspects, that is – the Biblical and Patristic Roots of the Church Year. Then in part two I will get into the nitty gritty of why Advent is not Christmas (and why that matters).

The Church Year is Grounded in God’s Word

The church year is not just a cool thing that trendy churches are now doing. While I think it’s good that all kinds of churches are getting in touch with the roots of historic Christianity, as we do that we need to understand what we are doing and why. Ancient does not necessarily equate to good and helpful, and we need to understand what unhelpful aspects may have developed in ancient practices so we can avoid them. When it comes to the church year, we are not just appropriating church tradition. It turns out that, as in many other things, the church’s tradition is grounded in God’s Word.

There are some folks (I happen to be one of them) that believe that whatever we do in the worship of God should be grounded in God’s word. In other words, we can’t do whatever we like in our worship of God. The Bible teaches us how we are to worship, and our worship should be regulated by God’s Word. This idea is referred to by Reformed theologians as The Regulative Principle of Worship.

There are three places we can find the church year grounded in God’s word: the creation narrative, the Mosaic law, and in New Testament observance. The first is in creation itself. In Genesis chapter one we find that light is created on the first day, but the Sun, Moon, and stars aren’t created until the fourth. Light existed before day four— it evidently was a manifestation of God’s glory. Much like the waters were gathered on day three to produce the dry land, the light is gathered on day four to produce the Sun, Moon, and stars. The Sun is said to rule over the day, and the Moon to rule over the night. The Sun, Moon, and stars are given to “to separate the day from the night,” and to serve as indicators of “signs and for seasons, and for days and years,” (Gen. 1:14). The Sun marks the day, the Moon marks the month. The stars mark seasons. Together, all three help us mark years. But did God create all this just for telling time?

The text says they are for “signs and seasons, and for days and years.” Why is the word “signs” in with “seasons, days, and years”? It seems to show that the heavenly bodies will not just mark the passage of time, but that they serve as important markers throughout the year. The word sign used there appears several times in the Old Testament, but two of its usages are as a pledge of the covenant (circumcision, rainbow, and Passover are all signs) or as a marker of divine action. One way to think of these celestial signs are as creational ebenezers, heavenly stones of remembrance, that move us to mark the mighty deeds of the Lord in worship as we move through each year of our lives. Further, the word used for “seasons” here is almost always used in the Old Testament with a connection to worship. It can mean an “appointed place,” in which case it almost always refers to a particular spot in the Temple/Tabernacle, or to the Tent of Meeting itself. As an appointed time, it most regularly refers to the time for appointed feasts. This is how the BDB Hebrew Lexicon defines this usage in Genesis 1, preferring the translation, “for signs and sacred seasons.” This is also the case in Psalm 104: 19, which should be translated, “He made the Moon to mark the sacred seasons.”

This creational feature is encoded in the worship of the Old Testament Church. We find a series of yearly feasts prescribed in the Mosaic law. These feasts are largely agricultural, but they follow the cycle of the year. The movement of the Sun, Moon, and stars in their yearly cycle set the dates for the great festivals, especially those of the springtime.

Exodus 12 describes both the ritual of the Passover meal and the day that it is to be observed. The LORD tells Moses that this month, the month they were delivered from Egypt, is to be counted as the first month in their ecclesiastical calendar. We find that several other important events happen on the first day of the first month, including the day when the waters were dried after the Flood (Gen. 8:13) and the day when the desert Tabernacle was erected (Ex. 40:2, 17). The first day of the first month has also been traditionally thought to be the first day of creation. The first month of the year was calculated based on the first ripening of the barley harvest, a marker of springtime (see Leviticus 23). The first new moon after this marked the beginning of the first month. Then the next full moon marked the Passover. This is why to this day we calculate Easter based on the first full moon after the spring equinox. But more on this later.

After the Passover, the people of God were to celebrate Pentecost, which was dated 50 days after the Passover (Lev. 23:15-16). Thus, Passover and Pentecost were the two great feasts of the springtime. There were also two fall feasts, which are described in Leviticus 23: Trumpets and Booths (also called Ingathering in Ex. 34:22). All four of these festivals marked significant events in the Exodus story. Two other feasts were added to the calendar at later points. The feast of Purim celebrates the deliverance of the people of God as told in the book of Esther. It is held yearly in the last month of the ecclesiastical year (Adar, see Est. 9:18ff). Hanukkah, an early winter feast, was added during the intertestamental period in the month Kislev to celebrate the Maccabees’ deliverance of the people from the Seleucids. Every year the people of God were to celebrate these feasts with eating and drinking and worship services. These feasts had three aspects. First, they were thanksgiving feasts, based on the agricultural calendar of ancient Israel. Second, they were memorial feasts marking out significant moments in salvation history. Third, they were formative feasts, teaching the people of God important theological truths. These three aspects, thanksgiving, instruction, and formation, will be criteria that we refer back to when evaluating Advent in part two.

In the New Testament we find that the people of God are still celebrating these feasts and references to them are sprinkled throughout. Passover is connected with Jesus’ death and resurrection. Pentecost, the day when the Law was given at Sinai, is connected with the coming of the Holy Spirit in the upper room. We also find Jesus attending Jerusalem for the Feast of Booths (John 7:2, 10), Dedication (Hanukkah) (John 10:22), and apparently also Purim (John 5:1-2). The only feast that is not mentioned explicitly in the New Testament is Trumpets along with its Day of Atonement. Perhaps this is because Passover and Eastertide are going to subsume them in the New Covenant.

Even after Christ’s death and resurrection we have references to the OT feasts in the New Testament. We cannot discount the fact that God chose the Mosaic feast of Pentecost to send the Holy Spirit upon the believers in the Upper Room. This seems to point not only to a New Covenant fulfillment of that feast, but to a continued New Covenant observance of it. Further, we read in Acts 20 that Paul desired to reach Jerusalem by Pentecost. He also mentions Pentecost in 1 Corinthians 16. With these positive participations in the ecclesiastical calendar, we find nowhere in the New Testament that the yearly calendar is to be abrogated. We find other aspects of the Mosaic law are abrogated: bloody sacrifices, circumcision, food laws, other holiness separation laws related to purifications and clothing, and others. But we do not find any abrogation of the ecclesiastical year. Instead, we find an encouragement from Paul to keep the feast, not the old feast of unleavened bread, but the new Pascha, that we now call Easter (1 Cor. 5:7-8). There Paul gives us the theological content of the Old Testament feast (cutting off the old leaven of malice and wickedness) and connects the Old Testament feast of Pascha to the sacrificial death of Christ on the Cross.

The Early Church Celebrated the Church Year

It’s hard to overstate just how important the leaders of the post-Apostolic church were in building the faith that we all profess and practice. Paul uses the metaphor of the Temple structure to describe how our faith has been established. In Ephesians 2:20 he states that our faith is, “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.” In Paul’s conception though, the apostles, prophets, and Christ don’t make up the entire structure. They are the foundation, but the subsequent generations make up the rest of the building. Peter agrees, saying that we are “living stones” making up the structure of our faith, with Christ as the cornerstone, (1 Pet. 2:5). By the time the Apostles left the scene in the late first century, the foundations were laid, but the early church had to continue building.

The first Christian leaders after the Apostles understood this. The earliest extant Christian document outside of the New Testament, the Didache, purports to hand down instructions from the Apostles themselves on how the church should be organized. As it was written in Syria around 80 A.D. this is not a fantastic claim and should be taken seriously. Clement of Rome, writing to the church at Corinth around the same time, described the problem of who would be the successors to the Apostles and carry on their leadership of the church. In chapter 44 of his letter he writes that the Apostles had designated ordained presbyters to be the successors to their ministry. Ignatius of Antioch, writing after the turn of the century, writes that the people should be subject to the bishop led presbytery, that bishops and presbyters are in tune with one another like strings on a guitar, and that the bishops have the mind of Christ (Ig. Eph. 2:2, 3:2, 4:1). Some scholars have posited that Clement and Ignatius present alternative visions for church government in the early church, but I believe they represent an identical polity, one that is a hybrid of episcopal and presbyterian systems. But I digress.

Those early Christian leaders also addressed the problem of the apostolic vacuum by arguing that the writings of the Apostles were inspired and should be the basis for the fledgling faith. Both Ignatius and Clement demonstrate an awareness that what Peter and Paul wrote was inspired by God and thus authoritative, but that what they themselves were writing was neither inspired nor authoritative in the same way (1 Clem. 47:3, Ig. Ep. 12:1-2, Ig. Rom. 4:3). Thus, while the ordained presbyters were the successors to the Apostles in leading the church, they were bound by the writings of the Apostles in scripture as to what doctrines they elucidated and in their leadership of the church.

These two pillars of early Christian theology lead to the calling of the great ecumenical councils to deliberate and articulate the content of the faith in the presence of heresy. Those first four councils were the weight bearing joists and beams, laid on the foundation of the Apostles, that would support the faith for centuries and even millennia. The Niceno-Constatinopolitan Creed and the formulations of Ephesus and Chalcedon serve as our theological floor to this day. As the preamble to the Athanasian Creed would later expound, no one can be considered a Christian who does not profess the faith that those four councils describe.

But what does all this have to do with the church year? Did you know that when the Council of Nicaea was called in 325 A.D. one of the primary issues it met to deliberate on was the yearly day of the celebration of Easter? One of the more significant controversies of the early church was whether Easter should be celebrated on a fixed date (like Christmas is now) or whether it should be movable based on the calculation of Jewish Passover. The first issue discussed in the published canons of the council does address the issue of the Trinity, but the final act published was the solution of the Holy Pasch (see Decrees of the Ecumencial Councils by Norman P. Tanner). The council decided that Easter should be determined each year according to the practice of the Romans, which practice was developed based on the occurrence of the first full moon after the spring equinox. To this day this is how we determine when Easter will be.

The Nicene deliberation demonstrates two things for us. First is that for the earliest Christians celebration of the springtime ecclesiastical feasts was not a question of if, but when and how. Second, this demonstrates how important the concept of unity was for them (see John 17:20-26 and Eph. 4:3-6 for the reason why), and that unity was based on tangible, observable practices like worship and the celebration of ecclesiastical feasts.

In fact, the Church Fathers felt strongly that the church year should be practiced as a practical feature of the unity of the church. Athanasius of Alexandria is known first for his ardent defense of Nicene Orthodoxy and secondly for his being the first full articulation of the New Testament canon in 367 A.D. Yet Athanasius was also an ardent supporter of the church year, arguing that the 40 day fast of Lent should be a feature of the church’s worship throughout the world. The fact that the council of Nicea refers to the observance of Lent as a given further demonstrates this. (Please see my earlier essay on the origins of Lent for more information.)

Therefore, in addition to laying down our ecclesiological and theological framework, the Church Fathers bequeathed to us the Christian calendar. They redemptive historically transmogrified (to borrow a phrase from two of my seminary professors Jack Collins and Michael Williams) the springtime feasts of the Old Testament into a Christian liturgical calendar. The feast of Unleavened Bread became Holy Week and then Lent. The Day of Atonement became Good Friday. Passover and Trumpets became Eastertide (in fact the vast majority of the world still refers to what we call Easter as Pashca). Pentecost became, well, Pentecost, but the shift moved from Sinai to the New Sinai of the Upper Room and the coming of the Holy Spirit. That the New Testament writers place so much emphasis on the fact that these major events in salvation history occurred on these festal days, also arguing that the sacrificial system of worship itself was transmogrified and brought into the New Covenant in Christ, bolsters what the Church Fathers did. As in the case of canon, presbyterate, and creed, the Apostles laid the foundations for the church year, and the Church Fathers built upon it a sturdy floor for us to stand upon. In fact, continuing with our building metaphor, we might see that patristic doctrines of polity and scripture built the basement walls, the creeds of the councils laid the floor joists, and the liturgy of the Fathers created the weight bearing walls. What remained for later generations was to “dry in” the frame and then to provide the interior design of the place, making the house of our faith into a beautiful dwelling place for us with our God.

The Reformers Accepted the Early Church’s Calendar

To bring this forward a thousand plus years (I promise I will go back and fill in the medieval gaps in part two) the Reformers accepted the calendar that the Church Fathers developed. Even our Reformed forebears kept the major “evangelical” feasts, emphasizing that communion should be received on those days. For certain, the Reformed rejected the late medieval excesses of Lent, throwing out with that dirty bathwater the baby of patristic Lenten practice, but they did not reject the calendar outright. Martin Luther did not reject it at all, but reformed it, as was his practice in general. But even the Reformed kept the major feasts, while rejecting Lent and being more skeptical of Advent. All the Reformers were keen to reform the calendar of late Medieval excesses with its proliferation of Saints Days, which they felt distracted from the central story of Christ and his life. For this reason they accepted the framework of the church year that emphasized the major events of Christ’s life (birth, death, and resurrection) along with the coming of the Holy Spirit in the Upper Room. We see the pre-Puritan Reformed position clearly in Heinrich Bullinger’s Second Helvetic Confession where he writes:

If in Christian liberty the churches religiously celebrate the memory of the Lord’s nativity, circumcision, passion, resurrection, and of his ascension into heaven, and the sending of the Holy Spirit upon his disciples, we approve of it highly. but we do not approve of feasts instituted for men and for saints. Holy days have to do with the first Table of the Law and belong to God alone. Finally, holy days which have been instituted for the saints and which we have abolished, have much that is absurd and useless, and are not to be tolerated. In the meantime, we confess that the remembrance of saints, at a suitable time and place, is to be profitably commended to the people in sermons, and the holy examples of the saints set forth to be imitated by all.

For certain, Calvin was more critical of the church year than Bullinger, but he seems to be more concerned with perfunctory performance of them and those who we colloquially call “Chreasters”. Calvin’s Geneavan churches did keep the major holidays, and he preached sermons on their topics (the Nativity of Jesus on Christmas, for example) and served communion. His objections seem to be for pastoral reasons, specifically, that people were only showing up for major holidays and thinking their observance of them was enough for them spiritually. In spite of this, Calvin said that he did not think that observation of the major holidays should be abolished unless the majority of the church agreed.

This Evangelical (story of the gospel) Church Year is a concept I believe that we can all center around. Whether we choose to retain the Puritan rejection of all days save Sunday, go the Lutheran (as in Martin, not the denomination) route of major holidays with their seasons, or walk the Reformed middle way of Bullinger, hopefully we can see the biblical and patristic roots of the church year. In this we can have charity towards our brothers and sisters who observe certain days along with those who do not. Afterall, this is what is laid down by Paul in Colossians 2 and Romans 14, establishing the Apostolic principle that the Church year is a matter of adiaphora not dogma. Paul says we should not despise each other based on our observance of these days and that we should find our central unity not in them but in Christ.

While exercising this charity, the question remains whether the dominical and apostolic exhortations to maintain the unity of the church around the one faith, along with the practical applications of Christian formation that the church year presents, demonstrate the wisdom of the early fathers in building those weight bearing walls. I’m obviously arguing that case, while extending charity to my brothers and sisters who disagree and hoping for theirs in return.

In part two I will discuss that if we accept the wisdom of the Fathers and choose to observe the winter cycle of Advent and Christmas, we should do it in ways that are keeping with the patristic and biblical principles regarding the Church year, and that means, ultimately, that Advent is not Christmas.

Visit New Life Presbyterian Church for more articles and teaching from Tim LeCroy. New Life is a church worshiping in the beautiful Finger Lakes region of New York serving both the Cornell University and Ithaca College communities.

Podcast – History of Infant Baptism

My post on the history of infant baptism has gotten some traction. It was hosted on the Theopolis Institute Blog and I was interviewed on the subject by the Kuyperian Commentary Podcast. Check ’em out!

Sunday Music – The Old Rugged Cross

At Christ Our King, the church where I pastor, we’ve been recording our worship services, including the music. Here’s a recent rendition we did of the old hymn, “The Old Rugged Cross.” I hope it is a blessing to you!

Vocals: Tim LeCroy and Olivia Cordray
Guitar: Tim LeCroy
Mandolin: Olivia Cordray
Violin: Erica Kallis
Bass: Tim LeCroy

Hadrian of Carthage: A Medieval African Who Changed Europe

February is Black History Month, a month to pay “tribute to the generations of African Americans who struggled with adversity to achieve full citizenship in American society.” As a church historian I am particularly interested in paying tribute to those African-Americans and others of African origin who played a major role in the story of the Christian Church. There are many who have done excellent work in telling the story of early African-Americans who contributed to American Christianity: leaders like Absalom Jones and Richard Allen, and early African-American Presbyterian leaders like John Gloucester.

My interest in church history though lies further back in the annals of time. I’m a medievalist and I also dabble in the early church period. I have been encouraged at the increased awareness of just how many of the early church Fathers were African: Athanasius, the staunch defender of Nicene Orthodoxy, Augustine, the Schoolmaster of Western Christianity, Cyril of Alexandria, Origin, Cyprian of Carthage, Tertullian… I could go on. I was encouraged to see an article recently that highlighted this wonderful history as a part of a series of posts on Black History Month on the Reformed African-American Network.

The medieval period, however, has often been seen as a time without much contribution from Africans to the life and work of the Church. Part of that is due to the spread of Islam over North Africa. Part of that is due to our ignorance in knowing and telling the stories of African Christians during that time. Yet, as I was reading the article linked above I remembered one particular African who had an enormous impact on medieval Europe: Hadrian of Carthage.

Hadrian, also known as St. Adrian of Canterbury, was like St. Augustine a North African of the Berber people. He was born in Carthage in the early to mid 7th century, and classically educated. He later moved to Italy and became an abbot of a monastery near modern day Naples. Bede describes Hadrian as, “a native of Africa, very learned in the Scriptures, experienced in ecclesiastical and monastic administration, and a great scholar in Greek and Latin,” (HE IV:1). That’s a pretty impressive endorsement by Bede! Because of his experience and erudition, Hadrian was impressed upon two separate times by his friend Vitalian, the Bishop of Rome, to take the vacant see of Canterbury and engage himself in a much needed reformation and revival in the English Church. Twice though Hadrian turned him down, the last time recommending another monastic leader, one Theodore of Tarsus. Theodore accepted the appointment, but the Pope insisted that Hadrian go along, ostensibly, to show Theodore the way through Gaul to England. Yet it was not travel directions that the Bishop of Rome truly desired Hadrian to give, but to be a partner to Theodore in the reformation and revival of the English Church.

Theodore and Hadrian set off for England in 668, after a brief pause for Theodore to grow his hair out so as to be able to accept the Roman form of tonsure. They arrived in England in 669 and began visiting the churches so as to ascertain their state and begin the needed education and reform. They began to attract students whom they instructed in the knowledge of theology, church customs and rites, sacred music, Greek and Latin, and the study of sacred Scripture. Bede describes a renaissance of sorts in England that came as a result of their labors, “The people eagerly sought the new-found joys of the kingdom of heaven, and all who wished for instruction in the reading of the Scriptures found teachers ready at hand,” (HE IV:2). This explosion of learning was such that Bede remarked a couple of generations later that, “some of their students still alive today are as proficient in Latin and Greek as in their native tongue,” (ibid.).

Thus we can see that Hadrian’s impact on England and the church in England was massive. Yet what remains to be seen is just how much his contribution to the reformation and revival of England led to the foundations of Christianity in Western Europe.

Western Europe in the 7th c. was still a largely unreached place. Catholic Christianity was established in some places, while others of the Germanic tribes had been converted to Arian forms of Christianity. Still others remained pagan. There was a great need in these Germanic areas for both evangelization and Christianization. The problem was that the existing churches of Western Europe (mostly in Gaul, modern France) were not equipped to undertake this mission. This is where the English came in.

Due to the work of Hadrian and Theodore, the English were equipped to engage in this mission to the Germanic peoples. And so they did, with great vigor and success. Boniface led a wave of missionaries from England back to the continent to evangelize and establish churches. He is now known as the Apostle to the Germans. Educational leaders like Alcuin of York were brought from England by the Carolingian rulers to help establish court schools as well as cathedral and monastery schools and to lead in the Christianization and reform of the churches in Western Europe. The legacy of these English missionaries is hard to overstate: these are the fathers of the Europe we know today. They established the institutions and infrastructure upon which Western civilization is established.

And none of this would have been possible without the efforts of St. Hadrian, the African. A medieval giant who had a greater impact than any of us probably realize.

Let us give thanks for St. Hadrian and celebrate his work and ministry and its vast impact on the world we live in.

Transcript of Rev. Jim Baird’s Speech

Here is a transcript of the speech that Rev. Jim Baird, former Senior Pastor of First Presbyterian Church, Jackson, MS, gave on the floor of General Assembly in support of the personal resolution on Civil Rights.

Mr. Moderator, Jim Baird, Mississippi Valley Presbytery.

In 1971 twelve men were elected to form a new denomination. Take two years and form that denomination. Of those twelve men six were ministers and six were ruling elders. All have died or left the PCA except two: Kennedy Smartt and Me.

[Pause]

And I confess, that in 1973, the only thing I understood was that we were starting a new denomination, which we did. And I confess that I did not raise a finger for civil rights. I was taught (sic) with one thing, and that was to start a new denomination, for the sake of the scripture, for the sake of the preservation of historic Presbyterianism, and for the furtherance of the gospel proclamation. And so I confess my sin.

I’m not confessing the sin of my fathers, I’m confessing my sin, and of those twelve men. Were we racists? No. But we did not do anything to help our black brethren.

That’s the first thing here.

The second thing, fifty years later I’m a different man, but that’s beside the point. It was my understanding that this resolution would have been passed here and would have been passed with the understanding that we confess, you men, but I confess personally that I did nothing.

But the idea was that it would be sent down to the local churches. What you do here is not going to affect anything at the local church, unless they have a chance to represent themselves. And it seems to me that we oughta say that we made a mistake. We confess our sins. I don’t believe there’s anybody here who hasn’t said I got problems one way or another with the racial problems in the United States. We got a problem. OK. But we oughta do something. We’re looking for a resolution. And I just assumed that we would have the resolution, and by the way it comes from Mississippi. Two men from Mississippi. And it is also my conviction that we’re never going to solve the problem among us, not in Baltimore, or in Chesapeake or in any other place, or in Chattanooga – it’s gotta be done in Mississippi.

And there are some of us who are trying.

But if we go back and go to every single congregation in the PCA and ask the Session of that church and the Deacons of that church to bring it before their own and decide themselves what have we done in forty years, and what should we be doing today – and take it to every single congregation, and then take it to the presbyteries, and then bring it to the next General Assembly. And that’s what I thought this was all about.

And where all the arguments have gone, I don’t understand. But I thought I was going to go back to the First Presbyterian Church of Jackson Mississippi and speak to the issue. And say, “Let’s do something.”

Have I been wrong, Mr. Moderator?

[Mr. Wert: I hope not.]

I don’t understand. Why don’t we take this thing and just say, the resolution – and that’s how I think the resolution ends, I don’t have it in front of me. But I think the last thing the resolution says is to take it back to your local church, and have your local church deal with it. Every single denomination [sic – congregation]. And can you imagine what it would mean to have a whole denomination to work on that one issue – that’s what I thought it was all about.

And that’s what I would propose.

Thank you Mr. Moderator.

[Mr. Wert: Thank you sir. I think that is a speech for the recommendation.]

[Applause]

[Mr. Wert: Thank you, brother Baird.

The Protest of 2015

In 1843 in the midst of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, 121 ministers and 73 elders filed a protest asserting the spiritual rights of the church over wealthy landowners. After filing the protest, the men walked out of the Assembly and convened down the street to form the Free Church of Scotland, electing Thomas Chalmers as their first moderator. This event is now known in Church History as “The Disruption of 1843.”

Last Tuesday evening, June 9, 2015, Rev. Drs. Ligon Duncan and Sean Lucas, both pastors in Mississippi, stood up to make a personal resolution on the floor of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America. That resolution called the General Assembly to confess our sins regarding our complicity and involvement in racial injustice during the Civil Rights era up until the present day. These sins had recently been addressed through the research of PCA historians including the same Rev. Dr. Lucas, Dr. Otis Picket, and Rev. Bobby Griffith (PhD cand.). According to our rules, the resolution was received by the Assembly and referred to the overtures committee whose job it is to recommend to the assembly what action should be taken on the resolution.

The resolution was debated in committee for over nine hours. The predominant arguments against adoption were that the Assembly needed more time to consider this issue and that the resolution needed perfecting. There were others who argued that the PCA didn’t exist during the Civil Rights era, that individual presbyters themselves did not do these things and therefore could not confess, that the resolution seemed to cave to political correctness and white guilt, and that if prominent PCA churchmen were racists perhaps they have repented of it thus we shouldn’t call them out.

Arguments for adopting the resolution were that corporate confession is biblical, we as a denomination have already delayed this for far too long, and that there are members of our denomination, including pastors and elders, who greatly desire this confession. Others also argued that we must stop hiding the past and be honest about what we did. In the course of debate, Dr. Lucas passed out a paper with quotes showing the undeniable fact that southern Presbyterian conservatives (who would later enter the PCA) actively worked against the aims of the Civil Rights movement in the church and in the broader culture.

Ultimately, after the protracted debate in committee, there was first a vote to recommend adoption of the resolution that failed by three votes (37-40). Then there was a motion to refer the resolution to the 44th General Assembly (next year). This vote passed by a margin of thirteen votes (48-35). The rationale given by the majority was that a momentous resolution such as this should come from several presbyteries to give it more weight. Of course, this argument was undergirded by the other arguments mentioned above, yet this was the official rationale given. The majority also argued that the Assembly needed more time to consider Dr. Lucas’s research and that another year would allow for the perfecting of the resolution.

Those 35 who voted against this recommendation in the committee formed a minority and agreed to produce a substitute motion that the assembly adopt the resolution this year. The sentiment of the minority was that referral of the resolution was effectively “punting” the issue and would line up with common critiques of the PCA on issues of race. Those common critiques are that we refuse to deal with racial sins directly but continually use diversionary arguments, such as the ones exhibited above, in order to perpetually kick the can down the road. This minority was headed up by Rev. David Richter. While the minority was forming its rationale, several members of the newly formed African American Presbyterian Fellowship approached the minority to say that they actually preferred that the resolution be referred to the next General Assembly because it would allow time to have substantive discussions and to provide more concrete ways for churches and presbyteries to demonstrate fruits of repentance on this matter. With this new information, the committee reconvened and reconsidered its motion with updated rationale. With several members of the AAPF speaking for referral, the new motion and rationale passed the committee with an 80-0 vote.

However, after that vote, several other African American pastors approached members of the committee and expressed that while they loved and respected the views of their brothers, they disagreed with their opinion that the resolution should be referred. While they agreed that discussions need to continue and concrete fruits of repentance demonstrated, they greatly desired to see the Assembly confess our sins now. Some of these men, one of whom later spoke on the floor of General Assembly, expressed that there were people in their communities whom they were trying to reach with the gospel, who would not be a part of a PCA church as long as this issue was left unaddressed. As a result several commissioners who were not on the overtures committee but had observed all the proceedings, headed up by Rev. Kevin Twit, planned to make a substitute motion to the committee’s recommendation from the floor of General Assembly.

The committee’s recommendation came to the floor of the General Assembly in the late session on Thursday night which began around 9PM. As soon as the committee’s recommendation was presented, Rev. Twit rose with the intention to make a substitute motion to recommit the resolution back to the overtures committee of the 43rd General Assembly. The force of this motion would be to reconvene the overtures committee so that the resolution could be adopted this year. Yet before Rev. Twit could speak, Rev. David Coffin rose to a point of parliamentary inquiry to ask that no matter what action was taken, would the resolution in all cases be referred to the next General Assembly. The moderator, Elder Jim Wert, then ruled that it was the case that no matter what motions were made, the only result would be that it would be referred to the next assembly. With this information, Rev. Twit then decided to make a speech against the referral. Yet the next speaker, Rev. Mike Sloan, after a point of order from Rev. Fred Greco and advice by the Stated Clerk, Rev. Dr. Roy Taylor, was able to successfully make the motion.

The arguments for reconsidering the resolution this year were eloquently made by Rev. Twit, Rev. Sloan, Rev. Bobby Griffith, among others. They argued that the time for confession of sin that is acknowledged to have occurred is always now, and that if we admit that we have sinned, we should not delay but confess our sins now. Psalm 32 was appealed to, on which the Very Reverend Dr. Bryan Chapell preached the opening night of the Assembly, which says that if we delay in confessing our sins our bones will waste away. In fact, Rev. Jon Storck, during a time of prayer that preceded the vote, prayed that if our decision to refer to next year was wrong that our denomination would waste away until we confessed our sin. Speaking also for the substitute was Rev. Leon Brown, an African American pastor from Richmond, VA.

Those that rose to speak for the committee’s recommendation to refer by and large did not challenge the need for repentance by the denomination, but on the whole argued that we simply needed to return a better product that had the support of the presbyteries. On this side several African American pastors spoke, including Rev. Irwyn Ince, Rev. Lance Lewis, Rev. Alex Shipman, and Rev. Kenneth McHeard. Their main argument was that while we do indeed need to repent of our involvement in and complicity with racial injustice, we also need to make sure that whatever resolution we pass includes action items for local churches and presbyteries to correct past wrongs and work for racial justice in the future.

At one point in the debate, there was a motion by Rev. Sam DeSocio to suspend the rules so that we could adopt the original resolution made by Duncan and Lucas, effectively circumventing the committee. While this was a noble attempt, it failed due to the high threshold required for suspending the rules of Assembly operation.

As the discussion continued there were several points in which the time allotted for debate expired. At each point, because of the weightiness of the opinions that were being expressed, the assembly voted to extend debate. This was done so even though with the new electronic voting system these votes were anonymous. Men could have, without anyone knowing that they had done so, voted to end debate and thus shut out the move of the Spirit that was beginning to stir. Yet at each and every point the Assembly voted to extend debate so that we could continue to hear men passionately speak their hearts on this very important issue.

As the debate wore on, the Assembly seemed to be agreed that we in the PCA need to confess our sins of involvement in and complicity with racial injustice during the civil rights era. And yet it also seemed that the majority wished to follow the recommendation of the committee to refer the resolution to next year’s assembly with the rationale provided by some African American pastors. That rationale was that the resolution be perfected to, “include specific suggestions with regard to the nature of the fruit of such repentance.” When the will of the Assembly became apparent, Rev. Mike Khandjian rose to a point of parliamentary inquiry to ask the moderator, Mr. Wert, if there was anything procedurally that could be done in order for the Assembly to confess our sins now, even if the resolution was referred. After conferring with the Stated Clerk, Rev. Dr. Taylor and other parliamentarians assembled on the dais, Mr. Wert replied that a possible solution would be to file a protest, and let the wording of that protest reflect such a sentiment. The idea of a protest then began to be discussed among the group of commissioners I was in communication with as a possible way forward if the substitute motion failed.

When the next time period for debate expired, the substitute motion to recommit the resolution to the overtures committee of this general assembly so that they could change their recommendation and the Assembly could confess sins this year, came to a vote. When the voting opened, there was a point of order from the front of the Assembly, where Rev. Travis Hutchinson asked the moderator if we could take time to pray before the vote. Mr. Wert then gave Rev. Hutchinson and one other person, Rev. Jon Storck, the opportunity to pray. I’ve already mentioned part of Rev. Storck’s prayer, but as I remember it the substance of Rev. Hutchinson’s prayer was that the Holy Spirit come and direct our voting. He prayed that he still wasn’t sure which way was the right way to vote, and he need the Holy Spirit to come and help him and help us all do the right thing in that moment.

I’ve never witnessed such an immediate and evident answer to such a prayer. The Holy Spirit did indeed come and directed us to what I believe was the best possible solution.

After the two prayers the vote was taken and the substitute failed. This moved the debate back to the main motion, which was the committee’s recommendation to refer to next year’s General Assembly.

If you’re still with me, this is when to start paying attention again. In short order an older gentleman rose to microphone 3 at the front of the Assembly. He identified himself as Rev. Jim Baird, one of the two living founding fathers of the PCA. Rev. Baird is also the former senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church, Jackson Mississippi, an important and historic church in our denomination. Baird delivered an impassioned speech, indeed it was a confession of sin. He said that when 12 men gathered in the early 1970’s to discuss founding a new denomination, their rationale was to do so in order to be faithful to the word of God and the reformed tradition. Furthermore, he said, none of the 12 men, including himself, were racists. Yet, he passionately and fervently confessed, when it came to supporting our African American brothers and sisters during the civil rights era, we did nothing. We did nothing to help. We stood by and watched as they were abused and oppressed and let others take up the charge. As he continued to speak and confess his, and indeed our sin, many of the men in the room began to weep. It was as if a great weight was being lifted off of us. We were finally beginning to be honest about our past and to confess it so that healing can come.

I grew up Pentecostal. But that is the most intense move of the Spirit I have ever felt in my life. The presence of the Spirit was palpable as if a Holy weight was pressing down on me. Other men reported feeling goosebumps and other similar impressions. The move of the Spirit that Revs. Hutchinson and Storck prayed for was heavily upon us.

The response to Rev. Baird’s speech was immediate on social media among those watching the Assembly on-line. Mr. Jemar Tisby, a seminary student at RTS Jacson and co-founder of the Reformed African American Network said this on his Facebook page:

This man will forever have my utmost #respect. The photo below shows, Rev. Jim Baird, a Southern Presbyterian pastor emeritus of a multi-thousand member congregation in Jackson, Mississippi and one of the original twelve men who organized the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), confessing his own indifference to the concerns of African Americans in the past and offering heartfelt plea to see the Resolution on Civil Rights Remembrance passed this year and not get referred to next year’s Assembly.

Dr. Anthony Bradley, a professor at the King’s College and former professor at Covenant Seminary, said this on his Facebook page:

I totally agree with Jemar Tisby. I’d take a bullet for Rev. Jim Baird. WOW!!! I’ve been waiting 20 years to finally hear something like that. Super encouraged by George Robertson’s prayer as well.

The next few minutes are a bit of a blur to me, but eventually the debate period ended and we came to a vote. The committee’s recommendation passed with an overwhelming majority. There were also several abstentions, of which I was one. I abstained because while I agreed that the process outlined by the committee would eventually lead us to a good place, I also agreed that we should be able to confess our sins that night, especially after they had been so clearly elucidated by Rev. Baird.

After the vote, the moderator, Mr. Wert, opened the Assembly to a season of prayer. Men began flooding to the microphones to confess their sins of involvement in and complicity with racial injustice, which is exactly what the resolution asked us to do! Early on in the prayer time, Rev. Dr. George Robertson, pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Augusta, Georgia rose to pray. His church is also a historic church in the history of American Presbyterianism. The old Presbyterian Church in the United States was founded at his church in 1861. Rev. Dr. Robertson stood up and confessed his own sins but also the sins of his congregation. He confessed that his church supported slave owning, and that the African Americans were kept in the balcony away from the white worshipers. He also confessed that during the Civil Rights era, when local police beat a developmentally challenged African American boy to death in the town jail, the leaders of his church did nothing.

This period of prayer lasted for about an hour as men continued to confess their sins and pray for healing. There were more men who were in line to pray, but the moderator eventually ended the time of prayer.* Still, this was the longest time of prayer that many of us, including the Moderator, had experienced at any General Assembly.

Our Stated Clerk, Rev. Dr. Roy Taylor, had this to say about the prayer time in his report about the actions of the Assembly:

This writer has attended every General Assembly the PCA has ever had. In his opinion, the periods of prayer and expressions of repentance and brotherly love on the Thursday evening session of the 2015 General Assembly were the most evident and powerful work of the Holy Spirit at any PCA Assembly heretofore.

After the prayer time ended, Rev. Jon Price rose to move that we suspend the rules so that we could have another motion to the effect that the Assembly confess our sins now. As Rev. Price expected, the moderator, Mr. Wert, ruled the motion out of order because the Assembly had already voted not to suspend the rules on this matter. Then Rev. Price expressed that he wished to protest the ruling of the moderator, and Mr. Wert responded that he may do so, and that if anyone wished to join the protest, they may come to the front and put their name to it.

According to Rev. Jon Storck, who recorded his observations on his Facebook page, this is what happened next:

The clerk pulled out one piece of paper and then more than 1/3 and close to 1/2 of the Assembly got out of their seats and walked up front to add their signature to the protest!!! It was beautiful. The clerks starting scrambling to try to find more paper. White delegates were repenting to black delegates while they stood in line to sign. God is good. So after approving one of the first and most robust policy statement on the protection of children last year, and then this, this year, perhaps the winds of revival are starting to stir?? Let your kingdom come, Lord Jesus!!!

Here is an account of what happened according to Rev. Price’s own words that I obtained directly from him:

I don’t remember who it was, but he came up and thanked me. I still had my back to the assembly filling out the protest. I said, “You’re welcome, glad to do it.” He said, I don’t think you understand, turn around and look. I turned around, and almost shed tears. It was so beautiful to see all those men in line coming to sign their names to that repentance. One of the most beautiful things I’ve seen. I had goosebumps, and felt a deep moving of the Spirit.

Indeed, though the final count is not yet in, somewhere between 200 and 300 pastors and elders have signed their names to the protest.(NOTE: See update at the bottom for final count). Here is the official wording of the protest that Rev. Price filed:

We the 43rd General Assembly of the PCA (the undersigned) understand that repentance is not merely a statement, but steps of faithfulness that follow. Allowing that more time is needed to adequately work on such a denominational statement, but also the need for action now, we recognize and confess our church’s covenantal and generational involvement in and complicity with racial injustice inside and outside of our churches during the Civil Rights period. We commit ourselves to the task of truth and repentance over the next year for the glory of God and the furtherance of the Gospel. We urge the congregations of the Presbyterian Church in America to confess their own particular sins and failures as may be appropriate and to seek truth and repentance for the Gospel’s sake within their own local communities.

When it was all said and done, the Spirit had moved and, I believe, the best possible result had occurred. The wishes of many, including leaders in the African American Presbyterian Fellowship, were respected, that we come back next year with a resolution that is more specific and gives specific ways for churches and presbyteries to show fruits of repentance. At the same time, the desires of many, that we confess sin this year, were also answered as best as could be, given the will of the assembly. The time of confession and prayer, including Rev. Baird’s and Rev. Robertson’s confessions, and the protest signed by so many members of the Assembly, will ensure that Chattanooga 2015 will indeed go down in history as the framers of the original resolution desired.

To the historic nature of what occurred: while I acknowledge that we live in a tiny corner of a small part of Christendom, this protest is significant with respect to other protests in Presbyterian history. The Disruption of 1843 that I mentioned above is certainly the most famous instance of protest in our history, and we already know that the Protest of 2015 is larger, in terms of numbers, than that one was. I am not 100% certain, and maybe readers who specialize in Presbyterian history can help me, but I think that it may be the largest protest not only in the short history of the PCA, but also in the entirety of Presbyterian history. I may be wrong about that, but I’ll let the crowd show me if I am (see my note below).

At any rate, it was a historic moment. It was a holy moment. And while I am glad that we can finally be honest about our past and begin to confess it and make it right, I also agree with Dr. Bradley who asks, “Why Did It Take 50 Years For Calvinists To Care About Race?” Indeed. So while we are not proud that it took us so long, we may also be glad that the Spirit of revival is moving. Please join with me in praying that over the next year that the Spirit will continue to move and that in Mobile in 2016, we will be able to pass an overture that truly acknowledges and confesses our sins and gives us concrete ways as individuals, churches, and presbyteries to move forward in righting past wrongs and seeking racial justice in the future.

Note: As mentioned above there were a total of 194 who protested in the Great Disruption. One other possible large protest was the one lead by Charles Hodge in 1861 protesting the Gardner Spring Resolutions, 58 men total signed that protest. How fitting then that the protest of 2015 dwarfs the Gardner Spring protest by a factor of four.

* The Moderator, Elder Jim Wert, in a comment to me wished to expressed that he did not wish to prohibit anyone from praying, but that he had thought that everyone who had desired to pray had done so. See below in the comment section.

Here is the text of the recommendation that the General Assembly adopted, along with the grounds provided:

That the Personal Resolution on Civil Rights submitted by TE Sean Michael Lucas and TE J. Ligon Duncan III, be referred to the 44th General Assembly (80-0-0)

Grounds: After consultation with the leadership of the African-American Presbyterian Fellowship, we present the following grounds:

Due to the gravity and complexity of racial sin, and sympathetic with the need to pursue corporate and personal repentance over it, the Committee believes that:

A perfected version of the resolution would effect particular denominational, regional, and local church repentance more particularly, and could include specific suggestions with regard to the nature of the fruit of such repentance (Matthew 3:8; II Corinthians 7:10; WCF15. 5, 6);

More time for Dr. Lucas’s research to be disseminated and studied by the church would also help effect a more particular and heartfelt repentance (cf. WCF 15.1);

Time for our African-American brothers to visit with the Overtures Committee in next year’s Assembly will further perfect the language and allow our repentance to be more heartfelt and accurate (cf. WCF 15.2)

These matters of corporate repentance ought to come through lower courts of the church rather than by personal resolutions. [It is important to note that personal resolutions have special provisions in the RAO for people without access to the courts of the PCA or in case of emergency. (Cf. RAO 13–2; RAO 11–2: “Communications from individuals shall not be received by the General Assembly, unless they originate with persons who have no other access to the Assembly.”)]

For the sake of the peace and purity of Christ’s Church, and in preparation for the 44th General Assembly, the Committee encourages sessions and presbyteries to prayerfully consider any and all sins of racial prejudice and to pursue a proper course of action humbly, sincerely and expeditiously (Matthew 5:21–26; Ephesians 2:1–22; 4:1-32).

NOTE: As recorded in the published minutes of the 43rd General Assembly, the total number of commissioners who signed the protest was 216. Office of the Stated Clerk of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America, Minutes of the Forty-Third General Assembly (Lawrenceville, GA: 2015): pp. 71-77.

On the Historic Diversity of Reformed Theology

Historically there has been room in Reformed theology for a wide range of views on various topics. In this post Mark Jones gives further evidence that the theologians who made up the Westminster Assembly had a diversity of opinion and that the Westminster Confession is a consensus document meant to draw a wide range of people together. In other words, Westminster was broadly Reformed and not meant to articulate any particular strain of Reformed thought. Give it it a read:

http://www.reformation21.org/blog/2014/10/reformed-theological-diversity.php

By the way, the Hebrew word at the top of the post is “shibboleth.” Read Judges 12:6 and surrounding for more information.

Chrysostom’s Easter Homily

Each semester when I lecture on John Crystostom in my Ancient and Medieval Church History Course at Covenant Seminary, instead of talking about Chrysostom and his preaching ability and about his famous Easter Homily, I simply preach it to the class.

Here is a recording, along with the response of the students.

John Chrysostom’s Easter Homily (3 minutes)

A Chance To Thrive

I love this story! It reminds me of another socially awkward “smart” kid from rural South Carolina who was given an opportunity to thrive that he would have gotten no where else.

Yes, Virginia, I am talking about myself.

Kudos to the state of South Carolina for continuing to support this wonderful school for gifted young South Carolinians. It’s sort of like Charles Xavier’s school (if you are familiar with X-Men). Gifted children have to be taught how to deal with their gifts and harness them for the greater good of society.

I bet this kid turns out all right.

Old Soul’s Hard Work Turns Into Big Opportunity: Young man accepted to South Carolina Governor’s School

I love this story! It reminds me of another socially awkward “smart” kid from rural South Carolina who was given an opportunity to thrive that he would have gotten no where else.

Yes, Virginia, I am talking about myself.

The New York times did a wonderful piece on my high school alma mater highlighting how this school gives so many kids a chance to thrive in an environment where they will not be viewed as weird or abnormal, and encouraged to develop as complete human persons. I loved what one commenter on the NYT article said, “For me and many others, attending was a revelation. It was proof that we weren’t crazy; there were others like us.”

I bet this kid turns out all right.