Christology is biggest battle tearing apart PCUSA, pastor tells Gathering By Craig M. Kibler The Layman Online Thursday, October 9, 2003 PORTLAND, Ore. – The ongoing battles over ordination standards, abortion and other issues pale in comparison to the battle over Christology that is tearing the Presbyterian Church (USA) apart, a pastor told Gathering VIII. The Rev. Rick Wolling, pastor of Beverly Heights Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh, told more than 250 people during a presentation of a proposal called gracious separation that, "I have put my resources into renewal. And what has it gotten me? Well, it has allowed me to look my Savior in the face and say I believe that I've been faithful to what he has called me to do for 40 years." "Now," he said, "I believe he is calling me to test my resources and faithfulness in a way that has a different shape. As recently as last evening, someone asked me, 'What's your problem?' My problem is our approach to Christology where, at one General Assembly in regard to Jesus Christ, we hold up a green flag. That's an 'up' year for Jesus. The next year, we hold up a red flag – we're not really ready for Jesus that year. "My problem is with Scripture," Wolling said. "I stand alone on the Word of God. In Presbyterian churches, I've been challenged to do just that – defend the foundation on which our church is built as a testimony to Jesus Christ. And, as a gift to us all, in all of its particulars, God's Word – his gift to us and the world. "When the U.S. Congress has a higher view of life than we do, we have lost our prophetic edge," Wolling said, referring to the decision of the 214th General Assembly that was affirmed by the 215th General Assembly to sanction partial-birth abortion – the only mainline denomination to do so. On this issue, he said, "I'm reminded of relief of conscience. Whose conscience is being relieved? "Day after day after day, like you, I have people coming into my study who say, 'Pastor, my marriage is busting up.' They're so overwhelmed because they feel it shouldn't be busting up," he said. "As a Presbyterian pastor, what can I say to them about what is coming out of headquarters and the rulings and beliefs of our church?" Wolling told the story of how he first felt the call to ministry. On Feb. 23, 1965, he said, "the pastor of First Church in Queens Village, my pastor, addressed the congregation and a group of 12 boys who sat in front of him. It was Christian Service Brigade Sunday." "In his sermon," Wolling said, "he suggested that perhaps God might be calling one or more of us to give our lives in service to his church and, if one felt that was the case, one should raise his hand and indicate such by standing up an saying, 'God, whatever you will have for me, I will do.' And I raised my hand. And from that moment I knew that I would be serving the Lord Jesus Christ as a pastor in a local church." That spring, he said, "my pastor took me to my first Presbyterian renewal meeting. I was 15 years-old. Ironically, I went to the city were I've been a pastor, Pittsburgh." The renewal meeting, Wolling said, was a board meeting for Presbyterians United for Biblical Confession and it centered around "what was going to happen in 1967. I've been going to renewal meetings since then. I've been to consultations, conferences, General Assembly, network meetings, celebrations and gatherings and, with all due respect for those who have spoken from this podium, I have no good reports, good news of good rulings and good representation and victories with regard to an overture or with one letter or another. Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, I am done. I am finished" with trying to reform the PCUSA from within. Wolling said he was raised in a church that taught him to set aside everything except Jesus Christ, and that he now ministers in a denomination that won't affirm that. "The greatest thing that keeps Beverly Heights from growing in membership statistics," he said, "is the sign out front that says 'Presbyterian.'" He's been the pastor at Beverly Heights Presbyterian Church for 18 years. "We can only turn no more than 50-75 percent of inquirers into members" because of the denomination's approach to Christology. "They will go the whole route with us and then say 'I just can't do it.' I just can't keep giving apologies to people as to why I've become a Presbyterian." Five weeks ago, Wolling said, an associate pastor and three elders took 40 families with them to start an independent church just three miles down the road. The executive presbyter "tells me the appropriate response is to go away" and "he's warned me, do it quietly, don't make it a big deal in the presbytery ... and Louisville will never allow Beverly Heights to leave with its property." "What is it that might be worth breaking fellowship over?" he asked, dismissing the recent troubles in the Episcopal Church, USA over a gay bishop spilling over into the PCUSA. "If we don't act when our denomination votes Jesus Christ out, it won't act if it votes Gene Robinson in." Saying that gracious separation and the work of the New Wineskins Task Force provides the "foundation for a secondary option," Wolling said that, as far as the denomination goes, "I used to think it would be disobedient and unfaithful to leave. Now, I think it would be disobedient and unfaithful to stay."

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