Lay Committee chief speaks to D.C. congregation Mark D. Tooley Wednesday, January 21, 2004 Presbyterian Lay Committee chief Parker Williamson addressed the men's ministry of the prominent National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., warning a friendly audience that the Presbyterian Church (USA) has "compromised" the Gospel. But he also stressed that theologically orthodox "confessing movements" in the PCUSA and other mainline denominations represent the "burgeoning reality" of the future. "Confessing movements are crossing denominational lines," Williamson said in his January 18 remarks. "Christians wearing one label sense spiritual communion with Christians wearing another. And this bonding appears more like a lateral internet connection than the structure of a hierarchical institution." Williamson's visit to the National Presbyterian Church was featured the day before in a front page story in The Washington Times. The church has a national reputation, was once the place of worship for President Dwight Eisenhower and FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, and is today the church home of many prominent Washingtonians, including Senator Elizabeth Dole. "This is a great church, called by God to bear witness to Jesus Christ in a city whose sphere of influence circles the globe," Williamson told his audience, mentioning his friendships with former pastors Louis Evans and Craig Barnes. The Church was born when Jesus Christ was confessed, Williamson said. This confession is not of man's making but an act of God. Confessing that Jesus is the only Lord is not arrogant, as many believe, because this confession is not human-made but God-made. "We make our claim not out of arrogance but out of humility," Williamson asserted. "God himself births the Church. Every philosophy, every religion, every ideology, every human construct, no matter how intricate, wise or passionately expressed must be judged by the benchmark of this divine revelation." Williamson made clear that current fads about "inclusiveness" and "diversity" were only "regurgitated ideologies of the ancient pagans" such as what St. Paul found in Athens. The Church, then as now, must confront these ideologies with what God has done, not what man has done. "The Presbyterian Church is 'church' only in a lower case 'c' sense," Williamson insisted. "It is a denomination, a humanly conceived, non-profit, 501c3 corporation, the product of an organizational merger." Williamson said "church" is a needed clay pot that humans build with tools from their culture to transmit the Gospel. But the instrument should not be confused with the message. 'There is an inherent tension between the container and that dynamic, effervescent, mission-oriented, outgoing Gospel that it purports to contain," he insisted. "The Gospel cannot be contained." Warning against the self-preservation principle of all human institutions, Williamson warned that the "church" can become "calcified" and "occlude all evidence of the life that was once within its walls." But the good news is that God will not allow anything to suppress the Gospel, including the "church." "When the institution no longer serves the purpose for which it was created, God, whose loving nature is always to express itself, will send forth his Word by some other means," Williamson said. Confession of the Gospel will always break through, Williamson insisted. He cited the Reformation and the Confessing Movement under Hitler's Germany. "Whenever the lower case church has compromised its Gospel, God has ultimately abandoned it, inspiring new expressions of his Word, often where people would least expect to hear them," he said. "What else would one expect from One who spoke through a shepherd boy's sling, a harlot's hospitality, and a baby in a manger," Williamson asked. Williamson condemned an "apostasy" known as "the inclusive church" that manifests itself in the policies of the Presbyterian Church (USA). He traced this modern apostasy to the Presbyterian Confession of 1967, which referred to Scripture as "the words of men" rather than the Word of God. This 1967 confession was the product of culture, not Christ, Williamson noted. "There is much wisdom to be mined from the mother lode of human culture, and in that sense C-67 [the 1967 confession] is useful," Williamson said. "But its weak view of Scripture essentially alienates it from God's Word, and has therefore rendered it impotent." Presbyterian membership decline began in 1967, Williamson observed, and the denomination has lost 1.7 million members since then. Williamson referred to key benchmarks of the church's decline. One was the Human Sexuality Report submitted to the 1991 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA). This report declared that all sexual practices were accepted if they embodied both justice and love. All Scriptures that conform to this principle would be authoritative, the report announced, and all Scriptures that do not conform would not. That General Assembly rejected the report. But the church's bureaucracy incorporated its principles into its programs. The 1993 Re-Imagining Conference, which portrayed a god who is only the product of human imagination, was another benchmark of the church's accommodation of the culture, Williamson said. The conference was criticized by the 1994 General Assembly. But the church bureaucracy went on to incorporate many of its themes into its programs. Williamson also cited the numerous times that the church has reaffirmed traditional Christian sexual morality, only to have the church's bureaucracy refuse to accept it. "We are experiencing a full-blown constitutional crisis," Williamson said, because the church's structures refuse to uphold the church's official teachings. He went on to refer to theologians given audience within Presbyterian circles who deny the uniqueness of Christ, deny his atonement, and deny his resurrection, all contributing to the "final shattering of this clay pot called the Presbyterian Church (USA)." Williamson admitted that the Gospel is still proclaimed in many congregations and can still be found in denominational documents. "But what we must say is that there are those occupying positions of controlling authority in this denomination who do not believe that Gospel," he asserted. "Two faiths are now encompassed in this clay pot, and they are irreconcilable." "Ecclesiastical politics will not save this institution," Williamson said. "No Rodney King, 'Can't we all just get along?' theology will save us. No big-tent church. No local-option compromise. No human construct will save us." Williamson referred to the Presbyterian Lay Committee's issuance of a Declaration of Conscience opposing unrestricted contributions to the national church bureaucracy. He said this does not mean leaving the denomination. But it is obvious that the "current organizational structure cannot survive," he concluded. "The disunity that it seeks to encompass (primarily by laying claim to your church property) is soul rending," Williamson said. Ending on a hopeful note, Williamson said reformation often follows a "depressing diagnosis." The church will come back alive through confession, not only among Presbyterians but also among all the troubled mainline denominations. Referring to the confessing movements within the mainline churches, Williamson said, "The power in these movements is not yet political. This is yet to come. But make no mistake about it: Confessing the faith is itself powerful. Ask the Roman Caesars what happened in their realm when people proclaimed the Gospel . Where are those Caesars today?" Mark D. Tooley is research associate and UM Action executive director for the Institute on Religion and Democracy in Washington D.C.

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