Session sends
Reformation Day
paper to Santa Barbara Presbytery
Progressives told: Show integrity and leave PCUSA
By John H.
Adams
The Layman
Online
Thursday, November
2, 2006
Issues raised in resolutions
The declaration asks the Presbytery of Santa Barbara to
approve a number of resolutions "Toward Peace, Unity and
Purity," including proposals embracing these points:
- 1. Compliance with the "fidelity/chastity"
requirement in the Constitution is essential.
- 2. No candidate from another presbytery will be considered
for membership if the candidate had been granted an exception to
the ordination requirement.
- 3. Contrary to the recommendations of the attorneys working
with the General Assembly's stated clerk, the presbytery would
work pastorally with any pastor, sessions or congregation that
seeks dismissal from the PCUSA. The presbytery "shall not
preemptively take any coercive action against any pastor,
session or congregation who merely considers faithfully
following the Great Ends of the Church in another Reformed
denomination; and shall not treat property as a basis for unity
or as an opportunity for division. The presbytery interprets
'use and benefit of the Presbyterian Church (USA)' in G-8.0201
to mean … solely whatever furthers the Great Ends of the
Church."
- 4. The presbytery would honoring the protest of every
congregation that withholds per-capita funds from the General
Assembly."
- 5. Request the stated clerk of the General Assembly to "publicly
repudiate the coercive and unconstitutional practices advocated
by his legal counsel regarding actions to be taken in secular or
church courts against pastors, sessions and congregations who
might contemplate or seek dismissal from the Presbyterian Church
(USA).
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Calling on the Presbyterian Church (USA) to "turn from the
naturalistic theology, romanticism, folly and idolatry that have
characterized our church and return to its first love, Jesus Christ,"
the session of a California congregation has crafted a
19-page
theological declaration and resolutions to present to the
Presbytery of Santa Barbara.
The elders of Community Presbyterian Church in Ventura unanimously
approved "A Declaration of Theology and Action" on Oct. 29,
Reformation Sunday.
The document includes strongly worded assertions affirming orthodox
Reformed theology, the singular lordship of Christ, essential tenets and
the authority of Scripture. The assertions include strong criticism –
including some charges of teaching heresy – of theological "progressives,"
General Assembly actions and the General Assembly's stated clerk.
It repudiates the denomination's legal and administrative strategies
designed to coerce ministers and sessions to cease talking about leaving
the PCUSA with their property.
An invitation to leave PCUSA
But it welcomes an exodus by those who reject a traditional
understanding of the Reformed faith. "It is time, in the name of
integrity and honesty, for those who have denied and rejected the
essential tenets of the Reformed faith to graciously separate from the
body and leave the church to those who have remained faithful to its
standards, doctrine and tradition," the declaration says.
The Barmen-like declaration includes a number of resolutions in response
to the declaration's theological affirmations and its repudiation of "heretical"
teachings and doctrine.
After declaring that Scripture, through the work of the Holy Spirit, is
the church's highest authority for truth, the declaration says, "We
hold that the natural theology manifesting in the progressive wing of
the church and defining its theology is radically inconsistent with the
teaching of Scripture and our Reformed tradition."
The document uses extensive quotations from Scripture, the PCUSA's Book
of Order and The Book of Confessions to ground its
assertions.
It makes five theological statements that it describes as "essential
and defining doctrines of the Reformed faith" and declares that the
five "are being annulled by alien principles leveraging for a place
of authority in the PCUSA."
"The anemic and impotent state of the church today is the result of
its confusion over doctrine, its faithlessness, immorality, materialism,
and its subtle replacement of the Gospel of Christ for another gospel
that is nothing more than the romantic hopes of a lost humanity,"
the statement says.
The 'essentials'
- "Jesus is unique, unrivaled and singular in nature, being
and work, the center of God's saving work and the singular goal of
creation." The declaration rejects "the errors of
progressive and revisionist theology that deny the singular saving
work of Christ by proclaiming that Jesus is but one way of salvation
among others of equal validity … We believe that any holding or
teaching such errors have departed from the Reformed faith, are
deceived, and have become promoters of heresy."
- "We believe that Jesus Christ is the One Word of God to
whom we turn, whom alone we obey and trust in life and in death …
We reject the false claims of modern Gnosticism and neo-mysticism
that boasts of secret, personal, innate or inner knowledge that
openly contradicts God's self revelation."
- "We hold that the Scriptures by God's inspiration and the
interpretative work of the Holy Spirit do manifest themselves to be
the Word of God written, and thus wholly sufficient to lead the
church into true wisdom, godliness, reform, obedience and worship of
God … We reject the false doctrine that would raise alongside
or over the Scriptures other authorities, opinions, and voices
intended to transcend, correct, repeal or annul the Word of God. …
"We hold, with the guidance of Calvin, that opinions formed
without the leading of the Word of God are of no account and are
voices without authority or relevance to the Christian life."
- "[T]hat our righteousness before the Triune God is itself a
gift of God through Christ, wholly imparted and thus entirely an act
of grace. … We hold that Christ Jesus is our righteousness, our
justification, our sanctification and this righteousness, extrinsic
to us by nature, is made ours only through the sacrifice of Christ
and the inner work of the Holy Spirit and true faith which is its
fruit and effect. … We reject as false any doctrine or teaching
that holds that persons by their nature bear or possess an
intrinsic, natural, or innate righteousness before God based on
human works, nature, spirituality, or by the fact of their being
created in God's image. We reject as heresy any doctrine that would
hold the human race as essentially righteous, holy, and pleasing
before God apart from the work of salvation in Christ Jesus …"
- "Our knowledge of God is neither noetic nor a postulate of
human reason or discovery but the result of God being among us,
drawing us to himself as his people and redeeming us to be a nation
of priests before him … We reject the populist doctrine that
one can know God without true relationship – making God a
postulate of human knowledge – or that one can have a
relationship with God without knowledge of his revealed will and
work – making God little more than the fabrication of
subjective romanticism or Gnostic mysticism."
The essentials section concludes with a theological assault on the
"unity in diversity" emphasis that has been the springboard
for the denomination's often confusing statements about the saving work
of Christ, the Trinity and the compatibility of Christianity and
non-Christian religions.
"It would be institutional suicide and utter faithlessness before
God to equate forbearance with uncertainty or require tolerance to mean
denial, agnosticism or rejection of truth … To allow and respect
the conscience of a Muslim, a Mormon, or atheist does not mean we agree
with them, hold their doctrine or welcome them as equal members within
the church. …
"Sadly, many in leadership in the church have ignored the clear
mandate of the constitution and refused "to censure or cast out the
erroneous and scandalous. … [I]n losing real unity, we have lost
our witness and are in the process of losing our very existence. At some
point, if we have enough courage, we will need to wrestle with the
question of whether our divided house and hearts have not led us to lose
our God."
In a section on "Faith and Full Participation in Christ Jesus,"
the declaration holds that "faith in Christ and purity of life are
the two, necessary, sides of the one act of Christian discipleship. One
cannot have one without the other." Under that rubric, it strongly
affirms the constitutional ordination requirement of "fidelity to
marital vows between a man and a woman, chastity in singleness."
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