 Exchanging
sex  The Presbyterian Layman Volume 34, Number 4, Posted May 30, 2001
Sex remains on the docket – activists have generated almost 30 overtures that revisit the subject – but in churches throughout the denomination, Presbyterian passions for debating this issue have peaked. Many who will travel to the General Assembly meeting in Louisville this June believe that enough has been said about sex. Instead, they want to talk about Jesus and the Great Commission. Church sessions talking about God Church sessions throughout the United States are already talking about Jesus. Inspired by the Confessing Church Movement, these elders and ministers of Presbyterian congregations are turning their attention to Christianity’s core questions: Who is Jesus Christ? From what authority does one discern the will of God? In the light of God’s self revelation, how now shall we live? Much of what currently passes among us as “theology” has no theos in it. Desiring to be relevant, denominational leaders have parroted the voice of culture. With that loss of transcendence, the PCUSA has blurred its vision. ‘The way, the truth, and the life’ Congregations that have rediscovered Jesus are bringing the core of our faith back into focus. That is why the most important thing that the General Assembly can do when it gathers in Louisville this June is to restate the Presbyterian Church (USA)’s commitment to Jesus Christ as “the way, the truth, and the life.” The definite article here is important. He is not a way among many, but the way. And he is not a mere Christ-concept, a blob of spiritual Gnosticism wearing a label called “Christ.” He is the flesh and blood Jesus Christ who lived and died and was raised from the grave, the one to whom Scripture attests. He alone is Lord. The gospel is at stake If commissioners to the 2001 General Assembly reaffirm the Church’s historic faith in Jesus Christ, instructing all agencies of this denomination to teach, preach and publish this faith (and no other), they can go a long way toward restoring the peace and purity of our severely fractured Presbyterian Church (USA). There must not be even the slightest equivocation, not one genuflection toward that syncretism that masquerades under a cloak called “diversity.” At stake here is nothing less than the gospel. Worldly discourse employs the voices of politics, sociology, and psychology. But the Church, which employs a language quite different from that which is spoken by culture, has something to say that no one else can say. It’s called the Word of God. |
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