Synod-Day Two

I had to leave Synod early this year--Joy has been sick. By "early" I mean suppertime. The synod was still going on when I left. Now I understand that it was stopped for lack of a quorum.


I feel bad about that, but not too much. Getting home to my wife when she is sick was more important at that time Besides, like about two hundred other people. I was not prepared to spend another night in the mountains.

The ignoble end of the Synod is indicative of a problem we often have in the church. I don't mean the lack of dedication. I mean the lack of sensitivity to others feelings. We need to repent of this before we preach at others.

Christianity is a religion of grace. But too often we think we can do the work of Christ by scolding others. We resort to shame when we fail to love.

I saw that lived out as Synod this day. The Erskine board, in an act of reconciliation, agreed in advance to avoid a meeting which threatened to break our ties. It was abundantly clear that they wanted to continue to be ARP. But others in the Synod wanted to force them to rebuke people they thought had offended them, and to do it on the basis of their interpretation of I Corinthians 6. There was no need for this. The discussion added hours to the meeting. Then there was an attempt to replace one slate of board nominees for another. That added more hours. At every turn the spirit of reconciliation was thwarted by people who seem to have no regard for the peace and prosperity of the church. I do not fault the moderator or any of the officers for this. It was simply that we had no regard for the feelings and needs of others.

I did not rise to speak at Synod, but I was prepared to. I wanted to point out the survey that is available on a website called erskineforeveryone.com. The faculty portion of the survey was included in the moderator's committee report, incredibly scrubbed of all results. The survey showed that more than eighty-five percent of the students did not agree that there was any culture of intimidation on the campus. Among those who did thing there was such a culture, more than two thirds believed that it was Synod and ARP students who were doing most of the intimidating. Among the faculty, only one professor who answered the question expressed any agreement with the actions of Synod and the commission. Common sense would suggest that any attempt to roughly impose change from the outside would be greeted with serious resistance.

One commentator on the Erskine situation had the temerity to call the Erskine community a "mutinous den of thieves." This is slander of the worst sort, of course . But one thing is probably true they might have a mutiny on their hands. At least, when Captain Bligh was thrown off the Bounty, a third of the men wanted to go with him. We would be hard pressed to find a sixth of the Erskine community who are not offended by the heavy-handed treatment of Synod representatives.

I agree that Erskine needs to become more evangelical. For thirty years I have wanted to see the school better integrate faith and learning. But It seem to me that the actions of those who have made it their mission to change Erskine are clumsy at best and cruel and insensitive at worst. Like an abusive father, they get upset when the ones they beat up on are not content to sit down and take it.

I know the men on that commission, as well as those who have driven them are sincere, Godly men. They are highly intelligent and sincerely convinced that their course is right. But the same thing can be said for the captain of the Titanic. When we ignore the feelings of those we lead, we court disaster. And disaster is what we get.

I believe the quorum crisis at the end of Synod is a similar issue. When people's needs are ignored, they tend to get up and walk out. When we stretch a meeting beyond what most people are prepared to do, they tend to set their own priorities. This is not lack of faith, or laziness, or unfaithfulness. This is the simple fact of life that we must all choose priorities, according to our own conscience. I am sorry I had to leave, but I would do it again. Next time, we can be prepared to stay, but not to listen to other people's pointless and uncivil bloviations.

We need an outpouring of the Spirit in our denomination. But it won't come just from asking God from it. It will not come until we are all willing to admit our own personal sins. We have to clean house, starting with ourselves. Until we can truthfully say that we've done all we can to obey the Great Commandment to love God and to love our neighbor, especially our fellow believers, revival will not come.

My college, Asbury experienced just such a revival in 1970. That revival which started at that Christian College spread over the entire country and is still being felt today. I came there the following year. I talked to the people at the center of that revival, and I know what they told me. It came when they admitted to their wrongs. Professors confessed not loving their students. Students confessed cheatig. Administrators confessed to financial irregularities. All confessed that they had neglected God's call oh their lives. It was these individual acts of repentance, more than the big meetings that drove that revival.

If we are ever to see Erskine and the ARP Church revived, it will come hot only by prayer but by repentance. We must stop abusing one another. "If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and forgive their sins and heal their land." II Chronicles 7: 14.