Reading through the Synod Packet

I got my report  last week. It is so disheartening, I hardly know where to begin.

There's a line in the last Batman movie, when Alfred is trying to explain why the Joker is blowing everything up.  "Some men sir, just want to see the  world burn." Judging from the Synod packet, some men just want to see the ARP church burn.  It's hard to see any other motivation. 

Synod and Erskine have always had differences of opinion.  Thirty years ago, when I  was there,  there was a severe difference of opinion over the role of faith in the church.  I once took  a group of students to an orientation where the president said outright that it was not a Christian college. 

Today,  Erskine is very, very different. The President is an inerrantist and the school is much, much better. In fact, we have the most conservative administration the college has had in sixty years.  Outside of a few tenured professors, there are few who would deny the infallibility of the Bible.   That was not the case before. 

Nevertheless,  a couple of years ago a  group of presbyters tried to fire the bulk of the board so they could put their own people, picked not for their qualifications to run a college, but for their party spirit.  Some members of the old board resisted by going to the one source they could--the secular-court.  Instead of lying down and taking their beating from the bullies who picked the fight, they asked the secular courts to intervene.   When they did not lie down submissively enough,  this group who tried to have them removed wailed in mock righteousness that they were insubordinate and deserved to be punished for defending themselves.  When everyone knows that if they lost, they were prepared to do the same thing.   If they did not,  why were they so eager to get lawyers on their side?   Then,  when a concord was reached between Christian gentlemen from both sides who favored peace over strife, this same group pushed harder for division.  When the session  of one man who dared to resist refused to punish him sufficiently, they brought charges against the session. When their presbytery refused, they brought charges against presbytery.  Then they accuse others of not seeking the peace, purity, and prosperity of the church, when they should be on their knees in repentance for doing that very thing!

Now, one of the synod moderator's committee-namely Erskine's--has been deliberately stacked to produce a political outcome.  If you think that untrue, look at the packet for yourself.  Eleven members of the Erskine moderator's committee come from one presbytery, while Florida presbytery has none. Three churches have both a pastor and an elder on the same committee. In thirty years, I have never seen that happen before.  Cross-reference the names and churches of the people who were appointed to the committee with those who have signed the various complaints included in the packet, and you will see a remarkable similarity. 

One of the members of this committee, admitting to this collusion ,  justified this privately by saying,  "The liberals used to do it to us all the time. "  By "all the time," he meant thirty years ago.  Since when are standards of Christian behavior based on how other people behave?  If the old liberals were wrong to do it, why do they do the same thing?

Why continue to push for discipline over a matter that had long since been settled?  Who do they think they are helping?  Do they think that a God of peace and mercy is best served by pushing punitive action over a matter that that no longer matters?

I must question their motives. I do not think this is about Erskine or about the Bible. I think it is about power and control.  Some of them just want to see Erskine burn and know that they set the fire.

If that were all there were,  that would be a bad enough. But that is not all.

This year, Erskine has been seeking to renew their accreditation with ATS and SACS.  Last year, that would not have meant much to me. But this year, I'm working at a school that is also renewing their accreditation. Board autonomy and academic freedom are serious, serious matters to accrediting agencies.   If you haven't seen the thoroughness and pickiness of reaccreditation boards, you probably can't appreciate the seriousness of it.  If the board is not free of undue influence, and does not take a warning from the accrediting agency seriously, they can and will shut it down. This happened a few years ago to Barber-Scotia College in Concord, North Carolina. Overnight, it went from several  hundred students to twenty-five.  Students lost their degrees, their financial aid--everything.  

The writers of the minority report give their word that it won't happen. They also gave their word that they know what is best for the college and denomination, and that they are acting in the school and denomination's best interest.  Do we really want to take their word for it?  I don't.

But wait,  There's more.  There are no less than four disciplinary actions either referred to or calling for our action.   There's a call for action against a member from First Presbytery.  The information we are given ahead of time is a blank sheet.  A blank sheet!    All we know is his name.  Evidently, it was okay to publish his name as a potential malefactor, but not any charges,  leaving the rest of Synod to freely imagine whatever charges they wish   Look at the report of the Ecclesiastical Commission on Judiciary Affairs indicating that we have apparently already lost Pacific Presbytery.  The Ecclesiastical Commission report also refers to another ecclesiastical trial, that was cut short only because one presbyter  recused himself and another quit.  Otherwise, that one would probably be before us, too.

Think about it, those of you who've been around Synod many times.  How many trials have you seen on the floor of Synod?  At this rate, we'll soon have more ecclesiastical trials than Salem, Massachusetts.  

I have been told by some of these men that they are acting in defense of the Bible and the Reformed faith. But they use the Bible the way an ape uses a computer--to bang people over the head with it, without any regard for what is in it. 

Ask yourself this,  how does any of this relate to the Great Commission or the Great Commandment? Does it help or hurt making disciples? Does it unify or divide the church? Does it cause us to love God and our brothers more or less?   How can they be squared with the vow to seek the peace, purity, and prosperity of the church? Does it bring peace? Does it bring purity? Does it bring prosperity? 

Some men just like to see the world burn, all right, and apparently the Synod, too.  I cannot conceive of any reason all this could be done, unless it were to see our church divide and fall--strip off Erskine,  keep the presbyteries in turmoil, and threaten with tribunals any who get in  the way. 

I do not like church fights.  I would rather see us praying and repenting together,  seeking God's will for why we haven't fulfilled either the Great Commission or Great Commandment.    But sometimes we just need to say the truth.  Either we treat our own behavior as seriously as we treat other people's doctrinal errors, or we cease to be a practicing Christian denomination.

 NOTE:  If you read this, and want to know more,  please click here.   And also here