Richard Phillips has weighed in on the “Meeting of Understanding” on byFaith’s web site. In his article, he goes beyond critiquing the meeting and offers several positive steps that we can take to preserve the unity of the PCA. Here are his five suggestions in light of the “Meeting of Understanding”: Remembering that the shepherds [...]
Archive for January 2012
Richard Phillips’ Advice for PCA Unity
Tuesday, January 31, 2012Peace
Tuesday, January 31, 2012If we may not say “Peace at any price,” yet we may certainly cry “Peace at the highest price.” Those who are daily fluttered by rude alarms are charmed to reach their nest in a holy fellowship, and abide in it. In a church one of the main ingredients of success is internal peace: strife, [...]
Happy for the Throne of Judgment
Monday, January 30, 2012“To a true saint the throne is never more amiable than in its judicial capacity; righteous men love judgment, and are glad that right will be rewarded and iniquity will be punished. To see God reigning in the Son of David and evermore avenging the just cause is a thing which is good for weeping [...]
Northern New England sends licensure overture to GA
Monday, January 30, 2012Northern New England Presbytery has concurred with Western Carolina Presbytery in sending an overture to amend BCO 19-2. Candidates for ordination must now state their differences with the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms, and the Court must rule whether the differences are hostile to the system or strike at the vitals of religion at [...]
The Freedom and Responsibility of the New Media
Saturday, January 28, 2012The new media has opened up possibilities for reporting on public events that would have been ignored by the old media. The old media, for example, would have been completely uninterested in most PCA Presbytery meetings. The wide availability and inexpensive nature of the new media make it possible to instantly publicize things that are [...]
The PCA Rocky Mountain Presbytery approves overture on historicity of Adam
Thursday, January 26, 2012The Aquila Report has reported the following breaking news: The PCA Rocky Mountain Presbytery, meeting in Ft. Collins, Colo. on January 26, approved sending an overture to the General Assembly asking that it reaffirm its confessional position on the existence and historicity of Adam. The overture entitled, “Declaration Rejecting All Evolutionary Views of Adam’s Origin,” [...]
Turretin on Reward and Merit From a Sermon on Hebrews 11:24–26
Thursday, January 26, 2012You can find the original sermon here, printed in 1686. He is responding to the objection that the term “reward” in Heb. 11:26 implies merit. * * * * * On this point, before we finish, we must answer two scruples that can come from these words. The first is whether it is permitted to [...]
The New Proposed Funding Plan
Tuesday, January 24, 2012The Administrative Committee of the PCA has released a summary of the new proposed CMC funding plan to the public on ByFaith. Here it is: There are six components to the proposed plan: (1) that the AC increase development work, (2) charge fees for specified services and publications, (3) receive contributions from other PCA committees [...]
Dr. Roy Taylor Explains the “Meeting of Understanding”
Tuesday, January 24, 2012Dr. Roy Taylor, Stated Clerk of the PCA, has given a further explanation of the basis and results of the “Meeting of Understanding.” He notes that the need for such meetings has become all the more acute: The world has changed since 1973. The PCA of today is not the PCA of 1973. We are [...]
ECO: The New Presbyterian Denomination
Tuesday, January 24, 2012On January 18–20, 500 congregations from the mainline PCUSA covenanted together to form a new denomination called the “Evangelical Covenant Order.” One conference goer said to Don Sweeting, President of RTS Orlando, said to me, “they’ve adopted a curiously unmissional name with an extremely trendy acronym.” Sweeting has a report on the meeting on his [...]
Think ANE Myth Is the Proper Genre for Genesis?
Monday, January 23, 2012John J. Yeo, Assistant Professor of Old Testament at RTS Atlanta, argues forcefully that this is not the case. He writes: In reality, Enns’s view of Genesis 1 is closer to the liberal understanding of biblical narrative as “historicized fiction.” In the final analysis, what is driving Enns’s denial of the historicity and literality of [...]
GA Overture seeks to keep clear boundaries
Sunday, January 22, 2012In the spirit of wanting to preserve a clear boundary between what is an acceptable exception and one that strikes at the vitals of the religion or is hostile to the system, Great Lakes Presbytery has proposed a change to the Rules of Assembly Operation. TE Sarafolean explains on his web site: In recent years [...]
What Is the Cause of “Simmering Tensions” in the PCA?
Saturday, January 21, 2012Don Clements has some comments about the recent “Meeting of Understanding.” Clearly, this man has his pulse on the issues within the PCA. I wish he had been invited. Read it here.
On Not Being More Strict Than God on the Sabbath
Saturday, January 21, 2012Though I admit that being overly strict on the Sabbath is hardly the major problem of our day, we do well to heed this advice from Matthew Henry (from his comments on John 9) as we consider how to apply God’s law to this and every other area: [Jesus] did not keep the sabbath according [...]
Comments on “A Meeting of Understanding”
Friday, January 20, 2012Yesterday, byFaith reported on an invitation-only “Meeting of Understanding” under the auspices of the Stated Clerk of the PCA. There were numerous reactions pro and con to the report. While some questioned the accuracy of byFaith’s report, there were more comments on byFaith Online than I have seen on any other article on the site. [...]
PCA “Meeting of Understanding” held in Atlanta
Thursday, January 19, 2012ByFaith is reporting that a meeting called by Dr. Roy Taylor and other “denomninational leaders” met this past Tuesday in order to “discuss charitably and forthrightly the cause for conflicts in the PCA that hamper our ministry and unity.” The meeting was held under Chatham House rules, which means that you can mention what was [...]
The Reformed View of Justification
Wednesday, January 18, 2012This is an excellent statement of the Reformed doctrine of justification by John Girardeau from his book Calvinism and Evangelical Arminianism. All emphases are mine. The Calvinistic doctrine may be stated under three heads: first, the Ground of justification; secondly, its Constituent Elements, or Nature; thirdly, its human Condition or Instrument. The Ground of Justification [...]
Great Lakes overtures GA to send all proposed constitutional changes to the Overtures Committee
Tuesday, January 17, 2012The PCA allows all Teaching Elders and at least two Ruling elders per church to attend the General Assembly. Consequently, there are generally over a thousand commissioners at General Assembly, which is not as conducive to deliberation. In addition, TEs outnumber REs 3 to 1 or even 4 to 1. The last strategic planning process [...]
Westminster Presbytery overtures 40th GA to change rules on the Cooperative Ministries Committee
Saturday, January 14, 2012Today, Westminster Presbytery held its 200th Stated Meeting at Eastern Heights Presbyterian Church in Bristol, Tennessee. RE Kerry Belcher was Moderator at this meeting, and he is the son of RE Klynard Belcher, who was Moderator of the 1st Stated Meeting. Several original members of the Presbytery stood up at this meeting and made comments [...]
Jesus Loves Religion
Saturday, January 14, 2012Update: Apparently, Jeff Bethke has responded to Kevin DeYoung’s critique. You can read it here. Bethke states, “For the first few years of walking with Jesus (started in ’08) I had a warped/poor paradigm of the church and it didn’t build up, unify, or glorify His wife (the Bride).” If this is the case, then [...]