Ministerial Discipline Doesn't Work Either

The Death of Iain Campbell

 and 

Presbyterian Discipline*

The news I read this morning at The Aquila Report regarding the death of Iain Campbell and the scandalous accusations made by his wife following his death, raised a question for me. What if the accusations are true, had been made known to his Presbytery and denomination, and he had been dealt with by Presbyterian disciplinary process - what would have happened to him? I don't know, because I do not know the Free Church of Scotland that well.

But it also set me thinking again, as I often have, about the way discipline of ministers was handled in my former connection. And it impresses me that it was handled in the way a particular kind of father might deal with his son. The son took the family car out on a Friday night without permission. The father becomes aware of what the son did because (1) the son confessed it, (2) someone who witnessed the son with the family car told the father, or (3) the father himself discovered it. 

What does this particular type of father do? (1) He takes away the son's keys and intends to return them (a) never or (b) after observing his son's repentance for a long time. (2) He beats the hell out of the son. (3) He requires the son to confess his disobedience and avow his repentance at a council of the whole family.

Now the father may cry. He may even cry with the leaders of his church. He may pour out his heart to God about how he has gone wrong in the bringing up of his son. He may ask others to pray for him and his son. He may tell his son he loves him and that his heart is broken. Still, he takes the keys away forever or an indeterminate time. Still he beats the hell out of the kid. Still he requires the son to humiliate himself before his family.

I have seen this scenario play out too often in church settings for it to be hyperbolic. Rather it is parabolic. 

This system works very efficiently, and, often, very swiftly with regard to erring ministers. I have heard the bewailing, I have seen the tears, I have witnessed the protestations of love and mercy. But is it still the belt - in fact I have heard - and it angers me every time a think about it - a man say he would like a spank a younger man caught in a sin. It is surgery with an ax not a scalpel. It is addressed not like an infection to be treated but like a cancer to be cut out. It's goal is not healing but excision. It is not a pastoral system but a judicial system.

And it is very different from the way many churches in the same communion deal with members of the local churches. At the local church level discipline is too messy and too likely to cause embarrassment to congregations who don't want to be embarrassed.

Not too long ago I asked my Bishop how he would have dealt with a recent case that led immediately to suspension from the means of grace and divestiture from office. He told me he would have suspended the individual from ministerial functions for several months and then seen what happened. Pastoral not judicial. I presented a case in a congregation where it could be reasonably argued that the person should be cut off from the Sacrament. I asked for the counsel of the Bishop. And he confirmed what had been my instinct. Do not cut off from the grace of the Holy Supper. Pastoral not judicial. 

I say all this from the knowledge there was a time in years past when I might have joined in the clamor for the ax to be brought out. I was wrong.

*This Blog is based a number of cases I personally witnessed or was a part of in more than one regional judicatory of my former connection. In one case, because of the lack of mercy shown, I resigned my membership on a committee assigned to deal with a fellow minister's failure. This was well before the more egregious cases I have in mind. The system is designed to deal with behavior in a judicial (rigid) manner, but lacks the ability to be pastoral - to take into account personal, medical, and psychological issues. In cases of serious failure, it's goal is seldom restoration. Infrequently do members of these bodies relate to the fallen minister deal with him as colleague/friend after the body has carried out its discipline. 

  

The Regulative Principle Doesn't Work

And There's Your Problem

A Low Church Episcopal Church

Nick Batzig, editor of Reformation 21, writes: 

I was baptized in the Reformed Episcopal church, spent time in Reformed Presbyterian Churches (mainly PCA and OPC) as a boy, was extremely rebellious and and dechurched for over a decade, came to Christ in repentance and faith in my 20's and now pastor a moderately liturgical Reformed Presbyterian (PCA) church. I am Reformed because of biblical convictions about soteriology and committed to Presbyterianism out of biblical convictions about ecclesiology. My own experience has fueled my interest as I have seen others make dramatic shifts in their ecclesiastical affiliation over the years. The tensions that have recently arisen on account of the debate surrounding the use of the Liturgical Calendar have me once again revisiting this subject.

Mr. Batzig is a graduate of Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, interned at Tenth Presbyterian Church (pulpit of James Montgomery Boice among others), and is a now a church planter in Richmond Hill, GA. And, as it turns out, he is a big fan of Jonathan Edwards. Nick is very concerned about the slippery slope on which he sees among some evangelicals, including Presbyterians, slipping toward Anglicanism, Episcopalianism, Anglo-catholicism, and ultimately Roman Catholicism. One of his main concerns is that these churches and their liturgical practices are not compatible with - wait for this - Calvinistic experientialialism (read "Edwards-experimentalism").  

Nick Batzig

But my interest here is not with Nick's history, experience, or theology, but with his liturgical practice. He writes: "(I) now pastor a moderately liturgical Reformed Presbyterian (PCA) church." And there is the problem. As a pastor, Nick does what he thinks best when it comes to the practice of worship, and it is "moderately liturgical." Within the PCA that is the norm. Pastors, in consultation with their staffs and local congregational elders, do what they think best. If you visit churches in the PCA you never know what you are going to get. You can get churches that borrow heavily from the Book of Common Prayer (much of it incorporated into the old Presbyterian Book of Common Worship which was the liturgical standard taught in worship courses when I was a student at RTS-Jackson), Terry Johnson worship, Tim Keller worship, James Ward worship, Bill Hill (PEF) worship, and the list of personalities goes on. In the Jackson, MS, area you can visit a number of churches and get a different worship experience in each - First Presbyterian Church, Pear Orchard Presbyterian Church, Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Madison Heights Presbyterian Church, and more. Across the PCA you can find strict regulative principle worship (few), traditional worship, contemporary worship, black worship, near charismatic worship, blues worship, revivalistic worship complete with the invitation system, gospel-driven worship, and all sorts of blended worship. You can find ministers leading worship in black Geneva gowns, suits with white shirts and ties, blazers and open collar shirts, polo shirts and sandals, khakis or jeans and sports shirts tucked in or out standing behind pulpits, sitting on stools, walking across and an empty stage. You can find pulpits, baptismal fonts, and communion tables prominently displayed, or entirely hidden. You can sing Psalms and historic hymns, gospel hymns, praise and worship songs, accompanied by nothing, organs, pianos, orchestras, acoustic guitars, and rock bands. Depending on your worship principles, preferences, and personality, you can find the worship in a PCA church comfortable, compatible, challenging, relevant, irrelevant, or offensive.

There is a phrase I find that describes worship in the PCA: liturgical chaos. This is in a church which in its Confession of Faith, to which all officers vow allegiance, says: 

But the acceptable way of worshiping the true God is instituted by himself, and so limited by his own revealed will, that he may not be worshiped according to the imaginations and devices of men, or the suggestions of Satan, under any visible representation, or any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scripture.

This is in a church whose roots are in the Westminster Assembly which produced a Directory for Worship which was binding. This is in a church which with regard to its own Directory of Worship declared all but a couple of chapters non-binding. If all the worship practices one can find among the PCA churches are consistent with the "regulative principle" stated in the paragraph of the Westminster Confession quoted above, then that paragraph is absolutely meaningless. In the PCA it is the days of the Judges - no directory for worship as king, every man doing what is right in his own eyes.

At one General Assembly I attended during my Presbyterian days, on Sunday night there was a worship service in which there was liturgical dance (mercifully I was spared since I did not get there till Monday). Inevitably some TR offered a resolution condemning the practice. In arguing against the adoption of the motion the Stated Clerk of the General Assembly argued that Presbyterians do not have prescribed worship but directed worship, so the worship service should not be condemned. The question that rose in my mind was, "Directed by what?" The only plausible answer is, "Nothing."

Tomorrow I will be walking on a slippery slope. I know what is going to happen when I go to church. We are going to celebrate Holy Communion according to the Book of Common Prayer and its rubrics. We will read the Epistle and Gospel prescribed for the first Sunday in Lent. We will read a Psalm and an Old Testament Lesson chosen from a list of those appropriate for this day. Ministers will lead the service, preach the sermon, administer the Sacrament, but there will be much congregational participation throughout the service in hymns, prayers, responses, and reading of Holy Scripture.

The title of Nick Batzig's Blog at Reformation 21 is "The Ecclesiastical Pendulum Swing," I wonder if, given his history, Nick has had his last swing?

31 Truths to Doubt

They Ain't Necessarily So

Some accepted truths there are reasons to doubt (in no particular order). There are things here to irritate almost everyone, and one on which all will agree:

1. You voted for Trump because you are a Christian.

2. You oppose Trump because you are a Christian.

3. Only a woman can understand and can minister to the deepest needs of women.

4. There is only one person in the world who's right for you, so look hard and be sure.

5. Couples should have a weekly date night.

6. Christians who believe in an old universe have capitulated to unbelieving science.

7. Only black people understand the black experience and white privilege, so only black people can speak about issues in the black community.

8. Churches can be relevant only if they do practical ministries that meet people's perceived needs (how to parent, how to handle money, exercising with Christian music, creating enterprise zones), etc.

9. The church must have a prophetic voice by speaking to social and political issues of the day.

10. Anglicanism is or should be a halfway house between Rome and Protestantism.

11. Spiritual ministers preach long sermons and spiritual congregations demand them.

10. Frequent celebration of the Lord’s Supper makes it less meaningful.

11. "Blessed Assurance" is a true and glorious expression of Christian experience.

12. Tim Bayly is a great defender of Christianity without compromise.

13. If you want your children to be godly spank them early and often.

14. Home school your kids so they will not be socialized by peers from other families in either the public or the Christian school.

15. Anything that looks or feels Roman Catholic is.

16. Christians should speak to and instruct the government on its duties from the Bible.

17. An education in any Christian school, including the most rigid fundamentalist ones, is always better than education in any public schools.

18. Questioning the perspective of black evangelicals on matters of race, society, politics, and church betrays a latent or crypto racism.

19. It is un-Christian to believe in providing health care through a single payer system.

20. It is un-Christian to believe in providing health care through the free market.

21. Christians should study the Bibles to form their political views and vote accordingly.

22. Vaccinations are bad for you and your kids and are a conspiracy involving big-pharma, medical professionals, and government

23. Organic foods are better for your health.

24. Churches should provide gluten and wine free Communion.

25. Whatever is natural is best.

26. "Saved" ("life now is sweet and my joy is complete") tells the truth about post-conversion experience.

27. Anglicans should look at the English Reformation as an unfortunate and overwrought historical turn and return to the catholic (with no pope) doctrine and worship of the pre-39 Articles English Church.

28. Traffic law enforcement is all about public safety.

29. Betsy DeVos is qualified to be Secretary of Education because she is a Christian and believes in charter schools.

30. Betsy DeVos bought her position with contributions to politicians and is totally unqualified to be Secretary of Education.

31. Bill Smith is always right.