I am an individual who is ready to get the issues out on the table, face to face, and talk them through in the hope that the Holy Spirit will sweep through as in Acts 15, and offer a common direction for all.”
For as long as the church has existed, there have been differences of opinion among the Body threatening to cause a schism. The pattern is first seen in the New Testament church’s divide over the need for Gentiles to become Jewish followers of the Law before being baptized as Christians. Salvation through the law or through grace alone was the issue of the day, and Acts 15 describes the conflict as one that threatened the existence of the fledgling church. In response, Christian leaders gathered in Jerusalem and held heated debates around the issue. Through long and certainly exhausting discussions, the Holy Spirit was able to bring about a consensus in the Body and a split was avoided.
Having been in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) for a number of years, I have been dismayed at our inability to gather together and follow such a model in dealing with our own conflicts.
My first time at the General Assembly I was a Theological Student Advisory Delegate from Columbia Theological Seminary during the 213th General Assembly in Louisville. I remember my shock at arriving in Louisville and the immediate rush of information from different groups seeking to influence my vote. Nobody wanted to sit and discuss the issues in depth, but rather simply secure my vote and then move on to the next delegate. As an “evangelical” Christian, I quickly gravitated to those interest groups who thought like me. Others did the same and the strategies on both sides became quite intricate as we planned for debates and votes with military precision. I kept thinking that surely this could not be the best the church has to offer in terms of resolving the issues it faces. Certainly it cannot be all about strategizing, voting, winners, losers, and waiting for the next GA when it all starts again. Where is the prayer? The repentance? The authentic conversation and honest dialogue between the different groups that could help move us past the pattern of annual voting in which we are mired?
This past summer I returned to the GA .The patterns of interest groups separating, strategizing, and breathlessly waiting for the voting results were the same. Although many people across the theological spectrum shared my frustrations with the process, nobody seemed to be talking about alternatives.
One afternoon I went to coffee with Pen Peery, a friend from Columbia Seminary. Our plan was to catch up since it had been a year after our seminary graduation, but frustrations with the Assembly boiled over and we started talking about our positions on the issues, and why we held them. Pen and I have very different views on the future God desires for the Presbyterian Church, but we listened and talked openly, and our meeting turned into one of the most informative and positive afternoons I had in Richmond. We both felt invigorated by honest conversation that was conducted behind a backdrop of love and mutual respect. We left the coffee shop convinced this process should not stop, but rather continue and expand to include other young leaders who sought to speak in authentic ways about the divisions in our church.
And so we prepare to gather for the first time with no false pretenses about our abilities to solve the problems that plague our denomination, but rather with the hope that meeting, talking, and worshipping together in intentional ways will help us to invite the transforming power of the Holy Spirit into our midst. I am newly ordained yet already pessimistic about the future of this denomination. I am 30 years old and already tired by the same old arguments and voting trends. I am a Presbyterian who is ashamed that outsiders best know our denomination because of intense bickering rather than our proclamation of the gospel. I am an individual who is ready to get the issues out on the table, face to face, and talk them through in the hope that the Holy Spirit will sweep through as in Acts 15, and offer a common direction for all.
THOMAS DANIEL is associate pastor for young adult ministries at North Avenue Church, Atlanta, Ga.
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