In my more sarcastic moments I’ve thought of these biennial Eastertides as “ … the spring of the year, the time when [Presbyterians] go out to battle … ” (2 Samuel 11:1). In my more “it’s a God-thing” moments I recognize it to be the season for the Presbyterians to go out to learn. And to discern. And to strategize. And to galvanize. And to do so constructively.
In reality the ball started rolling when the 217th General Assembly, meeting in Birmingham, Ala., adjourned on June 22, 2006. The decisions made there led to many actions taking place throughout the church. In the national office, the staff was restructured and Middle Eastern peacemaking was attenuated. Presbyteries organized theological reflection groups, retooled the way they examine ministerial candidates and, in some locations, engaged disaffected congregations’ efforts to transfer to another denomination. Sessions studied to assess just what those actions of that GA really mean.
Through these past two years, scores of those sessions, presbyteries, and synods have formulated overtures to introduce business to this next Assembly. Designated groups like the New Form of Government task force, the Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy, the Stated Clerk Search Committee, and the Department of Ecumenical and Agency Relations have dug through piles of assignments to prepare proposals to come before this national meeting.
Now we all get down to the business of testing those proposals, seeking understanding, assessing candidates, and listening with our God-made ears to hear God’s voice in all of this.
Life would be much simpler if we didn’t need to hold meetings such as General Assemblies. Published reports of our deliberations can embarrass us. Non-denominational, i.e., disconnectional, churches don’t have to explain to their people why eccentric things are being said on their behalf which, no doubt, is one growth advantage those churches have over us. But, we do this for the best reason: We want to discern God’s will as it applies to the big issues of our day. We want to obey God’s will and be faithful to God’s intentions — and we want to do that together, connected with the larger body of Christ.
But isn’t that will already clear? Why do we need to meet so often to discern the will of God for us?
When the Apostle John wrote the book of Revelation, the churches there already had in hand the Hebrew Scriptures, the writings of countless rabbis, and most, if not all, of the epistles and gospels. What more did they need? Well one thing they needed was to hear what the Spirit was saying to the churches then and there. So, before unveiling his apocalyptic visions, John first spoke seven specific words to seven specific churches. Each time he concludes with the words, “Let anyone who has an ear listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches.”
For the past 500 years, when we in the Presbyterian and Reformed church community have opened the Scriptures to seek to know God’s Word to guide us, we have sought the Spirit’s illumination. Lacking the magisterial authority of a writing apostle, we have followed the other New Testament model of discernment — the Jerusalem Council (see Acts. 15) — by gathering to pray, to worship, to study, and to deliberate. Whether by forming and amending motions or by seeking consensus, we have listened for the voices of the prophets, we have sought experts’ opinions, we have deliberated, and we have taken action. Most such discernment processes have produced good fruit.
But those processes don’t begin when the commissioners and advisory delegates arrive in San Jose. The discernment for this General Assembly began on June 22, 2006. As the next GA approaches, our hope to be faithful to the mission of God requires us all to study, to pray, to listen, to deliberate, and to discern the will of God to be lived through us and beyond us into the creation. Through the next two months, The Presbyterian Outlook will provide many analyses and guest commentaries to help you engage in that discernment process.
Let the games, er uh, discernment begin.
— JHH
