One church in our presbytery has left the denomination and another is threatening to do so. The bitterness, the suspicion, the anger that often accompanies such a divorce (on both sides) can cause one to wonder how the good news of grace can be preached or heard from Sunday to Sunday in the midst of such rancor and discord.
After delivering some lectures at a church this past summer on the fundamentalist-modernist controversy of the early 20th century, someone asked, given the issues over the years of race, ordination of women, divorce, and now the ordination of gays and lesbians, if Presbyterians just liked to fight. It’s hard to answer that with a no.
It seems that we have assumed a mindset of argument and suspicion. At presbytery meetings it’s difficult to look at anyone without wondering where he or she stands, ideologically. Whose side is she on? I wonder how he’s a liberal or a conservative. Our guard is always up. Some have even said that they intend to stay in the denomination – not out of some commitment to the larger church, but so that their side can win.
It seems that we can no longer look at someone as a devoted elder, deacon, minister, or member of the church of Jesus Christ. We have to wonder about what one’s intentions are when a question is asked. What did he or she really mean by that?
Doris Kearns Goodwin did us a wonderful favor by writing her book Team of Rivals which describes Lincoln’s ability to draw into his cabinet the very persons who had opposed his candidacy for president. Lincoln didn’t let their opposition to him stand in the way of seeing the gifts they might bring to his administration. It was also an astute political move to have them inside working for him and not outside working against him.
The choice is whether we will work towards having a big tent in which everyone has a say, but not everyone will get their way, or we will have a small tent in which everyone always agrees. I vote for the big tent in which it is assumed that everyone’s motives are based on a devotion to Jesus Christ and that we are all involved in the common enterprise of laboring in his kingdom. If some feel led to become part of another tradition or organization, they are free to go. But we surely don’t insist that everyone conform to uniformity. We do assume a commitment to Jesus Christ and the themes of the Reformed tradition.
Even though some of us may espouse the big tent view, our tent is becoming smaller. I regret that because grace is getting squeezed out. Pain and bitterness remain. Those who want their side to win remain. It doesn’t have to be that way. It is a sad time when genuine grace and forgiveness no longer have a place. How strange for the church to find itself in that position!
National Geographic photographer Dewitt Jones has said that it doesn’t do much good to walk to preach somewhere if our preaching isn’t in our walking. No one has a corner on the market of righteousness, let alone grace and mercy. All of us stand in need of the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ. The sooner all of us remember that, the sooner all of us remember that our preaching needs to be in our walking, the sooner we might resemble the people God intends us to be. By the way, that last statement is intended as much for me as for anyone.
Jim Currie, Houston, TX (Associate Dean and Director, Austin Seminary’s Houston Extension Program)
