confirmed in a congregation that fully supported more than a dozen full-time Presbyterian missionary couples all over the world. In my later years, I served a congregation that had initiated a major mission program to build up and support a mission hospital in Zambia, and I have made a number of mission trips there, as well as one to Haiti.
I have many fond recollections of Presbyterian participation over the years, from early Sunday School, where children really learned the content of the Bible, to summer camps where we learned that there were indeed a wide variety of Presbyterian young people from all over who were well worth becoming acquainted with. In short, I have a great respect for the Presbyterian Church, and for what it has done for me, over the years, as well as a deep appreciation for the many opportunities it has provided me to serve my Lord Jesus. It was a great church, and I love it dearly.
What made the Presbyterian Church, north and south, great, in my estimation was that it stood for some very important things, and it stood for them with competence and with vigor. In no particular order, we Presbyterians stood for: (1) respectful worship that was more about God than about us; (2) the education of children, youth, and adults in the knowledge of the content of Scripture, and the knowledge and value of our theological heritage; (3) service in the community and mission into the world, in the name of Jesus, and for the sake of His Kingdom; (4) competence in our daily work, whatever it was; (5) leadership in our communities, and (6) generosity with the resources that the Lord had put into our hands. I am sure that many who read this will be able to add to my list. Presbyterians made a difference, and if we were proud about that, it was a pride colored by humility. We acknowledged that the Spirit of God was working through us rather than that we were such great and wonderful people.
But that was then and this is now. We have been going in the wrong direction for a long time, especially the past thirty years or so, and that it is the primary business of our soon-to-be elected new leadership to change direction before we finally crash on the rocks (yes, I know that there are many who say that we have already crashed, but I am not there — yet).
Frankly, those capabilities and accomplishments that were so much of our past are gifts from the Lord that never go out of date. Our church would be blessed if we sought to recover them in today’s world, and in the face of today’s challenges. But we have not been particularly blessed in these recent years, and that is our own fault. What happened? We faced up to a variety of real social issues, challenges and problems that needed to be addressed in our society, and we made those the focus of the Presbyterian Church, instead of merely part of the work of the church. To make this worse, we often came up with the wrong answers, in many cases. So, in recent years, the major issues within the higher levels of the denomination have mostly focused on how the Presbyterians shall address social issues, and on who decides. Our top leadership has chosen to take positions, and then claim to the world that we Presbyterians know better than anybody else what the nation and the world should do about all of their problems. To put it bluntly, we have chosen to mind the problems of others while our own structure, and the necessary trust that is required in order to make it work, have disintegrated.
So now, we have come to realize that trust barely, if at all, exists anywhere in the church; to fix it we are busy designing a revised Book of Order that will require us all to trust each other. Bound to fail. Our denomination staked out positions and solutions that did not reflect the will of the vast majority of the denomination. When folks protested, by cutting their giving, or worse, by seeking ways to leave the denomination and taking their congregations with them, we instituted policies to take everybody to court, in order to show that the denomination still has power, and that disobedience is not acceptable. Currently, this tactic is failing big-time. Membership is crashing, congregations are leaving, whether the folks in Louisville like it or not, and financial support has weakened. And it seems that just about everybody is mad and hardly anybody trusts anybody. The recent PUP report was a tragedy of the first rank, if for no other reason than that it was a devious attempt to by-pass constitutional procedure, and (as we now know) it was intended in its very essence to achieve by devious means what the denomination had clearly rejected on several occasions. It has now failed. If we were a business, we would have been in receivership by now!
We are a denomination in crisis, and in the midst of this crisis, we are electing some new leadership. You two men (at least, as of this writing, it is only men in the running, so far as I know) are going to have to carry the load, and while there are surely lots of folks to help you (maybe far more than you will want), you two are the ones who will be in the spotlight. Our beloved denomination is desperate for leadership that we can trust, that we can quickly come to respect, even like, and that will help us get back on track.
Here is what I would like to see, and what I would support, even with increased financial giving.
First, say to the church that your primary focus and attention will be given over to restoring what has made the Presbyterian Church such an important witness in our nation and across the world in the past (the things that I mention above), and be specific. Please focus on Reformed theology, which is a primary underpinning of our history, but also of our life together. Focus on Christian Education and Youth work, including college ministry. Work to improve the quality of teaching of preaching in our seminaries (the horror stories that I have heard from pastor nominating committees about the quality of preaching that they have heard are legion). Change the public face of our denomination from one that is always speaking to the world what leadership thinks we should be saying, to one of speaking to the church, that is, to our congregations and members. Lead us, but don’t try to drive us. Presbyteries and synods do not need strengthening, but congregations do. The cutting edge of ministry to the world, and where God is worshipped, is in the congregations. Move quickly away from the warfare over retaining congregations, if they desperately want to (or have to) depart. As a denomination, we have made so many blunders that this is one of the unfortunate results. Face it and get over it. Yes, we are going to experience some losses here, and I think that this is sad, but we have brought it on ourselves.
Change the direction of the denomination in the matter of the warfare over sex. For the past thirty or so years, it has been this one issue that is the one most killing us. No, we are not all going to agree about premarital sex, abortion, and homosexuality. If we don’t want to end up with two denominations, ultimately, divided on this issue alone, our leadership must face the reality that our society as well as our church is awash in misused, misplaced, and misunderstood sexuality, and as a denomination we have been moving to the dark side of “anything goes”, with the tacit approval and support of our leadership that will shortly be departing the scene. General Assemblies have frequently attempted to dial back the structure, with respect to abortion, curriculum, and homosexuality, but the leadership and structure has mostly ignored the corrections. If you fail to get the denominational structure in line, if you fail to turn the denomination around on this one issue alone, all of your other efforts, no matter how well intended and directed, are bound to fail, and our beloved denomination will continue its present direction into near-total destruction. For the first time in many years, show some respect, in word and deed, for the conservative and Evangelical side of the church.
Let me be clear about one thing. Even today, in the midst of all of the chaos that we have in our denomination, due in great part (I believe) to misdirected leadership, we have many vibrant, vital, useful, and beautiful congregations, who study Scripture, who worship God with beauty and fidelity, who participate in a kaleidoscope of mission work and ministry, and who are credits to their communities, their heritage, and to their members. The Spirit is not dead in our congregations. But the Presbyterian structure above congregational level has been so misguided, so lost, so willing to hornswoggle membership, so focused on its own aims and goals and its cultural desires, it has lost sight of its tasks and responsibilities. Dare I say that it has lost its soul?
I am hoping against hope that the two of you will set out to turn us around, and the sooner the better. My hopes go with you, and I will be praying for you.
